Miami Second Round

Well, the upset bug continues as we've taken the tennis action across the country. In the first day of second round action, which is the first match for the men's seeds, a full third of the seeded players lost. Some of these wins were not all that surprising, as number 30 Viktor Troicki losing to wildcard David Nalbandian, but some were absolute shockers, as number 2 Novak Djokovic losing the shortest player in the top 100, 29-year old Olivier Rochus from Belgium.

Thirty-second seed Julien Benneteau also lost to Sergiy Stakhovsky, but that's not too much of an upset, as he was the second-lowest-ranked seed. Last week's champion, Ivan Ljubicic, was forced to retire in his match against Benjamin Becker, even though he was up a set and a game. Well, it looks like the Croat was feeling his 31 years again, after the thrill of winning last week's title wore off.

The last seeded player to be upset was one of many American players to put in an absolutely dismal showing at the last American hardcourt tournament of the season. Sam Querrey lost to Frenchman Jeremy Chardy after winning the first set. In addition to Querrey, Blake lost to Tomaz Bellucci, also after being up a set. Taylor Dent lost to Nadal, but that's not really that surprising a result. And Melanie Oudin was demolished by Vera Zvonareva 6-1, 6-2.

The only Americans who managed their way to victories were Andy Roddick, who beat Igor Andreev in a routine match, and John Isner, who happened to be playing in a match where it was guaranteed an American would win, as he was facing Michael Russel. He was actually outplayed by Russel and won 14 fewer points over the course of the three set match, but he still managed to win two tiebreaks. Credit Isner as the only American who could find a way to win on a day where conditions were tough and the fans must have been little help. With so many rain delays and crappy weather, anyone who was expecting an excited crowd was disappointed.

It's a shame, because for most of these players, this is their best surface, and this was their best chance for a good result until the middle of the summer. One of the good things about the upset bug that was going around the grounds is that it was Andy Roddick's (formerly Novak Djokovic's) quarter of the draw that was decimated, giving Roddick another good chance at a deep run.

There are some good matches tomorrow, and a few more chances to continue the unbelievable run of upsets that has been the order of the day for the past few weeks. Andy Murray plays Mardy Fish, and it will be interesting to if the upset bug or the American failure bug is more at play in that match. Verdasco has been on a pretty poor run since his hard-court title last month, and he plays another small firecracker like Rochus, Israel's Dudi Sela.

The top seeds are also in action. Svetlana Kuznetsova, who barely survived her first match, plays 27th seed Agnes Szavay of Hungary. Look for a potential upset, there. Roger Federer plays lucky loser Nicolas Lapentti, but don't be on the lookout for that match to end in an upset. It's also interesting to note that Rafael Nadal teams up with a partner I've never seen before to play the Bryan Brothers in doubles tomorrow. They lost in their first outing in Indian Wells, so they're hoping to make a better run at this tournament.

Two possible upsets tomorrow feature recently underachieving seeds taking on a couple of young guns, as Gilles Simon takes on Horacio Zeballos and Tomas Berdych takes on Thiemo De Bakker. Outside chance of an upset in either match. Also watch out for Kevin Anderson taking on Stan Wawrinka, Michael Berrer against Feliciano Lopez, and an extremely low possibility for Australian veteran Peter Luczak to upset Robin Soderling.

It almost seems impossible for this tournament to be as crazy as last week in Indian Wells, but we're off to a good start.