Ep. 58: US Open 2025 Round 1 Review | Venus’ Comeback, Keys’ Struggles & Novak’s Test

Alvin Owusu (00:01.066)
And welcome to another episode of the best of three podcast. I am Alvin, that's Tory and we are here to discuss a little round one review. And Tory, before we get into it, I'm supposed to ask everyone, because this is the thing you're supposed to do. If you guys are not subscribed to the channel, whether you're on Spotify or Apple or you're on YouTube, wherever, subscribe, like, rate, review, all that stuff, okay? We can.

Torrey Hawkins (00:06.616)
Thanks.

Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (00:15.715)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (00:28.332)
We can cross it off the list. Lawyers are happy. Fantastic. TH, how you doing?

Torrey Hawkins (00:30.879)
That's right. Do the thing.

Alvin Owusu (00:33.678)
I gotta do the thing you're supposed to do. Keep us on air. Keep us on air.

Torrey Hawkins (00:36.099)
That's right. That's it. That's it. I'm good, man. I'm good. It's been a been a crazy few matches, man. You know what? I always feel like I'll been at the first round. There's always four or five players that I hadn't heard of. And there's always three or four that I kind of wish they would just hang up the cleats a little bit. I know that sounds harsh.

Alvin Owusu (01:00.398)
Ha

Torrey Hawkins (01:00.984)
I just wanted to start off with that whole stuff. I'm a fan and I feel as a fan, I have a right to say that, but I say it also to say, I also feel like, you know, sometimes in the coverage of it all, unless you're there, right? You don't see all the matches that you wish you could see to get a true feel and a true understanding of how close this guy is and isn't, you know, you're seeing scores, you're seeing this and that in the third, you don't know, you know, and then you

Alvin Owusu (01:06.68)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:22.7)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:29.975)
My experience for the five days I was there and my experience now that two or three days I've been back watching on TV are so dihedral opposite, you know, I'm like, God, I wouldn't be saying this if I was court side. You know what I mean? I wouldn't be saying it.

Alvin Owusu (01:42.846)
Right, right. Yeah, and you know, that's kind of where I wanted to start it. Just kind of like general round one, like how we're not just what we're thinking about the tennis, because I think we have plenty of time to talk about the tennis itself, right? But how we're experiencing this US Open, because it's quite unique in that like you were there for the vast majority of fan week in the coaches symposium. I'm going up Thursday, so I'll be there for round two and round three. And then I think you're going back next week. Is that right? Potentially?

Torrey Hawkins (02:12.247)
I was supposed to go yesterday and I didn't make it. So I had to, had some stuff come up to work. was for the legacy summit, got all kinds of pictures that I wish I'd gone. I'm still mad at myself for not going and some things in the club happened. But bottom line, yes, you know, I have, I was there for, as you said, the better part of family, Sunday through Thursday. Saw quite a bit of tennis. Again.

Alvin Owusu (02:14.648)
Okay.

Alvin Owusu (02:18.349)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (02:37.399)
and your experience on the grounds, your experience court side is much different than it is on the TV. Even if you're watching the same exact match, it could be a little bit different. But you know, and then when the pros start coming in and whatnot, and it was, you know, I'm happy to get to this part of the tournament because we're back into the matches now. did shout out to my girl, my former student, Hannah A. Rolte, who won 16s hard courts, who will be there next week. I was hoping to get

Alvin Owusu (02:47.047)
absolutely.

Alvin Owusu (03:03.084)
Hey now, hey now.

Torrey Hawkins (03:06.103)
get up there the next week to watch her. if you're up there next week, you'll get a chance to see her for me. Tell me how she fares and the junior. again, as I say, it's just so much to do, so much to say. But again, go ahead.

Alvin Owusu (03:11.862)
Absolutely, absolutely.

Alvin Owusu (03:21.694)
Right, but the part about live versus in person, right? You said it's very different and it is very, very different, but I find that the first week of a Grand Slam, especially the first two rounds, I'd actually prefer not to be there. I guess the conventional wisdom is like, there's so many matches to see, so it's great for the fan on the outside courts. While I agree with that, because I've been to the US Open first two rounds before.

Torrey Hawkins (03:27.274)
Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (03:37.278)
Hmm.

Alvin Owusu (03:51.104)
and other Grand Slams as well, you have to remember that you as a person can only watch one match with your two eyeballs at one time. And you can't really go from court 17 to court four, like, if you're on site, right? You don't wanna lose your seat, you can't really get there, but I feel like with all the happening concurrently in these opening rounds, I prefer to be at home, because I can bounce around, I can take notes, I can...

Torrey Hawkins (03:58.75)
time. Sure.

Torrey Hawkins (04:05.556)
No, at all. At all. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (04:17.845)
Yeah. With your, with your remote. Sure. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (04:20.873)
Exactly, exactly, because that's the, mean, I don't want to get too deep into any real match, you know, unless it calls for it, but I feel like that's the best way to canvas. Anyways, I mean, that's...

Torrey Hawkins (04:31.094)
I agree with that. I agree with that. There's something we said for, you know, courts four, five and six right there together. They're always great. And if you post up on the backside of five, you have a a good eyeball on, on four and six as well. Ash is polarizing. All you're watching is Ash. You know what I mean? And hopefully it's a decent match. And unfortunately, first in the first few, it's not usually as, as I'm going to say, I as it, as it isn't, you know, it's a, it's a first round match, but the top seed who's going to be a, a name to get butts in the seats.

But there's a lot to be said for that. I will say this. I prefer watching tennis in person to TV. I have had I've had several opportunities to watch the Falcons play in Mercedes-Benz. I prefer watching it on TV, not in person. I'm just saying and that's just I mean, what TV can do for the experience of a football game to help me see it all.

Alvin Owusu (05:14.753)
Yep. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Torrey Hawkins (05:27.476)
versus what it can do on TV. I don't know. You're the TV guy aspect ratio visual, the zoom camera that comes in on that little beam on that little line that it says. I don't know all of that. What I do know is I would much rather watch a football game on TV in person tennis. There's nothing quite like it. And I and that's and I know that seems like a bit of a dichotomy. But for me, that's what that's that's what I and I get happy just come back from it.

Alvin Owusu (05:51.401)
No, I'm... I get ya.

Torrey Hawkins (05:56.753)
I miss watching it courtside, seeing the judges in real time, seeing how the flow of the match, getting engrossed in the match, whatever. We don't need to talk too much on it, but that's all I'm saying.

Alvin Owusu (06:07.661)
Well, I'll rank order it from a tennis standpoint. We'll just keep it on tennis then. The best place to watch a tennis match is from right behind the court. That's one. I go right behind the court, up a little bit is good. Corners at that same height is good. Once you start getting away from there, then for me it turns into I'd rather watch it on television because it just starts getting worse. If I'm on the sidelines, I don't want to sit on the sidelines. I'm going back and forth with the neck.

Torrey Hawkins (06:18.052)
and money.

Alvin Owusu (06:37.581)
Like that's just like no man's land. And then if you're in Ash and you're up top, it's pointless. You're just there to be in the building. You're not really, I saw Fed up there once in like 2008 and it was like, that was horrible. I saw him, but I didn't really, I didn't really, and then like I've seen Djokovic practice from right behind the baseline in Miami and like that's what you want right there. That's watching professional tennis. you know.

Torrey Hawkins (06:38.056)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (06:43.262)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (06:49.141)
Yeah. Yeah. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (06:59.669)
That's Yeah. Yeah, I agree.

Alvin Owusu (07:04.897)
Let's jump into some, we highlighted a few matches that were of interest. Obviously we're not gonna hit them all, but let's start in ash on the women's side, one match that I did watch. Venus Williams versus Carolina Muhova. That was, I'll be the first to say it. We talked about Venus and her from DC, her comeback all the way up to now.

Torrey Hawkins (07:31.092)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (07:33.174)
Right, we've been watching it, we've been following it, we've been appreciating it. I appreciated that she played the best level that she had available to her. Like she brought it from a tennis standpoint. You saw flashes of a former Grand Slam champion, right? You never saw her waver in the face of adversity, right? She just got beat by a top 15 player, right? And at no point in that match, like I was cheering for Venus to play well. I did not.

Torrey Hawkins (07:44.436)
100%. Yeah. 100%.

Torrey Hawkins (07:52.456)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (08:02.571)
I was not cheering for Venus to win that match. If that makes sense. If that makes sense.

Torrey Hawkins (08:05.553)
Right. Makes perfect sense because you didn't know if the next day was going to have the same level of anything. You know what I mean? Just not only injury free and what have you. If anything, I'll be honest, Alvin, you saw it in the second. In that second set, Venus played pretty darn well. know, she played pretty darn well and showed some glimpses she didn't even show against Ashton. Was it Ashton Kruger she be in DC?

Alvin Owusu (08:24.461)
She played great! She played great!

Alvin Owusu (08:34.31)
Payton Cerns, Payton Cerns. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (08:35.7)
Sorry, sorry, sorry, Payton Storms. It showed some skills and some high tempo that I'm like, now that's the Venus I remember right there. You know what I mean? And I was so happy to see it, Alvin. At the same time, I'm like you, you know, could she keep this up for two more rounds? Could she keep this up even more? And if not, then bow out to somebody who can. And that was just, I guess I'm questioning the overall long

Alvin Owusu (08:43.253)
Right, right, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (09:04.98)
And do you have this whole why she's back? Is it the say that she still can then you've already proved that point. Is it to say that I could still have the best of them that didn't need to be said. That was already understood. And if it was to say, you know what? I just want to play again. Then I say hats off to your girlfriend. Good for you. You did it. You know, you had a win. You had a set against top 15 player. Good for you. And you know what? You know, you ain't got to rush back into retirement, but you know, let's

Alvin Owusu (09:22.349)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (09:34.087)
Let's put the comeback, you know, a little bit off to the side and just, we are so happy that you grace us with your presence once again. And you know, I don't think anybody doubts her level. I don't think anybody doubts her relevance. And I don't think it never did. Now don't think that there's a reason to push this any further for any other reason other than she chooses to do so because she can. I just don't know how far that will take, right? Or it'll go with that, with that train.

