http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/1247...elgian-tribunal


Interesting. Another Belgian in the spotlight for possible drug use. I'm not one for conspiracy theories, usually, but I'm starting to wonder about JH's retirement more and more. I'm really starting to wonder if it wasn't really just her obnoxious ego all along.

Leaving aside that Justine's tennis is clearly grounded in talent rather than physicality, and that she was complaining about burnout and fitness issues long before she abruptly retired, I don't think there's any there there. Yet again an 'example' is being made of a tennis player for no clear reason - even the prosecutor in the case recommended a simple warning! Yanina didn't fail or even skip any drug tests, but rather was careless with the Big Brother-esque system so many of the top players were complaining about at the start of the year, including the likes of Murray and Serena.

So does she get a two-month suspended sentence like Gasquet, who actually FAILED a drug test? No, she gets a full freakin' year. For what? Tennis is in danger of destroying itself with this witch hunt atmosphere, with virtually no top players (maybe loose exceptions can be made for the likes of then-Top 10 Cañas and Slam 'finalist' Puerta, who each managed successful appeals anyhow) having actually been shown to use performance-enhancing drugs over the past decade, unlike say, baseball or cycling. It's analogous to the overreaction to the betting scandal, with a hard-working, perennial Top 5 player like Davydenko subjected to a cloud of suspicion for months and months before a long-overdue exoneration and a hapless journeyman like the late Montcourt is thrown off the tour and loses his livelihood (and later his life) for betting a handful of euros on an equal handful of matches which had no relation to his own. Poor decision-making, sure - followed by an even more egregious disciplinary process.

There has to be a way to demonstrate no-tolerance policies without all these draconian casualties. Wickmayer had just broken into the Top 20, winning two titles and reaching a Slam semifinal, and looked a good bet to reach the final in Bali except she was forced to pull out due to this. Who is willing to step forward on her behalf? The chorus of bewilderment and outrage when the news about beloved ne'er-do-well Gasquet broke? Or will crickets sound like they did with the unpopular Hingis, whose disgrace was greeted instead by the eager sharpening of all the long knives which came out for her? The appeal process is so drawn out and laboured that even if she eventually succeeds in clearing her name or lessening the penalty, chances are she will have already been off the tour for months anyhow. Ugh.

Longtime tennis columnist Jon Wertheim put it this way via his Twitter feed: '1) where is the wta? 2)where does wickmayer find funds to fight this? there should be some "innocence project" for these athletes...' I'm inclined to agree. The first question has already been answered, with new WTA head Allaster basically throwing Yanina under the bus for the sake of a united (Inquisition) front or to avoid ruffling any feathers, apparently.

I'm beginning to wonder if the ATP and WTA are on completely different pages when doling out suspensions for drug related cases. Hingis got two years for her cocaine test, and Wickmayer got a year for not-even-a-positive test. Karantacheva got two years for a real positive test.

Agassi got nothing for a positive meth test, Gasquet got what amounted to a "go stand in the corner and think about what you did" for his coke test, but Canas got hit with two years for his real hydrochlorothiazide test.

If you ask me, the WTA looks more consistent, and both look to be tough on the non-recreational, but just how gaping a difference is there regarding the recreational stuff?

Hingis was fairly blunt about the hypocrisy in a recent interview in Tennis.

I think her punishment was ridiculous.

But if I had to guess at the few non-sexist justifications behind it, a major reason might be that her violation came at that grand dame of tournaments, Wimbledon, and not (like Gasquet) trashy Miami.

That, and the fact that it was Hingis. Like Agassi, she has a child phenom love-hate thing going on with tennis.

But while Agassi plays the fame game, Hingis tended to act out and rebel (albeit like a spoiled Bad Seed brat). Agassi's rebellions tend to be all image.

It's hard not to see the coke thing as some kind of final f**k you between Hingis and the sport's authorities. Things never changed much from that amazing French Open psychodrama with Graf and those underhand serves.

Well, maybe there's some parity after all. Xavier Malisse was also suspended for a year, for the same reason as Wickmayer. When the story broke, though, I don't remember Malisse being mentioned, maybe it's because Wickmayer's been such a big deal since the USO.

TwoH, that's an interesting take on Hingis. That FO really was so important in so many ways. It was the brief "taking back" of a torch to a great champion, that a spoiled brat champion should have never had (IMO) and it so appropriately marked the demise of said spoiled brat champion. It was Steffi's last hurrah as she started riding gracefully into the sunset and exposed Hingis for l'enfante terrible she truly was...and Hingis never won another slam again. While I had to eat quite a bit of crow when Hingis came back, it's the irony in that it was Kim Clijsters who kept her from advancing so many times in the QFs of the big matches that makes it all good again...seeing as how Kim Clijsters came back and won a slam almost right away.

Anyway, back on topic , I wonder just how many more of these "where were you?" type of suspensions we'll start seeing...on both tours.

Both Wickmayer and Malisse have been reinstated. To state the painfully obvious, tennis needs to figure this sh*t out. Make out a reasonable drug policy -- for starters, one that doesn't yank a bunch of players out of bed in the middle of a Grand Slam, one that distinguishes between performance-enhancers and recreational drugs, and this above all, one in which all players are treated equally, regardless of ranking, marquee value, or sports agent. And then stick to it. This ain't neurosurgery, guys. Figure it out.