us open champions '08

I let my racket do the talking. That's what I am all about, really. I just go out and win tennis matches.
- Pete Sampras

If you think about it, there are a lot more professional tennis players out there than we, the public, really realize. That's probably largely because a small percentage of that group accounts for most of the major wins and titles. And so, understandably, you here about them on the news and not the others. We've also found that it helps your celebrity athlete life a good deal if you're even just semi-good looking...even if you're on-court skills aren't the most impressive. (I won't mention any names, but you already know.)

The reason I bring it up is because it's always interesting to me that the Open starts with 128 eager, hopeful, determined tennis players all vying for the top spots, but as the days go by, that number quickly diminishes. And soon it feels like Thanksgiving evening all over again, when all the extended family members and friends you haven't seen all year and who you kind of forgot their names start leaving the house, and you're once again left with those closest to you. Nadal. Jankovic. Djokovic. Roddick. Williams. Federer.

And so it should come as not too much of a surprise to find that the 2008 US Open champions are Roger Federer and Serena Williams.

Sunday night, Williams and Jelena Jankovic traded forehands and fired off winners in two sets filled to the brim with exciting moments and amazing, this-is-why-you-watch-tennis rallies. At no point (until maybe toward the end) was a winner certain, and both players knew it. But, the match had to end, and it did, with Serena victorious at 6-4, 7-5.

Then on Monday (remember, there was that Saturday rain delay) Roger Federer faced off against a young, still-high-from-his-Nadal-win Andy Murray. To be completely honest, I didn't see the match. (Say it isn't so!!) It started at 5 PM, and I was already on a train to the city for my acting on-film class. But when I got home and checked out the score, it was nothing unexpected, but still, I was happy that, after a rough year, Federer got the US Open title he's been dreaming about (his excited on-court behavior would imply) for the past two weeks. Final: 6-2, 7-5, 6-2.

So were the final acts of the Open surprising? No.

Were they entertaining? Most definitely.

And in the end, really, that's what it's all about.

As for me, I have a match of my own next week I have to go prepare for...