And I don't know if it needs to be said any further. I'll leave it at that.

Alvin Owusu (10:06.176)
Well, in her post-match she said she's enjoying being able to play healthy, finally, for the first time in a few years. And I can relate to that, right? As we get older, more more things happen. She's had far more serious health concerns than I've had. But what I'm saying is, I don't think anyone is confusing this for a run at Grand Slams, either in her camp or on the public. There she has...

Torrey Hawkins (10:31.741)
All right.

Alvin Owusu (10:33.868)
know 110 % goodwill amongst the tennis community. When Venus is playing, people show up, they show up in droves. Right, yeah, so I'm in a place like you would normally think that I would poo poo this, but I'm like no, if Venus wants to play, play. It's great, if they wanna give her a wild card, give her a wild card. Puts butts in seat, people show up, and she's competing. That's the biggest thing. She played well enough to beat most players outside of the top 25 last night. She just.

Torrey Hawkins (10:39.239)
For life.

Torrey Hawkins (10:55.474)
Thank you. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (11:02.214)
Thank you. If she had played anybody who wasn't muhova, right, or top 20, she might have done or won that match and she played the same way. Let's put that out there. Make that perfectly clear for sure.

Alvin Owusu (11:03.028)
She played a former Grand Slam finalist. Right.

Alvin Owusu (11:10.708)
Exactly, exactly. Which I think is just, that's kudos to her. like, but yeah, so we'll keep looking. I don't know if you noticed, I'm wearing black. And I'm wearing black because I'm celebrating, I'm not celebrating, I'm recognizing a loss. Madison Key's lost. First round, my man. Zara Zua, Zara Zua, yeah, that was, I mean.

Torrey Hawkins (11:21.223)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (11:28.818)
that was a tough one. Zarzuzah, Zarzuzah, Zarzuzah, Zarzua, that's it.

Alvin Owusu (11:39.404)
That was a Madison Keys match of old. 89 unforced errors, 40, I think 41 winners. That's three sets of.

Torrey Hawkins (11:47.708)
Who was the young Italian Alvin, I'm sorry, Coach O, the young Italian that beat somebody in the first round of first, was it the, Coachiabatta, or I'm not butchering her name, Coachioretta, there was an Italian girl that beat, Coachi, she beat somebody first round of Wimby. I can't remember if it was golf or if it was JPEG. Was it golf? JPEG. That's what that match reminded me of. It was like coming out of nowhere.

Alvin Owusu (11:52.459)
No, you're good.

Alvin Owusu (12:03.564)
Cut your reddit? Okay, yep.

Alvin Owusu (12:10.103)
she beat JPEG, first round to Wimbledon. yeah, yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (12:16.826)
similar stature, kind of on the shorter side, hitting off both hitting like a hit like we tennis, you know, just wham wham. I mean, just look like an like an avatar. We tennis just played unreal hats off to her for all a career win for her. There were moments of that match, Alvin, that Madison looked like Madison, right? I mean, hitting through the ball, crushing the ball when she caught four or five balls clean.

Alvin Owusu (12:23.336)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (12:45.39)
It wasn't even a match. And yet the score stayed close. She couldn't continue to. I don't know if she was, I heard on the commentator said she was nervous and this and that and the third. I'm like, come on now. You know what mean? Come on now. Let's, let's, let's, right. Let's move past that. Not to say you can't be nervous, but it's also to say, I don't know. I'm not prepared, nervous. I don't know. I don't want to put, I don't want to speculate. I will say this.

Alvin Owusu (12:56.32)
Yeah. Her words, her words.

Alvin Owusu (13:06.452)
Yeah

Torrey Hawkins (13:12.101)
You've been out there for 10 plus years. You've won a grand slam. You've had multiple titles to your, to your name. You always get butterflies and that's the take home for any player nerves or nerves. You're nervous regardless. think some of the greats have all said that from macro down to fed to you're always nervous, especially in the first rounds. I'm not so sure if mentally she didn't embrace the nerves, embrace that. And perhaps a little bit of post Australian.

There's now expectations for herself that she felt that that kind of put her in a weird spot, but I'll say this is our Zara Zua did a great job of handling the moment. and I hate to see Madison. Here's now the third slam. She hasn't necessarily gone that deep in, afterwards, you know, that, I just, I just felt like, I felt like we have not seen the best of her since Australia.

Alvin Owusu (14:07.852)
Well, what if we flip that, because I've been thinking about Madison Keys' career, and we'll do this at a different time, but what is the comp? She's won 17 tournaments on tour, one slam, one slam final, one Masters 1000, and then 15 tour events. If you take in...

Torrey Hawkins (14:33.283)
in 10 years.

Alvin Owusu (14:35.308)
I mean, longer than that, it's been 15. Like, what, yeah, she turned pro in 09. So yeah, so, but like, but sure. Okay, let's, let's, let's call it 2011 when she, when she actually like made her first, first US Open, US Open 2011. It's been a while, but like, that if you take the Wimbledon, I mean, the Wimbledon, the Australian Open win out, even take the, take that final out of the US Open, like what is the career that we're looking at?

Torrey Hawkins (14:37.584)
Is it 15? Wow. See, I was going back from... Yeah, you're right. She was 14 then. So I'm not going to give her the 14 years, but to your point.

Fair. 13, 14 year for sure. We, we, we, I hear you.

Torrey Hawkins (15:01.251)
Mmm.

Alvin Owusu (15:04.864)
like a smattering of semi-finals. I'm looking at it right now, she's semi-finaled five Grand Slams in 15 years. One win, one final. Maybe these are just, these are the outliers maybe. Maybe what we're seeing is the regression to the mean. Maybe this is the mean, like an occasional first round loss, that's kind of odd, but then to a quarter-final ceiling, and every once in a while pops through.

Torrey Hawkins (15:05.648)
Mmmmm.

Torrey Hawkins (15:29.903)
Yeah.

Right, Yeah, that's and I'm gonna let you keep talking on it because I hear you. I would that that is a that is a comment that a true fan can make and look and kind of resetting their own baseline or expectation for their players. And I get that. I'm a Kansas City Chiefs fan. I do it. I do it every year. I do it every year. So that that I hear you loud and clear. I think Alvin.

Alvin Owusu (15:34.944)
And that's.

Torrey Hawkins (16:02.029)
When you say those words though, I don't hear regression to the mean. What I hear is a great career with a few great highlights and a few stubs to the toe, right? That's enough to get you in the hall of fame. Let's be honest. You know, I know that. You know, I know that. But, but I, yes. And I would think, and I think her game has, has always been a little up and down and been a little streaky at best from time to time. It tells me that players like this.

Alvin Owusu (16:12.692)
One of my favorite players, let's be clear, I'm not throwing shade here. This is, my ride or die, but I'm like, let's call it what it is.

Torrey Hawkins (16:32.324)
that are bit streaky in their career should perhaps play a few less events and try to maximize their lightning, their, their lightning strikes as best they can. And I almost feel like they, when they play too much, there's almost a little bit of lack of confidence stemming from the volume of play without results when you really should be playing for how, what makes you feel better. I'm reminded of some of the, the

Jamaican sprinters, coaches that are always talking about how American track and field coaches over train and how they don't do a whole lot. And perhaps, perhaps that's where Madison's flaw is, is that we're, keep trying to run this young lady like a, like a Clydesdale and she's more of a thoroughbred and we need to run her schedule a little more 15, 18 weeks a year, maybe 20, you know, and just, Hey, Madison, go swing B sharp.

Alvin Owusu (17:10.166)
Sure, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (17:31.971)
We don't need 40 weeks. We don't need 38. And at the end of the day, if she's feeling good about it, I always wonder sometimes when I see these kinds of things, if the end isn't justifying the means or the means ain't justifying the ends, you might want to change it up a little bit, right? It ain't working. And I'm not saying this year hasn't worked. She won a grand slam. What I'm saying is I would go back and look at each one of those tournament wins and start to look back if I am...

Alvin Owusu (17:51.797)
Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (18:00.847)
her or a friend, Tangel and say, look, let's just check this out and say, Hey, here's what was working when I did this. I was fresh. was this. I was that change rackets. I changed this and that something. And each time I bet you'll start to see a little bit of a, I bet you'll start seeing a little bit of some, uh, some, you know, some, crossover, some rel, some correlation here and there. I just, I just feel like too many is, is worse.

Alvin Owusu (18:20.681)
Right, and her-

her best three events this year, obviously she won the warmup event before Australian Open, she wins the Australian Open, she semi-finaled Indian Wells right after that, and then it's been steadily, not to say dropping, but we have not seen results that good since then. So, know, quarter-final here, quarter-final at the Garros, like semi-final at the 250, like we're seeing,

Torrey Hawkins (18:30.67)
That's right, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (18:44.248)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (18:53.643)
the better results for the front end of the year. And I know that foreign American player being, especially a Grand Slam winner, coming to the US Open, your demands are vast, right? From sponsorships and appearances, like the whole deal, you're cramming a lot of your requirements in the year, like into a very small period of time. And then add onto that, the, not necessarily the pressure of being an American hopeful, but yeah, let's just call it that.

Torrey Hawkins (19:06.008)
Sure.

Torrey Hawkins (19:13.314)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (19:22.979)
She is hopeful.

Alvin Owusu (19:24.503)
and on the back end of a very long year. like, yeah, I don't know. I don't think I have anything like, I'm not making a proclamation or anything. It's just like something I noticed. like at some point when the year slows down and we start taking a look at kind of macro trends from this year, it's like if Madison Keys were to retire at the end of 2025, where does her career put her? Is that a Grand Slam career? I mean, is that a Hall of Fame career?

