As Good As They Get

Early Sunday evening, nearing on 6 p.m., the chill of fall settling for the first time over New York City : That was the moment when the impossible seemed possible. No, more than possible. It was happening; you could feel it and see it. There was Andy Roddick , sitting at courtside like an unmedicated teenager, legs pumping, head nodding up and down. There was his coach, Jimmy Connors , staring from across the court, his eyes locked with Roddick 's, his head bobbing too. A new vibration thrummed under the music at Arthur Ashe Stadium , some 25,000 unbelievers passing along this sudden germ of hope: Could it be? Roddick had just taken the second set from

Roger Federer , made the Great One look nearly ordinary. Now Roddick was stalking back onto the court, tugging his shirt, wielding his racket like a club. Federer sat sipping a bottle of water, looking stunned. The noise grew louder. Roddick waited.

So here, now, is the thing to know about 25-year-old Roger Federer , the most dominant athlete alive--save for, maybe, Tiger Woods . What you see and feel is not what he sees or feels. Sure, the final of the 2006 U.S. Open would now go at least four sets, maybe five; sure, the crowd verged on turning fully against Federer, verged on turning Roddick into some unstoppable Son of Jimbo. But Federer took his sips slowly. "I was actually feeling quite calm," he said later, cradling the Open trophy in his lap. "I knew: If this match turns, I guess I'm going to go five--and I had no problem doing that. It's that feeling of belief: I'm ready. Years ago I would think, Oh, no. Five. That's disaster. But I was not nervous. He needed that set more than I did."

Thus it went in the third set, Roddick pressing with his need and Federer pressing back with his cool, and at the last moment, when he had worn Roddick down with a resurgent serve and his signature collection of stinging forehands, Federer broke his challenger with an angled chip backhand that few players could imagine striking. And as Federer steamed through the fourth set, sealing the 6--2, 4--6, 7--5, 6--1 victory, he occasionally looked up to the players' box to see his special guest: Woods himself, who had taken time out of his own Year of Winning Marvelously to meet Federer for the first time and support him. Though Woods 's presence saddled Federer with a unique pressure--made him feel "awkward," he said--he liked it. Early in that fourth set, just when Federer began hitting freely, Woods stopped cheering long enough to say, "He's just gone to another level."

It was that kind of recognition that would more than make up for any awkwardness. After all, the two men's seemingly inexorable drive to greatness had become a hot topic during this Open. By winning his ninth Grand Slam title (and third of the year), Federer broke a tie with four Hall of Fame players, including Connors and the just departed Andre Agassi , and he now seems a lock to reach Pete Sampras 's record of 14 majors. His romp through the rain-soaked fortnight at Flushing Meadow made him the first player ever to win Wimbledon and the U.S. Open back-to-back three years running and the first man since Rod Laver in 1969 to reach all four Slam finals in a calendar year. Yet greatness can be a lonely business; how can "mere mortals," as Tim Henman called his cowed tourmates, possibly relate? "That's something I haven't felt before: a guy who knows how it feels to feel invincible at times," Federer said of Woods .

But Federer felt it Sunday, drinking beer with Woods in the locker room after the match. Woods chatted with Federer's startled parents in Switzerland by phone, and Federer joked that he'd like to visit Woods at a golf major and see how Tiger would like having his nerves rattled by the presence of a fellow world-beater. But the best part was when Woods asked Federer about his devastatingly elegant fourth set, and, as Federer would recount later, he replied, "'I felt I was not going to miss a shot anymore, and everything Andy tried I knew I had an answer for.' And Tiger knew exactly what I was talking about. It was a very strong moment for me."

And it was perfectly in keeping with this U.S. Open's theme. What with the opening-night ceremony honoring Billie Jean King , the retirements of Agassi and Martina Navratilova and the reappearance of Connors as a tennis sage, the tournament unfolded in an unusually thick cloud of history. There was the usual comparing of young talents with legends, and if 19-year-old Maria Sharapova , who beat Justine Henin-Hardenne 6--4, 6--4 last Saturday night to win the women's title, doesn't have enough majors to join the pantheon, she showed plenty of reasons why she may soon. Still, it's Federer's game that Agassi , King and Navratilova call the best they've ever seen, and there's no one else in professional sports who so consistently reduces his opponents to happy losers. "If I lose to him in eight Grand Slam finals, that's fine," Roddick said in his postmatch press conference.

"That's bulls---," said Connors , watching on a TV in the players' lounge. "I don't accept that." Indeed, to the man who once called a chair umpire "an abortion" and tried to make every match a mugging, the Era of Good Feeling in men's tennis must seem bizarre. Roddick tried hard to gin up his hostility throughout the fortnight, snarling at reporters and sniping at "experts" like John McEnroe , and the result was his best Grand Slam showing in a year. But Federer may well be the friendliest No. 1 in tennis history; he invited Roddick to have his picture taken with him and Woods in the locker room. Aside from Rafael Nadal , who beat Federer in the French Open final, no one seems too bothered by losing to the man. "They're intimidated by him," says U.S. Davis Cup captain Pat McEnroe . "There's not that sense in the locker room: 'We've got to take this guy down.'"

Sharapova will never be viewed so benignly. This is partly because the women's tour pulsates with the resentment and carping common to competitive ecosystems, and it's partly because of Sharapova herself, who has a reputation for haughtiness and lacks Federer's gift for making even the most arrogant statement sound palatable. Indulging her Audrey Hepburn phase with a sparkly black dress--Holly Golightly with a grunt--Sharapova sailed through the draw with an air of rightful presumption. After disposing of top-ranked Am�lie Mauresmo (winner of two majors in 2006 and all four of their previous matches) by a devastating score of 6--0, 4--6, 6--0 in the semifinals, Sharapova took one look at her 1--4 record against Henin-Hardenne and said, "I look forward to beating her again."

It has been a long time since Sharapova felt so good. Injuries to her chest and right shoulder ravaged the second half of her 2005 schedule, and an ankle sprain limited her court time last spring. Now healthy and moving better than ever, Sharapova drove the curiously passive Henin-Hardenne behind the baseline with a crackling serve and relentless ground strokes, broke her easily and rolled to victory. It was the kind of dominant run that people have expected since Sharapova broke out as the sport's golden girl with her '04 Wimbledon title. Backed by an omnipresent Nike commercial ("I'm so pretty!" one male fan screamed early in the first set) and hounded by questions about her rumored--and denied--relationship with Roddick , Sharapova never wavered in her focus as she took apart the two women who, until now, had seemed to be alone at the top of the game. "She just hates to lose," tour veteran Rennae Stubbs said of Sharapova. "As rich as she is, she doesn't have to lift a finger the rest of her life. But this is what makes her tick: competitiveness."