It seems to me and in previous years as well that Nadal seems to escape media scrutiny whenever he has by his standards been average. Now normally I wouldn't make up such an argument because he has always won his French Open crown. Except last year as we all obviously saw he didnt.

Even today I am surprised about his early exit from Buenos Aires losing to rising star Dominic Thiem. There does not seem to be too much about it.
It seems that 'losing to the top 10' has now been lowered 'losing to anyone decent in the top 30'. Mediocrity is acceptable and sometimes accepting that your opponent was 'too good' on the day and played 'the match of their life'.
This 'match of their life' phrase is the most overused and overrated term in explaining an opponent beating Nadal.
Verdasco DID NOT play the match of his life when he beat Nadal in Australia this year. However in 2009 he most certainly did.
Brown, Kyrgios and Darcis playing the matches of their lives? Please...I may make some exception to Rosol but even then he most certainly served his way into the third round as well...

But, it still amazes me that me that people and fans or whatever are still saying 'he'll be back on clay at his best'...well it is clay now with a field no better or worse then when he was winning those small clay titles as warm ups. Yet the media have not woken up to the reality that the decline is real and legit. And I think fans are still buying into that.

Compare that to Federer to a lesser extent Djokovic or Murray
In 2008 Federer was considered 'washed up' and Nadal was the main man. That was after he won a U.S. Open, 2 slam finals, a few titles and a gold medal in doubles.

Federer would lose a set in a slam and people would question his ability all the way to go in that slam. Is the protected species because Nadal played second fiddle to Federer for so long denounce the pressure?

Is is it just me or do other people think Federer faces waaaaay more scrunity then his rival. Even now when most players are just happy to be winning handfuls of matches every while and then Federer is being questioned about whether he will win a slam again despite making finals and semi finals still...
Why can't the media focus on how amaze balls it is that Federer is doing well at majors at his age and winning Masters?
Why can't anyone ask Nadal the tough questions about why he's not up to scratch and why he can't compete the way the others do. Whether it hurts losing to players he normally doesn't lose to on his favourite surface of all things? Whether he's losing those locker room wins he once used to have?