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    John Isner Says Goodbye to Pro Tennis at the U.S. Open

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    A 6-foot-10 American, Isner had announced he would retire following the tournament. Losses in singles and doubles on Thursday ended a career known for powerful serves and a marathon match.Josh Zipin of Manhattan rushed over from Arthur Ashe Stadium to the Grandstand court of the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center on Thursday hoping to catch the final set of John Isner’s singles match. Zipin, 34, said he had never seen Isner play live, and wanted to see what his “insane” serve looked like in person.“Somebody behind me was asking if Isner served to you 100 times, how many times could you return it in the court and the person sitting behind me said one,” Zipin said. “I think that’s probably being generous.”For 16 years, Isner, the 38-year-old American star, has wowed fans around the world with his signature game, which combined a booming serve, powerful groundstrokes, and quick hands at the net with volleys and overheads.A North Carolina native who stands at 6-foot-10, Isner is the career ace leader in the history of the men’s tour. But he is perhaps best known for winning the longest match in tennis history when he played for 11 hours 5 minutes over three days against Nicolas Mahut of France at Wimbledon in 2010. That match, along with another Isner marathon at the tournament in 2018, led Wimbledon to institute a final-set tiebreaker. (If you have 11 hours to kill, you can watch the match in full here.)Isner won the longest match in tennis history, beating Nicolas Mahut at Wimbledon after a battle that played out over three days.Pool photo by Suzanne PlunkettIsner was in the top 20 of the singles rankings for 10 straight years, from 2010 to 2019. He was a U.S. Open quarterfinalist in 2011 and 2018, a Wimbledon semifinalist in 2018 and has earned nearly $23 million in career prize money, but was unable to win a Grand Slam tournament title.Andy Murray, one of Isner’s contemporaries, said during an interview this week that Isner “was always a disaster to play against or see in your draw,” adding that “his serve’s the best of all time.”Thursday would turn out to be the last time he would fire that serve at a pro event. Isner had announced on X, formerly known as Twitter, before the U.S. Open that the tournament would be his final act so that he could spend more time with his wife, Madison, and their four children.“This transition won’t be easy but I’m looking forward to every second of it with my amazing family,” Isner wrote. “Time to lace ‘em up one last time.”Isner won his first-round match on Tuesday in straight sets against Facundo Diaz Acosta, an unseeded player from Argentina. A number of his cohort, who have since retired, including Bob and Mike Bryan and Sam Querrey, were in attendance.On Thursday, he was defeated in five sets by a younger American named Michael Mmoh, who stayed composed despite playing before a crowd that was solidly in his opponent’s corner.When the match was over, Isner buried his head in a white towel and fought back tears. He could barely speak during the on-court interview.Mmoh said the match was “no doubt the biggest win of my career,” and he congratulated Isner on a remarkable, trailblazing career.Lisa Katter, 54 of Long Island, said she was impressed by Isner’s performance. “I can’t believe even at this point in his career he’s still acing an entire game,” she said.Then, not quite ready to call it a career, Isner slung his bag over his shoulder and trudged off to play doubles. A few hours later, that too was in the books, as he and fellow American Jack Sock, who is also retiring after the U.S. Open, lost in three sets.Isner ended his doubles career with Jack Sock, an American who is also retiring after the tournament.Al Bello/Getty ImagesLater, Isner said that he was feeling many emotions — disappointment over how he played, gratitude to have one last time to compete in the atmosphere at the U.S. Open, and pride in what he achieved throughout his career.“It just didn’t go my way today,” he said. “It’s a tough way to go out but at the same time I went out in front of a packed stadium and a standing ovation and it was pretty cool.”He said it was hard to explain how badly his body has felt recently, and he was looking forward to not having to practice anymore. He said he looked forward to finding what he was passionate about, and devoting more energy to being a good husband and father.“Tennis is a,” he started before trailing off and lowering his head to gather himself. “It’s been a huge part of my life so it’s tough to say goodbye, it’s not easy.” More

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      A Field Guide to the 2023 U.S. Open

