Ep. 45: Wimbledon 1st Round - Upsets Everywhere

Torrey (00:02.115)
It already happened. And welcome to Best of Three.

Alvin Owusu (00:03.543)
And welcome. there he is. There he is. He just wow. Wow. Just jumped me. He just jumped me. He distracted me with this over here and then just took my line.

Torrey (00:13.09)
No, I saw it. I saw it, buddy. I was ready. Just like these underdogs are taking some of these seeds to the woodshed, I just saw an opportunity. I just jumped in on it.

Alvin Owusu (00:26.391)
It's like straight up Mariah Carey, why are you so upset with me? It's bad out there. yeah, so it's, we just wrapped up first round. Didn't plan on being back here so soon with UTH. We promised we weren't gonna talk about the first, like about round one. We were gonna let it play out and let round two happen and then check back in on Thursday. But.

Torrey (00:45.549)
Right.

Torrey (00:50.062)
Other people had other plans, Alvin.

Alvin Owusu (00:52.379)
yeah, a lot of those plans I think involve jumping on Pugula's PJ back to the United States. It's bad out here in these streets.

Torrey (00:57.55)
Man, Pagula, golf, keen win. mean, where do we start? mean, it's just.

Alvin Owusu (01:05.679)
boy, okay, I always like to start with a nice little level set and a hey, how are you doing? Good to see you. You're in your all whites. I see that. Tis the season, tis the season. It is, we just wrapped up day two, Wimbledon, end of round one all the way through. I think maybe one match left to be finished, but not that important. And heads are rolling right now. So we're gonna start with the women and we'll try to be as...

Torrey (01:12.834)
same. You know what saying? Wimby baby, Wimby. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:34.583)
concise as possible, but there's a lot of ink on this page, a lot of blood in the streets, a lot of English tea spilled. So where do you wanna start? I'm gonna give you the choice. What's...

Torrey (01:36.609)
Yeah.

Yeah, blood in the water.

Torrey (01:47.147)
I want to start off with, you know, I'm the biggest Jessica Bagula fan. I got to start with Elizabeth. She played an absolute phenomenal match. I don't know if she was, had a pep talk from Jasmine or not, but I swear to God she took every ball early. And there was a girl, Alvin, that I want to kind of, this is a shout out to those that remember Nicole Vyda Sova from years ago. Remember Nicole?

Alvin Owusu (02:14.698)
Yeah, I Vitasilva, yeah.

Torrey (02:16.333)
She mastered the left foot forward, open stance backhand. When you finish it, you're almost on your, on the left knee. You know what I'm talking about? The straight up give no ground. I mean, if you have to take it out of the air, do so. But that shot, I saw that shot hit today from about six different women that literally had the upset, perhaps the upset of their career up to this point.

Alvin Owusu (02:26.069)
Yeah.

Torrey (02:45.727)
I'll mention the three and Elizabeth. I'm going to butcher her name. So forgive me. Coach Yabata did a phenomenal job of not just taking it from Jessica. Jessica wasn't playing terrible, but she had no idea what she was in for today. There was a couple of camera shots where she was like, where did you come from? Like, didn't you know this is first round? You know what I mean? Like I'm supposed to win this match.

Alvin Owusu (03:10.352)
Jessica just won a title in was a bad Homburg last weekend. Yeah, beat Egan the final

Torrey (03:12.939)
Yeah. Bad Humbert. Playing some good ball and kind of thought that, you know, I should just kind of take care of business round and hey, my girl is about to head of the plans. I mean, when I tell you took the ball early, had Jess and Jessica doesn't hit a small shot. I mean, you say what you want about JPEG. She hits the ball. She.

Alvin Owusu (03:36.8)
I got nothing bad to say about JPEG.

Torrey (03:38.777)
absolutely got taken to the woodshed today. And I got to tell you, it was refreshing to see that level of tennis and Alvin hats off to her. mean, she literally played like she had like somebody had the cheat code and gave to her for the match. And she was like, what's all we got to do?

Alvin Owusu (03:54.932)
You know, one of the most interesting thing about the match in itself, like, yeah, you know, sometimes you catch a player on a heater and it's like, you what am I supposed to do? Like Jess had her three all in the second set. I think she was serving. She had an opportunity to kind of get like, maybe kind of stop the bleeding, get herself back in the match. But it was not to be. And I think one of the more interesting things was I watched her press conference after the match.

Torrey (04:13.632)
Yeah, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (04:24.215)
And she kind of said the same thing. She was on a heater, not much I could have really done. Maybe kind of played a few points a little bit better in the back end of that second set. But one of the reporters in there asking questions asked about the format, best of three versus best of five. And she's like, if we had more time, best over the course of five sets, generally the better player wins. So that's what makes it tough.

Torrey (04:41.264)
and

Alvin Owusu (04:54.123)
you these Grand Slams are, you you start slow, someone has a good day, or you lose your serve and you're fighting for water. But she did say something really interesting. She said she had no interest in playing five sets. She was like, no, I think the men should play three. I don't wanna play five. And that doesn't matter. She was giving a press conference after losing the match. Whatever, whatever. I expect great things from her in the hard court season. But her time here is, nyeh.

Torrey (04:57.759)
Yeah, you're done.

Torrey (05:14.411)
Right.

100%.

buddy.

Alvin Owusu (05:22.679)
And with her former doubles partner, Coco Goff, also, short trip to GB. Yeah, that was a... Ooh, yeah.

Torrey (05:36.052)
Both girls started off strong. By that I mean, Elizabeth and Diana, yes, Shrymska. I'm gonna say this.

Cocoa looked blitzkrieg'd.

Alvin Owusu (05:48.565)
Yeah, she got punched in the mouth.

Torrey (05:50.027)
Jessica got surprised, fought her way back into it, had her footing, and I think just didn't play aggressive enough later in the match. I thought Coco got absolutely punched in the mouth, and I felt like Diana came through and gave her something she hadn't seen. Kept taking her ball early. Ironically, Alvin, as we've seen, she's got a good backhand. She kept attacking the backhand of Coco Golf, which I thought was kind of amazing.

Alvin Owusu (06:18.368)
I think she did a really good job of building up on that side.

Torrey (06:20.267)
Right. And almost like, no, no, no, no, no, no, I'm not going, I'm going go behind you a few times to the four and one point. She went back behind her like seven times, but in general, she was going through the court and had no problem coming forward. Had no problem coming big on the return. Had no problem coming, uh, coming up on volleys. Uh, I just thought she tactically played her smart for the surface. And this is what I wanted to just piggyback on from our last podcast, Alvin. This is what the grass will do to you.

It will make you play a different style of tennis. will make you defend a different style of tennis. And it's not just, as you mentioned, the shooter's paradise. I get that the playmakers, but it comes, it brings the transition game back forward. And so all these players that can get you ball five, ball six, get their teeth back in the point on a second serve. It really allows the clay, especially hardcore. You can hit a ball open stance album. If you're a pretty good athlete and a pretty tall.

male or female, and you can get yourself back into a point. On the grass, you lose your footing, you're behind, you start hitting the can open instead of hitting the forehand. And buddy, once you see that continental grip open up and you're coming forward, you've been well taught to come forward. Buddy, it's curtains. that's to me where how the game kind of started. And in a lot of ways, I like the serving baller in me, the purist in me likes that that's still relevant today.

Alvin Owusu (07:32.181)
Yeah, it-

Alvin Owusu (07:42.968)
It does force you to do more things, right? It does force you to do more things. It forces you to, I wouldn't say necessarily construct points, but put together some pretty effective plays, if you will. It's less about your ability. Yeah, yeah, you need to come out with a serve plus one that actually makes some serious sense because you might not get ball five, right? There's really a lot of adapting going on out there. It's a lot about execution. A very different plan of attack

Torrey (07:53.959)
Yep. Yep.

Yeah.

Torrey (08:01.865)
That's right.

Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (08:12.907)
but a very similar face that I saw from Coco this year versus last year's round 16 against Emma Navarro. She just kinda looked like, I don't really know what I'm supposed to do right now. Now, Emma played her very differently in that round 16 at Wimbledon last year versus Diana today. Diana just hit her in the mouth, yeah, which is very different. played, yeah, and.

Torrey (08:30.622)
Yeah. Went through her. Right, right. Emma had some slides, had some junk, had some different shots. I remember that match. Right. Kind of changed it up on her little bit and made her create some pace, which I thought was smart.

Alvin Owusu (08:42.839)
That's a tough matchup first round, right? mean, mentioned as much in her post match, which I don't normally watch a lot of press conferences. I don't generally take much from them, but sometimes you get some, especially in these kind of instances where these are upsets, major upsets, early first round, there's some insight there. And Coco did mention, one of the things that she took after French Open was buy with all the stuff she had to do afterwards, and then.

Torrey (08:57.33)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (09:11.667)
a little bit of time to celebrate with her friends and family by the time she actually got to practice. It's like she had maybe two days on the grass, played Berlin, got a few more days at Wimbledon. The players don't get a ton of time on the show courts. They get some time in the outside courts. It's a tough transition, which makes what Dahl did so many times, the handful of times he did it, so much more impressive. And the...

Torrey (09:15.761)
Right.

Torrey (09:24.008)
Sure. Sure.

Torrey (09:33.578)
Oh, and the great beyond board, you know what I mean? Who did it about five, six times in a row?

Alvin Owusu (09:40.295)
And Carlos as well, same thing he did last year. So it's not something to be taken for granted. mean, Bjorn did it back when it was a two week turnaround. Carlos, same thing with Nadal, but now it's three weeks. Regardless, know, Coco out.

Torrey (09:42.161)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey (09:50.291)
Sure.

Torrey (09:54.461)
Yeah. Regardless. And you heard it right here. This is indicative of what the Australian Open used to be, where seeds would come in a little bit, just a little bit soft, not quite ready for competition. And you would get those players, kind of catch them slipping a little bit. And this one here, I got to tell you, was, hate to see Coco out. It's obviously bad for the tournament to have her out, but.

Don't tell that to Diana, your shrimps go. Play great. And I'll tell you another one that I watched was Queen. It's Keen Wind. Went out very similar. Katarina Sinjakova came out and punched her in the mouth. Came forward. Alvin, it's like they're all kind of taking the same, hey, you know what you can do to be the top five player? Take the ball early inside in backhand that you call the skinny cross. Come forward. They'll all slice the can open and you can get a volley. And I'm telling you, I've seen it probably.

Alvin Owusu (10:24.178)
Right, yeah, exactly, exactly.

Alvin Owusu (10:33.639)
Yeah, you mentioned that one.

Alvin Owusu (10:48.766)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey (10:51.496)
50 times today, especially off that side. And I'm telling you, Alvin, it's been really good to see these 30 and outs, right? Not bow down to this level of competition. And hats off to them, man. I mean, we were kind of, know, cheering on Lois Boisson, you know, a little bit in the French, but kind of looking these seeds in the eye, like, hey, I'm not scared of you. And we've had three in one day. So anyway, I just want to say that it was great to see.

