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When Federer won his third round match against Mardy Fish in four sets – he dropped the third – Toni Nadal, Rafa’s uncle and coach, was immediately impressed. And not just with the Swiss’s game. “I saw a guy who played really well, who played with unbelievable technique,” he says. “I love tennis and I love how he played. I love not only where the ball goes but how you put the ball there. His hair was very beautiful. But his work also.” The Roger Federer Effect tells the story of the world's most famous tennis player in a fresh, innovative way - through the eyes of his friends, rivals, coaches, fans and many others who have been drawn to him as he blazed a trail and transcended the sport. The RF line was groundbreaking. “We used to create a shirt for everybody in the world, US style, baggy, and then we realized that Europeans are so far ahead in fashion. Roger wanted it a lot more tailor-fitted. So we started creating the Roger Federer collection. Roger would have been famous on his own for sure. Even if he was playing for any other brand. But he became a lot bigger because of Nike’s marketing machine. The exposure that Nike can provide to an athlete is amazing. Obviously, you have to have success on the court, which Roger had. He won a few US Opens; that opened many people’s eyes.”
Cambers offers tremendous insight into the people that desperately tried to figure out how beat Federer on the tennis court, and the appreciation those individuals & their camps had. Before Novak Djokovic was a 21-time major champion, he was a young player fighting to get to the Swiss Maestro's level. Nakajima left Nike in 2017 to start his own business. He founded the company BaseLine Performance Finance, which works with athletes and sports organizations. However, he remains connected to Nike, as his wife, brother and one of his three sons work there. For Federer, the move to Uniqlo paid off, allowing him to become an investor in the Swiss performance footwear company On and promote its shoes. And it’s all about the shoes, right? “I’m sure everything works out for a reason,” said Nakajima. Many times when I spoke with Rafael, I said Federer plays not too smart with you. In my opinion, he normally played the return very easy to us. He was not aggressive enough.” The process of writing the book was really enjoyable, not least the relationship with Simon Graf, who was a pleasure to work with. We both conducted the interviews and put the book together in addition to our daily jobs, having regular Zoom chats with each other to discuss chapters. As a freelance for more than 20 years, I have almost always written for more than one publication at each event, so being able to really focus on one thing, as I did, particularly in the three weeks immediately after Wimbledon, was a genuine pleasure. Nakajima continued: “People love to hate successful people. They’re jealous. But it always astounds me that no one ever says anything negative about Roger. Because of the way he portrays himself to others, he’s loved by others. Because he treats others respectfully, he knows the audience and can adjust his conversation based on his audience. He knows how to talk to grownups and kids.The thing that came across from everyone we spoke to is just how much Federer loved tennis. It sounds simple but as we know from the likes of Andre Agassi, that’s never a given. But Federer was really almost unique in his child-like love for the sport, which barely diminished even as he endured yet another trip through yet another airport. That should never have happened. For us to let somebody like that go, it’s an atrocity. Roger Federer belonged with Nike for the rest of his career. Just like Michael Jordan. Like LeBron James, like Tiger Woods. He’s right up there with the all-time greatest Nike athletes ever. I’m still disappointed. But it happened. I have to get over it. It wasn’t my decision and I wasn’t there for it.” A connoisseur of the humdrum details of failure, Dyer also has a joyous appreciation of the transcendent and the triumphant Auch wenn alle Drei exzellente Spieler sind, war es doch immer Federer, der mir aufgefallen ist. Im Gegensatz zu den meisten seiner Gegner blieb er stets ruhig und wirkte immer ein wenig so, als ob er über den Dingen stehen würde. Und auch wenn er nicht immer der Sieger war, wirkte er nie wie ein Verlierer. In the process of more than 40 exclusive interviews, we spoke to his rivals, fans, friends, peers, coaches and even politicians, skiers, musicians, film directors, commentators and photographers, trying to explore how and why Federer became such a revered figure inside and outside of the sporting world.
Federer readily admits that Nadal made him change his game. He was the only one whose natural style meant that his own natural game was not always good enough to win. For Toni Nadal, how Federer turned things on their head is what makes him even more impressive. The Roger Federer Effect was published on October 31, the culmination of a year and a half of work shared equally between myself and Simon Graf, the renowned Swiss journalist and authority on all things Roger Federer, having covered his entire career. But why does it always happen to Novak? Or the whole controversy about the Covid-19 vaccination. Now, as a brand: do I want to be behind somebody who always has controversy around him? Or do I want to go with an athlete with a squeaky clean image?” Where does Nakajima see the Swiss after his career? “I can’t imagine he will be a commentator; nothing against that. But I’m sure he is thinking about other things. He’s such a savvy guy; if you’re a company, who wouldn’t want somebody like Roger working with you? I think he’ll branch out into other things. And his name will live on forever as one of the best athletes of all time.” There, athletes have a safe haven,” said Mike Nakajima, tennis director at Nike for 29 years. “They can come and hang around and nobody asks for pictures.”
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As a die-hard Federer fan myself, and being so very humble and grateful to be one of the fans being interviewed then captured in this book, I wholeheartedly enjoy reading this book - everyone else’s story surrounding the one and only great Roger Federer - some are very relatable, some put a smile on my face, and others moved me to tears.
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