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      With the grass and clay seasons over, the eyes of the tennis world now turn to Flushing Meadows.The U.S. Open, played from Aug. 28 to Sept. 10 in Queens, is the last Grand Slam tournament of the calendar year, giving players one more chance to win a major title. Each year, the tournament creates a buzz around New York City, and it never fails to excite — or wreak havoc on sleep schedules, with marathon matches that can go deep into the night.At last year’s U.S. Open, Serena Williams largely stole the show during the first week as she closed out her storied career by reaching the third round of the singles draw. This year, without Williams, Roger Federer and an injured Rafael Nadal, a largely younger generation of tennis stars is looking to make a deep run in the tournament.Both of the 2022 singles winners are back in the field: Iga Swiatek, the 22-year-old from Poland and a four-time Grand Slam tournament champion, and Carlos Alcaraz, the 20-year-old Spanish phenom with two Grand Slam singles titles under his belt. But while Alcaraz and Swiatek are among those favored to win, you never know when a couple of teenagers could surprise everyone and reach the final.Here’s what to know about this year’s U.S. Open.How can I watch?In the United States, ESPN will carry the action from the first ball of the day until late into the night. Over Labor Day weekend, ABC will also broadcast some matches.Around the world, other networks airing the tournament include TSN in Canada, Sky Sports in Britain, Migu in China, Sky Deutschland in Germany, SuperTennis in Italy and Movistar in Spain.Kids lined up for autographs from Frances Tiafoe in Arthur Ashe Stadium after he practiced on Friday.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York Times‘Stand clear of the closing doors, please.’For those heading out to the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens, the No. 7 train, which makes stops in Manhattan at Times Square and Grand Central Station, is one of the easiest ways to get to the U.S. Open.The No. 7 train stops at Mets-Willets Point station, which leads directly to the tennis grounds. (If you see a bunch of fans in Mets gear, turn around because you’ve gone the wrong way.) It also includes an express route, which makes fewer stops than the local trains, and on certain nights an even faster “super express train” is offered back to Manhattan. Another option is to take the Long Island Rail Road to the Mets-Willets Point station.Parking is also available at the tournament, along with designated ride-share spots. But beware: Heavy traffic often means that driving either in or out of Manhattan can take longer than a train ride.Baseball fans and tennis fans will mingle at the Mets-Willets Point subway station.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesCan’t get a ticket to Arthur Ashe Stadium?There is something electric about a night match under the lights of Arthur Ashe Stadium. The court is reserved for the tournament’s top-billed players, who are spurred on by raucous, Honey Deuce-fueled crowds. But a seat in Arthur Ashe can be pricey.Other options include buying a ticket to Louis Armstrong Stadium or the Grandstand, which both host a number of often-underrated matches and offer a closer look at the action. There isn’t a bad seat in either venue.Perhaps one of the best — and more laissez-faire — ways to enjoy the tournament is to buy a grounds pass and hop around from court to court. A grounds pass also offers first-come, first-serve access to the general admission seating in Armstrong and the Grandstand.Don’t sleep on those numbered outer courts, either. At last year’s tournament, Aryna Sabalenka, who won this year’s Australian Open, was down — 2-6, 1-5 — in a second-round match against Kaia Kanepi. The match seemed all but over until Sabalenka fought back to win the second set and eventually the third. Where did this epic comeback go down? Court 5, over by the practice courts.Spectators watched qualifying matches inside the Grandstand on Friday.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesWho’s playing?Novak Djokovic is back. After missing last year’s U.S. Open because he was not vaccinated against the coronavirus, as American travel restrictions required of foreign visitors at the time, the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion returns to seek a 24th title.Djokovic will enter the tournament in strong form after winning the Western & Southern Open in Ohio last week against Alcaraz. In the final, Djokovic was down a set, and he appeared to be suffering badly from the heat, but he rallied and forced a third set, winning on a tiebreaker.In addition to Alcaraz and Swiatek, other big names in this year’s tournament include Sabalenka of Belarus, Ons Jabeur of Tunisia, Daniil Medvedev of Russia, Casper Ruud of Norway and Elena Rybakina, who represents Kazakhstan. Some of the top-seeded American players include Frances Tiafoe, Jessica Pegula, Coco Gauff and Taylor Fritz.Frances Tiafoe made a deep run in last year’s U.S. Open.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesKeep an eye on these story lines.Elina Svitolina, a U.S. Open semifinalist in 2019, missed last year’s tournament while taking time off for the birth of her daughter and raising money for Ukraine, her home country, after it was invaded by Russia. Since returning to tennis this year, Svitolina made an impressive run to the quarterfinals of the French Open, and she defeated Swiatek to reach the semifinals of Wimbledon. (By the way, don’t be surprised if you see Svitolina or any Ukrainian player refuse to shake hands with Russian or Belarusian players.)Gauff, the 19-year-old who was a French Open finalist in 2022, enters the U.S. Open having won two titles this month, in Washington, D.C., and Ohio. In the semis of the Western & Southern Open, she was finally able to beat Swiatek, having lost the previous seven matches against her.Caroline Wozniacki and Venus Williams were both awarded wild-card slots at this year’s U.S. Open. Wozniacki, a one-time Grand Slam singles champion from Denmark, is back after retiring from tennis in 2020 to start a family. Williams, a seven-time Grand Slam singles champion, shows no signs of stopping at 43.On the men’s side, Andy Murray, 36, is another veteran who is keeping on with three Grand Slam titles in tow, and John Isner, the 38-year-old American, was awarded a wild card for what he said will be his final tournament.Someone else to keep tabs on is Jennifer Brady, the 28-year-old American who reached the 2021 Australian Open final. After missing nearly two years with injuries, Brady is back on the tennis scene.Jennifer Brady made her return to tennis this year.Jacob Langston for The New York TimesSome big names are missing this year.One of the most notable absences will be Rafael Nadal, the 22-time Grand Slam singles champion. He is out for the rest of the year with an injury and is eyeing a return next year.This year’s tournament will also lack some recent U.S. Open champions: Naomi Osaka, who won the U.S. Open in 2018 and 2020, will miss this year’s tournament after giving birth to a daughter this summer. Emma Raducanu, who won the 2021 U.S. Open women’s title as a qualifier without losing a single set, is recovering from minor procedures on both hands and an ankle. Bianca Andreescu, the 2019 U.S. Open champion, is out this year with a small stress fracture in her back.Simona Halep, a two-time Grand Slam singles champion, was withdrawn from the tournament because she received a provisional suspension in October after testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug during last year’s U.S. Open.Nick Kyrgios, the fiery Australian, withdrew from the men’s draw in early August. Kyrgios, who has played in only one tournament this year, wrote on Instagram that a wrist injury was keeping him out of the U.S. Open.Naomi Osaka at last year’s U.S. Open.Michelle V. Agins/The New York TimesMark your calendars.The action begins on Monday, with the first, second and third rounds scheduled through Sept. 2. The round of 16 starts on Sept. 3, followed by the quarterfinals on Sept. 5 and 6.The women’s semifinals are scheduled for Sept. 7, with the men’s semifinals on Sept. 8. The women’s final will be played Sept. 9, and the tournament wraps up with the men’s final on Sept. 10.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York Times More

