The Tricky Double

LONDON--A Serbian slump, a Spanish flurry.

That's the early story out of Wimbledon today, with Serbia's Jelena Jankovic, the No. 2 seed in the women's singles competition, bounced out today by little-known journeywoman Tamarine Tanasurgan of Thailand.

Jankovic join's fellow Serbs Ana Ivanovic (No. 1) and Novak Djokovic (No. 3 on the men's side) as early upset victims this year. All three surged to the top of their respective tours in the past year, but all three were beaten early here at the world's most important tennis tournament.

Jankovic, with her left knee taped after jamming in on Saturday, couldn't keep pace with the groundstrokes of Tanasurgan, one of the hottest players on tour after winning a pre-Wimbledon tourney in the Netherlands. Jankovic couldn't seem to move well enough on her sore knee, and she had her serve broken three times in the second set to lose a surprisingly lopsided 6-3, 6-2 verdict to the world's 60th ranked player.

(UPDATE: The No. 4 seed among the women, Russia's Svetlana Kuznetsova, was upset in three sets by Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland, leaving fifth seeded Elena Dementieva as the highest seeded player left in the women's draw. Sisters Serena and Venus Williams, the sixth and seventh seeds, both won easily today.)

With Spain still riding the wave of emotion after capturing Euro 2008 in Vienna on Sunday night, meanwhile, three Spanish men arrived in the Round of 16 today at the All-England Club hoping to make history for their country.

Rafael Nadal, seeded No. 2, is in some minds the favourite to end Roger Federer's domination of the English greensward. (UPDATE: Nadal crushed Russia's Mikhail Youzhny today, while Federer easily defeated former Wimbledon champ Lleyton Hewitt). Fernando Verdasco and left Felipe Lopez, both lefthanders like Nadal, were also still alive today, hoping for a quarterfinal berth.

(UPDATE: Verdasco was eliminated this afternoon, losing a marathon five-set match to Mario Ancic of Croatia. Ancic, who lost the first two sets, won the final set 13-11, finishing off Verdasco with an ace down the middle. Lopez later outlasted Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus in another five-setter, 8-6 in the final set, giving Spain two quarterfinalists.)

No Spanish male has won this tournament since Manuel Santana in 1966.

But here's a little historical parallel. When Amelie Mauresmo won the Wimbledon singles title in 2006, she was the first Frenchwoman to capture the title since Suzanne Lenglen in 1926.

In '06, of course, France also won made the final of soccer's World Cup, but lost to Italy.

This year, Spain has won Euro '08. Could another tennis achievement follow?

NOTES: Canada's Daniel Nestor and his doubles partner, Serbia's Nenad Zimonjic, moved into the quarterfinals today with an impressive straight sets victory over Britain's Jamie Murray and Max Mirnyi of Belarus. The only other Canadian left at Wimbledon, junior Milos Raonic of Thornhill, Ont., won his first round match in straight sets over James Chaudry of Britain to advance.

Russians, Czechs and Saturday Night Tennis

LONDON--By the end, it was so dark, they had to bring out new balls for the players to see.

That's how desperate Wimbledon organizers were Saturday night to make sure the match between Mikhail Youzhny of Russia and the Czech Republic's Radek Stepanek was completed.

After all, the winner was to play Rafael Nadal on Monday.

The scene was noisy, maybe a little ugly and nearly surreal. After four hours, Youzhny and Stepanek, two of the tour's more entertaining players, were deadlocked at two sets apiece.

It was like a Davis Cup match had broken out. Russians chanting on one side of the legendary "Graveyard of Champions," Court No. 2, and Czechs chanting on the other.

Both players emoting, chirping at their supporters, mugging for the fans and kissing the net cord when it worked in their favour.

The clock ticked on. The light faded.

At 9:24, with Youzhny ahead 5-3 in the fifth set and serving for the match at deuce, Stepanek fell, apparently injuring his right hand.

At 9:26, he called for a medical timeout. Camera flashbulbs seemed like lighthouse beacons in the near darkness.

At 9:29, they resumed play. Two points later, Youzhny won the match. As Stepanek walked to his chair, he smashed a racquet, then another.

Russian fans booed.

Then Youzhny stood at mid-court, placing his racquet on his head while saluting, military style, to the various corners of the court.

Czech fans booed.

