2018 US OPEN

whether the implication was that she was “cheating” has nothing to do with gender tbh. whether there was a different threshold for men vs women is a different, fair question however. do you watch much tennis?

she got a warning for the coaching btw. no penalty. she then proceeded later in the match to smash her racquet in frustration and impugn the character of the umpire. she’s 37 fwiw.

I watch a lot of tennis. I played varsity tennis in high school even though I sucked and I have been to the US open. I live 30 minutes away from the stadium. I am glad analysis are being done about the umpire's calls and how other men have been little bitches too recently And we ALL immediately thought of McEnroe going on a performance art monologue. He was celebrated for being a bitch.

She's 37 . Wtf does that have to do with anything.

At dinner tonight someone implied that she was more upset that she lost to a much younger woman. Seriously dudes, have you learned nothing this year? Nothing?

I watch a lot of tennis. I played varsity tennis in high school even though I sucked and I have been to the US open. I live 30 minutes away from the stadium. I am glad analysis are being done about the umpire's calls and how other men have been little bitches too recently And we ALL immediately thought of McEnroe going on a performance art monologue. He was celebrated for being a bitch.

― Yerac, Sunday, September 9, 2018 12:58 AM (ten minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I am really not sure how mcenroe’s conduct 35 years ago has anything to do with what happened today tbh

also don’t really care what someone said at your dinner party. do you filter everything in your life through these tediously tendentious lenses or is it just on ilx? it makes it hard to have a serious conversation

ffs I felt for her so much in that moment. She knows how to lose. But to give her that violation. I would lose my shit on top of the year she has had ON TOP OF BEING A BLACK WOMAN IN THE U.S. WITH TRUMP.

I'm sure this person who is literally a millionaire more than a hundred times over, and is arguably the most successful person to ever play her sport is doing okay. She's not a victim. Her behaviour sucked; she totally lost her composure when she realised she was being outplayed, and started deflecting blame from herself on to the umpire. Which is a totally normal sports thing, but no less childish when Serena does it.

It's okay to really like an athlete, and also to say that they have behaved shittily at some point.

It was just dinner; not a dinner party. I knew someone would bring up her money. It's always something. People bring up McEnroe right now because he was super egregious and Chris Everett and MAry Joe were commentating so the mind went to right to that era. But things are already being written about more recent events. Like, I am super glad you guys want to hold the fort that it wasn't sexism. Good job. Let's all tread water in life until we die.

Can we talk about how Colin Kap was a shitty football player but super rich now so what he says must be only for lols?

Kinda fitting that a tournament marked by bad umpiring would end like this.

I would say Ramos was wrong on the coaching violation (but not that wrong, given that Mourataglou himself admitted to giving instructions) but Serena did herself no favours after that. Unlike illegal coaching, where the rule has been often arbitrarily enforced, racquet abuse is a well-understood code violation and umpires WILL dock you on it. She should have known that.

The smart thing to do would have been to let it go after that but Serena went ahead and threatened his career and called him a thief.

Bad calls happen in matches all the time and the best players learn to move past them quickly. We've seen this happen with Serena so many times - she can't let go, particularly in matches where she feels she should be winning. The Williams sisters have endured countless instances of sexism and racism, but let's not pretend that this wasn't part of a long pattern of bad behaviour from Serena alone. She behaved poorly, and took away from what should have been a huge moment for her opponent.

dont know anything abt this but we should all feel free to relate dinner party conversation in any thread wtf

I think Ramos has acted correctly tbh

the first warning (for coaching) is debatable, but Mouratoglou admitted afterwards that he coached

the second warning (for racquet abuse) ALWAYS gets carried out

the third one (for verbal abuse) is justified imho, because what she said was really inexcusable (not just the "thief" comment, but especially the "you will never be on another court of mine as long as you live")

xpost he just wanted to be a condescending wank. I get it.

The illegal coaching, I have actually never ever seen a violation for that and I didn't even know it was a thing. And now that people are readily admitting that all coaches do this and even in that specific umpire's matches! And the verbal abuse,...yeah I get it was on top of the others but let's not pretend the men haven't said worse. I see Nadal even threatened the same umpire about his career. Granted, there was a ten year gap where I didn't follow tennis because it got super boring. I have to look up Serena's "epidemic"bad behaviour because I obviously don't watch enough of her to know this is a trademark. Like this is the first instance I have ever seen it. I know she has had issues at the US Open in the past. And then the change in her ranking because of maternity time off, and the french open dress requirement, and the never-ending excessive drug testing and the "she looks like a man." remarks.

kap was a v good qb for about 1.5 years

To hear it told, he is a rich, white, castro loving, cop bashing, communist, shit football player who can't even drive.

