A week without stars in L.A.

If you want to know how strong a pitch veteran tournament director Bob Kramer made to get Roger Federer to come to Los Angeles, consider what Kramer did last year.

He hopped on a plane and made his case in person. Except “hopped” conjures images of a trip from Los Angeles to San Francisco, not a 14-hour flight to Melbourne, Australia.

Reaching Federer often requires extraordinary measures, so Kramer gave it his best shot in a meeting with the Swiss star and his representatives during the 2006 Australian Open.

“He knows L.A. He’s got some friends here,” Kramer said. “He’s aware of the history of the tournament. Boy, it’s just tough to get him to play ... much before the U.S. Open because he’s got his system down. I thought last year we had a good shot at him, but it didn’t work out. We’ll keep trying.”

This is the harsh reality of the post-Pete Sampras/Andre Agassi era. And the Countrywide Classic, which starts today at UCLA, is the symbol of tennis life after those halcyon days.

Last year’s event had the now-retired Agassi, who made his final appearance in Southern California, as well as Andy Roddick. The top five seeded players in this year’s tournament are Australian Open finalist Fernando Gonzalez of Chile, James Blake, Marat Safin of Russia, David Nalbandian of Argentina and Dmitry Tursunov, who lost to Tommy Haas in last year’s final.

UCLA always got a great deal of mileage from the Agassi mystique. Agassi did the heavy lifting at the Los Angeles Tennis Center, playing the event eight of the last 10 years and bringing in big crowds.

Sampras had one stretch -- in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s -- where he showed up five of six years. His last two appearances at UCLA were highlighted by finals against Agassi, a win in 1999 and a one-sided loss in 2001.

Now the two leading men in tennis, by a wide margin, are Federer and Rafael Nadal. They have never played L.A., and appear unlikely to do so in the foreseeable future. Nadal, in fact, is playing this week at a clay-court event in Stuttgart, Germany.

For the top players it’s mostly about the schedule. Federer and Nadal prefer not to come to the United States this early in the summer; both are automatically entered in Masters Series events next month in consecutive weeks at Montreal and Cincinnati.

Not that Federer and Nadal are always locks to show in the summer Masters Series events, either. Federer missed Canada in 2005 and 2001.

Los Angeles is hardly alone in this quandary hitting hard-court tournaments not in the top-tier Masters Series. Nadal has never played Washington or Indianapolis, and Federer appeared once at each event early in his career, playing Washington in 1999 and Indianapolis in 2000.

Officials had hoped Roddick, who was in town last week for the ESPYs, would be a last-minute entry before Friday’s draw. But Roddick will be playing next week at Indianapolis, followed by Washington and then the Masters Series events.

All eras come to an end and the Agassi/Sampras wave could last only so long.

“We were blessed, and before that, it was [John] McEnroe and [Jimmy] Connors,” Kramer said. “Anyway, it’s one of those things. It does go in cycles. Maybe we’ll get the Sam Querrey cycle.”

In the meantime, the challenges are considerable for tournament organizers, who were also hit with injury withdrawals by Haas and Andy Murray.

“Probably if you go two years in a row without the perceived entertainers, it might start to erode,” Kramer said. “It’s probably going to be Year 1 of what could be a two-year cycle. But we just try to work on those things we have control over and sometimes the player withdrawals and commitments can be frustrating.

“If we don’t have the Petes and the Andres playing tennis here and we’re waiting for the next group to come along -- and the Europeans are benefiting -- we’ve got to do all the things we have control over a little bit better.”

lisa.dillman@latimes.com

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Today’s matches

The Countrywide Classic is being played at the Los Angeles Tennis Center on the campus of UCLA:

STADIUM COURT

Starting at 11 a.m.

* Teimuraz Gabashvili, Russia, vs. Nicolas Kiefer, Germany (wild card); followed by Michael Berrer, Germany, vs. Amer Delic (8), followed by Dmitry Tursunov (5), Russia, vs. Danai Udomchoke, Thailand.

Starting at 7:15 p.m.

* Mardy Fish/Sam Querrey vs. Alex Bogdanovic/Ross Hutchins, Britain, followed by Chris Guccione, Australia, vs. Marat Safin (3), Russia.

GRANDSTAND COURT

Starting at 1 p.m.

* Hyung-Taik Lee (7), Korea, vs. Kevin Kim; not before 3:30 p.m. -- Gabashvili/Vincent Spadea vs. Fernando Gonzalez, Chile/David Nalbandian, Argentina.