ATP Tour Finals Breakdown: Sinner’s Edge, Alcaraz’s Ceiling, and What’s Next | Ep. 76

Torrey Hawkins (00:00.482)
At the end of the day, Alvin, Carlos Alcaraz is still the number one player in the world. And I wish that the announcement that he was going to be number one in the world came at the end of this tournament, not before the finals of the ATP finals. Because you can't tell me that that didn't have some level of taking the edge off or taking the importance off of the outcome of this match. And that's all I have to say about that.

Alvin Owusu (00:06.456)
Still never been playing the world. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (00:17.9)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (00:29.868)
And we'll just, we'll actually officially announce ourselves. Welcome to another episode of the best three podcasts. I'm Alvin that's Tory and we are, we're basking in the post ATP tour finals center versus Alcaraz. Yannick center defeats Carlos Alcaraz, seven, six, seven, five entertaining match. I mean, we'll get into it and talk about the tournament a little bit more. I think, you know, I'll speak for myself. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed that we.

Torrey Hawkins (00:55.456)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (00:56.524)
We get another one of these in a slightly different venue. Like, you know, we missed out on one in Cincinnati, but here we got two out of three indoor tennis. know, conditions are perfect. Not to, it's a home match. It probably felt a little bit like Davis Cup. Yeah, yeah, that is what it is. But so, like, it's interesting when we have these guys play each other so much, right? That.

Torrey Hawkins (00:58.486)
Yeah!

Torrey Hawkins (01:05.666)
Yeah. Yeah. Not so perfect. It was in the ring. Let's just put that. It's basically a home match. We need to put that out there. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:25.42)
I've started to feel like I'm so comfortable with this matchup that it allows you to get into like the nitty gritty of the nuances of like seeing how each player is adjusting. What are they doing differently? What have they added to their games? What is uniquely different about this matchup than the last one? And like to your point, it's it's in it's in centers backyard, right? The crowd is very respectful to Carlos, but very pro center. The circuit as they should be. This is, know, this is this is one of the things that makes our sport, I think, great is that sometimes we change surfaces.

Torrey Hawkins (01:30.799)
The granular. Sure.

Torrey Hawkins (01:46.964)
Yeah, and they should be. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:55.469)
Sometimes we change conditions and you sometimes it can feel like a home match or a non-neutral, neutral site match. So I feel like, you know, we'll get into the match and kind of the circumstances around it, right? Number one, number one in the world locked up before that match. Carlos secured world number one by going undefeated in the group stage. Okay.

Torrey Hawkins (02:15.777)
And that Mousserie match, think is what put him over the top.

Alvin Owusu (02:18.786)
Yep, and then does his job, through that semifinal match and then gets to the final and we've got this dream matchup that everyone expected and everyone wants. I went into this match excited that we got to have it. We just get to have it again. And it's not like maybe they'll play 20 times over course of their career, but that's a lot when you zoom.

Torrey Hawkins (02:37.569)
Right, again. I agree with you.

Right. I hope more, but yeah. Right.

Alvin Owusu (02:46.368)
Sure. It's maybe more, but it's a lot when you zoom out. But when you zoom in, it's not every week. It's not every tournament. Things happen. It's been five times this year. So maybe six times. Yep. Rome, the three Grand Slams and then Cincinnati kind of. So this is the sixth one. But yeah, it was, was fun that it happened and there was the kind of nothing on the line except for let's just, who's got the advantage going into Australia. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (02:51.488)
Right. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (03:05.131)
No.

Torrey Hawkins (03:14.702)
Going to Australia. Sure, sure.

Alvin Owusu (03:17.848)
So what were your thoughts going into the match? And then we can of dig into the match a little bit and then the rest of the tournament.

Torrey Hawkins (03:28.35)
Carlos Alcó...

Alvin Owusu (03:28.366)
Or what were you looking for? What were you looking for going into this match?

Torrey Hawkins (03:31.316)
I was looking for a tactical matchup difference from center to Carlos. I feel like in every one of the matches, it's always been Carlos's offense and how long could center counter or could Yannick's counter punishing finally turn the tide. I think Yannick's

consistency, his whole approach to the game is so surgical, dare I say, that you know what you're going to get with him. Few errors, solid shot making, great percentage tennis, everything you should play, right? If I were to take the 80s Lindell and his approach to the game and high percentage, if I were to take, them with a big dash of Mats V. Lander from back in the day, just.

Alvin Owusu (04:07.106)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Torrey Hawkins (04:30.036)
great returns, great depth. I'm gonna counter everything you do big, I'm gonna do, especially off the return side. And then you throw in just a little bit of late and Hewitt hustle, you know, and you put in a 2.0 version of Novak, that is Yannick Center, right? On the flip side of that, you have, in my opinion, probably the best shop maker, the best.

Alvin Owusu (04:36.11)
Mm-hmm.

Torrey Hawkins (04:58.975)
I don't want to put it all on. I don't want to put so many superlatives that I put this description out of proportion, but perhaps one of the best athletes to ever pick up a tennis racket. You know, I certainly think it's fair. And certainly, number two is Yannick Center, by the way. So let's make sure I put that in there in the same context. You've got one of the most exciting players whose probably biggest weakness is his biggest strength in that he is a shop maker and his own

Alvin Owusu (05:08.664)
think it's fair.

Torrey Hawkins (05:29.639)
discipline or his own sometimes inability to do the routine or to do it over and over again might be his undoing. And so you love to see these matchups where Al Carraz's imagination playing in a sense video game tennis and Yannick's ability to counter and play percentages is really what you're looking at. You're looking at, you know,

You're looking at who's the great chess champion and when he and now I think he played Watson after a while. Yeah, and in the big to see how fast how good Watson was. I know it's a bad analogy, but that's that's what I'm coming up with. You've got this ability of this great tennis brain that just sees the whole game in a in a magical ethereal sense. And then you've got, you know, one of the best high percentage counter is of all time. So

Alvin Owusu (06:01.975)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (06:21.829)
I was honestly disappointed with that it didn't go three. I was really hoping that, I was really hoping that we'd see a little more of it. I felt like Carlos as he's apt to do got a little sloppy, got a little sloppy in the first. I thought he had him in the match. And quite frankly, I think he had that medical situation in the first, right? And then he actually came out and played a little better, right? He was a return away from winning the first set. And he was a oddly weird shank.

you know, return from right from center. And I kind of threw them off and kind of gave center a little bit of a match to not to break back. And otherwise that three one could have easily been six three and we'd have had ourselves a third set. So I don't want to sound disappointed in yet winning. I want to sound disappointed in that didn't go three sets. I felt like the longer these two play, you start to see different nuances. You start seeing a few more things.

Alvin Owusu (06:51.831)
shank return, shank forehand.

Torrey Hawkins (07:20.156)
He never really did, Alvin, he never really did break Carlos. Carlos lost serve. And the same with the first, and I have to make that distinction because throughout the match, Carlos' out wide serve and his down the tee on the deuce are so lethal that anytime he dialed it up, which was often, Yannick has no answer.

But your boy kept making a couple comments about it. My main man, I love Jim Curry, kept making comments. Let's see if Yanuk can get the ball to Carlos' backhand. He got it to his backhand a few times and he got stung off the darn backhand. And still, I think he got it to his backhand maybe four, maybe five times in the entire match off the due side. So I say that to say the ball and the options are still on Carlos' side.

Alvin Owusu (07:55.309)
I can't off that first ball, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (08:05.452)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (08:13.757)
Did Carlos convert? No, he got a little sloppy. He got a little error, got a little extra. He had a volley. He had a volley out in the high backhand volley. As you both saw, that would have converted that whole thing. I think that was to go up low 40. You know what mean? And had that whole thing going, that would have been a 6-3 second set. And who knows what would have happened. I'm not here to talk about what it could have showed up. As a fan, I was looking forward to another edition of the French that may have gone a little bit longer.

Alvin Owusu (08:41.879)
Sure, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (08:42.969)
And that's my quote unquote disappointment as a fan. Hats off to Yannick. But I really feel like Carlos lost this match. Yannick didn't beat him.

