Much ado about...logic

US OPEN
In the end, Favorites > Outsiders

It’s so open, they said. It’s an “anyone can take it now” situation because, really, “everybody can win on Tour now; that’s saying so much about the depth,” they said. Some were ready for a tennis world led by outsiders the moment, in order of defeat, Carlos Alcaraz, Novak Djokovic, Iga Swiatek and Elena Rybakina were out of these draws. And then Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka basically said, sorry but LOL.

American players pushed the flag all they could and came close, but in the end, they remained at a good distance and so lost. Taylor Fritz and Jessica Pegula, as well as Frances Tiafoe and Emma Navarro, helped the US Open get a massive amount of traction in NYC despite the defeats of some of the biggest names in the game.

But whatever the narratives about how it was going to be such a close call in that draw, Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka bagged those titles. Australian Open style. Outsiders got back to earth: there’s been no opening for the trophy, just for the n°2 spots. Sinner and Sabalenka winning proves one thing: that Tour isn’t open if you’re out of the Top 5 or even the Top 3. Fritz was #12 before the US Open, and Pegula was #6; now they’re 7 and 3, so we’ll see 1) if they can stay there or even climb more before the end of the year and 2) If they’re going to enter the super VIP club able to secure the last rounds of the Majors regularly.

Sabalenka keeps improving

Honestly, Pegula - who was obviously “annoyed” she lost - did much better than I thought she would against Sabalenka in her first Grand Slam final. She fought hard, kept coming back, and made Sabalenka work for it. Fritz, who said he was upset with how he lost, did pretty much what I thought he would against Sinner, who was at home against a player hitting a flat ball like him but with less power and wouldn’t throw him off his tempo or suddenly change patterns much. Sinner also has so much more experience than Fritz in these matches now: he nearly had this title in the bag just because of how calm he was out there. If it wasn’t enough, Fritz had spent so much energy to get there that he lacked the intensity and the “PlayStation-like mode” that can sometimes break the Italian.

Sabalenka, beaten by Coco Gauff in the final here last year, won her first US Open title, her second Grand Slam title of the year after Melbourne, and her third overall. Long gone are the days when her right shoulder seemed to be derailing her year after Roland-Garros. She dedicated her victory to her father, explaining how his death was still a major motivation for her to win. Since she has understood how to control her power, Sabalenka has kept improving: proof again that it’s never too late to change. Iga Swiatek is now feeling Sabalenka breathing on her neck in the ranking, which should give us thrilling suspense through the end of the season.

Sinner is way tougher than people might have thought

As for Sinner, he showed what he’s been showing since last March, but we didn’t know: he can endure a lot of things off the court without losing it on the court. The double positive test had no big effect on his results, and since the secret had been out, he showed zero signs of being distracted. He won Cincinnati, got taken into a doping scandal, got out of it, and won the US Open. He was the overwhelming favorite to do so after Alcaraz and Djokovic lost, and so he did. So long for a Tour hoping that there will be more space with the new generation: you guys are about to sign a 10-year lease of Sinner-Alcaraz! However, let’s see how their heads and bodies will deal with the domination.

Sinner said he was proud of that second Grand Slam title after all that happened and got emotional when dedicating his US Open title to his aunt battling illness. As we said, the kid is much tougher than many might have thought a few years ago. I have already read tennis people calling him Djokovic 2.0 because of how fine-tuned his game is and how little emotion he shows in the biggest matches. Yet, Sinner has reached that level at just 23. Yet, Djokovic has been doing it for, what, 15 years. Let’s circle back later! In the meantime, Sinner became the first Italian man to win the US Open and only the fourth man to do the Australian Open - US Open double in the same year since 1988. Side note: I had missed the Sinner-Seal BFF situation!

DOUBLES:

• Lyudmila Kichenok could have gotten married during the second week of the US Open, on the day of the semi-finals. Or she could have won a Grand Slam title with Jelena Ostapenko. She picked the trophy. Nobody panics: no relationship has been broken! She’s engaged to Jelena Ostapenko’s coach, Stas Kumarsky, so he was okay with the delay in the wedding. Ostapenko and Kichenok got the best of Kristina Mladenovic and Zhang Shuai in the final (6-4, 6-3), not losing a set on the way to this first Major (they lost in the final of the Australian Open this year).
  