Torrey Hawkins (19:32.286)
Yeah. Yeah, I'm with you.

Torrey Hawkins (19:48.718)
I think so.

Alvin Owusu (19:49.802)
I mean a slam more or less gets you in, I guess, but to that being said, we have some one time, we have a lot of one time Grand Slam winners. And I think that becomes a, maybe it's not the sure thing that it used to be. Because Imurankano has one Grand Slam. Bianconi Drasku has one Grand Slam. You see where I'm going with this?

Torrey Hawkins (20:10.829)
Yeah, I do, but they have not been relevant for the remaining bit of their 15 years. And I'm just gonna put that out there. One is struggling to refine, regain some relevance and which I think is good. And again, I saw my US Open three today four years ago was Layla and Emma's fateful match. I was like, wow, that was only four years ago. And both girls are trying to struggle to get back into the top 20 from that match. And I don't know if they ever broke top 10 from that.

Alvin Owusu (20:17.604)
That's fair. That's fair.

Alvin Owusu (20:32.362)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (20:40.462)
from those from that ranking boost, just to be honest, just if I'm right. So anyway, your points well taken. I think Madison is well served. don't think she's in that same category. And hey, and there's no shade on that group either, right? lot of good players in that situation. But I certainly think Madison is a step above those just for the body of work she's amassed as well as the length of time she's been out there. And quite frankly, from US Open final was that 2017-2018 with Sloan?

Alvin Owusu (20:42.271)
No, no.

Alvin Owusu (21:04.937)
Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (21:10.189)
Two, two, 20, 25. You mean that to me also, you know, I mean that to me that says, says I've been relevant that long. You know, I think back to Boris Becker's two slams when he won Wimby at 18 and 19 and then won the US Open six, seven years later, that also tells you, buddy, I've been relevant for this length of time, you know, struggle with injury here or there. Sure. But I've been, I didn't get to the top, went away, retired and came back. And I know I've been, I've been out here the whole time. You can't say that for a lot of players.

Alvin Owusu (21:10.271)
Yeah, something like that.

Alvin Owusu (21:38.796)
Yeah, the curious case of Madison Keys. That's like because the year after she finaled, so she finaled US Open 2017, the very next year, semi-finaled French, semi-final US Open. Like she was building something there. And then like 2022, 2023, couple semi-finals there. But yeah, it's it's interesting. I think this speaks more to the parody of the women's game, not necessarily an indictment on Madison. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (22:04.397)
That's huge, that's a great point there. Huge and her still proven shriekiness, right? Where she can be on and very, when she's on, I don't think there's any players that can beat her. Let's be honest, as Arena noticed in Australia, and when she's a tad off, she's beatable. think that's, and Alvin, I'm gonna tell you right now, I watched a ton of matches last week, I watched a few over the last few days.

Alvin Owusu (22:17.491)
Right, right, exactly.

Torrey Hawkins (22:33.056)
that is becoming more more apparent to me than anything is, that commonality? Can I be beaten on my bad day? And, that is about 60 % of the tour. Let's be honest, 60 % of the top hundred can be beaten on their bad day period. And you mentioned earlier the parody. That's the parody Alvin. The parody is, and the reality is everybody is so much closer to each other. Now it's not like

Alvin Owusu (22:43.517)
Right, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (23:01.229)
Top 100 would just fold. It's not like 50 would just go away. You know, I just saw that match. I don't want to skip over to the men. Was it Pissarro? Played his fellow countryman, Caboli. Dude, that match was knocked down, drag out. I mean, I don't want to get to the men yet, but to my point, I'd never heard of Pissarro. I'm like, dude, where's this Italian band? This guy is good. And I'm like, where'd this guy go? You know, so anyway, I say it to say,

Alvin Owusu (23:11.999)
Yeah. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (23:20.255)
just a next man up in the Italian armada there. It's crazy.

Torrey Hawkins (23:30.668)
And you heard it right here, Kaboli was a little lucky to get out of that one. You know what I mean? So I just said to say he was one of those guys that I said in the match, where has this guy been? Watch out for him. Like I said with Kaboli, a few tournaments back. So I'm just really happy to see this kick in. again, I would tell you that keep Madison in the very esteemed and rare air position she has earned herself whenever she decides to hang it up.

Alvin Owusu (23:36.394)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (23:58.782)
She will be, she has a hall of fame career already. If she decides to keep going good for her. She's doing great. I would tell her just pick a po pick her poison and pick a tournaments and keep graces with her presence with that great looking game. And if she can do it for 30 weeks, great. If she can do it for 25, even better because she fits a very big spot in the game of one of the few that can out hit some of the games best when she's playing well, you know what mean? And so, and that's, and leave it at that.

Alvin Owusu (24:24.904)
Right, fair, Speaking of big hitters, I believe in our preview, our friend Ashley had a hankering for Clara Towson, I believe it Ashley. Clara caught a bad matchup because Alexandria Ayala is the kind of player, I mean that match tiebreaker at the end of the third set was master class tennis on

Torrey Hawkins (24:37.661)
Yeah. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (24:53.93)
on behalf of both ladies, but Alex's ability to, when she's a good mover, she takes the ball off the rise well, and she can expose a player's lack of movement. so the up and down for Alex is always like, okay, she can expose your movement, but you can also expose her lack of power. So I saw that kind of like, I don't wanna say yin and yang effect in that match, but it was one of those matches where the game styles match up and.

Torrey Hawkins (25:01.451)
Very well.

Torrey Hawkins (25:19.942)
Yeah,

Alvin Owusu (25:22.97)
It's like not the most beautiful tennis all the way throughout, but you can see like each player making these micro adjustments to try to put themselves in the best position to take advantage of the little advantages that they do have.

Torrey Hawkins (25:37.375)
Yep. And Towson did not respond and did not have the energy. I think she got punched in the mouth in that first set out Alvin. I watched a bit of that match. I watched a good chunk of it. Alex Ayala and I, heard it right here. I was, I was mad at myself for not looking at that match as a potential upset early because we haven't really heard much from her since. Was it Miami? It was Miami.

Alvin Owusu (25:39.166)
Alvin Owusu (26:06.1)
Miami,

Torrey Hawkins (26:06.725)
She had a hurt her nice run. I was mad at myself. She's been injured since. But, but a healthy Alex, I should have looked at that match and said, Whoa, that could be, that could be a tough one right there because she's proven that she has the ability to beat some of these top players. And you said it, Wimby, I, I agree with you on a percent. You have to take some of the Wimbledon results with a grain of salt because players can do well at Wimby. It doesn't necessarily mean much, except that they're really good on grass and

Alvin Owusu (26:08.852)
She was a bit injured there, she's been injured. Shoulder injury, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (26:36.218)
I felt like Towson's great run she had at Wimby was just that. It was a great run on grass. She's every bit of a top 20 player in the world. I'm not so sure. And that match with a, with a bona fide proven hardcore player like Alex Ayala, that that match was so straightforward. And so I, I looked at the match album and I couldn't even call it an upset. I called it a great first round match in my mind because I kind of see.

Alvin Owusu (26:51.709)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (27:03.347)
I kind of see Alex being a top 30 player within the next, you know, six months to a year, the way she's playing, if she can continue to follow up that body of work. So that's, it just looked like a, it looked like a round of 32 match to me more than a first round and to be on, and that, in which case somebody has to lose. It's a, it's a first round loss in the sense of that. That's where they met this, this time around, but it wasn't a first round matchup, so to speak.

Alvin Owusu (27:16.477)
Right, right, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (27:30.891)
And that's where we are with the women's game right now too. I would say anywhere from 10 in the world to about 60 in the world. It's almost a coin toss. So you get a lot of these women who are, especially, we talked about this in the preview, I feel for those players who are seeded 25 to 32 when they end up playing someone who's ranked 35 to 45 because we saw McCartney Kessler had her hands full with Magdalena. Sophia Kennan was seeded, lost to

Torrey Hawkins (27:49.364)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (27:52.958)
Right?

Alvin Owusu (28:01.372)
American Kruger, Ashton Kruger, right? And I mean, even you go all the way back to Wimbledon, because you mentioned Wimbledon, Alex played, Barbara Krachikova defending champion first round, right? First round. Now, Barbara hadn't played in a while. She was a bit injured, but she kind of did the same thing. Like she, Alex came out, hit Barbara in the mouth, right? Runs with that first set six, three. And then I think she might've gotten up a break in the second set. And then Barbara got a hold of the match.

Torrey Hawkins (28:02.595)
Kruger, Ashton Kruger. Yeah, saw it.

Torrey Hawkins (28:11.753)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (28:30.858)
62 in the second run away 61 on the third which is what I would have expected what you would expect from a top-ranked player it's for Towson to do and she almost did it she got up in the fifth and the third set and then and Then I maybe she got a little I'm assume she got tired then then Alex was Right. Yeah Alex did step up in the back. So there's it

Torrey Hawkins (28:31.091)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (28:36.937)
thousand to do. Sure.

Right. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (28:46.313)
Or maybe, or maybe Alex stepped up, you know, but to your, but to your point, Alex is a future top 30 and I was, and I was very happy to see that match. I remember looking, I'm like, how did I not see this matchup early? It's almost as if since Miami, she's been kind of out of sight, out of mind a little bit with some, with some deep runs, but dude, that the girl's here to stay, bro. She's here to stay. And I got to say, I'm a very, she is 100 % legit once again, you know, proving herself to be a feisty competitor. So.

Alvin Owusu (29:08.116)
No, she's legit. She's legit.

