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Bridgid Bergin: You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin in for Alison Stewart. The US Open is underway in Flushing Meadows and with some big names out of the competition, the field seems wide open. On the women's side, without Serena Williams or Naomi Osaka in the competition, could this be Coco Gauff's year, or could fellow American Jessica Pegula give her a run for her money?

On the men's side, all eyes are on Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz, fresh off an epic Wimbledon showdown. Alcaraz is the reigning US Open champ, but he'll have some stiff competition. Plus two American men, Francis Tiafoe and Christopher Eubanks, have captured the hearts of fans. Can they make it to the finals this year?

Joining us to break it down and preview all things Us Open is friend of the show and friend of mine Caitlin Thompson, co-founder of Racquet Magazine. She also has a spread in Vanity Fair spotlighting American players. Caitlin, welcome back to All Of It.

Caitlin Thompson: I am so happy to be here, Brigid. You know talking about tennis is my absolute favorite thing. Especially during this time of year. Let me just commend you. Every single one of those names you pronounced correctly-

Bridgid Bergin: Thank you very much.

Caitlin Thompson: -so incredible job.

Bridgid Bergin: Thank you. I appreciate that. Listeners, [laughter] we are taking your calls. What player are you most excited to watch during the US Open? Who do you think will win? Are you planning on attending the Open this year, or do you have any questions for our tennis expert here, Caitlin Thompson? Give us a call. 212-433-9692. That's 212-433 WNYC. Of course you can text or reach us on social media. Okay, Caitlin, so what are some of the challenges that players face that are unique to the US Open as opposed to some of the other major slams?

Caitlin Thompson: Great question. One of the things that is so unique about New York here in this late August, early September period is it is sticky, it is humid. These players deal with a ton of weather concerns that, if you've been in the New York City area in the last couple of days, you know that there's been rain on and off.

Luckily now, the US Open Facility, which is named after, really, the shero of the sport Billie Jean King- It is Billie Jean King National Tennis Center after all. -Louis Armstrong Stadium and Arthur Ashe Stadium both have roofs. You can keep playing if there's a torrential downpour during this, which is hurricane season, but all the other play on all the outer courts tends to stop. One of the main headaches, which is not to say the other tournaments don't get rain, but seems to happen every year that New York has at least a couple of days where it's a washout and the only match is played are inside, so that's number one.

Number two, and this is actually more complicated and has to do with a bunch of internecine fighting and rules about the sport of tennis, which we can get into because it is the most arcanely overcomplicated self-sabotaging of sports at times. The scheduling for these players is nothing short of just impossible. The matches that oftentimes don't even begin until 11:00 or 12:00 at night mean that not only are the players on court, especially if we're watching a men's match that goes to five sets, sometimes these players are onsite playing until three or four.

Which means they're actually on site recovering with staff, with food, with physios, with trainers, with security until 6:00 or 7:00 in the morning. Then they have to go home, somehow reset their circadian rhythms, and then come back and, maybe, play, if not the next day, then certainly the day after depending on whether they're in other draws like doubles or mixed doubles.

Really the late, late nights that the US Open is famous for can sometimes be really exciting. It's certainly something that we don't see very often in the other tournaments, but it's also just this giant bear of a physical obstacle to ask a player to start a match, as Novak Djokovic did on Monday night, at 11:00 PM.

Bridgid Bergin: I think you're getting into what I wanted to ask you about next, which is you hear announcers in these early matches talk about players having good or bad draws. Is that what we're talking about? Is it the timing or is it the matchups? What are they referring to when they say that?

Caitlin Thompson: Good question. It's three-dimensional chess because there are so many factors that go into what a player's daily schedule looks like. What we were just talking about is quite literally just the order of play. Usually, depending on what position a player in the draw is, and if anybody knows March Madness, that they've seen a draw before. Right? If you're seated first, you're at the very top of the draw. If you're seated second, you're at the very bottom.

Theoretically, the top half and the bottom half don't meet each other until very late in the tournament stages. Part of it has to do with the fact that each of these halves of the draw-- This is men's and women's, but also keep in mind the US Open, which is a grand slam, has mixed doubles, doubles, wheelchair, wheelchair singles, wheelchair doubles, wheelchair juniors, juniors. There's just like tons and tons of matches that need to be played.

