In the world of tennis, every top-ranked tennis player should (in theory) be proficient at hitting something on the order of 25 different possible strokes. There are top-spin, side-spin, and back-spin versions of the forehand, backhand, volley, lob, drop-shot, and other shots.

Most male tennis players in the top 20 meet this requirement. (Let’s ignore women’s tennis because, well, frankly it’s terrible.)

And then you have Roger Federer, who just invents his own shots whenever the hell he feels like it:

The sheer artistry and variety of the man’s shot-making is what makes him such a joy to watch. In nearly 30 years of watching tennis through all of the various eras and across so many great champions, I’ve never quite seen anything approaching Federer’s level of skill, versatility, and finesse on the court.

I wonder what it must be like for his opponents when they see him just making shit up on the fly- and somehow it works and he comes up with some insane, completely impossible winner that simply should not have worked based on what we understand to be the laws of physics.

I imagine that it  is rather similar to what a trout feels just before it looks up to see the jaws of a big-ass grizzly bear closing around its head.