Sports
‘I’m Just Serena,’ Swinging Freely for Another Grand Slam Run
Serena Williams is sort of 41. She didn’t play aggressive tennis for almost a 12 months, and it confirmed — really it confirmed — at Wimbledon, in Toronto and in Mason, Ohio, on the three tournaments the place she made painfully transient appearances earlier this summer season earlier than arriving in New York for her farewell U.S. Open.
She appeared sluggish to react and sluggish on the run. She appeared rusty, mistiming returns off second serves that she would as soon as have punished.
However that’s all irrelevant now. Williams is relaunched, as she made clear by defeating Anett Kontaveit, the No. 2 participant on this planet, on Wednesday night time.
Williams is into the third spherical of what’s very doubtless her closing event: convincingly replaying her biggest hits — big-point aces, swing-volley winners, full-cut groundstrokes on the transfer — and rapidly giving first-time opponents like Danka Kovinic and Kontaveit a real style of what it’s wish to face the true Serena.
Along with her 7-6 (4), 2-6, 6-2 victory over Kontaveit full, Williams was requested on courtroom by ESPN analyst Mary Joe Fernandez, “Are you stunning your self along with your degree in the meanwhile?”
Williams checked out her for a short time and chuckled.
It was probably the most telling reply of the night, and no precise phrases have been required even when Williams did tack on a couple of when the chuckling was finished: “I’m simply Serena ,” she stated.
“She’s not coming right here to be shocked by successful, in any other case she wouldn’t be right here,” stated her coach Eric Hechtman.
This isn’t bravado. That is hard-earned confidence. The type that comes with being raised by mother and father who made it clear that greatness lay forward if the appropriate decisions and sacrifices have been made. The type that comes from measuring your self towards an uber-talented large sister named Venus from the second you would choose up a racket on a courtroom filled with cracks in Compton, Calif. The type that comes from successful 23 Grand Slam singles titles throughout almost twenty years towards rivals from a number of tennis generations and regardless of all method of setbacks, each skilled and private.
Williams has good cause to imagine that she will be able to rise above, even within the twilight, as a result of she has finished it so typically.
Serena Williams’s Farewell to Tennis
The U.S. Open could possibly be the tennis star’s final skilled event after an extended profession of breaking boundaries and obliterating expectations.
“I’d by no means, ever rely Serena Williams out, and if you happen to do, that may be your greatest mistake,” stated Kathy Rinaldi, the captain of the USA King Cup staff, who was watching on Wednesday.
In case you do rely her out, as Williams has defined earlier than, you’re solely going to assist her.
“As a result of she’s going to make use of that to show you flawed,” Rinaldi stated. “However she’s actually having fun with this one. You possibly can clearly see. It’s acquired to be actually robust for her opponents: to face her and face the gang.”
It has been fairly a staff effort up to now: Williams rolling again the years and 5 tiers of stands packed to the roof in sold-out Arthur Ashe Stadium with followers wholly dedicated, maybe for the primary time, to displaying Williams nothing however love in a venue the place she has generated ambivalence previously along with her outbursts and, at different occasions, along with her dominance as she racked up six U.S. Open singles titles and made lengthy runs at No. 1.
However with Williams getting ready, in her phrases, to “evolve away from tennis,” the U.S. Open crowd appears to have thought-about her physique of labor, enduring excellence and manifest love of the sport and the battle and determined to go all in.
“There’s no rush right here,” Williams stated with a smile, alluding to her impending evolution. “I’m loving this crowd. Oh, my goodness, it’s actually implausible. There’s nonetheless slightly left in me. We’ll see.”
Watching her lose 6-4, 6-0 final month to Emma Raducanu within the first spherical of the Western and Southern Open with tape on her left leg, it did appear affordable to imagine she may not be capable of pull her sport collectively in time.
“She was slightly banged up in Cincy,” Hechtman stated. “She’s significantly better now and naturally the gang helps loads, completely. On the finish of the day, you play that a few years and that many tournaments and win that many titles, you want the large stage to get you up for it.”
There have been extra standing ovations than at a nationwide political conference, myriad shouts of help and, much less sportingly however most likely unavoidably, loads of cheers for the opposition’s errors, together with their missed serves.
The newest sellout crowd on Wednesday night time even booed a machine: disagreeing with the digital line-calling system when certainly one of Kontaveit’s winners was proven to have landed on the acute outdoors fringe of the sideline.