Scheduling those matches is something that I don't-- I truly, truly don't envy the logistical mind that it takes to figure out who needs to play in what order on which court. There's a lot of politicking that go on. There's a lot of, players who have preferences. Some of them absolutely refuse to play at certain times of day. Depending on their standing with the tournament, maybe they're a hometown favorite, maybe they're not a friend to the tournament.

It looks like the UN general counsel when you get into the players and tournament directors boxes just even to determine who plays where on which court. Setting that aside, there's also the fact of having a good or bad draw meaning who, based on rankings and based on the year's performance, is lurking who you might have to play sooner rather than later.

Because the draws are outside of who is ranked what, sort of randomized, you could get somebody who maybe is really, really, really high performing but doesn't have their ranking reflect their performance, and so they're kind of a dangerous wild card. You could have somebody who is seeded really highly but tends not to do very well on a hard court which is why, sometimes, if you see somebody bow out early, it's like, "Oh my God, I can't believe Venus Williams lost in the first round."

Well, Venus Williams hasn't played a real competitive tennis match in about four years. Even though you know her name, she's my age and for tennis terms, that's no spring chicken. There's something to do with familiarity of names versus odds and probability of victory that the more you get into tennis, the more you come to the conclusion, which I actually really like. I can see you're skeptical at this, so I'm going to walk you through it.

One of the things I love so much about tennis is, truly, truly, anybody can beat anybody else on any given day. Once you start seeing that as a feature not a bug, then asking questions like, who's the favorite, who's going to win, become exercises in philosophical futility. Instead, you're just left to wash yourself with the joy of live competition and the random unpredictability of life and sport.

Bridgid Bergin: That's not going to get you out of me asking you who your favorites are. I love that answer but nice try.

Caitlin Thompson: I thought maybe since this is public radio-

Bridgid Bergin: So diplomatic.

Caitlin Thompson: -public radio I could go as esoteric.

Bridgid Bergin: Esoteric but not satisfying. We're still going to make you name names. Let's talk about some of the missing players. On the women's side, we're missing some big competitors. Serena Williams who retired last year. Naomi Osaka gave birth to a baby just a few weeks ago,-

Caitlin Thompson: Yes, new mom.

Bridgid Bergin: -and Bianca Andreescu who is out with an injury. With these three out of the competition, Caitlin, who is your female favorite in the tournament?

Caitlin Thompson: The problem with asking me this question is I have so many favorites that I could answer this question about 20 different ways. You want to hear me talk about Coco, so I'm going to talk about Coco. Coco Gauff young-

Bridgid Bergin: Who just won two sets I should note.

Caitlin Thompson: -who just won, just now, won her second-round match after a epic, difficult, tricky match that I went to on Monday night sitting-

Bridgid Bergin: We're going to talk a little bit about that in a moment.

Caitlin Thompson: courtside against Laura Siegemund. Coco has, up until this point, really punched above her weight in terms of her game. I won't get too technical and bore everyone to death, but essentially, she's kind of overperformed given what her, I think, talent is. Instead of taking that in the offensive way, take it in the sense that she's such a fighter, and she's such a quick mover, and she's such a good competitor that, in my mind, she's outperformed her natural ceiling.

That said, she made some amazing changes to her game. A lot of us who follow tennis really closely figured with the forehand she has, with the serve she has, it's just hard for her to ever win a slam even though she's gotten pretty close. That's changed. She had a new coaching change-up. Kind of with Brad Gilbert but also a guy called Pere Riba who reoriented the way she hits the ball.

Sounds so minor to somebody who doesn't follow the sport closely, but if you take someone's weakness and turn it into a weapon, then just imagine how the tables can turn on-- In these matches where, really, truly, after a couple of sets, the differential between wins and losses can sometimes come down to, literally, fewer than 10 points. Coco Gauff actually, to me, for the first time, truly for the first time, is coming into the Slam as a favorite.

The other one to watch is Jessie Pegula. She isn't a young American. She's awesome. She's just a gritty fighter. Incidentally, the two of them play doubles together-

Bridgid Bergin: Oh, wow.

Caitlin Thompson: -which is really fun and great. She really is the personification of grit which is something that I like to point out.

