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    An Opportunity at Paris Masters After a Taxing Tennis Season

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    Several players have broken through at the Paris Masters recently to win their first top-tier title. A well-rested Novak Djokovic may stifle that trend this year.It should come as no surprise that tennis’s Big Three — Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer — have dominated the Masters 1000 tournaments with nearly the same record-setting thoroughness as they have the Grand Slams. They’ve won a combined 103 of these top-tier tournaments; throw in Andy Murray and the title tally reaches 117.The Big Three won all but one Indian Wells crown from 2004 through 2017 and, with Murray, 12 of 15 Miami Open championships through 2019. Nadal won 10 times in Rome and 11 in Monte Carlo, with Djokovic winning a combined eight times at those two tournaments. The list goes on, with these legends typically filling a final’s other slot in most years, too.But there’s one slight weakness: the Rolex Paris Masters, which begins Monday. Djokovic has won it six times. But Federer, now retired, won it only once. Murray has won once, and Nadal has reached onlyone final.Last year, Holger Rune, then 19, won his first Masters 1000 in Paris, joining a list of surprising winners that since 2010 includes Robin Soderling, David Ferrer, Jack Sock and Karen Khachanov, none of whom ever won other Masters 1000 singles titles. (Three others — Denis Shapovalov, Filip Krajinovic and Jerzy Janowicz — reached their only Masters 1000 finals here.)Novak Djokovic has won the Paris Masters six times.Julian Finney/Getty ImagesSeveral factors make Paris different, including that it’s the last big tournament of the year. “People are tired,” said Brad Gilbert, an ESPN analyst and former pro. “That brings a lot of unpredictability.”Vedran Martic, Khachanov’s coach, noted that Khachanov was just 22 when he won, explaining that it’s easier for younger (and lower-ranked) players to find success after a long, grinding season. They have not been playing as deep into tournaments week after week as top-ranked players have, which gives them fresher legs. (Older players, he added, may also be more likely to have wives and children eager for their brief off-season to begin.)Craig Boynton, who coaches the world No. 11, Hubert Hurkacz, said the court surface in Paris kept the ball from bouncing high, making it tougher for players to set up shots and win quick points. “That is taxing mentally and on the legs,” he said, emphasizing that the fatigue factor in Paris is typically more mental than physical.“Attitude is most important at this time,” Boynton said. “In the locker room, people say, ‘Who’s crispy?’, meaning ‘Who’s burned out?’” Guys can get to Paris super crispy thinking about their vacation and want to get it over with and move on.”Young players feeling good in the fall can gain confidence and get on a roll, as Rune did last year, Gilbert said. “If you get hot, that’s a good tournament to capitalize on.”Martic agreed to an extent, saying that in 2018 Khachanov had just won in Moscow and was in a good groove. But he added, “It’s difficult to point to one reason: He also plays well indoors and likes Paris and the crowds and atmosphere there.”The calendar matters in other ways, too. Federer withdrew from the Paris Masters or skipped it four times in the 2010s, partly because his hometown tournament in Basel, Switzerland, immediately precedes it. He not only won Basel seven times in that decade (and 10 total), reaching the final two other times, but also devoted extra energy to supporting the event.More significant, Boynton said, is that on the heels of Paris is the ATP Finals for the top eight players. That’s even more prestigious than a Masters 1000. Three of those four times Federer bowed out of Paris, he played in the Finals; Nadal played the Finals four times after either skipping Paris or withdrawing mid-tournament because of injury.Gilbert said that if a strong performance at the Paris Masters could send a player into the ATP Finals, however, “that’s a great motivator.” And, he added, money matters, too, pointing to a new wrinkle this year that will reduce crispiness.The ATP will distribute $20 million among the top 30 players with the most rankings points accrued from Masters 1000 tournaments and ATP Finals. “That’s a significant amount of money, and my guess is that everyone close to the bonus pool will be up for a real battle,” he said.However, any opportunity to break through comes with a Novak-size caveat: Djokovic, the most successful of the Big Three at this level, has reached the finals in seven of his past eight visits.This year, he will be well rested. So, despite prior unpredictability and the factors favoring youth, the odds remain strong that an older man will be playing on the last day in Paris. More

