Djokovic defeats Fritz at a clay-court Masters event, once again

Taylor Fritz doubled his output, in games won, in his second clay-court-Masters meeting with Novak Djokovic this season. That's progress.

But when Fritz's goal before to the match was to "win more than three games"—the Serb walloped the American in Monte Carlo, 6-3, 6-0—such progress was hardly enough to prevent Djokovic from progressing.

The world No. 1 got his 250th week as world No. 1 off to a winning start with a 6-4, 6-2 victory over Fritz, who was recovering from a cold. Djokovic will also get an advantage in his next match, against either Diego Schwartzman, Jeremy Chardy or Albert Ramos-Vinolas. Schwartzman has already advanced to the second round with a win over Marco Cecchinato; Chardy and Ramos-Vinolas, as of this writing, are still playing their first-round match.

Djokovic's third-round opponent will come into their match having already played two matches in two previous days.