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Early Season Physical Setbacks Befall ISDA Stand-Outs

By Rob Dinerman, Oct 27 2002 © 2002 reproduction prohibited

Only two tournaments have taken place so far in the 2002-2003 ISDA pro doubles season but already a number of maladies have incapacitated several key players and thereby thrown several solid partnerships into disarray. The ISDA tour has deservedly received much praise for the degree and swiftness of its rise from a nascent start-up just three years ago into a popular and populous organization with a full schedule and professionally presented product that has grown substantially with each season and even attracted established softball singles stars into its realm.

That said, the current season will clearly constitute a challenging test to determine its ability to build upon or at least consolidate these early gains, and the prolonged absence of some of its leading protagonists will self-evidently deprive the ISDA cast of some of its most appealing elements.

Foremost of these prominent casualties is David Kay, whose previously solid doubles career was transformed in midseason last year when he joined up with Michael Pirnak in an alignment that rocketed to five finals over the final few months and finished with the No. 3 team rankng behind only Willie Hosey/Viktor Beg (barely) at No. 2 and the Gary Waite/Damien Mudge juggernaut that won all 17 ranking 2001-2002 ISDA tournaments. Though ranked third, Kay and Pirnak were seeded second for this season's opening event in Denver late last month after Berg and Hosey parted ways during the intervening summer, even though Kay had undergone disc surgery in early July to treat a back
problem that had been bothering him for several months.

Though they lost in the semis to Berg and his new partner Josh McDonald, Kay seemed fully recovered from his operation and even entered a minor softball event in Annapolis the following weekend while visiting friends in Maryland. His progress through the draw was terminated instantaneously early Sunday morning, however, when he accelerated forward in pursuit of a drop shot only a few points into his semi-final match and ruptured his left
Achilles tendon.

Surgery to re-attach the tendon several days later was deemed successful, but Kay is almost certainly done for the remainder of the season while he pursues a rehabilitation regimen that frequently takes an entire year to complete. Pirnak will play with Eric Vlcek in Vancouver this coming weekend, but his remaining ISDA events this season, beginning with Montreal later this autumn, will at least for now be with Hosey, who will return to the
right-wall slot he filled so efficiently for several years in the late 1990's partnering Todd Binns before his two seasons with Jamie Bentley (19 finals in 21 combined attempts) and one year with Berg.

In addition to his on-court success (including reaching the final of last year's Hamil Cup hardball singles tourney with wins over Berg and Mudge), Kay also served as one of the two elected Player Representatives, so his absence will be felt on that front as well. Another officer of the Association is James Hewitt, who frequently attained the quarter-finals last season and even advanced to the semis when he and McDonald saved a fourth-game match-point in an upset win over Hosey and Berg at the Denver Athletic Club last April.
In an effort to better his mid-teens ranking, the Toronto-based Hewitt did wind sprints and conditioning drills with NHL players over the summer, only to see the effects of this innovative approach undone when he tore ligaments in his right (i.e. playing) elbow during an informal hockey game.

Forced to wear a cumbersome brace and hampered by this injury in the Denver Club qualifying last month, especially on his forehand swings, Hewitt may have to withdraw from some of the fall events to give his elbow a chance to fully heal, and there is no doubt that his effectiveness will be reduced for several months to come.

The most recent and potentially serious misadventure was that undergone by Preston Quick, the best active American-born softball player and a rising star on the ISDA circuit, who played so well last year that Bentley asked him to be his partner this season. Ironically, Quick's very versatility has contributed to the at least temporary undermining of his partnership with Bentley in the form of the hepatitis A infection he contracted while
representing the United States in the Pan American Federation Cup event in Quito, Ecuador this past August.

There have been a spate of such diagnoses among players and officials from several countries, which in fact caused the host South American federation to send an emergency email to the visiting federations apprising them of the situation and suggesting that they contact their player base to inquire about their health. But by the time the USSRA had received and forwarded this communique, Quick had already consulted a physician and taken a diagnostic blood test after suffering severe symptoms first during the Denver Club ISDA weekend and then last week and weekend while putting forth a valiant effort, reaching the main draw of the Betteridge Cup in Westchester, where he was eliminated 3-0 in his first main draw match.

Quick of course was forced to withdraw from the several events he had entered this month, including Vancouver, where Bentley played instead with Scott Butcher, who was available because he and his normal partner, fellow Aussie Jeff Osborne, had decided not to enter. How these emergency partnerships fare, and how the later alignments sort themselves out as the season unfolds, remain to be seen. What is known is that the ISDA can ill afford to go without players of the caliber of Kay, Hewitt and Quick for any
major length of time, and it can only be hoped that it is only going through a brief patch of bad luck, which will soon pass, thereby leaving the tour with its full arsenal as it continues its attempt to become a significant force in the highly competitive sports marketplace.

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