Roz otm.

deserved win for Osaka. not only this game, but she's been awesome the entire tournament.

Serena will get her record next season, the weird anger explosion could be explained from the nerves getting to that record Slam

Billy Jean King had an interesting point that due to her coach's actions Serena was penalised and yes that isn't right. Coaching probably should be allowed. But that's for another day.

How many times does Rafa get a violation for time wasting for example? Rules being inconsistently applied is a thing, and I bet even more so via racial lines. This issue will never have its day.

I bought up the McEnroe comparison bcz as a commentator he would always say you should use the crowd (never seen him play to exactly see how this worked for him) and Serena has seldom needed it but it was clear she was going to lose...and things just ran out of control for her. Or was she? I mean she had just managed to finally break Osaka in the 2nd set when this all kicked off right? If she brushed that aside and got on with it she could've won the set...there was a long way to go. And then there wasn't.

I have never seen a game awarded to an opponent at a slam final. Has this ever happened?

She broke Osaka and Osaka broke right back, which was when she smashed her racquet. Who knows what would have happened if she had kept her cool then. (Worth noting that a racquet smash also came before her outburst on match point during the 2009 semi against Clijsters).

No I've never seen anyone given a game penalty in a Slam final, but it was her third code violation. Would have been a fine or a point docked, otherwise. I have seen a player defaulted from the USO for insulting an umpire though - Fognini last year.

Right thanks. Osaka had broken back...listening to radio and looking at this through social media was a weird trip.

I hope Osaka can look back and taken even more pride. To serve for a slam in those one-time conditions and come through it is something special.

And we ALL immediately thought of McEnroe going on a performance art monologue. He was celebrated for being a bitch.

He was never celebrated for this, the kindest thing people used to do was laugh at it and turn it into some kind of a joke, otherwise he was criticized for it constantly.

He was celebrated. People tuned in to watch him lose his shit. Even Jimmy Connors started acting up.

Again, this has nothing to do with Osaka not being the better player during the match. And Serena knows how to lose.

I have never, ever seen a game penalty.

The equivalent of the umpires and tennis authorities and commentators and ex-pros laying into Serena now were not celebrating when McEnroe did it back then. Granted the general public might have been tuning into gawp and guffaw at McEnroe's antics though.

Kyrgios is widely denigrated for his antics but it draws viewers

Yes, and I'm sure the heightened circus draws in ppl.

Re: McEnroe I wonder whether he was liked for it in the US but hated for it over here. Can't see Wimbledon openly welcoming vulgarity.

a teacher friend on my TL compared this to how black students are disciplined in school. penalized for violations of rules that are arbitrarily enforced with greater frequency against black students.

serena was playing poorly a lot of this match and that frustration was not helped by ramos' nitpicky coaching violation call. the fact that he's calling a coaching violation after it was revealed that serena is drug-tested more than any player makes me sympathetic to her feeling accused of cheating.

in another universe where he gives a verbal warning about the coaching rather than a formal one, the broken racket after osaka broke her serve (assuming it still happens) should've been the only formal reprimand. ramos has tolerated tongue-lashings from men before, and finding something especially egregious about serena's words feels like trying to find justification for the imbalance of consequences. that game penalty was bush league and robbed serena of any chance at mounting a comeback, however remote given her unsteady service play up to that point. she wasn't composed yesterday, but that's a benefit of the doubt other players are given and it's not wrong for her to expect a similar benefit of the doubt.

Djokovic Gets Into Argument With Same Umpire Carlos Ramos at French Open, multiple violations did not result in docked point or game. https://t.co/qkZv2SNE7O

— Has The Umpire Been Fired Yet? (@AgentTinsley) September 9, 2018

Celebrated not equal to celebrating. I used a word easily misinterpretted. He was the "bad boy" of tennis. Heh, I look up jimmy Connors to see what he was doing and on my first page of hits is him calling someone on the court a "fucking f****t playing pusher."

Yeah, when we were watching it we just got overwhelmingly sad. We had been discussing the stupid french open dress code thing and the absurd penalty against the woman for changing her shirt on the court. The umpire just couldn't stand be talking to that way by a black woman. I am surprised he didn't call the cops on her because he feared for his life (hyperbole, yes I know, but not really.)

Violation...not penalty for shirt changing. Since you guys want to make it about tedious specifics and not the big picture of what went terribly wrong.

Tennis 'bad boys', before McEnroe there was Nastase, undoubtedly get special treatment and attention and, yes, are celebrated by some - in ways a female player would never be if she acted the same way.

Thanks for that thread Bison - Ramos was correct according to the laws of the game, but its the inconsistency of the application for male and mostly white players.

