Shelton, Draper, Rune & the “Blocked Generation” | ATP 2025 Review - Part 2

Torrey (00:00.49)
You know what mean? We're looking at the same door. I'm looking at a different part of it.

Alvin Owusu (00:06.166)
Yeah, it's like how many times does a play get redone? It's the same story, but a different person's interpretation of that story. it's like, same story. There you go, exactly, exactly. Well, we are back. It's either right after our last section or maybe it's a complete different episode. I don't know. We'll find out. Actually, you're finding out right now if you're watching this. But here we are, end of year.

Torrey (00:12.839)
Right. 100%. 100%. Wicked in particular, right? So, you know.

Torrey (00:28.393)
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Alvin Owusu (00:36.206)
doing our ATP year in review. Previous segment we covered the young guns, those guys ages kinda 19 to 21, took a look at some of those players and their year and what we liked, what we saw, what we're looking forward to next year. And we're gonna kinda shift our focus to the topic of disagreement maybe. I call these guys the quote unquote born at the wrong time group. well basically these are the guys ages 22 to 24.

Torrey (00:57.021)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:05.026)
who happen to be the same age as Carlos Sarkar as in Yannick Center. I think that's a good place to start. Is this one of the groups where you felt like the naming convention was a little off or was it a different group?

Torrey (01:19.753)
First of all, let's understand this. If you were part of the Big Three's era in whatever timeframe, you were born at the wrong time. I think if anything, Andy Roddick is 100 % the captain of that crew. And mind you, he snuck out with one. You know what mean? He snuck out right before Fed got going. I think that was about...

Alvin Owusu (01:29.112)
Fair. Roddick might be the captain of that group.

Torrey (01:45.0)
20 years with the people born at the wrong time. So that's, it's more of the overall what that means. Do I like the title? Yes. Do I think that applies to a lot of people? Yeah. So, but moving forward, I'd like to know why you feel that this group is born at the wrong time, aside from the obvious, a fellow player, you know, or two.

Alvin Owusu (01:55.554)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey (02:13.736)
happen to be born at the same time. Why are they born at the wrong time?

Alvin Owusu (02:18.05)
Yeah, I think it's interesting to take a look back to kind of understand this particular situation that we're in right now with Yannick and Carlos. So with the big three, it wasn't just the players who were in their particular cohort, They usurped would-be generations of champions, would-be champions if you were looking at a normal run at the top, right? So a generation should last something like...

I don't know, maybe five, seven years at the top of the game and before like, before they retire or age out and a new, a new generation pushes them out. That never happened with those, with those three, let's say four put Murray in there as well. Even stand to a lesser extent, Warenka as he won Grand Slams as a, an older player. So I think that's kind of the, there's that part, right? They ate probably three generations worth of

would be Grand Slam champions. And now we're finally post big three and we've got these new two, this big two. And so I say bored at the wrong time, like these guys are firmly in the same cohort as Sinner and Alcarazz. Where I'm talking about your Shelton's and your Runas and your Draper's and your even Kabali's a little further down and Diallo's even further down than that. But the other side of that is at least they know what the task is. The task is

Torrey (03:36.988)
Yep. Right.

Alvin Owusu (03:45.046)
I need to keep up with these guys. I need to figure out these guys. And you see Shelton and Musetti kind of pushing, clawing, trying to get closer, sometimes making inroads, just small progress bit by bit. But there's no waiting it out for these guys is kind of my point. Ben Shelton's career is gonna go as Yannick Center and Carlos Ocarra's career is gonna go. They're gonna play about the same amount of time. There's no ducking them. It's only gonna get.

Torrey (04:01.672)
Right? Right? No.

Torrey (04:10.64)
Yep. Right. Question. Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (04:13.665)
It can only get worse, actually. There can only be a group that we talked about previously. Like if Fonseca comes up in, or Tien comes up and passes one of these guys, like this is what you're stuck with. that's.

