|
NO
CENSURE FOR COMMENT
Foot
fault: Blake and ITF bail out Hewitt
By
Matthew Cronin
tennisreporters.net
 |
|
Susan
Mullane
Camerawork USA, Inc.
|
FLUSHING
MEADOWS, N.Y., SEPT. 2 –
Luck was definitely on the side of Lleyton Hewitt as the ITF and
the ultimate gentleman, James Blake, bailed him out of the 2001
U.S. Open's biggest controversery Saturday.
This
is the same Blake who was his opponent when Hewitt spewed what
could have been interpreted as racially tinged venom at linesman,
African American Marion Johnson, on Friday.
After
24 hours of accusations, hand-wringing, video-tape watching, interviewing
and serious debate, Hewitt was let off the hook by the ITF, which
said it could find no violation of the Grand Slams Code of Conduct
rules. Referee Brian Early and Grand Slam supervisor Stefan Fransson
essentially said that Hewitt's statement were too ambiguous to
rule against him, that there is no way to tell whether they were
racially tinged or not.
Because
Blake was willing to kiss and make up, the ITF was not going to
slap
Lleyton's hand, which tennisreporters.net
will,
but not before a recount of the incident.
In
the third set of his five set victory over Blake after he received
what he
considered to be two bad foot-fault calls against him by Johnson,
Lleyton yelled to umpire Andres Egli of Switzerland "Look
at him, mate. Look
at him. You tell me what the similarity is. … You put him off
the court, get
him off the court," said Hewitt.
A
little while after the match in the locker room before he considered
the
potential impact of the incident on his career, Blake told tennisreporters.net,
"It did bother me a little bit. But I figured that it was
in the heat of the moment
when he's fighting out there and not thinking about being politically
correct. I hope he didn't mean anything derogatory by it. But
I can't speak
for him. I hope he didn't mean it in a racist way. If he has racial
problems,
he has to be the one to deal with that. I'll try to give him the
benefit of
the doubt. He has this me against the world attitude that makes
him play
better. That's how he gets pumped up. I tried not to let it mar
the match I
don't like to slam other players. I want to put it in the past
and move on."
On
Friday, Hewitt denied making racial comments. "There was
nothing said out
there racial at all," said the Australian. "I didn't
say it in that way. I went out there and got two foot-faults on
one end. I asked if the guy could be moved. The umpire said 'Yeah,
we could move him'. They moved him. You can all think what you
want. At the end of the day, I wasn't making a racial comment.
It was just between me and the umpire. It's a conversation between
two people out there when we're in the heat of a tennis match."
Blake's
parents, Thomas and Betty, said that the comment couldn't have
been
interpreted any other way.
"It's
hard to interpret it otherwise," said Thomas, who is African
American. "It
just isn't right. You have to question a person and his motives
when he says something like that."
James,
21, said that while he hasn't been a consistent victim of racism
throughout his career, the Hewitt incident wasn't the first time
his skin
color was made an issue. "I've heard it some from parents
and juniors when
they wouldn't approve that I beat their son but I didn't voice
any opinions
because I wasn't supposed to hear it," Blake said. "I'm
very lucky not to
have gone through so many racial problems like (former African
American
tennis champion) Arthur Ashe did."
Thomas
Blake said that while his son tries to be a gentleman and rise
above
such incidents, his family has been a victim of racism in Fairfield,
Connecticut, where they live. "We've been dealing with it,"
said Thomas, who
also has a son named Thomas who is a pro tennis player. "It's
part of my kids'
socialization. It's too bad that some people see the world in
black and
white. It's unfortunate. We don't even have to talk about it.
They know what
society is like."
Before
the ruling came down on Saturday, Lleyton's girlfriend, Kim Clijsters,
defended her man.
"We've
got friends that have a different color as well," she said.
"We're not
racists at all. … Lleyton and I like to get involved in the
match and get
motivated. Those are things that pump me up and a lot of players.
You see a
lot of players that say stuff to the umpire to get themselves
pumped up.
… Lleyton wasn't upset at all [this morning] because he didn't
mean it
badly. He was getting angry because he wanted to get the umpire
removed. I
think he apologized if anyone understood it differently."
Hewitt
decided on Saturday to apologize to Blake in person. While the
contents of the conversation are unknown, it's suffice to say
that he
contrite enough to impress Blake, who said that Hewitt came clean
with him.
"I
didn't really know him going into the match," Blake said.
"Sometimes its
can actually make a relationship better to go through some sort
of
drama. … He seemed very sincere to me. … I'm going to give
him the benefit of
the doubt."
To
many observers, the "similarity" Hewitt was discussing
appeared to be
Lleyton saying that because Johnson was black he was favoring
Blake, who is
half black, half white. Early said that what Hewitt claimed on
Saturday was
that he thought the chair didn't understand that it was the same
person
making the call. Somehow, Hewitt believes, Egli confused Johnson
with another
linesperson, so it had to be pointed out to this experienced chair
(who
Hewitt called a "Spaz" at Roland Garros this year) that
another human being
was calling the baseline on the other side of the court.
Huh?
As
someone asked Brian Early, why would Lleyton use use the "similarity
"
language rather than just state something more up his alley, which
usually
goes something like, "That f---er has called me for two foot
faults. Get him
the f--- off the court."
Early
said the "similarity" language was a "little bit"
unusual. "That's why
were here," Early said. "If it were easy, then it would
not have been
misconstrued. Whether it's misconstrued or not, I can't tell you.
I only can
say that I would have to draw a conclusion from what I see and
what I hear
was a definitely a racist remark, and I can't do that from what
I have. I
can't say the court of public opinion won't do that. I can't say
that I'm a
mind reader. It's very, very tough to prove what he did, that's
why we made
the decision that we did. "
That
means no fine for Lleyton but since we are in the court of semi-public
opinion here (the tennis world is far too incestuous to call ourselves
pure
members of the public), we offer the following comments.
1.
Lleyton is paranoid, angry young man who's "It's me against
the World" attitude is growing very tiresome. He is abusive,
evasive and often rude. Whether or not he was engaging in racial
profiling is hard to say, but it is easy to opine that he offended
a lot of people on Friday
– Johnson,
Egli, the Blake family, and every fan who watched him perform
his circus-like Rocky Balboa fist-pumping routine after he won
the fourth set largely due to the fact that Blake was overcome
with cramps and had puked into a garbage can. Unquestionably,
Hewitt is in better shape than Blake and is a better player.
But why celebrate so wildly when you know your opponent is hurting?
Sure, step on your opponent, but don't stick it into his face.
2.
Hewitt's explanation makes very little sense to tennisreporters.net.
Maybe he was so pissed off that he spoke poorly and confusingly.
Then maybe he shouldn't speak at all when he's pissed off if
he's going to cause major racial incidents. Maybe he should
stop getting pissed off so much and looking like one of some
dark god's evil minions with his beet-red face, pit bull's snarl
and Mike Tyson eyes.
3.
Blake is an intelligent guy with a developing game who doesn't
want his career defined by this one incident, which is one of
the reasons he let Lleyton off the hook. He is also a positivist
who tries to think the best of people. That's a great attitude
and will win him tons of friends and accolades. But he needs
to get in much better shape and add more spice to his game if
he's going to stick on the tour.
4.
Umpires in general need to be stricter with the players
– especially
with the men. The tour doesn't need tons of guys being booted
from matches for incidents of abuse (it cheats fans), but more
point penalties are in order.
|
