John McEnroe said all that was needed to say about golf, as far as I am concerned, when he stated (a long time ago): “Golf is not a sport. To be a sport, you have to run sometime.”

Golf is a game, and a wonderful one. Maddeningly difficult, it is addictive. It brings a lot of mixed feelings. Any golfer that has found himself deep in the rough has had the little devil on the left shoulder saying, “C’mon, just throw it out there on the fairway. No one will notice”.

Officially, I dislike golf. But on Sunday, April 8, I found myself glued to the TV during the final three holes of the Masters, watching Bubba Watson and Louis Oosthuizen slowly play out their drama. It was compelling, and I thought that what I experienced was maybe the same sensation that those people who do not follow tennis regularly got when they stumbled into the fifth set of the Djokovic-Nadal final at the Aussie Open (or, even better, the fifth set of Nadal-Federer at the 2008 Wimbledon final).

I was introduced to the greatness of live Grand Slam tennis way back in 1995, at the Wimbledon Championships. In awe of all things related to tennis and its history, I was witness to several great days of the best tennis in the world. In those halcyon days, the era of serve and volley was slowly coming to an end (in the men's field; the women had buried it already) but the sleek grass courts at Church Road were the last stronghold of that art. Coupled with the presence of Pete Sampras, Goran Ivanisevic, Boris Becker and Stefan Edberg, the pace of play was fast and relentless. And amid the many things I recall I got from those two weeks was the appreciation that tennis is a sport of commitment.

Not only the type of commitment that I will dub "MACRO commitment," the commitment that every young player that dreams of tennis glory has to make early in his or her life, that particular dedication of several hours a day needed to properly hone a forehand, learn a backhand to the point of automation, and understand the geometry of a court. I refer also to "MICRO commitments," the instantaneous decisions that a player must make when he or she decides on what stroke to hit, where and how. The fast courts of Wimbledon, in 1995 not yet slowed down to increase the length of rallies, were the epitome of the fast decisionmaking process that a tennis player must go through when the ball is in play.

As Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic bent forward, their hands on their knees, sweat dripping from every pore of their bodies, the tennis establishment was already trying to find the adjectives to describe the nearly six  hours of pleasurable tennis the world audience had witnessed (pleasurable to watch; Rafa and Nole may have a different opinion about playing it).  A few records had been broken during that 2012 Australian Open Final, a legendary match had been played, and there was no doubt that both men had given it their all, and that they are, indeed, the best at their trade.

No doubt was left, either, that Nadal had lost the match.

Hello, Australian Open. So glad you are rolling in. Just about six minutes ago Roger Federer won the ATP World Tour Finals, Rafa Nadal was complaining about the length of the season while winning yet another Davis Cup, Novak Djokovic was about to undergo arthroscopic surgery of the soul, and yet here you are again.

And we are glad.

Excuse me for the familiar tone, which may be misconstrued as disrespectful. But it is just that you are really not that awe-inspiring. Yes, you are a Grand Slam, and yes, you have a wonderful history, but you really have that aura that you are not stuffy or, heaven forbid, a snob.

Seriously. You are officially known as the KIA Australian Open, and, no offense - KIA makes some very good cars, but can you picture Wimbledon being named The KIA Championships? Heck, they would probably balk at being known as The Rolls Royce Championships.

With 2011 gone, I put these questions forward for these top ten players (and one special addition) to answer next year.

Novak Djokovic - You had your dream year. The only thing that could beat you was your shoulder and the chronic case of the sniffu’s that you are famous for. So the question for you in 2012 is: Was your 2011 Mats Wilander’s 1988, or will it be Roger’s 2004?

Rafael Nadal - You had your dream year in 2010, and 2011 was to be just the consolidation. Really, you had a great year for anybody else’s standards (except Roger’s) but when we began the year all we could talk about was whether you would win your fourth straight Slam at the Aussie. 12 months later, you are faced with a question you never faced before. Before, it was always about you: Could you improve your serve? Your Volleys? How about your knees, would they hold up? You finished on a high note, winning the Davis Cup. But now it is not about you. The question now is: Can you figure out Novak?