• They were not going to be denied this time! After losing the Wimbledon final despite three match points (and having to stand there while Harri Heliövaara was enjoying a contender for the GOAT celebration title), Australians Max Purcell and Jordan Thompson clinched the US Open title against Germans Kevin Krawietz and Tim Puetz (6-4, 7-6(4)).

Lastly, the Guardian made a very nice selection of the best pictures from the US Open.

QUESTION OF THE DAY 
Do you get it?

You were 54,55% to think that Iga Swiatek’s Grand Slam season has been disappointing, but it wasn’t harming her overall status.

Now, if you need a refresher to understand why I’m asking you the question below, please scroll down to find out what happened again.

SOME BREAK POINTS… 
Murray cheats on tennis; Kyrgios won’t change

• Andy Murray’s back thought it was now off the hook. Well, that spine didn’t even have the time to say hold my cuppa! I must admit that I laughed and had a “you’ve gotta be kidding me” moment when I read that Sir Andrew had accepted an invitation to the BMW PGA Championship Pro-Am at Wentworth. And now I’m just wondering how long it’s gonna take him and Rafael Nadal to start competing with each other on the golf course.
  
  For those who might be too young to remember, these two good friends used to be fierce competitors in anything video game-related. If you add that both Novak Djokovic (who entered the All-Star Celebrity match at the Ryder Cup last year) and Roger Federer are also playing golf, it’s possible that one day, our Big 4 will be reunited on a grass surface that won’t be Wimbledon.
  
  In a talk with BBC Radio 4, Murray also revealed how surprised he’s been not to miss playing tennis that much. "Since I've stopped, I feel really free and have got lots of time to do whatever it is I want. I can dedicate time to my children and have free time to play golf or go to the gym on my own terms. It is really nice and I didn't expect that. I was expecting to find retirement hard and be missing tennis a lot and wanting to get back on the tennis court on tour. So far it has been the complete opposite to what I was thinking." In the interview, Murray also talked about the guilt he was starting to feel leaving his children to be on Tour, but also the issues he had when home to make sure he wasn’t spending too much time enjoying his life instead of getting ready for the next match. He also expressed how lonely he felt sometimes in the sport, even when at the top. As usual, a very good chat.
  

• Emma Navarro and Katerina Siniakova didn’t win the US Open, but both still ended with a pretty nice milestone. Navarro is entering the Top 10 for the first time in her career after reaching the US Open semi-finals, while Siniakova (winner at Roland-Garros and Wimbledon, Olympic champion, US Open semi-finalist) is back on the doubles throne after already finishing the season as World No.1 in 2018 and 2021.
  

• What to even say again about Nick Kyrgios? How many times? Seriously, how many times? Nick Kyrgios has sparked outrage - again - after making a misogynistic comment - again, unfortunately paging Donna Vekic - about Anna Kalinskaya, this time, on social media. Kalinskaya, his ex-girlfriend who is signed by the same agency as he is (!!), is now dating Jannik Sinner. ESPN still let Kyrgios be on air to comment on… the US Open women’s final. And so ESPN is logically getting dragged as much as Kyrgios. Other people who are also sent into this mess are Naomi Osaka and Caroline Garcia. Why? Because Osaka’s and Stuart Duguid’s agency Evolve has signed Kyrgios (and so Kalinskaya), and because Garcia invited him for an interview on the latest episode of her podcast.
  
  Let us also refer you to what was already a heated debate when the Australian was hired by the BBC to join their Wimbledon team. Let’s be real, these companies mainly hire Kyrgios in the hope he’s going to say something outrageous that will bring them some buzz. It is not for what he has to say about the game. Like, please. Here is a player who has spent his career disrespecting the game, the other players, the tournaments, and the umpires. Sometimes, he’d take a break and play nice long enough for people to forget or claim he had changed. But overall, that’s what his brand is, and that’s what ESPN, like the BBC, is paying for.
  
  So for these media companies, Kyrgios is their “oh look how edgy we are” token, the “we can enter the villain era too, look” token. And they all think they can somehow control him enough so that he doesn’t cross the last line. Well, guess what? That’s also his brand and his obvious struggles: he lives for crossing that last line. That’s when he thinks he shines. And then he can keep the cycle of saying he’s too raw for that sport, haters gonna hate, it’s-not-my-fault-because-you-are-all-a-bunch-of-hypocrites-and-I-am-misunderstood. When you keep enabling and glorifying this behavior with someone who clearly can’t help himself because that’s the only way he has found to get the attention he craves, someone has to pay for it. With Kyrgios, it has too often been women. So when does it finally stop?

