Abnormal Use Takes in Family Circle Cup, Causes Player Losses

Recently, our home state of South Carolina hosted the Family Circle Cup, a WTA tennis tournament.  The Charleston, South Carolina event featured 80 of the top female tennis players in the world competing for the title.  We here at Abnormal Use were on hand to report on the tournament.  You must be thinking what place a torts blog has at a professional tennis tournament.  Admittedly, in the beginning, we were wondering the same thing ourselves.  Shortly into the event, however, we realized the event was full of product liability news – only this time we were the unreasonably dangerous product, metaphorically speaking.

The Cup taught us that we can be unreasonably dangerous.  Our presence at the event was harmful to a number of the world’s top tennis players, and we have the following evidence to prove it:

• Exhibit 1: Friday morning, we were greeted by (or shared a hotel elevator with) World No. 9 ranked player Vera Zvonerava.  Several hours later she was upset in straight sets, 6-3, 6-3.
• Exhibit 2: Saturday morning, we had breakfast with (or sat in the same room as) surprise semi-finalist, Polona Hercog.  Later that day, she was double-bageled, 6-0, 6-0.
• Exhibit 3: Saturday night, we ran into Lucie Safarova in the hotel lobby.  The next day, she was destroyed in the final by Serena Williams, 6-0, 6-1.

We have always believed that we were bad luck charms for our favorite teams.  Our attendance at sporting events always seems to result in losses for whoever we throw our support.  At the Family Circle Cup, we didn’t have a dog in the fight, so we thought all players were safe.  Looking at the evidence, however, can lead to only one reasonable conclusion – our bad luck is far-reaching.

Some may argue that losses are due to our teams’ lack of talent and not the result of our presence.  While that may be the case with the Charlotte Bobcats, how else can we explain the upset loss of a Top-10 player after sharing an elevator with us?  If we aren’t “defective,” why would players who have been playing tremendous tennis get shut out in the rounds that followed our encounters?  Shutouts rarely happen in professional tennis even in some of the largest mismatches.

Under a res ipsa theory, we may be in trouble.  Our unreasonably dangerous presence is the only way to explain these players’ losses.  Combine that with the admissions made in this blog and Zvonerava, Hercog, and Safarova have a good prima facie case against us.  So, do us a favor.  Don’t alert these players to their potential claims.  While you’re at it, you may want to take some steps to keep us away from your favorite players as well.