Thanks, Distant Sun. I was hoping that was the case. And you probably do recall correctly who the interviewer was. I didn't recognize him; I just thought I heard them call him Ted.

I think his name is Michael Barkan (sp) and he was at the top of his asshole-ish game today. Glad to see Serena tell him that it wasn't very nice. Boo to TSN for not showing any of the night coverage, usually they show it at 11 if they don't have it live, but no we got to see Wrestling, twice! Thank god for RDS

So what's the consensus on Bam-Bam's new skin tight shirt and black pants/socks? Me, I lurve the shirt, hate the black. So funny that the shirt was literally popping at the seams with his muscles. Hee.

And Trautwig with NAY-dal? Pathetic. Just pathetic. I'll give them a break on the 12-syllable Eastern European names, but two syllable Hispanic names? Please.

What's TSN?

Who amongst us is going this year? I gather LT is. (You're not Lawrence Taylor are you? Betcha NEVER heard that one before, huh? He doesn't seem like TWOPer. Sorry, Lawrence!) I'm a New Yorker but beyond broke (literally!), so it's TV for me.

Dementieva's rather horsey-looking. She could be one of the better-looking members of the British royal family, if that's not being too mean to her. I agree that Schnyder is pretty, though.

From the US Open site:

Good lord. Shut up, stupid fawning reporter.

Looks like some more very late nights up for me to watch this thing live. Oh well.

Ew! That description of Sharapova is gross. A Hollywood starlet? It's like what Davenport was saying. With women the hotness (or lack) is always a part of their identity, whether they like it or not. So unfair and dumb to me. Uh though I have to say, as a gay man, Nadal is looking metro-er and metro-er everyday and I'm not upset about it.

Delurking to say that I am thoroughly sick of Maria Sharapova. I can't stand her. And, I'm sorry, but I really don't think she's that great of a player. There, I said it.

I love Nadal. After Sampras retired, I felt so lost without anyone worthy of my support (snerk) and it's so refreshing to see a player like Nadal. I love his pantaloons (although, I like the white better).

Al Trautwig needs to get the hell out of the sun. He looks terrible. When he was covering the Tour de France, he had horrible blisters on his forehead, most likely from the sun. You'd think he'd learn to get some sunscreen or something.

I like both. The shirt shows he isn't just biceps. If I had a body like that, I'd definitely be showing it off. The red looks really good. I love the black pants because they fit tighter. While I've grown to accept the capri pants, these are a big improvement because they're so sleek. He looks like he's all business out there. Of course, when I first saw him I wondered when Daniel-san started playing tennis.

Amen to that!

Actually I kind of liked the outfit, it does make him look all business as Distant Sun said . . . kind of imposing compared to what the other players are wearing.


Amen to that too. I read that Gimelstob piece, and at the end I was wishing I could have back the 5 minutes I'd just wasted. He said absolutely nothing.

I'll second that, AgentX. TSN consistently drops the ball on tennis coverage. One night recently, they continued their day coverage on sportsnet (channel 22 in my area), -- which ordinarily is a complete waste of a station -- and that worked well (although they didn't advertise it, so if you weren't looking, you wouldn't have known). They should do more of that in future.

Things were better when WTSN was around. More of the women's matches were covered, but often you'd just get a rebroadcast of men's or women's matches that had aired on the main network, rather than the unaired matches that you wanted to see. They were really just phoning it in with that station. No surprise, I guess that it went belly-up.

So what's RDS? And how much is it gonna cost me?

I usually stay away from discussions about players' physical attractiveness (or not) -- other than to say how incredibly gorgeous James Blake is ;-) -- because it's all so darned subjective. You like what you like. But this description sums up my thoughts about Dementieva perfectly that I had to mention it.

I love Lindsay. She was articulate in her response, thoughtful and got her point across pretty well. Good for you, Lindsay.

I HATE Sharapova.

There I said it.

Must she fist pump after EVERY shot? And not just fist pump, but fist pump and bend over like she's in pain.

Even if she didn't have to strike a ball!

SHUT! UP! SHARAPOVA! and the stupid reporters who insist on shoving her down our throats like she's the best thing going. She's not.