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      The End of the Endless Final Set: Grand Slams Adopt Same Tiebreaker

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      The French Open was the last major tennis tournament that allowed an “advantage final set” without a tiebreaker. Once the maker of many classic, marathon matches, the system is no more.INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — Tennis is entering a new era: one in which the marathon final sets that have concluded some of its greatest and longest matches are no longer an option.The Grand Slam Board announced Wednesday that beginning in May with the French Open, all four major tournaments will put in place a tiebreaker at 6-6 in decisive sets: the third set in women’s singles matches and the fifth set in men’s singles.The first player with at least 10 points and a 2-point margin will win the tiebreaker. The move was announced as a one-year trial, but is likely to be adopted permanently considering the extensive consultation behind it.The winds have been blowing in this direction for some time amid concerns about the pace of play, match lengths, player health and recovery times.“It’s good they have that uniformity now, but I guess what made them unique was also how each fifth set was different, so I can see both sides to it,” said John Isner, the American veteran whose first-round victory over Nicolas Mahut of France at Wimbledon in 2010 established a logic-defying record by stretching to 70-68 in the fifth set.If the new rules are embraced permanently, that mark will forever remain untouchable.“It was never going to get broken anyway, so those are my thoughts,” Isner said.It is difficult to argue. The final set of Isner-Mahut stretched across three days, monopolizing Court 18 at the All England Club and generating global interest for an otherwise obscure early-round match.There is a fascination created by two players pushing each other to their physical and mental limits; a particular sort of tension fostered by a marathon final set after competitors and spectators have invested so many hours in the outcome.“That’s just like an absolute battle,” said Taylor Fritz, the 24-year-old American who reached the quarterfinals of the BNP Paribas Open.Fritz said ultralong final sets make it all but impossible for the victor to advance much further in a tournament. “You’re so done for your next match if you have one of those,” he said. “But it’s tradition, and I will miss seeing those crazy battles.”Before the Open era, there were no tiebreakers in any set at the Grand Slam tournaments or in the Davis Cup, the premier men’s team competition. A set was won by winning a minimum of six games by a margin of at least two. In one extreme example from the first round of Wimbledon in 1969, 41-year-old Pancho Gonzales defeated his fellow American Charlie Pasarell, 22-24, 1-6, 16-14, 6-3, 11-9, in a match that stretched over two days.The next year, a tiebreaker at six games all was introduced at the 1970 U.S. Open for all sets and was gradually adopted by the other Grand Slam tournaments and major team competitions for all sets except the final one.But after more than a century, the Davis Cup opted for a final-set tiebreaker in 2016 and the Australian Open and Wimbledon followed suit in 2019, though in different ways. The Australian Open opted for the extended first-to-10-points tiebreaker at 6-all and Wimbledon adopted a traditional first-to-seven tiebreaker at 12-all.The French Open continued to play out the fifth set, which left the four Grand Slam tournaments with four different methods of resolving decisive sets — a discrepancy that confused some players.In the middle of the fifth set of the 2019 Wimbledon men’s singles final, Novak Djokovic had to double check with the chair umpire when the tiebreaker would be played.The Grand Slam tournament leaders clearly wanted a tidier solution.“The Grand Slam Board’s decision is based on a strong desire to create greater consistency in the rules of the game at the Grand Slams, and thus enhance the experience for the players and fans alike,” the board said in its statement.Uniformity at least will provide clarity, and the first-to-10-points tiebreaker should allow for more suspense and momentum shifts than the first-to-seven system.But if the new rules are adopted after the trial, it will shrink the horizons of what constitutes an epic match.Many matches that are ranked among the greatest went into the tennis equivalent of overtime, which is certainly no coincidence.Bjorn Borg’s victory over John McEnroe in the 1980 Wimbledon final went to 8-6 in the fifth set; Rafael Nadal’s victory over Roger Federer in the 2008 Wimbledon final went to 9-7 in the fifth; Djokovic’s victory over Federer in the 2019 Wimbledon final went to 13-12 in the fifth with a tiebreaker at 12-all.At the French Open, Monica Seles’s victory over Steffi Graf in the exquisite 1992 final went to 10-8 in the third, and Jennifer Capriati’s victory over Kim Clijsters in the 2001 final stretched to 12-10 in the third.But marathons will not be out of the question in this new, streamlined tennis world. Consider the 2012 Australian Open men’s final, between Djokovic and Nadal, the longest singles final in Grand Slam history in terms of elapsed time. They played for 5 hours 53 minutes and were so spent by the time Djokovic finished his victory that both needed chairs at the award ceremony.But that match, undoubtedly one of the greatest in tennis history, would not have been shortened by a tiebreaker under the unified rules announced on Wednesday.It ended at 7-5 in the fifth. More

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      An Unplayed Australian Open Is a Turning Point for Novak Djokovic