Torrey (04:22.02)
Right, Right, or or or Mensa or Mensa gets gets on a huge role and just starts and just starts You know on a goes on a tear I get it and again, and I'm glad you get that that rolling definition because I get it. I think that You know tennis has always been and it will always have this level of hierarchy. This is tearing if you will of players I like the players

I understood the question before I asked it but I appreciate the color to it. Segway and the Sheltlin and Musetti who clearly are very close third and fourth compared to the rest of the list. When you look at them compared to Carlos and Yannick you may say distant third and fourth but compared to the rest of the I think they're actually pretty close.

Alvin Owusu (04:51.516)
Hahaha

Torrey (05:17.447)
depending which way you're looking up or down. I like Ben. I think he's done a wonderful job in making himself very relevant. Of the players that are out there, he's closest to me to the young guns in the sense that he still has a lot more to continue to develop and improve and he has a lot already that he's gotten down. I think his ceiling to me is the highest. I've said that before. I double down on that now. He has

figure out a little bit better B game. He's playing more consistently throughout all the tournaments. Has gone deep into 1000s, has gone into 500s. has, in my opinion, has, to your point, you always talk about, he has become a professional. He's become a tour professional. He's playing week in, week out at a very high level. And let's be honest, I was talking to his dad at the US Open, and Brian was the first to admit that...

He wasn't a finished product even going, even coming out of college, let alone going into college. And I felt like that was a very neat thing to say having been a former tour player himself and Brian Shelton. He was very honest with what Ben's level, what Ben's skills were. He was just so uber competitive that he knew that he was gonna figure it out and enjoy the challenge. And he put more on Ben's competitiveness than he put on Ben's skillset.

know, to borrow one of your terms, he waxed poetic on his daughter Emma and her skill set, much more of a complete tennis player, technically very sound, all things right. Ben was the opposite, you know, and he wasn't saying that Ben didn't have a good technique. He was merely saying that Emma had better, compared to his own two kids. And I thought that was kind of a neat thing to say, you know, when you hear who your kid is now. At that time, you know.

eight or whatever seven in the world had to talk about. Yeah, my daughter actually had better technique. It was a little more complete. You know, and it was just a neat thing to hear his perspective. He was being, he was being real and he was also, I see that in the context of Ben. Ben is only going to get better, Alvin. He's only going to get more, more polished. He's only going to get a little more, only more nuanced to his game. And Ben is just competitive enough.

Torrey (07:39.393)
If he knows he needs to change something or do something to it, to address, to counter, to actually beat and take down Carlos or Yannick, Ben, like the group we talked about before in the Young Guns, Ben to me is the most likely to do it. He will make that happen. He's that competitive. He'll figure it out. I don't know if I feel the same way about Mousseti and I definitely don't know if I feel that same way about some of the others, say for one or two and we'll get to them in a second.

Alvin Owusu (08:09.197)
So I like the way that you frame Ben Shelton kind of less about the results in the rankings and more so about him and his progression as a tennis player. I think it's, it takes me back to, like heading down to Florida this week to Eddie Herr and I remember, I don't know if it's the last time I was there, but there was one time I was on site and I saw Taylor Fritz, Francis Tiafoe, and Riley Opelka.

all kind of like at the check-in table. think Riley had just finished, Taylor and Francis were getting ready to go on. And like I see these guys now, like they are, saw, I know where they came from, high levels of international junior tennis, and then ended up on the Pro Tour and got themselves in the top 100, top 50, top 10 competing for Grand Slams with Taylor and Francis. So that all kind of makes sense. You look at someone like Ben, Ben never played.

Torrey (08:49.581)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (09:05.761)
those tournaments, he didn't play high level international junior events. He was playing football up until like, you know, most of his high school career. Obviously played a good amount of tennis as well, got himself into a good junior player, turned himself into a great college player, and has now turned himself into a legitimate great professional tennis player. is top, he finished top eight. He qualified for the year in finals. Like this is like,

Torrey (09:21.08)
Yep.

Torrey (09:28.196)
But, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (09:34.274)
When you put it all into perspective, it's like I look at him and Musetti as like two players who are in the same place who took two very different paths to get there. And yet I still feel like their end result, see this is where I differ a little bit, I still feel like their end result is probably going to be the same. I don't see either one of them breaking in past to join Sinner and Alcaraz as the potential third of that two, of that top two right now because

Torrey (09:35.97)
Right?

