I'm a big Andre Agassi fan. But I'm also a big tennis fan. You too?

Am I the only one wondering why, during the Pacific Life Open, when there are only 6 hours of tennis shown a day, ESPN sees fit to repeat matches they aired the day before? Would it be so hard to show us a Marat Safin match live rather than giving in to the urge to show a repeat of Andre's win the night before?

The Tennis Masters series has all of the top men's players. So it's not as if there aren't great matches happening all day. Plus, the PacLife Open also features the women's tour (although most of the top players are fighting injuries now).

I agree that ESPN has a slavish devotion to showing all matches showcasing Agassi and Roddick, however, I don't think it has been that bad so far at the Pacific Life Open. It is nothing like what they did during the Australian Open.

So far it seems like they have had a featured match involving whoever is on the schedule, and have resorted to showing a replay of an Agassi or Roddick match if the featured match runs short. Like today they showed the Federer-Chela match, when it ran short they repeated the Roddick match from last night.

That being said, does Patrick McEnroe bug anyone else? I find him annoying and arrogant. He seems totally bias in favor of all the American players. I know he is the Davis Cup captain, but I think he should dial it down while he is commentating.

I like Patrick McEnroe but there is a saying: "no rooting in the press box" and he definitely lets friendships and Davis Cup captaining get the better of him. His pure joy in watching Agassi always shines. But in his defense, he can provide technical analysis of the non-Americans' game(s) as well.

I was impressed that last night after Agassi's match, they re-aired the Chela-Federer match. Because I'm working, and in the Midwest, I am only catching the night matches. So when they air the same night match as they showed live the previous night, I never see new tennis.

But I don't think I've seen a single women's match at this tournament. Tonite, however, is women's.

God, no kidding! I'm an American but I hate his bias towards Roddick and Agassi. I about wanted to hit him when he gave Safin very little props for beating both of them at The Aussie Open. He even called the fact that Safin was able to take cuts at Aggasi's serve a joke. You know Pat, it is possible!

Does Patrick McEnroe really believe that the American audience can't appreciate great players from all countries. I mean I'm an American and I love seeing the US players doing well, but more importantly I like to see great competition regardless of where the competitors come from.



Didn't Safin win the US Open a couple of years ago? Beating (GASP!) an American, named Sampras something. I remember that match and Safin blew him away. So it stands to reason that He could handle Agassi's serve. Especially considering that Agassi has never been known as a big server.

I don't know about anyone else but a lot of my favorite players are foreigners. Federer is one of the best players I have ever seen, and I loved watching Martina Hingis before she retired. Tennis is a global sport and should be covered as such. I mean if the NBA can market foreign stars like Peja Stojakovic and Yao Ming, why can't TPTB in Tennis do the same.

You know, after she beat Venus, I totally expected to see Elena Dementieva's semifinal last night. What did I see instead? A fucking REPLAY of the Roddick/Moya match from earlier in the day. God I hate the Network Suits a lot sometimes.

From Jon Wertheim of Sports Illustrated:

It's really unfortunate, but hardly surprising.

The fact that players like Roger Federer, J.C. Ferrero, Guillermo Coria, Kim Clijsters, Amelie Mauresmo and Justine Henin-Hardenne still cause a "hunh? who?" amongst the majority of ESPN viewers is quite sad, especially considering they're all top 5 players.

I noticed too that when Gustavo Kuerten and Lleyton Hewitt were at Number #1, their respective coverage was not that great either. Almost zero attention.

The problem is once American fans actually come visit the tour events in the U.S., they're clueless as to who is competing, aside from the American players such as Roddick, WilliamsX2, Capriati, etc.

Golf is an excellent example where the international flavour of its competitors has been much better embraced by the media- with Spain (Sergio Garcia), South Africa (Ernie Els), Canada (Mike Weir), Fiji (Vijay Singh), Australia (Stuart Appleby), Korea (KJ Choi), Argentina (Angel Cabrerra), etc etc......

Ugh, note to self: Stop watching Davis Cup! I couldn't stand all the ass kissing comming from the booth, that I actually was cheering for Sweden.

Jer2002: LOL!
I was watching doubles last night since we so rarely get to see men's doubles and I wanted to root for the Bryan twins. But yeah, I know what you mean.

Also interesting that women's tennis (without a Williams sister) was being shown last night too. I wish I had known Lindsay was in the final today, I would've taped it so I could watch later. *sigh* When I watched it, Lindsay wasn't doing well against Petrova.