Alvin Owusu (08:52.919)
So I think we look at this through, and I've done this before and I try to be very judicious not to do it when it's not warranted, but I feel like we look at this matchup a lot of the times through the lens of it's always on Carlos' racket. It's not really about Yannick, it's about Carlos. And so when I was watching this match today, I'm like, okay, well there's nothing really on the line here. Like this is effectively a trumped up, not necessarily exhibition match, but they can just let it all hang out.

Maybe it's a little bit of bragging rights, whatever, whatever these guys play out each other all the time. But then as I'm watching the match and I'm watching the first set unfold, I never felt like Carlos was losing. I never felt like he was losing or threatened. And even the look on his face, he never seemed stressed. He never seemed worried again, maybe that had to do with the circumstances. But also I wrote down it's like he doesn't he seems like he understands exactly what he needs to do.

Torrey Hawkins (09:37.149)
or threatened. Thank you.

Alvin Owusu (09:52.31)
And this is gonna teeter on whether or not he executes at the points that he needs to. And that's kinda what it came down to in the first set. Now, he did get a little, he pulled the hamstring a little bit, whatever, and I think that's almost a microcosm of what it takes to beat either one of these guys. You need everything. The other one needs help, but if you're gonna do it, you need everything because you can't slip up. You can't slip up.

Torrey Hawkins (10:11.303)
Right. He needs some help.

Alvin Owusu (10:22.221)
Center it did not serve well today and I want to I wanted to talk a little bit about serves and returns with you when we get there but Yannick didn't serve well Backhand was backhand was out and you know somewhere in in the the plaza most of the most of the first set and Carlos seemed like he had that match like where he wanted that match as we got further and further into that set it's like okay Well in a tiebreaker, actually trust Yannick more. I just I trust Yannick when

Torrey Hawkins (10:27.228)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (10:48.54)
100%.

Alvin Owusu (10:50.497)
When it comes down to we need to not miss, I trust him in general. Right, right. When you don't have time to make it up. Like in a tiebreaker, there's very little time to make up for your bad decisions or your dump points here and there. That's exactly what we saw in that tiebreaker, right? Like Carlos missed one here, he missed one there, next thing you okay, this thing is done. But yeah, I wanna make sure that I give credit where credit's due with Yannick. He didn't.

Torrey Hawkins (10:53.371)
Right. And not make bad decisions.

Alvin Owusu (11:18.059)
One of the things that he does so well, and we talked about this, I think in Paris, right? The amount of, like when I watch him get low and create ground force off of ground strokes, it is something to watch. it's as specific as like internal rotation of the opposite knee, like on that forehand side, that left knee just torques in and he just unloads in that ball. It's a beautiful thing to see, like, yeah, on the forehand side, like it's...

Torrey Hawkins (11:39.26)
No. No. He does on the foreign side too. mean, he, I was saying his inside out might be as textbook as I've ever seen. And he gets so, and his ability to get around it and nail it. He has the ability Alvin to go inside out with a step in. You know how hard that is? mean, and still get rotational power. I mean,

The speed and the ability of which to get the hip around on a ball like that. mean, a lot of guys have to wait, let it slot and then create torque. No, he can get around it and step in and he can get around and go up and stance. Doesn't matter. And that's very, very hard to do. And he does it and makes it look relatively simple.

Alvin Owusu (12:23.051)
Yeah, and like I'll even add to that. Like if I felt like any time Yannick has the ability to step forward and hit a ball, toast, like toast. And Carlos does a really good job of making Yannick move side to side, making him pick balls up, especially on the backhand side. Like when Carlos, you saw it in the US Open and you saw it again today, slice to the backhand cross court, make Yannick pick it up, roll backhand, make Yannick either hitch kick it,

Torrey Hawkins (12:37.957)
Right.

Right. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (12:50.468)
Yes.

Alvin Owusu (12:52.107)
or back up just a little bit and then start, exactly, exactly. So yeah, just making Yannick do it from a lot of different positions, but in the event that Yannick can step forward, especially with that left foot, it's game over, you're on your ass. So that battle, it's really interesting to watch. And I was impressed that Yannick was able to not play his best tennis.

Torrey Hawkins (12:54.029)
enough to not count as punished. That's right.

Alvin Owusu (13:21.035)
and yet be solid enough to capitalize on the little slip ups that that Carlos had in the big moments and ultimately just win the match. Yeah, just just win the match. Yeah, it was it.

Torrey Hawkins (13:26.395)
Right, right. A hundred percent. He got through it. He did amazing. I thought he played great. A little bit of help from Carlos. I have to say it. Clearly Carlos perhaps pressed a little bit, right? Especially toward the end. Who knows how much the injury was bothering him. He's never going to make an excuse. I'm not here to make one for him. I'm just saying even all that was standing. It still seemed like he was in control of the match. But hats off to Yannick. was another great

another good match. The only reason it's not a great match, Alvin, is that they had given us great before. And so this got relegated to just good, you know, in the all-time instant classic list from these two. And I feel we'll see a lot of these two going forward. Alvin, I have to say there was two or three things I didn't like about this whole thing. And I've already mentioned the first. I hated that they announced the year-end information.

Alvin Owusu (13:59.627)
Right, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (14:23.191)
ahead of the finals. really, yeah, but it isn't. This is your point earlier about this whole tournament. And it's to me, it's one of the whole reasons why this tournament to me needs to be done a little bit differently. You're still, you need to play for something for this tournament to really matter. The reasons the slams matter is their slams. They have history on their side. There's points, there's rankings and such. The winner of this tournament, I think,

Alvin Owusu (14:23.958)
Why, that's just math though. It's unfortunate, but like.

Torrey Hawkins (14:53.658)
and however they want to do it next year, it's up to them. It needs to have year-end consequences. Now, is that to say a guy can win three slams and not win the end of year tournament and not be number one? Well, that would be unfortunate. But I feel like given this past year, the guys were in a sense teed up and tied up on lot of stats going in, even with centers, we're gonna call it his sabbatical, for lack of a better word.

I feel like this tournament should have been the tiebreaker a little more than it should have That's my first one. What say you?

Alvin Owusu (15:31.063)
I'll say what if we just, what if we take the, because really we're just talking about points in math, right? What if we take that out of it? Let's take it out of it, okay? Whatever the points are, whatever the actual rankings are, let's look at it from a tennis fan standpoint, right? We've got two guys who have split the two, you know, the four Grand Slams over the last two years, but specifically this year, right? You've got these ties who are head and shoulders above the rest of the field. I think I heard this that repeated a few different times over the last week that.

Alexander's very who is ranked three in the world in points is closer to the 1000 person in the world than he is to number two Like that's how big the gap is right? It's a joke. So Take the take but take the points out of it. These are the these guys are I Effectively saw this as a maybe a tiebreaker Like maybe maybe the the bragging rights between the two of them is all that really matters Maybe what we feel at the end of the year going into Australia in a couple weeks

is all that really matters. Like they know what's up and Yannick played 75 % of the year and he was still right there. So, I mean, who had a better season? mean...

Torrey Hawkins (16:33.594)
Right? Right? I think I saw the match, it was something to your exact point. want to say it was like, Carlos was like, I don't know, and I'm gonna spitball this amount. I wrote it down, 72 and like six, I Yanuk was 63 and like five. It was something that you looked at, where was those extra nine to 10 or 15 matches? Oh, that's right, he missed 90 days. so, but right, so that being said.

Alvin Owusu (16:58.038)
He didn't play Indian Wells, he didn't play Miami, he didn't play Monte Carlo.

Torrey Hawkins (17:02.797)
But they were both very similar in points. It's just one of them played a little longer than the other one did. So to your point, it was a very similar year and obviously they both ended up in the same situation. So you can't even be mad at the result. And they are the best two players in the world. So it is what it is. It is what it

Alvin Owusu (17:21.716)
It is what it is. It doesn't bother me. It didn't bother me. What was your third point? Second point, sorry.

Torrey Hawkins (17:25.632)
My second point. My second point is that going forward, I would like for this last end of the year tournament to have a little bigger impact on next year. I don't care what it may be. It's hard to say it's just one tournament, but I feel like it should have the, in a sense, the two things should matter in next year's seating for any slam. Number one, this tournament.

