Giovanni the Giant: 6"8 guy with one handed backhand is making having a breakout year!

BH looks weak. In todays tennis you are not allowed such a weakness if you want more than top 20-30.
 
ey039524 said:
Wow. Crazy that he's having a breakout on clay. He's going to be trouble on grass. Like that he s&vs on clay. Hated that isner and opelka stayed back. Kid has a lot of potential.
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He won 3 hard court challengers already this year but just reached Challenger 175 QF on clay last week
 
ok, only one question left and that question is most tasty... how many seconds in the first round vs fury
 
Shaolin said:
Some nice s&v and good hands...moves really well for 6'8 too. Will be fun to see how he does on tour.
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commentator said he played many sports growing up. Probably football (euro) and basketball. Easy to move well with those fundamentals.
His bh is little Lendl-esque but not as pretty as Wawa or Dimitrov.
Nice net game and fh.
 
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just watched the highlights. movement is...exceptional for his size. serve decent but doesn't look like a 'spot hitter,', kinda rolls it in with some top slice action. backhand is weird...catches it very close to body, not a lot of extension, kind of shovels it forward without a lot of torso rotation. forehand looked pretty solid, bit of a hitch but not bad...reminded me a little of moya. nice hands at net. overall game though...interesting. wish he ripped through the 1hbh more.
 
mental midget said:
just watched the highlights. movement is...exceptional for his size. serve decent but doesn't look like a 'spot hitter,', kinda rolls it in with some top slice action. backhand is weird...catches it very close to body, not a lot of extension, kind of shovels it forward without a lot of torso rotation. forehand looked pretty solid, bit of a hitch but not bad...reminded me a little of moya. nice hands at net. overall game though...interesting. wish he ripped through the 1hbh more.
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Did moyas forehand have a hitch? It was a very pretty and imposing shot... if less effective on grass.
 
TheGoldenEra1990’s said:
I’ll never understand why these guys don’t play basketball. Especially someone with this type of speed and lateral movement. Being tall works against you in tennis.
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Never seen anyone 6'8 move like this, not even close, he should play basketball.... but then he must have thought about it, his hand eye coordination for basketball must not be good, he must be having aptitude only for tennis and that why he must have chosen this career
 
Razer said:
Never seen anyone 6'8 move like this, not even close, he should play basketball.... but then he must have thought about it, his hand eye coordination for basketball must not be good, he must be having aptitude only for tennis and that why he must have chosen this career
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So his European height is 2,03m - which makes him about 5cm taller than Zverev, Medevedev, Tsitsi
all these move better, have a better serve and better groundstrokes than him - I don't see the hype

He is Chris Eubanks from France, the backhand looks about similar honestly :)

And to your point about him playing basketball, I think you underestimate how these guys move
 
buscemi said:
Yep. Nice win over Sonego. And he faces the winner of Nishioka and lucky loser Fanselow in the second round of Lyon, so he has a solid shot of doubling his ATP win total.
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Nishioka withdrew before their match, so Giovanni is into the QF. Faces the winner of Cerúndolo/Gaston.
 
yourtennisfit said:
So his European height is 2,03m - which makes him about 5cm taller than Zverev, Medevedev, Tsitsi
all these move better, have a better serve and better groundstrokes than him - I don't see the hype

He is Chris Eubanks from France, the backhand looks about similar honestly :)

And to your point about him playing basketball, I think you underestimate how these guys move
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His serve is better than all those guys, even a peaking Zverev
 
GRASScaraz said:
He is regularly serving 25+ aces in 3 setters and 200kmh kick second serves. Also I think Hurkacz is a better server than Zverev
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Where is he consistently doing this? on the Challenger tour?

Calm down, the guy has 5 matches at tour level and we have seen one of those against a Sonego, who clearly wasn't too motivated.
And remember that Opelka and Eubanks were top-25 at their respective peaks. Just a big serve doesn't do anything for you, guys in the top-50 will casually return your 200km/h serve and beat you on all other shots.
 
He and Montiero had a 3 tiebreaker war last year in US Open qualifiers. Lost to Mayo next round, but I’m sure he was gassed. A fun game. Nice to see him hopefully make a living out of tennis.
 
Razer said:
If Zverev is the 3rd best server on tour behind Kyrgios and Opelka then it must mean that Tennis is in danger...

I think you have mistaken him for Hurkacz ???
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No dude. Zverev's serve is elite, metrics are off the charts.
 
yourtennisfit said:
Where is he consistently doing this? on the Challenger tour?

Calm down, the guy has 5 matches at tour level and we have seen one of those against a Sonego, who clearly wasn't too motivated.
And remember that Opelka and Eubanks were top-25 at their respective peaks. Just a big serve doesn't do anything for you, guys in the top-50 will casually return your 200km/h serve and beat you on all other shots.
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Opelka was Top 20, and Isner did get into Top 10. Berretini was also not better at the same age.

Perricard serve is below Hurkacz’s current serve but actually better than Hurkacz’s pre-2023 serve.

Anyway, let’s wait and see. For now he is definitely one of the guys to watch.
 
Kralingen said:
Does he beat PETE head to head? :p
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Haha no.... He won't beat Pete for sure, Pete still matches pretty well against everyone but what about Rod Laver ? I donno... Tennis has evolved a lot that way, back in the day 6'3-6'4 was a true "giant" and today if a guy 6'8 can move like this then I donno how guys 5'7 will become GOAT candidates in this era, they cannot.

To be fair to Rod Laver if Diego Schwartzmann can be ranked 8 in the world then Rod should be ranked in the top 5 given his talent, but then can he beat peak Big 3 or peak Pete ? I donno think he can... See Pete himself was 6'1 which is the height of Federer and Nadal.... he is not outdated in anyway, he and Agassi can win tonnes of majors in this era too if they get all the benefits that current sportsmen have, after all Alcaraz is still ranked super high, isn't he ?

But then evolution is happening before our eyes, Pete is not affected, Lendl is not affected, they were tall men, but Rod Laver? Ken Rosewall? Sorry to say but they are outdated... but at least they can draw comfort from the fact that it took like 60-70 years after their prime to actually get outdated ...
 
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GRASScaraz said:
Now into the Top 100 and in Lyon SF! Dealt with Gaston's antics well and didn't fold after losing that tight second set.
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saw him in the the highlights today. Guy is a real talent and doesn't seem bothered by any pro shots, doubt anyone is going to kick it high enough to bother his 1h backhand. Hope he makes a run at the FO
 
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