Four things to watch for this fall: Return to China; fights for No. 1; Cups runneth over; American momentum

When players lose at the US Open and come to the interview room for their final press conference, they often have to remind local reporters that their season isn’t over yet. If you’re not immersed in the sport, there’s a tendency to think that the Open, the final Grand Slam tournament, essentially closes the door on the year. And it’s true, millions of people who tuned in for the two weeks from Flushing Meadows will tune out again.

In reality, New York is just a slightly larger and longer-than-normal stop on an 11-month global gallivant that never slows down, even for a week. Since the Open, the men have already played a round of Davis Cup and begun to get ready for Laver Cup, and the women have finished a 500 in San Diego and started a 1000 in Guadalajara. This year the women’s season goes until November 12, while the men won’t stop until the Next Gen Finals wraps up on December 2. And with both tours in China again, there may be more money to be won in the fall than ever before.

What else, besides cash, will be on the line over the next two and a half months? Here’s what to watch for as the 2023 tennis season starts down the homestretch.

1. The WTA will go back to China, and on to Cancun

In 2021, WTA chief Steve Simon pulled the tour out of China to protest the disappearance of former player Peng Shuai, and was hailed as a rare hero of the executive suite. Two years later, he isn’t looking quite as heroic, for a couple of reasons.

First, he decided to go back to China, despite no clear resolution with Peng Shuai. Simon felt like he was sacrificing lucrative events for what had turned out to be a lost cause. The decision isn’t a shock. It’s just a depressingly hopeless end to the story.

Yet even as Simon was leading the tour back to China’s money, he was leading it away from Saudi Arabia’s. Earlier this month, rumors flew that the WTA Finals was heading for Riyadh. But after a fair amount of blowback about the country’s track record on women’s rights, the tournament ended up in sunny and less-controversial Cancun instead.

That was probably a good landing spot. Both tours have drawn enthusiastic audiences at Mexican resort towns like Acapulco and Guadalajara. This time the criticism of Simon came over how long he and the WTA took to make the decision. Seven weeks is not a lot of time to set up and sell tennis’ premier women’s-only event, as last year's sparsely attended Finals in Fort Worth, Texas proved.

For fans who just want to watch tennis—even if it takes place in the middle of the night in the West—the news here is that the WTA will return to Beijing on September 30th for the $8 million China Open. As of now, everyone in the Top 30 is scheduled to play this 1000-level tournament.

2. There will be live races for No. 1

Often, by this point in the season, the fight for the year-end No. 1 ranking has been decided. Not so in 2023. On the men’s side, Novak Djokovic leads Carlos Alcaraz by roughly 3,200 points; on the women’s, Aryna Sabalenka has an 1,100 point edge over Iga Swiatek.

Numbers-wise, Djokovic is obviously in command of the ATP race, but that gap could close. He won’t defend his title in Astana, and won’t play in Beijing or at the Masters 1000 in Shanghai, while Alcaraz will. The Spaniard, who doesn’t have anything to defend until Basel in late October, could potentially pick up 1500 points in China and put himself within striking distance when both men are scheduled to return to Europe for the Paris Masters and the ATP Finals in November.

Swiatek is already within striking distance of Sabalenka, who just claimed the No. 1 ranking for the first time last week. Swiatek has never been to China and has played just one event in Asia, at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. She’s scheduled to return to the Japanese capital next week for the Pan Pacific Open, while Sabalenka will come back in Beijing the following week. Could their race be decided, head-to-head, in Cancun?

3. Cups will runneth over

Team tennis comes to the fore in the fall. Davis Cup will hold its eight-team finals from November 21-26 in Malaga, Spain. The first-round ties will be:

• Canada vs. Finland
• Czech Republic vs. Australia
• Italy vs. Netherlands
• Serbia vs. Great Britain

That means, most likely, we’ll see Djokovic in action for Serbia. Will we also see Felix Auger-Aliassime and Denis Shapovalov defend their 2022 title for Canada? They’ve both been injured this season, and neither played for the team last week. What will Great Britain do for an encore after their thriller of a win over France? And could we see Nick Kyrgios return, and make his belated 2023 debut, for Australia?

First, though, we have Laver Cup coming this weekend. The question there will be: How will Roger Federer’s baby survive without him—and Rafael Nadal, and Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray?

Momentum finally seems to be with Team World, which won its first Cup last year, and will field an American-heavy team featuring Taylor Fritz, Frances Tiafoe, Tommy Paul, Ben Shelton, Felix Auger-Aliassime and, as an alternate, Chris Eubanks. Shelton and Eubanks seem like perfect additions to the Laver Cup atmosphere, while Tiafoe and Auger-Aliassime will try to use the weekend to turn around seasons that have gone south. FAA, who beat Djokovic in Laver Cup last year, has three titles to defend this fall.

Finally, there’s the Billie Jean King Cup, which is celebrating its 60th anniversary. The 12-team finals will be held November 7-12 in Seville, Spain, and will feature Australia, Slovenia, France, Italy, Kazakhstan, Germany, Switzerland, Czech Republic, Spain, the U.S., Canada and Poland.

4. The American wave will try not to crash

The US Open was hailed as a renaissance fortnight for American tennis, and for good reason. Coco Gauff, 19, won her first major title. Ben Shelton, 20, made his first major semi. Madison Keys returned to the semis on the women’s side, while Taylor Fritz and Frances Tiafoe made the quarters on the men’s. This was the type of Slam performance the country has been waiting many years, even decades, to see. And it came on the heels of the surprising run by Chris Eubanks to the Wimbledon quarterfinals, and Jessica Pegula’s 1000-level title in Montreal.

Can the U.S.’ momentum last beyond the loudly friendly confines of New York? In the past, Americans tended to disappear again in the fall, but that hasn’t been true of Fritz, Tiafoe, and Paul, who have all won titles and reached finals late in the season. Now we’ll see what Shelton can do away from the spotlight. After reaching the quarters at the Australian Open in January, he struggled.

For Gauff and Pegula, things can only improve—hopefully—in Cancun. At last year’s WTA Finals, they went a combined 0-9 in singles and doubles. I’m going to go out on a limb and say we’ll see something better from them this time around.