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While the tennis world remains focused on that swank suburb in south London, John Isner is back in Tampa, getting ready for his slate of upcoming tournaments.

It's an important stretch for Isner (I know, aren't they all?) because he's finally reached his one-year anniversary in pro tennis. To explain one more time, pro tennis rankings are taken from a 12-month snapshot. In other words, your ranking as of July 1, 2008 includes all your results from July 1, 2007 - July 1, 2008. A week later, it's all your results from July 8, 2007 - July 8, 2008 and so on.

Up until now, becuase Isner had no past history beyond his first pro tournament, a Futures tournament in Chico, Calif. that began on June 25, 2007, Isner was only in accumulation mode. Every point he earned helped boost his ranking.

Now, while Isner is still earning points with each match he wins, he's also "losing" points that he had accumulated in tournaments that are now over 12-months old. For example, Isner won that Futures tournament, earning 18 ranking points. After Wimbledon, those points will be subtracted off his total (he had 504 ranking points coming into Wimbledon). Isner got five ranking points just for making the main draw at Wimbledon, but he'll still come away with a net loss of 13 points after this week, which will probably drop him a few spots in the rankings from his current perch at No. 83.

Next up though, is an opportunity for Isner to make up some of that lost ground. He's playing in the Hall of Fame Tennis Championships in Newport, RI on July 7. Isner has two things going for him here. One, it's a grass court tournament, so the speed of the surface is fast. Two, it's right after Wimbledon, so most of the heavy hitters on the tour will skip it. Based on the rankings of the entrants in last year's field, Isner will likely be about a No. 5 seed, the first time he's been seeded in an ATP event in his career.

Last year, Isner lost in the first round at Newport, earning zero points. So if he can win, for example, two rounds this year, he'd pick up 40 points and likely bump his ATP ranking up into the 70's.

After Newport, it's time to start tuning up for the U.S. Open. And it's a return to the surface that I think suits him best, American hard courts. He starts off with a tournament in Indianapolis on July 14.

Isner will need sucess during this stretch, because early in August, he will reach the one-year anniversary of his run to the finals of the Legg Mason tournament in Washington, D.C. While that tournament put him on the map in American tennis, it also earned him 140 precious ranking points, which will disappear from his total the first week in August.

It's a critical amount, because right now Isner is still ranked high enough to qualify for entrance to most ATP tournaments. If he drops back into triple digits, he'll have to either get a few wild cards and get hot in another tournament soon, or go back to building up his ranking on the challenger circuit.

But that's still a month off. There are matches to be won, and ranking points to be earned, in the next few weeks, beginning in Newport.

Chris Volstad, one of the five first-round draft picks who made up the Grasshoppers' starting rotation in all or part of 2006, has become the second member of the group to make the Florida Marlins. Having been promoted from Double-A Carolina over the weekend, he joins Ryan Tucker in the club. The complete list of former Greensboro players now in the Majors can be found here.
Aaron Thompson, Sean West and Brett Sinkbeil, the other first-round starters from two seasons ago, have had injury problems. Thompson and Sinkbel are in Double-A and West, who missed all of 2007, has been limited in Jupiter, the next step above Greensboro in the Marlins' system.
Let's just say Sunday was a memorable and busy one for the 16th overall choice of the 2005 draft. Informed he had been promoted late Saturday night, he flew from RDU to Denver at 6 a.m. Sunday and said he barely had time to get out to the bullpen before the Marlins' contest with the Colorado Rockies. The Marlins threw him in there soon thereafter, and he picked up the win with a two-inning, scoreless performance.
The team immediately said it will move Volstad, who went 11-8 with a 3.08 ERA for the Hoppers, into the starting rotation.

Former UNCG star Kyle Hines plays his third game of the NBA's Summer League at 10:30 tonight. He's coming off a seven-point, five-rebound performance in nine minutes in the team's most recent game, a 77-75 loss to the New Orleans Hornets.
There isn't necessarily going to be a ton of playing time available to Hines, an undrafted free agent who can't trump first-round draftee Alexis Ajinca no matter what he does. The Bobcats have an investment in Ajinca and are using this 10-day summer session as a developmental tool.
But there's still an upside to participating for Hines, who can display his talents to foreign scouts and other NBA execs and enhance his profile in the process.
The Bobcats' summer team is coached by Dave Hanners, a former UNC assistant and one of the really good guys in the business. Hanners is one of several assistants on Larry Brown's staff.

