He Cannot Be Serious ... Right?

Just moments after finalizing my latest post that chronicled the struggles of playing on a court full of men who feel it is their job to fix my game -- while conspicuously ignoring their own issues -- I found out that John McEnroe decided he had something to say about Serena Williams and it might play well into the macro part of that post.

For those of you who missed it, McEnroe said that Serena's a great female player but in terms of how she'd stack up against a man? She'd just be ranked #700. 

No, the male No. 700 player in the world does not happen to possess 23 Grand Slam titles, but I guess it is not really a Grand Slam win if it is won by a woman playing other women. Welp, Serena, welcome to being a woman in America. 

Serena Williams won the Australian Open while she was pregnant. Most men can't get out of bed if they have a common cold. Women are paid less for doing the same work as men as standard practice and men get mad if they get kicked out of their company for making disparaging comments about women. I guess I can understand why Uber dude is confused. I mean, if you don't have to pay them equally, why can't you treat them however you want? It's all very confusing.

Did McEnroe just degrade the worth of women's tennis with his comments? Of course he did. No, women aren't as physically strong as men. Williams has won more majors than a man ever has. She's 35 years old. She won her first major at 17. But she's a woman, so that means ... less? 

(Incidentally, John McEnroe wasn't on the pro tour at 17. He won his first major at 20 and when he was 35, he'd been retired from tennis for about two years.)

You know, I will never again whine about having advice doled out to me unsolicited by men who don't know what they're talking about. I mean, it could be worse. You could ascend to the top of the game, do things no PERSON has ever done before and still have someone has hasn't been relevant in the pro game for about 30 years strip your achievements down with barely a second thought. And someone who never did anything about that forehand. 

I mean, come the hell on already with that forehand.

Therapy with TWA: Nick Kyrgios

OK. You might have heard a little bit about Nick Kyrgios' performance at last week's tournament in Shanghai. If you haven't, here's a video highlighting his "level" of "play."
At first, those in the tennis know felt that the $16,500 fine first levied on him was a bit weak, but then yesterday, the ATP brought the hammer down. It fined him an additional $25,000 ... and ended his season. Kind of. Kyrgios was banned from the sport for eight weeks. He will be allowed to return one day before the Australian Open. This is the ATP saying to Nick:

Even more merciful still, the ATP has offered to reduce the ban to three weeks if he would submit to psychiatric care. Nick's statement is like, "See y'all in 2017," so I guess that's a no.
So it's time for us to talk about Nick. In a profile the New York Times did about Kyrgios, he tells the writer that he doesn't know his racquet head size, and it appears he knows little about the strings he uses. The best tennis players in the world are almost always students of the game and its history. Roger Federer. Rafa Nadal. Serena Williams (and she wasn't always). But if you want to do something well, you learn about how to do it, and who before you has done it.
Kyrgios has said he doesn't like tennis, that he'd rather be playing basketball. Why doesn't he just play basketball? Seriously, I'm asking. I have no idea.
The temper doesn't bother me so much. First, it sort of flies in the face of the idea he doesn't care. Also, we loved John McEnroe for being a jerk on the court. It gave tennis an extra dimension. For some reason, tennis has this reputation of being a "gentleman's" sport. We wave off our accidental winning shots. We shake hands when it's over. But most people I know don't feel very gentlemanly about tennis when they're playing. They are trying to win. And unless you're dealing with a complete jerk, it's almost universally understood that any anger displayed is meant inwardly, not at your opponent. (Unless you think Novak Djokovic was really mad at Roberto Bautista Agut over the weekend in Shanghai.) Yelling at fans is wrong, though, and inexcusable. They literally have paid to sit there and listen to you yell at them.
The larger sin for most, including me, is this nonsense about not giving it a good effort during a match. There are two things that irritate the hell out of me when I see it on a tennis court I am occupying. 1. Cheating. Because just don't even bother if you're going to cheat. 2. Showing a lack of effort, or showing that you're just not interested in our match. Then leave. I've got other things to do, you've got other things to do, and I think I'm decent enough that you could stop looking at your cell phone for a second. On the pro level, this sentiment must be emphasized by a thousand. People are paying good money to watch you play. Your opponent wants to play well and likely is trying to improve his lot in the rankings. This is not a situation where your laziness/lack of concern/whatever your problem is is affecting only yourself.
Kyrgios is uneducated about his sport. He's rude. He bails out of matches and says terrible things to people. All of that is true. Here's why I'm willing to give him a few minutes to settle down: He's a kid. He's 21. And he's a male, so it's a given that mentally, he's really, like, 15. For some reason, we expect our athletes, even the young ones, to be fully formed when they emerge onto the scene. This is probably because they are physically strong and most likely able to do things that we can't do and that's something we can see plainly. So when they show an incomplete or malformed personality, we just can't believe it. But they are undergoing a maturation process, like any other human. Among the things he needs to assess -- the main thing really -- is whether he wants to play tennis. If the answer is no, well then, That probably would solve about 100 percent of his problems.
There's hope for Nick. Back in the day (like seven years ago), there was this player. Let's call him Novak Djokovic, because that is who I am talking about. He was tagged by top analysts of the game as an up-and-comer, with a megaton of talent. There was one problem, though: He bailed out of matches faster than I dodge mowing the lawn, even after he won a major. He was known for showing little effort, or just quitting, claiming some niggling injury. A lot of people wondered if it was going to be his lack of effort that kept him from realizing his full potential. We know the answer to that question now.
Ultimately, this suspension will be good for everyone. Tennis fans want to see blood for Kyrgios' behavior and Kyrgios needs to do some thinking. I'm genuinely curious to see what a couple months off will do for him.