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      Federer, Even in Defeat, Gets Fitting End to Storied Career

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      The last match of Roger Federer’s 24-year professional career was about to begin, and Andy Murray, one of his rivals turned teammates at this Laver Cup in London, kept his advice short and sweet.“Enjoy it,” Murray said.Federer, 41, took that to heart on Friday night: acknowledging the roars and support of the sellout crowd in the O2 Arena; smiling often and cracking jokes with his doubles partner Rafael Nadal as they lost to Frances Tiafoe and Jack Sock, 4-6, 7-6 (2), (11-9). The decider after the teams split sets was a 10-point tiebreaker rather than a third set.His Final Bow! 😭 @rogerfederer plays the final match of his career with Nadal and fought hard, but ultimately Team World wins, 4-6, 7-6, 11-9.#LaverCup pic.twitter.com/CQrAVfr7cu— Tennis Channel (@TennisChannel) September 23, 2022
      The tone, as so often with Federer, seemed just right, and there were of course tears when it was over from a champion who has so often given free rein to his emotions — in victory or defeat — after keeping them tightly under wraps with the ball in play. What underscored the special circumstances on Friday were the emotions that others were feeling: the thousands in the arena, including Federer’s family and friends, and perhaps most poignantly, Nadal, a much less lachrymose champion who appeared every bit as inconsolable as his friend and doubles partner as the tears streamed down his face.“A lot of years, sharing a lot of things together,” Nadal said. “When Roger leaves the tour, an important part of my life is leaving, too.”But Federer made it clear that he had received what he had hoped for on Friday, even in defeat.“It’s been a wonderful day,” Federer said. “I told the guys I’m happy, I’m not sad. I enjoyed tying my shoes one more time. Everything was the last time.”With a suspect right knee, he could have ended his great career in many a manner and many a venue, but he chose to emphasize the collective: forgoing an individual tour event like Wimbledon or his home city stop in Basel, Switzerland, and opting instead for this team event partly of his own creation.“I didn’t want it to feel lonely out there,” Federer said. “I always felt I was a team player at heart.”James Hill for The New York TimesJames Hill for The New York TimesHe could have tried one more singles match. Instead, he chose to play doubles with Nadal, settling on the opening night of this three-day event to avoid stealing too much thunder from the Laver Cup’s homestretch.“It does feel like a celebration. It’s exactly what I wanted at the end, exactly what I hoped for,” he said, wiping tears away in his post-match interview with the crowd applauding him supportively to help him through it.The gallery in London included his wife, Mirka, and four children and his parents, Robert and Lynette, as well as members past and present of his support team: from former No. 1 Stefan Edberg to his current coaches Severin Lüthi and Ivan Ljubicic.Roger Federer’s Farewell to Professional TennisThe Swiss tennis player leaves the game with one of the greatest competitive records in history.An Appraisal: “He has, figuratively and literally, re-embodied men’s tennis, and for the first time in years, the game’s future is unpredictable,” the author David Foster Wallace wrote of Roger Federer in 2006.A Poignant Send-Off: Wimbledon may have been more fitting. But the Laver Cup, which Federer helped create, will offer a sensible final act for one of the greatest players of this era.Two Great Rivals: When players retire from individual sports like tennis, their rivalries go with them. Here is a look at some of the best matches that pitted Roger Federer against Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.Tennis After Federer: The Swiss player, along with Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic, helped define a remarkably durable period in men’s tennis history. Following behind is a new generation of hungry players, ready to muscle their way into the breach.“She could have stopped me a long time ago, but she didn’t,” Federer said of Mirka, a former tour player whom he has long called “my rock.”Mirka Federer, like Federer’s fitness trainer Pierre Paganini, has been instrumental in Federer pushing the boundaries of enduring tennis excellence and playing, like Serena Williams, another departing megastar, across four decades.But the strong emotions on Friday were not restricted to the grand setting and the fanfare, to the series of standing ovations and Federer banners that read, “Forever our No. 1,” to the extended, tender embrace between Federer and Lüthi shortly before Federer took the court.The tennis turned out to be diverting, too, which was no guarantee considering that Federer