Chris Paul talks about the Olympics (video by Rob Daniels)

As clubs prepare to retun to play after the All-Star Game, here's your weekly runown of who's where and how they're doing.
Notable addition to the group: Oroles pitcher Alberto Castillo, who defected from Cuba to Canada in 1993; went to junior college in Miami; was drafted by the Giants; wound up with the Yankees system and played here in 1998; and was claimed in the offseason this year by the Orioles.

You may have missed it over the weekend, but Greensboro's own John Isner won his first ATP title on Sunday.

Before you wonder how you did miss that, let me add that he won it in doubles, teaming with Mardy Fish to capture the Hall of Fame Tennis Championships in Newport, Rhode Island.

Not bad considering Isner and Fish had only played together once before, at last year's Newport tournament.

Isner is now ranked No. 105 in the world in doubles. Pretty impressive considering he's piled up his 583 ranking points in just 15 tournaments.

Last year Isner won two doubles titles in challenger tournaments. Isner and Sam Querrey reached the third round of the French Open earlier this year. Isner also won a national title in doubles his sophomore year.

So clearly, Isner has a ton of potential in doubles. Not to pat myself on the back (okay, I'm giving myself a brief pat between typing letters) but as Isner was finishing up his career at Georgia, I was asked by someone about his pro prospects.

"I'm not sure how he'll do in singles, but I think he could win a grand slam in doubles."

Of course, a few months later, Isner reached the finals of the Legg Mason tournament in D.C. and we all forgot about the doubles thing.

Now, though, I'm starting to wonder again about Isner's doubles future.

I think it's as bright as he wants it to be, but there are three factors which will probably keep it in check right now.

The New Orleans Saints have started their training camp today, and apparently Greensboro's DeMario Pressley has impressed (see the 10:43 entry).

That's just one little tidbit, but it's important because it looks like an indication that Pressley, who was battling nagging injuries during the mini-camps, is approaching 100 percent.

The best thing Pressley has done is make sure that he's actually at the Saints' training camp to catch the eyes of the New Orleans coaches. He took care of that almost two weeks ago, when he signed a 3-year contract with the Saints.

"There are no guarantees in the sense of makign the team and playing," said Pressley's agent, Hadley Engelhard. "So you don't want to miss training camp."

To Engelhard, the money amount of Pressley's contract was secondary to the length. Both Engelhard and Pressley both felt the former Dudley standout was drafted lower than his talent level. So the plan was to lessen the amount of time Pressley would have to spend in a contract that underpaid his talents.

"In the fifth year teams do three or four-year deals," Engelhard. "Our object all along was to do a three-year deal so that DeMario could become a free agent after three years."

The tradeoff is that Pressley's signing bonus was lower than if he had accepted a four-year contract from the Saints.

"You have to weigh both sides of it," Engelhard said. "Do you want the extra 50,000 or do you want the opportunity to sign for 50 million, maybe."

That's clearly an optimistic scenario, but for now Pressley's off to a good start - he's in camp and he's healthy.

Do you want the extra 50K or do you wan tht potty to sing for 50 million maybe…

Click here for an update of former Hornets, Bats and Grasshoppers now in the Majors.
The week's biggest news is the latest Jorge Posada injury, which has emperiled the Yankee catcher's season. His team has been rolling without him, but Posada doesn't want to undergo season-ending surgery and miss out on another Yankee second-half run toward the playoffs.
Rick VandenHurk, who pitched briefly here three seasons ago, is back with the Florida Marlins. Known as "The Holland Hammer" or "The Incredible Hurk," he has fanned 14 batters in a little more than 10 innings.
The Marlins have used 19 pitchers this season; seven of them played in this town.

Here's an article up on the New Orleans Saints team website about Pressley. Not a ton of new information here, but a few interesting nuggets.

1) Pressley said that he was particularly intent on getting signed and in camp on time to make sure his dedication was obvious to the Saints, particularly after injuries kept him out of previos mini camps. Smart move.

2) Pressley's going back to No. 90, the number he wore at Dudley until his senior season. That was the number on his back the first time I saw him play, against Glenn. I remember watching him burst through the line and run down Glenn's running back, who was pretty darned good as I recall, from behind. And I remember thinking, "Man, I think this kid's going to be pretty good."

I should have been an NFL scout, I tell ya.

