Monday, September 10, 2018

Many Happy Returns -- UPDATE


Your 2018 U.S. Open singles champions, Naomi Osaka and Novak Djokovic!


More of the media blitz HERE.


I've tried not to get involved, but I couldn't let this go, where my friend is only talking about Serena Williams's dust-up at the U.S. Open where she wasn't in the wrong:
That Capriati match was a travesty and thank god for Hawkeye.  
Did your dad happen to send you the one where she tells the lineswoman who was doing her job correctly: "I swear to God I’ll fucking take the ball and shove it down your fucking throat”? Or the one where she told the umpire: "If you ever see me walking down the hall, look the other way. You’re totally out of control. You’re a hater and you’re unattractive inside”? Many people knowledgeable about the game agree she should have been tossed from the remaining doubles events she was in for either of those, yet she was given a pass. (Talk about a double standard.) 
Let's not let our wokeness blind us to some reprehensible behavior by this woman. Martina Navratilova got it right today: We shouldn't aim for the lowest common denominator. 
There are a million things players cannot control on the court -- fans screaming out during play, weather, bad calls, inconsistent officiating -- but the one thing they can control is how he or she reacts to these variables. I don't agree with everything the umpire did in the women's final. But Serena Williams did not act like a champion by any definition of the word. And for people to twist themselves into pretzels to excuse or commend(!) her behavior is just plain embarrassing -- and counterproductive to the all of the causes she claims to be working toward.


Read HERE.

4 comments:

Lynn said...

This morning I heard the audio from Serena Williams, and it sounded like a repeat of the meltdown in the Clisters match.

In both cases, she was being outplayed by a player she assumed she would be able to handle, and she unraveled (unconsciously, I suspect) to give herself an excuse for losing a match she felt she should have won.

Where it got ridiculous was when she started demanding that the umpire apologize to her. (There’s no way she thought the umpire would actually do that.) And no one was accusing her of cheating. (As her coach pointed out, everyone does it. They just wanted her to tell her coach not to be so obvious.)

Also, in the umpire’s defense, another umpire at the tournament got a lot of flac for treating a player who was melting down with kid gloves. I bet the umpires were subsequently instructed to make everyone obey the rules and treat all of them evenhandedly.

Martina Navratilova has a good piece in The Times on the controversy.

Size Queen said...

In this day and age, it seems like the trophies would be identical.

northalabama said...

martina was spot on.

ATANNER said...

I never noticed about the trophies ...good call.

I do not think this mirrors the clijsters situation, where Serena was blinded in rage.

She was totally over the top in her reaction, but the umpire also handled the situation very poorly, there is culpability on both sides. Both of their behaviors belied their resumes and professional experience. She should have had the wherewithal to calm herself down and focus and he should have had the discretion to prevent the situation from descending into chaos which is his job. While her being outplayed may have certainly played a factor, I am not 100% convinced as she was demolished by Kerber at Wimbledon, hit off the court by Muguruza at the French etc and had no explosion and was very gracious in both instances....