Torrey Hawkins (29:15.049)
So some great matchups so far man. That's what I said every every open like this is four or five She was that player in Miami. She's continued to be and there's four or five that you're like, yeah, maybe time

Alvin Owusu (29:26.41)
Yeah, and she lost first round French Open, lost in three sets, lost first round Wimbledon, three sets, gets herself in a very similar position here and was able to claw back in that third set, put a lights out tie breaker. So much fun to watch that match. The crowd was completely engaged. I'm like, oh man, that's the kind of match, I'm not a US, yeah, I'm a little bit of a US Open hater, but it's like that kind of match. It's like, oh, I can't wait to get there. This is gonna be so much fun.

Torrey Hawkins (29:45.202)
Yeah. That you want to see in person. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (29:56.235)
Kind of bouncing forward, like the first match that I watched, think the first match on Sunday that I watched, uh, Magdalena against your girl, um, Cartney Kessler. Um, that, that was a, almost like a classic WTA match in the year 2025, both ranked, like I said, somewhere in that 25 to 35 phase. think Magda just missed out getting seated. McCartney just got in and you're watching the match. Like there's no difference between these players. Like it is.

Torrey Hawkins (30:18.236)
Yep. Just miss eating. Yeah. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (30:26.374)
It is so slim, so slim. But I wanted to ask you about this one thing, and we haven't taken a trip to a courtesan's corner in a while, but I wanna go now. I noticed on McCartney's forehand side, she could step up and hit it, but didn't hit it very well open stance in the corner. And she hits it off the backhand, fantastic open stance in the corner, but forehand.

Torrey Hawkins (30:28.306)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (30:35.397)
Okay.

Alvin Owusu (30:53.084)
not so much, not able to generate the same kind of power balance on that side. What are kind of the, if you're walking through the progression of open stance forehand in this instance, what are your of your check marks that you're looking for for a player to be able to defend that forehand corner well?

Torrey Hawkins (31:13.033)
I'm going to take you back before I go to checkpoints. Number one, having a great backhand at sometimes almost is your worst enemy for having a huge forehand because you have a great backhand. You don't always need one. Number two, how often are you in that situation? Not often enough, right? To really develop it and really have it. think what, I think what McCartney's dealing with right now is

Alvin Owusu (31:15.625)
Okay.

Torrey Hawkins (31:42.278)
the need to have both wings and to have both wings very well because people are starting to get away from that backhand and they're testing her much like Coco Golf. Let's be honest who has a very similar issue on the forehand side. The people know not to test that side, right? They know not to go there in big rallies and they're going to start going bigger to that side. I remember, I remember this was a funny thing. I'll just to help, as you say, level set.

One of our best players was a guy named Brian Vahaley, now current USDA president. He had one of the best back in the junior tennis. Okay. He goes off to college. He comes and I was trying to get him to understand the open stance backhand. He never hit him in juniors. He didn't need to. He was that good off the backhand. He could rifle the backhand through you if he needed to. Angle you, rip it, roll it, doesn't matter. Whatever he could do, he could darn near scatter, cover, and smother on the backhand side. He was...

Alvin Owusu (32:35.773)
What do mean he didn't need to? Explain that because the shot to be hit is there. What you're saying is he would just cross over and hit it as opposed to.

Torrey Hawkins (32:45.288)
crossover, stance, rip it if he needed to, step in if he needed, and even if he did have the occasional, Ryan had developed this funky hop step on the left to hit a close stance back, remember that? And it was his own version of remaining in the squared stance he was comfortable with, and he could always step across and go big if he had to. And he was smart enough, he was one the smartest players I've ever worked with, so he knew what he was doing.

Alvin Owusu (32:56.327)
Yeah, I do remember that.

Torrey Hawkins (33:13.627)
He gets to college and realizes he can't get away with his little hop step rip backhand anymore. And that guys were starting to run into the forehand to open up the backhand. This whole com, this whole trip back memory lane is to tell you Brian comes back the Christmas break of his freshman year and says, I need a lesson every day this week on that open sense backhand. I cannot get away with it anymore. And I was very, I was not only impressed with him as a player to understand what he needed.

But I was also impressed that he now realized his whatever he was doing to compensate could not do it anymore. Now we talk about it now we laugh about it. But the funny part about I go back now to to Miss Kessler. She's at that point, right? She's at that point I think and there's other players, you know, I think Peyton Stearns is in a situation she loves her step back forehand, right? She's gonna have to get a true step up and get inside the court a little more. She's there's these there's these shots that they've continued to get away with.

Alvin Owusu (33:50.537)
Mm-hmm.

Alvin Owusu (34:08.305)
Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (34:13.114)
There's these plays, there's other Americans I think are in the same ballpark. They got to start having another weapon that they have not needed here to for, but they need it now. And I think it's not so much getting back to your actual question. Now that I've kind of level set, they now need to hit copious amounts of that ball and develop a pattern over it. I don't think hitting the ball is an issue. Comfortability? They'll get over that.

The checkpoints of a step up forehand and this is off the open open open. So all the open sense forehand are and this is, and these are, and they're innocence in this order. Can you hit off of pace? Can you hit it a bit wide while you're on the run that some call it the, the, the outside hop. And can you take the true step up inside the court when the ball's there? It's not quite on the rise. It's not quite.

Alvin Owusu (34:44.189)
Open this forehead.

Torrey Hawkins (35:08.528)
But it's definitely a drive, but it's just about a shoulder height ball tip through. Those to me are the three. You need them in that order. You have to defend it. You have to be able to counter to what I call counter punish it. And you got to have the ability to hit the ball as a step up and you get that reset ball or the ball that's having a bit of spin. That's the three. And right now to me, she only has the count. She only has the counter and then she's feeling that she'll have the counter punish on a, on a low wide ball.

but not necessarily on the high ball. that again, what does she do? She hits well off the backhand side. She tends to fade back on the floor and the roll a bit more hoping to come back to her backhand, which, is what most people do. Now they're going to start realizing they're going to come back to that ball. She needs a few more of those. She moves very well. She has great hands and great racket speed. It won't take her much, but she has to develop it now. So they won't have that wing to expose.

Alvin Owusu (36:01.725)
Yeah, I've been, I was super impressed, like not only in that match, but her progression that we've seen over the summer, like what's the other last three to four months, like she's a real player and that's the kind of speaking back to what you, we've always talked about, like just cause you're on the pro tour does not mean that, you know, the development stops, especially a lot of these women are so young, like they have a lot, I mean, she's probably four or five years away from her peak, like there's still work to be done. We're seeing it with, you can win a grand slam and still have work to be done, right? Coco's in a.

Torrey Hawkins (36:18.918)
100%.

Torrey Hawkins (36:23.91)
100%.

Torrey Hawkins (36:28.902)
Got that right.

Alvin Owusu (36:29.937)
Coco Coco cops in a bit bit of a bit of a tussle right now. She just split sets with a little time Yanavich So we'll we'll keep an eye on that one as we continue to move forward but another young player who You know about out left us a little earlier than I think some people were assuming but again, we're back to Barbara Krcic of a taking out Victoria and Boko that's a Victoria had a great run in Canada, right?

Torrey Hawkins (36:33.51)
Yes, she is. Just because of our eye-life. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (36:48.912)
Yeah. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (36:57.797)
Great run. Great run. Great for Canada. Great for her. Great for the whole Canadian Federation. 100%.

Alvin Owusu (36:58.129)
when's our first WTA event? Yeah, the whole.

the whole deal and I think losing in the first round to Barbora, two things are true here. Progression is not always linear, one, and losing a match does not mean that she is not progressing. Barbora just recently, Barbora is not seated because she had some injuries in the back end of last year, fell out of the rankings, but she did win a Grand Slam last year, win one in champion just last year and she's...

Torrey Hawkins (37:17.505)
sure. Yeah, both can be true at the same time, right? Right, right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (37:25.85)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (37:29.593)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (37:32.273)
She's playing well right now. She's gotten herself healthy. She just came back this year at Wimbledon and has been building since July. her a couple times over the summer on the hard courts. Starting to look better, looking healthy. And if Barbora's healthy, like, I mean, she's a scalpel, man. She's a scalpel.

Torrey Hawkins (37:34.202)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (37:44.986)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (37:50.543)
Barbara played, who was it? Was she playing Navarro? Was that what she played in Wimby when the matches kind of went off the rails?

Alvin Owusu (37:56.777)
believe so, yeah, cause she- she- she fell apart, but she had- she had Emma.

Torrey Hawkins (37:58.625)
What? Yeah. Got sick, got with, had her like was up a set and going away. Like it was, and she had this weird, I remember watching the match, I think it was at my mother-in-law's place. I remember watching this match, like that was weird air. Like out of nowhere, she had a ball, like she's on the near court. She had a ball between the doubles alley and the crowd. Like, and I literally, Alvin, I literally looked at it like,

Alvin Owusu (38:03.558)
back I yeah

Alvin Owusu (38:22.92)
You

Torrey Hawkins (38:28.568)
Well, like, that's a rare mistake, you know, and somebody was either his wife or my mother. I was like, well, what do you mean? Like that? She's made a mistake. I go, no, no, no, no, no, You're not that good to make that mistake. You know, you can miss a lot of balls. You can shake one from time to time. It happens. But you don't hit a ball fairly clean to that side. It's almost as if it was it was a it was a precursor of.

Alvin Owusu (38:40.739)
Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (38:55.492)
It was a tremor of an earthquake and a volcano. And I remember watching that like, Oh, that's, that's, that's a bad mistake. Like she didn't make bad mistakes. I say it to say she would have on that day beat Emma Navarro pretty clean in that match had she not gotten whatever happened to her. So to see her back healthy, didn't she win it the year before? So those points fall off. Right. And so at that point, like you said, shame, shame, uh, you know, hate to be that person who runs up against a defending champs.

Alvin Owusu (38:57.381)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (39:18.438)
Yeah, that's what happened.