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      Djokovic has rebounded from demoralizing periods in the past, but talented players are coming behind him, and his anti-vaccine stance has made him a global target.MELBOURNE, Australia — Even after being ejected from Australia, Novak Djokovic will remain No. 1 in the men’s tennis rankings at the end of the Australian Open, which began on Monday without him.He still holds the titles at the French Open and Wimbledon; still has supple limbs, formidable tennis skills and a deep history of resilience in the face of hostile crowds and long odds.But in a what-have-you-won-for-me-lately sport that is often categorized by eras and the champions who define them, it would come as no surprise if Sunday marked a turning point, symbolized by his long, grim walk to the airport gate in Melbourne under the escort of immigration officials.Djokovic is 34, and as he left Australia against his will after his visa was canceled, a new generation of taller, talented stars in men’s tennis was preparing to pursue the title at the Grand Slam tournament he has dominated like no other and may never play again, if his three-year ban from the country is not rescinded.“This certainly could knock him back,” John Isner, a friend of Djokovic’s and one of the top-ranked American players, said on Sunday. “I honestly don’t know which way it will go. It could take him a long time to recover, or light a fire under him.”Djokovic has rebounded from demoralizing periods in the past and resumed winning. In 2017, after perhaps the most dominant phase of his career, he struggled with his motivation and lost his edge for more than a year amid personal problems and a persistent right elbow injury. He had a commitment to natural healing that foreshadowed his decision not to be vaccinated for the coronavirus. But after playing and struggling at the Australian Open in 2018 with his elbow supported by a compression sleeve, he decided, tearfully he has said, to undergo surgery.Five months later, he was a Grand Slam champion again, winning the 2018 Wimbledon title and soon re-establishing himself as No. 1, at the expense of his career-long rivals, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal.In early 2020, Djokovic was still on a roll, starting the year with 18 straight victories before the pandemic shut down the sport for five months in 2020. He organized an ill-advised exhibition tour in Serbia and Croatia in June during the enforced break that turned into a superspreader event and public-relations bonfire as he and other players and team members, including Djokovic’s coach Goran Ivanisevic, danced and partied unmasked in a Balkan nightclub, thoroughly out of sync with the global mood.The tour was canceled. Djokovic; his wife, Jelena; Ivanisevic; and others tested positive for the coronavirus, and when Djokovic did return to Grand Slam action, at the 2020 U.S. Open, he proceeded to eliminate himself from the tournament in the fourth round by hitting a ball in frustration after losing his serve and inadvertently hitting a lineswoman in the throat. He was defaulted by the tournament referee and returned to Europe to regroup. A young Austrian, Dominic Thiem, eventually won the title.After all the dubious decisions and dents to his image, another Djokovic tailspin was hardly out of the question, but in a reflection of his tenacity and talent, he roared back in 2021 with one of his finest seasons: winning the first three Grand Slam tournaments and coming within one match of achieving the first men’s Grand Slam in singles in 52 years before losing to Daniil Medvedev in the U.S. Open final.That display of resilience in 2021 should give pause to all those who might expect Djokovic to curl himself into a ball on the floor of his Monte Carlo apartment in the aftermath of the Australian affair.A spectator inspected a banner of the 2021 champion on opening day at the Australian Open. Darrian Traynor/Getty ImagesWe are talking about a player who became a champion despite growing up in Belgrade during the violent breakup of Yugoslavia, when NATO bombing forced him to interrupt tennis practices. He left home at 12 for a tennis academy in Germany as his parents and family borrowed and improvised to fund his training in the hope that the sport would be his route, and theirs, to better days. Djokovic told me that his father, Srdjan, once gathered the family and slammed a 10 Deutsche mark on the kitchen table and explained that this was all the money they had left.“He said that more than ever we have to stick together and go through this together and figure out the way,” Djokovic said in that interview. “That was a very powerful and very impactful moment in my growth, my life, all of our lives.”What is one deportation in comparison with all of that?The answer seems self-evident, but the body blows can add up. Djokovic is accustomed to being the outsider, to hearing the roars of support for Federer and other opponents and winning anyway. He has even gone so far as to imagine that the crowds are chanting his name instead, but he has never been a global target to this degree.Though he insists he does not want to be an anti-vaccine champion, the fallout from his iconoclastic stance in Australia — he is one of only three top-100 men’s players to be unvaccinated — means that he will be indelibly associated with the issue. And as long as he remains unvaccinated, he will face challenges entering some other countries and tournaments.Energy is one of Djokovic’s hallmarks. Spend time with him one on one and his life force and restless curiosity come through, but he has expended a great deal of effort in recent years on causes beyond winning tennis matches: taking on the status quo on the men’s tour and creating a new player group to promote — so far unsuccessfully — change and more decision-making power for players at all levels of the rankings. He has helped start a new tournament in Belgrade, done charitable work in Serbia and the Balkan region and has cooperated with a behind-the-scenes documentary that is expected be released in 2022.It should have no dearth of content: no shortage of major triumphs and brutal setbacks. At what point does it all dull his edge? The answer could be right about now.The Novak Djokovic Standoff With AustraliaCard 1 of 5A vaccine exemption question. More