Torrey (09:43.331)
to get there.

Torrey (09:51.362)
Mmm.

Alvin Owusu (10:03.853)
Neither one of them have anything that the other guys don't have. Like Ben's athletic and competitive. So is Carlos, so is Yannick. They have everything he has plus a little more. And I don't know if that little more is something that any player can train themselves into. Like that little more is something that's actually very special that only so many players are born with, right? Ever.

Torrey (10:08.004)
Mmm.

Torrey (10:11.661)
Yeah. Sure.

Torrey (10:29.175)
Right, ever, Yeah, yeah, I, I. Sure, sure.

Alvin Owusu (10:31.441)
There's only so much room in the greatest of all time, like space, which is where these guys are trekking towards that competition anyway. And that's not to throw shade on Ben or throw shade on Lorenzo. I think Ben will continue to get better. I think he will continue to pose a challenge. Do I think that challenge is going to be competing for Grand Slam titles? things happen. But could he consistently be making quarterfinals and semi-finals? Absolutely.

Torrey (10:55.85)
Yeah. Right.

Right, I see him being more on the Marin Cilic side of things with the big three. He could come in and rock somebody's world in a tournament and I wouldn't be shocked at all. Do I see Musetti being the verenka of this cohort? Not necessarily, it's not to that he couldn't do it. I'd be surprised if he did. I wouldn't be surprised if Ben did it. And with that said, the rest of the players on this list, I feel trail.

Alvin Owusu (11:01.1)
Absolutely.

Torrey (11:30.398)
significantly. I do have to put out one very, very strong caveat in Flavio Caboli. I was so impressed with his, with his, not just the Davis Cup match and that win. I think it's Moonawg. I I could play some great tennis, but it wasn't, it wasn't that, there wasn't the quality. Alvin, it was the fact that he was down at one point. He actually came out in the first game with that match and played unreal.

and somehow lost it. I he was tagging the ball from ball one. Alvin then he goes down 0-4. 0-4. Double break is tough to come back from. Makes it competitive in the first, loses the first. Then fights his butt off to get up. I don't think he got a break until like late in the second set, you know, of that match. And then obviously, you know, to go three. And I'm forgetting what the first set or second was the break, but he, his fight is what.

Continues to show some things. He lost a match. want to say it was either Alcara's or He lost one to one of them and it was either Wimby or it's either I think was Wimby He was visibly pissed and I remember it might have been the Ben actually it might have been the Ben I thought not mistaken and he was pissed at they got to a little bit of exchange. I may get the term it wrong, but

Alvin Owusu (12:51.116)
So yeah, Flavio and Ben, they play a lot and it was in DC where they got, think DC they might've got a little chippy. But they play each other, maybe it Canada, it might've been Canada, I think it was Canada actually, yeah.

Torrey (13:00.995)
They exchanged words then. Right, I think you're right. But this was before that. This was in Wimby, if I'm not mistaken. He was pissed off.

And he said it in that interview or in that exchange with Ben, think in whether was DC or Toronto. I think it was DC. I think you're right about DC. But he said the words, again, and his very good Italian, Italianese said something to the effect of.

but I'm losing. You can't expect me to handle that well. And it was something to the effect of, buddy, I hear you. You won. So you're gonna be cool about it. I lost. So don't expect me ever to be cool about that. And it was just a little insight into his personality to me that, buddy, I will dig, I will claw, I will work, I will run balls down.

Alvin Owusu (13:47.318)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey (14:03.074)
I will go visit the tape. I will go and the first person that the IBM sent to get the stats. I will figure this out. And he showed that to me in that Davis Cup final. But Alvin, I'm telling you, he reminds me of a David Ferrer. He reminds me of a guy that just will, I don't care what you throw at me in your expectation. I will get this done. I am that good and I don't care what I have to do to do it.

Alvin Owusu (14:21.036)
Hmm.