And number two, who won this tournament last year, right, should affect seeding slash rankings going forward. I'm sorry, not rankings, seeding, not necessarily ranking. Ranking is points. I get that. That you have to keep constant. But it should affect seeding. And that way a person should be able to, and I'm talking the end of the year situation. That way these eight guys, who are largely gonna be the same eight guys, get the chance to have.

the benefit of this tournament's results, I'm about the group stage in particular, to factor into next year. And let's just say it was Felix and who was it, Felix and Ben, and now you get the ability for that, no, Demon R, sorry, it Demon R and, was it Demon R? Demon R and Felix. Demon R and Felix should then get some love or some tiebreaker, if you will, to be three and four, as the case may be. Now, that's the smaller thing, because now you're putting something on the line, right?

Alvin Owusu (18:36.502)
DemonR and Felix, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (18:46.444)
Mmm.

Torrey Hawkins (18:52.277)
If not, then it's just another tournament. You know, this is just another 1000 that just has a lot of points in a bigger purse.

Alvin Owusu (18:57.002)
Well, it's another 1,000, but only eight people get to play it. So by playing it, you get the opportunity to win more extra points that other players don't have the opportunity to earn.

Torrey Hawkins (19:08.237)
But if it doesn't help you that much into next year and seeding, for your points, and seeding, what does it matter? I would personally like to see this have some level of, it should matter enough, especially for the three through. And I think the other guys should play it out. That's a side point. The other guys should play it out for five through eight. You know what mean? I think now you really get an idea of, hey buddy, you better finish strong. You know, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (19:17.056)
Yeah

Alvin Owusu (19:37.046)
Send him over to the, send him to the local university to play the backdoll.

Torrey Hawkins (19:40.196)
Well, do something. They can play a set for it, whatever the case may be. And again, it's very non-tennis, but it's also non-tennis to a group stage. So if we're gonna change this whole format, why not? Please. My third one. Under no circumstances, under no circumstances should the results of number one be listed before the end.

Alvin Owusu (19:50.152)
Ooh, I'm gonna come back to that. Give me your third one though before I come back to that.

Torrey Hawkins (20:07.978)
match. I'm going to come back to that point in here and here's my reason for missing it.

Alvin Owusu (20:11.424)
What do mean by listed? What do you mean? Because everyone was aware of the math going in. Like Carlos needed to do X, Y, Z in this event to secure you're in number one. So what do you?

Torrey Hawkins (20:22.583)
That can't be until this tournament is over. If this tournament is to matter. That's all I'm saying. Let it be 5,000 points. I don't care what it is. Put two slams on top of it there it is. Now, should that guy who won it win, well then it doesn't matter anyway. He's number one. But should they, again, to my point, on a simple map, 1,000 points per grand slam. I don't know what the points are. Let's say it's 2,000.

Alvin Owusu (20:29.504)
Well, yeah, I hear.

Hahaha

Alvin Owusu (20:50.252)
2004 Grayson win.

Torrey Hawkins (20:51.704)
2004 slam. So this one becomes 3,500. I'm just saying it should be that much more to matter. here's, here's my, and I know it's dicey, but Alvin, the reason why this tournament has always struggled to matter at the end of the year is the fact that it doesn't matter at the end of the year at the slams hold so much sway and everything else. And go ahead.

Alvin Owusu (20:57.644)
Uggh

Alvin Owusu (21:15.926)
Okay, so yeah, okay, I'm obviously directionally, I'm with you. I'm Mr. Make Turin Matter, right? And for the year in number one, so let's say if Carlos had lost to Musetti, right? And went into the semi-finals round two and one, he would have played against Sinner. And they would have literally been playing for year number one. So we were close, we were close, right?

Torrey Hawkins (21:41.749)
Nope. Nope.

Alvin Owusu (21:44.3)
I don't like necessarily having 51 weeks, know, matter less than, I mean matter less than one week. But directionally I'm with you. I make Turin matter. I'm with you. The execution, it's up for debate. But.

Torrey Hawkins (22:02.87)
And it's getting it gets dicey messy. I'm building to my third point and the winner should have it be in their home turf the following year

Alvin Owusu (22:05.565)
But okay.

Alvin Owusu (22:14.715)
Okay, I'm gonna not address. I like, I hear you. think what we're talking about is how we make Davis Cup better. That's really what that is.

Torrey Hawkins (22:17.664)
Pushback, I know you wanna pushback. At some point, at some point.

Torrey Hawkins (22:26.71)
Davis Cup, Davis Cup is Davis Cup and they have their own challenges. Davis Cup to me is, we'll put that off to the side and I love Davis Cup. I just feel like.

Alvin Owusu (22:30.846)
Sure, let's put that to the side.

Torrey Hawkins (22:38.773)
and I love the fact that it's there. I'm so happy for Italy to have such a great tennis presence right now. could not, from Jasmine, and let me kick off, let me make sure everybody put my shout out to Jasmine Paolini, who has completely helped Italy be on the map. Dare I say, even before Carlos really, before Janik kind of took his ascension to the top. She has done a phenomenal job. My favorite.

Alvin Owusu (22:44.597)
We're right back at it next week.

Torrey Hawkins (23:05.012)
Lorenzo Mazzetti and others have done a phenomenal job. They've had a lot of top players. Who's my girls? Arani. There have been so many good players from Italy that they deserve this moment. I'm just saying if there is a way for that tournament to float based off of last year's champ, then that's also just one more thing to put the onus on the champs. This tournament has implications for next.

year. That's my point. And all I'm trying to do is trying to find a way for this to continue to matter. You know, it was my issue and quite frankly, I mentioned the same thing for the deputy. Hey, I love it in Riyadh. It was a great spot. I'm sure it's a nice, as you mentioned before, neutral setting. Maybe that's the problem. Maybe it should be a little more raucous for that person. The person who won it last year should have that, if you will, it should hold sway that direction. There's nothing.

Alvin Owusu (23:35.125)
Sure, okay, fair.

Alvin Owusu (24:01.835)
Well, here's, me, I'm gonna quickly pivot over to like why I think this tournament might be perfect. Might be perfect, right? The location was fantastic. Like Italy's kind of the center of the ATP right now in it. And Turin, I don't know if you've ever been to Turin. I've been to Turin, I've been to this event. It's lovely and it takes over the city. You see pictures of the players everywhere, especially when you're at the airport. It's like down.

Torrey Hawkins (24:06.39)
That's it.

Okay?

Alvin Owusu (24:29.375)
downtown throughout the area, especially closer, closer and closer you get to the arena. It's fantastic. It's great weather this time of year as well. Okay, so location's great. One, two, do you get to see your favorite players? Yeah, you do, because they're playing a minimum of three matches. It's fantastic, all right? Is the prize money, group stage, yeah. Is the prize money good? It's fantastic. they, like, are tied in, they get points, they get great prize money.

Torrey Hawkins (24:45.141)
if we match it, sure. Goobstakes, that's Goobstakes format.

Alvin Owusu (24:58.163)
It's played in one week and in your world it has higher stakes, but like, there is something, there is something, there's a lot of players have a lot of pride in qualifying for the event. Like Lorenzo Mazzetti put himself through the wringer the last month just to get into this event. and had his, and had his, exactly. That's what I'm saying. Like, so when you start looking at all the different people who were involved in like in tennis, right? Tournament organizers, players, fans.

Torrey Hawkins (25:14.325)
Just to qualify, for sure. And there's a not a paycheck. Let's not put that out there.

Alvin Owusu (25:27.539)
rights holders, everyone kind of wins here. And like, I feel like more tournaments, that's the worst thing is when you like buy tickets to day three or four of an event hoping to see your favorite player and then they have a, they poop the bed in round one for some reason and they're gone by the time you get there. It's like, it's the worst, it's the worst. And that sucks for a fan. And I think like, there can be a way to get it all. The players get to play a few matches.

Torrey Hawkins (25:40.646)
And then I didn't buy that.

Torrey Hawkins (25:46.751)
Yeah, I'll put you.