I WAS SUBJECTED during a recent tennis broadcast to the peculiar guilty pleasure of watching Daniela Hantuchova play. I say it is a guilty pleasure because while watching Dani is, by itself, something to relish, watching her bounce up and down while preparing to serve is certainly excruciating. Hantuchova is indeed a very talented player, but when one watches her do the Cha Cha Cha (or is it the Charleston?) before serving it is a clear reminder of a player that still, after all these years on tour, is poorly equipped to cope with pressure.

Before somebody tells me she is not the only one, let me be the first: she is not the only one. See, for example, how Marion Bartoli shadow boxes her return of serve before getting into position. Bartoli is a fine athlete and she approaches forehands and backhands with the same ferocity she probably displays towards a stack of Crepes Suzettes, but when she turns her back to her opponent and practices hallucinatory returns of serve, you really have to wonder what message she is sending to her opponent. Confidence brimming it is not.

Sports are played with tools, in general. You have baseball bats, certainly a myriad of balls (all shapes and sizes and colors), golf clubs and various paddles in the “Racquet Sports.” Hockey and lacrosse sticks, poles to vault, discuses and javelins to throw. Racing sports are basically centered around tools (not only the vehicles themselves, but those to fix them), and it is only track athletics that are done without an implement.

Most of these tools are dull. Bats are basically a cone with a handle. The gloves and sticks have little, if any, adornment. But when it comes to tennis, we have a plethora of choices. And, fortunately for us, most of them are beautiful, almost to the point of art.

There was very little difference between the wooden racquets used prior to the graphite era. I certainly can appreciate the beauty of a Wilson Jack Kramer, a Slazenger King or the gorgeous Dunlop Maxply. They were all elegant wands of wood, but there was very little difference between them other than the colors of their lacquered cosmetics. And then, roughly around 1972, the tennis world discovered composites, and the race was on.

The 2011 US Open was a fantastic tournament to examine the psyche of the top players of the world. And, especially, to examine the frailty of (some of) their minds. Tennis is meant to be an independent sport, but too many players are seem too attached.

Nobody, and I mean, nobody, displays in a better way the torture that is playing tennis at a high level when you have the self-confidence akin to that of a rodent surrounded by felines than Ana Ivanovic. One has to wonder how come a woman of such statuesque beauty and solid strokes can be so lacking in self-belief, but when you see Ana play a match you have to conclude that tennis mangles confidence and egos in the same way that the U.S. Government pulverizes budgets. One is forced to remember that Ivanovic is still somewhat of a little girl (at the very least, a very young woman), but when she celebrates a break of serve early in the first set as if converting match point, weekend hacks can bristle at all the silly dancing and powder puff self-belief.

From way up, as viewed from Google Earth, the actual court at the center of Arthur Ashe stadium is a small spec of blue amid an octagonal huge bowl of bricks and mortar. By now it is almost consensual: the stadium is too big, from the top rows only eagles, super heroes and other creatures with extreme eyesight can actually see the ball in play, it is almost impossible to put a roof on top of it, and the belt of corporate suites (which have a good view, and where corporate head honchos meet to talk business but seldom watch the actual matches) creates a separation between the Patricians and the Plebeians that would make Ashe himself, a leader of civil rights and equality movements of the 70’s, ashamed of the fact that this gargantuan building bears his name.

It is summer and time for the grueling ATP and WTA tours to look at their hectic schedules. As opposed to many American sport leagues (the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB), tennis resembles more the European football leagues, which actually have very little time off during the year. And tennis players want you to know that they play too much. Way too much.

(And, actually, it is the MALE tennis players complaining; one seldom hears the women complain about this subject. They just go get married, have an injury or lose in the first round for five or six consecutive tournaments. Or, like Caro Wozniacki, simply can’t wait for the day to start and go play a match).

This “complaint” is kind of odd. After the delightful six weeks (for the fans) from the beginning of the French Open to the end of Wimbledon, most of the tennis players of the world (those that are paid for playing) head into their SECOND one-month-long vacation of the year.