Torrey (14:32.994)
And I just always respect guys like that that had that burn that you just can't turn that off. And so that's why I give him, don't get me wrong, his game is very good. He tags the crap out of the ball. He's certainly a good ball striker. But there are bigger, better ball strikers, right? It isn't that puts him, that's not superlative. Superlative, there's that old expression you can measure.

the size of the dog and the fight, but you can never measure the size of fighting the dog. And that's where Flavio Capoli is to me. And that's why I put him, I know he's further down our list here, but that's why I put him up there a little higher than most. And we're just starting to see it a little bit this year as he's starting to kind of come on the scene. I really think Jack Draper is also close to that. think he burns a little more than most. It was unfortunate.

after Indy Wells and we weren't able to see much more of him through getting dinged up or what have you. But I would love to see, I think he also burns to that level and just, you know, I just want to see a little more of him, you know, to be able to really, for me to see that he can, that he is what I think he is in that, again, Alvin, we're talking about this competing for top five, top eight space. You know, we're talking, which is to me gonna be very rare air, especially because of the new two.

Alvin Owusu (15:31.968)
or yell at us.

Alvin Owusu (15:46.325)
Right, right.

Torrey (15:51.841)
But I say that also to say the other guys are going away. You know what mean? So, Yep.

Alvin Owusu (15:56.365)
Well, let's hold off on Jack for a second. I wanna stay on Flavio and maybe Ben because while they're both the same age, right, they're 23 years old and I think this makes it a very, I mean, 23 years old, of finished, well, talk about Cavalli's, yeah, Cavalli's 23. They're a little separated in the rankings. They're about 15 spots or so, but they do match up a good bit. They played three times this year, right? And Ben won all three, but they were all really competitive matches, like Ben beat him in Acapulco six and six.

Ben and beat him in Canada was like six four four six think tiebreaker in the third and that was the one where they had the the exchange at the end and then they played again at the Paris Paris Masters event six and three to Ben but Flavio beat him twice in 2024. So like it's a it's a in both in three sets So it's a competitive it's a really competitive matchup and I like that both of them have similar backgrounds like Ben has that more like traditional like American football background where Flavio was a high-level

Torrey (16:31.648)
That was one, get a little chirping.

Torrey (16:42.728)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (16:55.148)
soccer player in Italy. like they both come from this team sport background which breeds a little something different inside of people, right? Like having, I always felt like growing up playing both basketball and tennis, really helped me like understand kind of both sports differently than only having the team sport or only individual sport lids and both of those guys have that. So when they get together, it's a very...

Torrey (16:55.846)
soccer player,

Torrey (17:14.751)
Only having one land. Yeah. I agree.

Alvin Owusu (17:23.596)
It's almost one of those competing, there's similar people whose game styles just look a little bit, look different, but I think to their core, they see a bit of one another in each other. So there's a little bit of like, they piss each other off a little bit, but also have respect for each other. So I like looking at players like that, and I think Flavio has had a great year. One to 250, one to 500.

Torrey (17:33.136)
in each other.

Torrey (17:37.536)
Sure.

Alvin Owusu (17:50.252)
started a breakthrough at a Grand Slam. think his kind of coming out party was against Novak reaching the quarterfinals at Wimbledon. So, I mean, looking towards next year, coming off of that great Davis Cup performance, I really think that if he can hit the ground running, doesn't have much to defend on the front half of the year. Last year he lost in the first round on Australian Open, think round of 32 at French Open. So, a a lot.

He became the player that he is right now, kind of in the last half of the year. He kind of clicked for him. And so if he can build on that and fill it up, mean, Flavio could be pushing for, he could be coming from his Eddie spot. Like as the, who is the Italian number two? Who's the Italian number three? Like, let's play it out. But yeah, so that's, back to Jack Draper and maybe we can even look at Jack and Holger Runa in the same way. Cause they both had shortened years.

Torrey (18:20.787)
Right, right, right.

Torrey (18:29.087)
100%, 100%. That's right.

Alvin Owusu (18:46.954)
But Jack, I was gonna say by top end performances that they've put out, you would say Jack is one of the guys that should be considered to be pushing the big two. I don't know. I don't know about, I'm not sure. I'm not saying no, I'm just not sure. Because I still don't know what the best version of Jack Draper looks like. If you were saying, this is how,

This is how Jack Draper wins matches. How would you say he should, I'm not saying it should be playing, but like help me better understand what I'm seeing when I watch Jack Draper.