Alvin Owusu (25:56.896)
You get to see all the players and then based on how they do, then they move forward and someone can actually win the tournament. Right. And I think you could even take like a, if you, you did that for the top eight players, maybe leave open two spots, let there be two rounds of qualities before that, let those players play. And this is our grand pre, right? This is our super tour or whatever it is. I there's something there because I felt like it was a full experience, both as a spectator at home, as a spectator in person, like I,

Torrey Hawkins (26:03.731)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (26:26.739)
I love this event. That's just me. I talk a little bit about this matchup. There are some things that I saw this week. Actually, let's talk about Yannick Center just a little bit. There's one thing that both Anacone and Courier both called out throughout this match. And Yannick mentioned it as much after the US Open that his serve needs to get better. And his first serve particularly. So Anacone was breaking down the idea that

with that Yannick has been trying to get his serve toss back. And when his serve goes off, you can see him chasing tosses out in front. His left foot is landing further and further into the court. And then you start to see the dip in the first serve percentage. What specifically, like what is the mechanism we're working with there when we're talking about not depth and shallowness of the serve toss?

Torrey Hawkins (27:22.366)
Simple geography, Alvin. 90 degrees versus 70 degrees, the sweet spot being 80, right? 90 degrees, the toss is more above me. 70 is too far in front of me, more than that. obviously 80 degrees is my ideal. Kicks, knee a little bit more on top of the head as most of us know, and slices and flats typically go off the same serve toss, obviously a much different action depending on the external rotation of the hand and the supination of the actual hand itself.

still rotation shoulder supination obviously of the sorry pronation of the wrist itself one of the things that i find is so key yanik is a pretty tall guy i find that when his toss is out in the court i find his flat serve is better against everybody else except carlos alcares that being said i find it's difficult it's difficult because we're

comparing one of the best returners in the game in his rival who just happens to know him well enough to know that his flattened slice are pretty good. His slice doesn't necessarily break the double sideline like it could. And for whatever reason, he has a decent first rep position most of the time. I personally think while he's dead on, I think it hurts him the most against one player.

And that's the guy over my left shoulder right now. And that is Carlos Alcaraz. Alcaraz just has the beat on Yannick's serve. To answer your question fully, I think Anacone's not necessarily taking into consideration that Yannick's 6'3", almost 6'4". And I think he actually does a great job of hitting the serve when his toss is slightly further on the court. I'm gonna disagree with Paul Anacone. And I think he's one of the best serve coaches.

Alvin Owusu (28:54.836)
Hmph.

Alvin Owusu (29:10.93)
Hmm, interesting, because Paul's a good server himself. Tall guy, with Taylor Fritz. Tennessee, right? Yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (29:13.747)
Big and a tall guy. I saw Paul when he played at University of Tennessee years ago. I went to the match when he played here, shot out. There's one, I Paul's watching in. When he lost to Roberto Saad of Wichita State way back in the early 80s. So I'm gonna kind of date myself, but also help him by to appreciate how long back I go from watching Paul Anico. Paul is a phenomenal serving and has great action on the ball.

and was one of the best serve ballers to play back. Hence why Roger called up his services and others. Taylor Fritch, you mentioned currently and others over the years. I personally feel, and Yannick has a little bit of the pinpoint, he's got what I call the hybrid pinpoint, but he has a little bit more of a pinpoint. And when you bring that foot forward, I think you get a little extra. The problem with Yannick's pinpoint and his serve motion, he doesn't get enough MPH to justify it. So yes, he lands further in the court. That's what the toss will do.

but he's not serving 140 plus. And if you're not serving 140 plus, you gotta ask yourself, is the juice worth the squeeze? And that's where I think Anacone is mentioning. He's not necessarily delivering the goods, getting first strikes, getting free service with service winners or aces like he could. Look at his five, I think Carlos is six feet one at best. But in my opinion, I've seen him around the grounds. They say he's a little taller. I think he's six foot, maybe six one.

Alvin Owusu (30:39.914)
Yeah, that's about right.

Torrey Hawkins (30:41.575)
He gets more action on that out wide serve, Alvin. He breaks that ball about the box is 21 feet long. He gets about 15 to 14 feet and breaks that ball into the alley where you have to move over and to respect it. And he's got a very solid, very, very solid down the T on the deuce. And so now you've got a guy who is for all intents and purposes, he is shorter, simple.

Alvin Owusu (31:02.846)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (31:10.654)
similar toss, but now his toss is a little more on the court because he's also shorter, but he can break the angle on the slice and not sacrifice pop down the tee. Now, to me, if I'm those guys, I'm working a little more on wrist snap, I'm working a little more on some strength conditioning, I'm working a little more on targets because there's no reason that Yannick, at his height and his stature, cannot get a little more pop down the tee with that toss big slap in the court and

actually get the freebie that that out in the court toss is giving him. Does it give it away a little bit? Sure. Always does when you're leaning a little bit more forward. You're not gonna, you're not gonna kick. We know that. But at the same time, you saw how far Carlos was back up on that return on all of Yanuk's second serves. Alvin, he moves back 10 feet. He knows what's coming.

Alvin Owusu (31:56.245)
You know, so let's, want to, want to break into that a little bit. the return position. So this came up actually on two separate occasions throughout this tournament. One being Taylor Fritz was asked about it in one of his post-match press conferences. I can't remember exactly who he was playing against, which matches was after. It might've been, I think it was when he played Musetti actually after his first match against Musetti.

And they were asking him, like, yeah, when Musetti backs up, like, why do you go with a slower kick? Why don't you go bigger? He's like, well, he's so far back there. By the time that thing actually comes down, it's right in his wheelhouse, and he's backing up to take a big swing at it. So there's not a lot of point in me increasing my risk.

Torrey Hawkins (32:42.193)
Thank you.

Alvin Owusu (32:50.998)
Just to like it's not gonna make much of a difference anyways. I hit that I hit that kicker 20 miles an hour bigger I'm in a more vulnerable position and it doesn't really matter. He's still gonna hit the same ball anyway, so Let's just get it and get it sir So, okay, so that's one way to look at it, right? That's the way Taylor was looking at it. I saw today Carlos Similar when Yannick would back up Carlos is often in the same position, right? Okay, he's backed up I'm hitting the second serve, but he's like I'm gonna come in

Torrey Hawkins (32:58.289)
Thank you.

Anyway, law of the

Alvin Owusu (33:20.446)
I'm just gonna start in volley off of it. He did it to Demonor actually two days ago, a lot, like just like, not Demonor, sorry, against Felix. He did it Felix, not Demonor. And I was like, there's two different ways to look at what do I do when someone backs up against a return to serve. Now, to the point about how Carlos was handling Janik's second serve, I thought that backing up, and I was counting that he did it like five or six times, but he only won one of those points.

Torrey Hawkins (33:23.76)
Yeah, thought that.

Alvin Owusu (33:50.653)
as opposed to coming up. There were lots of times when Carlos came up on second serves, took the backhand, especially on the do side, took the inside and backhand off there on the rise, effectively punched that something's down the line and came in behind it. And he was extremely effective there. They're not.

Torrey Hawkins (34:04.74)
Yup. Yup.

dare I say blew a of volleys on that play later in the second that he would have won the second form. Just saying.

Alvin Owusu (34:12.102)
Yeah Right, right. I think that's when we started to get a little bit of like maybe being just a half step slow started to Impact him and some of those Yeah

Torrey Hawkins (34:20.242)
Yeah, and being happy about that hamstring, flashed leg, and perhaps he was forcing, shortened points. But keep going.

Alvin Owusu (34:26.74)
But to that point though, they're not robots, right? You can have the intent to step up and tag a second serve and come in behind it, but sometimes, especially if you play a 21 ball rally at the point before, you just gotta catch your breath. Like, I can't get up there right now. I can't do it, I'm not feeling comfortable. I don't wanna take the risk, like whatever, whatever, whatever. But in this cat and mouse game of second serve server against second serve returner,

Torrey Hawkins (34:30.34)
I'm a human, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (34:56.314)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (34:56.682)
How do you look at this? How do we manage this?

