Sacramento Challenger
- Thread starter edmondsm
- Start date
GRANITECHIEF
Hall of Fame
I heard Sam Querrey was there but i don't see him on the draw? What gives.
Hope Taylor Dent wins a couple.
Hope Taylor Dent wins a couple.
slicekick95
Semi-Pro
sam querrey was not there ... donald young, spadea, levin, dent r probably the biggest names playin
W
woodrow1029
Guest
Did anyone see the Clemens vs. Fleishman match on Sunday qualifying? Clemens is quite a character. He got a code warning for coaching (obvious coaching.) Then, he called the lineswoman that reported the coaching to the chair umpire something very bad in German, so he got a point penalty. No need for that crap.
equinox
Hall of Fame
Glad to see dentsstamina is still at his old best. He's not called taylor spent for nothing.
GRANITECHIEF
Hall of Fame
DY up a break in 3rd, serving to get a 5-2 lead.
Scoville put a beatdown on Spadea, and had a very impressive FH.
Kendrick won as well.
Scoville put a beatdown on Spadea, and had a very impressive FH.
Kendrick won as well.
slicekick95
Semi-Pro
GRANITECHIEF
Hall of Fame
Didn't hear about Somdev, what was the deal?
edmondsm
Legend
What's with him and choking???
I was there yesterday (Tuesday).
As said above, Scoville beat Vince pretty bad. He really made Vince look like a relic, which is too bad, because i'm a big Spadea fan. Scoville served great and his groundstrokes were on, I was really impressed. Vince really had nothing for him. I have a feeling that if Vince slides much out of the top 100 here he may just call it quits, and from watching the match today, I can almost see the modern game finally starting to pass him by. Oh well, I hope he proves me wrong, I was really happy to get a chance to see him play anyway.
D Young had a helluva match with Dusan Vemic, and won 7-6(5) in the third. Dusan was cramping most of the third set and put on an energy conservation clinic, which made me root for him at the end. Vemic has some incredible touch on drop shots, and Young has some great wheels, so the combination made for some entertaining points.
As has been said before, these tourneys let players get away with murder. Young went off a few times, racquet throwing, jacking balls as far as he could, insulting the umpire, etc., and didn't even get a warning.
Oh and the "no coaching" rule is violated on an insane level. Vince was having audible arguments with his coach between points.
Kevin Kim was in the middle of a great comeback, down a set, 5-3, and down two match points (15-40) against Alex Bogomolov before coming back and winning the second set. Match was suspended due to darkness.
Easily the match of the day was, surprisingly, Cecil Mamiit vs Frank Dancevic. I have a soft spot for veterans so I was rooting for Mamiit. Both players played INCREDIBLE tennis. I saw Mamiit play the Aptos challenger a few months ago and was playing much better today. Both players do not have any dominating weapons nor do either of them have any glaring weaknesses, so consequently it was the definition of a grinder match.
Dancevic took the first set 6-4, Mamiit grinded his way into a breaker in the second and took it easily. The third set was an amazing set, Mamiit got up 3-0, Dancevic came back and tied it, Mamiit put together a couple of incredible game at the end and put it away 6-4. A few inches here and there and the set could've gone either way, but I guess that's true for alot of tennis at this level.
I heard Dancevic talking to his coach after the match and said that's the best he's played in awhile, but Mamiit just beat him, and its true, both players were playing phenomenal.
Cecil plays Wayne Odesnik next who dispatched Rajeev Ram with relative ease, Wayne should probably beat him but I hope I can go watch that match.
Anyway sorry for the length but I figured people might appreciate it, and I wanted to get it all down before I forgot.
Hopefully i'll be there a couple more days this week.
As said above, Scoville beat Vince pretty bad. He really made Vince look like a relic, which is too bad, because i'm a big Spadea fan. Scoville served great and his groundstrokes were on, I was really impressed. Vince really had nothing for him. I have a feeling that if Vince slides much out of the top 100 here he may just call it quits, and from watching the match today, I can almost see the modern game finally starting to pass him by. Oh well, I hope he proves me wrong, I was really happy to get a chance to see him play anyway.
D Young had a helluva match with Dusan Vemic, and won 7-6(5) in the third. Dusan was cramping most of the third set and put on an energy conservation clinic, which made me root for him at the end. Vemic has some incredible touch on drop shots, and Young has some great wheels, so the combination made for some entertaining points.
As has been said before, these tourneys let players get away with murder. Young went off a few times, racquet throwing, jacking balls as far as he could, insulting the umpire, etc., and didn't even get a warning.
