I just wanted to followup on last week’s entry about Serena Williams. As you’ll recall, she got in trouble for yelling at an official during the most recent US Open, threatening them with some bad things that I can’t write here on the blog. It was announced this weekend that she’d be fined $82,500 for the outburst, and she’s on a kind of probation for two years. She can’t have any major infraction for that entire time, otherwise she will be fined much more and be banned from some further Grand Slam tournaments. This is a tough fine to say the least, but this is how the association has decided to deal with this type of issue. And especially for one of their biggest players, they have practically been forced to make an example out of her to show that no one’s above the rules. It serves as warning to anyone else in tennis not to get too hot under the collar.

Serena won’t be fine with the fine she might be about to get. There is talk that she might get a $1million fine for her angry comments to a line judge during a semifinals event at the US Open this year. She shouted some threatening words to the line judge after an uncertain foot fault call. She was already fined $10,000 at the time for the incident, but it is currently under review by the international federation. The problem for her might not be the money, but the potential banning that she could get for the Australian Open in January. She is the defending champion there, but the announcement will be made a little bit later today, they say. Judging by the comments on the story, even this would be too lenient for some tennis fans!

When you think of Andy Murray, what do you think of first? I’ll bet the first thought you had wasn’t “rap music”! He has apparently recorded a track of rap music, in a bid to broaden his fan base and garner some extra interest. It’s not clear whether it’s going to work, although most of the people who have heard it don’t think that it’s going to hit to charts anytime soon. He was probably never trained much in music, and the tennis scene is not the usual locations where rap music has its origins. Usually, you find it in the inner cities and such, rather than at a Grand Slam tennis tournament.

Roger Federer is getting himself all ready for the ATP Finals. It has been a long year for him thusfar. He started out with a lot of back problems, which was unfortunate. In fact, we spent much of the first half of the year wondering when the exciting event would happen that brings Federer and Nadal back together in competition. Instead, they were both out for a long time. But Federer has made a credible comeback this season, winning several tournaments and competing hard in them. The ATP Finals will be especially tough, because many of the best in the world will be right in it. It will be a long couple of weeks, but Federer has proven time and again that he can hold his own against people like Murray and Roddick. Hopefully it will be an exciting time!

Andy Roddick has repeatedly shown that he is one of the toughest competitors in tennis. This year, when he played in Wimbledon against one of the most famous and talented players of the decade, Roger Federer, it was one of his finest moments, even though he didn’t win. They played hard into a 3rd set, and the long 3rd set was so close that he Roddick had to serve match points 9 times. He didn’t quite make it, but it showed that Roddick can keep up with the other best players, even after 6 years since he was last at the world #1 spot. Roddick is among those being discussed who will take the place of Federer and Nadal in the next couple of years. Roddick isn’t the youngest guy around either, though, so maybe Djokovic and others will take their place instead? No matter what happens, Roddick has shown strong character and a competitive ability that is hard to match.

The entire flurry of discussion of Andre Agassi continues this week, with some main tennis figures saying that he should give up his titles because of the drug controversy that came out. It’s not clear, though, that this is actually going to happen, nor that it should. How many other players have used some kind of drug like this even for a short time when they were playing? Probably many of them. He’s just the one that wrote a tell-all book about it. And hearing more about it, it is clear that he was living a rather sad life, where he felt very pressured to get into tennis and to be successful. His strange antics can be partly attributed to that situation, with him trying to distinguish himself in some other way from that. A tough life. You tell me, should he give up his titles because of what he’s admitted in the book?

Novak Djokovic got his first double-bagel in his career, winning in straight sets against Jan Hernych. 6-0 6-0 is apparently called a double bagel by some people. It was a magnificent performance that only took about 50 minutes total and represents the best job that he’s been able to do in tournament play ever. Like I mentioned once or twice before, Djokovic seems to be on track to win a lot more this year. He is at the top of his game and rising high in the eyes of a lot of the tennis world. Hopefully we’ll be able to see him become ever stronger over the next couple of years. Will he be the next Federer or Nadal? We’ll find out soon. Next season, in Australia and the other Grand Slam events, we’ll start to see for sure!

Ok, I lied. Last week I vowed that I wouldn’t mention the Agassi memoir again. I don’t like to turn a person’s drug addiction in a difficult time into a big story on my blog, because that’s not something that we should ridicule or anything. But things that are just strange are kind of interesting to talk about. The newest information to come out of the memoir is that he began losing his hair in the early 90s. So all that hair that he was well known for in the early and mid-90s: a wig. And when he went into competition, especially on television, he says he prayed that the wig would stay on his head. Because what would everyone say if he was playing and then his hair just fell off. The reason that he did this is that he was balding and his image of himself didn’t mesh with that of a balding guy. It’s a little bit sad, but he found himself at the end of his career, so good for him!