MENS SANA IN CORPORE SANO 
More tennis for us all, less nausea for Draper

• Recently, I shared with you a study stating that hitting a tennis ball could give you ten more years on that planet. Well, the word keeps spreading! Today reports that tennis has now been named “the world’s healthiest sport.” That’s what the Tour should praise as the GOAT of summer PR. “Tennis is one of the most intense sports you can play with some of the highest health benefits associated with them,” Dr. Elan Goldwaser, a sports medicine physician at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York, tells Today.
  

• Jack Draper needs to know. What? How to avoid getting sick on the court. It indeed sounds like a plan. The British player lost in three sets and three hours in the semi-finals of the US Open against Jannik Sinner (7-5, 7-6(3), 6-2). His lefty paw confirmed in NYC that it could really aim for the top but also that something needed fixing asap. Trying to win a Grand Slam title is challenging enough, no player needs to also fight against recurring on-court sickness.
  
  Yet, Draper got sick three times against Sinner, and it was nothing new for the 22-year-old who also threw up after his first-round victory at the Australian Open. “It’s the worst feeling ever,” he said about his nausea struggles after the match. “I think it’s a big occasion for me. Even though I generally feel pretty relaxed and stuff, I definitely felt more excited today with a few more nerves around. I’m definitely someone who is quite an anxious human being. I think when you add all that together, sometimes I do feel a bit of nausea on court, and I do feel a little bit sick when it gets tough,” he told the press.
  
  His anxiety and how much he was sweating in the NYC humidity got to his body in the end. But Draper wants to make sure there’s nothing else going on and then wants to fix this once and for all. "This has happened a few times now, in different situations for me; I'm going to really look into it. (…) I am going to have to work on that and really understand myself better in order to compete at these highest levels. I'm sure I'll figure out all these problems with my team,” he told the BBC.

PLAY HARD, TRAIN HARD, DRESS THE PART 
Say it again, for the people in the back

This US Open 2024 confirmed what we’ve been saying here for months: Tenniscore Is Real. It’s been everywhere this year, even before the release of the Challengers movie. Every influencer known to the Gram has posted tennis-inspired outfits. Every “I wanna be a Gen Z fav” brand has had a tennis-inspired collection (we see you, Alo Yoga).

In NYC, it’s been peak tennis fashion on and off the court. The NYC Fashion Week started near Arthur Ashe Stadium this year. And so AP is publishing a feature about why tennis fashion is suddenly the thing to wear even if you’ve never hit a ball in your life and don’t intend to start. The bigger picture question is, as often in tennis: how is the sport going to take advantage of being trendy? Do not make me talk about the Break Point failure again… Please.

Yay, or Nay? Taylor Swift showed up for the US Open men’s final, but it seems Travis Kelce’s (Gucci) hat stole her show. What do you think?

EDITOR’S PICKS 

You can find other picks here, including my go-to newsletters for anything tech*, anything backstage* or professional sports*, and the one for everything NIL*. If you’re a solopreneur, you might like this one, by the way.

READ: “Why is La Roche-Posay betting big on tennis?” The skincare brand, who has signed Jannik Sinner for anything sunscreen, explained to Marketing Brew why they were going all-in for the yellow ball. “Tennis is one of those sports where you spend the most amount of time outdoors…and we wanted to make sure we were also reaching a premium, affluent, and approachable consumer, as well. Our goal as a brand is to make sure we’re getting mass awareness and reach through these events as well,” says Guillaume Monsel, VP and head of marketing and digital at La Roche-Posay.

WATCH: The Rings Of Power, season 2, on Amazon Prime. I do not care about people coming for this show since season 1. It’s absolutely worth the watch, and season 2 confirms this. Only four episodes have been released as I’m writing these lines, and I cannot wait for what’s left of that season. It’s so ambitious in every aspect that I’m just stuck to the screen. Visually, it’s a wonder. The cast is perfect (I’m just sad the actor playing Adar in season 1 walked away). The storytelling is worthy of Tolkien’s legacy. Also, dwarves - the accent! - and elves? I’m here.

INDULGE: If you wonder how you could treat yourself today in the self-care department, just have a look at this list. You’re not taking a selfish, you’re getting what you deserve 🙂 If you like it, don’t forget to subscribe to Nice News newsletter*.

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