Oh and the "no coaching" rule is violated on an insane level. Vince was having audible arguments with his coach between points.
Kevin Kim was in the middle of a great comeback, down a set, 5-3, and down two match points (15-40) against Alex Bogomolov before coming back and winning the second set. Match was suspended due to darkness.
Easily the match of the day was, surprisingly, Cecil Mamiit vs Frank Dancevic. I have a soft spot for veterans so I was rooting for Mamiit. Both players played INCREDIBLE tennis. I saw Mamiit play the Aptos challenger a few months ago and was playing much better today. Both players do not have any dominating weapons nor do either of them have any glaring weaknesses, so consequently it was the definition of a grinder match.
Dancevic took the first set 6-4, Mamiit grinded his way into a breaker in the second and took it easily. The third set was an amazing set, Mamiit got up 3-0, Dancevic came back and tied it, Mamiit put together a couple of incredible game at the end and put it away 6-4. A few inches here and there and the set could've gone either way, but I guess that's true for alot of tennis at this level.
I heard Dancevic talking to his coach after the match and said that's the best he's played in awhile, but Mamiit just beat him, and its true, both players were playing phenomenal.
Cecil plays Wayne Odesnik next who dispatched Rajeev Ram with relative ease, Wayne should probably beat him but I hope I can go watch that match.
Anyway sorry for the length but I figured people might appreciate it, and I wanted to get it all down before I forgot.
Hopefully i'll be there a couple more days this week.
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Based on what I saw today I really think there's a good chance of him cracking the top 100 in the next year. Of course it's hard to say as alot of guys out there have great strokes but he really was very impressive today.
The problem is that Spadea actually seems like he's been the better player this year results wise. Spadea could just be burned out, he's done well in a few challengers lately and has been chaining them together in hot fashion to rack up the points. If he was a step slow and tired today and Scoville was just on, it would explain a lot. It's not like Spadea's never played big hitters before after all. I think what you saw today was more a reflection of what happens on the challenger tour. Players try to chain as many points together as they can, but end up getting burned out or fatigued. It's almost as if they're early round exits allow them to recover, forced rest stops in other words. Kevin Kim recently for example went from beating Vince in the finals of a challenger, only to lose in the first more or less the next day to a guy who lost like first round the week before at the same challenger Kevin Kim won. Then Vince I think went onto reach the finals, if not win, the challenger the next week, etc.
As Kevin Kim once said, seeds mean nothing on the challenger circuit, everyone in the draw can beat everyone and the players don't even pay attention to the seedings at this level because they find it so inconsequential. You see much one back and forth on the challenger circuit, there's no rhyme or reason to it. A guy'll get smoked one week, then the next return the favor, and so on and so forth. I think what you end up seeing is more or less guys playing each other at different fluctuations of their recycable energy cycle from week to week. Scoville Jenkins plays a high risk game, but if he were to feel a little peppered out, that's all it takes to send those ballistic missles into the fence instead of within the lines. The footwork is just a little less crisp at this level makes a night and day difference.
Also, regarding Dancevic. That's another good reminder of just how little separates these guys. Most experts these days wouldn't even consider Mammit in Dancevic's league anymore. Dancevic is a guy who as recently as Wimbledon absolutely schooled David Nalbandian, and I remember the commentators saying they'd never seen the guy play so well and that he was just in the zone today. ...well, he just lost to a guy in Mammit who relied on his speed who just happens to be getting long in the tooth now, more or less took a year or so off (whether that be injury or burnout I don't know), and hasn't been a top contending force on the challenger circuit in years now. Just goes to show you how little difference there is at this level.
I've come to realize that sometimes you see blowouts at this level, it's just inevitable given how many times these guys play a year, a statisical "chance" reality that plays itself out overtime.
And yet, an even more startling reality to me is that in general if you're good enough to practice with someone, you're good enough to beat them given enough opportunities. And on the challenger circuit, these guys see each other A LOT through the years and practice against each other and with guys who've practiced with each other a million times over. The other thing is that there's no "mystique" at this level to spook players out as sometimes happens at the glamour level of the sport. As such, every player just tends to look at each other as whatever, you're hustling just like me, you're just another dog just like me. When everyone looks at each other that way, I tend to think it creates an alarmingly more even playing field as you'd be surprised just how much not over respecting your opponent and putting him on a pedestal does for leveling the playing field.
slicekick95
Semi-Pro
no idea at least he pulled it out at the end
Tym, your whole post is great, I think you really hit the nail on the head. Maybe it sounds like I was reading into what I saw too much, and maybe I was.
