Foot Fault Gate

I know my little blog is not getting many readers but if for some reason someone should see it and want to share the contents with the powers that be, i.e. commentators etc., I will be very happy. This blog entry is specifically directed at the following people: Patrick McEnroe, John McEnroe, Mary Carillo, Dick Enberg, Mary-Jo Fernandez, Martina Navratilova, Bill MacAtee (sp?), Chris Fowler, Pam Shriver and Cliff Drysdale. Have I forgotten anyone, no, yes, whatever, if I have maybe one of the others will forward it to them.

Foot Fault Gate is over. The fans, you know those people who pay good money to watch tennis players hit a ball over a net, scream their lungs out, sweat, argue with chair umpires and smile and wave at the crowd, yes those folks, we have moved on. We do not on any given day turn on our television sets (and I tell you us tennis fans pay a lot of money to watch tennis on HDTV) do not wish to sit and watch you go on and on and on about an incident that happened almost 4 months ago. We don't care. In addition, the person to whom it happened, Ms. Serena Williams and her colleagues with whom she has to work, they don't care. Lest we forget one of the people that the player on whom the sun rises and sets called was Serena Williams. She, of the infamous, "I will shove this ball down your fucking throat" was called upon to play an exhibition match, even though she is the devil incarnate, should have been banned, has brought the sport into disrepute, has tarnished her legacy, will have sponsors and fans keeping away from her in droves. Yes, she was the one who was laughing while players made fun of her Foot Fault Gate and the fans, yes those folks, who paid money at the spur of the moment to watch an exhibition match, doubled over in laughter as they found it quite funny.

Leave it alone. You are doing a disservice to a great champion. She has already done a disservice to herself and she has to live with that everyday. One of the reasons why the American justice system fails people is the fact that you are never fully rehabilitated. You are always being watched. Serena did not kill anyone. She lost her cool for a split second and she apparently will be crucified until the day she steps out onto the Newport grass to accept her Hall of Fame plaque.

And Ms. Navratilova. We do not care whether Serena does not weigh 150 lbs. We really don't. Every single woman on the planet lies about their age. We lie about our dress sizes etc. In case you have forgotten, we live in a Mary Kate Olsen world and as Serena has pointed out she will always have a big ass and big boobs. That is what makes her a woman. She is also an exceptional athlete, despite the ass and the boobs and despite her allegedly lying about her weight. We watch tv and attend tennis matches to see her play because of her play. She is competitive, full of fire, and guess what she knows how to play tennis. She does not quit like some before her have. She has weathered the storms in her career and come back fighting. She should be the player on which most youngsters should model their games, but all the tennis world seems to be concerned about is Maria Sharapova's dress and how much money she is making for Nike, forgetting the fact that had it not been for a walkover she would be going almost 2 years without a title.

I close by saying, let it be about tennis commentators. The fans have moved on from Foot Fault Gate. Is it not time you guys move on as well.

ESPN

I live in the Caribbean (Jamaica to be exact). I get ESPNI, ESPN2 (the Latin version or some other version, have no clue) and TSN (a Canadian channel which really is the Canadian Americanized version of ESPN). Whatever. I do not have Tennis Channel. Anyway, last night I got ready to watch the first of 120 hours of tennis on ESPN. First of all I had to wait until the football game which had 5 minutes in the fourth quarter to finish. You should all know that 5 minutes in the fourth quarter of an American football match can last 30 minutes. Just saying. In the meantime I watched as many matches as I could on the livestreams that are to be found on the Internet.

Finally, at about 8:10 p.m. I finally saw tennis on my tv. Sharapova v. Kirilenko. The battle of the babes. Whatever. During the match when things were heating up and Sharapova was struggling to break Kirilenko in the 7th game, 4-2, ESPN took the opportunity to interview Sam Querrey. Yes, Sam Querrey who stood on a glass table and cut himself and who has never been a factor in a major, all of a sudden Sam Querrey gets to be interviewed on ESPN. Needless to say I muted the tv and went back to watching the livestreams.

