Hail Rafa (and a moment or two for Roger)

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The Dead Zone of tennis -- otherwise known as the post-U.S. Open, pre-Australian Open time period -- actually produces plenty of newsworthy events. Retirements, un-retirements ... changes at the top of the game, which, on the women’s side, seems to be a near-monthly thing.

So this morning, I spotted the familiar ESPN News crawl and learned that Rafael Nadal (pictured above) will finish the season ranked No. 1 by virtue of Roger Federer’s three-set loss today to Andy Murray in Madrid.

(Viva España! Nadal became the first Spanish male, in the Open era, to secure the year-end No. 1 ranking. Will have to find out at tonight’s Laker game if Pau Gasol sent Nadal a congratulatory text message.)

Murray had reversed his loss to Federer in the U.S. Open final, and it was noted that Federer had not won a Masters Series level tournament this year.

Somehow, I doubt that will keep him awake at night. After all, Federer’s so-called ‘off’ year resulted in a Slam title (the U.S. Open) and an Olympic gold medal in doubles in Beijing. But the persistent questions about a newly vulnerable Federer ended up winning him more fans and admiration by the end of the year.

Federer does get criticized for curious things. A friend of mine, a casual tennis fan, was grilling me about Federer a couple of weeks ago. Maybe it was because we were at a birthday party in Las Vegas for Perry Rogers, who is Andre Agassi’s boyhood friend and agent, and Agassi and his wife Steffi Graf were on hand at the club Tryst at the Wynn.

So there were many tennis questions coming my way. Hmm, quiz show or date?

He asked me if Federer had ever said anything truly funny in an interview. I knew he had but couldn’t think of anything specific in those years of news conferences and a couple of one-on-one interviews. (Perhaps I was too mesmerized by the waterfall in the nightclub.) I finally mumbled something about one of Federer’s cows.

This week, finally, a good answer came to mind. Federer was asked about the current global financial crisis during the Madrid tournament, and he spoke about his conservative approach in regard to money.

‘Anyway, I have a big mattress,’ he said.

Not quite Goran Ivanisevic, gold-medal stuff ... but perhaps enough to get Federer on the podium.

-- Lisa Dillman