Oudin's Open Comes to an End

I'm sure Oudin's run to the quarterfinals was thrilling for her and all, but thrills don't pay the bills. Cash money does. And that's what she banked on her week-plus of work.

For making it to the quarters, she made $175,000. And with that, of course, comes sponsorships. From SportsBusiness Daily:

Oudin scored the biggest endorsement of her career with data mining firm BackOffice Associates prior to her U.S. Open quarterfinal loss last night. She signed the deal 20 minutes before her match in the Arthur Ashe Stadium suite of her agency, BEST, with the co-CEOs of the company, Patrick and Patricia Kennedy. The multi-year deal is believed to be for a six-figure sum guaranteed annually with bonuses for performance.

Let me remind you that she is still 17 years old. Your now free to feel depressed about your job.

The numbers don't lie.

Melanie Oudin hit 43 unforced errors in her quarterfinal match against Caroline Wozniacki tonight, a staggering number given that the two only played 16 games.

That means that of the 69 points Wozniacki won in the match, a full 62 percent were given to her by the 17-year old Oudin.

Frankly, given Oudin's poor play, it's amazing she was able to win as many games as she did.

The Princess has been dethroned.

Melanie Oudin, the 17-year old American who stunned the tennis world by beating three straight seeded opponent en route to the U.S. Open quarterfinals, was thoroughly beaten tonight by No. 9 seed Caroline Wozniacki, 6-2, 6-2.

The teenager from Marietta, GA was never in the match, going down 0-3 early and never recovering. A late-arriving crowd didn't help matters, as Oudin was unable to get the fans behind her to give her a boost.

In an interview with ESPN at the start of the second set, Melanie Oudin's coach, Brian de Villers, said he could tell his pupil was "irritated" and that he said she "doesn't have the mindset to have the patience to battle this out."

Nice inspirational speech there, Vince Lombardi.

Oudin and Wozniacki are on serve at 1-1 in the second set and, for the first time, the crowd is starting to show some signs of life.

American phenom Melanie Oudin dropped the first set of her match against No. 9 seed Caroline Wozniacki, 6-2. The 17-year old upstart was broken three times and looked listless at points.

Oudin went down 0-3 early, which never allowed the crowd to get into the match. Much of the pro-Oudin fans had yet to arrive by the time the match started, since the afternoon to evening turnover caused long lines at the gates.

In the set, Oudin's body language was almost as poor as her lethargic footwork. (At one point a fan yelled "move your feet!") She snapped at ball boys, moping after particularly bad unforced errors and scowling at the crowd when somebody yells her name before the serve. Could the added pressure of being America's next tennis sweetheart have her unraveling?

Though she dropped the first, it's way too early to count out Oudin. After all, she did the same thing in each of her past three matches (including a 6-1 thumping on Monday).

Melanie Oudin is off to a poor start in her quarterfinal match against Caroline Wozniacki. She's down a break at 0-3 in the first set and has hit six unforced errors and one double fault.

The crowd at Arthur Ashe Stadium is still filing in, so the atmosphere on the court is a bit odd. There's murmuring, little cheering and lots of movement. It's like one of those early games in the NCAA tournament.

Since her win on Monday, Oudin has become a media sensation. Could it be that the pressure is finally getting to her? Or is this one of her patented slow starts?

Oudin has been down a set in each of her last three matches, so an early three-game deficit should hardly be reason for concern.

That's the question New York Times tennis blog Straight Sets asks today. Their answer?

Is Oudin’s run to the second week the best ever by a low-ranked youngster? It’s hard to say. But she can certainly put herself in an elite group with a win over Caroline Wozniacki on Wednesday night.

Going back further than 10 years, the American teenagers Andrea Jaeger and Tracy Austin wowed New York crowds with their own teenage runs at the Open. In 1979, as an already-established pro, Austin won the United States Open at the age of 16. The next year, at 15, Jaeger reached the semifinals at Flushing Meadows.

But since Serena Williams reached the United States Open semifinal a decade ago, no American teenager has performed the feat. Good company to keep for the No. 70 player in the world.

