Heh, me too. I was hoping for a fight. Has anyone here ever seen an actual punch-up on court between players? Don't think I have. Most of it seems to be dirty glances and swearing in another language, which is also very entertaining.

The footage of that fight was just about the longest piece of tennis footage shown on free-to-air TV over here. Boo! I refuse to give in and get cable TV. Bastards! I really want to see that Gonzalez/Safin match, dammit.

I have to say it makes me chuckle to see all these stories and headlines that say something to the effect of "Americans can't/don't win the French Open" or "Americans fail at the French again" etc....when the person who won this event more times than any other player in history, male or female, was the American Chris Evert.

She kinda owned the event, winning it back to back years on three different occasions.

So maybe it's more fair or more appropriate to say the current generation of American players struggles at the French rather than such a blanket statement about a country's failings at an event when one of their own holds the historic record for championships. Certainly an American woman has only won it twice in the past 20 years (Cap in '01, Serena in '02) and an American man has only won it 4 times in the past 17 years (Chang in '89, Courier '91 and '92 I believe and Agassi in '99).

It just irks me is all. It's almost like, "Ooops....forgot about Chrissie!"

Heh. Just to clarify, I'm not upset over comments that seem to dismiss Americans in general as contenders for the event, just the ones that seem to ignore or overlook Chris. If they all started with, "With the exception of the legendary Chris Evert, Americans have long struggled at the French", I wouldn't have a problem with it at all. It just seems like you can't cover Wimbledon or discuss Wimbledon without mentioning Martina, and rightfully so. The same should hold true for Chris and the French.

I'm back and rooting again for my girl Mauresmo to take the French. I believed in her to take the Australian Open even when everyone believed she'd choke as usual but she pulled through and played phenomenal the whole tourney.

Let’s see if she can do it again, I know this one is going to be alot harder to win then the Aussie. And hopefully no one quits with a tummy ache....

Here's a pic for anyone who's interested. I'm definitely seeing the dichotomy of the abs v. derangement. He looks like he does a lot of sit ups . . . in a van down by the river. Definitely intriguing though.


I have to agree with this. On the Roland Garros website alone, there have been at least 3-4 articles which are completely or at least substantially about how Americans just suck on clay; to say nothing of the ESPN and SI websites Ok, we get it. Every player that has been asked has acknowledged it, clearly there aren't that many left in the draw, the past 3 years have not been fruitful; what more is there to say? It is kind of amusing.

I am enjoying the variety of the coverage as well, to the extent that I have seen it. I hate that they aren't showing some of these matches at a reasonable hour at night instead of just highlights after midnight. Hopefully the second week will be a little better.

Ok this? Cracked me up for a good solid two minutes. I received a few stink eyes from co-workers. But it was worth it.

Y'all can have Keifer. I just fell in love with Tommy Haat--I mean Haas--today. He's movie star handsome.

I can't believe they left me hanging after the third set of the Monfils match. But at least they replayed part of the Mauresmo match during the rain delay. She has such a beautiful game.

I hate that the matches start at 2 AM on the West Coast. I try to wake up for them, but I really can't. I vaguely remember seeing old Justine swatting somebody around early on, but it's just a foggy memory.

To top it off, they had the nerve to keep teasing me with promises of Nadal and Hingis coverage and they never delivered!

I saw the end of the American woman's match this morning - she slides on clay and is American! Stop the presses! It does seem like she's got a dream draw since Petrova lost.

Augh!! They just suspended play after ther first set of the Blake/Almagro match! I'm totally tense and that's just from staring at the internet real-time scoreboard. Blake lost the first set 7-6(5), but it seems like he played a pretty clean set. Of course I'm basing this assessment on merely having seen the match stats, did anyone get to see some of it? I think if Blake wins this it's going to take him 5 sets which isn't great since I think he historically not great in 5-set matches.

Hopefully they'll be first up tomorrow morning and I'll get to see some of it before I go to work.