Torrey Hawkins (35:01.346)
Number one, how often is it happening? Number two, who am I second serve serving against and how effective is that second serve returner? Number one, how often is it happening? If I did the numbers, Alvin, off the top of my head, I would say that Yannick probably was in the 70 % range, is what I'm gonna spitball and say. I think that's where he was at. So it's not happening that often. And I don't think Yannick is as, he's not a,

Such a big gun off the serve that he's trying his his service hold is not dependent upon service winners and aces I think we both appreciate that and he controls the court He controls middle court he controls things on the rise so well that he's he's okay If you hurt him a little bit if the ball lands in that back three foot of the court anybody's vulnerable But who can return that well it just so happens that this opponent can hit the balls in the last three feet of the court and make that happen I I want to go

That's number one. There's the first answer to question is how often? How often is 7 % 30 %? So it's being Thursdays the time you're vulnerable. And in most cases, that's good enough for everybody else. Against Carlos, not as much, but today was enough. The second one was who is the second serve returner? In this case, I'll talk more to Carlos. Carlos showed us something in the US Open, Alvin, that I think that every junior pro, I mentioned it in the podcast actually, after that match, he has brought back

what I call the high heavy. I'm not talking about the looper. I'm talking about that roller with not much pace that puts every on the rise player, and Yannick is probably the best definition of one, because as an on the rise player, because you're taking the ball early, by definition, you're probably gonna go more cross court, right? And when you roll that ball, you take away the pace that the on the rise hitter wants to gain at two.

Alvin Owusu (36:37.93)
Mm-hmm.

Torrey Hawkins (36:53.495)
and you're almost always going to go cross court. You can't take it on the rise and change direction. And the slower the ball is, the more unlikely it is to do so. So he's rolling this ball. And I think that's actually the genius of what the Alcaraz camp, you know, obviously led by Juan Carlos has figured out. Don't give him pace to hurt you with, which is why I think it's such a riskier proposition to take the inside in, your favorite term, the skinny cross, back in and set it. Great play to do from time to time because you make, keep modest.

Alvin Owusu (37:00.946)
harder. Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (37:23.224)
But the more you back up, you almost know the ball's coming there. You know what you have to do. I would like to see both players improve upon the Carlos, the inside out backhand return really stretch the court wide. I think Yanek ironically is very good at covering his backhand side to the running forehand. I'm not so sure he's as good covering the out wide backhand with the running.

on on the run forehand with the on run backhand. Right. The right to left, I think is much more vulnerable than the left to right is what I'm getting at now. Andy Murray was phenomenal at this return above. had both of them, but he was so good at the inside out that he could take you back corner, which is of my reasons why he's Andy Murray. That backhand was all day. He was world class, one of the few players that was truly world class. I would even give it. I would even give him the nod just barely over

Alvin Owusu (37:52.938)
on the run forehand into the, rather backhand, yep.

Torrey Hawkins (38:19.99)
Novak over the best backhand return. And we know how solid Novak's back, Novak returns are. I say it because of the ability to move the ball around. And here's why I'm saying it, Alan. Because no one knows what you're gonna do with that ball. The one thing these two guys have going for them and unfortunately going against them, is you kind of know their, they each kind of know what they're each gonna do. So at some points, the,

Alvin Owusu (38:26.141)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (38:47.725)
The known is what you're fighting. And so there, again, it's not what's possible, it's what's likely. They're gonna hit what's likely. And when he's down, know, Carlos is gonna back up and roll that ball. And he knows Yanuk ain't gonna crush him. He knows Yanuk won't serve and ball against him because he respects Carlos's pass. And of course he's not as that, that's a huge risk for him. And the iterations going forward, I think that will change. But as of right now, I think that the who is retaking the return.

It's Carlos, it's a cause of awkward. Okay, well then let me just get the return in and survive. And then hope that he makes an uncharacteristic mistake and I'll get back to my 70 plus percent first serve to not give him that chance at the next point. That's how I think Gannett's thinking.

Alvin Owusu (39:33.194)
That's fair. are, I don't specifically on the deuce side, I don't love the idea of taking that backhand inside out just because of the way the ball's coming in, like righty, it's coming into the body, into Carlos' backhand. It's almost more natural to take it line. If you try to fight it off and take it inside out, now Carlos is almost right foot landing a little bit, even on the sideline.

Torrey Hawkins (39:52.194)
Sir?

Alvin Owusu (40:02.299)
and now you've got Yannick's forehand to an open court. I just don't love it. Maybe I like it more than backing up. I just don't feel like backing up is actually, it seems that Carlos is best when he's able to put pressure on Yannick as soon as possible and off the second serve is a really, really good opportunity. When he took it, he capitalized on it, but backing up and letting him reset is almost like giving away your advantage on that second serve return. But, you know, we're.

Torrey Hawkins (40:02.445)
YEAH!

Torrey Hawkins (40:30.529)
Here, let me add to that. We are splitting hairs, but with these two you have split hairs, because that's the difference. So Alvin, let me say this. How good are Yannick's passing shots?

Alvin Owusu (40:31.539)
We're splitting hairs to a certain extent. You have to split hairs. That's where we are with these two.

Alvin Owusu (40:42.907)
Okay, I don't know if you stole this from my notes, but I feel early in this match and almost as an extension of the US Open, I had this feeling that Carlos doesn't really rate Yannick's passing shots all that high because he does this, he does this like I'm coming in like it's approach shot pass, like self fed approach shot pass. Like I'm coming in and I'm pretty sure I can handle, my hands are better than your first pass. I'll be able take whatever you throw at me.

So long-winded answer of saying, I started off the smash feeling that Carlos didn't think Yannick's passing shots were that good. But then Yannick got pretty dialed in and his passing shots looked amazing.

Torrey Hawkins (41:25.021)
I was taking that route. think Yanick's passes are actually pretty good. Especially after he makes a couple. He finds he can pass line, he can pass cross, and he doesn't dip and pass. He doesn't do the old school Jerry Baskin, you know, two ball pass pattern. No, no,

Alvin Owusu (41:39.369)
Two shot pass. a two shot, love a two shot pass.

Torrey Hawkins (41:43.085)
100%, but he is ripping it cross or ripping it line. His height over the net is not very high, so it already is dipping anyway. It's like Jones Bjorkman's backhand return in doubles. It's hitting the service box corner. Whether you like it or not, deal with it. Here's the problem. If I take the backhand return due side inside in, I've got two options. Stay, look for a forehand, or come in and take a volley.

Let's take option one, I stay. He hits it on the rise backhand back cross court. I'm going backhand to backhand, I gain nothing. Okay, I can go for bigger and miss. I can go for bigger and just right nail it. Or I can let, I can run him again with my backhand line and he actually hurts me more on the forehand side, but she does constantly. So that's almost an antagonist against me taking the ball early and staying back. I can take the ball inside in and come in.

Alvin Owusu (42:19.689)
That's not a good spot.

Torrey Hawkins (42:42.7)
trust that my backhand volley is gonna nail it just enough. By the way, he missed that volley, which cost him a set. He missed that same volley. I can get creative in my out wide shape. You know, my fan angle, know, volley on the backhand drop angle, whatever the heck he was trying to do on that one ball. But I'm putting a lot of pressure on myself and the whole goal of approaching that is to put pressure on the opponent. So I feel.

Alvin Owusu (42:55.453)
dropper situation,

Alvin Owusu (43:07.561)
But what does he also, you missed one though. What does he leave open though? When he comes in, what does he leave open? What Yannick found at some point in this match was the reading rainbow shouts the Sawyer Duncan, the reading rainbow right over your head.

Torrey Hawkins (43:16.836)
The long. Green rainbows. The teardropper. The eyedropper as he called it. And that is the problem. So at some point, I just don't think that the juice was worth the squeezing up on that backhand inside in over time. Now, which is again why it comes back to who's the return of server here. Because they only have so many options. He's not gonna pull a booblick and try to hit a backhand drop shot on that return.

Yannick is fast. So at some point, what I'm getting to you is it isn't so much, hey, try the inside out one. It's that's the one play that will actually hurt Yannick's court position to allow you to then open up and run the back in and then come in and dictate play. I'm not saying that it's an easy ball. Arguably it's the hardest shot, which is why it doesn't happen. I watched a match, it had been Paris. I watched.

Alvin Owusu (44:02.258)
Sure. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (44:13.94)
And I went back and watch some highlights, try to get some notes for this podcast. And I watched the Felix match against Buble. Every single backhand serve was a on the rise backhand that landed at or near the service line. In which case, and this is the difference of the match. Buble took it backhand back cross. Felix took an inside out cross. It was the difference in the match. Where did they both go every single time?

They attempted to go inside in. The ball didn't get much past the service line. It might've gotten three, four, maybe five feet past service line. Alvin, the ball sat up like a piñata and it justifies the means for a good kick serve to the tee. How often does that happen on tour? The more I watched it, I'm like, this happens all the time. Which is why I thought it was so genius for Carlos to back up and roll that ball heavy because what's Yanna gonna do? Move up and hit on the rise?

