His height obviously makes bending for low balls difficult, and reaching out to hit balls tailing way from him even tougher. And like a lot of two-handed power baseliners, del Potro feeds on pace.

Andy Roddick's margin for error had shrunk to the size of the crocodile swimming in sweat on the front of his white baseball cap as Lukasz Kubot stepped up to serve for the match at 5-4 in the second ...