ETA: Congrats, Lindsay! Wish I had watched/taped it. Grrr Argh!

Adding on 4/19 that I watched tennis on ESPN yesterday and women were playing. Venus won her first tournament in 15 months. Woo hoo!
I hope this thread generates more interest during the French Open. *sigh* only a few more weeks to go.

it's very possible now that Kim Clijsters and Justine Henin-Hardenne will be forced to withdraw from the French Open due to injury and illness respectively. Certainly, it now opens the draw for Venus and Serena Williams, as well as Amelie Mauresmo, and maybe Jennifer Capriati , Vera Znoereva, etc.

And on that note, apparently Martina Navratilova decided it would be worth her time to play the French Open.

Added on 5/24:
Can't believe Andre went out in the first round. To a qualifier no less. *sigh*

Anyone else catch Patrick McEnroe calling Dick Enberg "Cliff" earlier this morning? Hee.

Agassi's OUT Agassi's OUT! Oh man it looks like it's just going to be the Andy Show until he gets knocked out.

Did ESPN show any live tennis today? I was watching for a couple of hours before I checked out the results on the internet and realized that all the matches I was watching were already completed.

They started the Roddick-Martin match from the beginning even though by that time Roddick had already taken the first set. I'd rather have seen that match live even though the first set was already over.

When they advertise live tennis I want to see LIVE tennis. Do these people know about the internet? You never see any other sporting event on a tape delay. Sorry for my rant I take my tennis a little too seriously.

I totally forgot to set the VCR to tape the matches while I'm at work and now I'm totally regretting it. Were the commentators still trying to kiss Agassi's ass despite the fact that he LOST. Hee, I'm so over him. What women's matches were shown if any? Dick Enberg is in the booth now eh? Interesting.

The tape delay of matches drives me absolutely insane most of the time as well. However, in some cases....like yesterday...it comes in handy.

I turned on the Agassi match yesterday at the start of the third set. After Haehnel (sp?) went up 3 games to 1, I figured out that the match was not being televised live and decided to go online and get the results. Since I'm pretty much tired of anything Agassi these days, I figured why bother investing my time to see him pull out a victory in the 4th or 5th set. Instead I confirmed that he lost the match in 3 sets and decided that it was in fact worth my time to watch the rest of the match and see "most shocking (read: satisfying) upset ever".

Anyone know if they showed Hewitt's match today? Unless it was a loss, I'm guessing not bloody likely.

Sorry, no Hewitt, just highlights. Today was pretty much the American women and that men's match that lasted 6:30 hours (Santoro & Clement (sp?)). Not to mention about an hour was wasted showing the Navratalova match when I could have been watching Capriati comeback in the third set.

No, they didn't show the Hewitt match. Of course, I tuned in late on the lil work TV :) They only showed a couple of highlights. The coverage I saw was all about the Williams Sisters, Capriati, and Navratilova.

I hate that they're giving Brad Gilbert all this fucking camera time to do all this coulda woulda shoulda about Andy Blahdicks potential opponents. Since I tuned in late, does anyone know if they showed my boy Juan Carlos Ferrero on any of this ESPN coverage?

All I saw were highlights. It seems that we will not see any significant coverage of any of the foreign players unless the Americans are out. It is a shame. I think that most tennis fans would like to see great tennis regardless of where the players come from.



No kidding! Why oh why would any one want to watch a taped match when a live match featuring a top seed and former champion in a tight three set match is going on. I don't get this, and Capriati is even an American. ESPN is making terrible decisions left and right. Do they think that they are going to get more viewers by pissing us off.

Yes, I just quoted myself. :)

Well, I was able to catch the majority of that Capriati match on the Today at the French Open wrap up show on ESPN2 tonight. It's usually on at 10pm central here, but tomorrow it airs at 12:30am b/c of baseball. So if you miss the "match of the day", at least you get to see a piece of it.

As of now, it'll probably be the Venus and Serena show with guest stars Jennifer and Lindsay as Justine Henin-Hardenne has been eliminated, as has both Andy Roddick and Vince Spadea, leaving no more American men in the singles draw after the 2nd round.