According to the tournament website, John Isner got the wildcard he'd been hoping for to next week's tournament in Cincinnati. He'll find out his first-round opponent at 4:30 today.

Here are a few other Isner items that I couldn't squeeze into my story on Isner in Thursday's paper:

Well it looks like John Isner's luck with draws may be turning. Not only did he get a wildcard into the Western & Southern Financial Masters in Cincinnati, he also got a matchup against a qualifier, Andrea Stoppini of Italy. (Here's the full draw if you want to take a look.)

Take a look at Stoppini's playing activity this year (or just let me do that heavy lifting for you) and you'll see that this is his first ATP event of the season. It's been all Challengers and Futures in 2008 for the 28-year-old Italian. He fits the "journeyman" label pretty well, I'd say.

But, Stoppini has been playing well lately, having reached the quarterfinals of the Lexington challenger last week (a tournament Isner won last season) and the finals of a challenger in California the week before. He's bumped his ranking up from 307 to No. 234 in the process. Between that streak and the Cincy qualifying, Stoppini has one clear advantage over Isner - lots of recent match play.

Winning his opening round is important to Isner not just for establishing some positive momentum during the pre-U.S. Open stretch, but also for his ranking. Because Isner took last week off, he earned 0 ranking points while at the same time the 55 points he got for winning Lexington last year. That meant his ranking took a 17-spot nosedive this week, from No. 90 to No. 107. That's not a big deal for the immediate future, because Isner already has spots guaranteed in tournaments up to the U.S. Open and would, in all likelihood, get a wildcard into the Open if he needed one.

But beyond that, the tournament fields in the fall will shrink and thus the rankings needed to get entry into the main draw will be lower. And there's the 140 points or so Isner will lose once the one-year anniversary of his run to the finals in D.C. expires,

So those 35 ranking points that Isner would get with a first-round win in Cincy are pretty important. Why so many points? This is a Masters series event, which are arguably tougher than Grand Slams when it comes to the talent level. Eleven of the top 12 players in the world are in the 56-player draw. The lowest-ranked player to get a direct entry into the draw was No. 78 Florent Serra.

As you can see, Isner got a pretty good break drawing a qualifier in the first round, given the rest of the field. If he can take advantage of this opportunity, then he'd have a decent second round as well, with a likely matchup against 18th ranked Radek Stepanek, the No. 15 seed. Given that Isner would have to face a top-16 seed (or an upset winner) in the Round of 32, a No. 15 seed is pretty good fortune.

But that's looking ahead. For now it's Stoppini in the first round, likely on Tuesday.

Oh, and Isner's in the doubles draw, teaming up with Mardy Fish again. They play the French team of Arnaud Clement and Michael Llodra. No time yet for their match, which means it'll probably be on Tuesday as well.

It won't last forever, but the stat line of Rick VandenHurk is pretty amazing. The Firing Dutchman, who made four appearances for the Grasshoppers in 2005, has allowed 20 hits in 14 innings for the Marlins. On the other hand, he has struck out 20 batters. In other words, those putting the ball in play against him are hitting .500 so far. For the entire list, click here.

Greensboro's Caroline Lind, who is competing in the women's eight rowing event for the U.S. in the Olympic Games, is keeping an online diary for the News & Record. In between getting ready to row for the gold - her team is a medal favorite - Lind will send dispatches describing her experiences in Beijing.

