If NBC Sports can’t carry Wimbledon matches live, especially crucial ones, it shouldn’t carry Wimbledon at all. The network’s tape-delay dance  and its excuses  have grown tired.

Here’s what happened Wednesday: at 8 a.m. Eastern, ESPN2 started showing the Tommy Haas-Novak Djokovic match live (!) until early in the third set. But the network had to leave at 10 a.m., when NBC’s exclusive three-hour window kicked in. That was NBC’s cue to go to the videotape of Roger Federer’s straight-sets victory over Ivo Karlovic  on an unnerving two-hour delay.

Then, as if diced-and-sliced tennis were how its surveys found that fans preferred to watch Grand Slam events, NBC showed the rest of the Haas-Djokovic match on what was a four- to five-hour delay.

Oy! NBC might have been following tennis history by choosing  with first dibs over ESPN2  Federer for its time slot. But Federer on videotape? He’s trying for a record 15th Grand Slam singles title and his quarterfinal match is on tape? This is how screwy it gets when two networks and their broadband services share an event: NBC didn’t stream the match live because its broadband window started at 10 a.m., and ESPN360.com couldn’t stream it because it was protected for when NBC wanted to show it on TV.