Right, hands up, all those who have heard of Denis Kudla.
(Looks around.)
OK, here's what you need to know about Mr. Kudla: He's 19 years old and ranked No. 203 in the ATP singles rankings, his family moved to Fairfax from Romania when he was one year old, he still lives in Arlington part-time, and he very nearly pulled off an upset of Andy Roddick at the SAP Open in San Jose while most of the area was watching the Wizards or sleeping.
From the Mercury-News:
Roddick was getting all he could handle in his opening tournament match against Kudla. After severely spraining his right ankle on the final point of the second set's ninth game, he looked as if he might be a casualty as well even though he led 5-4 on serve.
Roddick caught a break when Kudla suddenly lost his court mojo, made several sloppy
errors and essentially handed the second seed a 6-7 (7-5), 7-6 (7-5), 6-4 victory in a match that lasted 2 hours, 42 minutes.
OK, so the recap's short on flattery. However, we're convinced that we'd last about ten minutes on court against Roddick, sprained ankle or no. And it's worth pointing out that he's only 19. So, good on ya, Denis, and better luck next time.