Tuesday, July 29

Today is my second day in China and the journey here as well as being here has been extremely interesting so far. My Olympic experience started off three days ago when we flew from Princeton to San Jose State for “processing”. We stayed there for one day and one night but this was where we got all of our USA Olympic gear! All of the USA athletes got a shopping cart and walked through a room full of stations with USA workout gear, matching travel apparel, and the outfits for the opening and closing ceremonies. My shopping cart was completely full by the time I had made it through the room! Since it is nearly impossible to utilize all the gear we all pitch in a large chunk of it to give to our spares who don’t get to go through the same processing.
However, more exciting than all of the gear, was that I got to meet the Governator of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger! My teammate Elle Logan and I got him to sign one of the hats that they gave us and we also got a sweet picture with him! The most surprising thing was that both Elle and I were taller than him!
The next leg of our journey was a 13-hour plane flight to Beijing from San Francisco. Flights never seem quite as long if you have all your friends to hang out with during them so it wasn’t too bad. The Olympic rowing venue is situated about 20 to 30 kilometers outside of central Beijing in the Shunyi district. Because of the location we are staying at a hotel near the course instead of staying in the Olympic village which can take up to an hour by car to reach. Staying near the race course is nice because it gives us a chance to stay away from the distractions (such as the other Olympians, who I am dying to meet!) and focus on the race. For the last week of the Olympics, after our races are done we will move into the village.
The most interesting things so far are :
1.The toilets - which are not like western toilets but instead holes in the ground that you have to squat over to use. However, in our hotel we have a western toilet.
2. The security – in order to get into the hotel and the racecourse we have our identification checked every time and one must go through a security screening exactly like at the airport – x-ray scan for bags and a medal detector for people. I have certain jewelry that I always wear and so every time I set of the alarm and have to be wanded down; so now I immediately hold out my arms to get checked. It’s not so bad now but when more teams arrive I think it may cause delays getting in to the course and hotel.
3. The air – it’s pretty smoggy here, so far I have not seen any blue sky and it just looks white all the time. Although this morning it was stormy and windy which cleared out the air a little bit and from the race course I could see mountains off in the distance!!

Like the rest of America, I'm tired of the speculation about the whereabouts of a certain quarterback. Unfortunately, the protracted nature of the matter was inevitable.
Two things on this:
1) In order to win the PR war that was almost certain to result, the Packers had to wait Brett Favre out. They couldn't just release him immediately; they couldn't deal him mindlessly, either. They figured -- accurately -- that their fan base would embrace the Favre comeback concept at first. Their best hope was to draw this thing out so long that the populace would eventually get sick of the discussion and relent. They won't turn on Favre, but management doesn't need that. It simply needs fans to tone down their ardor for a player who voluntarily retired and then returned to the scene just in time to mess with the start of training camp.
2) Some have said the media in general and ESPN in particular are fixated on this story because they feel a need to prop up a Great White Sports Hero. Interesting rhetoric. Too bad it's absurd.
The story -- like all other preseason NFL stories -- is being overblown because of the time of year. The four to six weeks from the end of the NBA Finals until the start of NFL practice is the quiestest period of the calendar. It represents the only window in which one sport -- baseball, in this case -- has the floor to itself. Given a chance to run with a Quarterback Controversy, the national media are going to jump on it.
The other factor here is that Favre and his handlers have generally been accessible to the media. This makes them relatively rare in big-time sports.
So that's why it hasn't gone away.
In the interest of national sanity if not national security, the matter needs to be put to rest. The best way for that to happen is for Favre to accept a trade or step aside.

Greensboro's Caroline Lind, who is competing in the women's eight rowing event for the U.S. in the Olympic Games, is keeping an online diary for the News & Record. In between getting ready to row for the gold - her team is a medal favorite - Lind will send dispatches describing her experiences in Beijing.

Wednesday, July 30

So it’s the third day here in the Shunyi district of Beijing and my roommate is currently at the Great Wall of China. Our coach told us this morning that in conjunction with our afternoon off we had the option of going to see the Great Wall of China. I was one of three girls in my boat that opted not to go. Instead of an adventure to the Great Wall, which I plan on doing later after some important racing, I had a leisurely lunch, got worked on by one of our physical trainers, and now and just relaxing listening to the soundtrack to The Darjeeling Limited my second favorite Wes Anderson movie. My favorite is definitely The Royal Tenenbaums although I must say this soundtrack is awesome.
This morning we had a good practice at the course and things are really starting to pick up. The first couple of days were consumed by rigging, figuring out the mode of transportation, and generally getting into a rhythm. But now other teams are starting to show up at the course and the whole experience is slowly materializing into a reality before me! Today we were out on the course with the Romanian women’s eight. They had a slightly shorter practice than us and when we were coming across the finish line on our last lap our cox Mary Whipple pointed out to us that the entire Romanian women’s eight was situated on the shore at the finish line WATCHING us! I wonder if they liked what they saw?
The cultural landscape is quite engrossing. Although we don’t get to see a whole lot in our short trips to the course and minimal interactions with the staff at the hotel, what I have seen has been interesting. There is lots of biking happening. I am not sure if it is because they have certain streets closed off because of the games or if this is normal but there is a certain paucity of auto traffic, even on these great big wide streets. But there is a whole lane just for bikers and many of the Chinese people biking have baskets carry various good and materials. Some of the bikes that I have noticed are all decked out with fabric seats with tassels and things on them and some are not just bike but sort a cross between a bike and a moped!
On the very first day at the course we were walking from the container that shipped our boats over to the boathouse and we were walking by about 10 Chinese people that looked to be gardeners helping out with the watering of the landscape around the course. I remember being so excited and having just learned the Chinese “hello” - Ni hao - trying to make eye contact with these workers to say “hello” to them. Unfortunately only one of them looked over and I was able to extend my first of many cross cultural greetings. Since then I have become more confident with my Ni Hao’s and have extended this to many other Chinese citizens in my hotel and as I see them around. It’s really nice when in another country to be able to the make the simple offering of a hello to someone in their native language; sadly even if that is the only thing I can competently say. Oh well. I am working on thank you! It’s more difficult than one may think!

