Think I'll go all Roger Federer on you today. That is, I'll just go about my business, type a few pretty paragraphs, throw in a few juicy quotes, make a few brilliant observations, explain it all (and more) and call it good. Just take care of business in a ho-hum,

Crazy times, busy day here at the U.S. Open. With much to do, and not a lot of time to do it, here's today's Crisis Center post. Pete will be around shortly with something much more substantial...and enjoyable. Here's today's schedule: 12:00 pm: Rafael Nadal vs. Juan Martin del Potro,

*90625927 By Pete Bodo I spent this afternoon working on a piece for Tennis.com about the Super Saturday concept, a "tradition" that was wildly popular with some fans, especially high rollers who couldn't be bothered helicoptering in from the Hamptons for anything less than something with "Super" in front of

It tastes so good, so can sugar really be that bad? We asked the experts. Sugar is to our food supply what piercing screams are to Maria Sharapova matches: ubiquitous. The average American consumes a whopping 152 pounds of “added” sugar—caloric sweeteners not found naturally in foods—a year. That’s way

A few extra pounds can slow you down on court. We show you how to drop 10 of them by Memorial Day. Want to improve your court coverage? Shed a few pounds and you might be surprised by what you can do. “If you can get to your optimal body

Energy products have swept the sports world, but should you believe the hype? Here’s a guide to which ones will give your game a jolt and which you should leave on the shelf. By Alyssa Shaffer If you asked a tennis player 20 years ago how he or she fueled

It’s a yearly ritual: You walk into the U.S. Open smelling like Coppertone and walk out with the hood of your raincoat pulled around your face. The tournament’s two weeks always serve as a transition from summer to fall, from the country to the city, but this year the change

*90577269 by Pete Bodo They were like two youngsters shaken awake from an afternoon nap: each of them was thinking, What day is it? Where am I? Who am I? The answers were: Thursday, Sept. 10th, 2009, they were in Arthur Ashe Stadium, and they were Travis Parrott and Carly

As I threaded my way through the overstuffed grounds at Flushing Meadows in the early evening yesterday, I caught the sound of John McEnroe’s voice on a café television. The New York native was saying that it felt like one of those special nights at the Open, when there was

I have to be honest, I've never really warmed to Fernando Verdasco, although there's much to recommend him, beginning with the fact that he's left-handed, and has no inhibitions about smacking the fur off a tennis ball. But something held me back. I thought about that today as he warmed

DENVER(AP) The magazine cover and accompanying story sit on Kurt Kamperman's desk - a reminder of where his sport has been and where it cannot go again. ``Is Tennis Dying?'' the Sports Illustrated cover asks. Inside is a 5,000-word discourse about the slow, sad dismantling of the Great American Tennis

*90442910 by by Pete Bodo Long before Andy Murray and Marin Cilic took the court to haggle over a berth in the US Open quarterfinals, I had an inkling that it would be a different, downbeat kind of day. It's often like that on the Tuesday after Labor Day -

On Sunday night Andy Murray stood under the bright lights of Ashe Stadium. He looked crisp in light blue, and he played even more crisply in slicing up that bull in a China closet named Taylor Dent. The spotlight seemed to sharpen the Scot, in both style and substance. This

“What, you’re rooting for Isner?” my girlfriend Julie said in outrage. It was Saturday night, and I’d just hung my head in disappointment after the American giant had missed his umpteenth volley against Andy Roddick. “Yeah, you have to root for Isner,” I said without thinking. There really did seem

90426379 By Pete Bodo I have this theory about the state of the women's game these days. It's pretty simple. One reason we're seeing so many hot-potato matches is because the opportunities are too abundant. When the game has no dominant duo or trio - think Evert, Navratilova, Graf, Seles,

*90413241 by Pete Bodo About midway through the second set of the third-round US Open match between no. 6 seed Juan Martin del Potro and Austria's Daniel Koellerer, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned, surprised to see former Top 5 pro, Jose-Luis Clerc, sitting behind me. I've

I felt it way up on the roof of my mouth on Wednesday and knew I was doomed. It was an unpleasantly familiar sensation, a scratchy irritation that compelled me to stick my tongue up there and rub as hard as I could, as if that were going to relieve

90354896 by Pete Bodo Sometimes, like yesterday, it must be hard to be Maria Sharapova. There she was, a glamorpuss all decked out in a pale purple dress with fluorescent chartreuse straps and details. Impossibly tall, leggy and all-around marvelous, more than a little intimidating in a variety of ways,

90341959 by Pete Bodo Sometimes, bad things happen to good people, including good tennis players. And Jesse Levine is a mighty good tennis player. Oh, he may not be a contender at Grand Slam events, and he may be better known as the lad Roger Federer chose to import to

Juan Carlos Ferrero spent his Friday digging. He did it in ways big and small. He began by digging himself a two-set hole in his match with Germany’s Philipp Petzschner. To climb out of that, he needed to spend a good couple of hours in the hot afternoon sun bending