Go ahead, I got you. And that's why it's a little bit weird to think, in other words, you can't hurt me on this and I kind of hurt you, it's a 30 % situation if I don't, which is why I don't do it as often. And that's all I'm gonna, and that's all in me.

Alvin Owusu (45:30.502)
Right. So you bring up Felix and I think this is a really opportune time to, there's kind of one last point I wanted to hit before we kind of fan out over the tournament a little bit. The announcer during this match had a, the female announcer early on and I don't know who it was, I didn't catch the intro, said Carlos Alcaraz, he's like the Sistine Chapel, it's all about sealing. And I was like, damn, that's good.

because it, cause it kind of, it really, it gave me a visual for something that I'd been thinking about when we talk about Felix and we talk about Carlos. There's something that, that Felix has that often gets con these two things get kind of convoluted together. Feel and touch, feel and touch. Felix has touch. When you see him come to the net and he's got good hands, he could do some creative things with his hands. That is, that is what I consider to be touch.

Torrey Hawkins (46:14.588)
Okay. Sure.

Alvin Owusu (46:27.752)
Carlos has feel when we're talking about taking it inside and backhand and coming in behind it to then finish off. He's thinking two, three shots ahead. He's thinking about shapes. He's thinking about a lot of different things, like working his way around a tennis court to make things happen, create things, open things, give himself opportunities. That is feel. And I think that is like that.

Torrey Hawkins (46:54.279)
I agree with that.

Alvin Owusu (46:57.796)
alongside of his unworldly foot speed of the two things that really get a little overlooked, but are actually part of his superhuman package. Like, yeah, he hits the crap out of a Forehand. Sure.

Torrey Hawkins (47:08.394)
I agree with that. I would go further. When I'm talking about this, and I do this with a few other things besides these two terms that, as you say, can often be interchanged, touch almost always connotes some level of underspin or continental skill. You're talking about a drop volley, you're talking about a volley, you're talking about a low volley, you're talking about a slice, you're talking about some level of taking pace off.

and how close and how deft can that hands take away pace and drop a ball into a certain spot. Feel isn't limited to slice. Feel, while it includes, feel could also be your ability to have a high ball, the ability to handle a weird odd volley, how to handle a, an on the rise ball, how to, how to hit a ball a little bit out of your strike zone with a buggy whip and so on. I feel

And this is another one that gets, I feel, speed and quick, right? There's the other one that would be, Speed is how fast you are in every direction. Quick to me is almost always first step, you know? And your ability to get from here to there in a certain amount of time. There's a lot of guys that can be quick that aren't fast, but they're quick. And there's a lot of guys that are quick and fast. they're just, they're just.

Alvin Owusu (48:13.226)
yeah, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (48:21.842)
First step. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (48:36.418)
Usain Bolt is both, right? So I say it to say that I agree with you 100 % on that feel versus touch thing. I don't think there's many players in the world that have the feel of Carlos Alcaraz. And I feel like to your point, to the conscious point about the 16 Chapel, I think that was a good analogy because there is not much of a ceiling, you know, and the ceiling is very, very not only high.

It's pretty darn nice to look at what he can do when he's playing at his highest level. I find that Carlos, in a sense, and this is back to my point earlier, he is so creative, that's almost his undoing from time to time, because he does see the Rubik's Cube and the ways to solve it in nanoseconds is almost his undoing, because there's not much he can't do, right? And that is the concurrent fight within him to be solid.

or to be creative. And I think that's what makes this match up so good is you have the consummate statistician, risk management, and you have the consummate, what if we did it this way? You know what I mean? Kind of outside the box. There is no box for Carlos sometimes. So I think that's what makes this match up so fun to watch.

Alvin Owusu (49:41.576)
He is Mr. Wrist Management.

Alvin Owusu (49:54.931)
Yeah, and you know, it's very interesting how these players do certain things to each other, right? Like, Yannick didn't wake up this morning and like feel groggy and that was the reason why his first serve percentage dropped, right? Like, there was a reason why his first serve percentage dropped, right? He's gotta go for it a little more, right? And Carl...

Torrey Hawkins (50:12.72)
Right. He's trying for more. He knows he has. Right. Watson and his brain is saying you need to serve 78 % to these spots to be successful today. 100%.

Alvin Owusu (50:24.966)
Right. And during that, during that second, that first set tiebreaker, there was a couple of balls that, that Carlos missed that I'm like, he's not going to miss that against anyone else. It's not going to, it's probably not going to hurt him in this, in this position. So like the, the amount of pressure that these two put on each other, not only each other, but on the rest of the players in the tour, like that's, there's these, there's these little, little moments within each match where

Torrey Hawkins (50:44.89)
All right.

Alvin Owusu (50:53.19)
you can see a person, a player kind of blink a little bit, right? Like when Ben Shelton played against Felix, like there was a point in that second set where Ben just kind of got a little unsure of himself. And that was just enough for Felix to take control of the match. And I think the same thing, like Carlos is not above it, right? It just takes Yannick Center to put him in that position. And it was that, it was that.

Torrey Hawkins (50:56.604)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (51:06.054)
Right?

Torrey Hawkins (51:10.054)
Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (51:15.432)
Right.

Right. And maybe only yesterday.

Alvin Owusu (51:20.336)
Right, and I think it was right around three one, three one, maybe in the three one or three two in the tie breaker where he missed that backhand wide and I was like, yeah. He hadn't missed the backhand in a while. Now he misses the backhand. okay, now he misses the backhand.

Torrey Hawkins (51:23.304)
In a second. Yeah.

Contact, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (51:34.886)
Yeah. Yeah. And whether he's going for it or he realizes that Yannick is caught up, you know what mean? Again, to your point, they do a great job of countering each other and they respect each other a great deal. They both have a of an odd understanding. know, Kylo Ren and what's my girl? Rey. Understanding of each other, you know what I mean?

for Star Wars lore of us. Bottom line, another good match. Again, only reason it wasn't great is because we've seen better. But it still to me, know, rounds out the top five of them of all time to date. And if this was good, I'm really looking forward to next year as far as their next iterations going forward.

But to your point, I'd to talk maybe a little bit about Felix. I'd like to talk a little bit about Demonar. I'd to talk about the rest of the, what's the term? The best of the rest. I'd love to.

Alvin Owusu (52:43.877)
The best of the rest, yeah, let's start with Felix. And we'll hit, actually, I'm sure we'll hit most of these guys in the year-end ATP wrap-up pod that we'll do in a couple weeks, but Felix, he said after this tournament, he feels like he's back where he belongs. He's in the upper echelon of the game, and it's kind of built off of basically this part of the year, from US Open to now. He's banked the majority of his points from the season.

Felix has also been one of the best indoor players in the world over the last five years or so. Do you feel like you've seen something that is a marketable change that makes you feel like Felix is in position to have another great, to have a great 2026? Or do you feel like the difference between good Felix and, like decent Felix and good Felix is actually not that, it's not that big of a difference?

Torrey Hawkins (53:40.422)
It's great question. Had I not seen the send me to the US Open, I would have said, this is typical Felix. He plays great indoors. He happened to play that good prior to the indoor season in the US Open. I think Felix has caught a groove. This is the old one. Stella got a groove back kind of a thing. Ironically, he made the comic. know he's he's been ranked there before, but I didn't really feel like he was that good that I thought he was kind of overachieving. I feel like he's there now in essence.

Alvin Owusu (53:56.836)
Hehehe

Torrey Hawkins (54:09.958)
Dare I say in earnest, he's playing that good right now. Yours are my five words out, he's playing good right now. You've gotta appreciate that the other players know that and the fact that he knows that and there's no, absolutely no replacement for confidence in a player who's playing well. Do I think he can take in 20, 26? 1000%. Do I think he's playing good ball? 1000%. Do I think he's playing committed, playing clear, his forehand?

not waffling on what to do, what not to do, 1000%. And so I think that will bode him well going forward. Do I think that he's got a very short window to try to strike and to maintain his dominance and try to maybe take a set or two off these guys and some of the majors to really keep pushing? Cause you can't just stay in third place, Alvin. You have to continue to get closer to first and second and beat the also Rams down.

