usopen Page 2 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

In the era of offense over everything, golf is trying to zag, and Rory McIlroy is onboard
What would you say if I told you that baseball was capping how far a ball can be hit, basketball decided to negate shots over 30 feet, or the NFL limited how far the football can be thrown in the air? Your first reaction would probably be like mine when I read that Rory McIlroy is on board with the ...

So you’re telling me there’s a chance!
Tommy Paul didn’t play collegiate tennis. Instead, he came up through the junior circuit and turned pro in 2015. He’s one of the rare Americans who plays best on clay, yet his career breakthrough has come on the hardcourt of the Australian Open. Paul took down fellow American Ben Shelton on Wednesda...

Now we know why Naomi Osaka is stepping away from tennis for 2023
For those who had questions about why Naomi Osaka dropped out of the Australian Open, or if she still cares about being a professional tennis player, you just got your answer....

Oh great, they’re letting humanoids play tennis now
The US Open could’ve fizzled out after Serena Williams and Rafael Nadal lost. Casual fans are conditioned to look for those four names when following a Grand Slam. While we weren’t watching for Williams’ pursuit of her 24th Slam, we were still watching for Serena. The men’s bracket was more of the s...

Sports world reacts to death of Queen Elizabeth II
The reaction from the sports world came down quickly after Thursday’s passing of Queen Elizabeth II at 96. Tweets and other posts from athletes of British descent and others from around the globe paid tribute to the Queen, who served as the United Kingdom’s monarch for 70 years....

Who needs the NFL after a sports weekend like the one that just passed?
Usually, the best sports weekends happen in October. A few days of dramatic playoff baseball, a good old-fashioned upset Saturday in college football followed by a championship bout, and then a dizzying Redzone Witching Hour on Sunday....

It’s just a game
The first time I wrote “professionally” about Serena Williams, back when Bleacher Report was still an onslaught of slideshows, I called her overrated. I was just out of college, and my terrible, awful, horrendous take was she didn’t win as much as she could. This was more than a decade ago, and it w...

Novak Djokovic is stopping Novak Djokovic from playing in the U.S. Open
Update (8/25/22): It ain’t happening, chief....

The Jimmy G to Tampa Bay rumor was asinine, but another NFC team makes sense
Now that San Francisco 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo is on the mend following shoulder surgery in March, trade rumors are starting to resurface, with one sounding too ridiculous to be true. The rumor that Tampa Bay is interested in bringing Garoppolo to Florida has been floating around....

Get to the net, Taylor Fritz!
American tennis, on the men’s side, has been a desolate wasteland for over 20 years now, pretty much. Since Andy Roddick took the U.S. Open in 2003 and then spent the rest of his career getting clubbed by Roger Federer in the biggest matches of his career, no Yank has taken a major. No Yank has even...

The U.S. Open Twitter account went all in clowning a Seattle Seahawks fan and Drew Lock
The Seattle Seahawks are about to embark on a long NFL season. And whoever runs the U.S. Open’s official Twitter page knows that and isn’t shy about throwing it in the face of Seahawks fans. The tennis account fired back at a Seahawks fan that said tennis wasn’t a sport. They took down that fan, the...

No one ever gets the ending they want
It’s hard to imagine that’s how Serena Williams would end her career. There’s always the U.S. Open, where she won her first Grand Slam, where she’s rightly worshiped, where some of her biggest wins have come. And yet, it’s hard to see how the U.S. Open will go much better than Wimbledon, where she l...

In a sport of polite claps, the boos were never going to be loud enough to disrupt LIV golfers
Phil Mickelson slid out of the U.S. Open on the oil slick he oozed in on not a penny richer from his appearance in Brookline, Mass. He missed the cut after a 3-over round Friday that put him at +11 after 36 holes, and if you don’t make it to the final two days of the tournament, you don’t get a cent...

The (likely) beginning of the end for Serena Williams
After losing to Naomi Osaka in the semifinals of the 2021 Australian Open, Serena Williams’ response to a reporter’s inquiry about whether her tearful exit was her subconsciously saying goodbye went somewhat unnoticed....

Phil Mickelson tries to justify joining LIV tour (again), fails (again)
Phil Mickelson is facing the golf media in the lead-up to this weekend’s U.S. Open, and suffice it to say: it isn’t pretty. It’s not that the LIV press conferences have exactly gone easy on the defecting golfers, but the press has faced more moderation and censorship from people who have also been p...

Yes, women’s tennis is compelling
The call is coming from inside the house. Last night, the French Open’s first ever female director and former No. 1 player Amélie Mauresmo told the press that men’s tennis has “more appeal” than the women’s game right now, which was why 9 of the 10 primetime night sessions were scheduled for men’s m...

Pick a sport, any sport, and Danny Woodhead will beat you at it
I find it equal parts awe-inspiring and maddening when an athlete can play two sports let alone pick one up and, in a relatively short period of time, become better at it than a lot of people who do it for a living....

Tiger had the world on pins and needles for a shot that truthfully didn’t even matter
Tiger Woods, 18th hole, The Masters. It didn’t matter that he was 13-over par and his chances at winning had long expired. It didn’t matter that Tiger wasn’t expected to win. It was spectacular that just over one year after an automobile accident mangled his right leg, he was playing in The Masters,...

5 magical moments for Tiger at the Masters
It’s been 25 years since Tiger Woods walked onto Augusta National and shocked the world with a record-breaking Masters win at the age of 21. It’s been three years since he won his comeback Masters, and just over one year since he was in a car accident that nearly killed him. The ability to walk agai...

Can anyone fill the void left by Serena Williams and now Ash Barty?
Ash Barty’s retirement from professional tennis was a blunt instrument between the eyes of the WTA community. Barty was coupled with Naomi Osaka as the future of women’s tennis. At 25, she was coming into her own after winning the Australian Open in January, Wimbledon in 2021 and the 2019 French Ope...