F the USTA

Dear USTA:

I would start out this letter by simply saying, "You suck!" but you probably already know that, so I won't. I would just like to let you know a few things about tennis.

Some people just want to go to the park and play tennis. Some people don't have enough money to pay 40 dollars for a one-year membership to your shitty organization, and surely do not want to part with their hard-earned scranch just for the right to have a piece of shit membership card that says so. Furthermore, your league system sucks, and I think you have some wacked out priorities about the sport in general. Is your goal to promote the sport or to make money? Hmmmmmm...me thinks it's the second one. No one goes through the USTA to do anything unless they live in a big city, and here in Colorado, when someone utters the forbidden phrase "CTA," they are usually met with a sideways glance and a hard snicker. USTA, you are a disgusting tool.

In case you were wondering, USTA, what this rant is all about...I will tell you. The other day, I tried to sign up for a men's 4.5 league that will start playing in May and go through the summer. I had to "self-rate" myself, because in your infinite wisdom, everyone must have a designated skill level. I was halfway through your little self-rating program when I started to realize that I must have mis-read one of the questions, and since there is no way to go back and re-answer a question, I decided to close the window and start over. Then your program locked me out and rated me as a 6.0! What the fuck! In case you have forgotten, POSUSTA, your system ranks players from 1.0 (what is this thing called a racquet!?) all the way up to 7.0 (OMG it feels great to win Wimbledon again!). Most people are in the 3.0 to 4.0 ranks, and playing in a 4.5 league stands as a pretty respectable degree of ability. But 6.0!? What? You bastards. Now I have to appeal my ranking at send it to your office and let your degenerates decide that I am, in fact, not a professional tennis player, but am instead a mildly talented human being.

USTA, in case you didn't notice, I hate you.

Sincerely,

Jamison Parker
(and the real person who wrote this)

****************************************************

Anyhow, there is some real news at the moment. The team is idle right now -- we had an invogorating five matches in four days over the past weekend, so we had a few days off and are enjoying the Easter weekend by doing absolutely nothing. It freaking snowed here today but will be 70 tomorrow...go figure. It's CO. Fuck it. We have a week of practice, two matches, a week of practice, and then the conference tournament. I hope we are all peaking at the right time.

This was a Davis Cup weekend, and it was solid action all around. The US won which was nice. JB played well, Roddick played well, the Bryan bros played well (in singles even too!), so it was a solid effort. Semis now.

I wanted to see the France-Russia singles matches so badly!! Safin is such a bad ass!! He was held out of the first singles rubbers but then comes back and saves the day. What a quote: "It was a pure accident," said Safin, who is 29-18 in the Davis Cup. "I have not been playing for a long time and won quite unexpectedly."

As has been the trend lately, I'm going to go back for another round of Ass Ranger with my homework before some Easter dinner. Stay calm today, and please don't send me any more text messages that say, "Happy Easter, He is risen!" If you do, you're going right up on the big board next to the USTA.

Liverpool d. PSV Eindhoven 3-0

So that was a pretty sick game. A buddy and I devoured some pre-match subs and watched the first half, and then I watched the first half after our match against Metro. The soccer game went well, our match did not. Everyone was tired and a little dinged up after playing 10 times in 4 days, but oh well. We will get healthy and have some days off and get ready to beat that ass at the conference tournament.

Back to Liverpool for a minute. I know PSV was missing some players, but man, Liverpool took it to them very convincingly. The first goal was efficient and exactly what they should have done, the second goal was an amazing bonus, and the third goal was just insulting. I agree with the PSV coach...this series is doneski.

Davis Cup is in just a few days, and Roddick says that he is going to play no matter what. I read that he has been getting "intense ice, laser and other treatments" on his strained hamstring What!? Lasers? As I sit typing this with a bag of ice on my foot, I have to wonder...wouldn't it be nice to play sports for a living? I could have a team of people making sure that my foot feels 100% right now instead of sitting in a computer lab with a bag of stolen ice draped over my foot. Oh well. I like this better.

