Return Game

Maria Sharapova is ready to emerge from her 15-month ban and reclaim her place atop the tour. But is tennis ready to welcome her back?

- Shaun Assael

Maria Sharapova arrived at the NBA’s executive headquarters in New York City last August to see what it takes to run the kind of big league business she might want to oversee one day. She’d asked the commissioner, Adam Silver, if she could watch him work, and she began her tour seated next to him at a morning staff meeting, listening to him tick down a list of items that included a cracking down on teams that taunt officials via Twitter and growing the NBA’s international academies. Silver agreed to let her trail him because he’s a tennis fan and, frankly, because he was intrigued by why a five-time grand slam winner would want to spend a summer week inside a mid town skyscraper.

Over three days, according to Silver, Sharapova was poised and inquisitive, unafraid to volunteer her life experiences to make a point. She talked about how she uses her social media accounts to control her image and how important it was, as a young Russian, to train at a Florida academy to help her measure her talent. As the week wore on, she watched the league’s public relations and marketing managers in action and seemed especially interested in the WNBA, furiously scribbling and peppering its execs with questions. When the weekended, Silver joked, “Call me when you retire. I think we have a job for you here.”