Moscow, Stockholm and Vienna

Querrey wins Tiburon. 3 straight challenger wins demonstrating that either the U.S. challengers were tailor made for Querrey or proving that Querrey avoided the Asian circuit all-together to remain in the top 50, get his confidence in order and prepare for Australia. Here’s Norcaltennisczar Paul on why Querrey did it and now is #40 in the world.

“I was (going to be) in the qualifying of Tokyo and Shanghai, not in the main draw,” said Querrey, who lives in Las Vegas. “I don’t have a coach right now. David Nainkin and I (parted) ways earlier in the year. I didn’t want to go all the way over there by myself.
“I just knew that wasn’t going to be the right decision for me. I’m comfortable here, there are some USTA coaches here, I’ve got family and friends here, and it just seemed like a better fit for me.”
Players ranked 11 to 50 can enter a Challenger, comparable to Triple A in baseball, only via a wild card, said USTA supervisor Keith Crossland. Top-10 players are prohibited from entering Challengers, he added.”

Few interesting things to note here as the tour goes indoors. There used to be a lot of great indoor events in US, there still is one with the Memphis event I believe being indoors. But how about Philadelphia and I believe San Francisco used to have an indoor event in the old Cow Palace. Of course, there was San Jose for so long. It’s a crying shame there is only one premier indoor event in the US now.

Scoop, I don’t know if you ever attended on a press pass the Masters event at the Garden, but it was great. To have such big game tennis being played in an iconic arena like MSG. I remember meeting a very fetching woman reporter at one, taking her to the Dylan show at the Beacon a couple of nights later and sleeping with her. That was awesome.

I remember watching Johnny Mac playing Chang in a very close match I think Mac lost. Then there was a match I’ll never forget, in the finals one year, where I believe Becker won the match against Lendl on a net cord that rolled over the net in a tight 3rd or possibly 5th set.

These events overseas sometimes feel like they’re being played underwater. I had that feeling watching the Stockholm Open today where amazingly, Tomic had to struggle to beat a Patrik Rosenholm, a Swede wildcard ranked No. 371 and 25 yrs old. The arena they played in is dark and there were few fans in the stands so you get the feeling the match is being played underwater.

Good article in the Times today about Soderling who is the tournament director this year in Stockholm. The former two-time French Open finalist said he tried to make a comeback this year at 30, and he said his body just couldn’t stand the strain. This is what makes me so suspicious about tennis players and possible PED use. Give me one name of another athlete who has to retire at 27 because of something other than a major injury? Soderling had mono apparently, and three years later he still can’t come back!!? What kind of superpower strain of mono is that?

Sody was one of those players who basically came out of nowhere to becoming a slam finalist and great player. I remember Spadea saying the guy was like No. 50 and had mashed potatoes for brains and suddenly he’s a world beater. Makes no sense. Only in tennis and maybe baseball with a guy like David Ortiz.

Finally, anyone know anything about the Challenger played in Charlottesville, Va. later this month? I’ve heard Charlottesville is the best tennis city in the States and I was thinking of maybe shooting down there and hanging for a few days.

Personally I think it’s important to look at the Indore Challenger in India to see the dangers of stocking your challenger draw with your own country’s players. About 2/3rd of the draw is from India and if you win it you get the same points at Tiburon. This draw was “designed” for the home team. It’s fair to say the same thing about the San Juan, Argentina challenger, where upwards of 50% of the draw is from Argentina.

In women’s tennis I see Lisicki handled Hantichova again! Poor Hantuchova. I see Cornet also keeps winning (and in very long matches) even though she’s probably on a bad surface for her. It’s been impressive to see Cornet go for it again this year.

Thiem & Gulbis played different tournaments in the past. It’s nothing new. Last year Domi played Vienna & Ernests played Stockholm.

They are still besties:

https://twitter.com/jessica4stein/status/518921956096110592

Better to win like soderling and retire . Sampras did that but probably had another season in him. Hingis too.

Fish isnt coming back. That was the worst retirement in pro tennis history. I guess Fish had control here because of his condition but no press conference, no nothing. Just an annual whats going on with Fish token press interview that expresses non commitment. I supposs Roddick interest in double was a way to give Fish a standing ovation or two before leaving his playing days behind for good.

Maybe Fish will be back as Coach Fish. If Blake is chosen for a big usta role he will need some help .

I believe the Charlottesville tournament is played at the Boare’s Head Inn about a mile from the downtown, UVA now owns or co owns the resort, its very nice, I think UVA plays their indoor matches there and they have plenty of outdoor har tru courts as well (indoor hard courts)–when is it?

Charlottesville tourney has Groth as No. 1 seed. We’ve got to go Scoop. I’ll pick you up Monday morning, we drive down to Charlottesville and find some flea bag motel to stay in. We go to the matches. We play lots of tennis. We bring our bikes and do some cycling. We eat at Chilis and Hardees and we hang with Groth and Harry.

You good? I’ll pick up Monday morning Oct. 27?

Actually, couldn’t give a hoot about match fixing. It always seems to be some inconsequential match that occurs in some out of the way tournament. Now do I care if Braccali or Starace drops a first round match to someone at Newport? Pretty much not in the least. Look these guys are corrupt and they’re going to smear their whole careers by doing something like this. I don’t believe there are too many players doing this. Maybe I’m naïve but I just don’t think so. It’s like Odesnik now. How fun can it be for him playing on the tour even as he’s made a nice little comeback.