had not played a public match of any kind in the nearly 15 months since he slumped out of Wimbledon in 2021 with a straight-set defeat in the quarterfinals to Hubert Hurkacz, which included a 6-0 final set.Unable to fully recover from his latest knee surgery, he said he was uncertain even a few weeks ago that he would be able to play at all. A ceremonial adieu on Friday night against the Team World doubles team of Sock and Tiafoe would have been understandable, but Federer managed rather more than that. The first ball he struck in the match was a winner: a reflex forehand volley. And though he mistimed a groundstroke or two and looked uncharacteristically slow off the mark when it came time to sprint for a short ball, he certainly gave the public quite a bit of what they paid from far and wide for.James Hill for The New York TimesKin Cheung/Associated Press“Playing doubles is more difficult than singles, because you don’t always get into a rhythm, but he’s done very well,” said Martina Navratilova, the tennis great who retired at 49 as a doubles specialist and was calling the farewell match for Tennis Channel. “It’s easier to come back when you have such good technique, and there’s not really anything to go wrong.”There has been a grace and purity to Federer’s game since he joined the tour in the late 1990s and was still losing his temper and serve on a regular basis.But he soon solved his anger management issues and kicked into a new gear: one that no rival could match consistently until Nadal emerged as an unstoppable force on clay and a major threat on every other surface, as well. Djokovic joined the lead pack in earnest in the 2010s and was unquestionably the player of that decade, turning men’s tennis into a Big Three with a strong supporting cast that included Murray and Stan Wawrinka, who each won three major singles titles.Federer finished with 20, third best in this golden age behind Nadal’s 22 and Djokovic’s 21.It was affirming to see them all sharing slaps on the back and tactical tips on Friday night as part of Team Europe.The Big Three have shared many a locker room and board room through the decades, but this was the first time they had all been teammates. The edge was off for a night, which turned into a late night with the match finishing at 12:26 a.m., even if the comparing and contrasting will continue for many years.Nadal has the Grand Slam title lead for now, and Djokovic looks like he has total weeks at No. 1 wrapped up for good with 373, well ahead of Federer’s 310. But Federer still has his strongholds. He finished with 103 tour singles titles, second only to Jimmy Connors’s 109 in the Open era for men. Federer also finished with eight Wimbledon singles titles, the all-time men’s record. His total of six year-end championships is another record, and two of those ATP Finals, fittingly, were won in the O2 Arena.James Hill for The New York TimesLewis Storey/Getty Images For Laver CupFederer grew up in Basel playing frequently indoors, often on red clay under temporary inflated bubbles in the wintertime. He is an attacking player at heart, most at home tight to the baseline and striking the ball remarkably early off the bounce. Andre Agassi once summed up the experience of facing Federer by explaining that there was no “safe haven”: no place to place a shot where danger did not lurk.That concept still made sense on Friday night, even after Federer had been out of action for more than a year and even if his 41 years and aching knees clearly limit his movement. He amiably mocked his new slowness afoot on the final changeover as he spoke with his teammates between sips of water after he had failed to track down a forehand to convert his and Nadal’s first and only match point during the closing tiebreaker.But the shotmaking was still there, even if the feathery footwork was not. Down the stretch, he hit big forehand returns, touch volleys and even a trademark loose-armed ace up the T. He also spun his racket before returning, blew on the fingers of his right hand and hopped after winners with delight and closure, albeit not quite as high as in his heyday.All that was missing was a victory, but then there have been so many of those through the years. And if you choose to search for symbolism, it was not entirely off key for Federer to go out in defeat.He has been a big winner, no doubt, capable of dominating the game from 2004 to 2007 and roaring back for a renaissance in 2017 and 2018. But he has also had to absorb some crushing defeats on the game’s grandest stages, which has certainly contributed to making him a more relatable champion.James Hill for The New York TimesAnd yet Friday was not a night for the score line, but for the bottom line, and Sock did as good a job as anyone at articulating it as he embraced Federer at the net.“Appreciate you,” Sock said, just before they parted ways and Federer turned left and headed toward the rest of his life.The words were not what spoke most eloquently, however. The real power was in the expressions: above all in the eyes of Nadal. If a man’s archrival will miss him that much, how should the rest of us feel?Andrew Das More

