The U.S. Open tennis match begins Sunday in Flushing, Queens, among the marquee matches being performed within the large room at Arthur Ashe Stadium. Arthur was an important American males’s participant, somebody who received this nation’s nationwide championship in tennis in 1968, again when the match was nonetheless performed on grass on the West Facet Tennis Membership in Forest Hills. After Arthur got here these American males’s champions on the Open: Stan Smith, Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe, Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, virtually in formation.
The final within the line was Andy Roddick, the final American man to win a serious championship, 22 years in the past, on the Open of 2003. And know that Roddick was each bit an important participant, too. He received that one main right here, but additionally had 4 losses to Roger Federer in Grand Slam finals after that, one on the Open and three at Wimbledon. In a kind of Wimbledon finals he didn’t lastly lose till it was 16-14 within the fifth set.
However now it’s been a minute for American males in majors, hasn’t it? Perhaps this time can be completely different, simply because it’s previous time for it to occur, right here or anyplace else. Perhaps Ben Shelton or Taylor Fritz and even Frances Tiafoe, who’s been knocking on the door for just a few years, could make himself the most important story on the finish of this Open, and never Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz, who can be attempting to go up in opposition to one another in three straight Grand Slam finals. That’s one thing that hasn’t occurred since Novak Djokovic confronted off in opposition to Rafa Nadal within the finals of Wimbledon and the Open in 2011 and the Australian in 2012.
Their ascendant and nascent rivalry, one or the opposite having now received the final seven majors and eight of the final 9, occurs for males’s tennis proper after Federer and Nadal and Djokovic mixed to win an out-of-this-world 66 majors (Connors, McEnroe and Bjorn Borg received 26). It’s Sinner and Alcaraz who now make the game really feel as large as ever after they play, particularly after a French Open remaining that lasted 5 hours and 29 minutes, went to a fifth-set tiebreaker and was, I imagine, the best males’s tennis match ever performed.
Sinner is 24. Alcaraz is 22. They’ve now mixed to win 9 majors earlier than both of them turns 25. If they’re blessed with good well being — and keep in mind Sinner did should default out of the Cincinnati remaining due to sickness final Monday afternoon — this rivalry may go on for the subsequent decade, and even longer than that. Federer received his final main, the Australian of 2018, on the age of 36. Nadal had simply turned 36 when he received his remaining French Open. Djokovic’s final main — for now — was on the Open of 2023, when he was 36. So the probabilities for Sinner and Alcaraz look like countless if each go the space the way in which Fed and Rafa and Djokovic did.
Once more: These two younger guys make males’s tennis really feel as necessary and glamorous because it did when Connors and McEnroe and Borg had been of their primes within the Nineteen Seventies after which into the ’80s. Then got here Sampras and Agassi, who received 22 majors between them and whose personal rivalry lit up the game, all the way in which till a reasonably great Open remaining between them in 2002, the yr earlier than Roddick received his, in what was basically Sampras’ final stand within the fourth set that day.
Federer and Nadal and Djokovic took the stage after that and principally held it for the subsequent 20 years virtually so long as Alcaraz has been alive. However simply think about how necessary it might really feel once more on this nation — for simply a few weeks — if an American man may in some way shock the world and win the Open this time. Think about what a second that may be for American tennis, for the primary time since Roddick, who simply occurred to play out his prime in Federer’s prime.
On the day in 2009 when Federer received one other Wimbledon off Roddick, it was Roger’s fifteenth main, passing Sampras at 14. Little did we all know that Federer would win 5 extra majors after that. However Sampras as within the Royal Field at Centre Courtroom that day in July of ’09, and when it was over Roddick mentioned this to him from the courtroom:
“Sorry, Pete. I know I tried to hold him off.”
It was the incorrect time for Roddick. Perhaps that is the incorrect time for Fritz, who turned the primary American man since Roddick to make a serious remaining final September earlier than operating into Sinner. The rating in that one was 6-3, 6-4, 7-5 for Sinner. This was after Fritz, who doesn’t flip 28 till October, had crushed Tiafoe within the semis.
