NEW YORK—The fourth-round match between Juan Martin del Potro and Dominic Thiem was Monday’s most-anticipated encounter at the U.S. Open. On one side of the net, you had a fan favorite and former Open champion. On the other, you had a rising star with a dynamic game. Plus, there was the novelty factor: The Argentine and the Austrian had played just once before, which meant that in the 48 hours before the match began, were were free to imagine how explosive their rallies might be.
Sadly, we didn’t get to see those rallies for long. Thiem, who has played as much or more tennis than anyone on tour this year, would retire in the second set with a knee injury. But even before he called it quits, the points that he and Del Potro played had been oddly underwhelming. Yes, they rocketed their shots back and forth; and yes, it was fun to see Delpo in his wily veteran phase, finding ways to hide his backhand and use his serve to compensate. But the two men had essentially stood at the baseline—in Thiem’s case, well behind the baseline—and pummeled balls at each other until someone missed.
Right now you might be thinking: What’s your point, exactly? That’s what tennis players do. The difference this time was that we had just spent two long afternoons of our Labor Day weekends watching tennis players not do this. On Saturday, 64th-ranked Daniel Evans of Great Britain had, with stealthy, speedy opportunism, nearly upset No. 3 Stan Wawrinka by barreling into the net 63 times over five sets. The following day, 25th-ranked Lucas Pouille had upset No. 4 Rafael Nadal by coming to net 61 times, also over five sets. These upstarts’ aggression forced their higher-ranked opponents to respond in kind or get run off the court. Wawrinka and Nadal, both of whom are born-and-bred baseliners, came in 50 and 48 times respectively, and each won close to 70 percent of those points.