Scoop, let me know about Charlottesville. I’d like to check it out. But I’d have to drive down there Monday and come back Thursday so really only two full days of watching tennis and hanging out. Airplane flight to D.C. is also possible. Only $185 then we could rent car and drive to Va.

For the record i am anti match fixing. It is far worse than a player throwing in the towel during a match because it is petty and stupid. A little surprised on the nonchalance here , i guess you are saying losers are losers . As for Odesnik what he did was awful, but i begrudgingly admit he has like Al Canas brought his level back. Sometimes you have to come back and show yourself for yourself.

Davydenko, his wife and brother didnt turn over their phone records and kept appealing to not have to do so, blocking key evidence of investigation. I guess bets were placed by phone. Accounts linked to russia would have made 7.5 milion dollars but the trades were cancelled by the betting agency, meaning no one made money off this random bet. Under cell phone privacy law records were withheld and destroyed, never analyzed. So in a way yes Davydenko was caught but not sure for what, seems like protecting his brother who i guess made a living off atp star sibling.

It is an investigation where they were suspected and very likely did the crime but were saved by privacy law in europe and a successful effort to postpone trials until records destroyed. Embarassing and rightfully so.

Davydenko likely did not know anything about the betting, only that he’d probably pull out of his Poland match and confided that to his team. Maybe they saw a once in a life opportunity to make a lot of money. My hunch is that he asked his wife and brother and probably decided to protect one of them (or both of them) or someone else they know. That’s why the records for them – their cell phone records – were off limits, while Daveydenko’s records were normal.

Could be he didnt want to involve them, but I think if you have nothing to hide you show what you know, or don’t know. Like steroids – sure, we trust you play without taking steroids. Just in case and for the integrity of the sport, let’s test for steroids.

A good article is here: ESPN, February 7, 2008, title:
“Evidence shows something terribly corrupt in infamous match”

“Months after highly unusual betting patterns set off a red flag in the infamous Nikolay Davydenko-Martin Vassallo Arguello match, the tennis world has yet to recover. Despite the ATP’s attempts to connect the dots, it might have to concede the outcome might never be known.”
By John Barr and William Weinbaum | Special to ESPN.com

Too bad the incident overshadowed Davydenko’s solid play. Remains one of better players probably just below Berdych , Ferrer Tsonga etc.

Andrew,

If the highest Sock can get is to win a few tournaments and get to the semis of a slam than he’s no better than, say, a Robby Ginepri, who won 3 titles in his career and reached one slam semis. Odd thing about Ginepri, he only won 31 slam matches and lost 36. He won 5 matches in that one US Open, so he only won 26 matches in all the other slams he played.

I would think if Sock only reaches the heights of Ginepri, while certainly okay, it would be a disappointment.

Dan, I can only compare Sock today with Sock last year and as far as I can tell he’s taken sone steps. His slam performance and in general his Masters performance is weak (to be kind; we could use other words that rhyme with pit, hit, knit, etc). I dont want to offend the other commenters on the board who prefer to discuss anything but the improvement or bottomless black hole for the u.s. current and next generation players . I think it is a good sign in best of three set tournaments that players like sock, johnson are playing consistently and winning at least a round or two against better players. That is the bar for being on the atp full time .

Hey at least i am not singing the praises of smyczek this week, who i still believe is a player that deserves credit and air time. I user to watch a lot of players from bryan shelton to christian bergstrom but like i said i doubt anyone wants to talk shop about the stefano pescolido indoor win over becker way back when. My sense on the board is that everyone preferd the debates on the big players and guys like jaziri or copil just dont make the cut in the fans minds.

Sock is a lone wolf/strange bird etc. Some of it is chockedup to youth. The guy will make bad decisions now he will regret later (like not making dimitrov earn important points). maybe in a few years he will wish he had those points back, or maybe because he gives up so often he will find his ranking slide back down to the triple digits.

Anyways my opinion of him is the same. When he is zoned in he competes well and is worth watching. His backhand is frighteningly bad and worse than Roddick before Roddick fixed it up to make it a rally shot. Sock is showing more aptitude for getting through matches he should win, which should keep his ranking intact. Seems to play the game for good reasons. On the other hand you have the harder working steve johnson, who doesnt have the luxury sock has to give away points. So to me it is a good story al things considered. Headline could be AMERICAN PLAYERS NOT NAMED QUISNER WINNING ROUNDS AT ATP TOURNAMENTS .

In the more important news BautistaAgut beat Gulbis. Now BautistaAgut to me is hard to watch. Like Sock of the no backhand the Bautista short game isnt there but he is vocal and tough. He will probably get Cilic in the Moscow final. Defending champ Dimitrov isnt in moscow because he is in sweden where he gets berdych in berds second straight indoor final.

Nice to see Dimitrov decide defending tournaments is for novices.

In wta news lucy safarova lost to a romanian! Who geta pavly..chenkova in the final of the other side of kremlin cup in moscow. Interesting safarova and berdych keep playing well post the break. Seems kvitova safarova and czech ladies are better off wihout their countrymen: )