2019 US Open, 1st Round, Serena Decimates Maria Sharapova

August 27, 2019,

Our friend Carina walked into the post office in a different neighborhood to have mail sent certified. To her surprise, the Postal Worker who served her was someone that she had seen for years in the neighborhood where she worked for almost 20 years. The employee looked good and the only real sign of aging is that her hair had turned completely gray.

She and Carina had a brief and pleasant conversation, recognizing one another and the employee smiled and expressed to her it was probably the last time that she would see her because she was retiring. The way that she said it, Carina gleaned that she had financially planned well and much of retirement would be spent socializing with family and friends at nice restaurants, creating more memories.

What really sunk into Carina was the power and sadness of the passing of time.

It waits for no one. Including her.

How does the passing of time affect many? Probably with a measure of sadness because even if things have gone incredibly well, there is still a realization that you are approaching the ultimate life retirement.

It was sad to watch Maria Sharapova walk onto the court in the first round of the greatest tennis tournament of the year to face a goliath in Serena Williams who had defeated her 18 times in a row with the very strong possibility that the 19^th victory would come tonight.

How lopsided have their recent battles been?

Maria has only won one set in the last 10 years.

As she quietly warmed up, it is easy to admire the resolved spirit from the regal Russian. If you didn’t pull for her in her younger years when she seemed have everything going for her; statuesque beauty, youth, bundles of green from lucrative endorsements, celebrity, global travel at the elite levels and an incredible champion on the tennis courts, it is hard not to be in her corner now.

We certainly are.

There is a sadness to her passing of time.

She has had her share of controversies and her ban from tennis for over a year for using an illegal substance was devastating because from our view, she has never been the same player since.

She was banned for taking Meldonium.

Initially designed in Latvia for use in animals, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has indicated that this drug is banned in Olympic sports.

Meldonium was added to the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) list of banned substances after reviewing evidence that it boosted blood flow and enhanced athletic performance.

Maria vowed to fight and make a comeback and she has to some degree.

She has flashes of brilliance like when she defeated the then world number three in Caroline Wozniacki on January 17, 2019, at the Australian Open. It was a nail biter, when at times, she looked like the Maria of her youth.

She has competed on the WTA tour since 2001.

Maria has been ranked world No. 1 in singles by the WTA on five separate occasions, for a total of 21 weeks. She is one of ten women, and the only Russian, to hold the career Grand Slam. She is also an Olympic medalist, having won silver in women’s singles at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.

Sharapova became the world No. 1 for the first time on August 22, 2005, at the age of 18, becoming the first Russian female tennis player to top the singles rankings, and last held the ranking for the fifth time for four weeks from June 11, 2012, to July 8, 2012.

Her 36 singles titles and five Grand Slam titles, two at the French Open and one each at the Australian Open, Wimbledon, and US Open, rank third among active players, behind Serena and Venus Williams. She won the year-ending WTA Finals in her debut in 2004.

She has also won three doubles titles.

Despite an injury-prone career, Ms. Sharapova has achieved a rare level of longevity in the women’s game. She won at least one singles title a year from 2003 until 2015, a streak only bested by Steffi Graf, Martina Navratilova, and Chris Evert.

Our shining star has been featured in a number of modeling assignments, including a feature in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. She has appeared in many advertisements, including those for Nike, Prince, and Canon, and has been the face of several fashion houses, most notably Cole Haan.

Having achieved and acquired all of those things, it is very clear that Maria still yearns to fight her way back into championship form. The mind is eager but the body is not willing.

So when she faced Serena, you just knew there was no way for her to win if Serena didn’t beat herself by spraying unforced errors. Serena was particularly focused on this August 26, 2019 night at the US Open.

She played flawlessly and steam rolled Maria 6-1, 6-1 in a match where the pre-match hype far outlasted the real life battle.

In watching the match, Maria didn’t play poorly it was just that at this stage of her career she just isn’t better than Serena in any aspect of her game.

There was only one point in the match, early in the second set, where Maria appeared to have a chance to make a go of it but Serena refocused and obliterated her.

You hate to think it, let alone say it, but it was easy to see this coming.

We’ve watched the US Open every year since 1990 and loved John McEnroe’s commentary, now on the Tennis Channel but especially in the early days on USA network. He once said words to the effect that one of the reasons he retired was that at some point, as powerful a career that he had, he didn’t feel that he could win a Grand Slam any more.

We wonder if deep down inside Maria now feels the same way.

Watching the world’s number two player, Australia’s Ashleigh Barty methodically dismantle her recently at the Cincinnati Masters tournament 6-4, 6-1 where the match was not as close as the score might suggest, it makes one wonder if we have seen Maria Sharapova for the last time at the US Open.

We hope not.

Though we sense that when she plays the top ten players, there is no longer any mystery as to who is going to win.

Time waits for no one.

So much of how we feel about the passing of time is measured by what we did with our youthful opportunities when it really counted.

We feel nostalgic about Maria because we remember her when she first came onto the scene and it seemed like the magic and excitement of her play would last forever. How fast time has sped by.

Maria certainly made the most of time in her youth. That is great. Her soft memories must be endless. Ours regarding watching her play certainly are.

Is it time for her to retire?

It depends upon what she wants.

She loves the game, that is obvious, but how many times is a US Open crowd going to want to watch what happened to her with Serena, especially since it wasn’t a fluke or she was having a bad night?

Even with the best of memories the passing of time is very sad.