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      Reilly Opelka

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      There are currently 14 men in the top 100, the most since 1996, but none in the top 20. While the United States may not have any truly elite players right now, it does have youth.It took a while, but after the American Reilly Opelka and his big serve were eliminated in the fourth round of the U.S. Open on Monday by Lloyd Harris of South Africa, I decided to go searching.I had to weave through the big crowds that have happily again been part of the experience at this year’s tournament. I had to work my way up and down the concourse, examining the banners that commemorate, year by year, the past Open champions — most of whom seemed to be named Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal or Roger Federer — before arriving at my destination.There, near a coffee stand, dangling from the same post, were banners featuring the last two American men to win the singles title at Flushing Meadows: Pete Sampras in 2002 and Andy Roddick in 2003.It has been nearly 20 years now, the longest gap in the history of this Grand Slam tournament between American men’s champions. I covered both Sampras’s and Roddick’s victories, and there was no suspecting the length of the drought to come.New American men’s stars had always emerged, sometimes with a slight delay but never this kind of delay. There was concern about the future when John McEnroe and Jimmy Connors got older in the 1980s, but then along came one of the greatest generations from any nation: Sampras, Andre Agassi, Jim Courier and Michael Chang, with fine players like Todd Martin and MaliVai Washington playing secondary roles.There was big concern when those players aged out in the early 2000s, but Roddick still managed to reach No. 1 before being left knee-deep by the genius of Federer and the inexorable rise of Nadal and Djokovic.Roddick did his best, no doubt, which was often remarkable, reaching three Wimbledon finals and another U.S. Open final before retiring in 2012.But though Serena Williams, a winner of 23 major singles titles, has given American tennis fans plenty to celebrate since then, no American man has reached a Grand Slam singles final in over a decade as the Europeans have put a chokehold on men’s tennis.“We got a little bit spoiled,” said Brad Stine, the veteran American coach who mentored Courier and now works with the young American Tommy Paul.There has been no room in this upscale neighborhood. The prime real estate has been occupied by the Big Three, which for a time could have been considered the Big Five with Andy Murray and Federer’s Swiss compatriot Stan Wawrinka each winning three major titles.Now a much younger group has emerged that you could call the Next Four: Matteo Berrettini of Italy, Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece, Daniil Medvedev of Russia and Alexander Zverev of Germany. If you like, toss in the still-reigning U.S. Open champion Dominic Thiem of Austria and Andrey Rublev of Russia, a top-10 player.They, like the stars they are succeeding, are all Europeans.Tennis is more central to the sports culture in Europe, attracting more interest and presumably a greater percentage of top-quality athletes. There are more professional tournaments, both at the minor league and major league level, in Europe.But this season and this U.S. Open have offered up some evidence for better days ahead for the American men. There are 14 in the top 100 at the moment, the most since 1996. There were 13 in the second round at the Open, the most since 1994 when Sampras, Agassi, Courier and Chang were in full flow.But unlike those halcyon days, none of the new-age Americans are currently ranked in the top 20. There is depth but, for now, no truly elite players. What bodes well is that there is youth. All three of the American men to reach the fourth round here were under 25: Opelka, 24; Frances Tiafoe, 23; and Jenson Brooksby, 20.“In the top 100, we’ve got a huge group of guys there; we just don’t have the world beaters,” Opelka said after his 6-7 (6), 6-4, 6-1, 6-3 loss to Harris. “I don’t think we will have a Sampras-Agassi era of just dominance like that again. It’s rare for any country.”Brooksby, the last American singles player left in the tournament, certainly looked like a worldbeater for a set and a half on Monday night. In his first appearance in Arthur Ashe Stadium, he played with intelligence and resilience to take a 6-1 lead on world No. 1 Novak Djokovic. Brooksby then got back on serve in the second set after breaking Djokovic in an eight-deuce game that felt more like chess than tennis. But Djokovic, chasing the Grand Slam, has been playing best-of-five set tennis for nearly 20 years. Brooksby is just starting out and could not keep pace, losing 1-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-2.“I told him at the net he has a bright future ahead of him,” Djokovic said.Opelka, Tiafoe and Brooksby are not alone. Sebastian Korda is 21 and Brandon Nakashima is 20, and both also have had success this season with Korda reaching the quarterfinals of the Miami Open after beating three seeded players and then winning his first tour title in Parma, Italy. Nakashima made the singles finals in Atlanta and Los Cabos, Mexico, and upset John Isner, the most successful American man of the last decade, in the first round of this year’s U.S. Open.All this might not have been worth celebrating 25 years ago, but it counts as good news now.“I do think we’re moving in the right direction,” said Stine, who has coached privately and with the United States Tennis Association. “Ideally for U.S. tennis we want to have as many guys as we possibly can inside the top 250, which means we’re flooding the qualifying rounds of the Slams. And then from there, we need as many in the top 100 as we can get. It’s a numbers game, ultimately. You could ask, would you rather have 14 in the top 100 with none in the top 20? Or only six in the top 100 and all in the top 20? I think you’d obviously go with the six, but I do think we’re making progress.”They are a diverse group with varied game styles. Consider just the three American men to reach the round of 16. Opelka, who should break into the top 20 on Monday after the Open, is nearly seven feet tall with a big-bang game that can make him a nightmare to face. Tiafoe, who lost in four sets to Felix Auger-Aliassime of Canada on Sunday night, is a compact power server from College Park, Md., with quickness and dynamic groundstrokes who has had a resurgent season under his new coach Wayne Ferreira.Brooksby, the newest arrival at this level, is a northern Californian who made good use of his wild card into the Open.“I think Brooksby is our best,” said Opelka, who picked Brooksby and Korda as the most likely Americans to win a Grand Slam title down the road.Brooksby has an unconventional game based on consistency, great defense and abrupt rhythm shifts rather than the power baseline style that predominates on the men’s tour.“Is his swing beautiful? No. But is it repeatable? Absolutely, and that’s the most important thing,” said Stine, who has known Brooksby since he was 11. “The contact point is clean, and he makes a million balls. He plays the game really at the simplest form there is. I’m going to miss fewer balls than you are. I’m going to run and get to all the balls you hit, and I’m going to make you hit one more ball. And it’s been extremely effective and extremely irritating to his opponents.”The next challenge for the young Americans is beating enough opponents to start going deep, truly deep, in the tournaments that matter most. More