Loving Nadal's new outfit.

The only thing that really bothers me about Sharapova is her loud annoying grunting. I don't know what they were talking about on USA yesterday when they said she wasn't grunting. Maybe they couldn't hear it in the broadcast booth but I could hear it even with the planes overhead.

Not anymore. I'm no Roddick fan but oh my goodness. He has trimmed down from last year and looks ridiculously good without a shirt. However, his serving shoulder is significantly bigger than the other side. Looks a bit off. The weather yesterday was so miserable that most of the day was spent watching players taking off their shirts--so I guess there was an upside to the awful humidity. MmmmmMax indeed. And Malisse is surprisingly hairy--he's so delicate looking that I assumed that he would have no chest hair.


I'm just glad that Nike has found a good body to put that shirt in. The baseball players? That ad campaign needed some work. However, Trautwig needs to learn the difference between "sleeveless" and "skin tight." Nadal always goes sleeveless, the new thing was the skin tight.

Barkan is the king of asking the bizarrely-invasive questions. Someone must like it, because every year he gets worse.

Hopefully everyone is upset with Gimelstob over his comments and people will root Max on today instead--since it is the last match on Armstrong I'm guessing it won't make the USA coverage. (The second 5pm rolled around yesterday Jim Courier bolted out the announcing booth. I think it was in the middle of a point.)

The grunting doesn't bother me. It's her personality that grates. She tries to make you believe she's so humble and modest, that's she's just a girl that looks a certain way and plays tennis. Yeah. Ok. She thinks she's the greatest thing to the game and that we should all be bowing down at her feet thanking her for being born. Ugh.

So I was there last night and was wondering. Was there coverage at all of the Fish-Karlovic match? It was way more competative than Agassi/RolledOver. Did they at least show the tiebreak and the part where Fish fell to the ground on a tough shot and had the ballgirl help him up? If so, what was the commentary? Thanks.

I think I'm terribly alone in disliking Nadal's outfit. It's ugly. Ugly. Ugly. Ugly. Ugly.

He's cute. But the outfit? Ugly.

Castallack, they did show some of the Fish/Karlovic match, specifically the first set tie-break and the 4th set from 5-3 Fish on, including the tie-break.

They did cover the ball kid helping Marty up and they basically laughed, the implication being, I think, that it was theatrics, but then McEnroe commented that Marty's groin may be bothering him as well.

TSN is The Sports Network in Canada. I would call it the equivalent of ESPN, but that would be to insult ESPN, which I really wish we could get up here. They have good coverage of the Canadian Open, which a lot of the top players consistently back out of, because it's so close to the US Open, but other than that, their tennis coverage leaves a lot to be desired.

Castallack - Yes, there was a decent amount of coverage of that match. USA showed the beginning of it, then they kept breaking in every so often to show some more(I remember seing the end of the third set where Fish pushed it to a fourth), then they showed the end as well. For some reason I don't remember them showing the actual final point, but I was distracted so they could have. I know they aired a good part of the last set.

You're right about the Fish/Karlovic match being more interesting than the Agassi match. I started feeling kind of bad for Sabau though, when the commentators started talking about how, if he went ahead and wrapped the match up quickly, Andre would still have time to schedule a massage session.

Yes and yes. Unfortunately, I don't remember the commentary more than praising Fish for his effort.


I have to admit I definitely get that impression about her (and I don't think all of it comes from her father).


I don't know. I certainly don't remember seeing a six pack in Cincy. OTOH, I've seen very few players with six packs; in fact, I can't name one off the top of my head. Still, it's obvious he's lost weight in the last year.

Hee to Dementieva looking horsey. I agree, but her legs are still smoking. Sharapova's got nothing on them.

I still say Gimelstob was right to call the women out on not hitting together. I can understand at separate tournaments, but they could suck it up if it's a coed event with limited courts. Regardless, Lindsay's rebuttal all but guarantees it'll be brought up today.

You are not alone. I'm glad I'm not the only one. I really don't care for his outfit at all.

Thanks everyone for that. That's great news as Fish has sort of fallen off the radar and I think this was his best US Open effort in years. The last couple of years he seemed to get deflated and lose the plot after losing a set or two. He really fought here. And we also thought it was theatrics with the ballgirl but she seemed to get a kick out of it and getting the crowd into the match is never a bad thing.

