Two years ago, The Times had five sports columnists. With Mr. Araton gone, there are two. One of them is 70. 

There will be no replacements.

The Times’ sports editor, Tom Jolly, explained to The Observer that in many ways, the general-interest sports columnist—at The Times, the Sports of the Times columnist, a designation that has existed since the 1930s—is part of a bygone era.

“The Sports of the Times is a great brand, and I hate to see that brand disappear, but it clearly is changing,” Mr. Jolly said.

He explained that The Times’ sports page will use fewer general-interest writers to generate columns, and will instead rely more on beat writers to provide expertise. He wants them to blog, he wants them to use Twitter and he wants them to write analysis pieces.

“In a world filled with blogs and opinion on talk radio and on cable television, there does seem to be a pretty good craving for expert analysis—the real insight of someone who is there,” he said.

This may not sound like a radical departure, but it is.

Sports desks have traditionally been defined by their big-foot generalists: Mike Lupica at the Daily News, Mitch Albom at the Detroit Free Press, Bill Plaschke at the L.A. Times, Johnette Howard at Newsday, Red Smith at The Times.

While The Times is proposing to do without all that, the alumni are not at all convinced that it’s a good idea.

“That thoughtful, reflective, reported opinion that we used to see has basically vanished,” said Selena Roberts, a writer with Sports Illustrated and a Times columnist from 2002 to 2007. “This leaves the reader, especially since the reader is going to the Web for the analysts’ point of view, with a shallower perspective of what’s going on.”

Ms. Roberts foresaw another, more practical problem with The Times’ plan to ask their access-dependent beat writers to be more authoritative and opinionated.

“Here they are covering a team on a daily basis,” said Ms. Roberts. “What if they blog something or tweet something that comes off as an opinion and it’s very much taken as an opinion by that organization? Do they run into problems because they make a joke about the GM?”

Either way, it’s clear that The Times has rendered its verdict. Now it’s just a matter of time until the end.

“Since they haven’t promoted any new columnists, it seems to me The Times doesn’t care if it’s one or two or five columnists,” said Dave Anderson, a columnist from 1971 to 2007 who is semi-retired and still contributes 18 columns a year. “But to me, this is a sad thing. We all grew up reading sports columnists. Red Smith, Jimmy Cannon. When you’re a sports reporter, people think you want to be an athlete. I didn’t want to be Joe DiMaggio. I wanted to be Red Smith.”

George Vecsey, one of two columnists left at The Times (along with William Rhoden), said that at age 70, he’s about ready to retire.

“I wouldn’t want to get really old in this business,” he said. “It’s a young person’s business.”

“People younger than me should be in their prime and doing this,” said Mr. Vecsey. “When I go to a sports arena and I don’t see [Newsday’s] Shaun [Powell] and Johnette? Who’s going to be the next Selena Roberts? The next Bob Lipsyte? The next Dave Anderson?”

Case in point: Novak Djokovic.

Last year, in his two weeks at the Open, Djokovic transformed himself, on our stage, before our very eyes, from a gifted-but-little-known Serbian up-and-comer into a full-fledged star. Yes, it had much to do with his daring, nerveless play, but it was more than that.

Robert De Niro and wife Grace Hightower sat in the Djokovic player's box during his Open final against Roger Federer; they treated him to dinner at Nobu during the tournament and at Wakiya after he lost the final. Maria Sharapova cheered him on every step of the way, and rumors started running high that they began dating at the Open.

He was a total stud.

"To get, you know, American people behind you, especially a crowd here in U.S. Open, is not so easy," he said last year. "Obviously they like my character on and off the court."

That was last year. By the end of his run at the 08, U.S. Open all that good will was lost.

After he lost to Roger Federer in the semis, The New York Post called him a "villain," the New York crowd began booing him. When he was asked about what he would take away from the tournament, he bristled.

"Well, look," he said, "I just want to forget some things, you know, as soon as possible."

Oddly, it was nearly all self-inflicted.

On Thursday night, in a quarter-final match against Andy Roddick, Novak Djokovic won a tough, hard-fought match in four sets.

Naturally, most of the crowd support belonged to the American, Roddick. Rather than acting graciously in defeat, Djokovic used his post-match on-court interview as a way to exact some revenge on Roddick, who had poked fun at Djokovic for making a meal of various unspectacular physical ailments.

"Well obviously, you know, Andy was saying I have 16 injuries after last match, so obviously I don't, right?," said Djokovic in the very public interview.

The boos began to rain down, but Djokovic wasn't fazed.

"Like it or not, it's like that," he said.

The USA anchor Michael Barkann tried to get him out of it, but Djokovic dug himself deeper.

"Well, I know, they're already against me because they think I'm faking everything, so it's alright." he said.

He wasn't quite done, but that was that.

