This is why he is a weak favorite for US Open. The Real Slam and USO very interesting because of this. I'll be shocked if Wawrinka can touch him, but on paper despite lackluster US hardcourts Stan would be dangerous. Hopefully they both make it to Friday showdown.
What?
Wawrinka has such extreme grips. His favorite area is behind the baseline. That's why he can loose to gasquet on grass, and why he's struggled thus far in the tournament. On clay and AO moving back is an advantage as you can get the ball in your strike zone better, especially for him. On these lower bouncing courts it's a disadvantage. Yet moving back on the return is his most aggressive move (that's actually consistent and he does a lot). If he gets a good look at the ball yes he can get back on the baseline, but on paper his game doesn't suit a faster court at all. Federer for example eats gasquet for a snack because of how much closer he likes to stand on the baseline, and how gasquet likes to play his backhand. Fed did a post match interview breaking down what he did to gasquet a few years ago at the WTF.
You sound like a Nadal or Federer fanboy with your stream of excuses. Djokovic just hasn't been as dominant thus far on fast outdoor U.S decoturf courts. Just accept it. I am a Djokovic fan and I have every confidence he can change that.
I mean if you wanted you could come up with an excuse for every RG loss except this year and say he is just as great on clay as plexicushion:
2009- Madrid final
2011- Heavy partisan crowd
2012- Grandpa
2013- Pascal
2014- Tummy ache
So see he really has 5 Roland Garros titles, not 0 right? It is the same logic.
Djokovic won't become dominant on US hc swing because he plays high percentage tennis. He doesn't play as offensively and doesn't take nearly as many risks as he once did, or some of his competitors do. Especially on that backhand wing. Back in 2008 novak was hitting the down the line backhand as good as anyone. Now you RARELY see him going down the line on the backhand side. This doesn't mean he isn't capable of hitting that shot, but if he isn't using it regularly in matches it is going to be quite hard to pull it out in a big match or a big point. He's also added quite a bit of margin on his forehand, which means he isn't going to hit quite as many winners. But this is what allowed him to win more consistently; playing percentage tennis using his serve, speed, and court positioning to get him the shots he wants to hit.
I've said this before for federer, and who beat him in the past. It's always been guys who have a great down the line backhand. Novak was even one of those guys to use the DTL backhand to beat him. It breaks up patterns, and opens up the court. People don't believe it but the top guys really have unique movement patterns and predict where their opponent hits their shots. And this is founded upon the basics of tennis and percentages. When someone starts hitting big dtl backhands off a good shot of yours, you can choose to let them have that part of the court, and protect the high percentage shot, or give them the easier shot cross court. We saw this with Stan twice against novak now. We saw this with safin against fed. We saw this with novak against roger, nalbandian against roger, nishikori against novak... Over the course of a five set match this is incredibly difficult to do, but these guys have proven they're capable of doing it.
I feel like a lot of people on here base their analysis off who beats who and the score, and not what was actually done to win the important points. Winning big points is what wins matches on the highest level.