Al Trautwig and Michael Barkann annoy the hell out of me. Johnny Mac and Ted Robinson bore.me.to.tears.

Can I have ESPN back? Please. At least those guys have personality. Even on their annoying days.

And J-Mac repeats the same things over and over and over. If I had to hear, "there have been concerns about Mardy's fitness" one more time I was going to scream.

I, too, am sick sick sick of hearing about Maria. Then I go to espn.com and she's featured on the home page. UGH.

ESPN's Page 2 on why you should watch the Open.

NY Times on Andy.

NY Times on Rafa.

Andy's birthday is today. Any guesses on how many times that will be brought up tonight?

Not entirely.... He's so sweet and talented - and will make such a mark on tennis and sports, and has already. That outfit screams adolescent rebellion to me, much like the Roddick outfits of a few years ago. But he IS still a teen, so I take it all with a grain of salt.

I love Lindsay so much for her commentary, and will now root for both her and Kimmy to take this whole thing.

And I kept thinking last night during the Sharapova match and all the pre-match fawning about her looks, that Danilidou was by far more appealing. With all that sweating, Maria's legs looked like hot dogs.

I love Jim Courier. Responding to the ridiculous notion that Federer isn't the best at any one thing, he right away said that he has the best forehand and the players would agree. Take that, Suzy Kolbert! I'm glad they touched on his serve as well. When you factor in all the important things (speed, placement, percentage, and variety), I think he's the best server as well.

I know I'm all alone, but I kinda liked Roddick's subway-map outfit. Yes, it was ridiculous, but in an amusing sort of way.

I read Justin's blog and was surprised to learn he's dating Corina M. (sorry, don't know how to spell her name). Corina is Lindsay's doubles partner and I think they're very close friends. I hope this is just a friendly disagreement, otherwise there may be some uncomfortable dinner parties in their futures.

McEnroe was on Letterman last night and managed to put his foot in his mouth a few times. He said something about gay players wanting the surface to be pink instead of blue. He really is a moron when you take him away from tennis.

Actually, Justin asked Lindsay to edit the blog for him which is how she saw it in the first place so I am sure that they will be fine.

How much say to players have over what they wear?

I know that some of the "big names" get to consult with their clothing sponsors, but I thought most of them just wore what they were told. I remember a match between Ashley Harkelroad and Daniela Hantuchova where they both wore the same outfit. You know if they had had some say, one of them would've changed into an alternate outfit

So, although Nadal's big now, he's just made his run in the last few months. I don't think he would've had the stature to dictacte to Nike what he would or wouldn't be wearing. He might by now, but I think the outfits are probably selected and delivered ahead of time, so I don't blame him for the outfit selection.

Personally, I wouldn't like wearing something that tight (even if I had the body for it) in muggy conditions. I can't believe it's comfortable, and I think if he had some negotiating room, he might ask for something a little looser that breathes.

I preface this by saying I do in fact know that comfort trumps style, but...;-)

Speaking of fashion, does anyone else think that James Blake's shirts are really unflattering to his rather substanital booty?

I don't think the baggy shirt hides it, if anything, I think it tends to emphasize his butt and makes it look more disproportionate to his body than it probably is.[/shallow]

Unless, of course, you're Serena Williams, who is on record as having said that she doesn't care if an outfit is uncomfortable, as long as it looks good. (The exception that proves the rule.) But maybe Serena should follow Venus' accessory-free Wimbledon example, and ditch the bling and all the distractions and focus on her game for the next while.

I liked Venus' outfit, but I thought Serena's two-tone skirt made her ass look extra-wide.

Good news from this Sunday’s Boston Globe



Hopefully this will translate to higher ratings for the finals of the USO.

Sad to see that Henman lost, this has been a horrible year for him. Fernandeo Verdasco is yet another one of those players though who has been talked about as having a bunch of natural talent but not the mentality yet to put it all together consistently. And he is yet another one of those hottie Spaniards (what do they put in the water there?)