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      Meet Frances Tiafoe and Jack Sock

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      Here’s a 22nd century tennis trivia question: “Who was Roger Federer’s last opponent?”Trick answer. There were two: Jack Sock and Frances Tiafoe.Sock and Tiafoe, both Americans, are definitely the supporting actors in Friday night’s Federer-centric farewell production. But they pose a real threat to Federer going out on a high note.Sock, in particular, has played a lot more doubles in recent years than Federer or his superstar partner, Rafael Nadal, who have long focused almost exclusively on singles.Sock, 29, has a glittering 205-96 career record in doubles and has been ranked as high as No. 2 in the world. He recently won the title in Washington, D.C., with partner Nick Kyrgios and just helped the United States Davis Cup team advance to the quarterfinals by partnering with Rajeev Ram to win two crucial matches.Federer and Nadal have both won gold medals at the Olympics in men’s doubles. Sock’s gold came in mixed doubles in 2016 with Bethanie Mattek-Sands. But unlike Federer or Nadal, Sock has won Grand Slam doubles titles: three in men’s doubles and one in mixed doubles.Sock has a big serve, an imposing forehand with an extreme grip and fabulous touch and reflexes at the net. Despite his solid frame and sometimes sleepy gaze, he also is very quick, which means that he and the speedy Tiafoe will be able to close a lot of gaps in a hurry tonight against Federer and Nadal.But though Tiafoe, 24, just broke through to reach the semifinals in singles this month at the U.S. Open, he could be the weak link in this match. He has yet to win a doubles title on tour and has a losing career record of 23-39.Tiafoe, an extrovert with a flashy game, does like a big occasion and an electric crowd, however, as he proved again in New York this year. He certainly seemed relaxed in the run-up.“I’m just excited to play two up-and-comers tomorrow,” Tiafoe joked on Thursday.Sock already has played those up-and-comers in doubles at the Laver Cup, losing with partner Sam Querrey in 2017 to Federer and Nadal in their first-ever official match together.For Tiafoe, given the circumstances, it will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. More

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      Doubles Tennis Adds Variety to Wimbledon

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      Doubles takes a back seat to the singles game on both tours, but famous players like Coco Gauff revel in the variety, pace and joy of tennis’s hidden gem.WIMBLEDON, England — Coco Gauff toed the line to serve, eyes focused, shoulders back, ready to go. It was a moment of peril in her semifinal mixed doubles match here on Wednesday. Break point. One game all, third set.Gauff aimed a tight-spinning serve toward Matthew Ebden, her male opponent, and the point was on: a perfect display of what makes Gauff great at age 18, and what makes doubles an enduring favorite for Wimbledon fans.Her teammate, Jack Sock, soon entered the mix, handling a difficult volley. Then Gauff poleaxed a forehand at her female opponent, Samantha Stosur. From there, tennis beauty. Back-to-back moonshot lobs; spinners; touch; power; all of the geometry on Court No. 3 explored, and Gauff holding more than her own.The rally finally ended after 24 shots, as the crowd swayed and swooned and shouted to the cloud dappled sky and one of Sock’s spinning forehands finally coaxed a miss.As I watched from the stands, it felt like Gauff was underlining a message she told me the day before.“I love doubles,” she said. She smiled and paused for a moment. “It’s a different kind of game, all the reflexes, and unorthodox shots, the touchy-feely shots, the half volleys.”“It’s a joy to play,” she added.If your only exposure to tennis’s Grand Slam events is through television or even most media reports, you might think singles is all that matters. It breathes in nearly all of the oxygen. We know the big names, their strokes, their on-court proclivities, their off-court foibles. We celebrate the upstarts who always seem to march to new heights.But with the advent of more powerful rackets and strings, singles is now invariably a war of pounding groundstrokes, even here at Wimbledon, once the province of the serve and volley. Doubles remains tennis’s hidden gem, the last outpost of variety.Players like Gauff, famed for her singles play but already a doubles runner-up in two Grand Slams, find doubles a relief from tripwire pressure that comes with playing alone. And fans, once they get hooked, never