Go James! he won more points than almagro but just came up short in the tb :( I know he can do this, if only he can keep his concentration through the whole match. Yeah, not likely if it goes to 5 especially since there's no tb in the 5th. Hope he can focus tomorrow and get it done in 4

Kiefer's always been crazy. I think he had his big meltdown last year during the US open series match with Agassi when he started talking to the voices in his head.

Agassi had fear in his eyes. Really, I expected him to scream "Please! I have a wife and kids you scary, scary journeyman!"

I can remember Coria verbally fighting with a couple of people, charming man that he is, and Gonzo almost got in a fight with some guy at the AO. This the first time I can remember them actually hitting each other, though. Nice accomplishment Mario! Heh.


LOL. Hilariously true. He blogs on his website and he sounds like an... interesting guy. But as long as he keeps taking his shirt off he's good with me. Can't help the shallow.

I always find it disappointing that McEnroe and Borg were actually really good friends and never got into a full on fist fight.

Oh dear lord, I am wiping tears from my eyes. That is spot on. I do think that there is something not quite right with him. And while that makes me kinda fear him, it makes me not really dislike him as much as I would say a more sane-seeming person who pulled antics like the raquet throwing thing versus Grosjean a while back. I have never seen an interview with him, have just read them, and would be rather interested to see how he comes across off of the courts.

But the announcers were cracking me up when they were a little taken aback by Keifer's shirt off after his win yesterday. The radio announcers were doing that today as well when Monfils won. They kept talking about how Gael was "still celebrating" and needed to calm down to conserve his energy. (It really did seem like he was celebrating for about three minutes by the sound of it.)

If it does not rain (please oh please no rain) it sounds like we should have a wide variety of coverage. We still have the completetion of the Blake/Nico match, the Nadal match, and the Martina and Kim match for today. Plus, Federer, Mauresmo, Nalby, Sharapova and Williams tomorrow. I really hope they also show Gaudio/JCF some too.

Pffftttt to Gonzo for losing today. Someone who played that well on Tuesday should not be losing to Djokovic with a score of 6/1 in the fifth- even though Djokovic is a rising talent. Gonzo is just so on and off. I feel like when he is playing to his upmost he could really beat about anybody, including TMF and Rafa. But he is so freaking streaky.

The Ancic/Capediville fight made it onto Sportscenter last night. Hee! I am always shocked that Ancic has such a deep sounding voice coming out of such a little baby face.

Okay, I'll give it a shot. "The Mighty Fed"?

Disappointing day today with all the rain. I wanted to see how Kevin (I'll Be at the Motel Six) Kim fares against Bam-Bam. More than three games?

I'm off of the Tommy (Answer The Question) Haas bandwagon. He doesn't even look handsome to me anymore. Ugh.

I'm getting a bit giggly watching Grumpy Roger this week It's so unlike his usual sweet self it's funny.

I think Chris Fowler is getting too big for his britches. He's making big pronouncements about players' abilities and contradicting Brad G's opinions. Not that Gilbert is exactly infallible, but he is a tennis coach and has been in the game his whole life. Tesez-vous (sp?), Chris!

I'm going to be praying for dry weather for sure because, wow, there's potentially a lot of good tennis to be had tomorrow (even if I won't be actually watching most of it).

Elena got off to a lousy start today, I'm sure she's not disapointed about the play stoppage at all. I'm interested to see if she can come back with some better play tomorrow. She's certainly capable of it (eg. that turn-around she pulled on JHH at Indian Wells).

This tournament has been very short on upsets so far. So many seeded players to choose from.

Brad Gilbert is pretty full of shit, though. He very rarely makes a correct prediction and is pretty biased towards Americans. Personally, I love that Fowler always gets pissy at Gilbert. Someone's got to do it. ;)

The Hewitt/Coria DC match last year was some of the most enetertaining stuff I saw on the screen in 2005. Hewitt says stuff to the Argentine DC coach that irritates Coria, Coria grabs his crotch in Hewitt's direction, Hewitt asks Coria something along the lines of if he is having trouble finding it, and then Coria demonstrates to the chair ump that he was itchy or something down there and it was not a deliberate crotch grab. Great stuff. And then Coria/Massu last year at the USO were yelling a ton of stuff to each other. I was expecting fisticuffs in that one. Iirc, didn't the chair ump stand between the chairs as they wre yelling back and forth?

