[bruce goose]

In re the scream/grunt comments in the other thread,the WTA has proven itself to be such a pathetic pamperer that it would NEVER risk irking its top players by cracking down on the 'audio'....UNLESS they learned that it was pushing large numbers of fans away,thus hurting the bottom line.The WTA still kisses ass on players who've been nearly irrelevant on court for almost 5 years,pretending that such players are JUST ABOUT to make their Godot comeback.

On a side note,most all of us remember how Hingis got a one-year drug suspension before choosing to retire again,but Martina was no longer an integral element in the WTA's future.So I'm wondering: If Masha,Vika,Serena,Aga or Li tested positive for either heroine or PEDs,do you think that the WTA would squelch it and just privately,strongly prod the player to clean up her act?Given the WTA's typical Star Treatment(pampering),I highly suspect that they might do that.

Back to the grunting,I can understand how it would bother fans,but the only one whose sound really gets to me is Vika's.Her emmittances sound so stupid,as if a bad actress were trying to IMITATE a WTA player's grunting.I'm not accusing her of that...it simply sounds bizarre to me,like something that you couldn't emit by accident...yet maybe that's just her 'voice'.

It's fairly clear that Vika isn't completely lacking in character;otherwise,she couldn't have achieved such sustained success.I definitely wouldn't call her 'dumb' by any stretch,either.Still,she strikes me as really,really shallow...like the sort of person you'd dread being stranded with indoors in a blizzard.E.g.,if you didn't share her favorite TV shows,musical groups or interest in fashion,she couldn't sustain an intelligent,interesting conversation for more than 30 minutes.She displays a notable lack of personality in her interviews and just seems very boring,without much creative spark....Vika reminds me of an old female acquaintance in the U.S. from many years ago.The younger President Bush's administration had invaded Afghanistan a few months prior,and I asked her if she had seen any news updates.....She had NO IDEA that a war was even going on

[Protoss]

How do you put those strikeover lines through a word on this board?

[backhandsmash]

Originally Posted by Protoss

How do you put those strikeover lines through a word on this board?

Like that?

[TennisFan66]

Originally Posted by Protoss

How do you put those strikeover lines through a word on this board?

Advance, code #, small s

[ s ] crossed over [ / s ] without the space.

crossed over

[marineblue]

Originally Posted by bruce goose

In re the scream/grunt comments in the other thread,the WTA has proven itself to be such a pathetic pamperer that it would NEVER risk irking its top players by cracking down on the 'audio'....UNLESS they learned that it was pushing large numbers of fans away,thus hurting the bottom line.The WTA still kisses ass on players who've been nearly irrelevant on court for almost 5 years,pretending that such players are JUST ABOUT to make their Godot comeback.

On a side note,most all of us remember how Hingis got a one-year drug suspension before choosing to retire again,but Martina was no longer an integral element in the WTA's future.So I'm wondering: If Masha,Vika,Serena,Aga or Li tested positive for either heroine or PEDs,do you think that the WTA would squelch it and just privately,strongly prod the player to clean up her act?Given the WTA's typical Star Treatment(pampering),I highly suspect that they might do that.

Back to the grunting,I can understand how it would bother fans,but the only one whose sound really gets to me is Vika's.Her emmittances sound so stupid,as if a bad actress were trying to IMITATE a WTA player's grunting.I'm not accusing her of that...it simply sounds bizarre to me,like something that you couldn't emit by accident...yet maybe that's just her 'voice'.

It's fairly clear that Vika isn't completely lacking in character;otherwise,she couldn't have achieved such sustained success.I definitely wouldn't call her 'dumb' by any stretch,either.Still,she strikes me as really,really shallow...like the sort of person you'd dread being stranded with indoors in a blizzard.E.g.,if you didn't share her favorite TV shows,musical groups or interest in fashion,she couldn't sustain an intelligent,interesting conversation for more than 30 minutes.She displays a notable lack of personality in her interviews and just seems very boring,without much creative spark....Vika reminds me of an old female acquaintance in the U.S. from many years ago.The younger President Bush's administration had invaded Afghanistan a few months prior,and I asked her if she had seen any news updates.....She had NO IDEA that a war was even going on

Vika is the tennis version of 'How to lose friends and alienate people'. Well, on this occassion it should be 'How to lose fans and alienate people'.

