Mornings with Mr. Canoehead

Water off a duck's back, raisins off an Oldsmobile ... what's not bothering you know.

... Sports columnists who think they have a right to comment on Serena Williams' body. Shame on you, Jason Whitlock: "She'd rather eat, half-ass her way through non-major tournaments and complain she's not getting the respect her 11-major-championships résumé demands...seriously, how else can Serena fill out her size 16 shorts without grazing at her stall between matches?"

... Whoever at FOXSports.com came up with the "Jays' Halladay all but gone in Toronto" headline based on J.P. Ricciardi saying, "if something makes sense, we at least have to listen." Flimsy basis, much? New rule: If a list of teams a reporter believes someone might be traded to exceeds one-third of the league, it's straight out of Eklund country. Quoth Craig Calcaterra: "The Blue Jays ... cannot spend a decade talking about how impossible it is to compete with Boston and New York and then turn around and give them one of the best starting pitchers in baseball during a pennant race ... if it did, it would potentially kill baseball in Toronto forever, and the fact that Rosenthal spends any time on those options at all suggests that this is more of a 'throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks' column than anything else."


... Whatever possessed an Ohio sportswriter to say, "Let the rest of the world play rugby," after Team USA beat Canada in the final of the world junior football championship on Sunday. Far be it to point out Americans should be flattered some of their backwards neighbours throughout the world have taken up the gridiron game. No matter how bad the over-the-top chauvinism gets in Canada during the world junior hockey championship, you'd never catch someone saying, "Let the rest of the world play ringette."

... The rumour Leafs first-round draft choice Nazem Kadri did not put on a hat on draft day because of his Muslim faith. Brian Burke was hilarious shooting that down: None of the Leafs' choices put on a hat when called down to the podium at the NHL draft as per a team policy (Burke noted he wanted photographers to get a better shot of the players' faces), plus there were published photos of a younger Kadri wearing a Canadiens hat. Whoever started that is out of touch.

... Bob Uecker dropping hints on-air about the possibility of a Major League 4.

... idly wondering if ave people seen the blog, Tennis Has A Steroid Problem?

BT to the dub, Erin Nicks is back up and blogging at The Universal Cynic. It will get more traffic than this site without even trying, and that's OK.

Mornings with Mr. Canoehead

It's all raisins off an Oldsmobile. None of this should have kept you up at night ...

... Any gut feeling that the Senators will end up stuck with Dany Heatley and have to pay him his $4-million bonus.

... People treating the story about Wimbledon putting better-looking female players on centre court as ribald. Sorry, but when the two Grand Slam events held in old Europe often schedule Serena Williams to play on a side court, it's not amusing. It's something else which rhymes with acism.

... wondering how long until it is OK to riff on Vernon Wells changing his at-bat music to Michael Jackson songs. It's a classy move, but it's as if Wells is trying to point out someone else has actually gone even longer without producing a big hit.

... feeling like you have taken the Hamilton Tiger-Cats' futility for granted for the past 10 years. (That's a great column by Stephen Brunt.)

... Whether to take the inaugural football Junior World Championship seriously. The joy of football is the journey, yet New Zealand, Sweden and France travelled all the way to Canton, Ohio to lose by a combined 184-7 to Canada, Mexico and the U.S. Did the French run the original Statue of Liberty play against the Americans, or did their quarterback's play wristband read, "Prenez un genou."*

(BT to the dub, proof the Creator does not throw dice. The Hockey Hall of Fame is in the heart of Canada's largest city. The Baseball Hall of Fame is nestled in the postcard-worthy Finger Lakes. The Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio is right next to interstate highway.)

Columnists bellyaching about how bored they were by watching the NHL draft. There seriously has to be a better topic and whining about you doing journalism, isn't that what a blog is for? (Besides, Jack Todd wrote the definitive takedown of the NHL draft on Monday.)

(*That's French for, "Take a knee.")

Tennis ethics are different when a Williams sister is affected

Your guess is as good as any how the wire-service reporter could get that the ball "appears to glance first off (Maria José) Martínez Sánchez's right forearm, then off her racket, before going over the net."



It quite something how the reaction could be so varied, when it's that bloody obvious that Serena Williams got hosed on that call. It's also beside the point if it did hit her opponent's racket, since the point should have been decided as soon as the ball hit her arm.