"That's not nice, anyhow, to say in front of this crowd that I have 16 injuries and that I'm faking it," he went on.

"He’s a professional and he knows he’s got to pay the consequences for his behavior, good or bad," said his agent Benito Pérez-Barbadillo after the match.

And he would.

When he came out for his match yesterday against Roger Federer, the crowd was completely against him; at one point, when someone shouted something just as he was about to serve, he threw up his arms in an expression of exasperation, if not something stronger.

There was a way to handle this. Roger Federer, who beat Andre Agassi in back-to-back Opens in 2004 and 2005, and then beat James Blake in 2006 and Andy Roddick in 2007, found a way to stay popular, or at least reasonably well-liked here. This year, he's become a sentimental hero in a way that Agassi or Sampras did.

Still, it's a particular wonder that Djokovic now finds himself in this situation.

The anticipation was so high again for him this year that when he strolled onto the rooftop of the Empire Hotel on West 63rd street the Friday night before the Open at a Heineken-sponsored tennis party packed with celebs, he was treated like royalty. Party-planners told him how they were waiting for him to arrive all night, and how he must get a stamp so he could go into the VIP-section; and a Maria Sharapova-handler said that she was asking for him all night.

Then again, maybe we knew this would be happen. Last year, when Djokovic was just emerging, the veteran Times columnist George Vecsey warned me that the Djokovic adoration wasn't a permanent phenomenon.

"He'll get bored with it after a year," he said. "It's refreshing right now because it's so new, but then he'll get bored with telling the same life story over and over again.

"He won't be as funny or expressive," he continued. "All it'll take is one bad experience."

And then this year got off to such a great start! Djokovic won his first Grand Slam in Australia and Ana Ivanovic won her first major at Roland Garros.

But since then, those beaming personalities and sparkly clean images have taken a bit of a public hit. First, before Wimbledon, Djokovic declared that Roger Federer was mentally fragile and plenty beatable. After that display of arrogance, Djokovic went ahead and got bounced in the second round. Meanwhile, Ivanovic, who reached the semis at Wimbledon in 07, suffered a humiliating straight-sets loss to a player seeded 133rd in the world. And Jankovic, after an early loss as well, reportedly complained louder than anyone about her court assignment at The Championships. Sports Illustrated's Jon Wertheim, in a story titled, "The Serbs' Dwindling Popularity," wrote, "You're in the second week of a Slam and you're griping about court assignments? It's not as though the net is higher on Court Two. Just win your match and move on. My sources tell me the most vocal griper was Jelena Jankovic (and her mom). Seems to me her outrage would be a lot better placed wondering why she is in her mid-20s and needs a medic-alert bracelet."

With the snap of a finger, our favorite pack of fresh and cute youngsters began looking and sounding more like entitled prima donnas.

Didn't the Times' George Vecsey predict last year that something very much like this would happen?

George Vecsey of the Times was impressed by the volume of volunteers to help shepherd him from Beijing's airport to the Main Press Center in the Olympic village. One volunteer who didn't know a word of English a few months ago, took him by the hand and helped him through. "My first hour ever in China could not have been nicer," he wrote.

Juliet Macur of the Times isn't one bit happy about the thick air--96 degrees on Monday, with 88 percent humidity--but things are smoother now than back in the spring when she first came for a reporting assignment. "[At media housing], just like everywhere else, volunteers outnumber the media 10 to 1. Eight volunteers greeted me as I stepped out of the bus. Three escorted me to the front door of the registration desk. Four lazily wiped down the doorknobs on a building no one was going into. At breakfast today, 12 volunteers stared as I entered the empty cafeteria at 6 a.m."

Things still get lost in translation:

CNN producer Steve Almasy isn't a fan of the air quality either--he confused the air with the smell of jet engines--but hey, all those volunteers! And the nice bedrooms in the media village. "Everything has been first class," he wrote.

Kevin Baxter at the L.A. Times writes about some of the, uh, challenges of reporting in China: "One colleague paused to take a picture of Chairman Mao's portrait as he left the Forbidden City. That's apparently a no-no, and when the guard's terse warning went unheeded, he accented it with a stiff shove."

After bitching about the air quality, he fairly concludes: "But it's far too early to be critical."

Is he some new breed of hyper-accommodating athlete?

"He'll get bored with it after a year," said New York Times columnist George Vecsey, who was among the scrum peppering him with questions. "It's refreshing right now because it's so new, but then he'll get bored with telling the same life story over and over again. He won't be as funny or expressive -- all it'll take is one bad experience. I'm not trying to be cynical here, but I've seen it before.

"I don't even think [James] Blake is as open as he was two years ago when it was just magic," he continued.

For reporters, Vecsey explained, Djokovic’s refreshing openness should mean one thing: "Gotta catch him while you can."