Darn, I miss Coria of old- the one who could really play and did not have to miss the FO while whiffing more serves than you can shake a stick at. He can be a little bugger- but he can also be loads of fun to watch with his expressions and what not. He just always seems so very involved in whatever match he is in. I can see why people don't like him, but I think his stinkerness is an aspect of a larger intensity and I have always loved his game (when it was working). He has always been entertaing to me.

I hope they show some of the Jamea Jackson/ Grönefeld third set tommorw. Jackson upset Anna during Fed Cup. Since they have showed Perry I think they may show Jackson.

I honestly think that Chris' remarks to Brad are meant in a teasing way and not in a mean way. The two guys seem to actually like each other. I have noticed that Chris is a bit more smart-assy during his coverage of tennis than he is during his coverage of college basketball- but I imagine that is because it is hard to get in enough words to be a smart ass with the ESPN college basketball crew.

I have to agree. Sometimes I don't get how Gilbert says some of the things he says with a straight face. During the first round he was commenting on Roddick's upcoming match and he tried to say that Roddick was only playing at like 60% with his injury, but at 60% he shouldn't have any trouble getting through. Fowler basically laughed in his face, and I was laughing right along with him.

Although Gilbert was coaching Roddick back when he won his major wasn't he? So maybe he's not completely full of it. ;)

ETA: WOOT! Blake won his match. He was playing some very clean tennis.

Yeah JB! He played some aggressive, awesome tennis today. Please keep believing in your game, and focus. In this form,he has a chance to get the qrtrs, who'd a thunk it?
lol@ at pmac's pinched, tightlipped expression when chris said that james was on the way up and could be the #1 american with pandy sliding down the rankings

James Blake will next meet up with Gael Monfils. That is going to be a hot match. I love Monfils, he's such a charismatic kid, but wouldn't it be something if James got through the next few rounds and met Nadal??!! He has a winning record over Nadal but they have never met on clay. Conventional wisdom says clay-court king Rafa would prevail, but what James has over all the other players is a total lack of fear of Rafa. It would be a mesmerizing match!

It's funny what a little adaptation will do: after resisting Brad's contributions to the ESPN coverage so intensely, even I am laughing and enjoying them more and more. The other day when he gave his classic betting odds on the weather clearing up? Hilarious. Fowler was flummoxed, sure, but I now see BG even poking fun at himself - something I wasn't picking up on a year or so ago....

And FWIW - just to play counterpoint I guess, or (let's hope not) to prove myself a prude - I have very little tolerance for all the antics/gestures/near-fights/etc that go on sometimes in tennis. It's the one thing that drives me from my TV. Coria? Kiefer? Gonzalez? Hewitt? Massu? Can't stand 'em. Maybe it's a class thing, and they seem like spoiled rich kids who can't handle even the fake adversity they face in a game. That sounds harsher than I think I mean it, but to some extent it's how I think it comes across. Maybe it's because those are the snipets that seem to make general US sports news, and IMO don't really reflect the majority of players' attitudes and perspectives.

For me intensity is something completely different. As is the full-out commitment to one's improvement and achievement, which I find more authentically displayed in the Federers, Blakes, Gugas, Grafs, etc. Which makes me very happy about the current spankings going on right now of Massu and Kiefer as we speak!

ETA: Damn, I spoke too soon, and maybe jinxed Roger! And yes, Chesty, I do! She's 10-months old: too early for lessons??

I am totally loving this Nalbandian/Tursunov 5-set match on RG radio. I hope that they showed some of this on ESPN and did not just focus on the one-sided (at this juncture) Roger and Maria matches.