Alvin Owusu (11:16.109)
Yeah, yeah, Katarina, you called her out in our draw show and I was a little iffy. She's had some tough first round matchups in previous slams and know, Katarina's ranked somewhere between like 50, 60 in the world, maybe 70 somewhere in there. Solid singles player, she's one in the world in doubles. think she's the best doubles player in the world, plays with Taylor a good bit. So you take that.

Torrey (11:27.899)
Yep. Yep.

Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (11:43.104)
And with her propensity, like she's crafty at the net, she has the skills and is a good enough singles players to know how to create the opportunities, like create the opportunities to come forward. Not just hit the volley, but you have to create those opportunities. That's the hard part. But yeah, she takes care of QZ pretty, it was a tough second set, but then like cleaned her up in the third. One that you,

Torrey (11:51.814)
Especially on grass. Yep.

Torrey (12:07.463)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (12:11.991)
we talked about a little bit, not necessarily a seed going out, but Peyton Stearns taking the L to Laura Siegmund. It's more like getting Siegmund. Like she has this way of really making life extremely difficult for typically young Americans actually. She's a tough out and she really, really forces you to go through her and she's annoying in that way.

Again, not a huge, what's the chuckle all about?

Torrey (12:45.329)
No, you're, just keep going. You're the king of the understatement right now is all.

Alvin Owusu (12:52.311)
Well, you can, you can, you can overstate if you want to, but, yeah, that was just like a, there's something about Wimbledon that it's not, obviously it's different than all the other Grand Slams, right? But with it being on grass and you getting so few opportunities to actually play on grass, it is one where like, you don't have like weeks to get ready for it or adapt to it. You actually, it happens over the course of a career.

Right, so someone like Laura Siegman who's been on the tour for years, right, she understands the transition between clay and grass better. She's probably had some opportunities to try and fail different ways of preparing for Wimbledon. And that's just enough to get you to the second round, even if the player you're playing against on paper is the better player.

Torrey (13:19.525)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey (13:26.629)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey (13:33.669)
Right.

Torrey (13:43.111)
And let's, and let's be honest, ability to play on grass year after year and each round played is exponentially better the next time you're that much better to have played it. I tell a lot of my players, sometimes your goal is to play five matches this weekend. Right. Not necessarily the wins and losses play five matches. Not clearly. got to win enough to play five matches, but five matches to me is a very good Mendoza of.

getting you enough reps under, I'm going to say under center, so to speak, enough snaps under center that you know what you're doing most of the time. Two matches is nothing you can really even put, you know, any stock in. You could have played terrible. The guy could have played great. You play five matches. You now have seen your better tennis. You're not so good tennis. You know how you're playing and you play any more than that, buddy. You have a real good idea, right? You come that Wimbledon. Ain't no back draw, right?

It's a short season in general and playing at the All-East Club is in itself a little bit of awe. You guys just got to get past the awe and kind of get, but as I said, I was at a Rangy Park and I was nervous, you know what mean? When I was there. So I say it to say, it's something. If you go through five Wimby's and you play five matches, you're already under, underserved, so to speak. You can play five Wimby's and you played 15 matches.

You have a lot more experience in the tank. I say, that's not, and it's not to say that you are going to be phenomenal and you're going to expect to get to the quarters or semis next year. No, you just have that many more matches to bank, to draw from as far as experience. And I think that's all I was getting at is that you make a great point in that it's not just a short turnaround. Most players, if you haven't grown up on the stuff and you're not, and you're little bit shaky, what say on the run, footing balance.

Alvin Owusu (15:11.103)
Yeah. Yep.

Torrey (15:38.722)
or striking after the serve and you're not as comfortable coming forward buddy. Any of those three, let alone a combination of you will be, and you play against a player who is, you can be in trouble.

Alvin Owusu (15:51.8)
Speaking of players, that's a nice segue. Speaking of players who came up on the surface, Sonny Kartal takes down Ostapenko. Wait, I brought...

Torrey (15:56.25)
Sunny, yeah. Big one. No tear shedded there, by the way, but it was certainly a surprise.

Alvin Owusu (16:05.149)
It, you know, it was, I mentioned Sunny in our previous show, just kind of like, you know, in the conversation around, do we overvalue grass court quote unquote experience for players from Great Britain, even though, you know, there aren't that many tournaments on grass court. Here are two examples back to back, you know, we'll talk about Sunny versus Panko and then Bolter versus Bedosa, but that was a match in which like, just felt like,

Panko, it felt like she was almost afraid to get dirty, like normal Panko stuff on like day one. I think they actually were the first match to start, to open the championships. She was smiling, like Panko doesn't smile, like what are we talking about? She was smiling, she was very, yes, very much so, I'm at Wimbledon, I'm enjoying being at Wimbledon, this is great.

Torrey (16:39.152)
Yeah. Right.

Torrey (16:45.157)
Right, right, right, right, right. Like she was apologizing to the grass or something. Right, right.

Torrey (16:58.489)
ceremonial.

Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (17:04.803)
and then loses the first set seven five. And you know, after she swarms back to take the second set six two, like pretty handily, I was like, okay, she's got it. And then Damien or Tank the third, I don't know what, I mean, guess that is the Panko dance, right? You don't know what you're gonna get. But she was like down, I think she was down like five and with the quickness in the fifth set and like not running for balls, I'm like, this is odd. Odd. But as it is.

Torrey (17:24.888)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey (17:29.794)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (17:34.089)
as it is.

Torrey (17:35.535)
Katie Bolter and Paula Badosa was a bit of surprise, not a surprise. You knew it was gonna be a tough match. We mentioned that before in the Draw podcast, but I don't know. I was more impressed by Katie's play and more than I was underwhelmed by Paula. I feel like Katie, if there was a surface to play Paula on.

Alvin Owusu (18:04.693)
Right, yeah, yeah.

Torrey (18:05.036)
Right? This was the way and she used her effectiveness and her experience on the grass to her advantage. I don't want to cut her short. I want you to time in. I want to save my, save my spiel for the, for the, for the upset that wasn't in Vondrasova and, and, and McCartney.

Alvin Owusu (18:24.51)
I didn't watch Bolter versus Badosa. think that was, there's just a match I just couldn't get, I didn't have time to get my eyes on. So I'm not gonna, I won't go, you know, it's interesting. A player I used to, I didn't work with him when I was at University of Texas, but he was, I was working in the athletic department on the academic side. And Lloyd Glasspool was one of my first year players that I worked with. He was a freshman on the men's tennis team, Lloyd's British.

Torrey (18:48.256)
Okay.

Torrey (18:52.978)
Yeah. You don't have a name like Glasspool and not be British by the way. I let's just put that out there.

Alvin Owusu (18:53.335)
He is now, I think, top 10 in the world in doubles. Right, yeah. But he's on the tour now. I think he's top 15 in the world in doubles. Like, very solid doubles player, professional doubles player at this point. I would like to ask him, I'll probably just shoot him a note, like, the value of growing up in Great Britain, like, how much does that help you when you get on grass courts?

Torrey (19:03.436)
Nice. Yeah.

Torrey (19:19.929)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (19:20.247)
for the few tournaments that are on grass. Is it something that once you grow up on it, is it in you forever?

Torrey (19:27.363)
Yeah, right. But clearly it's something you don't have the same, know, clearly you're more familiar. I mean, I think that we all can appreciate, you know what I mean? But at the same time, how much, and again, how much of them grew up on it? You know, that's like assuming, sometimes assuming every kid from South America grew up on clay and actually a lot of them grew up on hardcore, you know what I mean? So, but to your point, England is pretty unique in that way. The upset that wasn't was Marquetta.

Alvin Owusu (19:29.727)
I'm just, it's a-

Alvin Owusu (19:36.644)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (19:55.775)
Yeah, yeah, poor McCartney.

Torrey (19:56.644)
against McCartney and I felt bad for her because not only are one of the last seeds, you're playing a former champ. Again, we talked about it. Thanks a lot. You know what I mean? Thanks a lot. I would have much rather been the non-seed, right? Right. And played anywhere else in the draw, right? Obviously she lost in straights, break her and she kind of got caught up to her there at the end, which I thought was great. But you heard it right here. That, as we talked about, that is going to be some.

Alvin Owusu (20:06.569)
Right, exactly, exactly. This is the thanks I get.

Torrey (20:25.357)
Huff sledding and doesn't she play Rata Kondo next?

Alvin Owusu (20:28.929)
She's got Rana Kandu next. Yep, she's got Rana Kandu next.

Torrey (20:30.531)
Buddy, that is what we call wrecking ball. And I'm not a Hannah Montana fan, but you know, this is wrecking ball right here. You heard it right here.

Alvin Owusu (20:40.771)
I mean not to look too far but like in that match and somebody reached out and asked why don't we make predictions around these parts. And I say why? Why do I have to make predictions? So you can jump back in the comment section again when we're wrong. I'm not here to guess the future or the fortune of a professional tennis player.

Torrey (20:53.111)
Yeah, right.

Torrey (21:00.214)
us?

Yeah, I'm not Cleo, you know what I mean, call me now. More importantly, Alvin, I will say this.

Alvin Owusu (21:06.721)
Yeah.

Torrey (21:12.188)
I enjoy speaking to what I see as an intriguing matchup on this surface or, and you're very good at this, of looking at the history, head to head, doing the research on that and on the back end to know what might spark your interest. I look at matchups and I look at who I know is good and who game styles, know, years of being a coach. And I say, that's going to be tricky.

And so, you know, I look at those kinds of matches and we'll get to more of them on the men's side. So that's more of what I enjoy doing is highlighting a match that you want to watch. A match that I know is probably going to be a little dicey for the seeded or the favorite player. And because you just know, you know, from knowing the game that this is not going to be a cakewalk for that player, you know, and I think we dialed up.

four of the five or six of the upsets, you know what I mean? Not that we knew upset was coming, but that we knew they were gonna be tough sled.

Alvin Owusu (22:08.019)
Yeah, and a lot of it is especially right, but like, yeah, and in the beginning of a tournament like this, are, you know, there's 64 matches to be played on the, you know, per side in two days. It's, there's a lot to cover, but like as a fan, it's like, what should I be watching? Like, what should I pay attention to? And I think that's probably where we can provide more value. It's like, take a look, like keep an eye on someone.

Torrey (22:25.869)
Sure. Right.

Alvin Owusu (22:35.519)
like Cindy Yakeva who does not hit the headlines often but she's got a game and that's kind of match that you wanna, I mean they all have game, right? But okay, I have to put this out here.

Torrey (22:45.986)
But a very solid game, especially against a player that may not be expecting it.

Alvin Owusu (22:51.615)
Yeah, this match was at the US Open or the Australian Open, would be like, whatever, don't pay attention to that. But here, it's a different case scenario. I owe Katie McNally an apology. Yeah, yeah, I did it. I said a thing last time asking why she's, I see her in the first round of every Grand Slam. No, no, someone else joined me in asking about the curious case of Katie McNally.

Torrey (23:08.962)
Oh, I remember this. I remember this. Did somebody call you out? Oh, you.

Alvin Owusu (23:20.501)
But I went ahead and my own research, right? Because I don't want to be irresponsible. Katie McNally is operating on a protected ranking, right? So yeah, but it's not listed PR.

Torrey (23:21.843)
Okay. Right, right, right. So where did you find out?