It was a wild night at the All-England Club. Not stuffy at all.

Breaking Up the Gang

Don't expect to read any rejoicing over the departure of Darcy Tucker here.

No, he and I never liked each other, never got along. That's okay. We're all grownups.

But for the majority of his time in Toronto, you had to like his spirit and moxie, even if it was too often more self-serving than team oriented.

Tucker, like Tie Domi, created an image in Toronto, and like Domi, went south as a player when he started to believe too much in those press clippings.

But that doesn't change the fact that, pound for pound, he was one of the fiercest players to ever wear blue-and-white. Had he stayed real, had he not tried to re-invent himself as a scorer rather than his natural role of agitator, the Leafs surely would have liked to have kept him.

Fair or not, Tucker was viewed as one of the leaders of the so-called Muskoka Five, a gang now broken up by GM Cliff Fletcher. Fletcher vowed big changes, and you have to give him credit for following through. Tucker's gone, Mats Sundin's all but gone, and Kyle Wellwood, John Pohl and Andrew Raycroft are also no longer Leafs.

Bryan McCabe, by autumn, will almost certainly be playing somewhere else, as well. So the players who banded together to defy the wishes of management and remain Leafs at the 2008 trade deadline have, really, gained very little in the end.

Tomas Kaberle, at this point, seems the only one of the five certain to stick around. Tucker's pink slip was signed the day new head coach Ron Wilson mused aloud that the truculent winger seemed to have "worn down," likely echoing the thoughts of the rest of the Leaf management team that watched Tucker play all last year.

Tucker, if he can get back to his roots as a player, may find new life elsewhere. Sundin certainly will. It's less clear about Wellwood and Raycroft. McCabe, once traded, will undoubtedly be a better player elsewhere with the pressure of playing in Toronto and living up to his ridiculous contract lifted from his shoulders.

But it really doesn't matter what any of these players do in their post-Leaf career. None were going to help the team in the immediate future, with a very difficult 2008-09 season looming, and with their no question any longer this is a major rebuild.

Essentially, Fletcher has, indeed, blown up the Leafs. The next steps will be interesting. Does he try to replace Tucker with free agent Sean Avery? Would the Leafs pitch for Marian Hossa to replace Sundin as the team's franchise player?

Or will this club do the smart thing, suffered through a difficult season next year, pick very high in the '09 draft and really try to build something that lasts?

Misogyny and the Hockey Hall of Fame

There are a number of highly qualified, highly respected and thoughtful hockey people on the selection committee of the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Who'd have thought they could screw up so badly?

Last week, they announced the next Hall of Fame class, and it's a good one - Glenn Anderson, Igor Larionov, linesman Ray Scapinello and the late Ed Chynoweth.

Sadly, however, the 18-member selection committee again booted the ball so badly on honouring women in the game that it has seriously discredited itself and soiled the reputation of this hockey institution.

A year ago, you could argue that the HHOF was caught flatfooted when the IIHF Hall of Fame beat it to the punch and inducted several outstanding females - Angela James, Geraldine Heaney and Cammi Granato - for their contributions to the game. Tens of thousands of women and young girls now play in the game around the world, it's been an Olympic sport for a decade and Canadian and U.S. universities are filled with outstanding student athletes focusing on the sport.

This year, however, it's clear the HHOF selection committee, by ignoring women again, is either ignorant or blatantly misogynistic. It is now deliberately going out of its way to arrogantly deny a long list of female pioneers their rightful place in the Hall just because the old boy's club wants to pretend women's hockey doesn't matter in the same way it used to pretend outstanding European players weren't suitably qualified for induction.

The worst part is that it's all a big secret. The selection committee never reveals who was nominated, how the vote went or who voted for whom.

That's what allows these people to keep women out. They never have to reveal the workings of their secret organization, never have to be accountable to anyone other than themselves. That's how the Ballards and Steins once wormed their way in.

The HHOF is, however, a public trust. People need to be able to believe that decisions on inductees are being made on a fair and equitable basis, not because somebody likes somebody or doesn't like somebody else.

That's part of what kept Anderson out for so long. It wasn't about his talent or his accomplishments. There were some on the selection committee who held a personal grudge against Anderson and simply refused to vote for him.

