Rabbits, Blinkity

So, Cow on Ice beat Vika the Pirate (aka Extremely Injured) in the Stuttgart final. And it was awesome.

So now, people are speculating on whether or not Sharapova's best surface is clay now. I'm pleased to report that according to my magic tennis statistics box, is probably is:

Maria Sharapova pre-surgery (before 2009)
Overall win percentage: 0.794
Clay win percentage: 0.750
Grass win percentage: 0.855
Hardcourt win percentage: 0.790

Clay is worst.

Maria Sharapova post-surgery (2009 and on)
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There's a show on the USA network called Fairly Legal. It's about an arbitration negotiator, but that's not really important. Actually, the show is quite terrible; the plots are bizarrely artificial and usually contrived to demonstrate that, yes, the lead is the most gorgeous person in all of television. But it's still—for a certain mindset, anyway—well worth watching to see Sarah Shahi treat people like crap. (Or rather Shahi's character, to be fair, not that anybody actually cares to differentiate. It's "Sarah Shahi AS Tremendous Jerk"). If she want to get someone's attention, she'll whistle loudly or scream or break glass. Once per episode she'll dump a drink on somebody, or throw their cell phone into the harbor, or... you get the picture. She's completely unprofessional, and always late for everything. She periodically sets things on fire.

Sometimes this is vaguely justified, but usually? It's just not. And it's still fun to watch. We still want Kate to "win."

When it comes to entertainment, we love assholes. Our friends who run the USA network are particularly fond of them, of course (see also: In Plain Sight, Burn Notice, et al.) It's basically the whole point of House. 30 Rock's Jack Donaghy is made of asshole, and has basically no other redeeming qualities. Anything involving Gorden Ramsey is generally this. And you can't convince me that a substantial percentage of the inordinately large crowd watching American Idol, or now X-Factor, aren't there purely to watch Simon Cowell insult people in a British accent.

All this is a very complicated way to say that yes, Victoria Azarenka is a bit of a dick. In the very worst possible way. This doesn't mean you can't want her to win.
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Over in the land of professional tennis, there's been a lot of talk lately about so-called "grunting". It seems certain tennis player make a noise when they hit the ball. And whether you call it grunting, or screaming, or growling, or "I-hate-that-turn-it-off," opinions can be found everywhere from USA Today to FOX Sports Australia to every tennis blog, forum, and TV commentator. Every time you turn around, somebody else has something else to say about it.

It's horrible and distracting. It's borderline gamespersonship, and the players should complain. It's not actually that bad, and people should just put the TV on mute on if they don't like it. It's not actually that bad live; it's just the microphones that make it seem loud. It's even worse live, you can hear it from the next stadium over. It's contrary to the spirit of tennis; it's a sign tennis is evolving beyond its country club roots.

So, naturally, I have some feelings about this too. And my number-one feeling is, get over yourselves! Here's why.
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I've now got a tumblr: Tennis Whimsy. I intend to fill it up with, shall we say, dramatic sketches of tennis matches. None of that boring analysis stuff, just raw... stuff.

Also, there will be random/funny/bitchy quotes from all your favorite tennis stars.

Check it out!

Yesterday, I called Vika a pirate, and today she has the tennis player's equivalent of a wooden leg. Goddamn peanut gallery jinx. So, uh, my bad, dude!

Yes, they're at it again. Ten times they've played, this will be the eleventh. A-Rad's won three, Azarenka's won seven. Almost half have been three setters, half have involved a set that went to 7. In short, it's almost always fun when they play. But you probably knew this already.

The really neat thing about this matchup is that at this point in their careers, neither player is really prone to blowing up randomly. Yes, Azarenka used to have, well, issues, and Radwanska still sometimes just plays badly, as it were, but you can be reasonably certain that neither will completely lose her head and implode. Neither will just start missing dozens of shots, or double faulting at every turn, or simply stop trying. It's simply less stressful to watch them than a Sharapova or a Wozniacki or a Stosur or Li Na. In my opinion. And at the same time, VikaNinja* aren't exactly boring, hit-it-between-the-lines types either.

Can Vika hit Radwanska off of the court? Again? Or will Sneaky McNinja hit three dozen dropshots and get away with far more of them than she has any real right to? Will Radwanska keep her obscene service record for this tournament alive, or will Vika do her usual returning job? On paper, Azarenka should win easily, but I've convinced it'll be fairly close. It's an enormous game of cat/mouse, where it's not exactly clear who's the cat and who's the mouse.

Most importantly, will A-Rad return and volley again? (I swear she…
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Before you read anything else, you need to find out why you should stop worrying and love the WTA. That's my #1 feeling about the AO, actually. I really, really tried to watch more ATP matches this time, I promise. And almost every time (exception: Geal Monfils, why must you do this to me?), I became increasingly bored, and ended up watching women's doubles or something.

So in the interest of my never using the same format twice, grades! In no particular order!

Finals: B-

I watched the men slog through the first two sets, said to myself "Djokovic in five" and went to bed, because I wasn't going to stay up until six-thirty in the morning to watch them slug it out. See: above, re: loving the WTA. Look, Masha vs. Viki wasn't the match we hoped it would be, but I can honestly say I got more out of it in terms of entertainment per second. Now, I get that Djokovic and Nadal are incredible athletes, and that's great for them. But watching them play is sort of like watching basketball without the defensive goal tending rule; the only way to score is via dunk.

Victoria Azarenka: A+

She was in great form almost the entire tournament, she successfully stuck it to the obnoxious crowd, she beat Kim Clijsters at the Australian Open, and she did it all while wearing shorts (will this usher in a shorts-wearing era for the WTA? 'cause that would be awesome.) Her groundstrokes were to die for, her net play was above average, and she didn't even miss that many overheads. Not to mention, she kept control of herself in key moments, specifically after dropping the first-set tiebreak against Radwanska. Generation suck no longer.
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She stares impassively across the net, bouncing a tennis ball thoughtfully. She throws the ball high - too high - up in the air, pauses for a moment, then throws all the power of her 6'3" frame against it with a tremendous sound. To no avail; the ball crashes into the net. "15-40" says the chair umpire. For a moment the player look furious, outraged that the ball would betray her - but only for a moment. She stands still. Her features flow back to calmness. She turns around and walks toward the backstop in stiff half-steps. As she stops to receive balls for possibly the last point in the set, she glances up to the crowd, her face a perfect mask. The cameras zoom in. And the world wonders: what on earth is going on in Maria Sharapova's mind?
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