An employer.
They're both on the roster of Prima Veroli, a second-division Italian team.
You know Hines, one of the greatest players in Southern Conference history and a recent UNCG graduate. But when's the last time you heard Beard's name? Now 33, the former prep All-American signed with Duke, didn't play much and transferred to Boston University.
His pro career has been helped by his ownership of dual citizenship and an Italian passport, distinctions that exempt him from the cap on foreign players that exists in most European leagues.
Hines signed Wednesday with the team, which went 11-19 a year ago. He'll make $180,000 in 2008-09, and if you think that doesn't sound like much, consider context. That's $6,000 a game. The NBA minimum salary is $442,114, which works out to $5,458 a game. Furthermore, Hines' cash is tax-free.
If you consider federal and state tax structures, making $180K without taxes is like earning $280K if you're a Charlotte Bobcat and reside in the Old North State.

Jayson Stark, one of at least four ESPN reporters covering the Manny Ramirez trade discussions, reports that Grasshoppers outfielder Mike Stanton is among the players the Boston Red Sox may seek from the Florida Marlins in return for the mercurial Manny. The non-waiver trade deadline is 4 p.m. Thursday.
Stanton homered Wednesday for the Hoppers' only run in a 6-1 loss at Lake County. The blast was his fourth in the past four games, his 17th since June 1 and his 27th on the season.
The Hoppers conclude their series in suburban Cleveland at 11 a.m. Thursday and drive back to the Triad thereafter. In other words, we may have seen the last of Stanton at NewBridge Bank Park. At least in a Greensboro uniform.
The Sox have an affiliate in the South Atlantic League, and that team, the Greenville Drive, pays a visit in three weeks.

Two former Greensboro players, Jeremy Hermida and Ryan Tucker, are also on Boston's potential wish list.

I know, I know, every loss hurts, but John Isner's three-set defeat at the hands of Igor Andreev in Cincy yesterday had to linger a bit longer.

Consider that in the second set tie-breaker Isner held two match points, at 6-5 and 8-7. (We actually got bad info in the paper today, which said Isner fought off two match points. Actually it was Andreev that did so.)

Consider that it would have been a nice feather in the cap to knock off a player of Andreev's caliber. The 25-year old Russian is playing arguably the best tennis of his career, reaching two ATP titles in July to push his ranking up to a career-best No. 24 in the world.

Consider that Andreev had already knocked off No. 15 seed Radek Stepanek and that the third-round opponent may have been another unseed player. Carlos Moya is currently up one set on No. 4 seed Nikolay Davydenko.

Consider that, had Isner won, he would have added at least another 40 precious ranking points to his total. As is, he gained 35 at Cincy. A nice total, but coming on the one-year anniversary of the 140 points he earned in D.C. in 2007, not enough to keep Isner's ranking from plummeting.

Once again, here's how that math works. Players are ranked based on the amount of points they've accumulated in the last 12 months. It's a moving snapshot in that, the points you won, say, the week of July 25, 2007 disappear from your ranking total the instant that same date rolls around in 2008.

Thus, despite winning a round in Cincy and very nearly winning another. Isner's point total sinks from 451 to 346. It also didn't help that the previous week he did not play, while 55 points he earned in Lexington in 2007 also disappeared from his total. So in the past two weeks, Isner has dropped 195 points from his ranking total, while only adding 35. Two weeks ago he was ranked No. 90 in the world. After this week, he'll probably be somewhere around No. 135.

Ouch. So you can see why that loss to Andreev was doubly hard to swallow.