The Rally, Bubble Edition: How will a unique US Open affect attitudes?

The Rally, Bubble Edition: Joel Drucker and Steve Tignor wonder whether the Open will feel like the Open; which players may make the most of the moment; and how asterisks can take on lives of their own, whether we want them to or not.

Hi Steve,

So here it is, tennis’ New York bubble, about to commence. Scary? Yes. Intriguing? Absolutely. World Team Tennis’ engaging three-week season gave us a flavor of how competitive tennis can come off successfully during the pandemic. So now, with both Cincinnati and the US Open taking place at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, what are we looking forward to?

As a start, it will be great to see a tournament where there are lots of matches taking place all at once. That smorgasbord dimension makes big events like Cincinnati and Grand Slams exceptionally captivating. There might be a matchup between a veteran and a youngster, or a style contrast, or a dangerous floater versus a seed. Who knows just how sharp any player will be? There’s the matter of fitness, as well as the mental challenge of competing after such a long layoff—probably the longest time away from match play any of these players has had since first picking up a racquet. It will also be interesting to see which players have enhanced their skills—be it new techniques or tactics.

Alongside my curiosity about what players do with their racquets, I’m hoping for demonstrations and expressions of gratitude. No professional tennis player these days should dare come off as jaded. I’m keen to see how that plays out on and off the court. This reminds me of how well World War II veterans performed in classrooms after having seen combat. They were focused and relaxed. As much pressure as a tennis player can feel at key stages, might the incredible perspective gained in recent months make it somewhat easier to compete? Might we see the players more tranquil on the court, even as they continue to face ample stress of it in the form of frequent testing and a highly restricted set of living conditions? Billie Jean King calls pressure a privilege. Amid the tumult of 2020, might these athletes see it also as an illusion, particularly when compared to far bigger challenges?

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I’m also curious to hear how the players speak. You and I have both witnessed our share of desultory post-match press conferences, players speaking as if they’ve just returned from a dental appointment. Surely —hopefully—these last few months have helped them see how fortunate they are to earn a living playing a sport and that they in turn can articulate that joy.

What intrigues you about the New York bubble, Steve? Since you live in New York, you might also have some distinct perspectives as well.

Hi Joel,

You ask a good question and make a good point: How will the pandemic, and the time away from competition, affect players’ attitudes to the sport? Will they come back to it feeling less pressure, after living with the threat of the coronavirus for six months? And will that new perspective inspire them to act less selfishly, to keep the whining and moaning to a minimum? I hope so in both cases, but I’m also not going to hold my breath. The heat of competition has a weird way of making people forget about any other perspective outside of their life-or-death desire to win.

To start, I’m going to be interested in whether the Open feels anything like the Open. (We kind of know “Cincy” won’t feel like Cincy, since it’s going to be played in New York.) I’ll start by saying that Thursday actually did feel like a US Open type of day in Manhattan for the first time. The crisp air was more fall-like than summer-like. And there was that little bit of tension in the breeze, the way there is on big-match days. There are no players in Manhattan, of course, but just seeing them posting photos from the bubble in Queens was enough to put me in an Open mood.

This summer I’ve tried to imagine what the atmosphere in Arthur Ashe Stadium will be like with nearly all of its 23,000 seats empty. Can you picture, say, Serena Williams or Novak Djokovic doing a full-on, drop-to-the-court Grand Slam title celebration with no one there? (Actually, now that I ask that question, I know my answer: With those two, I can totally picture it.)

There’s at least one positive I can think of, though: With no fans to shuttle in and out of stadiums, there should be no delays to night-session starting times this year. Without any tickets to sell, the tournament won’t need separate day and night sessions at all. And with no spectators, we also won’t have to endure hundred of between-point cutaways to well-dressed Manhattan types looking vaguely bored in the corporate seats.

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How about the players you’re looking forward to seeing, Joel? With six of the Top 10 women, and two of the Big 3 men, not playing, this will be a major opportunity for dozens of pros to go deep at a major for the first time, and maybe win a Slam they never thought they could win. My first thoughts go to Serena, of course; she’ll be the No. 3 seed, behind Karolina Pliskova and Sofia Kenin, and many will make her the heavy favorite. The Open would obviously love for her to do well. The tournament built a DecoTurf II court for her at her home. But how will Serena react to those kinds of expectations?

Beyond that, it’s tantalizing to imagine players like Pliskova, Petra Kvitova, Madison Keys, Garbiñe Muguruza, heck, even Alison Riske, having a shot at their first Open title. The same goes for Dominic Thiem, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Alexander Zverev, Matteo Berrettini, heck, even Americans like Taylor Fritz, Reilly Opelka, Frances Tiafoe, and John Isner, on the men’s side. Opportunities abound. Thiem, who has played some good tennis this summer, may have the biggest of all. With Federer and Nadal out, this is the best chance yet for him, or anyone from his generation, of finally getting on the Grand Slam board.