Torrey (23:29.351)
PR for sure, for sure. I thought that when it was the case, I thought you were talking like what past her PR was getting her into some of these events and I knew she was on PR. got it, got it, got it.

Alvin Owusu (23:39.569)
So it's, I didn't know she was on a PR. Yeah, I didn't know because usually it's listed somewhere. Usually it's like it's got her name, now like PR and everything so it's very, very straightforward. But it's been a very extended PR. She got hurt like a year and a half ago, came back and now she's like selectively taking these PR.

Torrey (23:47.403)
Yep. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep.

Torrey (23:57.515)
That's what I'm They used to give you so many tournaments that you could use that PR for. What I thought it was, it used to be in the calendar year. I don't, and maybe now it's just extended. Right, right.

Alvin Owusu (24:01.544)
Yeah!

Alvin Owusu (24:05.761)
They might have stretched it, yeah. And just like to the term, because she's not taking them all the time. Like she's in all the Grand Slams without having to qualify, and she's two something in the world. Smart. Yeah, I she was top 60. Like no shade.

Torrey (24:12.63)
Hey, smart. I'll use my eight PRs for the next two years for Ranslabs. Thank you very much.

Alvin Owusu (24:21.823)
Right, yeah, yeah, I'll grind in a, you know, on the Challenger circuit, but I wanna live that good life when I go to All England.

Torrey (24:28.066)
No doubt, no doubt. And hey, where I can lose first round and still make about 50 grand, you know what mean? So, hey, I ain't mad at him. Yeah, yep. Katie can play. Grass is great for her. Much like Sinayaka, you know, talking about that very much so. Very good returns coming forward. mean, you know, why wouldn't she play wimpy? know, she should put all, she should put all if she has eight. From now until, what's that, 20?

Alvin Owusu (24:34.721)
pick up some towels on the way. But she won. But she won her first round match. So there you go.

Alvin Owusu (24:51.977)
Right. Right.

Torrey (24:56.802)
32. Just put me down.

Alvin Owusu (24:57.943)
And the, I don't know, not to say the irony or the serendipity of it all, but she was Coco's original doubles partner, right? And Coco dumped her for JPEG. And look who's in round two and who's not. That's all I'm saying. That's all, yeah. Shade, shade. I do wanna.

Torrey (25:06.364)
Old doubles partner, yeah, old school, triple OG.

Torrey (25:14.599)
Yeah, buddy, that's a low, that is a, that is a very low blow right there. I'm gonna let you get away with it and let that linger.

Alvin Owusu (25:26.711)
Kind of a few of the matches I wanted to kind of briefly talk about, not for the upsets, but for the near upsets where the higher seeded player really got it together. Madison was in a tough, weird one early day one. Yeah, yeah, Rusey played, yeah.

Torrey (25:37.013)
You're talking about your girl Madison about to say you gotta feel Madison in there. Dog fight. I told you that match of roots was gonna be tough. I knew that one, we called that one in the draw episode. I'm like, buddy, don't sleep.

Alvin Owusu (25:53.944)
Yeah, it's a, yeah, I mean, she got through it. And I think that's the, that's the number one thing you start to see that kind of in a few different areas. Like we'll talk about on the men's side later, but like Taylor Fritz, right? And you talk about, about Carlos, right? Like getting through the match, like getting that first, that first, your feet on that, on the slick grass and just saying, okay, I made it. I got through it. We'll get a few more, a couple more hits in and then we'll come back in two days and, and, and work it out. Same thing. A little cleaner, Barbara Krijikova, like,

Torrey (26:03.593)
Yep. Yep. Yep.

Torrey (26:13.225)
Yeah, yeah.

Yep.

Torrey (26:22.741)
Yeah, Ujigaba had it tough and I saw that.

Alvin Owusu (26:25.383)
She had a tough one. Alex Yala gave it to her, really, really brought the best version of her game in that first set. But Babs never looked shook. Like she looked like a true champion. mean, she's the defending champion. One, she's a two-time Grand Slam champion. Two, in singles, right? She is...

Torrey (26:37.439)
Right. Right.

Torrey (26:51.199)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (26:54.121)
She handled that match like an adult. She took Alex's best shot and then like you're not getting that forehand down the line ever again, the rest of this match. And just shut her down. She's like, you're lifting everything. I'm gonna make you work your ass off for everything. Offense is no longer an option. And then rolls her six, two, six, one in the next two sets. was one of those, you hear the conversations. Like Barbara Kujikova, she's not.

Torrey (27:08.927)
Yep, yep, yep.

Torrey (27:15.007)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (27:23.037)
always playing but when she's playing watch yourself

Torrey (27:25.31)
Yeah, I don't always play, but when I do.

Alvin Owusu (27:29.367)
I stack slams is what I do. Her and Vondrasova, if they're good, watch out.

Torrey (27:34.752)
buddy, Wiley. Yeah. I didn't see the match and I want to go back and look at some highlights. there are any, know, Wimby has, has a notorious way. All these slams do of not showing the non seated players in their little format, but that Naomi Osaka Gibson match was, it was, it was a four and six breaker in the second, some four, you know, that would, that, that speaks to me as another.

bit of a nail biter for a Naomi Osaka getting her legs under her in a match like this against a qualifier, you know, an Aussie who's probably pretty good, pretty adept at coming forward. Just looking at the scores and looking at the flags, I'm thinking to myself, you probably slept on this one here and the girl's probably pretty adept at coming forward as most Aussies are. And guess what? You're lucky to get through this one to get into your next round. And I think she's gonna, she's, and this is gonna end up plants in Yakuba, right? So that's my point. And you know, my point being,

Alvin Owusu (28:27.134)
against against Sinyakova. Yeah.

Torrey (28:32.883)
There's another one, right? You you, you don't, you don't look at a four and six as a typical first round against a qualifier of all things. You just, when you're a four time grand slam champ, but Hey, it is what it is. So good stuff, man. Good stuff. I was really impressed with some of the quality of play Alvin. I was really impressed with some of the girls that got through, impressed with some of these players that are, that are making some, making some noise. And as you said, it was a, it's, it's been a

It's been a pretty pretty solid tournament so far and it's just getting started. So, you

Alvin Owusu (29:08.184)
What do you think happens to Amanda Anasamova after, okay, so she mud stomps Putin Seva, and and I feel like that's not what you want to happen in the first round. That's like not even enough time on court.

Torrey (29:17.501)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey (29:25.73)
Had she not have done well at the last couple of tune ups, I would say yes. She's been dinged up a little bit, which we both know. So surely playing that well and playing and getting on and off the court in the grass is never a bad thing. Unlike the clay where you start kind of getting your groove a little more on the grass, you kind of want to get on and get off. You know what I mean? Don't take a tweak. Don't take a, you know, get a U joint in the back, you know, kind of tweaked on a bad bounce and on a weird.

Alvin Owusu (29:30.168)
Sure.

Alvin Owusu (29:48.076)
fair.

Torrey (29:54.14)
back, can't you misjudge and tweak something or turn something? not as if she were younger, I would be more concerned with Amanda. I'm not as, I'm not as concerned with her in this situation. Clearly. she go into the next match as prepared as tested? No. but she's been on the tour now five, six years. I mean, you know, she's, she's had, she's enough of a veteran now to know what she's doing. She's had a few of these tournaments now that she's healthy. Quite frankly, I think that's more of bigger issue here for her than the other way around.

I think, you know, what I'm looking at more is, you know, as you say, you started looking at the other half of that draw. mean, you know, players like Magda Lynette, I didn't think, I thought she got surprised again by a qualifier. She lost one third, Alvin. You know what I mean?

Alvin Owusu (30:39.768)
Well, okay, so she lost to Giacomo who was, she's French, French qualifier. The only reason I know that name is because she lost to Louise Boisson, I think in the second round of the French Open. And I remember they were talking, think Giacomo won French Open Juniors the year before. So there's this whole thing. She's younger, she's a good player.

Torrey (30:54.152)
Okay.

Torrey (31:00.254)
so she younger. Right.

Alvin Owusu (31:07.766)
Like if anyone of any of the young French qualifiers were to have made a run at the French Open, you would thought it would have her, but Boisson clipped her. But she's still making great progress and obviously she takes out Magdalene. I feel bad for these. This is different than the Jacobos situation here, but the way these draws are really randomized, some of the matchups are so lopsided. Like you're a seeded player.

Torrey (31:12.454)
It was going to be her. Sure. Right.

Alvin Owusu (31:37.4)
And like even in this moment, right? Obviously she gets through it pretty easy, but put the same as rank 33 in the world, right? I think she would have been seated had she not done so well in tournament. That was right before the cutoff, right? Same thing with like Mojoba. Mojoba hasn't played much. She's seated 15, right? She's hoping for an easy first round match, maybe two rounds to work herself into the draw. She draws weighing 32 in the world, just final event, right? Like it's like, that's...

Torrey (32:03.933)
Right, right, right. Probably when the cutoff, she was 33 to 35 and yeah, 100%. 100%, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (32:07.49)
That is exactly, exactly, exactly. So like those are tough. Like those are just, and then sometimes you get a matchup that's like, know, qualifier plays world number 96. And it's like, come on, we doing? But that's the beauty of the Grand Slam, right? You don't have to beat everybody. You only gotta beat seven players. The one in front of you, yeah, exactly.

Torrey (32:21.553)
Yeah. Yeah.

That's the beauty of a slam, baby. You just gotta beat that person in front of you.

Alvin Owusu (32:34.548)
Matches in the second round, I guess we'll just stick with all the women and then we'll move over to the men's. Obviously, Radhikaanu, Vandrosiva, right? That's gonna be tomorrow. So by the time you listen to those people, that might have already happened. what's your, not necessarily your prediction, but it's Vandrosiva. It feels like Vandrosiva, right? Yeah. Yeah, I mean.

Torrey (32:41.957)
Obviously.

Torrey (32:59.133)
It feels like Von Drusova and I'm worried about Sabalenka. That's how much I'm leaning on Von Drusova. And that's not to say that Emma is gonna go away quietly. She played a good match, gets a little qualifier, a little teenage upstart. But you heard it right here. Von Drusova could get hot on this thing and I'm worried about everybody else. This thing could be blown wide open if she were Coco Gone on the bottom side with JPEG, with...

Alvin Owusu (33:04.8)
Yeah, that's same boat same boat

Torrey (33:28.135)
King Wynn, I mean, this whole thing, and you take out Sabalinka. You know what I'm also noticing, I'm gonna say this. I've been watching all this Wimby, this and that. There's all this, you know, cheerio and all this dancing routines with her, but Sabalinka and Coco and everybody's all laughing it up. You know what I hate every year, hate every, and I'm a Chiefs fan, Alvin. I hate all of the State Farm commercials, Alvin, because every player I know, if I'm a player,

I can't stand seeing Patrick Mahomes on the darts and I'm looking to take Pat down just because I'm tired of seeing his face. I'm tired of seeing his face on the TV. I, as a tennis player, I'm seeing all this press conference this and all that. And I know they're laughing up because these players are who they are, but dude, you heard right here. These other players are like, I can't wait to be her because now you've kind of put them up on a bit of a pedestal.

Alvin Owusu (34:04.885)
easier said than done.

