open Page 35 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Denis Istomin, The Bespectacled Wildcard, Dismantled Novak Djokovic
Novak Djokovic is often likened to a machine, and his wins share that metallic flavor: suddenly the teeth of the cogs are all lined up, they’ve been set in motion, and what once felt like a tennis match becomes a grind towards an inexorable conclusion. ...
Nick Kyrgios Stopped Giving A Shit And Crashed Out Of The Australian Open
Lots of choice words spill out of Nick Kyrgios’s mouth—many of them amusing, wounded, self-righteous—but you don’t need to hear a single one to understand how he feels about the game at a particular moment in time. You can see that spelled out on the court, in the way he chooses to swing his racket ...
Stan Wawrinka And Kei Nishikori Had To Work At The Australian Open's First Round
The first round’s over in the Australian Open and no giants have been toppled yet, but two are already exposing their vulnerabilities: No. 4 seed Stan Wawrinka and No. 5 seed Kei Nishikori were both stretched to five sets in their opening matches....
Serena Williams Loses To World No. 72, Commits 88 Unforced Errors
Serena Williams, the second-ranked woman’s tennis player in the world, lost to No. 72 Madison Brengle in a 6-4, 6-7(3), 6-4 upset at the ASB Classic in Auckland, New Zealand last night. ...
Just Rafael Nadal Holding A Koala
One of the under-looked perks of tennis stardom is that you’re often being handed marsupials. Rafael Nadal got to hold this koala at the start of the Brisbane International. His grin and the bear’s claws appear to be saying very different things....
Juan Martin Del Potro May Not Play The Australian Open
The resurrection of Juan Martin del Potro was one of the quiet joys of 2016. He’d been out of the game for two years, he’d sunk lower than the No. 1000 ranking, and his wrists seemed like they’d never again be capable of bashing those flat, unforgiving groundstrokes. Yet somehow he snagged a silver ...
Let's Share Our Petty Stories About Famous People Acting Uncool
A very long time ago, during George W. Bush’s first term as president, Dick Cheney came into the Northern Virginia bookstore where I worked. Just surly old then-Vice President Dick Cheney and maybe a handful of (identifiable, visible) Secret Service dudes, coming into the bookstore on a weekend afte...
<i>SNL</i> Cold Open: Kate McKinnon, Playing Leonard Cohen's "<em></em>Hallelujah"<em></em>
Tonight’s Saturday Night Live cold open brought new meaning to the term, as longtime cast member Kate McKinnon—who, until Tuesday, presumed to be playing President Clinton for the next four years—performed a solo rendition of “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen, who died at 82 earlier this week....
Is Juan Martin Del Potro Back?
The large, hard-charging Argentine is winning things again. Juan Martin del Potro just captured his first ATP title in two years at the Stockholm Open, an event he’d only qualified for by way of wild card. Most of those two years he spent addressing chronic wrist injuries and free-falling through th...
Nick Kyrgios Likes To Look Cool As He Makes His Opponents Look Silly<em></em>
Nick Kyrgios is the bold bad boy in a sport where it’s frowned upon for fans to make noises during play. Tremble as you realize that this youngster, well ... he truly might not give a damn....
Stan Wawrinka Says He Had An Anxiety Attack Before The U.S. Open Final
To watch Stan Wawrinka dispatch Novak Djokovic in the U.S. Open final last month was to see the physical toll the sport can take. Both men looked dazed and drenched in the heat of late-summer New York City, and Djokovic cramped severely and took an injury timeout for a blistered, bloodied toe. But t...
Stan Wawrinka Wore Out Novak Djokovic In The Best Point Of The U.S. Open
The men’s final contained the single most entertaining point of the U.S. Open—the only point Stan Wawrinka won in the first set tiebreak against Novak Djokovic, before taking the next three sets and the trophy....
Gael Monfils And Novak Djokovic Combine For A Strange 21-Shot Rally
Gael Monfils and Novak Djokovic began their U.S. Open semifinal today on strange terms, with Monfils showing few signs of life until the third set, which he won. Even at his most disengaged, though, the Frenchman is still good for a few entertaining points....
Novak Djokovic Has Had The Easiest Road To The U.S. Open Semifinals
Like a carefree penguin belly-sliding across a glacier, the best men’s tennis player in the world has cruised into the semifinals of the U.S. Open by playing only nine full sets. Let’s examine how cushy Novak Djokovic has had it:...
Stan Wawrinka And Juan Martin Del Potro Both Beat The Sad Tennis Ball
Well after 1 a.m. in Queens this morning, Stan Wawrinka defeated Juan Martin del Potro in four sets, but the real loser was every tennis ball in play. The quarterfinal match pitted two of the sport’s most violent groundstrokes against one another and admittedly, all that violence is pretty to look a...
Butterfly Ghost Gets Revenge; Andy Murray Loses To Kei Nishikori
Life is not easy for Andy Murray, who has spent most of his career laboring away under the long shadows of three all-time greats—Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic—without ever tasting the No. 1 ranking. But nor is life particularly precious to Andy Murray, who slew a butterfly on court during the fifth s...
Andy Murray Maimed (And Probably Killed) A Butterfly
Oh, you thought Andy Murray was just a cool down-to-Earth Scottish bloke who liked to swing his tennis racket in peace? You thought he wouldn’t commit lepidoptericide on the court? Wrong, he’s a monster....
Andy Murray Is Unfazed By Loud-Ass Rain
Tennis is typically a sport of silent courts, but rain battered the newly retractable roof of Arthur Ashe Stadium today, drumming up a dull roar over a second-round U.S. Open match between Marcel Granollers and Andy Murray....
A Hungry Mike Tyson Allegedly Stole Some Ice Cream At The U.S. Open
Mike Tyson is apparently a big fan of tennis, as his daughter is an avid high school player and he’s attending the U.S. Open this week. He’s also apparently a big fan of ice cream, as he allegedly swiped an ice cream bar from a vendor this morning at the U.S. Open and never paid for it....