In this way a tennis match reflects the big picture, and its never an escape from it. Nor is it intended to be that.

Every time i think about him taking the game away from her, especially during a final as her "punishment" for talking back..I want to stab something.

Contrary to that thread, most regular tennis watchers know that Carlos Ramos is a known stickler for rules: https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/tennis/umpire-carlos-ramos-has-history-of-being-stickler-for-violations/ar-BBN40R7?li=AA54yf

Also, as many users in that thread pointed out, the difference between those instances and today was that Serena was given a game penalty after three separate code violations. That first video with Djokovic, for example: he was penalised a first serve for being slow, and then a code violation for unsportsmanlike conduct. He complained about Ramos but kept on playing. That's what players normally do after they've been docked, not call the umpire names.

As for the other examples, they involved other umpires not Ramos. xyzzzz_ is right, it's the inconsistency of the rules being applied that's the problem here. We had Mohamed Lahyani being criticised for being too lenient with a misbehaving player last week, and here we had Ramos, who's being criticised for being too harsh. I personally think he should have explained the coaching violation more clearly to her (if anything it's Mourataglou's fault!) or at least given her an initial warning, but apart from that, Serena deserved all the penalties she got. Rules are rules - the fact that they haven't been applied consistently in the past is irrelevant.

And yes, she has gone through a lot as a woman and a player. She's not the first to return to the game after maternity leave - Clijsters and Azarenka, both former no. 1s, came back to the game without protected rankings. Dress code rules are frequently stupid - she should be allowed to wear a catsuit at the French Open, and Alize Cornet should be allowed to change her shirt on court. No one, not Serena, not Martina Navratilova or Amelie Mauresmo, should be called out for their looks.

It's great that Serena is fighting against this and against all the bullshit that women athletes have to put up with, and she is an amazing and brilliant player all round. It's still no excuse for bad behaviour and flouting the rules.

it's absolutely relevant! if rules are intended to disincentivize behaviors but are applied in arbitrary ways, then this opens the doors for bias and the personal whims of officials.

xxp

roz otm obv

xpost I meant it's irrelevant in this particular match. Carlos Ramos is being attacked for correctly applying the rules - it is not his fault that other umpires have failed to do so in the past.

idg why 'coaching' is illegal -- what, exactly, is mourataglou telling serena (with hand signals!) that she doesn't already know?

is it really the umpire's job to survey the crowd looking for coaching? maybe the official coaches, at least, should be required to sit in a press box where they can't be easily seen, if this is such a terrible transgression

I don't get the coaching thing either. Someone was making chicken and dumpling last night and I started using that hand motion to coach him with the dumpling making.

Then maybe a large part of the problem is the rules themselves. From my humble perspective (I will admit I don't know as much about tennis as most of you seem to) it seems crazy that something like this could be such a factor in the score and outcome of a match let alone a GS final. And while the umpire may have been correct by the letter of the law it to me it seems that if he has any discretion in applying the rules, the better course of action would have been to take himself out as a factor in a situation like this. I don't think Serena's behavior alone (which I agree was poor and something she should have gotten under control) would have taken away from Osaka's win and moment if it hadn't resulted in the penalties, score change, controversy, crowd booing etc.
If the coaching rule is constantly violated, then either it should be changed or coaches should be removed from the stands (it should probably be changed) As it is, if it's applied arbitrarily then the time to arbitrarily apply it should not have been a situation like this.
Without necessarily drawing any conclusions about this particular incident, It goes without saying that it is in the discretionary power of authority and uneven application of rules & penalties for violating them that racial and gender bias often comes into play and that technically correct rulings can also be sexist and/or racist.
I don't think it's excusing Serena's behavior to say the umpire should also have handled this differently.

The umpire just couldn't stand be talking to that way by a black woman. I am surprised he didn't call the cops on her because he feared for his life (hyperbole, yes I know, but not really.)

Ramos is Portugese ffs. Not everything has to be about US domestic issues

George Zimmerman was half hispanic. What's your point? And for the US Open, taking place in the US, with two Americans, I am going to talk about US domestic issues.

The point is he is Portuguese, he lives in Portugal not the USA, and yes, calling the cops on a black person because you fear for your life might well happen in Portugal, but we don't know that it does.

Christ, I really wish ilx wasn't so white and male these days.

It always has been!

At least there are a number of good articles being written about this incident and what it means about race and gender and rage.

most of them written by people who "don't follow tennis"

well, most of the ppl who follow tennis "don't follow racism" either

People defending Roz albeit acknowledging bias is still NAGL.
"Technically he didn't do anything against the rules." <---shuddup teacher's pet

Well at least we have some men like James Blake backing her up because you know, listening to Serena say these things doesn't matter.