It's really curious that a person so successful can have so little appeal to the general public. Wondering why it might be I think it is a reflection of her own personal attitude. I think that she does this sport for herself and doesn't really care about others. She is in it to make a lot of money and fill up her trophy cabinet, that's basically it.
This could have something to do with the mentality of Eastern Europe (I'm from there). People,especially successful people, are rather individualistic and not so interested in supporting some sort of a community spirit.

[Protoss]

Whatever happened to ManixDk? I thought he had an interesting perspective and info on Caro.

[DownInAHole]

Originally Posted by Protoss

Whatever happened to ManixDk? I thought he had an interesting perspective and info on Caro.

He was active on some other tennis message boards (the names of which elude me), maybe you could try looking for him elsewhere and persuade him to start posting here again?

[Protoss]

This sucks

Thanks for the help guys.

[bruce goose]

A neighborhood dog was hit by a car a few hours ago.It was a little chihuahua and,since males have such small penises compared to other dogs',you have to get pretty darned close to a chihuahua to determine if it's male or female.Since I'd never been interested in solving that 'mystery',I regretfully can't tell you if today's victim was 'he' or 'she'.

I've seen my share of dead bodies,either from shootings or car accidents,but they were always at a distance when I was driving by,so there has been a sense of detachment that significantly lessened any potential impact.I like dogs a lot...chihuahuas,not so much...but I usually rate human life as more important than a dog's...with a few exceptions,such as recent addition to hell,Hugo Chavez.

However,this particular chihuahua felt like an integral part of our neighborhood...even though I never felt 'close' to him/her.He/she virtually never barked at ME cuz I live at the end of the street and didn't walk past his/her house....Yet he/she DID serve as a nice alarm system,along with a few of its doggy friends,on our street by always barking at strangers who wandered in.The dogs even bark at women and children who walk through,but they don't physically attack.That's one of the reasons why we haven't EVER had crime problems on our side street.The neighbors work together in keeping eyes on any strange cars that might be scoping out houses,and thieves typically avoid neighborhoods with lots of dogs who might draw attention to them.A chihuahua has good hearing and olfactory sense,apparently,and it doesn't have to physically STOP a thief;it's barking tips us off so we have time to get and load our guns...and,aimed properly with intent to kill,THEY will stop any thief that isn't a cyborg.

I think that my neighbor will likely replace his slain dog soon,but it was somewhat sad to see him carrying the lifeless body today.There's such a cold finality to it.Maybe it seems contradictory or bizarre that I could lament the loss of a dog's life while preparedly believing in citizens' executions of criminals......perhaps that's a byproduct of life here in Mexico

[Chrissie-fan]

Originally Posted by marineblue

[/b]

Vika is the tennis version of 'How to lose friends and alienate people'. Well, on this occassion it should be 'How to lose fans and alienate people'.

It's really curious that a person so successful can have so little appeal to the general public. Wondering why it might be I think it is a reflection of her own personal attitude. I think that she does this sport for herself and doesn't really care about others. She is in it to make a lot of money and fill up her trophy cabinet, that's basically it.
This could have something to do with the mentality of Eastern Europe (I'm from there). People,especially successful people, are rather individualistic and not so interested in supporting some sort of a community spirit.

I'm not a Vika fan by any stretch of the imagination, but I always considered her "I don't give a fuck about what you think about me" her most admirable character trait. And I really think she doesn't. She has this attitude of "you can root against me and for my opponent as much as you want, but when it's all over I'll be the winner and there's not a thing you can do about it."

Bad girls CAN be popular, but unfortunately she doesn't have enough charisma to pull it off. Hingis was a bad girl, sorta, but she was popular for her game which was eye candy of course, but also because she was funny despite her being so cocky. Capriati had a bad girl image, but people rooted for her because she had this rock'n'roll streetfighter "me against the world" aura around her. Vika doesn't really have any of that. It would already help her popularity if she gave up on that high pitched shrieking which to me is more annoying than Sharapova's because it sounds so unnatural. But again - Vika doesn't give a fuck, and somehow I can respect that.