Torrey (34:23.676)
I'm not saying that the top player doesn't deserve to be on the pedestal. What I'm saying is you better come in ready. You better come in ready.

Alvin Owusu (34:29.014)
Yeah, I I hear you, I hear you, and I guess like any other sport, like tennis has a marketing issue, especially in the United States, right? Like, I mean, we're lucky that we have someone like Koko Goff to at least put on, like that is somewhat, that is remarkable. She's one of the, she's the most marketable player on tour. So we're lucky that she's not only is she black, she's American, like she wins, this is, these are all good things. We, tennis needs to put her out there more.

Torrey (34:36.709)
Yeah!

Torrey (34:48.188)
100%.

Torrey (34:52.54)
100%.

Way more.

Alvin Owusu (34:55.864)
because this word is Charlotte, so.

Torrey (34:58.46)
But get your mind right.

Alvin Owusu (35:01.366)
Yeah,

Torrey (35:02.235)
Don't win the French and come out and get dusted first round and get surprised. That's all I'm saying. I know it's a hard ask. Beautiful girl too, by the way. She's certainly easy on the eyes. mean, there's so much good about Koki. New Balance has a whole different thing around. There's so many good things. I'm just saying, try to continue to be relevant and get your mind right in the next round. Because to me, to me, know, everyone is still, I say everyone.

Alvin Owusu (35:06.518)
Yeah, it's a hard ask. a hard ask. Same thing, yeah, same thing. Well...

Torrey (35:31.772)
There's a lot of ones out there. Some would say that they are questioning the validity of her true being number one over a Sabalenka, over a Sviatintek, even though she's had wins against both. And now you stub your toe against a num, against in the first round of a slam. And so it's just to say you've now got, you know, is it going to hurt her career? Absolutely not. It's just to say.

It's one more little chink in the armor to say she can be beaten on the right surface at the right time. And is she a legitimate number one? Maybe not yet. And that's all. And I think that's my only issue is that she needs that. Tennis needs that. But we also need to make sure she gets farther along with some of these other slams to make sure that she continues to, we said earlier, get her 15, 30, 40 matches.

Alvin Owusu (36:07.788)
Yeah, yeah, that's fair.

Alvin Owusu (36:26.348)
I'm willing to consider it an anomaly because she doesn't lose in the first round of Grand Slams. She's usually, yeah, she's won two slams, she's finaled one other. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I'm not concerned about Coco.

Torrey (36:30.62)
and she just ends, she's one, two slaps. But let's not, there's no issues here.

Torrey (36:41.34)
I'm talking long-term. I'm not talking this one. This is Mulligan. We'll chalk it up. The other one I'm looking up, I'm trying to get my head around is the Osaka Sinewaka is my next one. Are you getting me out? Is that bottom half or top half? Top half. I'm on top half. I'm looking at that one there to me has got a lot of, and that's bringing up that half of the draw now.

Alvin Owusu (36:46.039)
Sure, fair enough.

Alvin Owusu (36:53.984)
Ego versus Katie McNally.

Alvin Owusu (36:59.488)
I was kidding. That would have been top half.

Alvin Owusu (37:09.512)
It's a nice little opportunity for, we talked about this previously, Naomi's had a lot of, she looks good but keeps getting tough early round matchups and grand slams, right? just a little bit of, like you said, you wanna go into a tournament and you wanna get five matches in. What does Naomi Osaka look like with three wins behind her back and rolling into week two of a grand slam?

Torrey (37:29.947)
That's right.

Torrey (37:34.723)
a much different Naomi Osaka. But you got to get there. And this one here, and you got to think, you got to think, right, got to think Sinaka is going to be, may or may not be playing, may have felt that was a big win for her. And that's always that emotional possible let down. So we'll see. Anyway, that's the one I'm looking at.

Alvin Owusu (37:36.658)
Right, but you gotta get there first. And she's had some bad, she's got an opportunity. She's got an opportunity.

Alvin Owusu (37:55.385)
Kind of off the radar, Linda Nosková and Ava Lise, that will be a fun match. That will be a fun, fun match. Yeah, think Ava Lise is, she has this kind of infectious personality that's fantastic for tennis. And she also has the game to back it up. often, she has this, I think this condition that causes her back to kind of act up fairly frequently. So when we have her on tour, it's a fantastic thing.

Torrey (37:59.491)
Yeah, least that'll be a good one. Yep.

Torrey (38:20.366)
Mm. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (38:25.656)
Nuska was no joke, like firepower both sides, more than serviceable serve. if she touches 70 % on first serve percentages, like it's gonna be a tough match for Ava. But that should be a fun one, and that's what we're, I think that's, first round is always like, know, head on a swivel. Right, yeah, second round is like, okay, there's some interesting matchups here, and then by the time we get to third round, it's like, lock in, we're.

Torrey (38:34.104)
Right. Right. Right.

Torrey (38:44.836)
Get your bearings, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Torrey (38:52.378)
Right, right. Now you know who the usual suspects are. I feel the same way about the Giacomo girl you mentioned playing bench, that's gonna be a tough one. Katie Valenetta is playing your girl, Elizabeth, Coach Herberto. That's gonna be a tough one. And as far as I'm looking at, we're back in a Sicari. That one may be pre-routine. I gotta say this last one, Alvin.

Alvin Owusu (38:53.09)
we're making our way towards week two.

Alvin Owusu (38:59.127)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (39:08.639)
very well done.

Torrey (39:22.36)
You know, that could be a Towson and Collins guy. I mean that, you know, that that's not a, that's not a foregone conclusion right there. You know what I mean? I don't, I I'm just looking at a lot of these matchups, Kuda, Matova and them in the borrow that that could be another, another, another solid matchup. Right. So I just look at some of these matches and of all the people for Haley Baptiste to get, she gets the girl and Boko. Hey, now.

Alvin Owusu (39:36.064)
Yeah, that'll be it. That'll that will be another good one. Yeah

Torrey (39:48.078)
That would be a fun match for me to watch, not just because I got two black girls watching and playing, but you know, it's going to be fun to see how Mboko plays a girl like Haley. You know what I mean? Haley's got all the junk, all the craft, all the hand, and the grass is still fresh. So I think if this were in week two, not that it would be week two per se, but if it were, the court's a more chewed up. It would help the striker, right? Because they can get the footing a little bit more.

Alvin Owusu (40:16.77)
Wait, who's the striker in this instance?

Torrey (40:18.681)
Oh, and Boko's definitely more of a striker than Haley. I mean, I'm not saying she's a huge striker, but I don't think Haley's drop shot might be her weapon. I mean, Haley's slice backhand, she's right up there. She's probably number three behind Ange Jabbour and maybe one of the player and retired Stephane Graff on the backhand slice. Oh, her slice, their slice is absolute money. Her slice is absolute money.

Alvin Owusu (40:20.994)
Okay, okay, okay, okay. Well, well, Haley strikes.

Alvin Owusu (40:43.369)
wow, that is a...

Alvin Owusu (40:48.216)
Huh, I mean, I vividly remember her playing against Madison, French Open, and it was a rock fight of a match, which I guess both players can tend to get into those kind of matches, but I did see a lot of slap forehands from both sides. And yeah, it was a little ugly, but when I envision this match against Mboko, I feel like it's going to be a version of that.

Torrey (40:49.271)
There you

Torrey (41:03.939)
Yeah.

Torrey (41:07.678)
it'll probably be a lot ugly.

Alvin Owusu (41:16.888)
except for a book of mix. She's in that kind of space right now where she's played so many matches this year, both on the challenger level and lower level WTA and then making her way through qualifiers a lot of events. She's in this kind of just run hit kind of space. I feel like whatever, whatever, exactly, exactly. And whatever Hailey throws at her, I feel like she's not even like, right, yeah.

Torrey (41:24.15)
Right.

Torrey (41:29.527)
Right.

Torrey (41:33.974)
Yeah, right. She's kind of tennis drunk, punch drunk right now. Yeah, I know what you mean. Which to me hurts Haley to a degree, you know, but.

Alvin Owusu (41:46.745)
that could easily be like a three and three kind of match for Imboko, like just because, without even having to think about it, because she's not gonna think, she's just gonna run a hit. Yeah. Okay, let's, no break, we'll straight through. We ain't got time, we gotta get this out, we gotta get this out. Ain't nobody got time for that.

Torrey (41:58.776)
No break, man. Ain't nobody got time for that. Shout out to Sweet Brown right there. Old school, triple OG. That's what I'm talking about. Which match? Taylor Fritz. I thought that was a great match for Taylor pulling that one out. We knew it was gonna be tough with GMP.

Alvin Owusu (42:11.397)
I wanna talk about Taylor Fritz. I wanna talk about Taylor Fritz. Talk about Taylor Fritz.

Yeah, yeah. And know, GMP had his opportunities, 5-1 to the breaker in the fourth set, like up two sets to one, like, boy, fourth set, fourth set, yeah, he's up two sets to one, fourth set tire breaker, and like that was, you know, he got another opportunity by that match being called on account of going too late, coming back the next day, and you know, I know it was called, not Lice, they were inside, but just Curfew, Curfew, yeah, neighborhood Curfew.

Torrey (42:28.28)
Was that fourth? What was that? Fourth? Yeah, fourth set. Yeah. Yep.

Torrey (42:39.48)
lights and whatever, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Torrey (42:45.681)
Curp you. Sorry, what was it? Yeah. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (42:49.162)
and had a chance to regroup and come back today, but could not get it done. More than that, Taylor was just like, was able to show that he is the better player and was able to handle it. But I wanted to talk about this match because a buddy texted me on Monday and said, is this French kid the new version of John Isner? And I thought about it and my initial response was, I think people are starting to sleep on how good John Isner was.

Torrey (43:08.44)
Mmm, that's a question actually.

Torrey (43:19.275)
Right?

Alvin Owusu (43:21.016)
John Insider, yeah, great serve, right? Great serve. 95 % of his ranking is built off of that serve. But I feel like John had a lot more court savvy than people give him credit for. He was a perennial top 15 player, top 10 player, was the best American for years between Roddick and then this current group of, the Jack Sock.

Torrey (43:39.36)
Yeah, right. Years, yep. Between A-Rod and Shoot. Who? The current, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, but even, but Sock was sloppy. The current, 100%. And to your point, and Sock, well, always dangerous. Sock was, to me, our American version of Fabio Farnese. You know, always dangerous.

Alvin Owusu (43:51.082)
sock popped up in there at one point, like the current crap of like Fritz and TFO like, yeah.

Torrey (44:08.246)
You know what I mean? But, and when he's on, just, you just couldn't touch him where I felt like John, if anything was Mr. Consistency, you know, his, he single-handedly held up the two fifties and a few of the five hundreds around the tour due to including Atlanta, right? just due to his consistent play. he brought fans, especially in Atlanta back.

Alvin Owusu (44:16.087)
Mr. Consistency.

