Rafael Nadal has never, ever lost a best-of-five set match on clay. Never. The Spaniard has a perfect 34-0 mark in his career in best of five matches on the dirt, but that fact is not the only reason I’m making him my pick to win a fourth straight French Open.

The French Open draws are finally out. I won’t go into my picks just yet, but I will say it looks good for the top players Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.

I said going in that it was going to be tough to draw much value out of the Hamburg winner between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. And after Nadal’s topsy-turvy 7-5, 6-7, 6-3 win over Federer hasn’t changed my mind much.

If you are a fan of clay tennis, or really just tennis for that matter, you had to be impressed with the show Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal put on today in Hamburg.

A business trip has gotten the better of me this week, so I apologize for being late on the topic of Justine Henin’s retirement, but it really is the big tennis news of the week. And I was really stunned to learn of it.

MEMPHIS MOVING?: The Memphis Commercial Appeal reports that a deal to sell the combined ATP/WTA event to keep it in the city fell through, and now the event could be sold to outside interests who could move the event (see: Middle East, Asia, the usual suspects — goodbye to another U.S. event).

Thanks to his impressive performance in Rome, Novak Djokovic is nipping at the heals of Rafael Nadal for that No. 2 ranking spot, and by this time next week he just might get it.

Disaster Series it sure has been. The last three singles matches in Rome have all ended abruptly in retirement.

Now be honest, who would really have believed that after four days of tennis in Rome that Rafael Nadal, David Ferrer, Nikolay Davydenko and David Nalbandian would out and Andy Roddick and James Blake would still be in? There’s no one on the planet who would have thought that four days ago. No one.

Has there ever been a more forgotten former World No. 1 than Juan Carlos Ferrero? Just after the turn of this century Ferrero was not just the King of Clay, he was the King of Tennis, winning the French Open, reaching the US Open final and then a few weeks later finally ascending to the No. 1 Ranking. But then poof, just like that he’s gone.