However the American man with essentially the most upside at this level is Shelton, who continues to be simply 22 and who two years in the past turned the youngest American semifinalist at a serious in over 30 years. He’s an enormous man with a sport to match and a world of expertise, and is essentially the most thrilling and watchable American man since Roddick was pounding serves and swinging away from the baseline when he was Shelton’s age.
The issue Shelton in the meanwhile is that he’s in Alcaraz’s quarter of the draw, which is rarely a very good place to be, even on a hardcourt, in all probability the Spanish child’s weakest floor, if Alcaraz has such a factor.
Shelton is coming off his largest win but, in Toronto a few weeks in the past. However it’s price nothing that each Sinner and Alcaraz skipped that occasion. However each can be very a lot current in New York, the place Sinner will attempt to win his fourth main out of the final 5. If Sinner had transformed any one of many three match factors he had in opposition to Alcaraz in Paris, he could be going for the calendar Grand Slam in males’s tennis, one thing solely ever achieved on the boys’s facet by Don Budge and Rod Laver. However you higher imagine Alcaraz can be spoiling for a rematch with Sinner after Sinner prevented him from profitable three Wimbledons in a row lower than two months in the past.
“There’s a lot of great players, hungry, in-form players, who are looking to do some damage and, yeah, I think I’m one of those guys,” Shelton mentioned not way back.
One in every of lately, one other American man goes to win a serious. To do it anytime quickly, he could should knock off Sinner or Alcaraz. Or each. If it’s going to occur, Shelton is one of the best wager. My cash is on him. If nothing else, it’s going to be large enjoyable watching the massive child attempt, whether or not we’re going to finish up with Sinner-Alcaraz III or not.
MORE ERRORS FOR THE YANKS, GIANTS FACE A BRUTAL SCHEDULE & TIME TO HONOR JIMMY AT THE OPEN …
Anyone please clarify to me when Jazz Chisholm turned such a Bronx Bomber that Aaron Boone can by no means pinch-hit for him ever.
Folks acted like 4 errors for the Yankees on Thursday evening was quite a bit.
Say it once more: Cameron Younger, the Sleepy Hole child, must be on the Ryder Cup workforce.
I’ll ask this query once more, no matter occurs with the Mets the remainder of the way in which:
What transfer has David Stearns made since being in cost that has dramatically improved his baseball workforce’s probability to win all of it?
Neglect about not being requested to be on Mike Brown’s workers — I’m harm that Coco Gauff hasn’t requested me to be her coach.
By the way?
I learn the opposite day about Brown’s offensive coordinator and defensive coordinator and keep in mind when the one folks Purple Holzman had sitting subsequent to him had been Dick Barnett and the Knicks’ coach, Massive Time Danny Whelan.
For the Giants, it’s quick approaching the purpose the place you may’t cease Jaxson Dart, you may solely hope to comprise him.
However the context with each Dart and the Giants doesn’t change:
They’ve as brutal a regular-season schedule I’ve ever seen.
Certain is quiet round right here with out Aaron Rodgers utilizing up all of the oxygen within the room.
All of the reduction pitchers on the planet don’t take you all the way in which to the highest except you know the way to make the most of them accurately, am I proper?
The FBI in these tv exhibits is run means higher than the one we’ve received going lately.
Perhaps that is the yr when the U.S. Open figures out a means to not have matches finish in the midst of the evening.
Yet one more factor about tennis right now:
There was no yet one more liable for making the Open the massive deal it turned as soon as it moved to Flushing than Jimmy Connors.
One in every of lately the USTA should discover a method to acknowledge that someplace on the grounds.
The Purple Sox eliminating Rafael Devers actually was a basic instance of addition by subtraction in sports activities.
Ultimately, Micah Parsons will do every thing besides dunk the ball on Jerry Jones.
As soon as extra, for the West Coast:
All this publicity Jerry will get — how’s that understanding for his soccer workforce?
You recognize who had a greater probability than Giancarlo Stanton of catching that ball Alex Bregman hit to proper subject on Thursday evening?
Everybody.
James Patterson and Mike Lupica’s new Jane Smith thriller, “The Hamptons Lawyer,” has now spent a month on the Greatest Vendor lists of each the New York Instances and Publishers Weekly.
Initially Revealed: August 23, 2025 at 9:35 AM EDT