Brigid Bergin: You're gritty, Caitlin.

Caitlin Thompson: I do, I run down every ball and so does Jessica Bogula. I think, for that reason, you just like the way she approaches matches with a warlike mentality.

Brigid Bergin: Before we move on to talk about some other players, let's stick with Coco for just a moment. I mentioned she just won just while we're here on the air.

Caitlin Thompson: Moments ago.

Brigid Bergin: Moments ago. She's ranked sixth in the world. Let's talk about that match on Monday that you said you were at. She got into a bit of a tiff with her opponent and the ref. We're going to play a little audio from that, and I'll have you break down what's going on. Let's start. First, hear was Coco complaining to the ref that her opponent, the German player Laura Siegemund, wasn't getting ready fast enough for Coco's serves.

Coco Gauff: I'm not-- I'm going at a normal speed. Ask any ref here, I go at medium pace speed. She's-- But she can't, every single points. Everybody [unintelligible 00:11:00] She's been missing for, like, six points my first set, every game. Second set, every game. I didn't say nothing, but now it's ridiculous. I don't care what she doing on her serve, but my serve she has to be ready.

Speaker 1: Okay, well, well said.

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Brigid Bergin: Okay, so then later in the match, Laura got a time penalty from the ref, and then she complains.

Laura Siegemund: I'm going in, I don't know how many points, I go one time for the towel. One time in her serve. On her service games I never went for the towel. She's taking extremely fast. [unintelligible 00:11:42] for some reason [unintelligible 00:11:43] and I'm always there. One time I go to the towels [unintelligible 00:11:47]

Speaker 2: [unintelligible 00:11:48] sometimes it is also like a [unintelligible 00:11:51]

Laura Siegemund: Then I tell her and I was [unintelligible 00:11:55]

Brigid Bergin: It was a little hard to hear, maybe, some of what Laura was saying there because the crowd was so loud because I think, if I'm hearing it correctly, Caitlin, she was getting booed.

Caitlin Thompson: Those were boos.

Brigid Bergin: Yes. Let's hear one last clip from the press conference with Coco after the match.

Coco Gauff: I was trying to best communicate how I was feeling to the referee, and I think she understood. Maybe not, but yes, I think that certain situations like this that, when it happens over and over, I'm not going to complain if it's once or twice. It was at least seven times that I counted. I'm usually not a player to confront-- Confrontation with refs and everything, and I tried to explain that to her.

I'm not a fast-paced player. I'm not Nick, I'm not-- I bounce the ball six times before I serve. I ask for three or four balls, and I throw it back to the ball kids because I like to get the newest ball, so I know how much time I'm taking, and it's a normal amount of time.

Brigid Bergin: I don't want to dwell on this. We have a lot to cover here but, quickly, what's your analysis of what happened there?

Caitlin Thompson: The basic rule is- I love talking about rules. -the basic rule is that the receiver, whoever is not serving, must play at the server's pace. Simple as that. Some people, and you could hear Coco Gauff refer to Nick, as Nick Kygrios, immediately finish a point, get the next ball, step up to the next line, and they're ready to serve. The Novak Djokovic approach is to bounce the ball sometimes upward of 15, 16 times. There's toweling off, there's picking at strings.

Anybody who's watched a Rafa Nadal match in the last 20 years knows the entirety of his very involved pre-serve preparation. The rule is very straightforward which is, if the server is ready, you have to get ready. There's a time clock. It's 20 seconds. If you exceed it, it's a time violation. Pretty much cut and dried. Coco Gauff is not a complainer. She is somebody who is not only one of the most exciting players, but she's one of the most fair and well-liked players.

That really speaks volumes because Laura Siegmund is not. She is notorious for all sorts of gamesmanship. Taking too long, getting the towel three or four times, and you can hear her talking about it, so not surprised. I'm on Coco's side, not surprisingly, in this case.

Brigid Bergin: Well, I am speaking with Caitlin Thompson, co-founder of Racquet Magazine with a US Open preview. We've got a lot more to talk about. We've got to take a short break. Stick around. You're listening to All Of It on WNYC.