Torrey (19:26.259)
I wish I could, I'm right there with you. What's the figure in Batman? Enigma, you know what mean? He is 100 % enigma because he's, I feel like he is.

Alvin Owusu (19:27.628)
Hahaha

Torrey (19:42.141)
He is what he is in the sense that he's a righty playing lefty that in my opinion depends on the backhand and I say depends, prefers a backhand but yet takes forehands and has a serve that's not quite as big as it could be. I almost feel like his tennis wires are a bit crossed at a high level. I'm sure he is a very, very

successful and talented ball striker perhaps on both sides if he trained himself that way. I just don't feel that he is as

his tennis weapons are muted as a result. And when I say that...

Torrey (20:33.023)
Ratha had the ability as a righty turned lefty to match up on his backhand side, knowing you were going to come back to a ball he was very comfortable with. His serve wasn't as big, we knew that, but he used it to get to your backhand knowing that you had to come through either shot that he preferred. If he carved out the out wide lefty slice, if you took it line, he would rip you a new one cross court with his backhand. If you went cross,

Alvin Owusu (21:00.203)
Mm-hmm.

Torrey (21:01.662)
He would hook you back across to that same ball you wanted again until he was ready to yank you down the line. His mutant ability was that he got better as the point went on. He got cleaner. He got bigger. His ball got a little bit, I'm going to say a little bit stronger and firmer. He was a little thin early and then he had ball 10, ball 15 in a rally. Alvin Nadal was probably one the best ball strikers we've seen.

Other guys have kept the ball clean already. I think Nadal needed a few balls to kind of warm up almost in every rally. And he knew that and that's why he always rallied you into his rhythm. I don't know if Jack Draper understands that yet about himself. I see a guy that has a strong backhand that's still looking to take first strike, which is hard to in the backhand side a lot. You can do it, but it's hard to do it a lot. I see a guy that looks to, and it's always a conflict, right? Cause you have a good backhand, you're gonna step it on that backhand. It's harder than when to take.

the lefty inside out, or in his case, inside in. And I feel like his serve is not so big that it's that the lefty gives him what he's looking for. And so to your point, I don't know that we've seen Jack's best tennis. I would also put him slightly, he just makes the cut in the Ben Shelton era of I'm still figuring out me. And he is 23 years old, it's not like he's 27. So he has some time and it was hurt and clearly they weren't handing out.

Indian Wells trophies out of the Cracker Jack box. So clearly he has the ability to do some things and knock out some pretty big timber along the way. I'm just waiting to see.

Alvin Owusu (22:32.979)
Yeah, yeah, no.

Torrey (22:43.023)
If you talked about Brits and who played better on grass, you got it. You'd have to give it to Cam Norrie. You wouldn't give it to Jack Draper as far as success this year. And Cam understands Cam's game as unorthodox as his foreign looks, as much as he shovels that backhand, he knows what it does to you. Two or three years, what, didn't he play at TCU? You know, two or three years at TCU with the Horned Frogs. Shout out to my main man, David Ruditi. You know, maybe.

Alvin Owusu (23:04.693)
TCU,

Torrey (23:12.029)
taught him to understand, yeah, it's a little peculiar, but you know what, works and then break down. And the guy doesn't like this when you do this. And Cam now understands that better than anybody. He had a couple, he even had that strong matchup against Novak if I'm not mistaken, and never gave Novak the ball he was looking for. He understands that about his game. I don't see Jack having that play, that style yet that matches up to what he wants. He still has a lot of options and not a lot of.

plays, you know what mean? he, and that's kind of what it looks like to me to use a, you know, a basketball analogy. You know, he reminds me of, you know, kind of reminds me of the, to a lesser extent, the OKC Thunder back when they had Russ and KD and the beard, they, you knew they were all good, but they never seemed to click on all cylinders.

Alvin Owusu (24:01.867)
Pardon.

Torrey (24:09.988)
like Golden State did when Golden State beat him and then the unfortunate happened, they all went separate ways. So I say it to say, I get that same feeling like, you know there's something there, can't put your finger on it yet, because it hasn't been manifested, it hasn't come out yet, but it's something that I think in the next couple years he could get. Flip side of that is Alvin if he doesn't.

