After a couple of weeks of excitement, it’s time to relax before another grand event is staged. For now it’s the MLB, MLS and normal PGA stuff. But look out east, over the Atlantic horizon, Wimbledon’s coming.

Twice as nice?

Every year, something seems to make headlines between tennis’ French Open and Wimbledon. Last year, it was the fact that some top clay court players boycotted the latter event due to the way that they were seeded.

Wimbledon seeding has come to be based on a format which awards a player for their past success on grass (a season that doesn’t last very long anyway). This proves to create unbalanced seedings based on a player’s tour rating.

Last week, the four grand slam events announced that the number of seeds in a tournament will increase to 32, starting with Monday’s slam at the All England Club.

Now usually I would look at whiners and talk bad about their mamas or something like that. In this case, though, I think they have a pretty good beef.

While it is good to see numbers by this many players in a tournament, I don’t believe this solution solves the underlying problem with tennis set-ups, especially at the slams.

Participants are drawn just like someone picking names out of a hat. The only players who can possibly avoid drawing a seed are other seeded players. So in essence, the top seed can draw a very good opponent in the first round.

For the executives in the tennis world, I have an idea that might work. Why not put the best player against the worst player? It seems to work in all other events. Here’s the whole plan.

Take the top 96 players and automatically place them in the bracket.

Then have the others qualify for those last 32 spots, with the worst-ranked qualifier playing the number one seed, and so on and so forth.

Man, hell must have frozen over because logic actually works at times in sports. Who would of thunk it.

Absurd Predictions

Today, I focus across the pond for the fortnight of tennis called Wimbledon. One bad thing is that this prediction is a little drawn out, taking two weeks to finish.

The men’s champ should be a piece of cake to pick. Pete Sampras has been unstoppable on the grass, winning seven titles in the last eight years.

However, Pistol Pete has been slipping this year, including a loss this past weekend at a tune-up tourney. Will our lanky hero’s streak be put to an end for good? Maybe not for good, but at least in this tournament. He may be number one going in, but he won’t leave the top dog.

The men’s winner: Juan Carlos Ferrero. Say who?

Think about this. What better way for the clay court specialists to make their point by having one of their own embarrass the seeding system that the prestigious tournament is based on.

Now I head to the feel-good story of the year, Jennifer Capriati. Going from taking drugs to giving hugs, she has made a believer out of many who cast her off into the abyss of burn-out super-stardom.

She’s beaten just about everyone of the top women’s players on tour to win the Australian and French Opens.

The only obstacle Capriati will have to overcome will be the power and quickness of one,Venus Williams.

In the end, I believe that the run will continue, setting Capriati up for a possible storybook, Hollywood ending at Flushing Meadows in early September.

Hmm…maybe I should try to put this story on paper. Cannes, Sundance, Oscar, here I come.

Jonathan Lowe is a senior in meteorology from Kansas City, Mo.