Torrey Hawkins (39:25.208)
you know, whose points are falling off, you know, like she did because that was a tough matchup for a friend Boko to run it. But again, she needs that kind of player to help prove her metal and let her know, okay, now you get inside the top 20. Now you know what it's now you need to face me now. It's like it's like old school. What was the old boxing game back in the day? What you had?

Alvin Owusu (39:49.736)
What was it, Mike Tyson's punch out, was it?

Torrey Hawkins (39:51.619)
Well, punch out, yeah, the punch out, had a glass, Joe, and you had all the rest of the guys, you know what mean? All those, you had to get through those levels, you know, to get to that. And that's where, and so I'm actually happy that Mboko is getting those level of players now because the tour is going to be in real good hands in the next, you know, 18 to three years, 18 months, three years, because they've, these young ones would have played these top players and former slam champs to get there.

Alvin Owusu (39:55.973)
Right,

Alvin Owusu (40:17.064)
Right, Vicki, Vicki, I mean not Vicki Pardue, but Barbora reminds me like when I watch her play, it's like when the coach decides to play points against the kids. Like she's just like, it's like she's always in control. You can't rush her. You might occasionally be able to out power her, but like even if you go big, she's there because she read it before you even thought about hitting the ball. Like if.

Torrey Hawkins (40:33.091)
Right. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (40:43.202)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (40:44.136)
for those local, if Joby Ferrara was a female tennis player, he would be Barbora Kachikova. But I wanna switch gears a little bit. Speaking of former Grand Slam champions that are sliding the wrong direction in the rankings, I wanna move over to the men's side. Let's talk about Mr. Danil Medvedev.

Okay, so he loses the Benjamin Bonzi. This is two tournaments in a row, two slams in a row. He's lost the Bonzi first round. I believe he is lost in the first round in three of the four Grand Slams this year, if not all four. I think he might have stuck around at one of them. But lost first round, second round in Australia. Yep, to Lerner Tien. I think he lost first round, Wimbledon first round here.

Alvin Owusu (41:37.413)
That match got ugly for a lot of reasons, right? And I don't really want to go into that. Yeah, yeah, before, because that's the thing. People want to talk about the cameraman incident, but I saw at one point, Daniil missed eight out of nine second serve returns. What are we talking about? And he mentioned in his post match that he feels like he's just playing like crap. And I'm like, I agree. I concur. I concur.

Torrey Hawkins (41:39.906)
Well before the cameraman.

Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (42:04.268)
You are. Yeah. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (42:07.782)
So my question to you is like, you feel like Danil can, does he have one left, like one last two raw left in him or are we, know, he slips out of the seedings and we're going the wrong direction real quick?

Torrey Hawkins (42:20.716)
He should start coaching. He's done. He's Alvin. I'm serious. There is nobody that it's a better cleaner ball from the baseline. And there's nobody whose game has not evolved more over the last three or four years since he had his grand slam wins and his grand slam finals. Danil Medvedev is one of my favorite people to listen to an interview. He's funny. He's articulate. He's a great.

Alvin Owusu (42:44.306)
Amen.

Torrey Hawkins (42:47.203)
person I have when he finally beat did he beat Novak and was it four or five years ago and he was so humble so humble in his in his win that and which I thought was huge and here's you know he has that look he's a little bit awkward a little bit this or that but he could not have handled himself better I loved the Neil Medvedev I played with Peggy the Fiber myself right with with the Neil I'm telling you this comes from a place of

Alvin Owusu (42:53.124)
Yeah, 2021, finally.

Torrey Hawkins (43:16.482)
concern. I saw him Alvin and that Magic Kings learner in the Australia. We talked about this on this podcast. He was beside himself, not knowing what to do as if who is this guy, this learner guy. And we talked about there were about four to six players, Basavoretti, Lerner, Yao. There was this whole new group of players that were hitting the absolute piss out of the ball.

Alvin Owusu (43:42.28)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (43:46.026)
that these former players who had had some decent results, Danielle being one of them were simply not ready for. He was beside himself, That was, that was an Australia. Alvin, this is a year, a year away. He has not changed tack since. And I'm here to tell you Alvin at some point, if his whole thing is just being steady off the back end and working, working one wing, players have wings now they have both wings and they have different levels to their game.

He is trying to take, he's trying to cut down trees with the table, with the butter knife. And it just looks like it's, it's, he's just not able to go through them anymore, Alvin. And I don't, and he hasn't changed his game enough, right? To, add that new wrinkle to develop continually. We all love the player he was and will respect his body of work. No question. But if you're not going to continue to change and to adapt, man.

Alvin Owusu (44:26.864)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (44:56.87)
Right, so let's level set with Daniel, right? So going back to that match against Lerner Tien, so that was second round of Australian Open. The match prior, he goes five sets with Samraesh and wins 6-2 in the fifth, right? So that 6-2 in the fifth win was his last Grand Slam win. So he loses to Lerner in the second round of the Australian Open and then has lost first round in every Slam since then. If we go...

Alvin Owusu (48:07.729)
Yeah, I can see you now. I can hear you now, I can see you now.

Torrey Hawkins (48:09.603)
I can hear you even better, even better. Yeah, it just just flashed up on the screen. It said and I'm like, we're going to keep talking. We're going to lose all this. Go back to wherever you were. Sorry about that. I don't know. I don't know what happened. I'm literally in the same spot. My Internet's on everything full bars and it just I can't I can't diagnose it fast enough. If whatever it is.

Alvin Owusu (48:17.809)
Okay, no, it's okay. Yeah, okay, well.

Alvin Owusu (48:32.155)
Yeah, okay, I gotta get started though. Alright, so let's level set with Daniil, right? So we're gonna go back to Australian Open. We just talked about him losing to Lerner Tien, right? That was second round. First round, he goes five sets with a qualifier, know, beats him in five. I think it was Somerj. Loses to Lerner in five in the second round, and then loses first round French Open, first round Wimbledon, first round US Open, right? If you wanna compare that, and then I think this is important, you compare that to just the six prior Grand Slams to that, right?

Torrey Hawkins (49:02.05)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (49:02.075)
So Wimbledon, 2023, all the way through US Open last year. Semifinals, final, final, fourth round, semifinal, quarterfinal, right? So this is a pretty stark drop off we're talking about here, right? We're now looking at he hasn't been this player with these kind of results since 2017, right? And he's only 29 years old. So this is why I'm like, okay, let me ask the question. Is it salvageable?

Torrey Hawkins (49:17.795)
Grand Canyon drop off.

Alvin Owusu (49:30.435)
He still has, he's at the end of his peak, if you will.

Yeah, maybe it's maybe it's not maybe he ran the peak. He ran the whole thing from age 26 or 25 to 28, right? He finaled he yeah, he hit his first final in 2019 that I've been right around age 24 last final in 2024 2024. That's that's the peak. That's the window.

Torrey Hawkins (49:54.514)
a grand slam career that anyone would be proud of and envious of. And again, Hall of Fame all day. The problem.

Alvin Owusu (50:04.291)
Five finals, one win, three semi-finals. Yeah, I mean, that looks like you have Gini Kofelnikov, something like that, but like, who's also in the Hall of Fame.

Torrey Hawkins (50:14.722)
Thank you. Just saying he's going the wrong way in a hurry. There's blood in the water. I'm just telling you, Alvin, I like him. I've always liked to kneel. It just doesn't look like he is riding the ship anytime soon. There's no game changes. There's no differences. Who knows if he's 100 % healthy. Let's be honest. That kind of hitting over the years has got to take its toll on your body. He's a tall guy. He's a, you know, he's he's a, he's, lean.

You know, that's a lot of pounding, you know, I mean, on the tennis court for a lot of years. And I don't know if he's a hundred percent healthy or not. What I do know is he's not shortening the points in it. And I do know that at some point he's not doing a lot of the things he's he needs to, to continue to evolve with his given style and his given, with, with his profile, he's not expanded or, or enhanced his profile yet. So what are you going to do?

Don't keep doing what you've always done. And what is that? What do they call that? The definition of insanity? Doing the exact same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. That's where we are. And I don't say it lightly. I don't even say it without the due respect. Due a man who has won slams and gotten the numerous finals. This man is one of the top players in our game. I just feel like at a certain point, at a certain point, he needs to

Just consider if he's doing this to win slams and to prove that he needs to reconsider. If he's doing this just to make draws and continue to make a, make a career out of it. Sure. Keep doing what you're doing, you know, but, know, I wouldn't, I wouldn't plan on staying around many second weeks going in any grand slams anytime soon. and, and I'm hoping we tiptoe over to your boy Novak, who also had his hands full with Lerner 10 just the other day. Just saying.

Alvin Owusu (52:05.166)
And we call that a professional segue right there. So let's do talk about Novak versus Lerner Tien. Like on paper, pretty straightforward match for Novak. I believe the score was something like six one seven five, six one, I'll have to go back and look at it. I don't have it right in front of me. But I watched this match, it was anything but straightforward, especially in the middle. So the first set, Lerner looked horrible.

Torrey Hawkins (52:22.05)
Yeah, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (52:34.694)
He looked out of sorts, like maybe it was the moment, it's a big stadium, a lot of things going on there. He didn't make Novak, right, right, right. But Lerner couldn't, he was not making balls, like very basic stuff that he does very well, but then in the second set he settles in and gets into like his bag pretty solidly. Lerner is creating an MO of being able to handle

Torrey Hawkins (52:34.764)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (52:40.275)
Maybe you're playing the 24th time Grand Slam champ.

Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (53:03.536)
high tempo rallies with the best of them. And he was dogging Novak. Novak had to scream uncle a few times and bailed out on some 16, 20 ball rallies with some drop shots. Like I've seen enough, I don't wanna keep doing this. And looked every bit of it in between points. He looked dead to rights. Yeah, looking like an elder statesman.

