Oh man! Straight sets?!?

If you haven't heard yet (and you're in the population that actually likes tennis), big Andy Roddick went down in the first round of the USOpen yesterday. This article on ESPN.com likens it to some of the greatest upsets of all time... clearly written by either someone that (a) lives for tennis or (b) doesn't have a very firm grip on sports-reality.

For one thing: elite tennis players lose to "top" tennis players all the time. This is especially true on the men's side of the bracket but in recent history has become increasingly more true on the women's side. I would liken this more to watching the Astros and Roger Clemens lose 5-2 in a game against Tomo Ohka and the Brewers. Is Ohka better than Clemens? Only if you're Mrs.Ohka (and even then you have your doubts). Is my comparison fair? No, not really but it's every bit as fair as some of those in that article!

On the other hand, when we went to see Roddick last year: you would have never guessed that something like this could happen. From the pre-match warmups when Andy flipped his racket around and hit balls into the stands like a baseball bat, to the match where he utterly obliterated his opponent in little more than an hour. He was awesome to watch... even if we were high enough up in the stands to require oxygen masks!