[Mitten Kitten]

I am home working on the dissertation on tennis in American literature...found a couple of very nice poems...one of them is so funny:



I think Felicia would have hated Angie-Caro

[Chrissie-fan]

Originally Posted by bruce goose

On a side note,most all of us remember how Hingis got a one-year drug suspension before choosing to retire again,but Martina was no longer an integral element in the WTA's future.So I'm wondering: If Masha,Vika,Serena,Aga or Li tested positive for either heroine or PEDs,do you think that the WTA would squelch it and just privately,strongly prod the player to clean up her act?Given the WTA's typical Star Treatment(pampering),I highly suspect that they might do that.

If they tested positive for PED I hope they would be suspended. For how long depends on how severe the offense was, whether it was done intentionally, and so on. But it probably doesn't even matter what the attitude of the WTA would be since testing in tennis leaves much to be desired, so the chance that anyone will ever get caught isn't that big. If someone gets caught doing heroine, smoking marihuana or sniffing coke I would want them to do nothing since they are not PED and it's none of their business as far as I'm concerned. If it's against the law, let the regular courts deal with it, just like they do with parking tickets or having a fight in a bar. We need the powers that be of tennis (or any other sport) to see to it that we have a level playing field and that no competitor gets an unfair advantage over the others. We don't need them to give us lessons in morality or to make sure that every player eats an apple everyday. That's always been my position, and I stick to it.

[bruce goose]

Originally Posted by Chrissie-fan

If they tested positive for PED I hope they would be suspended. For how long depends on how severe the offense was, whether it was done intentionally, and so on. But it probably doesn't even matter what the attitude of the WTA would be since testing in tennis leaves much to be desired, so the chance that anyone will ever get caught isn't that big. If someone gets caught doing heroine, smoking marihuana or sniffing coke I would want them to do nothing since they are not PED and it's none of their business as far as I'm concerned. If it's against the law, let the regular courts deal with it, just like they do with parking tickets or having a fight in a bar. We need the powers that be of tennis (or any other sport) to see to it that we have a level playing field and that no competitor gets an unfair advantage over the others. We don't need them to give us lessons in morality or to make sure that every player eats an apple everyday. That's always been my position, and I stick to it.

As for the narcotics,you ALMOST have a decent forensic argument,but it falls apart when you look at how much the ATP and WTA try to reach out to youth.If they made no attempt to do that--if they ONLY advertised the sport as entertainment for adults--THEN I'd be more open to your position.However,tennis DOES put emphasis on being a gentlemen's/ladies' sport and posit many of its champions as role models for youth,so it would be rank hypocrisy for them to play both sides in re moral issues.

Your Vika comments were certainly respectable,but the 'don't give a shit attitude' is far more admirable if she employs it as a career strategy towards the media and many critical fans.If that's her guide on how she treats and respects people,in general then,quite frankly,Vika is a perra.I honestly have no idea how Vika treats her handlers,or others she meets,off court,but I suspect that her feelings would be hurt if someone showed that attitude towards HER.I can tell you that AI is FAR from charming when you waft through the B.S. smokescreen that her p.r. team has created for her.I've never seen a 'nice,sweet' girl who bitched and complained so much on the practice court,frequently got rid of coaches and trainers as if they were disposable garbage,and blamed the rest of the world BESIDES HERSELF for her underachieving failures

[Chrissie-fan]

Originally Posted by bruce goose

As for the narcotics,you ALMOST have a decent forensic argument,but it falls apart when you look at how much the ATP and WTA try to reach out to youth.If they made no attempt to do that--if they ONLY advertised the sport as entertainment for adults--THEN I'd be more open to your position.However,tennis DOES put emphasis on being a gentlemen's/ladies' sport and posit many of its champions as role models for youth,so it would be rank hypocrisy for them to play both sides in re moral issues.

Well, don't make test results public unless someone gets caught for PED. That's what the're testing for anyway.

Your Vika comments were certainly respectable,but the 'don't give a shit attitude' is far more admirable if she employs it as a career strategy towards the media and many critical fans.

Well, that's what I meant. I have no idea how she treats people in her day to day life.

[bruce goose]

Cruel irony: The poor guy's name was 'lucky'.I suppose that,if he died instantly,with very little pain,that could be considered a sort of luck