Torrey Hawkins (53:05.185)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (53:19.605)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (53:23.339)
Yeah, fell at one point, Alvin. Literally fell. Misstep on a backhand.

Alvin Owusu (53:32.231)
looking a little out of breath, right? And, know, obviously to his credit, you know, being the goat that he is, like got himself out of it, right? Lerner did not have the tools at his disposal to put Novak away in that second set when he had opportunities. And then down two sets of love, Novak just kind of like, found himself, took care of business. But I think the takeaway from that match, from my standpoint is, Novak hasn't played, he's not matched tough.

Torrey Hawkins (53:32.287)
Yeah.

A lot out of breath.

Torrey Hawkins (53:42.208)
Peace to go.

Right.

Torrey Hawkins (53:49.247)
Yes.

Alvin Owusu (54:01.806)
right now and this is the fine balance that he's working on right now. Like in order to preserve himself to go deep in these events, he feels like he needs to play fewer matches. But in order to get through these matches, quickly he needs to be sharp, which he is not. He's put himself into like Shaquille O'Neal, play my way into the season, but he doesn't have, yeah, he doesn't have the sharpness to.

Torrey Hawkins (54:14.962)
He needs to matches right?

Torrey Hawkins (54:22.208)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (54:27.59)
He's saving himself for the playoffs, but also playing himself into the season. It's hard to do both. There's a fine line between doing both. And he is riding it. He's on the Razor's edge. Got through that match, and I think he's got it pretty straightforward in the next one. I'm not gonna say it's concerning. Novak has, you know, he's been in some tough early round tussles in the last few, like, U.S. Open last year, I'll show you an open this year.

Przemyśl, another match. But I imagine he'll get right and he'll look like himself. But that's not the problem. The problem is getting to the quarterfinals and feeling like he can compete three matches in a row from that point.

Torrey Hawkins (55:10.996)
without with the depth of a thousand cuts that he's experienced along the way.

Alvin Owusu (55:15.5)
Exactly. Exactly. And I don't, I don't, I feel like we're in that spot now where there's not really a lot to say about it. Like, yeah, he's probably going to get himself through these first three, four matches. He probably will. I have no reason to doubt that he will, but then he's going to start running into the, the, the Alcaraz's and then, and then Medvedev's and then center. like, it's, it's just a lot to ask when we can't get through matches like this quickly and efficiently.

Torrey Hawkins (55:43.808)
bullies and others who are just a little fitter before he even gets to Al Carraz in center. I haven't looked that deep at his section of the draw, but there's players like that you have to go through. There's players that you're to, he's going to have to get through the tougher meat of the lower seeds, Alvin, before he even gets one of those here soon. And again, each one is a depth of a thousand cuts. He will get through like, like gladiator did.

glad he had a one and two. will, but buddy, he's licking. He will, he will have a few days in them, going, going that route. And again, we've all said it there father time is undefeated. And I just feel like, the man has blessed us for decades now, decades of tennis at a high, high level. I feel like there's nobody that can tell him, but, himself when it's time, but at the same time, we do not need to continue to

give him the this level of of of he may win 25 right I remember all this going down when Serena kept looking for that last one right and I kept thinking to myself you're you're you're you're willing to risk all these losses and all of this ding to your legacy for this one more tournament which you know yeah maybe the record books are that important I get that when you get that level of you why not I get it but

Alvin Owusu (56:50.148)
Yep, yep, yep.

Torrey Hawkins (57:10.297)
I just saw a woman, I remember when Naomi beat it the first time at the open, I remember saying to myself, you may not realize it, but the torch has already been passed, right? You're still Serena. We all get that, but you're no longer the Serena that you once were. And do we appreciate that? Yeah. Yeah. We maybe more than, know, and I think maybe it's your own. I hate to use these words, Alvin vanity, your own.

confidence, your own hard work, your own champion mindset. I don't know. I'm not, I'm not here to dog it, but that won't let you stop. Right. And that's, and that's the problem. And that's the only thing I should, no one questions that, you know, if he were to stop right now, we'd be like, yeah, yeah, he gave it a good run, you know, and I feel like the only person who's doubting that, that, that, that take is him, you know, or, or her at that time. And so that's, and that's all I'll say. I, I certainly don't want to come off any way of as

Alvin Owusu (57:48.229)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (58:02.341)
Yeah, I'm-

Torrey Hawkins (58:08.755)
with any level of nothing but respect. There's no condescension. There's no nothing. There's nothing but respect for the man. It's a moment of silence and he's still with us. You know what mean? I'm like, dude, what can you say that hasn't been said? But at the same time, I don't know, man. You think you're going to try to go two weeks with this? You know what I mean? In the hopes to get one more? I don't know.

Alvin Owusu (58:26.63)
Well, I remember the Serena thing too, and I don't have my Serena sets fresh, but after losing to Naomi, that was probably 2018 US Open, right? She follows that up by, she lost to Simona Hallepp at Wimbledon in 2019, right? Hallepp played the match of her life. think she had two unforced errors in the match, right? Like she had some, okay, but that was in the final. She was there. That year was maybe the following, I think it was that year maybe.

Torrey Hawkins (58:36.914)
Right. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (58:51.303)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (58:56.346)
Maybe the following year she lost a Bianca Andrescu in the final of US Open, right? So like she was still getting there. That's where I get that's where I'm in the same place I was then with Serena that I am now with Novak and these they're very much so parallel situations here where I can't tell someone to not continue to try when they keep getting that close. Like at that point, like that's what you play for. You play for the opportunity to win Grand Slams and Serena had opportunities Novak.

has semi-finaled or finaled the last like six, seven grand slams. Like he's right there, but we're now starting to see.

Torrey Hawkins (59:35.294)
Is at those three matches, the, the, uh, you mentioned, uh, the match with, uh, five to what's her name? You said it again. Simona has the Simona that has the Osaka, Halep and Andreas, uh, Andreas Q match happened already. And are we in the 20, what was her last one when she was at 20, 23? Are we closer to the 2023?

arena and not the 2019, 2020 or 2021? That's my question. Now, and I agree with you and I think that I think the parallels and we're talking about two of the absolute greatest of all time. I don't want to go I'm not throwing dirt on any graves, but it's a nuance that only two people ever can be a part of at this point in their career. We're talking Jordan after the six championships, we're talking Brady after the after the

Alvin Owusu (01:00:09.207)
Right. Well, yeah, and I think

Alvin Owusu (01:00:17.613)
Right, this is a nuanced conversation. It's a nuanced conversation here.

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:32.496)
championships at Tampa Bay. We're we're talking Tiger Woods coming back after a car accident. We're talking literally, we're talking about a handful of individuals of all time that can be in this conversation, Alvin, for us to even talk about. And that's what I'm saying is how rare this is. However, every time I see it, I just continue to look at it and say to myself, but is it likely?

And is it good? And each time it gets further away and each time it's going to require that much more of a, of a output of both the tear, wear and tear on the body. And to your point, he's playing less and less to be ready for these. And he's going to have more and more of these all the way through. And I just feel like it's, it's an inverse. It's an inverse relationship.

Alvin Owusu (01:01:16.089)
Yeah, I mean...

Alvin Owusu (01:01:20.099)
Yeah, mean the numbers say it's gonna work out, but I mean he is bumping up against, save for a US Open loss to Popron, right? He's lost to Center three or four times. He's lost to Carlos a couple times at Wimbledon. Had to pull out against Zverev, and I'll show you it open. So he's getting there, but these guys seem to, I mean he did beat Carlos this year, I'll show you it open.

but that seems to be the anomaly of the last two years as opposed to he's getting to these guys and these guys are just seemingly better than him in these events. it's probably, I mean, obviously we're closer to the end, right? We are, but.

Torrey Hawkins (01:02:01.703)
Right. Every day we wake up, close to that end, you know, and that's all I want to say. again, yeah, I see it. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:02:05.221)
Well, Touche. And I wanted to pull up here, I don't know if you can see, but I see it on the screen here, you have his next few rounds. He's got Zachary Schvata in the next round. I wanna say that should be straightforward. But then he's got Cam Norrie probably after that, and Cam will get in those legs. He's playing good tennis and he will get in those legs. And that's all we're talking about right now. We're talking about the mileage and the wear and tear that Novak's going to have to accumulate in week one.

Torrey Hawkins (01:02:22.352)
Who's playing some pretty good tennis.

Alvin Owusu (01:02:33.795)
And then where does that leave him come, you know, beginning of week two. And then after that, you're looking at either Francis or Holger, they're going to make him work. So it's not their matches. They're winnable. Of course they're winnable. He's the best player of all time, but if it were a challenge ladder, he'd be, he'd be money right now or some tiebreak tens or fast forwards, but we're playing three out of five here. It's a, it's a

Torrey Hawkins (01:02:47.409)
if he could play them once a week, he would dismantle each one.

Torrey Hawkins (01:02:57.277)
But unfortunately, you got that right. We're playing three out of five and it is a grand slam and it's the last one of the year coming into the year. So these players are also sharp, right? We're not shaking off any nerves. We're not shaking off any cobwebs. Everybody's been playing. So anyway.

Alvin Owusu (01:03:15.171)
Yeah, yeah. And just kind of last men's match I wanted to touch on, we mentioned Pasaro versus Kabali was a knockdown drag out match, you know, inner Italian battle. Kabali wins that match, he's gonna play Jenson Brooksby in the next round, who also won a knockdown drag out battle against Vukic, another five setter. that's like, these are the matches, think Brandon Nakashima is another example. Like, you wanna, when you're navigating through a grand slam.

Torrey Hawkins (01:03:21.892)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:03:32.912)
Yeah. one. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:03:44.022)
And these guys aren't like, they're not threatening to win slams quite yet, so maybe they're not at the point in their career where they can navigate these Grand Slams. But in order to put yourself in position to make a run in the second week, you gotta avoid these landmines of long fours and five set matches early on. The math doesn't math out when it comes to lactic threshold and replenishing of nutrients. That's not what you wanna be doing in the first day of Grand Slam.