I actually kind of liked the Nadal look yesterday. The black and red looked good on him (though supposidly he will be wearing the blue and white he wore during AA Kids day for his next match.) The shirt reminds me of the types you see track athletes or rugby players wear. But I do have to say that since the shirt clings so tight I could see the muscles above his hip joint and that made my mind wander to things that I should not be thinking about a 19-year old. I agree that I don’t think that he chose the clothing himself- that Nike did. They are kind of using him as their corporate experiment.

Speaking of Nadal, John McEnroe seems to be utterly fascinated by his physique. I had to laugh when he said that when you touch Rafael you can really tell how strong he is.

I liked both Venus and Maria’s outfits yesterday. I think they both tend to wear cute yet classy outfits. Although Maria needs to get linings in hers- her headlights were on the whole night last night.

OoopsSorry If I recall correctly, you must be watching the matches with your new little one. Congrats!

Serena's ass looks hot in any- and everything.

There goes Tim's chance to qualify for Shanghai. Damn.

That actually explains the bluntness of her response. Here I was reading it thinking, She must know this guy really well. Oh, and JMac's just an ass.

I would like to second that emotion on behalf of James Blake.

Nike starting pushing those shirts back in January (could even be earlier) and Nike wasn't thinking about Nadal hitting big in the US back then.

Am I the only one that thinks USA's Al Trautwig looks like a tanned version of Oz's Schillinger? Just me then? It kinda creeps me out.

And for the Roddick 6-pack debate... you be the judge.

That was horrible to see Monfils lose like that. Broke my heart. I'm all for the injury timeout for cramping/heat, but 12 minutes is excessive, especially at that point in the match. Like J-Mac said, they should have had a trainer at the court considering Djokovic had been complaining for 2 sets. It screwed Gael today. Maybe he should have done the gamemanship thing and called for his own trainer like J-Mac suggested, but I'm glad he didn't. He really showed some class despite his disappointment. Sad to see that kid go. I've only seen him play a couple of times, but I'm gaining some love for him. Poor guy.

As for Al Trautwig, I hate the guy. When he does Olympic coverage on NBC, his nationalism is even above and beyond what is expected during the Olympics. I don't know of any Olympic commentator whom I hate more than Trautwig. (He reminds me of the love child of Martin Mull and Pat O'Brien.)

Oh man, that was a heartbreaker of a match. To look at the stats you'd think Monfils should have won it for sure; he had more winners, fewer errors, and better serve percentages. He just couldn't capitalize on all those break opportunities. I have to agree, I'f it hadn't been for that injury delay, the outcome probably could have been different. I still wish I could have seen it though (I listened to it over the internet).

On a more positive note, great match by Blake today.

What a match between Djokovic and Monfils. It's good to see two young guys with great games doing battle out there.

I think Courier has a point about the trainer thing but he always strikes me as having that point of view just because it wasn't an option back when he played. I'm pretty sure that if he would have been able to call a trainer for cramps when he played he wouldn't have a problem with it now.

Trautwig is getting annoying....if he says NAY-dal one more time...Is anyone in production watching him screw this up?

I was surprised USA Network stuck with the Monfils/Djokovic match but I'm guessing none of the big names were out there so they had nothing to really chaneg to.

Actually Dementieva was playing on Armstrong and Nalbandian was playing in the grandstand at the same time, so they did have some other choices. It's good to hear that they stuck with it though. It must have been a great match to watch. I thought after the 4th set Monfils had it sewn up.

OMG! After the 12-minute delay, Djokovic won the next point. After he missed the subsequent first serve, someone in the audience yelled, "Trainer!" Hee!

RDS if the French-Canadian equivalent of TSN. They do a much better job of covering the US Open than does TSN, and as a bonus you can't hear the USA commentators salivating over Roddick or Sharapova. And you can pick up a bit of french.

ETA: You can get it on Rogers Digital Cable at channel 673

There clearly need to be a rule change when it comes to injury timeouts for cramping. I tend to agree with Courier on this, although I'd be less harsh than he is. When you see players abusing the rule due to lack of conditioning it is a huge turn off. Djokovic admitted he was using the breaks as timeouts. If you didn't put in the work to get into great shape then that is your fault and your opponent should not suffer because you were unprepared. I'm not crazy about all the bathroom breaks players take as well. I find it hard to believe that so many players need to go potty down a break in the final set. The rule changed after the infamous Shuzo Matsuoka match and it became too lenient, and has allowed players to take advantage. All in all, Monfils was screwed and under the old rules he would have won and Djokovic would have been defaulted. That would have been more fair than what occurred today.