Alvin Owusu (24:32.597)
Yeah, I mean, well, that's kind of the thing, right? Like you look at, you take everything you just said, which makes a lot of sense to me, and then I still go, and then I look at his results from before he got injured. So let's just say like you wanna cut his year off kind of after, maybe after Wimbledon, I would more or less say, yeah, or maybe even before, yeah, cut it up after Wimbledon, and then he got hurt. But before that, I mean, he finaled two Masters 1000s. He won one, finaled another.

Torrey (24:49.787)
Yeah, might as well, yeah. Right.

Alvin Owusu (25:04.275)
One Miami on hard court, final Madrid on clay, fantastic final match against Casper Ruth, that was one of my favorite matches of the year. beat, and then back that up with a quarter final finish in Rome as well. So it's like, now you're seeing the guy in the round of 16 at Roland Garros. So you're seeing the guy who's not naturally good on, supposedly not naturally good on clay, but then goes, know, final, quarter final round of 16 at three big clay court events, including Grand Slam. And I mean, beat,

Fonseca at Roland Garros talking about like upcomers like stiff arm stay down there not on my watch With a half years worth of work even going back a little further to US Open 2024 that he semi-finals and he's beaten good players along the way like he beat Carlos in Miami beat Ben Beat Holger beat Taylor. I mean Indian Wells. Sorry not Miami. I Would say he's just

Torrey (25:37.862)
Yep. Yep.

Torrey (25:43.164)
Pretty good.

Alvin Owusu (26:00.907)
doing what someone at the age of what 23 is supposed to be doing, which is he's putting up results while getting better. And I think for all that we said about maybe game style, not confusion or lack of clarity on our, yeah sure, but he's still get.

Torrey (26:03.855)
Yep. Supposed to do. Sure. Sure.

Torrey (26:15.663)
Yeah, no, no, no confusion at all. Lack of clarity. But he's a horrible matchup for most people because of those same things. I thought OKC and that those three players just might be future Hall of Fame on three of them. I don't think they, together they didn't win a title. So I say that to say, I'm putting them up in pretty high territory. I know how good he is. And I say it to say, if he figures that out.

I he could very well be in top four, perhaps even top three conversation because he is a bad matchup for some of those same guys, including the top two. Up to this current point in time, I don't see that as much and therefore I don't see that happening per se. Now, having said that, I think his dad was a pro soccer player, Alvin, the guy's moves unreal and it's very rare.

Right? It's very rare that you have a guy who's decent size like, like, like Jack is who moves as well as he does. His movement and fitness are pretty darn good out of the guys. The only way he can hit the ball like he does is his movement is so good. So I think that's more of his mutant ability is to, is just to his movie. The guy's on, he's on roller skates half the time and he just, that's why he does so well on both surfaces, which I think is another thing that most guys don't do as well. You know, they're not as equally adept.

I think think Yannick center wins that battle. He is so adept on all sorts of this footwork that he can play relatively the same style on all four, 10-3 because of that. He slides on hard court, he slides on the grass, he slides on clay, he slides indoor and outdoor. Doesn't matter, I slide, you know what mean? And to the point where he makes the court very small on his side of the court. And I feel like Jack is very similar to that different type of mover, but.

but very similar with his footwork efficiency. And I say that to say, I think the kid gets healthy. I think he's very firm inside top five, top eight for sure, once he's back healthy. And again, as I said earlier, and he burns, he burns to get better. He has a little something in him to want to be that good, to want to be that level of player. So I don't begrudge him anything as far as what he's accomplished. The guy's unbelievable. I'm still not sold.

Torrey (28:39.962)
The question was the best version of Jack Draper. And I was merely saying we haven't seen that yet. Now I want to leave some room in there for him to say he's showed us some good tennis. I still, I've seen some good matchups against other players. I've seen him being Carlos. I think you and me could have been Carlos during that time Miami because Carlos was on a little bit of a walkabout mentally. It's just to say he is as good as he is now and could get better. I don't.

think we've seen his best yet and I think he's got another couple years to really show us that.

