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    LaBrava RadioAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 9:21am

    But it’s unfathomable to think of referees boycotting, say, LeBron James’ games over a testy exchange.

    It’s unfathomable even in the sport of tennis. We’ve seen Federer tell an umpire to “not fucking talk to me” after berating him for minutes.

    Novak and Murray and virtually all of the top men have cursed at umpires without rumblings of a strike ensuing.

    I really find this unbelievable. The guy took away A GAME from Serena because she called him “a thief.” She didn’t even curse! AND IT WAS IN A GRAND SLAM FINAL! Just incredible times.

    I hope they do strike and create a real crisis and force the sport to pick a side and hopefully usher in new blood. This is outrageous.

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      ihadwordsLaBrava Radio
      9/12/18 9:29am

      Yup, this is a sign that the umpires need to be removed and replaced with fair unbiased and thick skinned referees.

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      hellfireLaBrava Radio
      9/12/18 9:36am

      Their own version of fragile masculinity.

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    HuskyBroAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 9:28am

    Martina Navratilova said:

    There have been many times when I was playing that I wanted to break my racket into a thousand pieces. Then I thought about the kids watching. And I grudgingly held on to that racket.

    George Carlin said:

    Illustration for article titled

    He also said...

    Illustration for article titled

    So I question Martina on her worrying about the children when the men are out there acting a damn fool? Where was her concern, her op-ed pieces then? Where is her questions when Serena is having to take more drug tests than anyone, male or female, in the sport? Where is her worry when Serena is being called racist/sexist names by the parents of these children that she’s so worried about?

    But Serena needs to handle herself better?

    Girl, bye.

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      KalxHuskyBro
      9/12/18 10:03am

      That corpse has had it out for the sisters since they first arrived on the tour. She’s especially big mad that Serena has eclipsed her ass. 

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      whatamithinkingHuskyBro
      9/12/18 10:19am

      That’s rich from Martina given her observations that when she came out as a lesbian many in the tennis world felt she’d be a bad role model for the kids blah blah blah... Envy perhaps?

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    ihadwordsAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 9:30am

    It’s been clear since the word go that Williams treatment is different because she is a dominant black female player. Consider that she is randomly tested for steroids several times the rate of other similar players.

    https://people.com/sports/serena-williams-drug-tests-discrimination/

     https://deadspin.com/an-anti-doping-agent-occupied-serena-williams-s-propert-1826993294

    Ref....your job isn’t to single out any athlete for collective punishment. Given the history of players throwing tantrums, attacking the ref etc, it comes with the sport, and if you can’t handle athletes getting upset at you over controversial calls, you need to be in a different sport.

    Ramos is the vanguard of these sorts of sensitive ref’s, who believe they are the sport, and not the players and spectators.

    Tennis has this issue, and if it isn’t addressed, it will cause a massive backlash.

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      Vinihadwords
      9/12/18 11:10am

      It’s been clear since the word go that Williams treatment is different because she is a dominant black female player. Consider that she is randomly tested for steroids several times the rate of other similar players.

      This seems to be the crux of the issue, from my POV: Serena’s supporters looking at the totality of actions against Serena during her career in spite of her dominance of the sport, while her critics are looking at these incidents in isolation and using her status as the best tennis player to justify whatever treatment she gets.

      It’s insane.

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      StingRayihadwords
      9/12/18 11:58am

      Nick Kyrgios starts tanking, and the umpire gives him an on-court therapy session.

      Serena shows what would be credited to male players as “passion” and gets penalized, fined, and targeted for collective retribution.

      I wonder what the difference is.

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    Nina LemoneAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 10:28am

    Considering Hawk-Eye was adopted in tennis after particularly egregious line calls against Serena (at the US Open of course), watch her revolutionize the game again with some sort of robo-chair ump.

    Or maybe some new rules and legislation about making the players absolutely aware of any warnings against them (to prevent future thievery). I don’t want tennis to turn into a Black Mirror-esque nightmare with rogue umpborgs.

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      Gameface doesn`t play nice with othersNina Lemone
      9/12/18 10:33am

      Resistance is probably futile.

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      JeanNikkiNina Lemone
      9/12/18 11:06am

      I don’t follow tennis so I didn’t know about this. Thanks for sharing.

      After researching this, I respect and empathize with Serena even more. And her comments on the press conference make perfect sense. Those who accuse her of having a martyr complex are simply refusing to see facts— Serena’s trials and unfair losses end up being everyone else’s gain.

