Grigor Dimitrov He is a player who has had a really bad time in his career. Very much. To the point where we almost lost it. The blame? The damn ‘Baby Fed’ label, which someone gave him when he was still a junior.
They compared him all the time to Roger Federer. The technical similarities between him and the Swiss when it came to executing his shots meant that he received a lot of attention in his early days. That made him have some thoughts that wreaked havoc on the inexperienced mind of a boy who was not even 20 years old yet. They made him believe something he wasn’t yet and probably couldn’t even be.
Your sponsors? The same. In press? They talked to him over and over again about him. Fans? Always the same comments about how much Roger looked like. And again. And again. One after another.
At first, that made him blush. He even liked her, as she confessed in an interview. What Grigor did not know is that that label was a poisoned gift. There came a point where it stopped being funny when the expectations that people created around him, and those that he himself added, did not begin to be met.
Because the years passed and the Bulgarian did not win Grand Slams, and that made him wonder many things in his head. “Why don’t I win?”, “Why am I not like others say I should be?” That label became a burden that grew bigger and heavier every year. They made him believe that he had to win 10 Grand Slams before he was 30, that he had to dominate the circuit above the others, and also play well. Everything like Federer.
“I don’t want to feel sorry for myself,” Dimitrov said in a press conference last year about the dark path he walked at that time. “Have I missed opportunities? Yes. Have I made mistakes? Too many. There comes a point where I accept everything that has been thrown at me, what I have had to face, and I move forward. I have an opportunity, and when you have it, you have to try to take advantage of it,” he added.
And boy did he take advantage of it.
You have to be very mature and have a very well-equipped head to cut the chains that others decided to put on you, open the backpack and put aside the ‘Baby Fed’ label, that damn label that prevented you from being yourself. You have to be very strong mentally to realize that no two people are the same, that Roger is Roger and that you are you, and that there will always be people who expect something from you, but that you cannot answer for the expectations that people have. has created on others.
For months now, I have seen a different Grigor. Since the end of last season, it has a different feel. He looks loose. A Dimitrov free of labels. Suddenly, when it seemed like we would never get to see what she really had inside her, she pulled it out. We have had to wait for him to be 33 years old, but he has been worth it.
We insist on running, sometimes. In which everything must be fast. If it doesn’t happen soon, it can’t happen anymore. Sometimes, things arrive – or mature – when they have to arrive. Neither before nor after. Everything has its time and “late” or “early” is relative.
Having removed the weight of that label has enormous merit, because it is not easy to do so. In the ditch behind there are a multitude of bodies that have succumbed to the ravages of the weight of labels and comparisons. People who couldn’t stand it. That they didn’t get over it. Truncated careers that we never get to know.
Today, Grigor will be able to look back with pride, for being a mentally stronger man today. by overcoming that and by showing the world what was inside. That he is not who others wanted him to be. He is, simply, Grigor Dimitrov. Distinct. Neither better nor worse. Simply different and unique.
2024-03-29 09:00:00
#Grigor #Dimitrov #free #labels