We will probably be seeing more of the Russian women now as well, namely Petrova, Myskina, Sharapova, Znonereva, Kusnetzova and Dementieva

What will ESPN do now with the men's coverage now that Agassi and Roddick have both been eliminated? Will doubles (re: Bryan and Bryan) suddenly become the hot ticket? Dare I dream for more internationally-flavoured coverage?

Unfortunately, ESPN generally only shows non-American matches when they have a great TV angle, or are absolutely forced to (ie. when there are no more Americans left). Screw the most competitive and/or entertaining matches. So, if you prefer the Ferreros and Hewitts and so on, you'd better hope they either go against an American, have a record length match, or make it to the final, or you're out of luck.


Well, as someone said upthread, they'll continue to shove the Williams' down our throats 24/7, so we can watch them destroy hapless early round opponents and bear witness to their latest fashion atrocities. Because everyone just loooooves the Williams sisters. Except, you know, every tennis fan I've ever met.

Man, do I ever wish I could get tennis coverage on another station. I'm sick of obviously biased commentators, missing the best games, and, of course, the MacEnroes and Brad Gilbert. Anything has to be better than this.

Add me to the list of the ESPN tennis coverage hate. I'm betting the only men's coverage we'll get between Williams sister routs will be analysis of why the U.S. men fared so poorly on clay. Hopefully we'll see some change in the coverage when NBC shows some matches this weekend. I know the American ladies will still be the top priority, but I am hoping they will show at least some of the Federer-Kuerten match on Saturday.

I only saw the latter part of today's coverage and saw Serena barely make it out of her match alive. Heh, Mary Carillo hates her. I loved it when she said that if Serena lost, the press would give her shit for going to the Cannes Film Festival instead of preparing for the tournament.

I lurve me some Serena Williams, but enough is enough.
ESPN showed her match on Thursday around 1pm.
Then they showed it again as the "match of the day" at 11:30pm.
THEN they showed it at 8am this morning!
THEN they showed it AGAIN at 12pm! UNREAL

I really HATE ESPN! They ruin everything!
So much for trying to catch some tennis on my day off! Bastards.[/end rant]

Not to mention that it was on tape all 4 times! This is getting ridiculous. Why would you show a taped match when there is live tennis going on. I can't wait for the US Open to come along. The USA network does a much better job than ESPN. They only show taped matches when there is a rain delay or no live tennis is going on. And they will cut into (GASP!) a Roddick, Agassi, or Williams match if a more exciting match is going on.

What is ESPN thinking? I don't know any tennis fans who only like to watch the Americans. I mean tennis is a global sport, so why would the US audience be offended by seeing non-Americans on the screen. ESPN just doesn't get it. Is this a recent problem or what? I remember seeing the likes of Graf, Seles, Becker, Edberg, Rafter, and Hingis on TV all the time a few years ago. What changed?

I dunno, it's like they're trying to selling it as more than tennis or something. I really hate John McEnroe's attitude that the players need to bring excitement and personality and flair, and, y'know, scream and get MAD and SHOW SOME EMOTION. Fuck, just play good tennis. Mac and his ilk want to turn the sport into some gargantua spectacle, with "grudge matches" and trash talk because it's so money. I'm fine with watching how beautiful Federer's and Henin-Hardenne's backhands are. Damn, it's beautiful.

So I tuned in all kinds of late to Saturday's French Open coverage. I missed all of the NBC coverage. On ESPN though, there was mention of a player from China on the Women's side who made the round of 16, yet they didn't even show her. Was she shown on NBC at all?

Jer, you probably won't be seeing Jie Zheng in her fourth round match tomorrow, because she's playing one of the lower seeds (Paola Suarez). Tomorrow's coverage will probably be (for the women):

Dementieva vs. Davenport
Capriati vs. Schiavone
V. Williams vs. Zuluaga
S. Williams vs. Asagoe

and maybe Sharapova or Mauresmo's matches

I saw the Sharapova match on ESPN2. She's a model, too, so you bet she'll always get a lot of coverage.

LOL, today ESPN has no choice but to show men's matches hee hee

So, hopefully they'll show much of Safin/Nalbandian

They did show the Safin vs. Nalbandian match. In fact, they showed portions of 3 men's matches. I thought, however, since no women's matches were being played at all today, that no women's matches would be shown. However, ESPN, never one to disappoint, thankfully came through in the end and showed taped coverage of matches already shown yesterday. Taped coverage, thanks ESPN, you really know what we like.