      ...More on Hawk Eye and the 2004 US Open Womens’ quarterfinal travesty:

      Video:

      Tennis

      In Serena Williams’s quarterfinal loss to Jennifer Capriati at the 2004 US Open, three line calls went against Williams in the final set, and Auto-Ref system was being tested during the match. Though the calls were not reversed, there was one overrule of a clearly correct call by the chair umpire Mariana Alvesthat the TV replay showed to be good. She was removed from consideration for further matches at that year’s U.S. Open. These errors prompted talks about line calling assistance especially as the Auto-Ref system was being tested by the U.S. Open at that time and was shown to be very accurate.[11]

      ...

      “...while everyone in the world other than Alves knew that Serena’s shot had been good, Serena herself was left with no option but to play on. She would eventually lose to Capriati, and receive an apology from U.S. Open officials the following day. Alves, meanwhile, was barred from working any more matches at the Open that year.

      While it came too late for Serena, her experience with Alves would give players a way to fight back against bad calls.

      Hawk-Eye has been an unmitigated boon for the sport as a whole. The computer’s ultimate, unchallenged authority has saved the players, and their fans, from thousands of ugly arguments, and helped tennis present a more appealing product to the public. Sadly for Serena Williams, her loss in 2004 has been everyone else’s gain ever since.”

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    HuskyBroAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 9:50am

    Serena has been outspoken about the ish she’s had to go through on the court over the years and no one in her game gets as much negative press as she does.

    Yet she’s usually facing this on her own

    But now you got all these folks coming out of the woodwork for her when she’s had enough (in the middle of a US Open Final, she has to deal with some dude’s nitpicking rules that everyone says happens on a regular basis and isn’t called but today he has time? Really?) and she goes off.

    Most of the ones giving Serena a hard time wouldn’t put up with nearly half of what she does on a regular basis, for half a second. What am I saying, they couldn’t put up with what she does because they know they wouldn’t have to.

    They’re not a black woman in America.

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      WhigglyHuskyBro
      9/12/18 10:57am

      She’s also the face of the sport, which means more eyeballs seeing her mistakes.

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      HuskyBroWhiggly
      9/12/18 11:00am

      and those very same eyeballs see her being mistreated and refuse to acknowledge it. 

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    Gameface doesn`t play nice with othersAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 10:20am

    So, if I watch Jimmy Connors (yes I’m dating myself) and McEnroe and their fucking tantrums which many times included calling the umpires all sorts of colorful words - at NO time was there a threat to walk off from doing their jobs. Get a new set of umpires with thicker skin. Umpires and referees in every sport get a hard way to go at some point. Men bitch at the umpires ALL THE TIME. For the most part, they may get a warning because men play with “passion and intensity.” Women are always expected to be demur and let shit slide. Black women, in particular, are expected to saddle transgressions silently. In her career Serena AND Venus combined have had less outburst that I could count on one hand. Johnny Mac had that count beat in any given tournament - in addition to cussing at players he was playing. This whole affair was a disaster. This woman was playing for a championship. Maybe she would have lost either way but as I watched, I thought “Let is go Queen. Focus on the tennis.” Osaka came to play to the US open. Serena let that whole exchange get into her head and therefore wasn’t focused on the keeping the main thing, the main thing: winning the match. The umpire, however, was completely out of pocket with his officiating and continuing the double standard that Serena continues to have to battle. As Osaka increases her victories and experience (and hopefully acknowledges her Haitian father as often as her Japanese mother) she, too, will face the same scrutiny if she becomes as dominant.

    Btw, hire some new umpires if they boycott. There is no union. There are several folks who would love an opportunity to officiate history. When has this EVER occurred in history where the umps have hurt feelings and want to take their proverbial ball and go home? Maybe it’s a coincidence that it is the greatest player in history. And that is a proud Black woman. Maybe. Big fucking maybe. But.....Fuck these folks and their hurt feelings.

    And one more thing. Even if the coaches do coach from the stands, does that shit help them? Against Serena? And apparently, against Osaka who didn’t drop a set? Uh, no. Coach, bitches. Coach all you fucking want. The best will always overcome. It’s why they are the best.

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      Gameface doesn`t play nice with othersGameface doesn`t play nice with others
      9/12/18 11:18am

      Response to HereComeOmar:

      So what you are saying is that he probably shouldn’t have been officiating in the first place because he is extra all the time. Got it. Thankfully, she doesn’t require your sympathy. She deserves fairness not additional scrutiny piled on as she has been an exemplary ambassador for the sport. Miss me with that bullshit.