Davis Cup - doneski

A few of my predictions held up. My biggest mis-prognostication, if such a term exists, was the forecast of a Chilean upset of Russia. Didn't happen. That's OK though, because both teams have some amazing players, and I was just guessing that Fena's amazing run of late could blast Chile past Mother Russia. I like Safin too though, so whatever.

Some thoughts...

• I'm glad that the USA played some nice tennis on clay for a change. Blake dropped his match which was disappointing, but Roddick showed us something in his win over Berdych. Apparently it was the first Davis Cup tie on clay that the US had won in 10 years. Impressive.
• I watched most of the tie on the VS network - apparently that is what OLN turned in to when it died - and I must say that the tennis was good and the commentary sucked. Lief Shiras, you're on alert.
• I liked how Roddick didn't let the clay phase him mentally; that's the key to being successful in ANYTHING, but especially clay court tennis. I know from experience too, because I played on some clay this weekend - sorry, no pics or highlights...check sportscenter though...
• I will say this about that: Clay is not the most enjoyable surface to play on if you've played on hard courts your entire life, but as long as you just make up your mind that you're going to be OK, it doesn't matter that much. That's what all the Americans need to do at the French.
  
  Look at Nadal - he won the French and made the finals at Wimbledon because he did not care that he was playing on grass. Tennis is tennis, to an extent. You have to be able to move on different surfaces to be successful, and yes, Nadal is a great mover, but still, it's a lot more mental than anyone will admit.
  
  And I can't believe I'm linking to this but Peter Bodo makes a solid point with this.
  
  That's all for now. I'm going to go hit for a little bit. It's 70 degrees in Pueblo right now and the sky is blue (alright, partially blue) and it is amazing. BUT, it's going to be 30 degrees for the next three or four days and our huge opener is on Friday. I am really looking forward to not hitting for three days and then playing an amazing team from ACU. We're so screwed.

US vs. Czech Republic - Davis Cup Preview

The US is playing against the Czech Republic in Davis Cup action this weekend. I hope we don't suck. And yes, it is purely conincidental that ESPN decided to run the same story as me. This was purely spontaneous. Moving on.

There are three things (OK, there's more) that could really mess us up in this tie.

• Andy Roddick and James Blake are maaaaaybe not the best clay court players in the world. They are also playing against Thomas Berdych -- always a dangerous opponent.


• This goes with #1...it's on clay. Americans probably do need to train on it more, but they are still playing catch up to the rest of the world on hard courts.


• It's Davis Cup. It's an away match. It's a racous atmosphere. Anything can happen.

The good news is this: Roddick, Blake, and the Bryan brothers (the dubs team, never a concern) are playing just about as well as they can. Roddick disposed of some of the best players in the world at the Australian, and Blake is still playing an extremely high level of tennis.

I have all the confidence in the world about those guys, but Davis Cup is do or die; it's going to be fierce.

ATP round-robin

The ATP has decided to shake things up a little bit this year. Instead of the normal 32-player draw or whatever each tournament features, the first few days of competition will now be dominated by a round-robin format. Essentially, players are grouped and play the other players in their group and the winners advance out to the elimination phase, which usually begins as the QF. This means that you can still lose in your round-robin group but win the tournament. Some players like it, some don't. The only time I have used round-robins is at small local tournaments when there aren't enough players to fill out a full draw sheet. I think it's kind of stupid that the ATP is doing that on tour though. It is how they run the Tennis Masters Cup, which makes sense, because if you have the 8 best players in the world, why not have them play more matches and beat on each other a little bit more for the benefit of the audience? It doesn't make much sense to do it at every tournament though, which is probably why the ATP is just trialing it at select tournaments this year. Brad Gilbert doesn't like it, which is good enough for me to not like it. And I agree with him, on-court coaching would be much better. It is allowed at every other level of the game, why not at the top?

In other news, the US Davis Cup team was announced, and it was no surprise. In fact it's barely news worthy. The line up will be Andy Roddick, James Blake, the Bryan brothers at dubs. They are playing the Czech Republic on indoor clay Feb. 9-11. It will be interesting for sure...I hope they don't lose. Aside from Thomas Berdych there is no one that should pose a threat to the US players, but because it's Davis Cup, and because we suck on clay, anything could happen.