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      2021 French Open: What to Watch on Friday

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      Serena Williams, John Isner and Victoria Azarenka will play on Court Philippe-Chatrier as the third round of the French Open begins.How to watch: 5 a.m. to 6 p.m. Eastern time on Tennis Channel; streaming on Tennis Channel+ and the Peacock app.The third round of the French Open begins on Friday, and 12 Americans will play singles matches in the next two days. John Isner and Reilly Opelka, who are seeded, will be looking to fix a recent issue: There are no American men ranked in the top 30 for the first time in more than 50 years. There are no such issues on the women’s side, with Sofia Kenin and Serena Williams in the top 10 and five more Americans behind them in the top 30.Here are some matches to keep an eye on.Because of the number of matches cycling through courts, the times for individual matchups are estimates and may fluctuate based on when earlier play is completed. All times are Eastern.Court Philippe-Chatrier | 6 a.m.Victoria Azarenka vs. Madison KeysVictoria Azarenka of Belarus, the 15th seed, reached the semifinals of the French Open in 2013, but has not been past the third round since. In the past year, she reached the U.S. Open final, but was also knocked out in the first round of the Australian Open. After injuring her back at the Madrid Open in early May, it was unclear whether Azarenka, 31, would be able to play at Roland Garros. So far, Azarenka, a former world No. 1, has performed well, but she will be facing a formidable opponent in the third round.Madison Keys of the United States, the 23rd seed, has also struggled in 2021, not winning consecutive matches until this week at the French Open. Keys, 26, reached the semifinals in 2018 and the quarterfinals in 2019, but lost in the first round last year. Both players are hard-hitting baseliners. It should be an electric match.Court Philippe-Chatrier | 10 a.m.Serena Williams vs. Danielle CollinsSerena Williams celebrated after winning a long point in a tough match against Mihaela Buzarnescu in the second round on Wednesday.Pete Kiehart for The New York TimesSerena Williams, the seventh seed, showed signs of vulnerability in the second round against Mihaela Buzarnescu of Romania. After losing the second set, Williams, 39, limited her errors and ended up storming through the third set, 6-1, with a dominant performance returning serves. After some early-round exits during the clay-court swing, Williams must take every challenge seriously.Danielle Collins, an American ranked No. 50, swept past Anhelina Kalinina in the second round, losing only two games. Collins, who had surgery for endometriosis in the spring, did not play a tournament on clay in preparation for the French Open, but she has shown match fitness in the first two rounds. Collins, 27, will be a troublesome opponent for Williams. When the two met on hardcourts in January, Williams barely won in a third-set tiebreaker. Now, on a less favorable surface, there is the potential for an upset.Court Philippe-Chatrier | 3 p.m.Stefanos Tsitsipas vs. John IsnerJohn Isner has a booming serve, but his ground game will be tested in the third round.Clive Brunskill/Getty ImagesJohn Isner, the 31st seed, does not have a game that would traditionally favor clay. Isner, a 6-foot-10 American, has a booming serve that favors him on hardcourts and grass, but he has worked in recent years to improve his ground game. This helped him as he broke his second-round opponent, Filip Krajinovic, three times in the second set. Now, Isner’s ground game will be tested to its limit as he looks for an upset.Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece, the fifth seed, has had a strong clay-court season, winning the Monte Carlo Masters and the Lyon Open and reaching the final of the Barcelona Open. Tsitsipas, 22, swept through the first two rounds of the French Open without dropping a set, and is a favorite to reach the final from his half of the draw. On Friday, he will have to find a way to adjust to Isner’s strong serve. If he can settle in on return games and get some early breaks, he should be able to control the flow of the match.Court 14 | 5 a.m.Casper Ruud vs. Alejandro Davidovich FokinaCasper Ruud, the 15th seed, has spent the last few years knocking down national records that were once held by his father, Christian. This time, he will look to be the first Norwegian player to reach the round of 16 at more than one Grand Slam event after doing so for the first time at the Australian Open this year. Ruud picked up his second ATP title, and his second on clay, in Geneva last week.Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, ranked No. 46, struggled in a five-set match against Botic van de Zandschulp in the second round. The match lasted 3 hours 42 minutes, with far more errors than winners coming from both players as they attempted to grind out long points and exhaust each other. It will be a challenge for Fokina, 21, to recover in time.Here are a few more matches to keep an eye on.Aryna Sabalenka vs. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova; Court Simonne-Mathieu, 5 a.m.Pablo Carreño Busta vs. Steve Johnson; Court Simonne-Mathieu, 10 a.m.Daniil Medvedev vs. Reilly Opelka; Suzanne Lenglen Court, 10 a.m.Paula Badosa vs. Ana Bogdan; Court Simonne-Mathieu, noon. More

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      In Tennis, Tough Decisions as Players Adjust to Shrunken Paydays