SB Nation's The Daily Forehand predicts all four of today's quarterfinal matches. Here are his thoughts on Oudin's match, which begins at 7PM ET:

Oudin, the story of the tournament, finally gets her first chance under the lights in prime time. She also gets a very different opponent in Caroline Wozniacki, who is more of a pusher that Oudin will have to outlast, rather than waiting for an error. While those factors favor Wozniacki, just about every conceivable intangible is in Oudin's favor. She plays utterly fearlessly on big stages (Wozniacki does not), she will have massive crowd support (Wozniacki will not), and she isn't facing the pressure of being the highest seed in her half with a seemingly easy road to the final (Wozniacki is). Should be another barn-burning win for the girl out of Marietta, GA. Prediction: Oudin in 3.

Melanie Oudin and her family left a midtown Manhattan hotel not because there were no more rooms left, but because her coach was too cheap to pay for a higher rate.

Brian de Villiers confirmed to the New York Times tennis blog Straight Sets that he and Oudin's family left the Marriott, as had been reported earlier today by Sports Business Journal. Unlike Oudin's agent, who was quoted in the original story, de Villiers gave a reason: his pupil had to change hotels. He said the reservation had run out and the price for reserving a new room had increased.

"I didn’t want to pay double," he said, "so we moved across the road."

Well, as long as his priorities are in the right place.

Surprised by American sweetheart Melanie Oudin's improbable run to the U.S. Open quarterfinals? So was she. The Sports Business Daily reports:

Melanie Oudin was booted Sunday from her Times Square hotel because her reservation was up. The 70th-ranked tennis player had not expected to remain in N.Y. so long, as she was only booked at the Marriott through the first week of the tournament. Her agent, BEST Tennis President John Tobias, through the company's travel agent, Sport Travel, quickly got her into the Intercontinental.

Hopefully her new accommodations last through Saturday - the day of the women's final.

They only release the schedule of play on a daily basis, so there's nothing on the U.S. Open site about Oudin's quarterfinal match. But CNBC's Darren Rovell tweets that the match will be in primetime tomorrow night. Seems like the obvious decision given that there are no American men left and Oudin really is the story of the tournament.

For the first time in the U.S. Open, Oudin will face someone not from Russia. Nine-seed Caroline Wozniacki, from Denmark, just beat Svetlana Kuznetsova (a Russian!) in a third-set tiebreak to advance and face Oudin in the quarters on Wednesday.

So, after defeating communism (Russians are still commies, right?), she now takes aim at socialism, which Fox News tells me is worse than fascism.

America!

17-year-old Oudin continues to dominate Russia, beating Nadia Petrova in the fourth round of the U.S. Open today to advance to the quarterfinals. It's her fourth straight upset of a Russian opponent. She struggled in the first set, losing 6-1, but came back to win the second in a tiebreak after being down a break. She won the third set 6-3.

The only person more thrilled about this than Oudin's family (specifically, her twin sister who was openly sobbing after the match) is CBS' Dick Enberg, who is now free to continue being old-man-creepy while calling her matches. The highlight from today: he said Oudin "looks like the kinda kid you wished lived next door." Decidedly more subtle than John McEnroe declaring her body "very physically mature" during her last match.

She needs to turn 18 before her next match to make all this commentary feel a little less, um ... illegal.

As a follow-up to her upset win over 4th seeded Elena Dementieva, Oudin knocked off one of her sport's biggest stars: Maria Sharapova. She won the final two sets (6-4, 7-5) after losing the first (3-6) to Sharapova, who was plagued by nagging injuries and repeated double faults throughout the match. Regardless of Sharapova's circumstances, though, it looks as though tennis may have found a new star.

Melanie Oudin may be the Cinderella of the 2009 U.S. Open, but her choice in footwear is hardly the traditional glass slipper.

The 17-year old, who scored the biggest upset thus far of the tournament with her three set victory over No. 4 seed Elena Dementieva, has been sporting customized Adidas sneakers during the tournament. The color scheme is, um, interesting:

Oudin and another American, Sam Querrey, are wearing new, customized adidas Barricade V sneakers for the Open. They both have the same design but with different color schemes. Querrey's look like something out of a Real Madrid catalog while Oudin's look like something a kindergartner with bad taste and limited crayon selection might color during indoor recess.

It says "BELIEVE" on the heel of the shoe, which Oudin says gives her inspiration. Inspiration to get a new shoe contract, maybe.