When it comes to women, there are some on the selection committee who have zero knowledge of the women's game, have never seen women play on a competitive level and simply don't understand the enormous contribution that many women have made to the sport.

And they're not interested in finding out.

Instead, they'll go out of their way to honour officials, bureaucrats, owners and, of course, their friends, but will make sure outstanding individuals who actually built the women's game continue to be kept out of their rightful place in the HHOF. They try to hide behind a sense of confusion over whether women should be honoured as players or builders or in some special category, but that's just a tactic that allows them to pretend they're actually considering the matter.

Excluding women from the Hall is no longer an understandable oversight. It's now simple chauvinism exhibited by people who are supposed to be caretakers of the sport, not political bagmen doling out patronage.

Keeping women out of the HHOF is insulting to women and a great game. Those responsible should do the right thing and resign their positions.

Draft Day

Maple Leaf fans have reason to hope today and tomorrow will signify positive, new beginnings for their favourite hockey team.

The Leafs have the No. 7 pick in tonight's draft, and by 9 p.m. or so there will be a new teenager with "saviour" tattooed on his forehead. There are all kinds of trade rumours, including some linking Pavel Kubina to San Jose when Kubina's trade window opens this weekend. There's an intent to at least try again to move veterans Darcy Tucker and Bryan McCabe, whose only professional aspirations currently seem to be to live in Toronto, whether the hockey club wants them or not.

So lots of intrigue, many possibilities.

And what a strange little move with which to see the hockey club start off.

After resourcefully picking up a third round pick, 70th overall, from Florida at the trade deadline for Chad Kilger, Fletcher peddled that moderately useful pick to St. Louis last night for 33-year-old winger Jamal Mayers.

Mayers is a local fellow, a big, grinding winger who again played for Canada at the recent world championships in Quebec City and Halifax. The Leafs have been eyeballing him for years as a useful third or fourth line player. Mayers is under contract for the next two seasons at the very affordable $1.4 million.

The question, however, would be why is the team selling off newly acquired picks, even third rounders, for aging veterans who can at best play supporting roles?

It's not a big deal, that's for sure. But isn't this where the Leafs want to be hoarding as many young prospects as possible, not dealing off picks? Or is the plan here to patch together a lineup that can qualify for that exalted eighth and final playoff berth in the east?

While first and second rounders are obviously the most useful, any pick in the top 100 has value. The idea was to move Kilger to start the rebuilding process, yet the pick acquired in exchange for him has now been flipped to land another older player.

Curious. Let's see what the rest of the weekend brings.

Thursday Mail Bag

Gotta love the entry draft.

If spring training in baseball is the time when hope springs eternal, well, the NHL draft has to come in a close second. Everyone’s unbeaten, every prospect is viewed as if they will reach their greatest possible upside and every team has a future.

The Maple Leafs, picking No. 7 on Friday night in Ottawa, are drafting at their highest position in 19 years, and for that, their fans should be somewhat grateful, if only because they haven’t already dealt the pick away. They did that last year, you’ll remember, and even though Vesa Toskala was probably worth it in the end, the cumulative impact of trading away so many top picks and so many prospects over the years has had a sobering effect on Leaf fans.

It shouldn’t work that way. Leaf fans get as excited or more excited than most fans about young players and teenage junior stars. Robbing them so often of the enjoyable process of watching a player mature from prospect to draft pick to NHL regular to NHL impact player just hasn’t been fair.

Fans need hope. And young players always represent hope in a way veterans never really can.

I’ve suggested in the past that the Leafs should place a five-year moratorium on trading away first round picks, even if only to give their fans respite from the perennial wasting of future possibilities.

Let’s face it; if they’d put such a moratorium in place five years ago, would they have missed out on anything? Would they be any further behind than they are now?

Now on to this week’s mail bag:

Q: Hey Damien: a quick query about this year's entry draft. While it's hard to predict who the Leafs (a team that, sadly, has very little to get excited about except what looks to be an early plan to have a shot at Tavares in the 2009 draft) might covet with their pick, I'm wondering what TYPE of player they're looking for. There are some talented forwards in this deep-looking draft as well as some possible top-four defenders. Any word on what - or yes, maybe even who - the Leafs are after?

