As many of you know I’m big NFL football guy. Love the game, the competition and every now and then someone says something interesting.

TENNIS-X NEWS, NOTES, QUOTES AND BARBS India’s Davis Cup team is refusing to play unless Leander Paes is ousted as captain… ADHEREL The only other player of note in the women’s singles game to hit two-handed off both sides, Marion Bartoli of France reminisced on Monica Seles being her hero after Seles’ recent retirement: “Monica […]

Americans Venus Williams and Lindsay Davenport are the drawing cards next week at the mouthful ‘The Regions Morgan Keegan Championships and The Cellular South Cup’ in Memphis, where the two former No. 1s are likely to meet in the semifinals.

Ivan Ljubicic returns to the PBZ Zagreb Indoors to try and best his effort in 2007 when, as the top seed, he was upset by No. 2-seeded Marcos Baghdatis in the three-set final.

American tennis is on display next week at the mouthful ‘Regions Morgan Keegan Championships and Cellular South Cup’ in Memphis, where Andy Roddick, James Blake, and Sam Querrey are among the seeded players, with land mines galore within the draw.

For decades, the issue of footwork patterns has been discussed and analyzed. Arguments surrounding the best “first step,” whether it be a cross-over step, a jab-step, or a gravity or drop-step, have been discussed and studied by pros and players alike.

Andy Roddick put tour rookie Kei Nishikori in his place Thursday night at the SAP Open in San Jose with a snarling, glaring, obscenity-ridden 6-2, 6-4 victory.

Florida-via-Japan sensation Kei Nishikori, the 18-year-old winner of the Delray Beach International Tennis Championships last week, will face American No. 1 Andy Roddick on Thursday night at the SAP Open in San Jose.

Who’s Got the Funk…

apan’s Kei Nishikori, the 18-year-old training in Florida at the IMG/Bollettieri Academy, wasn’t on anyone’s radar at Delray Beach, even after he qualified into the main draw.

Andy Roddick says the younger American players need to up their work ethic: “There’s no substitute for hard work. To be honest with you, that’s one of the things that lacks when you see the young American players. It puts a different dynamic on things when you’re playing tennis to find a way out of the country as opposed to playing for fun.”

The challengers keep emerging on the pro circuit, the latest being Japanese teen Kei Nishikori, who stunned James Blake to win the Delray Beach title earlier today.

With countless hours of Indian Wells and Miami broadcast on ESPN, for many years tennis fans have long had their very own version of March Madness.

I don’t have a lot of time, but I think I have just enough to scrape together a quick preview on the 2008 Davis Cup, which begins first round play in just a few hours.

On the 1st of December, Bob and Mike Bryan clinched the Davis Cup for the US, winning their doubles match against Russians Igor Andreev and Nikolay Davydenko in Portland. Two months later, the same fabulous four (Roddick, Blake and the Bryans) and captain P-Mac have landed in Austria, trying to hold on to their fresh […]