Torrey (44:35.937)
to the tournament year in, year out. It almost became his backyard tournament. That only happens when you went a lot year after year to do so. And I think that's really what the two fifties and we're going to miss them now as they're no longer here. They brought a big time player to help you kind of see, okay, how good are the rest of these guys? And, you people don't forget just two or three years ago, Ben Shelton got his start by taking John to three sets and tiebreaker in the third and the quarters one year.

not so long ago. So I say that to say, you know, its own passing of the torch, if you will. it's a great point. You mentioned it's a huge compliment for GMP to be compared to John. think it's what you're trying to say. Right. And I think the next thing you're trying to say is we have to hold off to your friend on that comparison because he ain't played enough yet to, to be bestowed with that high of an honor. I've known John and his brother Jordan.

Alvin Owusu (45:16.569)
Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey (45:31.447)
Shout out to his mom, Karen, if she's watching the show and his dad. I've known them since way, back in the day. Do you remember the Jarvis twins way back in the day, Alvin? I don't know if you remember Porter and Charles. There was a crazy match one night, speaking to John. John's older brother, Jordan, was playing. One of the Jarvis twins had to be Porter because Porter was little crazy. And Jordan and Porter Jarvis got into this, you know,

Alvin Owusu (45:43.926)
yeah, yeah, yep, yep.

Torrey (46:01.203)
They were hook fest, you know, it was the Florence Open. This is a crazy story. John, probably 10, 11 years old, Pepsi Open Florence, South Cadillac comes in and me and his mom, we're watching, I don't know it had to be March, springtime. We had to be watching some Final Four game or something in between. And you never knew what you're going to get with one of those Jarvis boys. So I was like, well, I'm gonna go watch the game a little bit, go check in on the second set. John comes around the corner, mom, you gotta come see this.

Alvin Owusu (46:07.512)
The Pepsi, the old Pepsi of it in Florence. Yeah.

Torrey (46:30.614)
Jordan and this guy are flipping each other off. And sure enough, these guys are flipping each other off, cussing each other, hooking each other. At one point, Jordan pulls the straight up, the ball, and melts the box. mean, just the old, the old standard. was just, going, it's going round for round. And my boy Jarvis turns around, gives him the full moon. I mean, we were like, oh, okay. Here we go. This is probably for a team you, Alvin. So this is not like either player has.

Alvin Owusu (46:46.744)
God.

Torrey (46:59.76)
not seen this before. They are literally one up in each other. Like, yeah? Well, you do. And so that was my first experience meeting John Isner at probably 10, 11 years old. He was already about five, eight at the time, you know what mean? But, and I say it to say it it always brings a smile on my face at how incredulous he was that his brother, a good player in his own right, by the way, he ended up playing for the Cav for two years. He played with Ibnganovia at

Alvin Owusu (47:04.426)
Right, yeah. Yeah.

Torrey (47:26.966)
at the cap back in the day. They were on that championship team back in the day when they were here. So a couple of my things. They won two championships for NAIA back here in Atlanta. So Jordan Jordan's a good player. Anyway, so funny, funny story. I had to bring that one up. But I want to make one last comment about John. GMP would be honored if he would get that far and get that high for that many years. And I think he certainly has that ability. I was disappointed he couldn't finish that one off. But it also helped me understand Taylor

Alvin Owusu (47:27.148)
Okay, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (47:48.556)
many years. Yeah.

Torrey (47:57.013)
is back. thought Taylor played a very solid end of that match. And I also like the way that Taylor pushed to want to finish that match. was not, he was rolling, was playing a good ball and I think they stopped him. And you always like it when you feel like a player wants to play more than when a player's kind of catching a nice little reprieve. know, Novak had a tough match against Wright.

Alvin Owusu (48:06.039)
Yeah, he was rolling. He was rolling.

Alvin Owusu (48:18.553)
You could see it the net in that conversation.

Torrey (48:21.365)
Novak had a match with Joe Willie at the French. They got called with darkness many, many years ago. I don't even remember this one. And he had him dead to rights. mean, Joe Willie had him dead to rights, up 4-1, 5-1 on the fourth, crushing him. And sure enough, we know what happened with Novak. I mean, he came back the next day looking like a different player. It was just absolutely ridiculous. So that's what, I didn't have a lot of faith in GMB after that day, after his momentum had kind of slipped.

Alvin Owusu (48:42.147)
Yeah, of course.

Torrey (48:49.171)
But I say it to say I was happy for, especially with his injuries to kind of regroup and put this back in on his side.

Alvin Owusu (48:57.239)
Yeah, you know, kind of speaking more on the injury route, I'm gonna give it to my boy Lorenzo. Took the L to Nicholas, Bachelash-Villy. Yeah, yeah, he's not ready. He's just not ready. He's not ready yet. He's not ready. He's just not ready. He played no warm-up events, still a little hurt post French Open. You gotta play the event, I get it. Okay.

Torrey (49:09.353)
Bashos Bili, yeah, the Georgian.

Torrey (49:18.036)
No comment.

Alvin Owusu (49:25.369)
I don't know what to expect from the hardcore season either. Don't do that to me. Don't look at me like that. I don't appreciate that. No, no, I will not. I will not. I will not. What I'm gonna do is I'm not even looking. Okay. Yeah, yeah. I did, I did. I'm not gonna dance around it. I'm not gonna dance around it. We got other. We got. We got other.

Torrey (49:37.747)
You lost me when you said my boy and that's what I'm like, oh Lorenzo, at least you owned it. I appreciate that. I just didn't like how you took my thunder away because you knew I was gonna break it.

Alvin Owusu (49:54.092)
We got other top seeds to talk about. We got other top seeds to talk about. We're not gonna talk about Lorenzo. We can talk Meddy, we can talk Sasha. Where do you wanna go with this? No, no, no, I need you to stay focused. Stay focused. Don't lose, I don't wanna lose you, stay focused.

Torrey (50:13.876)
There's my notes on Lorenzo. So much for that. Keep going. Alright.

Alvin Owusu (50:25.369)
I say let's go, let's go, Meddy.

Torrey (50:29.512)
Gotta talk about Fabio. Gotta talk about Fabio for one second. I called this one, I knew it was gonna be tough. You gotta talk about him.

Alvin Owusu (50:33.401)
Okay, yeah, let's talk about Fabio. Okay, 6'1", 6'2", and the fifth, 6'1", I can't remember if it's 6'1", and the fifth.

Torrey (50:42.854)
Yeah, but that's Fabio. Fabio's done. He was done after the fourth. He might've been done after the third, to be honest with you.

Alvin Owusu (50:48.62)
Yeah, that match was ugly. It was just ugly. Like, I mean, there were parts that were entertaining, but it was a hard watch.

Like a very hard watch.

Torrey (51:05.074)
Hard, hard in what way?

Alvin Owusu (51:09.337)
Carlos is, in music terms, he's like jazz, right? When it's all working, it's fantastic, sometimes it's spontaneous, but this was a jazz band that lost its drummer. The drummer just played a little bit, and I gotta go to the bathroom and came back, and then he played a little bit, and then had him come back. There was no rhythm to the match, and Carlos couldn't create rhythm. He was shanking forehands like nobody's business.

Torrey (51:37.895)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (51:38.906)
He looked just like off. Granted, you want a tennis match, right? The job here is to survive in advance and I guarantee he's gonna look like a world beater tomorrow. But there is something about that relationship as well. I know he has a lot of, he reveres Fabio. Fabio's like one of his guys. He looks up to him a little bit. Yeah, he's.

Torrey (51:59.407)
Yep. How do you not look up to a guy like him who smacks the biggest slap on the tour and don't think for a second, he's a cool dude, man. Don't think for a second the Fabio was gonna give him any rhythm. There was a match years ago at the Miami Ute when it was still in Key Biscayne where Fernando Gonzalez played a young Rafa Nadal.

Alvin Owusu (52:08.119)
And he's a cool dude too. He's a cool dude.

Torrey (52:24.436)
It was the ugliest warmup I'd ever seen. It literally looked like Gonzo was hitting balls intentionally as winners in the corner. was no, literally no warmup. He was slapping the balls hard as he could in the corners. I don't know if Nadal got any warmup at all. Gonzo ended up winning the match, but it was dirty and it was cheap. And quite frankly, I lost a little bit of respect for Gonzo, but it was one of those matches where no rhythm was the theme.

And he took it even into the warmup. Like, you're not going to groove off my ball, buddy. I just got to the finals of the Australian. I'm trying to get to another one. I don't need some upstart digging my chance to get there. And I think Fabio, while not as crude as Gonzo was at that time, I was very, very, you know, I told you earlier, this is going to be a tough match because Fabio can absolutely smack it anytime off either wing whenever he wants to. And

Was it ugly tennis? Yeah, I know if I wouldn't call it ugly. Was it shop makers tennis? Not necessarily. Was there no rhythm? That was by design. And I also feel like to Carlos's credit, if you play kind of a shaky match early, doesn't that bode well for you for the next two or three? You know what mean? So I kind of like that, but I did think that was gonna be a tough match and it was. It wasn't, not so much in, it didn't look as fiercely contested, but at the same time,

Alvin Owusu (53:37.945)
Sure, sure.

Torrey (53:48.411)
I felt like it was a match that was very, very much, knew he had, the shots were big, the points weren't great. I think that's what, and you have to appreciate that. And that may have also been something that you kind of, when Fabio slaps back at you with that big shot, point or backhand, you know, it kind of stuns you for a second. You're like, do I go for that ball again or not? And that's what I saw a little bit. Do I slice, do I roll? It was almost a little bit of indecision because,

Alvin Owusu (53:56.842)
Right. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (54:10.553)
You know,

Torrey (54:17.361)
He counters you so quickly with his slap and you know he's good three steps either direction.

Alvin Owusu (54:22.733)
Yeah, and I think this is another one of those, know, we'll keep, won't harp on it too much after today probably, but like this is one of those surface driven matchups where like this is on hardcore or this is on clay court. Like to a certain extent, like there's gonna be, I would imagine Fabio's, know, coming in here on his 10 match losing streak, his rally tolerance probably isn't where it needs to be to hang with someone like a Carlos Ocaarez on clay or on hardcore, point in.

Torrey (54:32.401)
100%. Yep.

Torrey (54:49.974)
or just as age and shape, let's be honest. I mean, he's older, he's older and yeah. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (54:51.929)
Well sure, some things, yeah, those two things inform the rest, but here, in this type of scenario, where it's just like, know, pin the years back and let's just see what we can come up with, it bodes well for a player like Fabio, and I think the Tor will miss him. I think this is his last one, so the Tor will miss him.

Torrey (55:03.483)
Yep.

Torrey (55:07.907)
A hundred percent. The tour missing big time. love Fabio. If you're watching, man, I remember you love, love watching over the years. Excellent tennis player. You started the Italian wave. You know what I mean? Way from way, way back. And I think even, got to think players like Yannick, Jasmine, who else was your girl? My girl, Elizabeth, how do I say her name again?

Alvin Owusu (55:35.259)
you nailed it last time. Cotirretta. I believe.

Torrey (55:35.931)
Coach, I've been coaching at the is was one of my guys, my main man, Julio Sasi, who was my head pro of my club. He's from Switzerland, but he's from the Southern part of Right next to right about a half hour from Italy. So he's all, he knows all the Italian players and watches them pretty, pretty fluent. So he just spelled, he pronounced her name like it was a fine wine. You know what I mean? So the other match I wanted to speak to,

Alvin Owusu (56:00.762)
Fair, fair.