Jamie Baker, St. John's

A: Teams are always very secretive about the types of players they’re looking for. Well, not all teams. Detroit GM Ken Holland makes it clear the Wings look for skill and value skill above nationality, aggressiveness, position and just about everything else. With the Leafs, however, management and scouts change so frequently that they’ve been unable to put such a philosophy in place over the years and make it stick.

In terms of “type,” hopefully you don’t mean position, because what you may need as a team now may have little or nothing to do with what you’ll need in two or three years when the player you’re drafting in ’08 might be ready to play. With the Leafs, Cliff Fletcher is temporarily in charge, Dave Morrison is in charge of the amateur scouts, the whole organization is in flux and there’s not a whole lot to go on. So I won’t lie to you – I really don’t know what type of player the Leafs are looking for. Based on their drafting record over the years, I’m not sure they do, either.

Heading to the Sacred Lawns

In the debate over the identity of the world's top individual athlete, Tiger Woods renewed the argument for himself over tennis star Roger Federer with a spectacular, gritty performance at the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines over the weekend.

Playing on a bad wheel, Woods delivered drama and a terrific storyline, outlasting journeyman Rocco Mediate to win his 14th major in style.

Now, with Wimbledon just around the corner, it's Federer's turn to respond, and it sure isn't going to be easy.

To be sure, he's heading back to his favourite surface, grass, upon which he's won 59 straight matches and five straight Wimbledon singles titles. He's been ranked No. 1 in the world since Feb. 2, 2004.

But he's got the King of Clay, Rafael Nadal, breathing down his neck, something Woods really doesn't have as he continues to dominate his sport without anything approximating a real rival.

Nadal blew Federer off the court in the final of the French Open, and on Sunday did something no other Spaniard had done in 36 years, win a grass court tournament. Nadal forced Federer to the limit in last year's Wimbledon final, and based on the performances of the two men so far this season, Federer can't be viewed as the overwhelming favourite to win again despite his fabulous record of success on grass, particularly if he runs into Nadal again.

If Federer were not able to defend his title at the All-England Club, then surely the sense that his star is starting to fade would gain momentum at the same time Woods clearly is unchallenged as the world's top golfer. He proved at Torrey Pines that even if injuries come, as they inevitably do, he may have the resources to overcome them and win many more majors.

Federer, meanwhile, didn't win Australia this year and didn't win the French. He's at 12 Grand Slam singles titles, two short of Pete Sampras' all-time record. If Nadal, or somebody else, knocks him off at Wimbledon, what at one time seemed a lock, that he would eclipse Sampras' record, might suddenly seem in doubt.

And there won't be much debate about the identity of the world's top individual athlete any more.

Losing the Handle

It matters less what A.J. Burnett says than what he does.

And what he does, very consistently, is win about the same number of games as he loses. He’s 75-72 over the course of his major league career, 10-8 last season and 6-6 this season, albeit with an ERA more than a full run per game higher.

He’s been getting an awful lot of money to be basically a .500 pitcher from the Blue Jays mostly because J.P. Ricciardi believed he could be more than a .500 pitcher, and has been proven wrong.

With the team sinking – again – and with Burnett approaching a clause in his contract that will allow him to opt out of his deal after this season, of course there is going to be speculation about his future.

But instead of being bothered by the fact he apparently would love to pitch for the first place Cubs rather than the last place Blue Jays, Blue Jay fans should probably be more encouraged by the possibility that over the next six weeks there may be a chance for the team to cash in on this opportunity to auction off the right-hander for significant returns.

Of course, it would be quite another thing for Ricciardi to be excited about that opportunity.

If he has to dump Burnett, it will be painful repudiation of his baseball judgment, or at least that of his administration. Moreover, with the club currently sitting six games behind the Tampa Bay Rays, there is also rampant speculation already surrounding the future of Ricciardi and manager John Gibbons.

This ball club hasn’t played meaningful games in August and September for a long time, and Ricciardi was supposed to change that. Burnett is symbolic of Ricciardi’s empty promises, and for him to be forced to peddle the pitcher to a contender would probably erase the last vestiges of the baseball reputation he once held in this city.

Ricciardi and Paul Godfrey probably really began to lose a handle on this thing in spring training of ’07 when they out-and-out lied about B.J. Ryan’s arm injury, and the faith of local baseball fans was tested more in the fall when Troy Glaus was pinpointed as, if not a steroid user, one who liked to order them in the mail. Rather than face the truth police again, the Jays just helped Glaus never answer the questions about his training regimen.

