Kevin Blackistone Tennis

If there is one truth about outrageous behavior it is that the only people who really wind up paying for it are companies seeing an opportunity to cash in, like Volkswagen with a screaming Bob Knight or American Express with an apologetic John McEnroe or, fresh off Madison Avenue, a ballistic Serena Williams firing away at Mother Nature.

But why stop at just a few athletes gone wild? There are a lot of other stars of our games whose personalities would do wonders for some other hawkers of products and ideas.

We've witnessed self-proclaimed concerned Americans drown out public debates over healthcare reform with vitriol. We saw a member of Congress heckle the president during an address by the commander-in-chief in the well of the House.

And shortly after Serena Williams belittled a tennis lineswoman in an embarrassing tirade, and then struggled mightily to muster the courtesy of an apology, a music producer extraordinaire selfishly and embarrassingly rained on an honoree's nationally televised parade with his uncontainable ego.

Incivility. It's the new black. Everyone's bearing it: Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.), rap mogul Kanye West -- again -- and the world's best women's tennis player.

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There is no truth to the rumor that Senator-turned-peacemaker George Mitchell chose President Obama's plea to take a stab at solving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in the Middle East over men's tennis president Adam Helfant's plea to soothe the Bosnian-Serbian conflict that now engulfs the world of tennis.

But maybe Helfant should've inquired.