{"id":9646,"date":"2018-08-31T14:45:59","date_gmt":"2018-08-31T18:45:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/?p=9646"},"modified":"2021-05-27T16:08:16","modified_gmt":"2021-05-27T20:08:16","slug":"nick-kyrgios-is-horrible-for-tennis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2018\/08\/31\/nick-kyrgios-is-horrible-for-tennis\/","title":{"rendered":"Nick Kyrgios Is Horrible For Tennis"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m sure you all know what happened between umpire Mohamed Lahyani and Nick Kyrgios on Thursday<\/a>. As it stands, all the talk is about Lahyani, but we have to realise just what caused the incident to happen in the first place: Nick Kyrgios\u2019 tanking. The thing is this isn\u2019t the first time he\u2019s supposedly tanked (which I\u2019ll go more into later). In fact, it\u2019s not even the first time he\u2019s done anything completely unacceptable in the sport.<\/p>\n

Over the years he\u2019s actually done so many disrespectful things that it\u2019s honestly reached a point where you wonder how so many people can still consider him \u201cgood for the game\u201d or \u201ccolorful,\u201d as if it\u2019s a good thing. In this very same match the Australian also faked an injury, calling out the trainer, which is what one does when either carrying an injury or is ill. In Kyrgios\u2019 case guess which of the two it was? Neither. The trainer came out and the former World #13 told him there\u2019s nothing wrong, patted him on the back, then left.<\/p>\n

Sure, he\u2019s been fined a few times for the ridiculous stuff he\u2019s done, but what has losing small amounts of money (relative to his earnings) really changed in Kyrgios? Nothing. Here\u2019s a long list of quite disrespectful things he\u2019s done in just a few years on tour and precisely why he\u2019s not good for the game:<\/p>\n

Tanking<\/h3>\n

We\u2019ll start with the tanking I mentioned earlier. On Thursday against Pierre-Hugues Herbert, the Australian found himself a set and break down without giving a bother about the match. He was hitting clueless shots, looked completely disinterested, wasn’t running after shots, hit into the net constantly, and dtayed in the same place during rallies–all obvious signs of someone who doesn\u2019t want to be on court. He even told the umpire \u201cI\u2019m not feeling it.\u201d Not \u201cfeeling it\u201d is one thing–every player has bad days, but not trying is something else.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the far from the first time this has happened either. It\u2019s happened so often these past few years I could give you countless examples. I won\u2019t go that far back though, what I will do is just mention a few of his recent events. In his third round match at Wimbledon<\/a> against former World #4 Kei Nishikori, he found himself losing the first set 6-1 in just 16 minutes, missing sitters and easy shots with his typical tanking and not-bothered attitude. That\u2019s right, at the biggest event in the sport, Kyrgios decided tanking was the best option. After the match he even said \u201cI just didn\u2019t feel good,\u201d as if it explains the lack of effort. Even stranger, despite not being fully fit for Roland Garros<\/a>, one of the reasons he didn\u2019t want to risk his body at that event was because the \u201cgrass season is around the corner\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The same can be said about his last event before the US Open<\/a>, in Cincinnati. The 23-year old took World #3 Juan Martin Del Potro to a final set after winning a close second set. In the third he was immediately broken, the first break of the match, and continued after that in a fashion of not caring or trying to get himself back into the set, missing obvious sitters and obviously just wanting to get off court.<\/p>\n

In a previous match the same event against Croatian Borna Coric, he even admitted to outright tanking. In the second set when he went a break down ,he found himself being sarcastic to fans and telling his team \u201cyou\u2019ll never see a bigger tank than these next three games.\u201d All of this just further adding to other odd things we saw in the same event, such as him coming on court in basketball shoes without tennis shoes packed.<\/p>\n