Although I like Blake, I am totally rooting for Nadal to beat both he and Hewitt. I think it would be great for him to beat two players that have winning records against him.

Iirc, OopsSorry, don’t you have a lil’ buddy watching tennis with you now?

Every time I have caught Tursunov playing, including today, I have thought he was really impressive. [I think he played on the Russian Davis Cup team this year, too...that must be right] The talking heads were very even handed with him and Nalbandian, especially since Nalby was an asshole early in the match.

I must really be a bitch. I wanted to see Venus lose.

The fighters are a problem for me because in some ways I hate the shenanigans Nadal and Sharapova do (come on!; turning back to keep opponent from serving; "staring down" opponents) as much as I dislike the physical aggression. Honestly, I like the way Hewett, Coria, and Nadal play, but I miss the "old days" when Navratilova said "yup" to a passing shot that was too good.

Navratilova looked really great during her interview with Mary, the Cheeto-eating interviewer, today. And Chucky had me up at 2 AM in Los Angeles to watch a demolition.

But don't forget that the "old days" also had some horrible behavior, such as Nastase purposfuly wiping out his opponents marks on clay and Connors calling a chair umpire an abortion. That crap was unreal- we don't usually see anything close to that nowadays. (Some of Kiwi's hijinks notwithstanding.)

I'm glad that there are a wide variety of player personalities out there today. I'm glad that there are some that are fighters, others that are calm, and others that are bubbley and I tend to like players with all sorts of different personalites. I would hate it if they all acted the same. In terms of what really turns me off, my biggest complaints are normally when they are horrible to the chair umps and linespeople. I usually like Safin, but man- does he get away with stuff that in another player people would call out as disgraceful behavior. Last year, during his match against JCF in Hamburg- his climbing up the umpire chair was unreal, and really ticked JCF off. I also dislike it when they incite bad crowd behavior. Hewitt can be awful to linespeople as well- although he has calmed down since AO 2005 and Roddick still has a tendency to be a real smart ass or whiney to the umps, as he was about the balls during his match against Monfils in Rome (funny, Gael had to use the same balls). But I think that is what is neat about having different personalities, we will all like/dislike certain things.

It is too bad that Tursunov had a couple of years in his around 2003/4 where he was out a lot because of a bad back injury. I think that he could do quite well at both Wimbledon and during the US hardcourts season, in particular since he will likely be seeded during the last two grands slams of the year.

I just finished my quick Tivo scan of today's coverage and I am glad that they focused on that adorabely happy Argentine player, Martin something or other who was so happy to win his third round match. I liked that they discussed that some of the players really don't have that much money and go day by day.

You make some great points. And I'm glad you mentioned Safin and Roddick. I think what I'm talking about are the real cases who seem to need some real socialization. Roddick and Safin have both demonstrated for me a sense of self-awareness - though they have moments that have been appalling.

I feel that the ones I mentioned (and I used to really love Coria - he seemed so sweet and gentle out there) just could not function outside of the tennis world. And I think their work within the tennis world suffers, too - as you mentioned a while back about Gonzalez. He's his own worst enemy there.

Therefore, as much as I agree with you about loving the diversity in personalities - and how the sport is really fascinating to me because they get played out against each other - the thing I love the absolute most about tennis is that on some level in order to get to his/her own greatest, a lot of the internal issues have to be dealt with.

Hard not to love Tursunov, no? I really hope his star's on the rise.

And while I didn't get to see the Argentine player, how sweet was Julien Benneteau? And that other French guy Marc Gicquel? Love the happiness.

Benneteau was great. Just an awesome match, and you could tell how completely happy was.

And I agree about Safin and Roddick, despite their behaviour (which I sometimes hate) I get the feeling that they own up to it, which is something I dont get from someone like Hewitt. And as much as I think Nadal is a sweetheart off court, on court his hooping it up is something another player would probably get slammed for.

