the DMZ afternoon: the player who can't be read off practice

deLint's public scouting verdict on the gap between a body in drill and a body under stakes: watching Pemulis in practice versus "in a real match that means anything" is like an e-mail courtship that collapses on the first meeting. It's the rankings machinery's blind spot named by one of its own officials — the number rewards the player who performs when it counts, and Pemulis, "a bundle of strangled nerves in tournaments," is precisely the talented body the ranking cannot capture because it only appears when nothing is on the line.