Traci totally ripped Djokovic, saying his win "left a bad taste in [her] mouth." He played really well in spots, but I agree with everyone else. It was especially bad when he admitted after the match that he used all of the timeouts he could.


Honestly, I don't think he's being unnecessarily harsh. Like he said, it's completely unfair to the other player. The guy paused the match in the middle of a game until he could play better.

How great was it to see Guga again? He had something like 94 winners and 71 unforced errors... and the match was only 4 sets! Damn!

Gael Monfils looked so sad and disappointed after his loss today. Awwww.

I do think that you should blame the rule and not the player in regards to getting a medical time out for cramps. However, it was odd to see Djokovic admitting that he tried to get as much time out as he could- that shows that the rules do need to be tightened up a bit, and I think also shows that Djokovic knew that people may be talking about it after the match. I agreed with Johnny Mac that there should have been a trainer out there much quicker than there was. Djokovic was having difficulty breathing and was shaking- they needed to ensure that he was okay pronto.

So happy to see Guga win! His ponytail on top of his head made me giggle. He will always be one of my main tennis favorites as all time. I have missed seeing his beautiful backhand. It is such a shame that he has had the hip problems. The commentators were right- you could see the difference in his side-to-side movement between now and before his hip issues.

So Andy Murray is supposed to be Britain's next big hope? I tuned in a bit today to see what all the hype was about him. When he first came on my tv, I thought he was - dare I say it - an ugly version of Andy Roddick with jacked up teeth and bad hair. He looked like he stayed up all night partying and had absolutely no energy, at least when I was watching him lose the second set and the beginning of the third. The announcers were even on him for his lack of fire. I think while I was watching, I could even say that I hit harder than him. He was a step slow all the time. His serves were pathetic. And his returns were basically backhand floaters. If this is the guy to succeed Tim Henman, then we'll have to wait even longer before a Brit wins Wimbledon.

Speaking of the esteemed Henman, I see he's out yet again. The announcer said "it's his earliest exit since 2003." 2003? As in, two years ago? It'd be significant if he said it was his earliest exit since 1993, but if it's only two years ago, why not just admit that he sucks?

How'd you miss him at Wimbledon? As Johnny Mac said, the man's played 10 straight tournaments. He's got a great game and I'm sure he'll be very successful in the coming years. He just got a good win tonight. He was taking it to Nalbandian before running out of steam.


Because he doesn't suck. Besides, that first-round loss in 2003 happened to be at the hands of the eventual champion, Andy Roddick. IIRC, he'd beaten Roddick earlier that year, but it was still an incredibly bad draw. Anyway, I'm glad to see Courier say we haven't seen the last of Henman.

Yes, that was a really stupid comment on the announcer's part, because really, you can't go out any earlier than 1st round. However, last year Henman made it to the semifinals at the U.S. Open. Poor guy. All the commentators kept saying things like "what on earth is Henman still doing here, he's not supposed to be this good on hardcourts." And now a first round exit. This has not been a good year for him. I don't think he made it past the 3rd round in any of the slams.

Also, I noticed that Greg Rusedski, Britain's #2, has also exited in the first round by losing to James Blake. Rusedski was actually seeded this year. I think he's going to retire. He has never been able to live up to the promise of somewhere around 1997, when he was the U.S. Open runner up and was ranked #4. I think the past three years or so he hasn't made it past the second round in any of the slams. He was once known for his big serve and had the record for the fastest serve at one point, but now a lot of other people have big serves too.

Did McEnroe just say something about Roddick "Beating off his opponents"?

I HATE Nadal's man tata showing shirt! Isn't that basically the same type of shirt that Haas was told to change out of a few years ago? What the hell's the difference?

I really want to like Andy Murray, but he needs to get in better shape. He took a 21 minute break for the love of God!