Torrey Hawkins (01:03:59.727)
Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:04:10.704)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:04:14.007)
And yet it's being required. And I feel like that's also the parody of the men's game and hats off to it, man. I got to tell you, you know, it's been a, just been a phenomenal show of tennis, you know, both those two matches you mentioned were good, buddy. It's not getting any easier. You know what I mean? It is not getting any easier. And that's first round. You and I remember days out and back from the day when

Alvin Owusu (01:04:33.221)
Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:04:40.205)
A guy was happy to get make main draw and he got dusted out pretty pretty routinely and you know everything went everything went forward. Buddy, I would dare say the 98 or whatever the actual cut was for the open. I bet that if you put 78 versus 58 that'd be a four set match period. You know I mean let alone 64 and in you know what I mean? So I mean there's just

Alvin Owusu (01:05:02.382)
absolutely, absolutely.

Torrey Hawkins (01:05:08.327)
I was watching three set matches in the qualities, Alvin, that I'm like, this is, this is some tough tennis, man. mean, almost the last, the second round, I think I watched four matches that all went long in the third. Like it wasn't just like, like I'm like, yeah, this is where it starts to heat up. This is, this is some solid tennis. I mean, you're talking each player gone through four shirts minimum, good tennis from both sides. Even the guy that was losing, you saw had chances.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:15.876)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:05:37.613)
And which is why it was both the tension, the nurse and the tennis itself, the actual exercise and execution. So now you carry that into, right? You carry that into the qualifiers are coming in ready. Not to mention, not to mention. Yeah, buddy, they play three matches. These guys, these guys are ready, you know? And so that's my point. The open man. And I don't think we give a lot of credit to. Here we are. It's a complete right complete dichotomy. We're talking about Novak.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:41.731)
Right, right.

Alvin Owusu (01:05:50.437)
Yeah, the qualifiers are ready. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:06:05.43)
may not be able to and we're talking about guys in the qualities are no joke. Make sure we understand the context here. Novak is the best player of all time period. Nothing more needs to be said. We're talking about an aging champion at the end and does he have it in him to do it again? That's all we're talking about Novak on his bad day is foreign the world on his bad day.

Alvin Owusu (01:06:06.469)
You

Torrey Hawkins (01:06:30.926)
You know, and so we're talking about, could he, with the parody of the men's game, can he navigate six more matches to get to the final and avoid to your point, the landmines that are going there. And I wouldn't even tell you, Alvin, that the qualities are becoming even more rough to deal with. And, you, you, better, you better come to the open with a little extra in the tank because it is that nobody's there to give you nothing, you know, and they're not there to help you.

Alvin Owusu (01:06:59.237)
So let's stay right there, I wanna look forward, I wanna kinda take a look forward now to our some round three, round two matchups of interest. Like there's a lot of good ones, but you mentioned Qualys, I'm gonna stick with the men's side. Lloyd Harris is playing against Taylor Fritz, right? So Lloyd Harris from South Africa, came through Qualys, he's currently ranked about 350 in the world, but Lloyd was a former top 50 player. Like I've seen him play in person, he's legit, he's legit. I think he's one in one or two in two lifetime against Taylor.

They're about the same age, 27, 28, very similar build. That is going to be an interesting match. It just feels like it's going to be a daytime match on Louis Armstrong. like Lloyd is not going anywhere. Taylor's going to have his hands full. That's a horrible, horrible second round match for a four seed. I Taylor's a four seed. It's like, Hey, congrats. It's like Mboko getting Kujikaba in the first round. Like here's your prize. Here's your prize.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:29.144)
Hmm.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:34.05)
Sure.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:39.843)
You'll the distance.

All right. Yep.

Right. Yep. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:54.489)
All right. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:57.911)
Also on the men's side, Gabe Diallo, our Canadian sensation, got himself through with the orange hair, got himself a four set win yesterday. He seeded, looked like a pros match. Like one of the first set dropped, second set wins sets three and four, like got himself out of there. He's playing, but he's playing Jaime Munoz, second round. Again, congratulations. We're now.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:01.219)
Yeah, yeah, with the orange hair.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:14.968)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:21.72)
Mmm.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:25.676)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:08:26.808)
We're now in a Masters 1000 event is what it feels like. And then Mr. Short Shorts himself, Tomas Mahatch against Yow Fonseca.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:29.42)
That's right. That's right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:08:40.107)
Oof, that's gonna, they need to change the balls out every, every five and three and not nine and seven. You heard it right here. Or I should say seven and nine and, and three and five. They don't, the Wilson needs to create a new ball for these two players because you know, right now they're going to, there will not be Wilson or us open on that ball by the, by that last game of that, of that ordeal. And both players are going to, are going to around for a few forehands.

Alvin Owusu (01:08:42.173)
baby.

Alvin Owusu (01:09:02.051)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:09:08.472)
And buddy, you heard right here, that is going to be a nice little barn burner. I'm looking forward. I saw some, I saw a little bit of guy. I saw a little bit of drop shot. saw occasional volley out of, uh, out of our Brazilian sensation on it on his first round match. I'm happy to see that. And my, just continue to kind of get his game up a little bit too. And it had a little variety and they started to be at a little shape when he needs to. This is going to be a good match out, but I'm really looking forward to those two. And again.

They continue like in Boko in some ways, each of these matches continue to help Yao to get to level that he's trying to be at down the road. And that's not to say that he's, you know, that Mr. Mahatch is a cannon fodder. It's not, he is every better respectable top 20 player in the world. It's just to say the more of these matches, I got to think they will continue to favor Yao in his matriculation. Do I see him being the next grand slam champ winner? Not yet. But do I see these matches he gets through?

Alvin Owusu (01:09:45.518)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:08.248)
preparing him and getting him there, I 100 % do.

Alvin Owusu (01:10:11.01)
Yeah, and I think we have to remember he is still young and what we look for from young players is continued progression, not just how well they do in these Grand Slams, but how they continue to build out their games. And like you mentioned, you're starting to see more out of him using slices, coming in, rounding out his all-court game. And this is his first full year playing all four Grand Slams. I think you just kind of want to see him like,

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:14.808)
Yeah, 18, 19 years old.

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:25.708)
Right. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:10:40.504)
get a win or two, do a little better than needed at Wimbledon potentially. But I think moving into that next echelon is beating someone like a Mahatch in the second round of a Grand Slam. So that should be fun. mean, that's gonna be on an outside court somewhere, potentially, Louis, daytime. I don't know when they're, what day they're playing, but I just.

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:49.079)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:57.687)
Yeah, I see that being a court 17 match that that's that that reeks of a court 17 match.

Alvin Owusu (01:11:03.362)
I just looked up tomorrow's order of play, Harris versus Fritz first on Louis Armstrong. Of course, of course, of course, our second on second on,

Torrey Hawkins (01:11:08.119)
Louis had to be, had to be. I see that Mahatch and Fonseca match on 17. Oh, grandstand, like I said, it deserves it. You know what I mean?

Alvin Owusu (01:11:16.12)
Grandstand, second match on Grandstand. There you go.

Yeah, and they are following another match of interest. Emma Navarro versus Katie McNally. First on grandstand, Katie's back, she's healthy, she's playing some good ball.

Torrey Hawkins (01:11:28.287)
Mm. Mm. The two Americans. Yup. Look good in the mix, Coach. Alvin, look good in the mix. Does she look good? Look good in the match of the day? Who's she playing the first round? I watched that match. Pull it up if you can. That's right. Taipman. Yeah. Yeah. No, she looks very solid and moving well. I was impressed with how...

Alvin Owusu (01:11:37.347)
She-

Alvin Owusu (01:11:45.54)
Jill Teichmann. She beat Jill clean. Yeah. Two and two.

Torrey Hawkins (01:11:58.295)
Heidi, she made that match look for her. And Taichman can be that kind of player that can give you some fits. She didn't even, she cleaned that match up pretty solid, which let me know that Katie's playing pretty well. She is one of those players that benefited from that early play of the mixed doubles and got in. That was your boy, my new favorite, Lorenzo Mosetti's partner, by the way. That's a whole nother talk show. Yeah, please.

Alvin Owusu (01:12:00.44)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:26.293)
You won't be getting any more compliments out of Lorenzo from me, but I will say I stand by what I said.

Alvin Owusu (01:12:30.724)
Hey, Lorenzo, Lorenzo handled GMP like a pro today. Let me just bring the big fellow down. They've played like this is their third time playing in a Grand Slam and Lorenzo always gets him in four or five. Like he's got a beat on that serve. He knows how to handle it. He's not gonna get, he's a pro. He's a top 10 pro. He knows how to handle these kinds of situations. But yeah, I like, yeah, let's talk about it.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:36.117)
Yeah, he did.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:48.257)
Yeah. Yes.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:53.303)
I have a question. Please, please continue. I'm so sorry. I've done this all night. Please.

Alvin Owusu (01:12:58.55)
No, no, no, no, no. Ask your question, because I was going to change topics anyways.

Torrey Hawkins (01:13:05.057)
There is a player Alvin that I watched his match. Kind of salty that I stayed up late to watch the match to be honest with you. Alvin, this player has been on the tour for a number of years. This player physically has a massive weapon in his size alone. His serve is ridiculous.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:14.936)
hate yourself for it.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:19.492)
Huh?

Alvin Owusu (01:13:29.859)
Okay.

Torrey Hawkins (01:13:33.738)
His height and wingspan are ridiculous. And Alvin, every time I watch this player play, feel like he's getting worse, not better. And Alvin, I wanted to find out if you felt the same way. Tell me, tell me why Riley O'Pelka continues to miss more or less routine returns. Camps out 20 feet behind the baseline for a guy that should be coming forward.