To add to what you said, I went to a futures event earlier this year, and saw a player who is around 850 in the world lose a tough three setter to the #3 seed, who went on to win the tournament. That #3 seed went on to win the tourney, and is a top 200 player in his own right. The #2 seed in that tourney (who won the futures event the week before with viritually the same draw) lost in the first round in this tourney.
The #3 seed beat a player in the finals who he lost to in the first round of a challenger a few weeks before, that player went on to win that challenger. Both of those players have lost close matches against top 50 players when they've gotten to the main draw of ATP events. The list goes on and on. It's fascinating.
You're right that it wouldn't have taken much for Scoville to have an off-day, or just enough off an of-day for Vince to break him down. Vince even made the comment to his coach at one point "how lucky is this guy getting?", I think he felt the same way. He *almost* made a match of it in the second set, having two break points to get back on serve, but Scoville came up huge and that was that. At any rate, I stick by my comment that if Scoville plays like he did yesterday on a regular basis, he does have a shot at going after the top 100. But then again, most of the guys out there would too if they played their best day in and day out.
As for Vince, it just really seemed like he's getting to a point where he has little weapons to really beat alot of players out there now, and he literally has to "play his heart out" to win every match, whether its against a top 20 player or a guy who's 250 in the world. Vince has to be that "smarter player" who hits the right shot at the right time, while alot of guys can get by on raw shotmaking up to a certain point. Granted, his bag of tricks so to speak is probably bigger than most, and I guess he's kind of already been that player most of his career, so I have mad respect for him for sticking with it and having the recent success he had a few years ago.
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edmondsm
Legend
The reason seeding is irrelevant on the challenger tour is because there are so many tournaments going on at once. Basically players ranked 100-300 are spread out all over the globe at any given time. If there was a challenger tournament with 128 players and no other tourneys to compete with, then seeding would matter.
I've been getting scores from here when they update the draws:
http://www.network.usta.com/publish.sps?syndicatorguid={79613965-029A-46A7-B34C-905B28958475}&rmasiteinstanceguid={FEF0791F-F7BB-4E5C-ADC3-23FEB141611D}&rmapageid=27&pagegid=%7B7591E284%2D0BA7%2D4EF5%2DA602%2D4CADC818ED74%7D§ionID=15224
J-man
Hall of Fame
He's got the talent and like I said he is very athletic and strong. Like him more than DY, lol. But there are hundreds of players like him. BTW, thanks for you recaps. They are a good read thanks:grin:
DY won his 2nd rd match today, so he plays the winner of the Jenkins - Warburg match. Warburg, he'll most likely beat, Jenkins beat him last time they played.
On another note, Nishikori is in the qtrs of Stockholm. If I were DY I would have stayed to play the qualies of Stockholm. Its a tour event so more pts to be had. Plus, he had the 4 Challengers he could have gotten into after Stockholm.
On another note, Nishikori is in the qtrs of Stockholm. If I were DY I would have stayed to play the qualies of Stockholm. Its a tour event so more pts to be had. Plus, he had the 4 Challengers he could have gotten into after Stockholm.
Jenkins won in a third-set breaker. He looked very good but his serve started getting really shaky in the third set. There was alot of wind and it seemed to be bothering him alot. Warburg got down early in the third set and battled back and almost pulled it off.
Current draw with todays matches listed can be seen here:
http://dps.usta.com/usta_master/usta/doc/content/doc_734_1252.pdf?9/25/2008 1:41:36 PM
I watched the Battistone brothers beat Kevin Kim and Donald Young 6-1, 7-5. The Battistone's were very impressive as doubles players, particularly Dann, and really made two world-class singles players look second-rate on a doubles court. I chatted with them later on and they were really nice guys as well.
tennisdad65
Hall of Fame
Nishikori in the SFs of Stockholm has nothing to do with DY. Nishikori is 100 times better than DY. DY would have lost in the Stockholm qualies.
Just like he did in the Toronto qualies????
edmondsm
Legend
Just goes to show you what a good mental game will do for you. Nishikori has it, Young doesn't, yet, I hope.
Interesting note, Young and Nishikori played once, a futures tourney in Arkansas. Young kind of trounced him 2 and 2.
did they use their 2-handled racquets and jump serve?
Yup. Interesting to watch, no doubt.
edmondsm
Legend
So do they volley with two hands on both sides? Logically that would impact their reach, right?
