SPORTS GROUCH

I’ll admit I’m a Serena Williams fan. We met when she and Andy Roddick gave a tennis clinic at Colonial Life Arena years ago.

That’s a reason her temperamental conduct at the US Open surprised and disappointed me as it undoubtedly did other fans.

Adding insult to injury, USTA officials acted like indulgent parents, making her opponent, Naomi Osaka, feel as if she was to blame.

What surprised me even more was Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz’s reaction to the incident.

The good professor and I often agree but not on this. “The Serena Williams controversy,” he wrote in the Wall Street Journal, “should result in rule changes in every professional sport. No athletic event should be decided by anything other than what the players do in competition.”

Hold on, Alan. You don’t think smashing a racquet, insulting the officials and being illegally coached from the stands should be grounds for discipline? Poppycock!

Indulgence 101

Dershowitz argues for no more technical fouls based on mouthing off, no ejection of players for loudly disputing calls or insulting officials, no yellow or red cards for screaming obscenities at soccer referees or loss of points or games for smashing rackets or calling an official a thief.

Don’t you wonder what he would do if one of his law students loudly disputed a grade he gave him, insulted him in front of other students or threw a law book across the room?

A heavy flying law book is more dangerous than any smashed tennis racquet.

A concession

Dershowitz concedes game-deciding sanctions could be ruled for hard fouls, bean balls, unnecessary roughness or other violations that affect games or threaten injury, but not for free speech.

We have 1st Amendment rights to consider.

“How would officials make sure games don’t get out of hand?” he asks.“With financial penalties. Could monetary penalties really deter athletes who earn tens or hundreds of millions of dollars? Yes, if they are substantial.

“Mrs. Williams could have been threatened with the loss of most, or even all, of her prize money if she persisted in insulting the official after smashing her racket.”

I seriously doubt that would’ve had much effect. Serena was not entitled to win. None of us are.

Someone of Serena’s stature should not act like John McEnroe or other spoiled pro tennis children.

The USTA owes an apology to Ms. Osaka and the rest of us sports fans.