Though that kind of behavior on court is ridiculous, Hewitt responding to Coria that way is hi-freaking-larious, IMO. Man, I wish I'd seen/heard that on television.

Confession: I have much more problem with Nadal's and Sharapova's behavior than I do with Hewitt's or Coria's. I think it's because their behavior is treated as normative--oh look! he pumps his fist like Tiger!--while people demonize Hewitt and Coria all the time. This Saint Rafa and Saint James coverage has just GOT to stop.

My romantikcized version of the past is, admittedly, just that: romantic. There were terrible fights (and terrible behavior) back then, but the gamesmanship today seems far more rampant, even when I try to peel my rose-colored glasses from my eyes.

Since we are talking about bad behavior, are there any examples on the women's side or is it simply a problem of etiquette? For instance, Maria Sharapova trying to barf her lungs out in the Wimbledon Championship.

On a side note, it becomes extremely frustrating to enjoy Roland-Garros via an internet scoreboard...did not see the Nalbandian/Tursunov. It looked interesting according to the scoreboard. Moreover, are there any patterns that could indicate winners in the previous editions of Roland Garros in the men's side?

Tell me about it - ESPN Asia doesn't show live matches until the quarterfinals, and even then some of the matches are at times when I'm not in. Although I'm not the biggest fan of clay matches, it seems there's a lot of drama I'm missing. Would have loved to see the Coria-Hewitt bust-up. And it's a shame Baghdatis and Roddick are out - they're usually pretty entertaining to watch, too.

banana is stuck in his throat...heh

Yeah, the commentators are having a great time with that one. I think Mary Carillo was laughing at the innuendo. I'm not sure why he'd want to interrupt his game like that though, I'm giving Rafa (and his arms) the benefit of the doubt on that one.

At first I was thinking that maybe he was stung by a bee and his throat was closing up. When it turned out to be a banana, I laughed. Poor Blake is getting hosed on his start times. Imagine starting a match at after 7:30pm without lights on the court. And this is the second round in a row that it's happened to him.

Why did they start this year's French on Sunday? They couldn't have known that far in advance that the weather would be this bad in Paris this week, but having the women's round of 16 complete on the middle Sunday even with the delays is a good thing.

As someone mentioned in the Spelling Bee thread, Mary Carillo would be a great announcer for that event. Too bad it's scheduled for the same time as the French.

Speaking of Mary's other announcing assignments, did any of you guys notice what PMac said when Amalgro fell down near the end of his match with Blake? PMac goes, "he caught an edge." Now, being a figure skating fan as well, I choose to consider this a shout-out to Mary's brilliant work on "OI" during the Olympics. (For those of you poor souls who missed the best entertainment of the Olympics, OI was "Olympic Ice", the hilarious ice-skating show Mary hosted.)

Nadal was just booed for playing the match of his life,


That sux....

I was kinda shocked to hear Johnny Mac mention Nadal's "antics" today. Is the worm beginning to turn?

I'm ever so sorry to hear about poor James Blake starting his match so late and how unfair the announcers think it is for him. Last time I looked, though, both players start a match at the same time.

Nadael payed well today, although not at his best.

If yo ever read his freakin interviews in Spanish, you willl see this is a goood guy. Very sweet, and very groudned.


I am getting tired of \he popular game in tennis circles to play Nadal like he is is a stupid, un talented ass.

I am just tired of the Nadal bashing.

I agree although in Blake's defense this is the second time it has happened to him. The way things are shpaing up he'll have to play at least 4 days in a row. That said, I think it actually helped him a bit in the Almagro match. It gave him a little time to mull over Almagro's game.

Amen to that!

I see what your saying, however, while I definitely find Nadapova's behavior annoying fairly frequently, I've never seen the full-on in your face asshole-ism (or petulance if you insist on using an actual word) that I've seen from Hewitt. At least with Nadapova I don't get the sense that they might be complete douchebags in real life.