Torrey (56:05.17)
which I am loathe to mention is my boy Felix. And he pulled out a six four in the fifth match that I thought was pretty solid with the very, you know, on the clay. Duckworth can be a very tough player to play against. And I was very happy to see him pull that match out to be honest with you. So what say you about that?

Alvin Owusu (56:29.411)
Yeah, that seems like, that feels like fair Felix in the first round. Like, he'll get himself, yeah, you wanna give more, probably a little more credit and more credence to Duckworth in this match. But Felix does tend to get himself into tussles early in Grand Slams. And maybe that's just a little bit of his level starting to show. But, you know, he got through it. I saw him in a very similar match.

Torrey (56:41.7)
Right.

Torrey (56:53.285)
got through it got through it and and again and James is

Alvin Owusu (56:57.837)
Yeah, very similar match. like Australia, first round he played David of Chiquita and it's like, what are we doing out here? Like it's still, I mean, that's a tough first round match, but yeah, know, that's Felix's job right now is to, you know, get through it, like just get through it. And we're in that kind of weird space with him and like sits pass, you know, these guys who were kind of like, you know, drifting backwards in the seedings. And then things get weird, like as we've seen.

Torrey (57:12.229)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (57:26.549)
once you slip out of the seedings, strange things happen, right? You can find yourself going from 35 to 70 real fast on account of like,

Torrey (57:30.961)
funny.

Torrey (57:34.641)
Do you, speaking of your boy, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm so sorry. Speaking of that, your boy retired. Clearly there's something wrong with him, he's hurt. Went out to the qualifier. What do you think?

Alvin Owusu (57:43.477)
is back.

Yeah, that's a, like what do I think, like, yeah.

Torrey (57:47.601)
I get that. I'm just saying, dude, I mean, that's a tough one right there. This time of year from now, you just said it, could he be 50, 60 in the world?

Alvin Owusu (57:59.002)
If he is, I mean, I think our problems are larger with Stephanos right now. if we're talking back injuries, like which is pulling you out of a grand slam.

Torrey (58:05.733)
Yeah.

Torrey (58:12.692)
Yeah, yeah, which, clearly means he thought he could play because of the slam and shorter points and what have you. But I mean, when, when, uh, when a French qualifier can, can take you out, you know, you, you're, you're more dinged up than you want to admit. That's, that's the only, obviously I didn't want to, and I hate seeing a player hurt, man. That's, that's the worst because I want to be able to speak to your quality of play based off what I see. And when a player's hurt, you can't do that. And I, and I all,

Alvin Owusu (58:19.223)
That's worrisome. That's worrisome.

Alvin Owusu (58:36.76)
Right, yeah.

Torrey (58:39.472)
All shade aside, I hope the best for him and hope the best for his team because you just can't get better fast enough. know what I mean? Anyway, moving on, Manorino. I thought Manorino would come through like we mentioned. O'Connell, hate the form, buddy. Another Aussie, takes on the champ. Rubalev came through. Don't let me talk about Metty. I wanna move on from Metty. I told you I was not talking about Metty.

Alvin Owusu (59:04.483)
We're just gonna not talk about just, or Mehdi, Mehdi and Musetti are hand in hand, arm in arm, just leaving the venue, not getting spoken about. Okay, that's fine. I owe you one, that's fine.

Torrey (59:08.952)
I'm not going to talk about Matty. Thank you. Thank you. I'm not talking about him. The match that I was going to mention, Cam Norrie and Batista Gut, you know what mean? Cam came through. Back to your point about surface, holding a little bit of something, right? I thought he did a nice job. Did a nice job. You called this one Brooks being Greek sport. You know what I mean? You called that. I thought that was a solid one. Yeah. Happy to see Fonseca get through.

Alvin Owusu (59:32.707)
Woo, straight sets too, straight sets.

Torrey (59:39.06)
And the one that.

Alvin Owusu (59:39.107)
So, Brooksby's playing Fonseca in the next match. That's gonna be...

Torrey (59:43.043)
Yeah. Who you got that with?

Tough, couple of young guys battling it out. That's gonna be, they're certainly gonna have some fireworks and some heat.

Alvin Owusu (59:49.908)
Yeah.

So, Brooksie's had to take some time away because of suspension over the last 18 months, but when he hit the scene three, four years ago, he hit the scene gangbusters. A little awkward game style, but one of those players that is adept at winning tennis matches, can win tennis matches and win a lot of them in a row. Now meeting up against Fonseca, obviously there's a...

Torrey (01:00:00.43)
Right.

Torrey (01:00:06.777)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (01:00:22.477)
Maybe a little bit of a, not a little bit, there's a talent dispersion there. But here on grass, like, I'm gonna go with talent here. I think Fonseca, this is a very nice opportunity for him to get some Grand Slam wins under his belt because we're looking at, he's destined for seeding at Grand Slams in the near future. So let's just let this party start. But it will not be straightforward. It will not be straightforward at all. Yeah.

Torrey (01:00:45.011)
Yeah, okay. Right, no, I agree with that. I agree with that. The match that right above that is the one that I called is your boy, Nico Jerry. Nico Jerry was, again, I don't wanna speak to the half of it, but I'm gonna tell you right now. I just knew that Holder was gonna be a tough spot. Nico's a good player. Got a big serve. He has, for South American, any from Chile, for a player from South America, he has a.

Alvin Owusu (01:00:58.101)
Holger.

Alvin Owusu (01:01:08.291)
Playing well. He's Chilean,

Torrey (01:01:14.254)
hardcore game more than you would think a clay court game and i just knew that was going to a tough matchup i mean i'm looking at him he's a tall guy big big server and holger doesn't possess some of those same some of those same you know uh attributes let's let's just say and on the grass that that was it hurt him and he again it was kind of like a marquetta not the same way because marquette is a grand slam champ but it was the upset that wasn't upset to me it was kind of like

That's just a bad matchup, you know, and for a whole green, a long story. I thought that was gonna be a good one and it was.

Alvin Owusu (01:01:45.676)
And that's also a case of Jerry, he was seated in Grand Slams, maybe not last year, maybe the year before, but now he comes through Qualies, but he smokes everyone in Qualies, and he's playing good tennis and is healthy. So for someone who's just kind of had a string of injuries and has got himself back into a place where he can play consistent tennis match after match, and again, he got down two sets to love. Holger came up a little bit lame in the third set, and then...

Torrey (01:01:52.15)
Right. Now that's quality in. Right.

Torrey (01:01:59.191)
Yeah.

Torrey (01:02:05.294)
100 %

Alvin Owusu (01:02:13.995)
Nico just kind of like hit the gas and rolled through the rest of the match. So you take advantage of the situations you're presented with. I guess, I don't know, see in Cincinnati, Holger, I don't know, whatever, that's fine. Yeah, so that's a tough, bad beat, but let's.

Torrey (01:02:18.03)
100%. 100%.

Torrey (01:02:26.12)
Hehehehehe

Torrey (01:02:33.433)
Jordan, is it Jordan? I think it's Jordan Thompson. Jordan Thompson got through a tough match. I want to say it went five, Alvin. Didn't I go five, four or five? Got it. He, I'm pretty sure, I'm pretty sure he, I'm trying to look it up here. You you gotta navigate the app. Anyway, long story, he's gonna go up against, let me get to my thing, Bonzi, who obviously beat,

Alvin Owusu (01:02:41.017)
I didn't make my note sheet. Jordan Thompson did not make my note sheet today.

Torrey (01:03:02.912)
who beat METI, right? So that being said, that whole draw has kind of opened up quite a bit. And so to me, as I'm looking at all this album, that was that section we talked about. It's going to be a little bit wide open. You know what I mean? If some things happen, that could be a tough match. I'm looking forward to that match up. Fritz and Diallo, that could be another tough match.

Alvin Owusu (01:03:04.759)
Medi, yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:03:27.357)
Yeah, think that's gonna be a little more straightforward. A lot more straightforward for Taylor, actually. Diallo's a nice young player, Canadian guy. Did he play one year?

Torrey (01:03:30.592)
I-I-I-I agree. I agree.

Torrey (01:03:37.27)
Yeah, I only say it to say on the grass and it's still early. Trust me, Fritz is a very good grass court player. I'm just saying it's another good test for another good player for him to win five today with GMP. Just saying, I just feel like there's some things that, you know, if there's a, if there's a opportunity for Diallo to serve his way through this, he might have a chance. And it's always good to see some good young players, especially those of color come through and matches like this. So we'll see. I look forward to seeing how he does.

Alvin Owusu (01:04:06.073)
What say you about, there's two matches kind of that I wanna make sure we don't overlook. One being Jaime Munar taking out Bublik, and then the other being Arthur Rendekrinesh taking out Zverev. Both matches went five, is that right? One, two, three, four, five, yeah. I remember, so I was in Dallas for that event in February, and I remember watching Rendekrinesh.

Torrey (01:04:16.365)
Yep.

Torrey (01:04:21.941)
my God, that not a big match? Renda Kinesh. Renda Kinesh. Frenchy.

Alvin Owusu (01:04:36.021)
he loses in the first round and I saw him practicing in one of the back courts and I just like, man this guy is just going, he's going so hard, he's doing the same thing over and over. was like, it was this pattern of like cross backhand and then coming across and then picking up the forehand kind of mid court where like he was just trying to make the shot perfect. And I mean like, he might have hit it like 120 times.

Torrey (01:04:46.294)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey (01:05:03.926)
Well, well.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:04.889)
And I'm like, give me some more spin, get some more shape, let's get that ball to drop. And it's like, can see he's very intentional about the practice. He's actually trying to drive this ball that's very difficult to drive. And I was like, right, yeah. And it's like, know, it's just so cool watching the pros practice and like be very specific and intentional about what they're trying to get done on the tennis court. Because there are times where you have to dial up maybe that exact shot. But it's for like, it's for $75,000, not for shits and giggles.

Torrey (01:05:10.634)
Right.

through for Max like today.

Torrey (01:05:28.94)
Sure.

Torrey (01:05:32.428)
Sure. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:33.545)
And so it's important.

Torrey (01:05:36.78)
I, let me, let me say one thing about that match. Cause I watched a good, a I watched that match a good bit in detail. Number one, it was one of the few matches and I watched Sasha a good bit. I've watched Sasha a good bit for the last 10 years. Where Sasha got animated, Alvin, he got into it. He was emotional and I don't think it's emotional enough. I was actually happy to see him look like he gave two cents.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:39.565)
Say a thing, you can say two things if you'd like.

Torrey (01:06:07.935)
These two players are so much alike, it's scary. With all due respect to Sasha being the higher player and having better results, and maybe a little bit better backhand. I felt like Rinnekanesh's forehand was a bigger, he was willing to take the shot a little more. They're both tall, they're both lanky, they both can bring it. Sasha has a big serve with kind of a muted forehand, and I think Rinnekanesh is a little more shrieky. I think we both agree on that.

Rinne Kanes, I think knew if he played the forehand side, Sasha may get a few out of 10 shots, he's going to get three, but I take my chances on the seven. And I feel like he played him tactically smart. I also feel like he served him big Alvin. He absolutely served very, very well, made a few errors, but as you're going to do when you're serving big and going big on the grass, but I got to say Rinne Kanes play, he outplayed.

