I learned this morning that Andy Roddick pulled out of the Tennis Channel Open in Las Vegas.

At first I was upset, since I'm a big fan of all of the American tennis players. Not to mention the fact that we were hoping to see Roddick when we attend next Friday's Quarterfinal matches. But on second thought, who cares.

Roddick is a one shot wonder and will probably finish his career as a one slam wonder. His game consists of his serve, and that's it. Every other shot he possesses, (save the big forehands set up by his first serve) are painfully average. He's the John Daly of the ATP tour.

A few years ago, there was a tremendous buzz about Andy. He won his first major just days after his 21st birthday on his home soil, and he finished out 2003 with the world's number one ranking. He even hosted Saturday Night Live.

Since then, he’s been exceptionally mediocre. He’s been to only two slam finals and both times ran into the Federer buzzsaw on the grass at Wimbledon. I have little doubt that Roddick will be a perennial finalist there, but he needs rapid and drastic improvement to his net game if he ever wishes to top Federer.

Since his last Wimbledon disappointment, he’s looked extremely vulnerable. His last two slam appearances have resulted in first and fourth round exits. It’s not like he can use the Federer excuse, the majority of his slam killers are not named Roger, Lleyton or Rafael. He’s lost in early rounds to virtual unknowns like Gilles Muller, Joachim Johansson and Jose Acasuso.

If you think that Roddick was looked weak in tournaments, then you’ll probably agree that he’s looked atrocious in Davis Cup as of late. After starting his career with a Davis Cup record of 14-3, Roddick's record has fallen to 4-4 in his last eight matches. He’s lost to such a sordid cast of characters lately, I’d like to see Captain McEnroe try to convince Sampras and Courier to come out of retirement.

Roddick has a problem hanging onto coaches. In fact, he’s had four in the last three years. I’m not sure if Roddick changes coaches so often because he’s not improving, or if he’s not improving because he’s had so many coaches. I’m not sure if Dean Goldfine was an improvement over Brad Gilbert, and I’m really not sure about his brother being an improvement over any of them. Maybe he should give the Russian, Yuri Sharapov a shot. And why not? Andy’s ‘06 girlfriend is Yuri’s daughter Maria Sharapova, so I’m sure they’ve talked before.

Despite the attention grabbing title of this post, I don’t really think he sucks. He’s got the fastest serve in history at 155 mph, and has the ability to run down almost any ball (if he feels the point is important enough to exert himself).

He’s a likable guy whose charitable foundation has raised more than $2.2 million for abused and neglected children. He also brings the game of tennis to a younger generation that doesn’t remember when Andre Agassi had hair.

I’ll admit that I’m still a huge fan of Roddick’s, and I hope he decides to play Vegas next year. I hope he can get the complete game he needs to hang in there with today’s elite players. His ranking has dropped a point a year since 2003, and there’s a young Cypriate out there who would like to bump him down one more.