Just fucking barely. Which really disappointed me cause I like both those players. I'm so sick of Serena and Jennifer. Too bad I'll still be left with one of them after their match.

I'm sooo glad that I taped the coverage yesterday and rushed home from work to watch what I thought would be close to 4 hours of men's coverage.

I just love how ESPN opts to show only 11 points of the tiebreak between Hewitt/Malisse and portions of the 3rd and 4th set of Safin/Nalbandian, just in case we haven't yet enough the Williams sisters. Why not just drag out the Conners/Krickstein match from the US Open, because I don't think I've seen THAT enough times?

How many times do you think they will re-air the sisters' matches of today during tomorrow's coverage, especially given the results?

Wow, I finally found this thread and I'm so happy that I agree with all of you. I wanna see a good close match with great shot-making and I don't care who is playing. I did not want to get stuck watching Serena and Venus over and over and over. Did they ever show Guga beating Federer (besides highlights)? I gave up looking. I'll bet it was a beautiful match though.


He makes me see red. I was in Houston for the year-end Championships and as bad as it was seeing Patrick sitting with the Bryan camp during one of their (untelevised) doubles matches--what made me really livid was listening to him screaming "USA USA" during the match. Hey buddy, at least pretend to be objective, okay?

Is anyone else distracted by ESPN's new on-screen scoreboard? It's bugging me. I am finding it distracting and hard to follow. Why they just don't go with the flow and keep it in the bottom left corner (instead of top left) like the rest of sports, I don't know. Also don't like the columns instead of rows. I think these TV types need to realize we don't ALL have big screen HI-def TVs. My little 19-inch TV is rolling that scoreboard off the screen. Lovely.

Yeah, that totally confused me.

Patrick McEnroe doesn't bug me toooooo much, but getting him to offer any analysis of a non-American player's game seems way too much to expect. Maybe it's his familiarity as Davis Cup coach, but he should know enough about all the players' games to offer astute commentary. Notice that when a non-American or non-marquee name loses a point, little about the quality of the winner's shot is said. Just the agony of the lost point.

I don't like those columns either.

I just read the post-match article about Capriati and Myskina winning and I have a question: why do both the Williams insist upon always saying they played badly instead of giving credit to their competitor? Do they think they will be somehow diminished by saying "Boy, [insert name here] played really well today. I just couldn't play my best against that."? I hate that.

They've always done this and that's why though I love watching their game I dislike them as players, talent notwithstanding. Many of the commentators have given them a pass on the attitude because they're so dominant and their dominance silences critics, but the arrogance is still a problem for me. John McEnroe loves it. He'd like tennis players to act more like major league trash-talkers.

Add the fact that criticism of the Williams sisters is often shouted down as racist and it just becomes infuriating. On Oprah (I think) a few years ago, an "expert" complained that Chris Evert, CBS commentator describing a Venus/Hingis match-up being athleticism vs. court smarts, was a racist(!). "Like Venus couldn't be smart on the court, too?" Well, Venus is 6'2" and Martina is 5'4". Venus at the time was powerful but was also a wild hitter. Martina, so much smaller than every other player, was #1 for several years because she played smart. The comparison was obvious to someone who knows about tennis as opposed to a media commentator like this one on Oprah who's never picked up a racket. The Williams Sisters as unassailable icons drives me nuts, but you'll always hear them commented on with kid gloves.

Nevermind.

The ESPN/CBS/NBC commentators are right to give them a pass, and it's not a fear of being called racists IMO. I don't think it's so much "arrogance" as brutal honesty. Let's face it -- the Williams sisters are so superior to the other players on the women's tour that when they bring anything better than their "B" game, they'll win 99% of the time. When they lose, it's because they committed a ton of unforced errors, not because the other player hit a bunch of winners or caused errors.

Once upon a time the commentators/magazines were commenting on the attitude and they were called racists. The scenario I most remember were those damn beads. When the sisters were first playing the professional circuit they wore a lot of beads in their hair that their opponents called distracting because they kept coming off and going all over the court. Venus and Serena said they were wearing the beads as a fashion statement and not as a gamesmanship tool. Lo and behold, as soon as the sisters started getting a feel for the matches and started playing really well (and boy, they played really well) the beads were gone. Anyway, when the commentators/magazines (rightly, IMO) cried gamesmanship, racism was shouted right back at them. Now, of course, we've seen that Venus and Serena like to change up their style all the time--but the timing on that one was a little too convenient.