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You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin, and I am speaking with Caitlin Thompson, co-founder of Racquet Magazine with a little of US Open preview. We're talking players to watch, matches to watch, and all the drama that's happening out in Flushing Meadows. Caitlin, you mentioned Venus Williams who-- She played in primetime and was defeated pretty quickly in just two sets. You mentioned she hasn't been competitive in a while, but any hints about what the future holds for her? Serena retired. She's well-known, but do we see a career comeback in the future or--

Caitlin Thompson: Hard to imagine. I think one of the things that we love so much about Venus is Venus is, really, to me, not only one of the game's most legendary players, but very few people know that she was responsible for getting Wimbledon to pay women and men equally. She won her second, I think, Venus Rosewater Dish, and then, within the same 24 hours, was appealing to a board of the kinds of people you would expect to be on a board of an old, dusty country club about why men and women deserve equal pay.

She had a piece written in the London Times about her childhood and why men and women deserve equal pay. The way I think of Venus is not as a player in her December. I think of her as, really, the closest thing that we have to the inheritance of Billie Jean King.

Brigid Bergin: That's great.

Caitlin Thompson: For me, I am personally a little wistful because we're the same age, so watching her compete and really not having the same Venus Williams-esque grace like a gazelle and speed and serve and power that we saw for so many years from her is a little bit of a gut punch. At the same time, Venus Williams asked for a wild card to play in this tournament. The tournament has the discretion to give those away, and they know that people are going to come and watch Venus Williams.

Whether people in the tennis ecosystem want to speculate about her motivations for playing, her health, she's spoken openly about having Sjögren's syndrome,- I'm not sure if I got that pronunciation right, but it is an anti-autoimmune disease. -she's doing her. For me, if she wants to look fabulous-- She walked into the tournament with a skirt over-- Under a double-breasted black blazer. She looked like somebody out of the Madonna Express Yourself video in the early '90s-

Brigid Bergin: Oh, I love it.

Caitlin Thompson: -with fabulous hair. I was just kind of like, "You know what? Venus is here.' I don't care how she does. I'm going to go see Venus." Would I love for her to lift the trophy at the end of the two weeks and do I think that's remotely a possibility in not only this but any tournament? Absolutely not. That said, the day she decides to hang it up and do something else will be the day that, hopefully, she'll get her flowers.

To me, let's give her her flowers now because she's still here.

Bridgid Bergin: She's worthy.

Caitlin Thompson: Yes, and she's worthy. I think, for me, the real inheritance is not only being a multiple Grand Slam champion and one of the best players who's ever played the game, won gold medals at the Olympics, but just somebody who really understood what it meant to be vocal and push for change. That's in short supply.

Brigid Bergin: Let's talk about some of the men.

Caitlin Thompson: Do we have to? I mean-- [chuckles]

Bridgid Bergin: We have left them out of this conversation so far.

Caitlin Thompson: If you insist.

Bridgid Bergin: I hear they're playing as well. The current rivalry in tennis right now is between the legend Novak Djokovic and defending US Open champion Carlos Alcaraz coming off that epic victory against Djokovic at Wimbledon. What do you think of Alcaraz? Does he have a slight edge over Djokovic recently? What's that about?

Caitlin Thompson: It's a good question. It's hard to know how quickly Novak Djokovic neutralizes new threats. If you watch tennis, you'll understand what I mean by that, because he has been the T2 Terminator for the last, really, two decades where anybody who comes up with an innovative way to beat him, he watches, maybe takes a defeat or two, and then comes back stronger.

I'll unpack that a little bit. Carlos Alcaraz, sort of sui generis. Comes onto the tennis scene within the last couple of years playing a style that is somehow a combination of what has become known as the Big Three: Roger Federer's sort of attacking creativity, Rafa Nadal's tenacious defense, and Novak Djokovic's flexibility and creativity in the point.

Each of those three styles are so unique and somehow this kid combines all of them, and so people watching him kind of had their minds blown. It's easy to hype up a new talent, and I think I was pretty honest about the way I feel about Coco's a few minutes ago. Contrasting to that, Carlos Alcaraz is a new strain. He's something different. He beat Novak Djokovic at his own game, at his own surface.

