When I wrote about my US Open visits of last year, I described watching the matches with my wife, Joy. My time with Joy was a great gift, not least our time playing tennis. She was an avid player who liked to hit the ball hard and flat. Not long after last year's Open, we found out that Joy was suffering from cancer. She battled hard and with optimism, but I lost her on May 21 of this year. It's not the same to go to Flushing Meadows, which is nea r where Joy grew up and where we played indoor tennis last winter (amid her treatments), without her. I dedicate this report to her blessed memory. If you want to read more about Joy and see some photos, including one at the grass courts in Newport, where we played last summer, please visit www.atid.org/joy.htm.

My first US Open visit of 2004 was on Wednesday, September 1, with my friend Gabriel, who also made an appearance in last year's report. This year, Gabriel had a cell phone with him, and this enabled him to roam without making me unduly anxious. We arrived at the National Tennis Center at around 2:00 and went to Arthur Ashe Stadium to watch a little bit of the third set of Lleyton Hewitt's demolition of Wayne Ferreira. Although our seats were relatively good, anything above the luxury boxes in Ashe is a l ong way from the action. The crowd was sparse and none too energized, and the sun was baking us, so I begged for a change of venue.

We repaired to Court 10, where we got great seats behind the court for the third set of Fernando Gonzalez, the fourteenth seed, and Robin Soderling. A blond fellow in an adidas outfit similar to Soderling's was in the row in front of us, with a towel draped over his bare knees for protection against the sun. He was Soderling's coach, and he offered steady if discreet encouragement to his charge. I've previously seen Soderling in the juniors and commen ted on his weaknesses at the net. He was awkward at net when I saw him beat Jordan Kanev in 2002, hopeless when he lost to Stephane Bohli in 2001. Now Bohli is number 375 in the world and Soderling is number 39, so he must be doing something right. Indeed, Soderling did manage to put a few volleys away against Gonzalez, and the ratio of acceptable to butchered volleys has improved.

When we arrived, Soderling was up two sets. The third set went to a tiebreak, and Soderling dropped two mini-breaks from 2-3, first on a double fault, then on a powerful crosscourt forehand from Gonzalez. Gonzalez gave back one mini-break with his own double fault, and then he left Soderling a very tempting short forehand, which Soderling whipped long. With Soderling serving a second ball at 3-6, Gonzalez ran around his backhand and cranked up a forehand, which he hit into the alley. On the 4-6 point, Gon zalez made no mistake with a crosscourt forehand, and he wrapped up the third set. The vocal Chilean contingent, featuring face-painters and flag-wavers, erupted.

In the fourth set, Gonzalez was serving at 1-2, 0-15, when he went for a surprise serve-and-volley on his second serve. That didn't work, and soon enough he was down 0-40, at which point he double faulted for the decisive break. In the 1-4 game, Gonzalez was down five break points, including two consecutive breakers at 15-40. On the fifth break point, maybe out of fatigue with the whole thing, Gonzalez whipped a huge second serve, which just missed, and now Soderling was up 5-1. For the first time, we hea rd from a Soderling rooting section: "We are yellow, we are blue; we are Sweden, who are you?" Soderling served out the match without incident. He's now 2-0 versus Gonzalez, having won a quarterfinal in Marseille earlier this year.

Gabriel wandered off to find a match to his liking, and I watched a couple of points of Juan Ignacio Chela against Ricardo Mello. There didn't seem to be any seats in the shade, so I kept moving. Mello, a qualifier, went on to surprise the seventeenth seed, 6-2 in the fifth.

My place in the shade was Court 13, where I saw Feliciano Lopez take on Arnaud Di Pasquale. Di Pasquale is number 252 in the world and got into the draw without qualifying, so I assume he has a protected ranking after an injury. Lopez, seeded thirtieth, is the highest-ranked lefty in the world. What ever happened to the lefty greats, Laver, Connors, Vilas, McEnroe, et al.? Could it be that the demise of serve-and-volley tennis has taken away the advantage of the lefty's slice serve in the ad court?

The match was not filled with drama. Lopez took the first set, which featured no breaks of serve, 7-4 in the tiebreak. After that, he broke once in the second set and twice in the third without being broken himself.