I don't think of their comments about the other players as being "honest." I think of those comments as being rude. We see how good they are--being gracious winners and losers won't hurt them. Of course, the quality of the Women's Tour takes a really steep drop after the top 5,6. I've had to sit through Myskina play lower-ranked women--no serve over 59 mph and all defensive lobs. Lulled everyone right to sleep. So yes, it would be that Venus didn't play well to lose to her--but my point is that it doesn't hurt Venus to give a little credit to her opponent.

ETA: As for today's matches: I was sorry to see Guga lose, but I love Nalbandian so I'm okay with that. As much as I really don't like Hewitt (or "cheeky little monkey" as my friend calls him) I do wish he could get back to really great playing form.

Yeah, I've also noticed how the Williams' sisters will sometimes chalk up losing to playing badly. But I have seen them give credit to their opponents sometimes. I remember last year after the repulsive treatment Serena got in her semi-final with Henin-Hardene, she said in her post match interview that Justine was the better player that day.

I don't necessarily view this as arrogance, I view it as competitiveness. No athlete wants to admit that another person is better than them.

And though I risk getting flak for this, I'll say it anyway. If the Americans get knocked out in the slams, as the men did, or if the Williams' sisters lose before the final, I usually quit watching, especially when it's the French Open. I don't watch football games where I don't care about the teams playing, I don't watch baseball games if I know nothing about the teams that are on, and I don't watch tennis matches if I don't give a hoot about either player.

You know, today's coverage still pissed me off. It may be because I can't stand him, but I was quite pissed that the Hewitt/That Other Guy's match was shown in its entirety, while the Kuerten/Nalbandian match was not. I mean, Kuerten has won The French Open 3 times & Nalbandian is in the top 10 in the rankings and has made the semis of now the last 3 Grand Slams and was a Wimbledon finalist. Meanwhile, Hewitt is out of the top 10 and is in a Grand Slam slump and I bareley know who the other guy is and it was all straight sets, yet it got full coverage? ESPN is so stupid. Hey, where's the freaking Henman coverage too?

And they are fun players to watch. That is how I'd like TV coverage to go: consistently entertaining players playing each other--show that. Of course, Hewitt and Gaudio could have been a good show but with the way Hewitt is playing it is a much safer bet that Guga will put more into it. And hey, where is the Henman coverage? Did they show him beat Chela yesterday? Henman vs. Coria should be interesting. Coria races around the court like a madman and Henman will be all stoic-like.

The coverage choices makes no sense. The Guga/Nalbandian match deserved full coverage. Even though I'm a Hewitt fan, I'll admit that the decision to show his match with Gaudio in its entirety makes no sense given the absence of any drama. It was simply a cakewalk and was unlikely to turn the casual viewer into a fan. The Malisse/Hewitt match from the 4th round, however, was more even, tightly fought and had some beautiful play by both players (according to the live audio feed on radio Roland Garros). Of course, we didn't get to see it due to the all-Williams, all-the-time programming.

On a side note, when did "David" Nalbandian become "Davide"?

It's always been correctly pronounced "Davide." I don't know when the commentators started doing so.

Are they only showing Capriati/Myskina on ESPN today? I want to see the Mirnyi/Bhupathi vs. Malisse/Rochus semi-final. I love that Max and, without giving anything away and only judging by the live scoreboard, it looks like that match is a lot better than the women's semi.

Why give credit to your opponent if she hasn't done anything to deserve it? As SpchProf noted, the Williams sisters do so when it's warranted. If they did when it wasn't, that would be dishonest and I would respect them even less. False modesty (which commentators NEVER seem to criticize) from athletes is just as annoying as unbridled arrogance.


Maybe so, but IMO it's never a bad thing for ESPN to show that whiny punk getting his ass kicked all over the court.

That's not true. They've often acted as if they've been hobbled by disease rather than admit to being beaten fairly.

OT: (And I haven't checked the news so I hope it's still on) The Tim Henman run at the championships. The only "feel-good" story left.

I was so pissed Tuesday, when I returned home to watch my four hour 8am-noon ESPN coverage. I discovered they held the Serena/Capriati match until 3pm. Those bastards! It was over before 9am eastern time (I think). Why not show it live?

I hadn't heard who won Guga/Nalbandian, so I was happy to sit down and watch it last night. But fucking ESPN showed the results of the match in their crawl underneath coverage of the match! Bastards!