Within the second set, Kontaveit gained one of many factors of the event — a spectacular scrambling effort punctuated with a backhand winner — and was greeted with a golf clap.
It won’t get simpler for her rivals. Ajla Tomljanovic, the tall and unseeded Australian who will face Williams within the third spherical on Friday night time, was taking part in on Court docket 7 on Wednesday as Williams and Kontaveit dueled in the primary stadium.
“I used to be listening to the gang and it like scared me, despite the fact that I used to be taking part in on a special courtroom,” Tomljanovic stated. “So I’m going to should get my earplugs.”
Tomljanovic stated earlier than even seeing the draw she had a imaginative and prescient that she would face Williams in New York and was solely hoping that it was not going to be within the first spherical.
So it has turned out, and Tomljanovic, like almost all of Williams’s opponents on this newest comeback, has by no means performed her earlier than. Like Kontaveit, she desires the expertise to make her profession really feel full however isn’t positive how she is going to deal with the second (Kontaveit ended up in tears at her information convention).
“I do that trick the place I really feel like the gang is cheering for me as properly,” she stated. “I heard Novak Djokovic say that when about doing that in his matches. It’s one. It’s all about tricking your thoughts actually, as a result of you’ll be able to’t management what the gang does.”
The British chair umpire, Alison Hughes, tried her greatest on Wednesday night time and ended up saying “please” an awesome deal greater than she succeeded in really quieting the din.
It’s a second that spurs ideas of U.S. Opens previous, significantly of Jimmy Connors’ rip-roaring run to the semifinals in 1991 as he was celebrating upset victories and his thirty ninth birthday.
“I simply really feel like I’ve had a giant purple X on my again since I gained the U.S. Open in ’99,” Williams stated. “It’s been there my total profession, as a result of I gained my first Grand Slam early in my profession. However right here it’s completely different. I really feel like I’ve already gained, figuratively, mentally.”
A record-tying twenty fourth Grand Slam singles title nonetheless appears an unreasonable notion to many people outsiders. She is 40, in any case, and in addition taking part in doubles with Venus beginning Thursday night time, which might put additional pressure on her injury-prone body.
Her ex-coach Patrick Mouratoglou endorsed towards doubles throughout majors and was proved right in 2018 when in her first main after getting back from childbirth she performed each occasions within the French Open and needed to exit the singles draw with an harm.
She and Venus haven’t performed doubles at a serious once more till now, however it’s comprehensible that they need this full-circle second, and Hechtman stated the plan is just to get rid of a full observe session on the times Serena performs doubles.
However her singles draw definitely will get one fascinated with the opportunity of a deeper run. There are not any Grand Slam singles champions left in Serena’s quarter of the draw and just one left in her half: the unseeded Canadian Bianca Andreescu, who beat Williams within the 2019 U.S. Open closing.
However going all the way in which absolutely doesn’t appear preposterous to Group Serena, and when Hechtman was requested very late on Wednesday night time concerning the Connors precedent, he mulled it over and stated he was leaning towards a special U.S. Open swan tune: Pete Sampras, who gained the 2002 males’s title in what turned out to be his closing event.
Dream on New York, and because the Williams household would absolutely endorse, dream large.
Sports
Giants legends Lawrence Taylor, Ottis Anderson speak at Donald Trump's Jersey Shore campaign rally
Nearly 40,000 people were in Wildwood, N.J., Saturday for a Donald Trump campaign rally, and one of those spectators was arguably the greatest defensive player of all time.
New York Giants legend Lawrence Taylor was spotted at the Jersey Shore rally.
Assemblyman Paul Kanitra from New Jersey’s 10th legislative district saw his “favorite player growing up” at the rally.
Those in attendance got a surprise when Taylor and former Giants teammate Ottis Anderson spoke on stage.
“I grew up a Democrat, and I’ve always been a Democrat, until I met this man right here,” Taylor said to cheers. “Nobody in my family ever will vote for a Democrat again.”
L.T. is widely regarded as the greatest linebacker to ever play. He was a three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year, including in his rookie season.
He won two Super Bowls, made 10 straight Pro Bowls and was named the MVP of the 1986 season. He also remains the franchise’s all-time sacks leader, which includes his 9½ sacks from his rookie season, before sacks became a stat.
