[bandabou]

There's a level of power among only a few of the top players:

Serena, Clijsters, Henin-Hardenne, Lindsay, Venus, and Capriati

These are the only players who hit consistently with aggressive power, however, of these players, if we factor in movement, shot selection, and the ability to construct points playing defense and offense, the list is whittled down to:

Serena, Henin-Hardenne and Venus. These are the three players that Kim has the most trouble with. With Lindsay she simply retrieves all the power until she gets a wide-open court to hit into, and the point is over. With Jen, Kim does much the same, only she can rely on Jen not being the best thinker out there, and almost always centering the ball, and then making the unforced error after the ball is in play longer than 5 or 6 strokes.

Yep and unless she changes her game she will keep struggling against the other elite three.

 

[Volcana]

I'll stick to the top ten. Hingis may be the gold standard, but she's also ranked 103 (Volcana, what was that you were saying about players outside the top 100? )

Nailed.

These actually aren't the best ten point constructors on tour

A point I tried to make and failed.

Indeed, often lower ranked players, or players with no particular weapon, wil be the best point builders because they HAVE to be. Matevzic in particular has so little power that if she didn't think and use variety on the court I doubt she'd be top 100, but as it is she's top 40.

This is how Ai Sugiyama got to be my #7.

Thank you for reading the initial post, and actually dealing with what I discussed.

 

[Volcana]

1. Kim is a very good point constructor. Eighth out of the top ten does not = bad.

2. She's being characterised as pure defence, which is erroneous. What's so good about her overall game is the fact that she has superlative defence and superlative attack; the former is emphasised vs top players such as Venus and Serena, but when she's playing people like Rossana Neffa De Los Rios, she's all aggression.

3. Pure defence players like Anna Pistolesi tend not to be good point constructors either. "Run every ball down until the opponent misses" is not the most complex of strategies.

As one of the people who've been characterizing Kim as pure defense, I'm going to remember this post. When I see Kim, she's usally playing someone who can hit hard and deep, Venus, Serena, Justine, Lindsay, because I don't often get to see early round tennis, and since she isn't American, ESP-fucking-N won't show Kim vs #99.

You're right. The few times I've seen Kim vs lesser opponents, she moves forward aggressively.

Perhaps more accurate would be for me to say something like:

'Kim has defense as good or better than anyone on the tour, but against elite competition, her normally aggressive offense can fade to reactive opportunism.'