Sasha and that that match was one of those where it wasn't a match of he played poorly. I saw the King win match and I'll use that one as an example with with Siniaka but she errored herself out on a lot of situations. No question and that's not to take it away from from Katerina. But this match here. Rene Canach just beat him Alvin. He just beat him. He just beat him. was it was was wasn't a five. Right? So my point he just flat out beat him and I say that to say

Alvin Owusu (01:07:07.939)
I mean.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:18.521)
Sure, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:29.443)
Alex didn't break him the entire match. He didn't break him.

Torrey (01:07:36.864)
This was a good match. And again, back to the point on grass, it's an equalizer. And both these guys, if this had been on clay, I'm going to in his French, but he probably was decent on clay. But I felt like, I felt like it was a whole lot more. It would be a favorite. The Sasha would be a favorite on clay, but on the grass, was, I was after watching it, I wasn't shocked at the result. If you had told me that Sasha's better goes out first round, I'm like, nah, no, no way. He'll, he'll choke a quarter.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:46.839)
He's not bad. He's not bad.

Torrey (01:08:06.729)
He'll lose to some guy playing well, but he's always gonna get through the first round. I watched that match and I'm like, you just got.

Alvin Owusu (01:08:11.115)
Right, and you go tall guy, big serve, big forehand with the propensity to come forward. It's like, that's the cocktail. That's how we make it.

Torrey (01:08:20.395)
That's the profile, your word profile. And that profile was, was, he had it in space today. was just saying it was great. was good tennis match. It was a very good tennis match. And I hope I see more passion, animation and emotion from Sasha going forward. But unfortunately, Mr. Render Connection had his number today.

Alvin Owusu (01:08:40.461)
mean there were three other matches on the men's side that went five and we don't have time to talk about all of them in detail. Monfils taking out Countrymen, Hugo, Umber, not just, yeah that's one of those like, it's like Monfils is in a fifth set just grinding someone down like on any given surface, it's amazing.

Torrey (01:08:48.073)
Yeah, you going there. I told you I knew I knew the elder statesman would get that one. That classic classic Gale.

Torrey (01:09:02.507)
You almost think with Monface in five, you almost think that he's in, not only is he, forget the age, you almost feel like, God, Monface is at five. You're like.

Alvin Owusu (01:09:13.209)
You

It's the tennis version of the rope a dope. He's just gonna get you in there, he's gonna sulk around a little bit, he's gonna run around, he's gonna fake out and then turn around and go get a ball. It doesn't matter the surface, doesn't matter the country. first round of Grand Slam on thesis in five, got it, yeah. And that's a tough one for Umber. I'm sure there's a kinship there.

Torrey (01:09:27.563)
You

Torrey (01:09:33.108)
Done. Check.

it is because he would he's the profile on grass that could be a lot of trouble for a of people. Lefty, big serve, blast the ball, but but Gale's like, no, not today. Sorry, bro. Sorry, Right.

Alvin Owusu (01:09:42.049)
Yeah, he gave Carlos Fitz last year too. Yeah. Nah, I'ma back up. We're gonna hang out for a bit. Alex Mickelson. Yeah, Mix is having a tough run here. He obviously hit the scene pretty intensely in Australia. Hasn't had a great showing at Grand Slams or any of larger events kind of since then.

Torrey (01:09:54.023)
Nicholson, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:10:09.056)
draws Kesmanovitch in the first round. Again, Mix is seated 30, Kesmanovitch is ranked 49. mean, Kesmanovitch, think just, my read on him is just he doesn't have that top level of athleticism like that. He can't really, really hurt you with pretty much anything, but he's got everything. He's like a seven across the board, which gets you to about 50 in the world, but for someone who's.

Torrey (01:10:29.256)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:10:35.528)
He back to back Orange Bowl champion something like that I believe or finished year number one in juniors two years in a row like you it's obviously there, but that's just kind of the difference at this level where Everyone's there It's just he just doesn't have the the ability the finishing pop on anything To really be the that same level of player at this level, but good enough to Good enough to beat Alex

Torrey (01:10:53.982)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey (01:11:01.16)
But good enough to beat Alex, unfortunately.

Alvin Owusu (01:11:05.674)
in five sets on grass. So that's tough.

Torrey (01:11:08.17)
Alex, Alex will improve for a match like this. These are those litmus test matches, Alvin, that I keep talking about. You got to be able to beat a professional who's 30, 40, 50 in the world who won't give you anything. You know, lot of our American kids, in my opinion, especially young and Alex is still what, 20 years old, you know, they come out kind of expecting their level of play to just bowl somebody over, you know, as it did in juniors.

some of may have done it in college, maybe not. I feel like a lot of our American players are not appreciative of, there are 10, there are 70 players that have played the tour for six plus years that you have to play against and then are going anywhere. They're, they're not super solid. They're not amazing. You don't see them, but you best believe that.

They're going to make you play some balls. You're going to have to beat me today. You're not, I'm not going to give it to you. You have to take it from me. And are you good enough to take it from me? And I think that's where he and, and, the slew of the young Americans. I'm not talking about Sheldon Fritz and Teofil. I'm talking about Basavoretti. I'm talking about Lerner 10. I'm talking about, uh, uh, my main man, uh, McDonald. I'm talking about, uh, Macky, not so much. I'm talking about, um, you know, obviously Alex, uh, Jerome. There, there, there's so many of these guys that have to now learn.

to understand and really get their feet, kind of get their legs under them in a match and realize, okay, especially ones that are underserved a little bit in terms of weapons. You got a big serve, okay, great. But like Sasha, I think Alex has a game very similar. He's got a, he's the Camilo Shricke, he's got a big big serve, but his forehand is not Yal Fonseca big. Got a good forehand. And so that way I look at him a lot more than like I look at Sasha in sense that, but he can't.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:00.333)
Yeah.

Torrey (01:13:06.374)
go through you either though. And that's why I think he's in that little bit of that tough space. And I think he needs to do a little more. Hey, you heard it right here. There's players like Riley Opelka that have massive serve, you know, and can't always convert the next piece of it from time to time. And that's something that takes a while. I obviously he's seven foot tall.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:24.952)
Well, with Mix, it's almost like he has the tools. You can see it all, it's all there. He's a very talented tennis player, much like everyone else, the transition from high level juniors all the way through to the pro tour, at this point now, he's going to be forced to define his game style. What is he actually trying to get done on the tennis court? He can move pretty well for his size, hit forehands and backhands, he's got good feel, right?

Torrey (01:13:32.195)
for sure, for sure. And he's very smooth.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:54.541)
can really pop a first serve, but like, yeah, there's 10 guys just like that, probably in his half of the draw, like at all times. So how do you turn a skill into a job? Like that is what being a professional is all about. And this is not just playing tennis anymore, this is being a professional tennis player. And that's the thing, and this is a situation that's as old as time when we're talking about tennis.

Torrey (01:13:59.74)
Thank you.

right especially in wembee

Torrey (01:14:13.029)
is.

Alvin Owusu (01:14:24.46)
transitioning from high level juniors into a day in and day out pro. You mentioned Marcus Garon, right? I'll give hats off to Marcus Garon. He's become a day in and day out pro. is the new school version of Bobby Reynolds, right? He's kind of found himself in the 50 to 60 range, but he's settling in. He's not gonna drop past that. At a good run, he might find himself into the year, like creeping into the 30, 32, maybe getting seeded at the US Open, but that's, he's going to,

Torrey (01:14:34.033)
Yeah.

Torrey (01:14:38.887)
All right, get settling in. Yeah, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:14:53.756)
maximize his skill and get everything out of his career. And I think that's, you yeah.

Torrey (01:15:00.295)
Hats off to them for that. That's a huge statement. For those of us that know, that's a huge statement. To settle in at 50 in the world, to settle in means you've been there a little while and you've defended that. You know what I mean? Across a litany of, back in the day, two 50s, five hundreds and a few surprise runs at a thousand or two, a round three versus round four versus first round at a slam, kind of maximizing the draw. And the fact that you've been there, done that,

Alvin Owusu (01:15:05.228)
It's hard.

Torrey (01:15:28.069)
You're getting there. So I agree with you, Alvin. I agree with you 100%. I think that's a good thing for him. And I look forward to all our young Americans going forward. I did want to ask you about that match with Haume and Bublik. Because to me, they're very similar type of players that have been out there a while. They're both very good. You, of course, would say Haume would be better on Klay. And Bublik is not the kind of player to go through you. Let's be honest. He's got big game.

But he's just as quick to hit a drop shot as he has hit a big backhand on the line. So.

Alvin Owusu (01:16:01.632)
Yeah, I think what we're running into with Bublik right now, not great, Bublik was up two sets to one and found himself in a tiebreaker in that fourth set, we could be having a very different conversation if he serves a little bit better in that breaker, right, gets out of the tennis match, right? But again, to that previous point about being a professional tennis player, so this is Bublik's next kind of iteration of himself. Like, he's been on the tour for a few years.

Torrey (01:16:13.657)
it 100 % 100 %

Alvin Owusu (01:16:27.991)
and now he's starting to see some success at the higher levels, right? Takes out center last week, made a good run at the French Open, I guess won Holla, but like that's the, he's never been in a situation before where he wins a warmup event, right? Wins a warmup event, beats the number one player in the world. Yeah, and that, like how do you do the full mental reset and then enter a Grand Slam in which you're hoping you can, like you expect yourself to be in the second week, right? That's a different.

Torrey (01:16:30.757)
Right.

Torrey (01:16:39.271)
He's defending now. Right. No, he's now the better, he's now the higher end player. Sure, I agree with that. Yeah.

Torrey (01:16:53.829)
Right, 100%.

Alvin Owusu (01:16:57.207)
That's a different mindset. Yeah, it's just great French Open, hits the scene, like hits the, I would say the casual tennis fan's conscience by doing well at the French Open. And then beats center, wins Holla. Okay, he's had a really strong, you know, last month or so. June was good to him.

Torrey (01:16:57.415)
Different kind of

Torrey (01:17:09.989)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:21.493)
But now it's like this is actually the prize. Like now you've got the seed, you're coming into Wimbledon on a surface that you've said if you ever win a Grand Slam it'll probably be Wimbledon just because of the creativity, the mix of power, it's good match for him. Yeah, it's not always that straightforward. Yeah, and then also thinking about now next year when he comes back to do this, if he expects to do well at French Open again, now you have to start looking at this as not two separate surfaces and two separate tournaments. This is a...

Torrey (01:17:38.203)
Yeah, that's true.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:51.18)
this is a seven week period that you have to now plan for and manage well. Like there's only five weeks between, know, second week of Wimbledon, or second week of French Open and the second week of Wimbledon. it's quick, it's quick. So yeah, that's, you know, I hope we're having the same conversation in my public next year and he's, you know, still seated and still doing well and pressing on and.

Torrey (01:18:00.421)
Right, right.

Torrey (01:18:11.941)
Yeah, and in typical public fashion, we have no idea. So that's the problem. Can we look ahead a little bit? Draper Chilich, what are you thinking?

Alvin Owusu (01:18:17.277)
I don't know, he could be retired next year, I don't know. I don't know.

