Tennis-X News, Notes, Quotes and Barbs

While today's US Open draw ceremony will be held at the United Nations at 11 a.m. at the Dag Hammarskjold, (if you're in NYC see if you can crash it), don't be surprised if No. 2 seed Andy Roddick draws American wildcard and junior champion Scoville Jenkins in his opener...Lindsay Davenport has reached the finals in WTA events held in California 20 times thus far in her career...The WTA stop in Berlin at the LTTC Rot-Weiss tennis club, the long-time host of the German Open, will dedicate the Steffi Graf Stadium next month. Graf, who won an amazing nine singles titles at Berlin, will play an exhibition match on the court to mark the renaming ceremony on Sept. 25...Headline on the US Open Series website: "Former World No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt Earns Wild Card Into TD Waterhouse Cup Field". How does one "earn" a wildcard? How has Alexandra "Dr. A" Stevenson earned her US Open wildcard? Can we earn a wildcard? So many questions...Not smooth running fan-wise for the US Open Series when, during the Olympics, Lleyton Hewitt is credited with his Washington title for the Series, but Lindsay Daveport is not credited for her Cincinnati title (or San Diego)...Good luck catching the ATP Long Island coverage this weekend in the U.S. on your local Fox Sports affiliate, be ready for some preempting by women's college softball or, knowing Fox, maybe a tape of a George Bush speech...Notables in the US Open qualifying this week are "You Say" Potito Starace, former Masters Series title winner Harel Levy, 15-year-old African-American Donald Young, Ivo "I Dated Hingis" Heuberger, Chris "Penthouse" Guccione, Justin Gimelstob, Richard Gasquet, veterans Franco "The Squirrel" Squillari and Bohdan "I Didn't Do It" Ulihrach, and the fallen Nicolas Lapentti...Holy cow, you see that chunky picture of Daniela Hantuchova as the main pic yesterday on the WTA Tour website? Better than being bone-thin anorexic though...No qualifying or doubles at the brand new 16-draw Forest Hills event this week for the WTA, are they experimenting with a future trend?...According to ESPN, Nicolas Massu left his gold medals in his room at the Olympic village amidst the celebration and the rush to catch his plane. They were found by a Chilean swimming coach, and countryman Fernando "Gonzo" Gonzalez is bringing them to the U.S. for Massu...Frenchman Nicolas Coutelot has received a two-month ban by an independent tribunal for having pot in his system during a drug test. Now that's what we call a doping violation...U.S. Olympic beach volleyball player Misty May says she prefers the atmosphere of her sport to that of cousin Taylor Dent: "My cousin plays tennis here, and you can only clap at certain times. Then it's 'Quiet please.'"...According to Charlie "Brick" Bricker of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, WTA CEO Larry Scott has done a study and concluded there aren't any more injuries in 2004 than in past years on average: "The injury statistics have been on the radar screen all year and we've been tracking them very carefully," Scott said. "But for a variety of reasons, it's very difficult to draw conclusions from it. A lot of this has been one-time or freak injuries and illnesses, as well as the usual wear and tear. But so far, there's no pattern that we can see."...Russian Vera "Warren" Zvonareva also pulled from New Haven this week, citing the need for rest and recovery. Anna Smashnova-Pistolesi pulled with a right hammy problem...The new 16-draw WTA event at Forest Hills this week is so shoddy the WTA didn't bother to send any communications staff...Alexandra "Dr. A" Stevenson update: still lost first round qualifying this week at New Haven, still 0-6 at the US Open, still getting a US Open wildcard...Serena gets a boost in the seedings to No. 3 with her "protected ranking" due to injury at the US Open, while Venus gets no protection at No. 11...On the link to SI.com's website as of Wednesday morning they have a link to Jon Wertheim's column, but the photo is of an African-American. Stone. Wertheim on the U.S. women's last-minute pull-outs at the Olympics: "For Jennifer Capriati and Serena Williams -- both Olympic veterans -- to treat this like a typical last-minute WTA Tour pull-out when it deprived another player of competing, was appalling."...More to come, but apparently a 13-year-old girl is playing in the qualies at the US Open. WTA rules state that only player 14 and over can compete, so of course the ITF-run US Open says 'Well screw that, we'll show them.' ITF officials are probably calling Andre and Steffi asking if their kids can swing a racquet yet, offering them a doubles wildcard.