What a tournament for the yanks. Shelton is the real deal. Insane to do this in his first international tournament.
Was really high on Ben’s chances coming out of college, but this is unbelievable. The variety of styles among these young American’s on the mens side is so nice now. After years of big serve, big forehand robots, have finally found some diversity.
I know what it is but there was drama once about someone not apologizing about it and that's when I started to find a ridiculous
“you go emergency toilet for five minutes and then you hit let and you don’t say sorry and you think you are a good kid?” still slays me every time.
outside of Djoker, real lack of obvious star power left in this tourney. some great players, no doubt, but I can't imagine ESPN is too thrilled with these QF and potential final matchups
at least they have a ~55% chance of an American in each men's semi. They were prepping for this scenario yesterday by having the Wolf/Shelton match over the Rublev/Rune one primarily
I imagine there are no bigger Pegula fans than ESPN execs. One Jess loss away from something like an all-Belarusian final or a Rybakina-Pliskova type final.
Caring about what the espn execs care about just ain’t for me. Throw everything on espn+ and I’m good.
I think he can move better than Sock ever could, and has a better backhand at the same age. The big question I think going forward is going to be whether he can keep the shot making up once the pressure/expectations start to kick in. He's playing incredibly free right now because he was basically playing with house money since the first round.
I like Rublev despite the occasional emotional outburst. Also, writing "No war" on the camera when Russia invaded Ukraine took guts.
I’ll admit I’m much more interested in the men’s side than women. But I do appreciate Jelena’s angry grunts and hard hitting style, and go Jess Go USA. Pliskova playing clean, I think she’s surrendered 3 BPs on 7 chances in 4 matches. I think Shelton’s draw has been extremely fortunate and I hope he uses the confidence he has gained to get over the proverbial hump. He may be in for a rude awakening in coming months though, reaching the quarter finals without facing a seeded player or even anyone higher than 67 in pre tourney rankings is pretty wild. Lehecka is live vs Stef as nearly a +500 dog in my opinion. His consistency point to point has been tough to deal with for everyone he has faced. He’s hasn’t been broken on serve more than once in any set he’s played this tournament which has allowed him to punish “better” players who think they are good enough to play their way out of holes.
Semi-related topic- This was such a pattern among young American prospects for basically two decades that it hardly seems it could be coincidence- do you guys see it as a failure by American coaches/the USTA to recognize the evolution of the game? Almost seems like ever since Sampras retired, American prospects have been attempting to replicate his game.
America is not good at developing any prospects for almost every sport. The NCAA is the primary reason for that.
I think unhinged capitalism is a bigger reason. The NCAA obviously has a role in that, but at every level everything has to be monetized and every penny extracted
I think the NCAA is root cause, makes other facets bleed in. But neither here nor there, in general, I largely believe it’s why we can’t develop talent. Regardless, everything is cyclical so we get some wins along the way, hopefully some in the next week or so.
Also I could care less about USA athletes. I respect rooting interests, but it doesn’t move the needle for me.
You can blame Patrick McEnroe for a good bit of it. He was in charge of usta high performance for many years. But like others have said the US is not set up like some other countries and relies heavily on private coaching or people paying to go to academies. College has also shown not to be a great place for top pros to develop aside from a few success stories.
I wouldn’t blame Sampras’s style directly. I think it is much more that last generation trying to replicate Roddick (who may have gotten some of his style from Sampras). Wolf seems to be trying to do an Agassi style now tho. And Shelton seems to have longer strokes like an FAA.
Honestly I think a lot of had to do with the fact that until more recently basically all American tennis was hard court based. So that big serve and forehand style is/was very effective on those courts.
Korda is favored. Wonder if that’s a symptom of being in US or universal books? I don’t think anyone should be heavy favorite; just curious what makers are trying to get their money on outside the US.
How I feel, but replace anyone for Rublev. Saw he made some shithead comment about an injury today as well during his press conference playing victim.
Big change from less than a year ago. I don’t think it will make her worse, because of her game, just noticeable difference.
Rain delay on a court with a roof always drives me nuts. Especially when it had already been raining earlier
We are know the meteorologists have a worse track record than the bettors in the thread, just close the damn roof.
She was already a big woman before this, but she’s a lot bigger. Also thicc, she would not be on the court tonight if she was a fat slob.
Me being right 56% of the time pays my mortgage. Them being right 56% of the time gets them fired I should be so lucky