The way the commentators were going on about it, I fully expected one of the to make a "banana in the tailpipe" comment.

double post

I too am tired of the Nadal bashing. I hope he wins. I understand his stopping the game -- I would understand that of anyone. Choking (literal choking) is scary stuff.

I didn't get the impression that anyone was bashing Nadal. At the very least I know I wasn't. I like him, but the fist-pumping etc does grate (as it does when I see anyone doing it a lot). As for the choking, I don't know whether it was real or not, but it hardly matters since he was pretty much in charge of that match at that point anyway. That kind of thing only bothers me when someone who's on the rocks tries to use it to derail their opponent.

I don't see any Nadal bashing, either. He's hyped all the time. The commentators love him. People are salivating over his bicep (and yes, I meant to say only one), and find him adorable.

That said, I don't like his on court behavior one bit. I think I really stopped giving him the benefit of the doubt last year, and just starting disliking his antics the way I dislike Roddick's, Safin's, Massu's, Hewitt's, Sharapova's, Capriati's, Pierce's, etc.

I don't mean here. I mean in general, I suppose. I read too many Fed-fawning newsgroups, I think. (The fawning is understandable, he's awesome, but the Nadal bashing can get pretty fierce.)

Yeah, I didn't mean on this board really, but I have read a lot of Nadal bashing on other boards that is frankly some of the meanest stuff I have ever read about a tennis player. Some gems have included : Nadal is a monkey/pig with no class, Nadal deserves no respect as a person, since Nadal has muscles, he must be on drugs, don't believe anything Nadal says in his interview- remember he is a stupid pig/monkey liar who deserves no respect as a person. I even read on one of the boards where someone wished a fan would stab him a'la Monica.

It just gets old.

Heh, I'm pretty tolerant of gamesmanship. If the rules say you are allowed to do something (challenge a line call, go to the bathroom, call a trainer) then hey, if you're desperate and feel you need to do it despite the fact that it's considered discourteous - well, ok! They'll have to change the rule if it's abused too often.

I'm less tolerant of poor sportsmanship directed at others - abusing the linespeople/ump, rubbing out marks, insulting opponents, throwing your racket... grr.

On the other hand, tantrums are great entertainment too. Showing frustration? Getting a bit snippy and frustrated? Great!

Nadal was great today. I thought it was a bit much for the announcers to imply that he'd interrupt his own service, set-winning, in-the-lead game to complain about deepthroating a banana (hee!) was gamesmanship. Still rooting for Fed, though, despite the sexy bicep (HA! He does have 2, but the other one is... smaller...)

I'm definitely not a Nadal hater, but I do think it's fair to question him on some of his questionable behavior instead of finding it "endearing," too. I've never been to the anti-Nadal boards, but I'm sure there are also anti-Federer boards, anti-Roddick boards, etc., that are just as brutal.

In fact, I've probably said many of the anti-Roddick things myself because I often compare him to a not-too-bright labrador retriever. *ruff* * ruff*

Edit: spelling

Eons ago at Wimbledon someone slugged Derrick Rostagno after losing to him on a questionable call. Wasn't Rostagno's fault, but couldn't deck the umpire, so he decked Derrick instead.


They don't call him Baby Goran for nothing. Goran's voice always stunned me, too, because early in his career he was so sweet faced and it was just so deep and gothic and a little filthy-sounding.



Except...he took that bite of the banana a few minutes earlier and managed to play two points before realizing he was "choking." Then he sat there and yelled at his uncle that he had a piece of banana in his throat indicating quite unequivocally that not only was he not choking but he was having no difficulty breathing. But he managed to "panic" right when Mathieu hit a screaming winner and the crowd was rallying behind Mathieu. I mean, sure he was serving for the set, but who was more likely to get rattled by that kind of gamesmanship, the dink pulling it or the guy who may have been able to turn a good point into a couple more from adrenaline and crowd support?

