After his shot was originally called out, 29th seed Kohlschreiber challenged the ruling and it was overturned, prompting an irate Roddick to argue that he would have attempted a return, but didn’t due to the stoppage in play. When his appeal went unfulfilled, he proceeded to ridicule the umpire’s intelligence, shouting insinuation that he was never educated after the second grade. He made one final dig by yelling out: “You’re an idiot! Stay in school kids or you’ll end up being an umpire.”
Roddick’s juvenile behavior aside, he makes a valid point. It is this very reason that some things are not reviewable in NFL football. Once the whistle blows a play dead, that’s it. If forward progress is ruled to have been stopped, but a running back breaks free and scores a touchdown, it’s called back because the whistle blew. If a runner is whistled down even though he has simultaneously fumbled the football, the runner will retain possession because the whistle supersedes all ensuing action. And rightfully so. Whether the whistle was correct or incorrect in the first place, the point is: when the whistle blows, people stop trying and you can’t let a game change after play is halted. The same applies to tennis where a player has no incentive to wear out his arm by returning a serve that has been called out. However, just because Roddick has a point, doesn’t mean there isn’t a flip side to the matter. Firstly, he knows darn well that if he were on the benefiting end of an overturned call, he’d be thrilled about the ruling. Secondly, the replay component to tennis isn’t new. It has to have occurred to him by now that such a situation is plausible and he might as well play every ball through. Until a perfect replay system is instituted and until there no longer exists a human error component to officiating sports, Roddick needs to expect such circumstances to unfold. And lastly, Andy Roddick ended up winning that game! If that was break point on the final game in a match, perhaps a bigger deal would need to have been made. But he fought back despite the controversial call and came out on top. So what was that all for anyway?But, now that I’ve broken down what I feel to be are the key elements to the reversed call, allow me to make a general statement about the way he carried himself. His behavior was unacceptable. Verbally berating an umpire like that would get you tossed out of other sports games, so why wasn’t Roddick forced to forfeit this one? Kudos to umpire Emmanuel Joseph for retaining his composure and allowing the childish Roddick to tire out with his tantrum before resuming play. But the damage was done, as Roddick humiliated himself and, in my estimation, left a black eye on his sport.
The black eye will undoubtedly heal; Roddick hasn’t crossed any lines that haven’t been crossed before. But that’s no excuse. I’m sick of bench-clearing brawls in baseball, fighting in hockey, and general unsportsmanlike conduct across the board. If fights in sports resulted in immediate ejection and fines with a minimum of one year suspension, guess how many fights there’d be in professional sports? Zero. If verbally harassing an umpire resulted in an automatic disqualification, do you know how many tennis players would speak like that? Zero. Athletes only carry on like that because they are so passionate about winning. But if their very ability to play the game at risk, their desire to win would shut them up rather than propel them to unbecoming conduct.
Andy Roddick’s charisma has won me over in the past, I will soon forgive his reckless behavior from today, and I’ll of course be rooting for him the next time he takes the court. But the more incidents like this, the harder it will be for me to enjoy watching him. If he were a Jerry Springer guest, he’d be perfect. But he’s not a rowdy talk show hoodlum; he’s an athlete. And we watch sports for the competition and the entertainment, not the freak-show jawing and bush-league machismo. Right? I fear that the constant squabbling and backstabbing in reality television has subliminally programmed the general public to look for and expect it in sports. So when shameful brawls in basketball stadiums spill out into the stands we find it equally fun and exciting as we do dangerous and degrading. Maybe it’s a little hypocritical of me to condemn the very behavior in sports that 90% of Americans probably enjoy. That’s why I am writing this; hoping to change the sports-viewing public’s perception first. Athletes will naturally change their behavior if we’re not buying their act any more.
Keywords: Andy Roddick, Australian Open, brawls, Emmanuel Joseph, fighting, Jerry Springer, Kohlschreiber, Pacers, Pistons, tennis, umpire