This came despite a lavish lifestyle off the field, which resulted in legal troubles after his playing days.
Many attendees who spoke to Fox News said they believe Trump could flip the Garden State in November, when he hopes to take back the White House for a second term.
Rod Delaine, an Amazon factory worker in Staten Island who lives in New Jersey, told Fox News Digital he drove nearly 2½ hours to attend the rally.
LIONS ROOKIE SAYS HE CHOSE NO. 0 BECAUSE ‘AIN’T NOBODY LIKE ME’
A New Jersey schoolteacher who identified herself as Anna said she was motivated to attend because of the state of the economy.
Another supporter, who identified himself as Carlos, said he believed the country needed to return to the way things were under the former president.
“I think this country needs to change. Although, we already know what Trump’s all about. So, that change is just going to come right back to us because that’s what we need,” Carlos said. “We need Trump because I don’t think Biden is just getting the job done right now. Some of it’s his fault. Some of it is probably the people around him. But I think we need Trump back to get this country back to where it needs to be.”
Fox News’ Bradford Betz and Emma Colton contributed to this report.
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Sports
Shaikin: Why USC, college baseball’s most decorated team, plays home games over an hour from campus
“You ever played Mafia before?”
I had asked Connor Clift, a senior catcher for the USC baseball team, about the Trojans’ trying season.
“We play Mafia for hours,” Clift said.
It’s a video game.
“You have a sheriff, and you have townies, and the mafia tries to kill the townies, and the sheriff tries to catch the mafia,” he said. “Nobody knows who is who, and then you fight it out.”
The Trojans play for hours, because they ride the bus for hours. They are a team without a home.
They practice half an hour from campus — an hour, with traffic. They play most of their home games an hour from campus — two hours, with traffic.
“Beat the traffic,” sophomore outfielder Austin Overn said, “or else you’re screwed.”
The most distinguished team in college baseball history is homeless. The 12-time NCAA champion Trojans cannot play on campus because of construction that includes upgrades to Dedeaux Field and new facilities for the USC football team.
When USC hired Andy Stankiewicz as its new baseball coach two years ago, he said had been assured whatever construction would take place would displace the team for the 2028 season.
“That’s it. One year,” he told The Times then. “When it’s over, we’re going to be in a gorgeous, brand new Dedeaux.”
That timeline changed last summer. The baseball team had to vacate last fall — and for two years, not one.
“That was a little bit of a surprise, honestly,” Stankiewicz said. “You have to learn to make the adjustment on the fly and keep going.”
Coaches and administrators scrambled. Baseball teams long have been barnstormers, but the Savannah Bananas do not have to worry about classes.
For fall practices, the Trojans bused to El Camino College in Torrance. The community college had priority for the baseball field in the afternoon, so the USC players shifted their classes to the afternoon and departed for El Camino as early as 7 a.m.
On occasion, Stankiewicz said, the Trojans would get there and the gates to the field would be locked, and the team would have to wait for campus security officers to come by and open up.
To leave El Camino at 11 a.m. and get to class at USC at noon, Overn said, could mean rushing to get in a shower and a couple bites of lunch in between.
“It was,” he said with a smile, “a little fast for me.”
The Trojans already had their 2024 schedule. No school would displace its own team so USC could play there. And, as USC associate director of operations and event management Garrett D’Angelo said, “We wanted one spot that was home.”
In Irvine, on the site of the former El Toro Marine base, voters rejected a proposed international airport two decades ago. Since then, a community sports mecca dubbed the Great Park has blossomed there, surrounded by thousands of homes. The NHL’s Ducks built themselves a practice rink there, not far from a stadium used by a minor league soccer team.
That is where USC found its home away from home, at a sparkling 1,300-seat ballpark designed to host championship games of youth tournaments. The ballpark is surrounded not by campus landmarks, but by an iconic orange balloon on one side and a water park on another side.
No one expected students would show up, but USC has a robust alumni base in Orange County.
“This was the best option on short notice,” said Rock Hudgens, USC director of baseball operations.
The Trojans built their own locker room, because the one in Irvine had 12 lockers and USC needed 40. They rented an ice machine and arranged for regular deliveries of ice.
The ballpark did not include a batter’s eye. The Trojans contracted with an event production company to deliver one, and so the makeshift batter’s eye is framed in the same way a concert stage would be.