Lopez (pictured at right) wore a yellow bracelet on his right wrist, which Gabriel (now returned) advised me symbolized Lance Armstrong's anti-cancer foundation. He swung from the heels regularly, and the ball went in some of the time. Lopez has a very big serve. There was no radar gun on Court 13 to tell us just how big, but the ATP's statistics tell us that he has won 84% of his service games this year (tied for 9th) and has saved 67% of break points (tied for 8th). His whole game, including a on e-handed backhand, gives the lie to the stereotype that all the Spanish players hug the baseline and push the ball back.

The most memorable moment of the match came with Lopez serving at 7-6 6-3 5-2 30-0. His first serve, called wide by the center lineswoman, hit her in the stomach. She doubled over in pain before getting her wind back. Lopez came to net and bowed in apology. Fortunately, it was not a big deal. Longtime fans will remember the story of the center linesman who was fatally injured when he hit his head on the court after being struck by a Stefan Edberg serve in a US Open juniors match against Aaron Krickstein.

From Court 13, Gabriel and I repaired to Louis Armstrong Stadium, which is my favorite place to watch a match at the National Tennis Center. Tommy Haas had stormed through the first set against Davide Sanguinetti and we stood on line through a protracted five-deuce game before we could get in midway through the second set. Sanguinetti is 32 and looks it. He is prematurely gray, wore sunglasses for the first set and a half, and guides the ball back gently like a devoted public parks player. Back in 1998, I saw him take Tim Henman to three sets in a match in New Haven. Indeed, he's played Henman three times and taken him to the limit each time. I can see how that happens, because Sanguinetti can drive opponents crazy. He doesn't give them pace, and then suddenly he unleashes his best shot, a flat two-handed backhand whipped crosscourt, which often paves the way for a successful foray to the net.

The second set was proceeding uneventfully on serve, when Haas played a loose game at 5-6, and suddenly we were tied. At 0-1 in the third, Haas played another loose game, slammed his racquet and received a warning, and was broken. The anger seemed to do something for Haas, who reeled off six straight games to take a lead of two sets to one.

At 1-1 in the fourth set, Sanguinetti held serve following a great point that featured two drop shots and a lob volley by Haas. Sanguinetti got the decisive break at 2-3 and served out the set after a few shaky moments. At the start of the fifth, Haas netted a backhand volley at 30-40, and it looked like we might see a big upset. But Haas broke right back and held for 2-1. In the fourth game, Sanguinetti spanked an easy forehand wide at 15-30. He got to 30-40 but then double faulted to go down a break. Ha as kept rolling, and Sanguinetti served at 2-5 to stay alive. At 30-30, he netted a backhand and then left a drop shot short. Haas put it away for the win. The final score, 6-1 5-7 6-2 3-6 6-2, suggests that Haas won three sets easily and dropped two sets when his mind wandered.

Gabriel and I then watched a bit of Martina Navratilova and Lisa Raymond versus Julie Ditty and Samantha Reeves. Interestingly, Raymond served first for her team. Each team featured a lefty, Navratilova and Ditty. Ditty was the only player I saw all day whose name was new to me. I see, however, that she was inducted into the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame based on her exploits at Vanderbilt. Reeves has been in the Top 100 in singles and doubles, so she is more of a known quantity. It is worth seeing Navratilova in person. At 47, she is lean, in better shape than she was thirty years ago. She and Raymond had their way fairly easily with Ditty and Reeves. We didn't stay through the first set, because Gabriel had to leave, but the final score was 6-3 6-2.

After Gabriel left, I caught the final match of the day session, a doubles match between Fernando Gonzalez and Nicolas Massu, the Olympic gold medal team, and Karsten Braasch and Sargis Sargsian. Braasch is something of a legend, but I'd never seen him before. He's 37 years old, bespectacled, balding, and left-handed. What's not to like? He also has a herky-jerky service motion that even Jonas Bjorkman would be hard pressed to mimic and reportedly enjoys a cigarette every now and again.

The Chilean fans were cheering robustly for their heroes. In opposition, a small Armenian group rooted Sargsian on, with one particularly leather-lunged fan trying to outdo the many Chileans on his own. The Armenian songs were pretty much as I had recalled them from last year, when Sargsian took on James Blake. When I arrived, the Chileans had just taken the first set in a tiebreak, 7-3. They took care of business, 6-4, in a relatively uneventful second set. Both teams, particularly the Chileans, tended to play one-up, one-back. That this phenomenon has caught on in men's doubles (it was certainly practiced by Ditty and Reeves) suggests that we are really in a down period for volleying and that the groundstrokers are hitting the ball really hard today.

The Chilean and Armenian fans will get another chance to square off, because Massu plays Sargsian in the second round of the singles.