Update
DY beat Jenkins, finally, he plays Odesnik tomorrow, who beat Isner.
Russell beat Ball, and he plays the winner of Bogie/Kendrick.
For all the haters, thats at least 24 more pts added to his ranking.
Where are all the Isner bandwaggoners now???
Like I said in a post a few wks ago, DYs coming back to the Fall Challenger circuit with a sense of belonging, Id even say superiority now. He's a year older, hopefully stronger and bigger as well. I'm expecting him to dominate like he did last year and get back into the top 100.
Then we'll see how he does at the tour level.
DY beat Jenkins, finally, he plays Odesnik tomorrow, who beat Isner.
Russell beat Ball, and he plays the winner of Bogie/Kendrick.
For all the haters, thats at least 24 more pts added to his ranking.
Where are all the Isner bandwaggoners now???
Like I said in a post a few wks ago, DYs coming back to the Fall Challenger circuit with a sense of belonging, Id even say superiority now. He's a year older, hopefully stronger and bigger as well. I'm expecting him to dominate like he did last year and get back into the top 100.
Then we'll see how he does at the tour level.
I had to call the tournament directly. They're doing a horrible job of updating the website.
edmondsm
Legend
Nice sleuthing Rob C. I will try this sometime. Maybe if we harass them enough they will start posting it faster.
J-man
Hall of Fame
A good win for DY
He will lose to Odesnik.A good win for DY
I'm not sure about that. I think he lost to him in 3 sets at San Jose earlier this year.
Either way, its definitely a winnable match for him. Its one DY needs. Its not critical, cause he has about 5 more Challengers he can play this year, but, the more pts/wins he gets early, the better.
edmondsm
Legend
DY should beat Odesnik. This has been a good tourney regardless because he at least picked up some wins, and especially points. It's important for Odesnik to finish stong this year too because he is right on that top 100 line. In other words, an important match for both these guys.
Man, you know, I really should've paid more attention. It seemed like what they did varied on the situation. I am pretty sure Dann was volleying with two hands on both sides, but not exclusively. Dann is a machine at the net.
FWIW, when I watched them warming, they were hitting every shot imaginable, two-handers on both sides, one handers on both sides, one-handed backhands on both sides(!).
In the match, if I remember correctly, Dann was using two hands on both sides for returns, and Brian was using two hands on the backhand with a one handed forehand for one side. But both players hit an occasional one handed forehand on either side when it was necessary.
edmondsm
Legend
Wow, amazing. I have to say, I would be amazed if these guys had any real success on the pro tour. But man is it cool to see people out there willing to defy the norms. Thanks so much for the summary.
You know, outside of Brian's serve, and the fact that the racquets had two handles, their playing didn't really strike you as unorthodox at all when you were watching. That's why I don't really remember many details about their specific strokes during the match.
Each individual shot doesn't look out of the ordinary, so unless you're concentrating you wouldn't see anything weird when a guy hits a left handed forehand when he's been hitting two handed backhands on that side all day
Brian's serve is pretty killer, and was giving Kim fits trying to return it. Kim was far back the entire match and Dann was able to pick off the vast majority of his returns.
Beating two players of the caliber of Young and Kim is an accomplishment, no doubt, but that match was a classic example of a good doubles "team" beating two much superior singles players who happened to be on the other side of the court. They really made Young/Kim look out of their element, particularly in the first set.Young/Kim rarely talked to each other between points, and didn't try using any signals/strategy until the very end of the second set. Neither of them was doing a very good job of attacking, and were pretty much just getting by on their raw shotmaking ability, which wasn't enough.
Both Dann and Brian (particularly Dann) have tremendous instincts for doubles, and their games complement each other as a team very well. They have had some wins against some top doubles players, so it really isn't unheard of to see them knocking on the door at ATP main draws or making a run in a Grand Slam qually sometime in the future.
edmondsm
Legend
Sounds like they might be a team to be reckoned with. Again, you're insight is much appreciated.
Any news on the doubles match between Battistone/Battistone and Amritraj/Dancevic?
edmondsm
Legend
Beautiful. The Donald has impressed in this tourney, pulling out a couple of tight matches in the 3rd set breaker. Not cool that Odesnik had to retire, he benefited from a retirement in his previous match so it looks like the long season is getting to the minor leaguers too.
I wonder if DY will play the Calabasas Challenger next week. I think he should. With a good result there he will be right back near the top 100.