The Jays made Glaus go away in exchange for the peppier, easier-to-sell Scott Rolen over the off-season, but now along comes the Burnett issue with the team having lost two of three in six consecutive series. Attendance is flat, with another season apparently gone south already by June.

So in the bigger picture, it really doesn’t matter what Burnett, a decent pitcher destined to never fulfill his potential, thinks about playing for the Cubs.

What matters is when a direction-less Blue Jays baseball club is going to get a new direction.

Burnett's simply an expensive symbol of seven wasted years.

That Old Green Magic

To steal an Orwellian phrase, all pro sports franchises are equal.

Just some are more equal than others.

There are the Yankees, of course, and the Montreal Canadiens, teams that specialize in drawing upon their unique and magical histories, sometimes even when it appears those histories have faded away and become irrelevant. These are teams that don't just sell their past, but listen to it.

You'd also have to put the Boston Celtics in that category once more, particularly after their memorable performance in Game 4 of the NBA Finals on Thursday night in Los Angeles. The Celtics, who have already engineered arguably the greatest single season turnaround in NBA history, spotted the Lakers a 24-point, first-half lead before charging back in the second half to win the game and move to within one victory of securing the team's 17th NBA title and first since 1986.

For most of the past decade, of course, the Celts have seemed as distant from their wonderful history of Russell and Auerbach as the Maple Leafs are from theirs. Remember, last year this Boston club won a pathetic 24 games, finishing 23 games behind the first place Toronto Raptors in the NBA's Atlantic Division.

But then came Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen, and then a spectacular 66-win season organized by GM Danny Ainge, the old Blue Jay third baseman, in which Garnett, Allen and Paul Pierce proved three superstars could work together in the modern era of pro sport without egos and contracts getting in the way.

On Thursday, it was as though the spiritual circle was officially closed for the Celtics. They weren't the Celtics of Larry Bird and Robert Parish, but more like those terrific teams of the 1970s.

Garnett was Dave Cowens. Allen was Jo-Jo White. Eddie House came off the bench to evoke for one night the memory of perhaps the greatest sixth man ever, John Havlicek.

Doc Rivers seemed a little like fiery Tommy Heinsohn. James Posey was opportunistic Don Nelson, making things happen while the Lakers were paying attention to the Boston stars, and Leon Powe and Kendrick Perkins combined to produce some Paul Silas moments.

And Pierce? He was a defensive stopper against Kobe Bryant just like long-armed Don Chaney was so often for Heinsohn's clubs, but with much more offensive firepower than Chaney ever had.

The Celtics won Game 4 with guts, defence, strong fundamental basketball and team play, qualities once associated with every Boston team, but ones that had seemed lost for so long.

The Celtics still have work to do, still have one more game to win. But they are indeed the Celtics again, one of those special teams of history and destiny, one of those teams for whom the ghosts of past greatness seem to be real and meaningful, insistently beckoning the modern heroes to return to the basics that produced past glories.

Thursday Mail Bag

Drove past the ACC this morning. Soon, you’ll barely be able to see the arena, with the new condo skyscraper going up to the west of it.

The MLSE brass seems to be able to get that project moving very quickly.

Lots of talk about MLSE chasing an English Premiership team, maybe Leeds United.

No problem getting somebody to lead that effort.

The company’s also taking dead aim at landing the 2012 World Junior Championships, an ambitious undertaking in a city that seems to hate junior hockey.

They’ve got the appropriate management team in place for that project.

Surely they’ll be soon turning their corporate attention to getting a proper management team in place for their NHL team, don’t you think?

Or maybe it’s just not a priority.

Now on to this week’s mail bag:

Q: Hi Damien,

So the Leafs have an NHL caliber coach; again. Considering the fact that the San Jose Sharks roster would look like an all-star team compared to the current Leafs squad, do you really think his hiring will make much of a difference?

Peter van Hoof, Pickering

A: If they waste their time by bringing back all the vets and adding a few more, Wilson can probably make them a better defensive club, and thereby push them slightly closer to an Eastern Conference playoff spot.

If they do the right thing and dump the vets and don’t bother spending on free agents, then Wilson will have little impact on the win-loss record. But he’s a good teacher, so some young players should get better.