Alvin Owusu (29:15.85)
Yeah, it's also the, it's also the can he put it together in Grand Slams? Obviously he made a semi-final run at the US Open a couple years ago, I think it 2024, but he tends to get himself into longer matches than he should earlier in Grand Slams, which if I ever see a guy go five in the first round, I automatically start taking him out of the second week picture because that toll builds up on you.

Torrey (29:42.873)
But, but,

Alvin Owusu (29:45.823)
faster than you can flush it out, right? You might get to the next round, maybe even the third, but you're gonna have to pay that bill. And players who contend for Grand Slams, who were there in the last two, three days of the event, are not wasting that energy in days one through four. It's quite hard to make it up. You see guys who, he got through two back to back five setters and then just looks like dog piss in the third round.

Torrey (29:47.801)
100%.

Alvin Owusu (30:12.478)
You can't do it, and we've seen him do that before. We've seen him do it before, and he was able to avoid it in that US Open so much, and also got some favorable withdrawals, but that was then, this is now. In this particular year, he put up some great results in Masters events, two out of three. I would just like to see him, one, healthy, two, efficient at Grand Slams, so we can get a true evaluation at this point next year of like, okay.

Torrey (30:15.757)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (30:41.096)
This is what Jack Draper does over the course of a year, especially with four best out of five set events to sift through. And I'm sure Zach wants the same thing for himself, right? Nothing more. He did a great interview on the Tennis Podcast a couple weeks ago and you can tell, like to your point, he cares a lot. He cares a lot. He wants this.

Torrey (30:51.878)
for sure, for sure. Be a little more.

Torrey (31:01.061)
man, no. And that's why I love him. I love him. And again, it's going to be somebody like that Alvin that's going to be able to rock one of those guys. Their belief, their fight is going to take them over that top and a few weapons, right? So I just feel like, you know, these, to me, this is the group. This is a group that we need to be talking about that can actually make a push. We keep talking about my opinion. I don't want to.

I don't want to put dirt on the casket on these guys, you know, as if they can't. think each of them can. It's going to take a Herculean effort to do so, but I think they can definitely do it. I think Jack, think Ben, and again, would put Flavio in that mix. think they all can do it. Holger Rune to me is, God, talk about tough injury. I'm really hoping that he can come back and be.

He's gonna lose that, that wasn't an Achilles if I'm not mistaken or Achilles or I thought so. That was, it was a.

Alvin Owusu (31:59.435)
yeah, when was that?

Is that happen in, yeah, it's end of this year, end of this year. That's right. Stockholm, I think. Is it Stockholm? Yeah. At least.

Torrey (32:07.512)
And this year, he could be out for six months, I that tends to be a six month minimum before you even start doing rehab and then start kind of getting PT in there. That's a long time to miss. know what mean? And trust me, I'm old enough to remember when, oh, who's the Austrian, your fellow lefty?

hitting forehands on the chair on the court.

Alvin Owusu (32:40.899)
it was Mooster. Mooster.

Torrey (32:42.487)
Tomas Muster, I'm holding from Mero Muster coming back from a top 20 to all the way to number one. So I'm not saying it can't be done. I've seen it done in spades. However, he's going to have to harness his inner Tomas on this one to really come back from the injury because these other guys aren't getting worse and they're only going to pick up where they left from. And I think 2026 is going to be turbocharged. I mean, I think you're going to see some great matches out of the gate. Like this is a horse race. I mean, I think you're going to see guys chomping the bit.

to just to want to get a little, know, jockeying for position, pun intended, early. And to me, it's going to be tough for Runa to get back, not only to that fitness level and that playing level, which he was finally starting to play himself into, but it was, know, and then with this, what could be six months to darn near year break, that's going to be tough to make up for. So it's, really feel bad for him.

He was starting to hit stride a little bit there toward the end of this year and had some, you and you heard it right here. Didn't he have that crazy match with Yannick in Australia last year where he actually took that shady medical break? Wasn't that ogre?