During the whole broadcast it came back to me why I really do dislike some of the ESPN commentators. I have heard it said over and over again but I never believed it. Mary Carillo really and truly dislikes the Williams Sisters, and in particular, Serena. It galls her so much that players and fans have put the USO incident behind them and moved on. She is still so caught up with that thing that you can see it on her face whenever she talks about it. I have only one thing to say to Mary. LET IT GO. IT IS OVER. MOVE ON ALREADY.

While listening to the Eurosport commentators last night, a gentleman said that it would be bad for the tournament if Sharapova was ousted in the first round. Really. It would. I thought that 128 women came to play a tournament in order to win. I did not realise that players were supposed to kowtow to players because of who they are. Kudos to Kirilenko for coming out to play a match and try her very best to win it, and actually win the darned thing.

Another thing that really galled me last night was the ever growing discussion about Sharapova's off court exploits. The money that Nike is paying her over 8 years (US$70M if you live in a cave and have not heard about it) as well as the fact that she now has her own collection that other Tour players will be wearing. In addition to all that she has her own production company, has a tv series in the works and basically is what is termed a one woman stimulus package. And everyone is happy with that.

Go back circa 2003 and Serena and Venus Williams who want to do a little acting, go to fashion school and do other stuff, including grieving for their murdered sister and all you could hear is this ... if they paid more attention to their tennis they would be better off. How come they did not play any warm up tournaments. Do they really think that they still have that aura or that invincibility factor. They need to focus more on tennis.

Now we have someone who has not played a Tour event since October 2009. She only played the Hong Kong exhibition and apart from Pam Shriver (bless her) no one has spoken out about the fact that Sharapova has not participated in any Tour event and that she actually needed the match play. Poor Mary-Jo was left to stutter her way through excuses etc. Poor thing.

Vera Dushevina. I cannot believe that the girl that I saw this morning playing Dementieva is the same person that pushed Venus Williams to 3 sets in last season's US Open first round. She also played credibly in her match against Serena at Sydney this year. Today, she could not even keep the ball in the court. Is there anything in the rules about tanking matches?

Anyway, I hope everyone has enjoyed what little of Day 1 that ESPN deigned to show us. Heres hoping that we will get to see more tennis and less tennis commentators in the coming 2 weeks.

2010 - New Year - Same Crap

Hello All. It is a new year and I am back. I promise that this year I will be blogging more than ever to bring to the eyes of the world all things tennis all the time, at least that which I can get on tv. I have now relocated to Jamaica and one of the things I do not have is Tennis Channel. Now that may be a good thing or it may be a bad thing. For right now it is a bad thing as Tennis Channel usually has good coverage of MS events, but little or no coverage of the women's events, you know the ones, Mandatories, Premiers etc. Anyway, I now have TSN (that is Canada's response to ESPN). I also have a ESPNI as well as a host of other ESPNs. The only problem is that because I am in Jamaica all of these channels are geared towards the Latin American market. Now I have nothing against that if but for the fact that I get to watch football (soccer to you North Americans) all the time. That would have been great except I do not particularly like soccer, so there you go.

Anyway, the new year has started and already message boards are abuzz with tennis being played. Live streams seem very hard to come by these days as folks over at tennis.com were visibly frustrated last night and early this morning with the Hopman Cup streams. I see from the tv schedule that Hopman Cup should be up on the tv by 4 January so I will be looking out for that. Oh, I am in Cayman now and back in front of my HDTV and Tennis Channel, so hopefully I will catch a little bit of it before I have to head back to Jamaica.

In December I watched via a livestream the playoffs for the Australian Open wildcard. I have to say that I am sorry a player that I had never seen much except for that one match against Dinara at the USO (Olivia Rogoskwa) but I like the mentality that she displays on court. In addition there was no drama to her, no fist pumps, no grunting, no smashed racquets. She just stepped up to the line and did her thing. What I liked about this match was not the play of the players themselves but that a Federation thought it would be a good thing to livestream their wildcard playoffs for all the world to see. Kudos to you Tennis Australia. I hope that other Federations take a leaf out of that book as it would be good to see the up and coming talent before it hits the big time.

Brisbane is on right now. I have not seen a ball being hit just yet but this is only the third day of the year. Tennis Channel is showing Davis Cup and WITC matches from days gone by. I would have thought they would have shown Classic AO matches in order to generate interest in the upcoming AO, but that would have been too easy. Anyway, maybe there are plans to do so. I will write them and enquire as to whether fans of tennis will be able to see Classic AO matches. Will keep you informed if I get a response but please do not hold your breath.