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      Melanin MonroeGameface doesn`t play nice with others
      9/12/18 5:05pm

      You don’t even have to go back to McEnroe or Connors:

      Illustration for article titled
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    Ms.MoonAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 10:28am

    The reason why they use sensors for the calls came about because of another triflin ass umpire making all sorts of biased calls against Serena and stealing another title from her.  Let them walk, technology can be developed to replace them.  

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      Gameface doesn`t play nice with othersMs.Moon
      9/12/18 10:31am
      Let them walk, technology can be developed to replace them.

      Truer words have never been written. Same could be said for baseball where it’s actually been proven. 

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      illuminancerGameface doesn`t play nice with others
      9/12/18 11:46am

      The difference in baseball is that the players don’t actually want the computerized strike zone. As often as calls go against them, sometimes it works in their favor, so I guess for them it balances out, no matter how much I yell at the TV when Joe West calls a strike that was two feet off the plate.

      I am amused by the pearl clutching that a player called an official a “thief”. Oh no! Such language! 

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    whatamithinkingAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 10:10am

    They will never do it because it would simply serve to expose the inherent racism in the sport - the very idea of boycotting Serena’s games makes the point. I am secretly hoping that they carry out the threat - let their racist & biased asses be exposed!

    Interestingly, in my opinion, both Serena & Venus have done everything to endear themselves to the white tennis world and the white world in general (both have white male romantic partners), yet the white embrace is still denied. What will it take?

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      badphairywhatamithinking
      9/12/18 12:10pm

      There is nothing black people can do to make themselves white. And that’s what it would take. 

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      Melanin Monroewhatamithinking
      9/12/18 5:12pm

      Not only that, but it wouldn’t be that hard to find other umpires to replace them, and technology has advanced to the point where they don’t need umpires at all really. Some of the rules in tennis are archaic and arbitrary anyway, and are selectively enforced.

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    BrwnskngurlAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 10:57am

    It bears repeating....when Serena and Venus walk unto that court—-every fucking time — they bring the criticism of their hair styles, even as teens (their beads on their braids were distracting/too loud); their bodies (too manly/not ladylike); their grunting (too loud); their father (too sensitive); their family (too many of them); their jewelry (too big, chunky, ethnic); their attire (not tennis-like); their skin color (too dark); their race (caricatured; niggers first, apes second; in commentary, in news, in cartoons).

    This shzt has gone on for twenty plus years. Jeered and booed from matches as young girls; racial epithets yelled. And they withstood all of that shzt with GRACE AND DIGNITY even when they were not shown the same.

    Serena stood up for herself last Saturday, during a grand slam tournament IN HER OWN MUTHAFUCKING COUNTRY, with a record win on the line, her comeback as a new mother on the line. She deserved a measured response from that umpire but, instead, he decided to inject himself into the match.

    Fuck him, fuck those umpires defending him, fuck tennis! 

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    BertrammmAnne Branigin
    9/12/18 9:50am

    Everyone seems to have a story about how they did something worse and got away with it, but did they do something worse in front of Ramos? If so, that’s a story. But if we’re talking about a different umpire, then it’s a complete non sequitur. Tennis umpires aren’t a hivemind, and the decisions made by one cannot be treated as transferable to all others. By most people’s accounts (except those who’ve purposely tried to avoid having any grasp on the truth whatsoever), Ramos is a tough-but-fair umpire. He has a record of issuing formal warnings to male and female players in situations where other umpires might have given leeway. He is understood by most to be consistent in this regard. So while one might pick on his choice to be stricter than most umpires, it’s baseless to argue that he was somehow carrying out a double-standard here, or being racist or sexist with his calls. Ramos was absolutely hung out to dry in the immediate aftermath, and it’s fucking shameful. I hope the tennis umpires unionize over this shit.

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      The Intersectional Feminist part dosBertrammm
      9/12/18 12:25pm

      Why are you continually caping for shitty people? I saw you over there at Jez in that Norm MacDonald article. Stop.

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      BertrammmThe Intersectional Feminist part dos
      9/12/18 12:26pm

      Blindly determining that decent people are “trash” is something I usually speak up against. It’s not my fault that the entire mode of the internet now seems to be “Rush to a bad conclusion as quickly as possible, and refuse to investigate its badness after the fact.”

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