U.S. Open 2016: The men's draw (or Why Not Be Seeded Fourth?)

Must be nice to be Novak Djokovic. You work hard, become a post-Federer/Nadal machine and then just when there's the slightest vulnerability (a bad wrist, for example) that might be at the heart of you being bundled out of the Olympics early, you end up in this top-heavy draw and you have what appears to be a very hard path just to the semifinals. Even Rafael Nadal, seeded fourth has got a smoother-looking draw than you. And on top all of that, there's a donkey cheese shortage that has severely curtailed your training.

Just kidding about the last part, although someone should really make sure Djokovic's supply remains secure. He's going to need it over the next two weeks. 

First up is Jerzy Janowicz, who has a nice game but his head game is a touch sensitive. But then you get perhaps Martin Klizan. SEED. Low seed, but still. Then maybe John Isner or Richard Gasquet. SEED. Marin Cilic. SEED. Jo-Jo Tsonga. SEED.  That's just through the quarterfinals. Djokovic will see a megaton of potential landmines just to advance through the first week. 

Having said all of that, I believe he will do that. Maybe only that. Curious to see how he looks after that first round. 

At the bottom half of this half is Milos Raonic. This weekend, one of his coaches, John McEnroe, said he would not be working with Raonic during the Open, and it must have been in part because of the criticism he took on because of his concurrent duties as commentator for ESPN during Wimbledon. It was a distraction. I'm not a fan of this arrangement either, but honestly, I think it's a worse offense when it involves coaches of female players during non-Slam events. I have gone there before, so I will digress. But it was a good call on Mac's part, and also, it appears that Raonic is a quick study. He's taken all of that net advice to heart and between McEnroe and Carlos Moya, Raonic is on track to be a threat. With a shaky Djokovic looming, this could be his chance to strike.

Here's my bottom half of the draw 

and I know what you're thinking. You might even be right. Yeah, I'm still thinking of Juan Martin del Potro's fine performance in Brazil and yes, that came virtually out of nowhere. There is no real evidence to back up a semifinal showing from him at the U.S. Open. But I will say it again -- if del Potro had been remotely healthy since he upset Roger Federer in the U.S. Open final in 2009, the men's tennis landscape would have more of a South American flair to it. And it looks like he's healthy again. He's unseeded here, but do I think he can beat Diego Schwartzman, Steve Johnson, David Ferrer, Dominic Thiem and Stan Wawrinka or Nicolas Kyrgios? Um, yeah. Yep. This could totally backfire, but I'm putting some eggs in the del Potro basket. 

I will also be leaving some of those eggs for Andy Murray, of course, because I believe he will win the U.S. Open. He is the steadiest of the Big Four right now (one, Roger Federer, is missing). 

First round matches worth blocking out some time at work for: 

Fernando Verdasco v. Stan Wawrinka: Like, really? I guess really, then. Unfair draw for both guys.

Feliciano Lopez v. Borna Coric: A wily veteran vs. an upstart kid who just beat Nadal. Hm. Hmm.

Radek Stepanek v. Gilles Simon: Just because Stepanek reminds me of Dracula. Will his tennis career never die? Does he have a reflection? Are you sure??

Dustin Brown v. Milos Raonic: Should be entertaining. One-sided, but entertaining. 

Djokovic v. Janowicz: For Djokovic's sake, here's hoping that wrist is at least serviceable.