another all day on clay in may

After taking a day off from waking up at 5am - ish to watch the French Open, I got right back in the saddle today. If you think that is sad, just wait until I tell you how long I continued to watch - more on than off for the next 10 plus hours.

No Roddick today so that was kind of a bummer. But we did get both Venus and Serena with wins. Venus played a stocky dynamo that gave her a brief problem in the second set. Serena had no such problems. I wish they had played doubles today.

The 6'9 American, Isner, went out like Sampras on clay. Fellow American Mardy Fish lost 10-8 in the 5th. A heartbreaking loss on the worst court at Roland Garros. It looked like they were playing at Kings Park Park.

The best match of the day was between two chicks that I've never seen before. Rezai from France and some Russian. Rezai had the crowd behind her but kept getting broken. Of course then she would break the Russian what's her name. It's currently 7-7 in the 3rd. Have to restart due to the sun going away.

I heard the Lakers game came down to the last second last night. I also heard that Ron Artest took a really bad shot, had a put back, and gave an epic interview. Unfortunately I didn't get to see it live. The power went out so I was stuck with updates on my Droid.

So that sucked.

But you know what is awesome? You know how when the power comes back on your clock flashes starting at 12:00am? The power came back on at 12:00am. That's right. My clock is flashing. But it's flashing the correct time.

Huge.

onyewu? more like offyewu

I doubt that Bob Bradley will have the stones to give Onyewu's plane ticket to Johannesburg to somebody else. But he should.

Beasley at left back is something that went horribly wrong at Costa Rica but it would have been nice if we could have seen that experiment given another chance or chances before the games really started to count. I say that because there are some serious problems in the back right now.

Against England, the Yanks need either Beasley or Hejduk to start in the back. The problem is that Beasley won't be back there and Hejduk won't even be on the continent. I would seriously have brought him just for that game. (If Onyewu goes to SA and has to go home, they can call up somebody AND it doesn't have to be from this preliminary 30 man roster. I just doubt that Bob is smart enough to do that.)

Up top is another problem. The US was playing their best ball last summer with Davies up top with Altidore. Davies is obviously hurt so he needs to be replaced. The problem with that is that they aren't replacing Davies with a similar player. When he initially went down, I thought Findley could be that type of player - a speedster that takes on defenders and compliments the bigger Jozy.

Ching isn't that guy. Neither is Buddle, Johnson, or Gomez really. Dempey is obviously a class player but not really a forward. He would probably play a little behind the forward (Jozy).

Findley hasn't really gotten a chance so it's a real long shot. The fact that he even made it to the final 30 is pretty freaking impressive. Maybe the plan is to have Donovan up there since there are a bunch of midfielders. The problem with that is that Donovan tracks back a lot on defense. It's not something that gets talked about a lot but it's needed.

I can't wait to see who Bob cuts tomorrow. I hope he will learn from the mistakes that Bruce made last World Cup. Renya was past his prime and injuried. Pope should have been a back up. O'Brien was hurt.

Taking a lame duck Onyewu would be the first mistake.

I say that the 7 cuts tomorrow are:

Rogers
Marshall
Pearce
Findley
Bedoya
Johnson
Kljestan

I'd keep Findley over Ching. I'd also ship Onyewu home from SA and replace him with Hejduk. Neither of those things will happen. You won't send Ching home Bob!

barefoot basketball?

Being unemployed, you find yourself with all kinds of crazy time on your hands. I'm not going to lie and tell you that I use my time efficiently. I don't.

A textbook example of that was what I watched on TV around lunchtime. I watched the NBA Draft Combine from Chicago. More specifically I watched guys get measured with their shoes both on and off. No seriously, I did. I also caught some of the vertical leap.

Momentarily ignoring the obsurdity that is me watching this grand spectacle, let's get to some of the other obvious problems.

Why are they measuring guys without their shoes on? Will there ever be a time where they have to play barefoot? Is there a chance that the NBA becomes the NBBA sometime soon?

I also think that a person can be either 6'9 or 6'9.5. I really don't think there is a need for 6'9.25 or 6'9.75. The half inch is almost too much. The quarter inch is just ridiculous.

So after that exciting process is over you then have two columns of data to mull through. What stood out to me is that Cole Aldrich of Kansas wears platform shoes on the basketball court. He was nearly an inch shorter than Greg Monroe without shoes but taller than Greg with shoes. I didn't realize that high heels were part of the standard uniform in Lawrence. Maybe he thought he was at the WNBA Draft Combine. I'm sure they measure all kinds of fun things at that combine.

If I were scheduled to be a top pick in the draft, I wouldn't waste my time with this nonsense. I'd just tweet my measurements and twitpic my shoes and call it a day. Maybe stand on a scale during a Skype conversation but that's about it.