FanHouse Martina Hingis

Some of the excuses from these athletes are just laughable. They thought they were just injecting vitamins in their behinds. They didn't know the ingredients in that medicine. They must have gotten it in their systems by kissing a woman who had been using the stuff at a bar.

Martina Hingis never made an excuse for failing a cocaine test. She said she never did the stuff and had no clue how it could have gotten into her system, if it really did.

So it's over for Hingis. She failed that test more than two years ago, and now her suspension is up, and it's the era of comebacks in women's tennis. I always figured she'd try again. A failed drug test was no way for a great athlete to end a career.

Venus is not Serena. They don't dress alike, sound alike, play alike or look alike. They stand out alike, yes, because they are a novelty together, they are great and they are sisters.

But we have combined them in every way for some obvious reasons, but frankly, that's not fair to Venus.

Venus Williams is a better champion than Serena Williams. More elegant, more gracious.

On Tuesday, Venus starts defense of her title at Wimbledon, where she has a royal feel. She is the queen. And in the most elegant place in tennis, Venus stands apart.

---

---

In the midst of a coaches' teleconference about 10 years ago, Nolan Richardson proffered why the conference, the SEC, in which he coached the Arkansas basketball team, was so stout. It was located in the South, he said, ground zero for slavery, and, as a result, the many black players who were the stars of the SEC were the products of purposeful breeding by slave owners of "big black [men] with his big woman so he [slave owner] would have a big black kid."

Coach Richardson continued to coach without much criticism and any sanction for his historical hysteria. He wasn't tarred and feathered like Jimmy the Greek was so famously for making similar comments.

Coach Richardson was spared because, unlike The Greek, he is black. He was handed a pass because of the extra gravitas he carried as the second black coach to lead a team to a Final Four championship, and because we in the media -- especially commentators of color -- are particularly uncomfortable criticizing people of color for such transgressions and gaffes.

There were two big press conferences in the world of sports yesterday. Joe Girardi's first outing as Yankee manager wasn't notable but Martina Hingis' meeting with the media in Zurich was pretty shocking. She announced that she had been accused of testing positive for cocaine during Wimbledon and then announced she was retiring from tennis. She's retiring because such a test carries an anti-doping suspension of two years and she didn't want to put her career on hold to fight the allegations.

The image of Hingis blowing lines is certainly one I'd never contemplated, but something else that struck me as odd was that cocaine is considered a violation of doping regulations. We've all become familiar with the phrase from the Olympics and Tour de France and associate it with steroids, human growth hormone and other chemicals taken to gain a competitive advantage on the field of play. Cocaine has been around sports for a long time, but it brings to mind Michael Irvin and a house full of strippers or Doc Gooden and Darryl Strawberry on an '86 Mets road trip.

In other words, its something you use to get a competitive advantage off the field of play.

Tennis star Martina Hingis, who spent 209 weeks as the world's No. 1 ranked player, announced her retirement today and acknowledged testing positive for cocaine at this year's Wimbledon. But she insisted that she has never used drugs.

"I have tested positive but I have never taken drugs and I feel 100 per cent innocent," Hingis said.

"The reason I have come out with this is because I do not want to have a fight with anti-doping authorities."

Hingis retired once before, in 2003, citing hip and ankle injuries. But she returned in 2006 and rose all the way to seventh in the world.

I just got done watching Novak Djokovic defeat Marcos Baghdatis in the Wimbledon quarterfinals. As you can tell by the picture above, the match went nearly five hours, lasted five sets, and it was an utter duel that tested endurance, strength, moxie, and heart. Only a day earlier, I saw Djokovic grind for four hours in a four-set 4th round win over Lleyton Hewitt. That same day, second seed Rafael Nadal, who has since reached the semifinals, rallied from down two sets to beat Mikhail Youzhny in five, 4-6, 3-6, 6-1, 6-1, 6-2. That was an incredible turn of events in which the better player won out in the long run. Putting all this together, plus many other years of watching both men's and women's tennis, and I'm led to conclude that the women are missing something. They are missing the magic that the men put on display at each Grand Slam event. They are missing five-set matches.

When you think of some of the greatest matches of all-time, what do you think of? You're all but guaranteed to see the 1980 Wimbledon final between Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe on everyone's list. Why? Not only did the match give Borg his fifth straight Wimbledon singles title, but it also went five sets, 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7, 8-6, with the 4th going 19-17 in a tiebreaker. The 1975 US Open semis between Guillermo Vilas and Manuel Orantes would have to make the list. Orantes rallied from down two sets and 0-5 in the fourth set -- one game away from losing, to win in five sets. The 1989 French Open Final between Michael Chang and Ivan Lendl was another legendary match. Down two sets to none, Change fought back, and eventually won it in five sets -- serving underhand in the fifth because of injury.

Wimbledon is upon us. As Roger Federer begins his quest for his fifth straight Wimbledon title, Justine Henin seeks her first.

Federer is an odds on favorite on the fast grass. Henin, on the other hand, must contend with women with powerful groundstrokes and big serves like Serena and Venus Williams, and Maria Sharapova.

Federer's first tough match will come in the third round against 6'4" Marat Safin. Though Safin has had an off year so far, he is always dangerous on the grass courts. Also down the road for Federer might be #13-ranked Tommy Haas or #9 James Blake.

World's #3 Andy Roddick is coming off a fourth straight victory at the Queen's Club, a warm up tournament for Wimbledon. Roddick's road to the quarterfinals appears easier than Federer's in that his main competition are player's whose games are more suited to clay than grass.

Rafael Nadal, #2-seed has an incredibly tough opening match against American Mardy Fish. Though Fish has been injured, this surface fits his serve-and-volley game to a tee. Should Fish return Nadal's serve and force his way to the net, an upset can happen. Should he get by Fish, in the third round Nadal is likely to face the huge-hitting Robin Soderling from Sweden. All-in-all I do not see Nadal reaching the final weekend this year.

On the women's side, Henin and Serena Williams appear to both have clear paths to a quarterfinal meeting. French Open finalist Jelena Jankovic must make her way through Israeli Shahar Peer or Martina Hingis, and possibly meet Anna Chakvetadze in the quarters. In Maria Sharapova's quarter of the draw it looks for all the world that she will face Venus Williams in a round-of-16 matchup worthy of the finals.

My predictions? It remains to be seen what the effect are of Federer losing to Nadal in the French Open finals. However, I feel Federer will pull through and win his fifth Winbledon. On the women's side I'm looking for Venus Williams to upset #2 Sharapova and Serena to defeat Henin in the quarterfinals. And I feel Serena takes the women's trophy.