Until then have a happy new year and all the best for 2010 and beyond for tennis.

US Open Series

Well, well, well. Now how about that. Things have changed considerably since I started writing this blog and publishing it in all parts of the internet. Even though I do not have anyone leaving comments, I can say that it would seem as if people are reading it as I have had persons emailing me to let me know that they appreciate the work that I am doing as regards airing fans' grouses about the lack of coverage of tennis on tv, especially during this so-called Greatest Road Trip in Sports.

I note that online streams have become available from the very first day of the Rogers Cup, and I was quite happy to listen to the beautiful French language being spoken as commentary. I cannot say that I understand the commentary but as tennis fans, all we really want to see is the tennis.

I will not stop writing this blog until Tennis Channel gets its act together and stop joining womens' tournaments at the tail end of the tournament. The men started in Cincy on Monday 17 August and today, 18 August they had a full day's coverage of tennis. Tomorrow will be even more coverage as they have the so-called big dogs of the ATP coming out to play tomorrow.

On the women's side we have the big dogs coming out as well as Serena, Dinara, Jelena, Sharapova and a whole host of other top women will begin their campaign tomorrow.

Let us all hope for some good tennis and even better commentators.

When did Women's Tennis take a Backseat

Yesterday was supposed to be the third day of my rant against the networks and I had planned to headline that article - It is not the Destination, tis the journey. That line may sound really nice, but I have to confess that I took it from Tennis Channels' commercial of the USO Series. Yes, it is the destination, not the journey, so in that sense it would have been nice to see tournaments from the begining and not at the quarter-final stages, but there you go.

However, I had to take a 360 degree turn when this morning while thinking to myself as to whether I was fighting a losing battle, I had occasion to visit Steve Tignor's blog over at tennis.com. He had written an article about Kim Clijsters' return to the Tour. Lo and behold he had referenced an article from Time magazine, circa 2001 when women's tennis was the queen of tennis. I am providing a link to the article, because you just cannot make this stuff up. In 2001, women's tennis was enjoyed by 75% of people who watched tennis or who visited tennis tournaments. Yes, 75% of persons who were asked said that they preferred women's tennis to men's tennis. This was at a time when Gustavo Kuerten was apparently the No. 1 player in the world. I dont know what else I can add to this whole scenario of how womens' tennis is now getting short shrift, but I will close today by linking the article and hope that everyone realises what has happened to the dream of Billie Jean King and other women who fought so hard for women's tennis.

http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101010903/cover.html

Cincy Tennis - Did you see it and how was it?

Today is Day 2 of my war against the networks regarding the lack of coverage of tennis, and in particular women's tennis. Overnight I sat down and I thought about this some more and I came up with a brilliant idea. Why dont the women of the WTA come together and start their own network. A network that showcases womens' tennis. Look, the ATP has ATP Masters Series Tv. Now I dont know whether with the advent of tennistv whether ATP TV is still around as I never subscribed to the thing, as guess what, Tennis Channel would inevitably be showing all these Masters Series Events, especially the ones from Europe. So, the thought crossed my mind, why dont the women of the WTA come together and have a television channel all their own. OK, so you say that this may be a bit far fetched, but listen to this. How did the WTA start? It started because people like Billie Jean King and Rosie Cassals had a vision and they decided to turn that vision into reality. They felt that female tennis player deserved a slice of the tournament pie. They felt that they should be paid for their services just as the men were being paid. What started as a protest against the establishment (men) became what is now known today as the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour. The last time I looked I understand that with the advent of Roadmap, as well as all the sponsorships coming in for tournaments etc, the WTA is now cash rich.

We have been hearing for years about growing the sport. The USTA has done a whole lot to try and develop future champions, but without an audience watching these champions, they will surely be turned off.