And that's going to be Felix's big test to me is can he now take on the all can he take on all comers and that's going to be, that's going to be tougher. That's something that I don't want to get ahead of myself and get you ahead of your list. That's something that I feel like Zverev has kind of failed to do as the number three person in the world. Take no leg out of it for all ranks and purposes. Zverev has been that number three. I am beating everybody else, but those two. And unfortunately Zverev has not.

been able of late to keep clawing and taking stabs, taking strides to catch up to the one and two. And therefore it's the death of a thousand cups for everybody else.

Alvin Owusu (55:49.586)
what's happened on the other side for Zverev as well. Like he's also now losing to other people. I think he's lost to 16 or 17 different players this year. So like it's happening. He's not, not only is he not getting closer to those two, he's getting further away and everyone else is just pulling him back.

Torrey Hawkins (56:03.353)
He's to my point. To my point, that of a thousand cuts will cover this morning. You're into the year thing you talked about. I've got this player not necessarily doing some things going forward, but I said also to you to say that's one of the problems. Felix will succumb to the same thing if he does not and his ability to keep that in a sense, that third and chasing versus third and being a target is very, that difference is very, very slight. And

many a third, fourth player in the world has succumbed to that for all the same reasons.

Alvin Owusu (56:38.929)
Yeah, okay, so next up, Ben Shelton. So, Ben had a pretty decent year, think, followed up his, he's semi-finaled two, one, two, semi-finaled Australian. I don't have it in front of me, let's not get into it. But he definitely semi-finaled Australian. Quarter-finaled Wimbledon. He had a pretty good year, but he does have a bit of a Yannick Center problem.

Torrey Hawkins (56:43.096)
been shot.

Torrey Hawkins (56:46.67)
Very good, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (57:09.095)
He's lost eight of their last matches in a row. And so not much better against Carlos either. I don't think he's taken a set from Jannik in their last eight matches. it's, we're,

Torrey Hawkins (57:22.946)
has a set off Carlos to think and when and was it Rome maybe with a French open and there was another thing I thought and I thought maybe one it was in Rome I thought it was Rome also he took it took a self of him and it was one of those kind of seven five or seven six sets but all the same still took a set that to me is the momentum that he Ben Shelton needs to know he's getting closer then is not like most players he's not the best tactical guru out there

Alvin Owusu (57:26.779)
Carlos, yes, at French Open. French Open. I think he took a set off of me at French Open.

Torrey Hawkins (57:52.28)
He is playing off emotion, belief, and absolute ball striking. And I feel like for him to know that he's getting close, and if he believes he's getting closer, that's all he needs to know. And if Ben feels it...

Alvin Owusu (58:03.931)
But that's the thing. I don't think I don't think he is getting closer. I don't think he is getting closer like he I

Torrey Hawkins (58:06.565)
Not closer to those two, but I think he feels he's getting closer in general. He's certainly not losing ground. I feel those players are just tactically a little sharper. And I say that to say, can get closer and be 6-2, 6-1 going away, and you can lose 3 and 4. That's getting closer. You haven't won a set yet, but you are closing the line.

Alvin Owusu (58:15.525)
Sure, sure.

Alvin Owusu (58:30.137)
It is, ask Alex E. Menor, that is getting closer.

Torrey Hawkins (58:33.284)
You are closing the gap and I do feel 1000 % that Ben Sheldon is closing the gap.

Alvin Owusu (58:40.529)
Hmm, interesting. I'm not gonna say that I'm not gonna say that Ben is hitting his ceiling.

Torrey Hawkins (58:44.612)
Will he be a threat to beat them next year? I'm not so sure but because those guys haven't dropped it They haven't dropped a beat, but I do want to mention I think Ben Schell That's what I'm saying that that's unfortunate side for all of them right

Alvin Owusu (58:54.075)
they're also still getting better. They're also still getting better. That's the thing. Yeah, that's the tricky part. Taylor Fritz, I'm gonna get, we're gonna talk a lot about Taylor over the next few weeks, but coming in and out of this event, I feel like Taylor just got the misfortune of almost his order of matches. Like he played Musetti first.

beat Musetti like a drum, fine. Played Carlos next, played really well against Carlos, really well against Carlos, lost that match. And then he plays DiMnore third. I feel like if he had played, and played a great first set against DiMnore, if he had played DiMnore after playing Musetti and then played Carlos last, I feel like he goes two and one and he's in this thing. But I saw him lose that first set to DiMnore in a tiebreaker, I think it was, and then.

Torrey Hawkins (59:35.758)
In reversal. Right.

Alvin Owusu (59:51.663)
just had a bit of a hiccup in his first service game, might have felt a little dejected, and then that was enough for DiMannor to take that second set in the match. So it's like, but they all finished one and two, know, Mercedes gets in and Taylor does not, I feel like, I mean sorry, DiMannor gets in and Taylor does not, but I feel like Taylor was the second best player in that group. And he's been consistently performing at that level.

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:12.83)
and presses that.

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:17.503)
I agree.

Alvin Owusu (01:00:22.214)
pretty much all year. The key is he.

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:23.266)
And took a set off Carlos in round.

Alvin Owusu (01:00:27.098)
Dick's out of Carlos, yeah, yeah. like that's, don't, Taylor, I think Taylor's, it kind of is what it is with him right now. He's going to, I see it every single time he plays against Carlos. Like that lateral, that lateral foot speed just like, not, it's just, can't, the rally gets a little too hot and he gets behind and once he gets behind, like he's off kilter and that's kind of what happens with center.

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:52.321)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:00:55.499)
And, and Carlos, they make it so damn hard. They just make it so hard.

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:58.742)
Yep. But he is the litmus test of number four in the world, in my opinion. Alvin, we've made this comment about Jessica Bagula and others who are very, very good. You cannot dismiss that. cannot, you can't, you can't speak enough to it. The problem is you're dealing with a couple of potential greatest of all times that are playing right now. And had that not been the case, there's a case for Taylor winning one of these bigger, bigger events had those two not

Alvin Owusu (01:01:05.444)
Yeah. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:01:22.437)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:01:28.567)
but that were those two not part of the conversation. Unfortunately, as my father always mentions to me, if a snake had hips, right? And then, so the if is always out there. So, but I think Taylor is doing a great job. He's continuing to close the gap as well. He's certainly no walk over by any stretch. But I do feel like.

He is making a great case for himself to be relevant in 2026. think D. Menard, switching gears a bit to him. This is the best I've seen Alex play against the top in a dare I say ever. I think he was one of those five through eight players that had a chance to maybe beat these guys on a bad day, but take a lot of help. And he's actually improved his chances. That first round match in the group stage against him and Carlos Alvin.

Demon R was playing solid. mean, Demon R had a very solid group stage to put himself very solid in that top five grouping, which was he in particular, Taylor as well, were part of my whole comments was what I feel this tournament should do for next year. Because that, those guys' performance to me showed me that if this tournament were to take the results of this thing, let's say they played out five through eight, or they had one more match to just.

whatever, constantly the rest of the match. So you had an actual ending. So this guy actually finished eighth, seventh, you know, a playoff, if you will. Now, if that were to take you into the actual seeding for next year, all things being equal, that would be something to see. And now you could upset or change your whole future based off this tournament. And I think I won't rehash it, but that would actually help some of the younger guys, some of these guys to make a move next year.

And I hate to say it kind of disrupt the whole cherry picking of Novak Djokovic because now he would face one of those guys sooner. It's not their fault that he's not playing. It's not their fault that he chose not they chose to pull out and it's not their fault that he did not finish top eight and play the end of year championships. All the more reason to make put something more on this tournament to make it have next year implications.

Alvin Owusu (01:03:45.894)
That's the snake with the hips again. That's the snake with the hips. About Demon Orr though.

Torrey Hawkins (01:03:49.729)
Sure, 100%, 100%. But you can't deny my point about D-Menor not playing well.