It's not clear what ism is really most at play, other than the media's need to create conflict when there really isn't one and pander to the knee-jerkers.

Yahoo! Sports attempted to characterize it as "a tough one," when it was not:

"If, as Williams claims, Martinez Sanchez knew the ball hit her and didn't say anything, it's not honest, but it's not an egregious violation of tennis ethics either. You can see where Serena is coming from, but what did she want Martinez Sanchez to do, overrule the chair umpire?

"Tennis players aren't responsible for their own calls."

However, over in London where they know their tennis and speak really good European, that's not how it's being seen. The Sunday Times believes there should be an investigation, while a lot of people here are saying in not so direct language, "Shut up, Serena."

"When Serena Williams accuses her Spanish opponent Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez of cheating, then things need to be investigated. After all this is the sport where players admit that the ball bounced twice on their side of the net and the French Open is the place where competitors scuff out ball marks on the clay when they know they are out, to save the umpire the task of getting out of his chair to invigilate.

"... Those with a long memory immediately cited the case of Ken Flach in the 1985 US Open doubles final when he and Robert Seguso confronted Yannick Noah and Henri Leconte. Flach wore his hair stylishly shoulder long in those days and a drive from the French duo hit his flowing locks.

"Noah, very much a man of peace since his retirement, was incensed but Flach insisted he had no idea whether the ball touched his hair or not which quite conceivably have been the case. Long hair has no nerve endings in the follicles but anyone who has been dealt a heavy blow on the wrist of forearm will know what’s hit them."

The point is the obvious. There's a long history in tennis of players owning up to it when an incorrect call went in their favour. Even people who only pay attention during the Grand Slam events probably remember the story of what happened at the 1982 French Open, when Mats Wilander overruled the official on match point vs. José-Luis Clerc (and Wilander went on to win the replayed point and won the tournament).

However, suddenly when it happens to a outspoken player who is African-American, suddenly that's never happened. That's what you get when you have a media that is overly opinionated and undereducated.

Related:
Cheating and Racism at Roland Garros: Ahhhh, It Must Be Spring in Paris (Sports On My Mind)

UP AT 6: BEDARD FOR CY YOUNG (OK, WAIT A FEW WEEKS)

What you might have missed while convincing the "general manager" you were ready to come off the "physically unable to perform list."

• The pitching line for Navan, Ont.'s own Erik Bedard across his past four starts with the lousy Orioles: Twenty-nine innings, 12 hits, two earned runs, seven bases on balls and 41 strikeouts. What kind of Cy Young buzz are his friends in the Baltimore media going to whip up for him, though? Probably not much.
• Who's afraid of a tall nude black woman? Serena Williams has posed undraped (which is different from naked) for Jane magazine. The link might be unsafe for work, but try it on colleagues who believe she and her sister Venus look like men anyways.
• Canada's in a tough in men's basketball at the Pan-Am Games in Brazil. Leo Rautins' team lost by 19 in their first game vs. Puerto Rico yesterday and has to face the host country later today. Odessa, Ont.'s Aaron Doornekamp made a late-game three-pointer and of course, cishoops.ca is providing reports on all the action in the Canadians' pool.
• Sadly, Superbad seems to have captured way too much of our high school experience. Seth Rogen is a god.

SOMEONE ACTUALLY GOT PAID FOR THIS...

Those Sportsnet.ca blog writers are really on the ball... they've managed to age Maria Sharapova a couple extra years. Hey, it's a blog, right? It's just like e-mail! The rules of journalism, grammar and good writing don't apply.

"In 2006, the 22-year-old proved that she could be as successful on the court as she is front of the cameras, rising to No. 2 in the world rankings and collecting four other titles in addition to her dominant win over world No. 1 Justine Henin-Hardenne in the U.S. Open final in September.

"After she stunned the sports world with her victory over Serena Williams in the 2003 Wimbledon final as a 17-year-old, many wondered whether the Russian would maintain the desire and focus needed to win a second Grand Slam."

For the record, Sharapova is 19, she beat Williams at Wimbledon in 2004 and she's rather attractive for a six-foot blonde, but you knew that already.