To make the place feel like home, they wrapped ballpark columns and draped railings with USC decor. They used Velcro, because the wraps and drapes come off when the stadium is used by others — including the weekends USC had to rent fields at Loyola Marymount and UC Irvine because the ballpark already had been reserved.
At the start of May, when USC had its finals week, players normally would have walked to class Thursday and Friday and taken their exams. Instead, because USC had a home game Friday night in Irvine, the players bused to Orange County Thursday afternoon and took finals in a hotel Friday morning.
The Trojans have fallen on hard times since the glory days of Tom Seaver and Fred Lynn, Mark McGwire and Randy Johnson, Barry Zito and Mark Prior. They have not won an NCAA championship in 26 years.
Over the past 18 seasons, they have posted three winning records and made one postseason appearance.
The Southland is not exactly a hotbed for college baseball — Cal State Fullerton and Long Beach State aside — but the Trojans have not averaged even 1,000 fans for years. In 2015, the last time USC posted a winning record, the average attendance was 826.
That is what makes this home-away-from-home season such a pleasant surprise. The students may not be here, but admission is free, and youngsters playing on adjacent diamonds stop by with their families.
Josh Boatright, 14, rode his bike past the ballpark one day and checked out a few innings. He has been back three times, although he admits he would not be as interested in the Trojans if the team played at Dedeaux Field instead of in his neighborhood.
“If I go all the way to L.A.,” he said, “I’d probably go for a Dodger game.”
The Trojans have averaged 740 fans at the Irvine ballpark this season, more than they averaged at Dedeaux Field last season, even for a team with a losing record. USC has three games left in Irvine this season.
“I feel like, as of now, it’s a home,” Overn said. “For the most part, I feel like we’re here all the time.
“It’s a home. It’s obviously not the home we were expecting this year.”
And, after we talked, Overn walked into the Friday night — not to a dorm room or an apartment or a fraternity, and not to a campus party, but to a bus that would take him to a Marriott hotel within walking distance of an outdoor mall that celebrates “life at its most stylish, delicious and exciting.”
Sports
NFL legend Jerry Rice 'hot' over Brenden Rice's draft tumble, but confident son will prove doubters wrong
Jerry Rice is widely considered one of the greatest wide receivers in NFL history. Rice’s son, Brenden Rice, followed in his father’s footsteps and recently became an NFL receiver.
The younger Rice finished his college football career with 1,821 receiving yards. Earlier this year, he declared for the NFL Draft, and last month fell to the Los Angeles Chargers in the seventh round.
While many projections had Brenden as a Day 2 or Day draft pick, his slide to the final round of the draft took some by surprise — especially his Hall of Fame father.
“My dad was hot,” Rice told reporters as he smiled. “You guys get the flash like … the humble dude, right? Me, he’s like, ‘Hell no, we’re going to take this to a different level. These guys going to feel us.’”
Rice attended his friend’s funeral on the same day the Chargers called and told him he would be one of their draft picks.
“It was just like a blessing from God because he allowed me to go ahead and just mourn the death of my friend,” Rice said, “and then after that just go ahead and be happy, and it was a glorious day.”
NFL LEGEND JERRY RICE’S SON BELIEVES HE AND CALEB WILLIAMS COULD BE NEXT TOM BRADY-ROB GRONKOWSKI DUO
He found the silver lining in his unexpected tumble in the draft. The 22-year-old now gets the opportunity to catch passes from quarterback Justin Herbert.
“I’m in the best position possible to go ahead and make my mark and make my own legacy. I went from Caleb Williams to Justin Herbert, and I’m in a room that’s going to allow me to compete, day-in and day-out,” Rice said.
The Chargers moved on from wide receiver Mike Williams and traded away six-time Pro Bowler Keenan Allen this offseason, which gives Rice an opportunity to play a significant role in the team’s offense.
“Everything’s upon me. If you guys don’t see me coming on this fall, that’s on me. If you guys see me out there, then I put in the necessary work to put my best foot in the door and go out there and produce.”
Rice spent the first two seasons of his college football career at Colorado, before transferring to USC in 2022.
Brenden suggested that it remains to be determined whether he is a better athlete than his father was, but he is certainly motivated to surpass his dad’s NFL rookie production.
“I feel as though we’re neck and neck. I’m faster, and I heard his rookie season in the NFL wasn’t good,” Rice said. “I gotta go top him.”
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