Alvin Owusu (01:03:58.439)
I have gained so much respect for Alex E. Menor over the last 15 months or so, let's call it, from US Open 2024 all the way up through now. And he's, I saw him play in person at DC, at the DC 500 this year. I really, take the top two guys out of it. Between Alex E. Menor and like,

Alejandro Davidovic, Vakina like those like it's kind of a toss-up between who I like most enjoy watching play tennis I just like the way that Alex maximizes he maximizes everything he has Like not a huge guy, but it's gotten the most out of a serve as possible like again Not a huge guy hits a pretty flat ball But hits it is about as big as about as big as restroom you get

Very few players can out hit him, right? And he moves laterally so well that he's able to do things with speed that other players try to do with strokes. Like I've talked about this before. If you're in a cross court rally with Alex and then he goes line and you start moving, he's coming in. He's coming in. He's coming in, he's got good volleys, he's got great presence. He's one of those players, I put him in the Carlos camp, he has feel.

Torrey Hawkins (01:04:54.433)
to

Torrey Hawkins (01:05:01.632)
All right. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:05:11.183)
Yeah. Right.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:20.772)
He knows what he's doing on a tennis court. knows how to manipulate a tennis court to his advantage. But one of the things that I think really hinders him and why he struggles with the centers and the Alcarazas is very similar to what we talked about with Felix. Guys who stand that close to the baseline and take balls on the rise, you're gonna be able to get to put them in a tough spot when you're bringing anything heavy that if they won't back up, right, you never see,

Torrey Hawkins (01:05:21.074)
Yeah. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:05:33.248)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:50.661)
You never see Alex back up and take a take a full swing, right? He's going to stay on that baseline. You can't square that ball up like even worse. one clay, you know, you know, you don't have nothing to work with either.

Torrey Hawkins (01:05:56.928)
No, that's not a top. Yeah. worse, go back behind him or if they go back behind him. And I think that's what hurts both center in order demon or, and obviously all the rest of the guys that are that fast and that quick, they just have the, you know, their disposition. What makes them great is the weakness, right? That is what hurts them in that kind of a rally. So if you have the goods to go big enough back behind them, you know, it would, that's how you get them a little bit out of position.

but you gotta do a darn good job about it to make that happen. The demon looked so good, right, the demon looked so good. I felt like Carlos played his angles and his out wide ball so well against him that that was the difference in that match, but he knew if I stroke with Alex, he'll beat me. If I just go toe to toe and go cross court to cross court, I have to go into Alcares mode, know what mean? Avatar mode, so to speak.

Alvin Owusu (01:06:31.684)
I mean, that's why he's top 10 in the world, Dave.

Torrey Hawkins (01:06:56.191)
and get this ball wider, serve wider, go back behind him, go in front of him and make sure I gotta make the court go 120 degrees. Because if I leave it at 90 degrees, this guy is as good as anybody in the world, dare I say number one in the world, nine degrees, because he just does so many good things. It's the 90 to 120 that matters and that's what separates him from an authorized Likah Yanuk Center.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:25.732)
Yeah. and then lastly, your favorite player and mine, Lorenzo, Lorenzo, Masetti. mean, Hey, he was in tournament. Lorenzo, Lorenzo did everything humanly that, that, that a human could do to get himself into this tournament and somehow pulls a rabbit out of the hat against, against de Manor and gets that one victory.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:29.919)
No, I you were make it.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:51.866)
kisses his girlfriend after the match, who's full on pregnant, like their second child, and the home fans are giving it to him, he had his moment. it all, the juice was worth the squeeze at that moment. I wish him a restful off season. I think he pulled out of Davis Cup next week, so yeah, he's done for the year. Yeah, man, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, take some time.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:56.613)
Yeah, good for him.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:04.243)
Yeah. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:12.575)
I got a little on the way. mean, that's absolutely and and and step five against them and play it and play a phenomenal match against Novak in the end of that tournament, which is to me one of the most one of the best matches I've seen either than play in the last so many weeks. So that was a you know, that was and hey, probably each of the other. How many guys left? Spot guys should each write him a little check for getting Novak to pull out.

So that they can at have a go back free.

Alvin Owusu (01:08:42.31)
This tournament doesn't need Novak. This tournament doesn't need Novak. It was a great event. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Short of the two top players actually playing for the number one spot. It can't be perfect. We had a fantastic year. I'm very much so looking forward to our year and breakdowns of both the ATP and WTA Tour, as well as American Tennis. We'll probably do that one by itself as well.

But I realized last episode, last episode was our 75th episode, TH, 75th. And exactly, exactly one year.

Torrey Hawkins (01:09:17.203)
How about that? How about that? Who knew we had 75 episodes to talk about stuff, Alvin?

Alvin Owusu (01:09:23.526)
75 episodes, one year, Monday was our one year as well. It's been a fun ride. Shouts to everyone who has been on the bus with us, jumping on the bus. I see you all in the comments section. I was telling my wife about it today. It's a true community that we have built here at the Vesta 3.

Torrey Hawkins (01:09:27.89)
How about that?

Torrey Hawkins (01:09:31.538)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:09:44.892)
Yeah, I will start meeting you all in the comments by the way. Alvin has shown me the piece. I'm coming to the comments. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:09:50.086)
TH coming to the comments, the water's warm. Coming to the comments. Speaking of where else we're going, we're going down to IMG Academy in a couple weeks. Eddie Herr, I guess it's officially called the IMG International Championships now. do whatever, Nick Volontary, rest in peace. Right, Eddie, Nick, Tito, I don't care.

Torrey Hawkins (01:09:59.889)
Yep. Yep. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:06.973)
Eddie Hur, rest in peace, ain't paying any sponsorship money, you know what I'm saying?

Yeah, exactly, exactly. Bobby Curtis.

Alvin Owusu (01:10:19.685)
Yeah, but yeah, if any of you, best of three listeners, find yourself down in Bradenton in a couple weeks. Come say what's up, but we'll also be popping up at a couple of ATP, WT events next year as well, so we'll get you more information on that. But just wanted to say that, thank you all for listening, subscribing, all that stuff. TH, got any last words for the people?

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:48.933)
Just thank you. It's been a great year. have thoroughly enjoyed it, Alvin. I thoroughly enjoyed your production of this thing. have, who knew that we were, when you first asked me to join you on this thing, you know, about a year ago, you know, I have learned so much about this whole venue and this whole medium, but I have also thoroughly enjoyed speaking about the game that I love.

And for you, and a big thank you to you and a big thank you to the fans, the listeners out there that have made this possible for us to continue going. I would love, love, love, love to see us continue to take this to the people more in some of these events around the world. I'd love to see more of our fans slash listeners and subscribers to interact more with us, to give us some of their things that they wanna.

you know, hear more about and like to see, you know, I love, I love nothing more than a good discussion. As much as I think I know what I'm talking about, I'm always, always love to hear a dissenting opinion and as to why or why not. And whether I, whether I change my, my mind because of a great point or I doubled down because I'm like, oh, see, here's why I got you on that one. I love to hear it. I think at the end of the day, we're all big tennis fans on this.

Alvin Owusu (01:12:14.885)
Absolutely.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:14.909)
on this podcast and so I would love to, that's why I'm jumping to the comments, Alvin. I wanna hear what the people are saying and I feel Alvin, you mentioned this before once, we've got a really educated group of tennis listeners that are chiming in. You know what mean? This is not your regular, know, run of the mill tennis fan. And so for that, I like it.

Alvin Owusu (01:12:37.637)
It is niche of niche.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:41.905)
for sure. it also makes you appreciate that they know what they're talking about. they are not only appreciative of the content, but they're also appreciative of the perspective that we're bringing. And to that I say, we'd like to hear more from them. We'd like to see more of them on the followers and subscribers. So as they continue to talk to their friends over the holidays and such, hey, give us a shout. Give us a like.

Alvin Owusu (01:12:47.277)
Absolutely.

Torrey Hawkins (01:13:08.678)
tell your friends and buddies and workmates and fellow tennis fans to like, subscribe and follow because that's how this thing continues to go. And you know, I would love nothing more than to post up at the US Open, you know, next year and we'd be at one of the watering holes and be holding court with several of our fellow tennis fans, you know what mean? Take a big group pic, you know, with all the whole best of three, just to, because that to me is really where this...

We're all watching and appreciating the tennis. That to me, would be one of my goals for next year is to see some of the followers, subscribers and whatnot to be there with us watching it their first hand.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:49.125)
There you go, no notes. I'll end it right there. We'll put a pin in it. Best of three, we are out.

Torrey Hawkins (01:13:55.676)
Peace.