I think Venus Williams is the most enjoyable to watch at this point. Venus seems to have reached a stage in her career where she has a nice balance between enjoying her life and enjoying her tennis. Especially at Wimbledon and the US Open, she seems to really embrace the crowd and express a sense of joy that is compelling.

If it sounds like the decision was tough, it was. But it wasn’t tough because I feel like there are so many great personalities – I actually feel the opposite. While the talent in women’s tennis is very high, the sport is struggling from a terrible one-two combination – lack of personality and lack of a good rivalry.

From a personality perspective, the players either uninteresting or pretentious (not in the “arrogant” sense, but in the “pretending to be someone else” sense). Serena Williams is incredibly talented, but she always seems uninterested or low-energy when she is interviewed. Sharapova is the most “famous” of the rest of the group, but her image seems very managed – she seems more focused on who people THINK she is than who she ACTUALLY is.

More importantly though, the women’s game really lacks a good rivalry. The men’s game doesn’t have nearly the personality it used to either (McEnroe, Agassi, Conners, etc.), but the rivalry between Nadal and Federer has been very interesting to watch and kept the men’s game going without the personality it has had historically. The best “rivalry” (from a talent perspective) on the women’s side would be Williams/Williams - except that they cheer for each other off the court and don’t ever seem that upset to lose to one another. The game really misses a rivalry like Evert/Navratilova or Graf/Seles that could make up for the lack of interesting personality. Maybe the US Open will bring one to the forefront.

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