Alvin Owusu (01:13:47.928)
about Riley O'Pulka.

Torrey Hawkins (01:14:02.814)
gets in late when he does volley is a pretty good volleyer, all falls considered and doesn't do near enough of it. And why does he not have Evo or John or anyone else who's over the height of six, nine as his coach, helping them to get him to that next level of a top 20, a top 10, because the more I keep watching this young man.

The more I keep thinking they're trying or he's trying to play like everyone else when he is unlike everyone else. And it's, it's, it's almost frustrating me Alvin to see him go the other direction with his game and his tactics. Tell me what you thought.

Alvin Owusu (01:14:46.509)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:14:50.464)
I mean, I kind of look at this from the inverse, right? So like Riley O'Pelka, we're saying why isn't he better? With that size, why isn't he better? I would even flip that question and go, maybe he's only this good because of that size. Like maybe he is not. And I don't know, I don't watch enough of Riley's matches because unlike yourself, I did not stay up to watch that match. I have no interest in watching SirBots.

I tennis, like I am interested in Carlos Alcaraz pressing through this tournament. I don't want to be stressed out by the odd task of him having to get through a tricky match like that, but he did it perfectly. Before the match came on, I was telling my wife, like, this match will be nip and tuck, and it'll be something like seven, five, six, four, seven, five, and I think it was pretty close, like six, four, seven, five, six, four. So, like, it's a one-break kind of situation. But.

Riley, I think it's hard for him to use his size. Like we talk about how good he is at the net, but he hits a big ball, the balls are coming back with a lot of pace and shape. It's gonna put him in bad positions hitting first volley. So like, if he's there, right, yeah, you're not getting past him. But it's hard for him to get there and really impose his size on you at the net. That's kind of my first read with him coming forward.

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:17.685)
Isn't that tactics, Alvin? Isn't that tactics? Can't he slice more? Can't he come forward more? Can't a guy like an Ivo Karlovic, who also was 6'10", not pop a serve, hit a slice? Why did Ivo hit so many slice returns? So he could come to the darn net and do use his magician hands when he could going forward more. But Ivo Karlovic, Karlovic, I don't want to say his name wrong, had

Alvin Owusu (01:16:17.963)
Outside it.

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:46.397)
Some of the best and John had some of the best tie break ratios and times under a number of times not getting broken in tournaments lead probably in the career of tennis of ATP tour. And these two gentlemen should be on Riley's short list and they should be on speed dial to get these guys in the camp and whatever he's doing. Okay. Whatever he's doing to your point, Alvin, you said it very well, but why is he not doing that?

And whatever he's doing to rip the ball, if he's having to go side to side, six feet behind the logo of the, of the, of of the U S open on the back and he's seven feet tall, Alvin, he's playing the wrong style. You know what I mean? He should be blocking, rolling or, or chipping and chart something because there were times it looked almost easy for Carlos to pass him. Now I'm not talking Carlos, Carlos is Carlos. We know that center would have probably passed him easier. Let's be very honest.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:21.325)
Yeah, that's a problem.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:28.407)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:17:44.978)
The problem I have is the fact that he started off that far back in the first place. And it just let me know he's not going to be anybody else. If he does that, sure. You're not going to win against Carlos, but who else will you beat with those tat with those same tactics and core position? That was my problem.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:50.445)
Sure, okay.

Alvin Owusu (01:18:04.931)
Yeah, mean, yeah, I can't really disagree there. mean, he does spike up and occasionally beat players you wouldn't expect him to beat. Like he beat Holger Runer earlier this year. I know back in the last year he beat Novak. Like he's beaten some good players and will continue to beat good players every once in a while. But like, how does he get himself back towards that? I mean, he's a career high, think of like 18, 19, somewhere in the top 20 there. But.

off of that injury, making his way back, like next year, how does he get himself back into being seated at Grand Slams? I'm with you in that he needs to maybe even shorten up the list of options. Sometimes at a restaurant, they got too much stuff on the menu, it's like, why you just tighten this up and do less and do it well? He could stand to tighten it up.

Torrey Hawkins (01:18:50.321)
real nice restaurant salvin they give you two options they give you a seafood option they give you a steak option and a chicken option they you're welcome you know what I mean thank you and I think he should go with the tight menu I like that I like that analogy

Alvin Owusu (01:18:58.051)
It's it's tight. It's tight. It's good. It's tight. It's tight menu.

Alvin Owusu (01:19:06.915)
And maybe, I mean this is also a case of like bad draw. Like Carlos ain't losing to many people these days, right? So like, Right, exactly, exactly. And he seems, he seems fit for the test. Couple of women's matches I wanna touch on that we can get out of here. McCartney Kessler, for all of her great work against Berta Lynette gets Von Josef next round. That will be tough. We touched on McNally and Navarro.

Torrey Hawkins (01:19:14.067)
Carlos was always a bad drunk.

Torrey Hawkins (01:19:30.353)
another one. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:19:36.834)
I could put Emma on upset watch here because Katie's playing well and Katie comes forward like relentlessly. So if she gets a ball that she can transition on, she will transition on it and she's a fantastic, obviously a fantastic double player, former partner of Coco Golf and obviously you saw her in the mix. yeah, she's playing a little better than Emma is right now anyways. That's, you know, if you're catching this,

Torrey Hawkins (01:19:39.827)
Mm.

Yup. Yup.

Torrey Hawkins (01:19:50.781)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:20:04.563)
Stop.

Alvin Owusu (01:20:06.179)
tomorrow morning by some chance. Grandstand is where it's at. Navarro versus McNally up first on the Grandstand. That will be a good one. And then, kind of the last two here. Taylor Townsend against Yelena Othepenko.

Torrey Hawkins (01:20:20.563)
No shortage of TUDE on that court.

Alvin Owusu (01:20:26.019)
I wonder if Panko will engage because she will have no familiar faces in the crowd, let's put it that way. This is home turf for TT. I'd like to see Taylor, obviously she's doing a lot of things on the double circuit, she's the number one double play in the world, Grand Slam champion. I would love to see her make a run.

Torrey Hawkins (01:20:36.819)
100%.

Alvin Owusu (01:20:51.447)
We've been blessed with US players making runs at the US Open the last few years on both men's and women's side. I would love to see Taylor Townsend, I'd love for the world to meet Taylor Townsend. A second week showing in the US Open would be Labor Day weekend, the perfect opportunity to do that. I think she's poised for it, she's playing good ball. I don't know, I don't have a call on it, just.

Torrey Hawkins (01:20:54.791)
Yeah. Right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:21:08.817)
I agree.

Torrey Hawkins (01:21:14.194)
Definitely could happen. Definitely could happen. I know I have a some history with her, with her coach, John Williams, great guy. Done great work with her and Taylor, I gotta say has just continued to improve every year in every part of her game. Gotten in better shape. She's gotten, she's continued to short parts of her game. She's continued to improve every year, Alvin. And so with the matchup being what it is, Penkel's backhand, Taylor's left-handed.

Alvin Owusu (01:21:29.739)
Right. Yeah. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:21:44.21)
Taylor's gonna come in, gonna move Yolanda. I I think that match could go the distance for sure. And if the variable is where it's at and maybe conditions, I certainly give the nod to Taylor. Obviously, will again, both ladies have no problem with a little controversy and being a little feisty, so.

Alvin Owusu (01:22:07.455)
Hehehehe

Torrey Hawkins (01:22:10.354)
I think that could be a great match. You almost hope it goes that way for Taylor's sake, because then Taylor's got a little chip on her shoulder, you know what I mean, to kind of get there. But no, you're absolutely right. That could be a definitely be a good one. Who is... There was one other match I was looking at, Alvin, that I was wanting to find out. Somebody else plays somebody that's pretty good. Oh, by the way, what's the score of...

Alvin Owusu (01:22:17.91)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:22:37.818)
I'm on my phone right now, not my iPad. What's the score of Coco and Isla Tamiyanovich?

Alvin Owusu (01:22:39.65)
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. We got five all in the third. I think Coco just surfed for it at five four too, let's...

Torrey Hawkins (01:22:48.54)
There's the sounds like the sounds like the serving glitches are still there.

Alvin Owusu (01:22:53.324)
I see the text messages coming rolling in, people are stressed out. I'm like, I'm not watching it, I'm talking to the man right here. There's one more match I had kinda pegged was Alina Kaliskaya is playing against, who did I have her play against? Putin Seva, not a blockbuster matchup, but that's like a, a, these women are both top 30 players-ish.

Torrey Hawkins (01:22:59.154)
Yeah. Yep. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:23:13.84)
Mmm.

Torrey Hawkins (01:23:21.564)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:23:22.956)
Putin Seva kind of in and out of seedings here over the course of the year. That will be an interesting one, but Callen's guys playing some really good ball right now. She's making very good ball right now. But yeah, so Koko's up, she just broke, she's up six five, seems like breaking is not the problem, seems like it's surfing. But let's put it independent, we'll leave the people with that. Just based on the...

Torrey Hawkins (01:23:30.47)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (01:23:41.145)
Never has been. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:23:51.37)
on the travel schedules next few days. I'm thinking maybe we'll let rounds two and three play out and then we'll touch base again over the weekend, maybe Saturday. And then we'll go from there, sound good?

Torrey Hawkins (01:24:04.209)
Think that sounds like a plant.

Alvin Owusu (01:24:06.049)
Fantastic. We'll wrap up here and then we'll finish watching this Cocoa match and maybe we'll get a little tiebreaker to send us off into the night. But yeah, thanks for sticking with us. Again, I'm Alvin, that's Tori. Like, rate, subscribe, all that stuff. Best of three, we are out.

Torrey Hawkins (01:24:10.705)
Hahaha!

Torrey Hawkins (01:24:33.009)
Well, I'm gonna, I'm gonna get on it.