That Owens Guy

He's one of those guys that go by two letters. T.O. That's Terrell Owens for the uninitiated. He's the diva wide receiver for the Dallas Cowboys. Wide receivers tend to be a temperamental egotistical lot, and TO has had a lot to do with that. They depend on quarterbacks throwing them the ball so they can make their circus catches. They also whine a lot if balls aren't being thrown their direction.

To be fair, TO, known for wrecking the harmony of the Philadelphia Eagles was, for the most part, a team player last year for the Cowboys, especially without another big personality there, Bill Parcells, who had stepped down for the more passive, Wade Phillips.

Even so, you'd think TO wouldn't be around checking out other athletes, especially in, of all sports, tennis. Maybe it's one of those Tiger Woods, Roger Federer, Nike made me do it, kinda deal. Whatever the reason, TO has been seen in Miami attending matches with Andy Roddick.

Roddick's frustration with Federer is legend. For a guy that's in the top 10, and at times, in the top 3, Roddick has never had it easy with Federer. Roddick had, up until last night, lost 12 consecutive sets to Federer. The fact of the matter is Federer hits his groundstrokes so much better than Federer.

Roddick typically stays even with Roger because of his serve, and because Federer, for all his greatness, makes a lot of errors. Federer can toss in dozens of errors. He usually gets away with it because his errors don't come in bunches. There are players that have lapses of concentration, whose errors cause them to lose games. Even if Federer is making errors, it's typically one error every other point.

Apparently, Roddick got some advice to deal with Federer from TO, and he beat him in three sets. However, watching the way he handled in-between points, you see elements of Connors, his former coach. Connors would typically follow up any point he played by straightening his strings (these were the days before Luxilon).

In other words, he'd not dwell on the success or mistakes of the previous point. Roddick's problems have typically been mental. He was more like Courier before Courier met Higueras, or Agassi before Brad Gilbert. You never felt (and to my mind, still don't) that Roddick knows how to mentally tough out a match.

I tend to diss Roddick's mental toughness, but certainly, he has some, because his groundstrokes, while good, even better than average, are not spectacular. He depends as much on steadiness to win points (again, possibly due to Connors) as he does power.

So as much as TO might get credit for a breakthrough against Federer, you have to realize that RFed is not having a particularly good year, failing to make final after final. He was eliminated in straight sets by Mardy Fish, now losing to Roddick in three sets (and losing to Djokovic at the Australian).

Even as they've parted ways, we may credit Roddick's win to that Connors guy, rather than that Owens guy.