Which brings me to my next topic: Asterisks. Do you think they should be attached, or at least implied, for this tournament, Joel? So far, when I’ve been asked that, my answer has been: “It depends who wins.”

Steve,

Alas, when it comes to the bandied asterisk notion, I picture myself, five years from now, at a social gathering. Remember those?

So there we are, sipping our kale smoothies, nibbling our organic almonds, and talk comes up about a player who won the 2020 US Open. One attendee notes that there weren’t any spectators that year. Another speaks about the depth of the player field, be it the absence of Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer on the men’s side, as well as many of the Top 10 women.

And then I think: That was the year the world turned upside-down as it never had. By mid-August, there were more than 20 million cases of COVID-19 around the world. Hundreds of thousands had died. There was no cure, no clear idea of when the pandemic might end. These athletes—all of them with world-class skill sets—had gone nearly half a year without playing a tournament match and wondered when they would collect their next paycheck. Then, in hot and sticky New York, they faced all sorts of restrictions and accompanying dread. And these folks at the party in the year 2025 wish to diminish such an achievement?

You win a major during a pandemic and you are one first-rate competitor. End of asterisk.

As far as players go, I’m most interested in Stefanos Tsitsipas, Naomi Osaka, Sofia Kenin and Coco Gauff. These four bring lots of energy and style—and since they’re each still quite young and studious, I’m fascinated to see how they continue to develop.

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But while the opportunities intrigue, I do have concerns, most notably when it comes to fitness and potential injuries. Given how little competition the players have had this year, weather and stamina will play bigger roles than ever. Will a man in his second straight five-setter hurt himself in a major way? Or, perhaps, might players let games and even sets fly by should they get too far behind? I doubt it, but surely there will be some unprecedented physical occurrences during the US Open.

Besides the notion of potential gratitude, I’m curious to see how the tactical dimension plays out in New York. Has this time off helped some players enhance their volley skills? What about serves—both the motion and deployment? Ditto for the return. Might there be a bit more adventure, with players coming in off their returns at least occasionally? After all, how easy is it after such a long layoff to hit passing shots? On the other hand, given all I’ve heard and seen about this time away being used for fitness (as shown last week in Lexington by Jennifer Brady), will players mostly channel their inner Novak Djokovic and hunker down as they never have? It will be fascinating to see what kind of statistics emerge about rally length at the 2020 US Open and see how they compare with prior years.

Given all this, Steve, what kind of playing style do you think it takes to win the US Open this year? Are there any shots you see as more or less important?

Joel,

You make a pretty fair point about the notion of an asterisk being attached to this event. If you win the US Open in a pandemic, you’ve earned the right to be called a Grand Slam champion, even if you didn’t beat Rafael Nadal or Ash Barty along the way. Also, there are no actual asterisks in tennis’s record books, so there’s no reason to think there would be one now. Especially if Serena Williams or Novak Djokovic or another Top 10 player wins the title.

My only pushback is this: If, say, the 30th-ranked man or woman wins the tournament, it seems highly likely to me that references to that victory in the future will inevitably come with a caveat, or an implied asterisk, whether we like it not. “So and so won her only Slam at the US Open in 2020, which was the pandemic year, of course.” That’s how I think of Wimbledon in 1973, when 80 top male players boycotted the event. In my mind, it’s always: “Jan Kodes beat Alex Metreveli in the final, in the boycott year.” Asterisks can have lives of their own, and defy our desire to banish them.

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Will we see any changes in players’ games in the bubble? As you note, Joel, Jen Brady is fitter. Venus Williams looked refreshed by the break. Dominic Thiem showed some extra swagger in his exhibitions. The players who were part of UTS, like Stefanos Tsitsipas and Matteo Berrettini, may be in an attack-first mode after taking part in that fast-paced format. Theoretically, the break gave players a chance to do something they normally never get to do: Add to their games or shore up weaknesses. But learning to, say, serve and volley effectively enough to employ it in competition is probably going to be beyond the powers of even the game’s greatest talents. Of course, like you, I’d love to see it.

But even if the pros haven’t changed their ways, watching the Western & Southern Open, and especially the US Open, will still feel different from anything we’ve watched in six months. That’s because these matches are going to matter, and in the case of the Open, they’re going to become part of the history of the sport, asterisk or no asterisk.

Even without seeing the players walking around Manhattan, it’s starting to feel like US Open time here.