Alvin Owusu (33:48.477)
Yeah, that-

Yeah, it was was like that's a it was it was Holger against Yannick. Yeah, and he he played him tough Yeah, he played center really tough center had to go off court and then came back and got it together Ended up being a very comfortable score three sets of one, but Holger was Holger was on him But I think that's the kind of thing with Holger though, like you look at his results at Grand Slam this year Round of 16. I'll show you an open round of 16 rolling arrows first round one will then round of 64 the US Open So like what are we actually talking about here?

Torrey (33:55.575)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (34:21.545)
Um, and I, that's where I get a little, when we talk about Holger, I think we talk about Holger the way Holger talks about Holger, um, which is with the utmost, with the utmost respect and, and, um, and confidence in his abilities. But then when I look at his results, I go, well, what am I talking about? Like you go back even to 2024, right? Round of 64, I'll show you it open. Round of 16, Roland Garros. Round of 16, Wimbledon. First round at, at the U.S. Open.

So what is he done outside of that one run, I think Paris Endors three years ago or something like that? What is he actually done to make us think that he is worthy of being included in that group?

Torrey (35:10.11)
Number one, he's been very consistent at all of them at a very similar young age. Number two, has, he matches up to just about everybody out there with almost no exceptions. And I would see the third thing he does, Alvin, is Holger has, Holger is a generation of ways late than he would. He doesn't, and unfortunately in an era that has figured out

Alvin Owusu (35:35.912)
Hmm.

Torrey (35:37.802)
how to beat Leighton Hughes is the unfortunate thing. Leighton had the ability to counterpunish, which I think Holger has very well. Leighton has had the ability to kind of understand what you didn't want. He played into that very, very well. Obviously was one of the fastest guys on the tour and had a little bit of chip on his shoulder. I think Holger should have a bigger chip on his shoulder to be honest with you. But I also feel like that's the mold I see him cast in.

Alvin Owusu (35:40.037)
Right, right.

Torrey (36:07.662)
the unfortunate side is, is I don't know if Layton was playing against the likes of these guys now. He was in one of those vacuum errors where he was, he was the way he was able to get a couple of his slams. Did Layton win two or three? I'm trying to I know it was these two. I thought maybe it was three. Anyway, my point to my point, mad respect for Layton, but the Holger to me is in that mold, that mold.

Alvin Owusu (36:23.337)
At least two, least two, yeah.

Torrey (36:36.359)
And when you're in that mold though, Alvin, have to have the ability to now do something better than Leighton did, right? And to me, Leighton's biggest, always his biggest, you know, the fly in the ointment was the serve. He didn't have a big enough serve per se. Returns were unreal, but the serve could always have better. I really hope he dials in a bigger and better and more efficient serve. I was gonna mention that earlier about Jack. Jack still lacks a...

for a guy with his level of power and decent size, he lacks a serve that could just give him that one or two freebies a game when he needs it. And I think goes three, triple for Holger.

Alvin Owusu (37:18.279)
Okay. Yeah, I think that's a fair assessment and I...

Torrey (37:20.661)
He's consistent as all day long. Just doesn't have that extra gear, I guess is what I'm trying to say. And so what are we talking about? We're talking about a player that has everything but, hence his consistency, hence his results, year in, year out in most lands. But without that, I don't think he has the, he didn't have that extra gear to go, to get to, to be relevant for this level of conversation. He has it in spades for 20 and out.

Alvin Owusu (37:26.099)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (37:47.955)
Yeah, he's a 15 to 20 in the world player to me and not moving up unless those things are addressed. I think that's a fair assessment. Let's do this, let's put a put in it there. I think this is a really good strong conversation for this particular group. We're either gonna take a break or we're gonna come back next week, I don't know, and kinda talk about the players who are that.

Torrey (37:58.303)
Hope so.

Torrey (38:07.22)
Yeah.

Torrey (38:10.631)
Or we're not.

Alvin Owusu (38:16.585)
that next age cohort, 25 to 26, those players who are entering their prime, and I wanna have a conversation about what prime actually means, because I'm kinda starting to think differently about it. But yeah, let's put a pin in for this one. All right, TH, I'll catch you on the next one,

Torrey (38:24.383)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey (38:29.013)
that you'll definitely tune in for that one.

Torrey (38:36.917)
Peace.