I don't like Nadal and I think he gets away with stuff that others don't because he's St. Rafa the only one who can threaten Federer. His fist pumps and celebrations on his opponents' errors wouldn't be tolerated from anyone else, but Rafael (with no small assist from Uncle Toni) has created this image of himself as this perfect little tennis savant who's happy go lucky so he'd never be such a prick. It's just his exuberance. Yeah, whatever. Sucks when Hewitt does it. Sucks just as bad when Rafa does it, too.

Seriously what's with the hingis obssesion? 2 hrs of coverage yesterday and espn spends half of than showcasing and lauding her blow out win over some nobody. I guess it would've made too much sense to give some coverage to other players who were actually involved in competitive matches and have gotten no airtime all tournament....and oh god the fawning over her 'smart' game, to listen to the likes of carillo et tal you'd think the rest of the tour were a bunch of drooling retards barely capable of stringing a couple points together. I can't stand her as it is, although agree that her return is good for the tour but this is getting ridiculous.

About the nadal bashing, it's not anymore than any top player subjected is to. Don't tell me you don't see threads/posts about federer's arrogance, his cheating, weak era, ugly face, fat girlfriend etc.?
It comes with the territory.

Yeah, after hearing jmac defending nadal's celebratory antics at uso 05, i was surprised to hear him be a little annoyed by it yesterday.......

All in all, I think the coverage has been excellent. I know it was luck that the Nadal and Blake matches happened to fall under their coverage window, but it was great to see live tennis on the middle Sunday from NBC.

I was a little surprised how much more entertained I was by JMac and Carillo on NBC than the ESPN crew. Granted, they had a great match to call.

Regarding Deep Throat II: Bananagate, (is there anyone else on this board old enough to understand the common reference there?), I have no problem understanding how having something stuck in your throat could be a legitimate reason to get help, even if it wasn't literally a question of choking or suffocating.

JMac's horrible French pronunciation is amusing: Ma-THOO (rhymes with achoo!) and Mon (The South Will Rise Again, Mon!) -Fees.

Did anyone notice in his last match that Feds shouted "Allez!" to himself. He's got to be the most polite player ever, modulating his self-expostulations to the language of the crowd. (Yeah, yeah, I know he trained in French Switzerland and speaks French, but I've never heard him use French on the court like that before.)

Has the Federer ESPN ad been shown during the coverage yet? I still haven't seen it. I've seen the Sharapova ESPN one twice (and the damn camera one countless times! Enough.

He is beginning to be called out on that more and more, even JMac did it yesterday. And even though I am a fan of Nadal, I do dislike that aspect of his game. I wish he would cut it out. He did not do that really much at all during Rome, so I thought that he was (hopefully) calming down a bit. I thought he was too animated yesterday and thought that JMac was right in telling him to pipe down.

In regards to him being as big of a prick as Hewitt, I still don't think so imo. I don't mind Hewitt's come ons. What I do mind are his yelling at the linespeople, chair umps and at times the opposing teams Davis Cup coach. I also dislike the fact that he supposidly would say anti-Argentine things to the Argie players during their junior days.

The Hewitt/Nadal match should be very interesting.

In regards to Bananagate, that was ill-timed - but I don't really think it was gamesmanship. I didn't see Nadal yelling to Uncle Toni during that. I saw him point to the peel, his throat, and say, not yell the word plaintain to the trainer. I once had food lodged in my throat when giving a paper presentation and had to stop after saying a few intro sentences. Regardless, he seems embarrased by the whole thing, as written in the New York Times



Gael Monfils is another young player that I like, but I think should cut down on his celebrations. I hope that we get to see the remainder of the match against Blake.

Speaking of choking, my dog has been keeping me up all night by making the sounds like she is going to vomit, poor thing. Well, I will enjoy a livestream (in English- yea!) of the Sharpova/Safina match while I keep an eye on her. It's from an Aussie channel so it will be neat to hear new announcers.

Whaddya know, Safina yells "Come on" in English. That was a great (and loud) match. Both players like their fist pumps. Since NBC might be showing taped match I wonder if they will show some of it. Congrats to Safina for that awesome comeback in the third!