seem to get enough of watching four professionals jam onto a court and produce set after set of novel angles and winners crafted with a pickpocket’s deft touch.There’s a paradox, though. Television shows doubles much less often and prominently. The prize money is lower for doubles than for singles (and even less for mixed doubles than for men’s and women’s doubles). I concede, reporters rarely write about it. So begins a feedback loop: Without more exposure, this unique part of professional tennis remains niche. So long as it is niche, it gets less attention.Unless it’s a final or a matchup featuring the biggest of names — Venus or Serena Williams —Grand Slam doubles remains relegated to the back courts.Rajeev Ram admitted that the doubles game tends to operate “in the shadows” of professional tennis. Ever heard of him? Unless you’re an ardent fan of tennis, probably not. The 38-year-old American is the world’s No. 2-ranked men’s doubles player, but can walk the grounds of Wimbledon without being noticed. Alongside his partner, Joe Salisbury, he made it to the men’s doubles semifinals here on Wednesday with a five-set win over Nicolas Mahut and Édouard Roger-Vasselin.Ram uses his pterodactyl wingspan and Sampras-ian serve to dominate matches and win over crowds. Once they watch doubles, Ram said, “the fans really take to it.”Rajeev Ram, right, said that the doubles game tends to operate “in the shadows” of professional tennis.Clive Brunskill/Getty ImagesOver the past few days, I spent a lot of time on the backcourts doing just that. I hung out with spectators and heard their observations. Many told stories of strolling the grounds, unsure what they’d find, only to happen upon a doubles star like Nikola Mektic, a Croatian doubles maestro whom I saw face down an 80 miles per hour tennis ball ripped at his gut only to send back a drop shot that fell to the grass like a marshmallow.“It’s sort of like a good dessert after the main dish,” one fan I spoke to said of the doubles draw. “The main dish is singles. I also like cake.”Other spectators raved to me that mixed doubles — an event typically only played at majors — offers what in elite sports remains a novelty: men and women competing side-by-side on the same field of play.Wimbledon spectators also seemed drawn to the joy that Gauff mentioned. During singles matches, players are usually tighter than tripwire. Doubles offers a relief that even a spectator can pick up on.“I’m not used to laughing much on the court,” Gauff said. She paused for a moment, smiled, then continued. “I do in doubles. I definitely think I loosen up and relax a bit more. So I’m going to try to use that all the time.”Gauff, who lost her third-round singles match to Amanda Anisimova, is one of the few famous players who gives doubles its due, reveling in a corner of tennis that allows her to hit new shots “in all sorts of different and unusual ways.”She hones her poise in singles and develops new shots and the flexibility to make them in doubles, taking the long view, believing the combination will round out her game to the point where she can finally lift a trophy at a Slam.After reaching her first Grand Slam singles finals at the French Open last month, Gauff was determined to keep playing both singles and doubles at majors (she also reached the women’s doubles finals at Roland Garros, playing alongside Jessica Pegula). There was a problem: She needed a new partner for Wimbledon. Gauff found one the new-fashioned way, starting her search on social media.“Who wants to play mixed at Wimby?” she posted to her Twitter account on June 15.The ask hardly went unnoticed by Gauff’s 250,000 followers. Dozens wanted in. Even Mikaela Shiffrin, the World Cup champion skier, sent an emoji saying she was up for it. Gauff noticed one reply in particular: “We’d be a decent team,” posted Sock, a four-time Grand Slam doubles winner.Gauff ended up taking a while to mull Sock’s offer. What if she played poorly and embarrassed herself with a male player of such prowess? “I almost said no to him,” she said. Finally, “I was like, ‘get out of your head, play with Jack!’”The early results proved it a wise decision. Gauff and Sock did not drop a set in their first three matches. Then came Wednesday’s semifinal against the veteran Australian pairing of Ebden and Stosur.She played with savvy, giving no quarter, serving and returning well, and hitting volleys with firm confidence as the third set marched on, pressure mounting. Two games apiece. Three games. Four.But with Gauff serving to go up, 6-5, it was Sock who dumped an easy volley into the net. Then another. Stosur and Ebden took advantage, breaking serve, edging ahead. They closed out the match quickly, 6-3, 5-7, 7-5.Gauff left the court with a determined look, comforted by a crowd that stood to loudly applaud, a thank you to both teams for a match of suspense and entertainment. More