TennisThis

Looking back to the last two weeks of the Aussie Open tennis championships, we have learned a couple of things….here are the random things that we picked up while watching ESPN’s daily coverage of the tennis tournament (in no particular order):

• Brad Gilbert is probably one of the best tennis announcers around…”Give ‘em the cheese!”, “Bring the wood!”, and our favorite “Gotta play the fear-hand…”
• Speaking of tennis announcers, Chris McKendry had no clue what she was talking about – did anybody else pick up on that?
• Andy Roddick is starting to show signs of wear and tear on court.
• Serena Williams doesn’t seem to have much respect for other female tennis players – She did quite a bit of trash talking during this tennis tournament.
• Male tennis players seem to age much faster than us “normal” human beings – Is Roger Federer really only 28? He looks at least 33.
• Melbourne, Australia looks beautiful – though we think that the tennis organization should change the court surface back to what it was a couple years ago – it was faster.
• Some tennis players announce retirement but make “special” appearances for grand slam events – Fabrice Santoro, Justine Henin, and couple of others that we can’t think of right now – so it’s not really retirement, right?
• Being really tall doesn’t always make you a better tennis player – Juan Martin Del Potro, Marin Cilic, Ivo Karlovic, etc.
• In Melbourne, the locals say that if you wait 10 minutes, the weather will change (typically to a different season) – if you remember the 2009 Aussie, it’s was something like 140+ degrees on the surface of the tennis courts.
• There was some heavy promotion of Vegemite.
• Ball kids have to wear some funky hats during the tennis matches.
• The wives’ hate us for staying up so late watching the tennis matches and filling up the DVR with the tennis matches that were aired at 3:30 am.
• The time rule for between points is non-existent – some tennis players took up to 39 seconds between points.
• The Australian tennis committee moved the beer garden to the other side of the tennis gardens to avoid unruly drunken fans.
• If you have 15 grand slam titles, chances are, you’re probably going to win a few more.
• Australia’s tennis security guards need to pay more attention on court.
• Unfortunately we didn’t get to see much of the tennis doubles (mixed doubles too) on TV and we certainly did not see ANY wheelchair tennis, why not?
• Rod Laver doesn’t live in Australia – and he’s a San Diego Chargers fan – huh?
• Roger Federer was portrayed as a Great White Shark – we also need a bigger tennis racquet!

Well, guess we could sit here for hours writing out all the little nuances we found during the two fabulous weeks of tennis action, but we just don’t have that much time. Feel free to add some of the things that you, the fellow reader, found to be beyond the tennis action!