Carlos Alcaraz, you might have guessed, is from a Spanish-speaking country, he's from Spain. He grew up on clay and so you'd kind of give him the edge in the French Open. They had a match that kind of got competitive, but then ended early when Carlos started cramping at the French Open. The Wimbledon victory went Carlos's way but, most recently, they played in a three-set match in Cincinnati and Novak won. I believe it was seven-six in the third. Just absolute bananas level and competition.

When these two meet, and usually, like I said, because tennis is a sport where anybody can beat anybody on any given day, you don't use words like when, you use words like if, but it does feel like when they meet in this tournament, it will be another addition of some insane Peloponnesian War. I don't even know how to describe it. It's going to be nuts.

Bridgid Bergin: Well, and then where does Daniil Medvedev, the relentless Russian tennis player, fit in all of this?

Caitlin Thompson: Nowhere. Not nowhere. Look, the guy has won the tournament, and he's one of my favorites. If you listen to his press conference, if you watch him play, he kind of looks like an accountant who somehow shouldn't be incredible at tennis and yet he is. He beat Djokovic quite badly in a final here at the US Open a couple of years ago. He hasn't had anything close to a good year and so what's really more interesting about these players is not exactly what they're ranked or not exactly how their head-to-head go, although that can be indicative if people have matched up together.

Some matchups really favor one player over another, but it's more just what kind of year are they having. Based on what I've seen so far of Daniil Medvedev, I can't imagine him being a real factor in this tournament, but believe me when I say I would love that he would be-- If he would be.

Bridgid Bergin: I want to get to a couple of the American players that I mentioned. Christopher Eubanks, one of the beloved players to come out of Wimbledon. 27 years old American from Atlanta. Made it to the quarterfinals. He won his first round at the open and is set to play again today. What's been impressing you about his game in the last few months?

Caitlin Thompson: His game is unbelievable. It's close to my platonic ideal of what tennis should look like. He's got a big, beautiful one-handed backhand which I have also. He's got a wonderful serving volley game. He can attack the net. He's also about 6'7". He's just insanely massive. He weighs probably about 120 pounds. He's pencil-like which is uncommon for an elite athlete. He has a game exquisitely suited for grass and the US Open, as we all know, is not played on grass. It's played on a relatively slow hard court.

While I love him, I am an Atlanta tennis alum, he went to Georgia Tech, the Georgia Tech fans right now are going nuts out in Queens, they are so pumped to see a yellow jacket, but I really don't love his odds in this tournament on this slow hard court surface. Maybe the Australian Open that has a little bit of a faster hard court would be a little bit more of advantage for him.

Bridgid Bergin: Then quickly, Frances Tiafoe.

Caitlin Thompson: Frances is a real wild card. Obviously, he went to five sets against Carlos Alcaraz last year very closely losing, and he is one of the all-time crowd favorites. Incredible energy, incredibly lovely guy. He's had, if I can share a little inside information, a racket change that has not gone very well and so, all of a sudden, he can't really put it together.

I think, again, when you look at how they've been playing, history would indicate he would do well here but recent history would indicate that he's going to have a really tough time. He has to get it together. Nobody would be happier to see him make a run to the finals, though, probably than me. I love that guy.

Bridgid Bergin: Before I let you go, you have started quite a controversy with your stances on pickleball.

Caitlin Thompson: Oh, man.

Bridgid Bergin: You have about 10 seconds to tell us your feelings. It's a safe space.

Caitlin Thompson: Is it a safe space? Whenever I talk about pickleball I feel like I just get nothing but ire. Good for everybody not being on a couch and doing a thing, but if you come for tennis courts and if you get the venture capital money that should be flowing into my beautiful underoptimized tennis sport, I'm coming after you.

Bridgid Bergin: Okay. Well, on that note, we're going to leave it there with Caitlin Thompson, the co-founder of Racquet Magazine. Please check out her incredible spread in Vanity Fair. It is very cool. Caitlin, thank you so much for joining me.

Caitlin Thompson: What a joy. Thank you so much for having me.

Bridgid Bergin: On tomorrow's show, New York Public Schools start next week, so we'll talk back to school with Chalkbeat's Mike Elsen-Rooney, plus how to be a good roommate. That's all coming up tomorrow on All Of It here on WNYC. Tune in then.

 

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