Last night saw the comeback of one of the most popular players on tour after a 2 year absence. Kim Clijsters was really never my favourite player but I can see how she was popular with tennis fans back then. For months all we could hear was how with the return of Kim how it would generate additional interest in the Tour etc. Well, she came back last night and won her match and 99% of tennis fans, including fans in her native Belgium and all her worldwide fans were left to watch a scoreboard and try and figure out what the hail was going on in Cincy, because guess what, this much anticipated match was not televised. This morning when I check all the sports sites you get all these write ups about the match. What good does it do to fans to have to read about a match when we could have sat in our living rooms and watched it, or better yet, sat at our computers and watched a grainy stream of this match. In the meantime, I visited sites and observed fans watching a match against Gilles Simon and Frank Dancevic on a live stream in Montreal. I tell you there is just something that smells rotten in this whole scenario.

Anyway, heres hoping that the women of the WTA will wake up and realise that their profession is being relegated to the back burners of prime time and unless your name is Williams or Sharapova you do not stand much chance of making it to the silver screen.

Lack of tennis coverage

OK, I know that there are hundreds of tennis blogs around, but this one is going to be very different. This one is about waking up the powers that be to the fact that there is absolutely no tennis on tv.
I am an avid tennis watcher. I play the game. I log on to message boards and post my opinions. I pose questions to question and answer forums and a lot of people know me because of my writing on other people's blogs. However, one thing that struck me recently was how many fans in the United States and other parts of North America (Canada) as well as those of us in the Caribbean (where I am from) who rely on North American networks for our daily tennis fix, are unable to watch matches. Separate and apart from calling out the powers that be for their lack of coverage, I will be offering suggestions as to how we can get tennis to the fans.

First of all, we are now in the season called the USO Series. That is the US Open Series. This is supposed to be a slew of tournaments which starts the North American hardcourt swing and ends at the US Open. The Series starts with a women' s event at Stanford called the Bank of the West Classic, then went to LA and then onwards to Cincinnatti, then Toronto, New Haven and finally New York. The men's events started in LA, moved on to Washington, D.C., then to Montreal, Cincinnatti, New Haven and finally ends in New York.

Now you would think that with all these tournaments all over North America folks would finally get to see some tennis. That would be too easy. The only tennis we saw were selected matches from the quarter finals onwards of all tournaments played to date. In addition, unless the players were American, or Sharapova, then you never got a chance to see other players. Anyway, for tennis fans, they will watch 2 dogs playing tennis to no tennis at all.

Today, 10 August is the start of a Masters Series event for the men in Montreal and a Mandatory event in Cincinnatti for the women. Lo and behold, the only tennis you get to see is via live streams, a phenomenom that I will address later in this post.

It is absolutely ridiculous that we have Tennis Channel, ESPN (along with every variation thereof) and we still cannot get tennis on tvs in North America. The Tennis Channel was recently inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame for its contribution to the growth of tennis. I am not sure that that induction was worthy as recently all we have seen are repeats of Murphy's Guide and Mika jetting around on Destination Tennis. These days Tennis Channel advertises itself as the Grand Slam network, but the only grand slams you see are Grand Slams from the 70s. Prior to whatever contractual considerations between Tennis Channel and their broadcast partners, the coverage of the Grand Slams was second to none. These days, for those of us who actually have jobs and who look forward to seeing repeats of matches played in the day, you will be out of luck these days, as it would seem that if the match was not shown on Tennis Channel, then they apparently cannot show a repeat.

Live Streams - I visit many blogs on the internet. One of the requests that you hear on every single blog devoted to tennis, and this is coming from folks in North America, the Caribbean and many other countries is this "anyone have a link?". Now I am a Dish Network subscriber in the Caribbean. I installed a second dish just to be able to get 1 single channel, the Tennis Channel. Imagine my dismay now when I hardly get to see any tennis on my HDTV or really enjoy tennis as hardly any tennis is on the tv.

Now, I am not about laying blame without making suggestions. Is it possible that CBS, NBC, ESPN and Tennis Channel could come together and have a highlight show during tournament play. Clearly, there is some form of financial consideration which prevents Tennis Channel from providing round the clock coverage of events that are being played. In this time of cut backs, I can understand that. However, what I cannot understand is why is it that there are countries in Europe who are able to see the current Masters Series event in Montreal on their tv, as well as coverage of Cincinnatti and people in the United States are unable to see it. This is after all the USO Series. We are told that every single time that the powers that be decide to show a match. If only we fans could see it then we would not think it is a figment of our imaginations.