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      With less money to be won, many players are working harder than ever, especially those not lucky enough to have million-dollar endorsement portfolios.Lloyd Harris has been on a bit of a roll this year.It’s a good thing, too, because if the 24-year-old from South Africa weren’t, he might be having a hard time breaking even as a professional tennis player these days. Even with his recent success — which includes making the third round of the Australian Open in February, the final of the Dubai Tennis Championships last month, and the second round at the Miami Open last week — his earnings are hardly the windfall they might have been, because prize money in his sport has been substantially downsized during the coronavirus pandemic and expenses are higher than ever.Harris, ranked No. 52 in the world, probably will not be able to go home until November. So he has to support himself on the road and pay for his usual coaching and physiotherapy, expenses that can run into the high six figures for a player of his caliber.“It was definitely tough last year,” Harris said last week after a tight first-round win over Emilio Nava. “This year, with the prize money being so reduced, it can really be a struggle.”Professional tennis may be the most economically top-heavy sport in the world. The best players are fabulously wealthy, in part because of lavish endorsement deals, and any player ranked in the top 30 lives very well.For those ranked between roughly 40th and 70th, a bad few months can cause serious problems. Life for those outside the top 80, and especially outside the top 100, can be precarious.The pandemic has made things more challenging, as cuts in prize money at most tournaments make each win more essential for players fighting for the extra cash that comes with making each successive round.Ann Li of the United States, who is ranked 67th in the world, hustles to earn a living.Rick Rycroft/Associated PressAt the Miami Open, which concludes this weekend, more than 200 players have been vying for $6.7 million. That is among the largest prize purses outside the Grand Slam events and the tour finals, but it is down nearly 60 percent from 2019, when the purse was $16.7 million.Heading into the season, the men’s and women’s tours worked with the players and tournament executives to figure out how to share revenues in an environment where only a fraction of the usual number of tickets can be sold.The professional tours have tried to structure prize payments so that players eliminated in the early rounds can still make a decent wage.In Miami, making the second round yielded $16,000 for a player this year compared with nearly $30,000 in 2019, the previous time the tournament took place. The winners will receive just over $300,000, a healthy payday but down nearly 80 percent from 2019. The tours are helping smaller tournaments avoid deficits by funding prize purses through broadcast rights deals and cash reserves.“It’s obviously a very challenging period of time for everybody,” said Steve Simon, chief executive of the women’s professional tour, the W.T.A. “Our approach was how do we manage this so we have prize money levels in a manner that would support players and make sure our events can operate.”No one needs to take up a collection for players who advance deep into tournaments, but the economics of being a solid professional tennis player can be challenging.Depending on the country where a player lives, roughly 50 percent of income can go to taxes. A decent coach demands $50,000 to $100,000 a year plus travel costs. Fitness training and physiotherapy over an 11-month season can cost an additional tens of thousands of dollars.Danielle Collins, the 27-year-old American ranked 40th in the world, trained with a four-person team before the pandemic — a tennis coach, a hitting partner, a physiotherapist and a fitness coach. With the cuts in prize money, though, Collins is now training largely with her boyfriend, Tom Couch, who is her fitness coach.“We don’t have an organization that pays for coaches, and physios and nutritionists like we would if we were on a team,” she said. “We have financial responsibilities that we are 100 percent committed to. Having to manage through that with the pandemic and ongoing uncertainty and with the prize money reductions, it’s taken a toll.”Danielle Collins, ranked 40th in the world, has had to reduce her support staff.  She says some players may lose money by competing.Geoff Burke/USA Today Sports, via ReutersAlso, travel this year figures to be more expensive, given the restrictions and quarantine rules that can change from week to week and country to country.This month the professional tours will shift to the clay- and grass-court seasons in Europe until mid-July. In typical years, players might return home several times during that period, especially if they lose early in one tournament and have a two-week lag until the start of the next event on their schedules. That might prove difficult this year.“If you can get to Europe, you might just want to stay there,” said Ann Li, a 20-year-old American who recently broke into the top 100.Housing abroad is complicated. When players are eliminated from a tournament, they lose their free lodging until the next tournament starts.And the pandemic presents more than logistical challenges.“We’re always at risk of contracting the virus and being in a two-week lockdown in a city far away from home,” said John Isner, a veteran player from the United States. “To do that in an environment where the money is much less is very risky on our part.”There is little choice but to keep competing. Endorsement contracts are often laden with incentives that require players to enter a minimum number of tournaments and earn rankings points by advancing. Collins said these deals — New Balance and Babolat are her main sponsors — had helped sustain many players during the past year.“For players outside of top 100, they might have opportunities to play, but they are losing money by playing,” she said.Harris had to default his second-round match in Miami. In the coming weeks, he plans to use Dubai as a kind of base camp, because if he returned to his home in South Africa, where the virus has been prevalent, he couldn’t be sure which countries would permit him to enter later.He has won nearly $300,000 in prize money this year, bringing his career total to $1.5 million. That may sound like a lot, but Harris turned professional in 2016. He spent far more than he earned during his first four seasons. He was fortunate that his two sponsors, Lotto and Yonex, remained loyal as he grinded through the lower-tier tournaments.Now, after a busy winter, he is trying to set aside his desire for a break, particularly from the restrictions players must follow while competing.“Most of the guys on tour have been very selective about where they can play,” Harris said.But he is finally winning more than losing at the top level. He is climbing the rankings and making decent money. For better or for worse, after a short break, he plans to play on. More

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      An American Made Week 2 at the Australian Open. He Avoided Djokovic and Nadal.