Attacking Umpires, Linespeople, and Journalists<\/h3>\n

At Wimbledon back in 2015 there was an incident with an umpire–funnily enough the same umpire as Thursday, Mohamed Lahyani. This time, however, was very different. Kyrgios shouted out \u201cdirty scum,\u201d and many thought it was aimed at Lahyani. In the press conference after Kyrgios however denied it claiming it was to himself, but then responded to a question asking why he called himself that with \u201cbecause I can.\u201d Either way, he was fined for such a pathetic comment.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, this attitude has continued with linespeople. Against Aljaz Bedene at a previous US Open, the Australian ran into one. Immediately afterwards he said to the umpire \u201cf***ing move\u201d in regards to what he thinks the linesperson should have done. He further makes an ageist comment of \u201cthat\u2019s why you can\u2019t have guys 80 plus being line umpires,\u201d something that should have been made into a far bigger deal at the time and is quite honestly, utterly disgusting. If you even watch the video<\/a>\u00a0you can even see that the linesperson didn\u2019t do much wrong; he was moving back to his position whilst not seeing the player. As sad as it is, he\u2019s also \u201cbullied\u201d<\/a> an innocent ballkid before over a poor throw before claiming he was \u201cjoking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another gem this week features Ben Rothernberg, a tennis writer for the New York Times and one of the most prominent English-speaking tennis journalists in the world. With Rothernberg praising 19-year old Toronto finalist, Stefanos Tsitsipas\u2019 videos, Kyrgios felt the need to respond with a gif of a man shaking his head. This further led to Kyrgios asking \u201cWait a minute? Who are you?\u201d to Rothernberg despite being the one who replied to the writer in the first place. This continued with the Aussie saying \u201cHahaha no I\u2019m good, I\u2019ve gotten my daily entertainment out of you\u201d when Rotherberg asked him out to talk over cupcakes. Most pathetically, he then attacked the build of the writer calling him \u201cchubs.\u201d How on Earth is it all right to body shame someone like that?<\/p>\n

Attacking Fans<\/h3>\n

We\u2019ve seen it all from Nick Kyrgios, from telling a fan \u201cget off your f***ing phone\u201d to telling other fans \u201cshut the f*** up.\u201d This extends further with the World #30 on Twitter, where he\u2019s at times personally attacked fans before deleting the tweets. A few of these instances include telling a woman she\u2019s no one as well as telling a male tennis fan he has to \u201cpull himself off\u201d in response to being tweeted that he struggles to win sets against Andy Murray.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s even worse than all of this were his actions at Queens this year that disgusted many and got him fined. At the London event Nick Kyrgios was seen simulating a sex act<\/a>\u00a0on live television with a water bottle. One of the broadcasters, BBC, apologised for what viewers had seen. When you consider that Kyrgios once said he wants to be a role model to kids<\/a>\u00a0you wonder just what he was thinking when doing something so immature and stupid in front of thousands of kids watching at home and in the stadium.<\/p>\n

None of this should be surprising to anyone though; the guy has never had respect for fans of the sport. In Shanghai two years ago, Kyrgios lost to qualifier Mischa Zverev 6-3 6-1, another match where he was fined for \u201clack of best efforts\u201d–in other words, tanking. After the match he said that he didn\u2019t care or take any responsibility to those who pay to see his matches even going as far as \u201cI don\u2019t owe you anything\u201d and it \u201cdoesn\u2019t affect how I sleep at night.\u201d<\/p>\n

Attacking Other Players<\/h3>\n

Saving the “best: for last, we have Kyrgios\u2019 incidents with fellow tennis players. At the 2015 Montreal Masters,\u00a0this year\u2019s US Open 30th<\/sup> seed told\u00a0Stan Wawrinka, \u201cKokkinakis\u00a0(a fellow tennis player) banged your girlfriend (Donna Vekic), sorry to tell you that, mate,\u201d in which the Swiss star responded after the match saying that it\u2019s \u201cSo disappointing to see a fellow athlete and colleague be so disrespectful in a way I could never even imagine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yesterday, he only further reminded people of the incident by attacking Donna Vekic again, directly this time. The WTA star commented on the Lahyani and Kyrgios incident by replying \u201cDidn\u2019t know umpires were allowed to give pep talks,\u201d to which the Australian replied \u201cDon\u2019t be salty that you are out of the US Open\u201d before, like always, deleting his insult, this time in under a minute. He then had another go with a somewhat less rude reply before also deleting that. Finally settling for \u201cI shouldn\u2019t have tweeted so quickly after the match. Everyone is entitled to an opinion but I can assure you it wasn\u2019t coaching,\u201d not even apologising to the 22-year-old Croatian. Later in the day Stan Wawrinka posted a classy response to Kyrgios\u2019 antics. <\/p>\n

\n

\ud83e\udd2b\ud83c\udf5d #shhh<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/eVcEpB8YYX<\/a><\/p>\n

— Stanislas Wawrinka (@stanwawrinka) August 30, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n