We Should all get an exit like this: surrounded by adulation, backslaps, handshakes, bro-hugs. We should all be allowed to walk off the stage with such dignity, such praise, such applause.
And, of course, if you are Andy Roddick, you also have Brooklyn Decker waiting for you at home.
Yes, this is the way you should go, a few years too early rather than a few years too late, but free of second-guesses, free of skeptics, free of anything other than relentless good wishes. That’s the gift of Roddick’s goodbye, when you think about it. Some athletes stay too long at the arena, drawing pity cheers. Some leave before their time, drawing blank stares of bemusement.
Think about it: Whenever an athlete stays five minutes past his expiration date, we automatically summon Willie Mays in center field and Johnny Unitas in San Diego. We always pine for them to walk away like Ted Williams or Michael Jordan (the first and second times, not the third) and Jim Brown.
But that isn’t always enough, either. Barry Sanders walked away from the Lions at the top of his game, and for two or three years people remained convinced it was some kind of negotiating ploy, that there had to be something bigger behind the decision to walk. Tiki Barber retired from the Giants at the peak of his powers, and though there have been plenty of things about Tiki you could take issue with across the years, walking away from football when he could still, you know, walk, never should have been one of them.
Sometimes, the difference between a fond farewell and a pathetic one is razor thin. This is the 21st anniversary of Jimmy Connors’ epic tour through the U.S. Open at age 39, still a rain-delay staple on CBS. Yet, if Aaron Krickstein had happened to finish Connors off in the fifth set of that most famous match of the run — and he was up 5-2 — or, better still, if Patrick McEnroe had simply polished him off in Round 1 — and he was up two sets, up 3-0 in the third, up 40-love in the fourth game of that set — you know what we would have thought about Jimmy Connors in that summer of 1991?
Just one more adulation-addicted glory hound who didn’t know when to say goodbye.
So, yes, good for Andy Roddick. Good for him for realizing what some people have called bad luck — sharing a prime with Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic — was in fact no burden at all, even if all he will have for his career is one major (barring a Connors-like miracle burst over the next week) and a spate of what-ifs and near-misses.
“Whatever my faults were,” Roddick said during his announcement Thursday, “I’ve always felt like I’ve never done anything halfway. This is probably the first time in my career that I can sit here and say, I’m not sure I can put everything into it physically and emotionally. I don’t know if I want to disrespect the game by coasting home.”
Roddick extended his Open on Friday, will try to do so again today against Italy’s Fabio Fognini, and if the end means he never will officially take the baton from the great American line of Connors-McEnroe-Agassi-Sampras … well, he certainly seems at peace with that. We should all face a final curtain looking as happy, as content as Andy Roddick. Good for him.
Whack Back at Vac
John Siciliano: I never thought I would say this, but after watching Josh Thole this year I really miss Ron Hodges.
Vac: By this time next year, you might be writing sonnets to Choo Choo Coleman.
@crashcolucci: Have you seen a worse Yankees lineup the past 15 years than the ones they trotted out against the Blue Jays this week?
@MikeVacc: The one where Billy Crystal batted leadoff?
Richard Siegelman: Maybe the Jets spokesman who swore that Wayne Hunter would not be traded was on his own version of a PUP list: Psychologically Unable to (not) Prevaricate.
Vac: Whenever we can slip an SAT word into The Whacks, we get that puppy in there.
Richard Fisher: Mike, from the mid ’60s till the early ’90s, I could get great seats at the Stadium. Now I depend on getting my friend’s company tickets once or twice a year. What I can’t stand is watching these “fans” behind home plate waving or texting and not even paying attention to the game. Instead of “Watch out for bats and balls,” the signs in the box seats should say “Only real Yankees fans allowed here.”
Vac: This is a pipe dream, I get it, but wouldn’t it be great if season-ticket plans consisted of 80 games, and one game a year was simply a lottery for the best seats in the house?
Vac’s Whacks
Honestly, it’s simply not possible to write a better book — sports, non-sports, fiction, non-fiction — than “The Good Son,” Mark Kriegel’s remarkable biography of Boom Boom Mancini, which is by equal turns uplifting, heartbreaking, cautionary and redemptive. And impossible to put down.
* Here’s a question for Nationals GM Mike Rizzo: How would things have worked out for the ’86 Mets if they had shut Dwight Gooden down, waiting for the half-dozen championships he would lead them to in later years?
Or the ’08 Phillies with Cole Hamels? Or the ’85 Royals and Bret Saberhagen?
Maybe the Nats really are on the brink of a dynasty run. Or maybe they will be the latest to learn a hard lesson: Sometimes you only get one crack at it.
* I’m not sure which world I’m less prepared to live in: a September in which Joe Girardi has an all-you-can-eat bullpen buffet, or one that makes me wait another year for the final eight episodes of “Breaking Bad.”
* Seriously: The NHL really isn’t going to do this again, is it? Really?