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Australian OpenWhat to Watch TodayHow to WatchThe Players to KnowFans in Virus LockdownAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyAn American Made Week 2 at the Australian Open. He Avoided Djokovic and Nadal.The next generation of American men are still searching for a big win on a Grand Slam stage against the best players.Mackenzie McDonald was the only American man to make it to the fourth round of the Australian Open.Credit…Andy Brownbill/Associated PressFeb. 14, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETMELBOURNE, Australia — American men had an awfully good start at the Australian Open. They won seven of 10 matches, placing the most male players from the United States in the second round of the tournament since 2017.Then things got real in a hurry.Only Mackenzie McDonald, 25, a former N.C.A.A. champion out of U.C.L.A. who is battling his way back from hamstring tendon surgery, and Taylor Fritz, a big-serving Californian who is 23 and still evolving, survived to Round 3. By late Saturday afternoon, only McDonald remained.The names of the two men responsible for a lot of the American carnage are familiar: Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal. In the span of roughly 55 hours from Wednesday afternoon through Friday night, Djokovic and Nadal dispatched Francis Tiafoe, Michael Mmoh and Fritz.Those wins continued what has become more than a decade of mostly frustrating efforts for American men going up against the game’s so-called Big Three — Djokovic, Nadal and Roger Federer — especially in the Grand Slam tournaments.According to Greg Sharko of the ATP, the master of match records for men’s tennis, the last American to beat Djokovic at a Grand Slam event was Sam Querrey, who bested him in the third round of Wimbledon in 2016. Since then, Djokovic has won 16 straight matches against American men at all tournaments.Nadal’s win over Mmoh was his 10th straight over an American. The last American to beat Nadal was John Isner, the 6-foot-10 serving machine, at the 2017 Laver Cup. Earlier that year, Querrey beat Nadal at a tournament in Acapulco, Mexico. At the time, Nadal had won 16 consecutive matches over Americans, dating to the summer of 2011.Federer has not lost to an American in a Grand Slam tournament in the past 15 years. Andre Agassi beat Federer at the 2001 United States Open, when Federer was 20.There is, of course, little shame in struggling against Djokovic, Nadal and Federer, who skipped the Australian Open to recover from knee surgery. They are the best of the game’s modern era, the winners of 57 Grand Slam singles championships. For years, they mostly lost to one another in the biggest events.But the failure of an American man to register the kind of signature win that can imbue a fledgling career with invaluable confidence is emblematic of the larger struggle. A country that once dominated the sport has struggled for years to find a successor to Andy Roddick, the last American man to win a Grand Slam tournament, at the 2003 U.S. Open, even as American women continue to thrive.Isner, 35, is the lone American in the top 30. In the 1990s, just as tennis was becoming a truly global sport, Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi and Jim Courier were mainstays of the top 10. Canada, which is about one-tenth of the size of the United States, has three men in the top 20. Also, the Australian Open takes place on a hardcourt, the surface that most Americans grow up playing on.“I think I’m more than capable, but it’s a matter of not what I do against Novak but what do you do every day,” Tiafoe, 23, said after he had lost his hard-fought four-set, three-and-a-half-hour battle with Djokovic. “Those matches, losing matches, I don’t think I should.”Fritz came a step closer to beating Djokovic on Friday night, pushing him to five sets as Djokovic struggled through an injury he described as a torn muscle on the right side of his midsection. Fritz appeared to have Djokovic beaten early in the fifth set but fell short as Djokovic began pounding serves and ripping forehands into the corners, as he had early on in the match.An hour after it ended, Fritz remained distraught over too many missed first serves and errors off his forehand. He had taken Djokovic to a tiebreaker in the first set and had then lost seven of the next eight points.“It’s very motivating that we’re so close, but at the same time, we are so far,” Fritz said. “These guys are so good.”And so it was that McDonald, perhaps the most unlikely of all of his countrymen, became the last hope to put an American into the second week of the year’s first Grand Slam. McDonald showed promise three years ago when, not long after leaving U.C.L.A., he made it to the fourth round of Wimbledon, where he lost to Milos Raonic of Canada.Less than a year later, he sustained a torn hamstring tendon while playing doubles at the French Open and underwent surgery. After the operation, he couldn’t leave his apartment for three weeks, and he couldn’t walk for the better part of two months. Slowly, week by week, he began to allow his leg to bear more weight.During the last two years, he has clawed his way back, training at the United States Tennis Association complex in Orlando, Fla., and playing a mix of lower-, middle- and top-tier tournaments. He was No. 192 in the world rankings entering the Australian Open, where he has played nearly flawless tennis and has also been blessed by a friendly draw.His highest-seeded opponent, Borna Coric of Croatia, was the No. 22 seed. After beating Coric in four sets in the second round, McDonald faced Lloyd Harris, 23, of South Africa, who was playing in the third round of a Grand Slam for the first time and is ranked No. 91. It was close early, as McDonald won the first set in a tiebreaker, but not after that. McDonald cranked 12 aces and punished Harris with deep, hard backhands all afternoon.In the fourth round, he gets Daniil Medvedev, the crafty and powerful Russian who is searching for his first Grand Slam title. With Djokovic ailing and Nadal battling a balky but improving lower back, many experts consider Medvedev a favorite to win this tournament.After his win over Harris, McDonald insisted that American players had the raw material to challenge the greats, and everyone else who reaches the later rounds of a Grand Slam event.“The talent is there,” McDonald said. “We just have to stay focused and keep working hard.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More