Let's please do.

Alvin Owusu (01:18:27.563)
I mean, Marin Chillis got through straight sets today, right? Like that was, he's like, I've been here, I know what I'm doing. I don't.

Torrey (01:18:36.953)
This is round two of the thank you very much England for thanks for being a Brit. Round.

Alvin Owusu (01:18:40.439)
Yeah, I'll mess around and call Chillich over Draper in like four. Yeah, I don't mind making that call. I don't mind making that call. I said it, but fine, I'll say something out loud. I don't care. I don't know, toss up. Probably Bonzi. I don't know, I didn't see much of either of their first round matches to, let's just put it this way, they didn't make my list.

Torrey (01:18:46.103)
wow, okay, wow. I wouldn't want you to go that, that's wrong, that's big. All right, there you go, you said it. Bonzi and Thompson.

Torrey (01:19:00.857)
Okay.

Alvin Owusu (01:19:09.175)
of matches of adventures. Yeah, yeah.

Torrey (01:19:09.183)
Fair enough. And hey, understand. And nori and tiafoe.

Alvin Owusu (01:19:18.303)
A third round performance for either of these players is going to really mean something considering what they're going have do to get there.

Francis looked pretty good in his match. I'm not gonna lie. Like he looked focused. He looked focused.

Torrey (01:19:35.055)
Francis has this crazy ability to look, to make a tough match look routine. I mean, it's darn near a mutant ability. I mean, he can take a rough match and make it look routine. And then the guy that you think he should handle pretty well, he can scrap out like he barely got through that thing. like, like he didn't get, he didn't get his match notes. I think that's going to be a tough match for Francis. I'll be honest. I think not just, not just the left hand.

Alvin Owusu (01:20:00.759)
Yeah, I-

Torrey (01:20:03.013)
Not just the serving, not just the grass. think that Cam is the player of all the veteran players, lefty, grass, experienced to play. They're just anybody else. I don't like that matchup for Francis. I'll be very honest. Another match I don't like is Shroof and Felix Alger Aliassim. That's going to be a tough matchup for you. You heard it right here.

Alvin Owusu (01:20:14.882)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:20:24.36)
Stufan Felix. Yeah.

So there's a slew of matches here that I've written down that all kind of feel very similar. Like Felix versus Shroof feels a lot like Monfist versus Fusovic, which feels a lot like Norrie versus Tiafoe, which also feels like Vanderzandt-Sloot versus Davidovic-Trakina. Like these matches all kind of feel like, I don't know, this is gonna go four or five. Like it's not...

Torrey (01:20:38.317)
Right. Right.

Right.

Torrey (01:20:45.351)
That's right, that's right.

Torrey (01:20:49.551)
Yeah.

it'll be fireworks for sure. Four for sure. Five likely. You can put Bonzi and Thompson in that situation.

Alvin Owusu (01:20:55.904)
Yeah. Even.

Hell, Rublev versus Lloyd Harris. Lloyd was top 50 two years ago before he got hurt, and now he's kind of making his way back. Lloyd's tough as shit, man. I don't know, especially on grass. Hell, even Dan Evans is not gonna make life easy for Novak.

Torrey (01:21:04.933)
Yeah.

Torrey (01:21:11.096)
Right.

Torrey (01:21:14.754)
Right.

Torrey (01:21:19.566)
Brnovac, 100%. Hey, you heard her here. That's the one I really wanna watch because Dan, Dan will play his butt off and has earned this chance to play. You know he's stoked for this.

Alvin Owusu (01:21:23.51)
There are some...

Alvin Owusu (01:21:31.466)
Yeah, yeah, think that's the, there are so many good matches on the men's side, second round. I would say the women's side had a lot of firework-ish in the, yeah, a lot of fireworks in the first round. I think the men are gonna take back the attention in the second round. There's a lot of really, really good, if you can make the time, find some time in the next Wednesday, Thursday here, there's gonna be a lot of really, really good men's matches.

Torrey (01:21:42.894)
A lot of early upsets. Right. Yeah.

Torrey (01:21:50.926)
Right, I agree with that.

Torrey (01:21:57.208)
Yeah.

Torrey (01:22:01.016)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:22:01.345)
It's gonna start to look like tennis again. But that's, yeah, that's what I'm looking forward to. Even Nico Jari versus Lerner Tien, like the...

Torrey (01:22:03.427)
Yep.

Torrey (01:22:08.548)
that can be a tough one. I was gonna say the same thing about Dimitrov and Moutet. mean, that's both those matches. There's so many good matches that are showing up here that you're like, dude, none of these are walkovers. You know what I mean? By any stretch of imagination. And as I said, and to me, the best one that just jumps off the pages is as a Shilich and Draper. that, I literally have got a...

Alvin Owusu (01:22:12.971)
gee, I forgot about that one. Yeah, that's...

Torrey (01:22:38.724)
The next three days, next two or three days are just chock full of...

Alvin Owusu (01:22:41.912)
It feels like a 500. At this point now it feels like a 500. There aren't a lot of random ones that have crept through into the second round. It's just like, okay, tight. It's a tight round of 64 right now. We just mentioned 13 matches. That's almost half of them. It's like, what are we talking about?

Torrey (01:22:45.144)
Right. Right.

Right.

Torrey (01:22:53.871)
no doubt.

Yeah. Yeah. Hey, it's Wimby. It's Wimby and three of the seeds or four of seeds of the top eight went out. You know what I mean? So, so I mean, this is if you got that many good ones still and three of your seeds went out including Zverev. I mean, that's dude, that's, that's some, that's some tough sled. So it's gonna be good. Hey, if you're watching out there, give us a shout what match you're keyed up on.

Alvin Owusu (01:23:09.342)
Yeah, yeah, that's that's weird.

Torrey (01:23:26.807)
Give us your thoughts on what you think may happen for me, especially for the matchups. Alvin Moore, he's more of the head to head and stats kind of guy. look forward to seeing what you guys are looking forward to. want to say one brief thing for the juniors that might be watching or parents of juniors that are watching and listening. Try to take a player that's in the tournament that reminds you of your son or daughter and just watch that player.

play through two, three, four matches if possible, see what they play like, see how they handle different styles. Watch that player through a few other tournaments. Obviously in addition to Wimbledon, which is obviously a little bit of a weird one because the service, which you, your kid likely may not play much on. but watching that gives you a great snapshot of the rock paper scissors effect of your kid in a finished form.

In a 10 years from now, my kid could at best hope to play and look like this. This is what that looks like. And really see does your kid have the intangibles like that player does to maximize those various things and what type of things still trip them up, you know, at a certain point. The last thing I was gonna say Alvin is that I'll be changing my background here pretty soon as the grass starts getting more chewed up. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean? But I will say that to say,

Alvin Owusu (01:24:48.5)
wow, look at you.

Torrey (01:24:51.81)
It is going to be a very, this tournament's always, always tough. And I am just happy to see a handful of the Brits make it through. You know what mean? Women and men. And I'm looking forward to, was a young qualifier, what was the guy named? TeeVent, was that his name? The young, the young, yeah, well he may not go too far, but I think he won it. Wasn't he like nine something, nine 70 or something like that in his first round? But he's gonna, he's gonna.

Alvin Owusu (01:25:09.304)
He's got Carlos in the second round.

Torrey (01:25:20.726)
Tarved, that's his name. I look forward to seeing him have a chance against Mr. Carlos. And again, those are, you always love seeing the English come through for their players in these kind of matches.

Alvin Owusu (01:25:32.601)
You you mentioned something about the grass and I think it's interesting to keep this kind of front of mind as we move through the championships, right? The play, this is the only tournament, or this is the only service in which the surface itself changes throughout the course of the event, right? Right now the grass is, it looks just like it is behind you. It's green, it's slick, it's a little more muted.

Torrey (01:25:51.106)
True. True.

Alvin Owusu (01:25:59.287)
Right, but like as the, you've already seen it in first two days, like now the brown spots are starting to creep up around the baseline, getting chewed up. And so the speed will change, the game will change, the bounces will change. The weather has a very weird impact on the way that grass court tennis is played.

Torrey (01:26:04.13)
Sure, Yep.

Torrey (01:26:17.376)
Sure. The dome, the cover of Senate Court matters.

Alvin Owusu (01:26:19.99)
Yeah, and even someone mentioned, you know, kind of Carlos coming here yesterday, I guess it was at this time, playing his first round match on fresh grass. Like even think about he played, was it Eastbourne? Did he play Eastbourne? Like just a weeks ago, that was the tournament he played, the warmth, yeah, he didn't play Holley, he played Eastbourne. But for the first time, the women played Eastbourne as well. So, but the men played the second week, the grass was already eaten up.

So he goes into from eaten up grass into fresh grass, right? Which is also just very, again, very different. So it's one of those nuances like we should be aware of and we should kind of appreciate because clay don't change. They water that thing every set and it's the.

Torrey (01:26:56.332)
Yeah.

Torrey (01:27:00.098)
Clay doesn't change, but the surface and the tip does make it be a little different. I was thinking about that when you said that. Right, but not throughout, right? The actual surface itself won't change as drastic. There's wet clay, dry clay, heated today, early morning, to your point, slower, faster, but it's still clay. Grass is, and the bounces, you know, the lack of grass, right?

Alvin Owusu (01:27:04.53)
Sure, so from location to location, but not throughout the course of the tournament. Like, Roland Garros played the same on... Right. Right.

Torrey (01:27:27.455)
All that's only gonna get worse as it gets through. and players start to get a little bit more, those that win especially, start to get a little more attuned to the grass, attuned to how they have to get through. And Alvie, you heard it right here. I've seen a lot. This might be a tournament where we're seeing, they're finally starting Chussy Bay. And I say, finally. Every time I've seen it, I'm talking about the women's match in particular, the forehand canned opener, may it rest in peace.

because people are starting to come forward on that thing like it's a part-time job. So if you're not going over there, smacking something, hitting a buggy or a slapper, the forehand can opener is starting to get very well adapted to. And so I'm looking forward to seeing players that are going to be a little more aggressive on the wings, smacking that down the line a little more. Render connection did not show up with that against Farrop and caught him several times. He was stretched out, but he's like, yeah, I'm hurt, but I'll make you hurt just as much as me.

Alvin Owusu (01:27:59.658)
Yeah, you gotta read it. You gotta read it.

Torrey (01:28:25.788)
And as opposed to hitting the old slice can opener and the players that tend to come up with the L including Sasha, including Coco, including a King win, including a JPEG. They were slicing out wide on the forehead album and the players were coming on nothing like, okay, thank you very much. Gotcha. And so that's just something I've been watching.

Alvin Owusu (01:28:44.066)
Yeah, and that first follow doesn't have to be that good because if you're coming off of open stance, know, can't open slice forehand, like you're just kind of, you're not getting back in the court. Like, yeah.

Torrey (01:28:47.616)
It just has to be made.

Torrey (01:28:53.184)
That's right. So you almost got off hitting it. Which begs the question, why didn't it? Anyway. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:28:57.75)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, all right. Let's put a pin in it there. I'm Alvin, that's Tori, we'll catch you guys after round two. Peace.

Torrey (01:29:05.631)
Yes, sir.