Roddick ousted in Memphis

Tennis Betting Lines

02/23/2012 - Memphis, TN (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Belgian Xavier Malisse knocked off second- seed and defending champion Andy Roddick 7-6 (10-8), 7-5 in first-round action at the $1.155 million Regions Morgan Keegan Championships on Wednesday.

Roddick started strong by winning the first two games of the second set, but his lead was quickly erased as Malisse got back on serve, and then broke Roddick in the final game to secure the win. It was Roddick's earliest exit at this tournament in 12 appearances on the indoor hardcourts at The Racquet Club of Memphis.

Third seed Radek Stepanek of the Czech Republic, who was the runner-up at this event in 2009, polished off American Bobby Reynolds 6-3, 6-2, while fourth- seeded Canadian Milos Raonic followed up his win in San Jose by topping Ernests Gulbis of Latvia 6-2, 7-6 (7-3) in one hour and 29 minutes.

Raonic lost to Roddick in last year's final to give Roddick his third consecutive title at this event.

Diminutive Belgian Olivier Rochus upended fifth-seeded Russian Alex Bogomolov Jr. 1-6, 6-4, 7-6 (7-5), while seventh-seeded South African slugger Kevin Anderson drove out oft-injured American Robby Ginepri 7-5, 6-3.

German Philipp Petzschner knocked off sixth-seeded Frenchman Julien Benneteau 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (8-6).

Additional opening-round wins came for Austrian Jurgen Melzer, Poland's Lukasz Kubot and Germany's Benjamin Becker. Melzer defeated Uzbekistan's Denis Istomin 6-7 (2-7), 6-3, 7-6 (7-4). Istomin was last week's San Jose runner-up to Raonic. Kubot topped American Jesse Levine 7-6 (7-2), 6-4, while Becker finished off Dudi Sela in straight sets 6-4, 6-1.

The 2012 Memphis champ will pocket $277,915.

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FOOTBALL TRASH TALK

NFL Football Trash Talk

Trash talk has a place in every competitive endeavor (except baseball; those stirrup-wearers are too busy chewing on their sunflower seeds and their supplements to worry about what their opponents are doing).

Fantasy sports is no exception. Any intelligent discussion of the subject would probably start with a thesis statement or a definition of terms. Thankfully, this wont be an intelligent discussion.

Let me just say that I am happy to take a place in this space alongside my talented colleagues, even our commissioner. (You should see how she bleats like a demented paper boy about league fees on our fantasy site).

Trash talking, I would argue, is primarily about amusing your friends, their sheeplike demeanors and sloping foreheads notwithstanding. The best place I have found for football trash talking is at www.SportsAlarm.com.

Beyond the entertainment factor, though, I would recognize that the sophomoric ritual has one advantage, when properly applied. It magnifies your fantasy triumphs and mitigates your fantasy failures by transforming the eventual point total into an afterthought. Winning makes it seem like your opponent really is a truss-owning, lapel-pin-wearing nitwit. And in defeat, trash talk can be the air bag to break the fall from your hyperbolic heights. The plug-necked yahoos on your team, you can say, will be sacking groceries by the end of the season.

The best trash talk, in my view, is layered and nuanced. And it doesnt focus only on your opponents team. It picks apart your opponent. The idea is to create a shock-and-awe-scale blizzard of nonsense, and the goal is to make your opponent drop his hands from his keyboard in exasperation.

What team does your opponent root for? Accuse a Giants fan of having a Joe Namath pillowcase. Wheres your opponent from? Give a look of concern no matter his reply, then say, I'll try to type slower for you next time. Is your opponent into politics? Label everyone a tax-and-spend corporate shill.

Cap all that with a liberal application of irrelevance. For instance, dont just conclude by saying your opponent is a twerp who drafts like my grandmother. Say that your opponent is a sweater-wearing, eyebrow-plucking twerp who drafts his team about as well as Zsa Zsa Gabor gave acceptance speeches at the Oscars. By the time your foe makes sense of that, his starting running back will have had puppies.

But what about you? Hmm? Recall a memorable slam? Have a tried-and-true technique? Know someone who seems impervious to insult? Take a moment and tells us about it. Put together some (fit-for-publication) thoughts. You wont be too busy returning phone messages from your friends, Im sure, to reply.

In addition to the trash talking, the Sports Alarm has a huge gallery of high resolution pictures of beautiful women and models in bikinis. The most popular models are: Lindsay Lohan, Carrie Underwood, Alessandra Ambrosio, and Paris Hilton.