Where's Cristina?

Fuzzy thought that his fans in Argentina would like this photo. But where is Cristina? It would be nice if Willy's girlfriend had showed up too.

battle of the ponytails

Young roger vs. Goran. The last two points are amazing.

Religious experience

David Foster Wallace, one of the most eloquent to appreciate Roger's game, passed away yesterday. Its a good time to revisit his great article on Roger Federer as Religious Experience.

You can also hear Wallace talk about Roger on NPR. His description makes me all the more determined to see Roger play in person, maybe in Montreal next summer.

Roger and Nietzsche

It is so nice to hear people once again speculating on the sources of Roger's greatness rather than the reasons for his decline. Here is an idea from his first coach, Seppli Kacovski:

"I believe Roger is ambitious because he isn't 100 per cent Swiss. His father is Swiss, and the calmness Roger has comes from his father, but the ambition and willpower come from his mother [who is South African]."

Kacovski's analysis disagrees with the general theory of heredity offered by Friedrich Nietzsche in Human all too Human where he speculated that "the woman gives the child her intellect, and the man gives the darker quality of will."

Muller

While it may seem a little hard to get worked up for a match between Roger and a qualifier named Muller, it was an awful lot of fun to see Roger completely into his five-setter in the fourth round. Roger's fist-clenched screams of joy after getting a break in the fifth, and again after match point, were welcome after some desultory losses since wimbledon. He wants this tournament badly. The points are at about 4:20 and 8:20 in this clip (watch in high quality).

smack talk

Roddick has had an interesting tournament. He annoyed Santoro enough to sit out what might be the final point of his grand slam career. He has cracked raquets, cracked the ball and now he is talking some smack about Novak. Delivered in his trademark style, his comments imply to us that he is working himself up to play hard today no matter what Djokovic pulls.

Q. When asked about his injuries today, mentioning the right ankle as opposed to the left ankle, the other day ‑‑

ANDY RODDICK: Isn't it both of them? And a back and a hip?

Q. And when he said there are too many to count.

ANDY RODDICK: And a cramp.

Q. Do you get the sense right now that he is...

ANDY RODDICK: Bird flu.

Q. Lot of things. Beijing hangover.

ANDY RODDICK: Yeah.

Q. He's got pretty long list of illness.

ANDY RODDICK: Anthrax. SARS. Common cough and cold.

Q. Got a lot of things going on with him.

ANDY RODDICK: Sure.

Q. Do you think he's bluffing?

ANDY RODDICK: No, I mean, I'm sure ‑‑

Q. The way you're saying it, almost means you feel like...

ANDY RODDICK: No, if it's there, it's there. There's just a lot. You know, he's either quick to call a trainer or he's the most courageous guy of all time. I think it's up for you guys to decide.

Little Rafa

Some people say that Nadal plays like a machine. Here at fuzzy we completely disagree. We love his fire and grit. But now that Rafa is being shadowed by an exact replica of himself, we are beginning to wonder. Note the kid's expression -- its classic Rafa.