Quick Served: Alcaraz vs Zverev Reaction

Andy jumps into the studio minutes after the 2024 Roland Garros final: Carlos Alcaraz vs Alexander Zverev.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:06

All right, everyone. Holy shit, I am in the studio. I literally watched the final game celebrations, all the hugs, and then just walked straight into the studio. This is not a full show. This is a quick hitter specifically to talk about I. I don't know if this is interesting or not. If it's not, well good thing. We have plenty of other content. But this is basically just reading through my stream of thought, cause I nerd out so hard when I'm watching these matches and I'm consistently writing notes just trying to think of different ways players can adjust what I'm noticing, what they're doing, and I don't know how I would ever do commentary because I would want to just get into the weeds too far. So if you want a full recap of Roland Garros, start to finish two weeks, all of the storylines. We have a full recap show on T2 Monday, june 10th at 7 pm.

Speaker 1: 1:02

That is going to be an extended version of of what we're talking about right now. This, specifically, the next 10 minutes of dribble is specifically the men's final and what I've I'm I'm just freaking out because, fuck, these players are good, right, and so going in. It's like okay, and this is like what we're thinking as players going in the one part of the match where Alcaraz probably isn't a favorite. From the baseline right it's backhand to backhand. Right Zverev has one of the best backhands on earth. Carlos has a great backhand, probably not as good as Zverev's, and this is why we're analysts and we're guessing. We know what we know but we're not out there, we're not adjusting in real time. Alcaraz comes out, he's hitting one backhand flat, flipping one up above his shoulders, hitting the slice on defense, playing the drop shot. So what that means is that Zverev loves kind of sitting six feet behind the baseline and kind of just coasting back and forth. It's like a game of pong. That's what he is. He's like a six foot six version of pong that can serve 135 consistently at 77% or some insane number like that. So rolls to the first set because Varev is having to move forward back, side to side and he's not quite comfortable in his movement and he's not comfortable in the rally that he thinks he could probably make his hay on right, which is that back into back end kind of slugfest. Great coaching out of the gate by Ferrero Alcaraz. Great game planning, the ability to be able to do that like step in, have it look the same as a drive backhand from Alcaraz, and then find some height underneath it, flip it up above Zverev's shoulders, who's six foot six Phenomenal I was, I was losing my mind.

Speaker 1: 2:40

So then we go to the and, by the way, like when you hear commentators saying, well, zverev is just missing out here today, no, he doesn't just miss, he's too good for. He doesn't just miss for no reason. Right, even unforced errors are strategically forced. Right, you might be missing shots, that is is not, you know, on the full run or some dramatic ending, but it's because you can't get away with just your lock stock. Keep the ball deep. Cross court, right, it's because you have to force the issue a little further and the greats force you to up your risk profile. I know I'm a broken record talking about that. So what happens?

Speaker 1: 3:16

Zverev is trying to kind of find that Alcaraz backhand early on with that. So basically, zverev can flatten a forehand out very well. Cross court. He can go after at cross court, doesn't it? Doesn't flatten it out line or inside out as well. He kind of has this like hook shape on his forehand, not dissimilar to what Andy Murray did. Right, he liked hitting a cross court more than he liked hitting a down line. What Zverev has done against most people is when they've forced the issue through his forehand side, he kind of goes flipper, magoo, find some height up the line and that resets the traffic to his backhand right. Because when it's up high on the backhand you kind of have to knock it down, cross court and then he finds a sweet spot. He wasn't able to get away with that one because Carlos was burning him line, burning him deep. It was basically a guessing game. Once he hit that ball up and away to Alcaraz's backhand side, he wasn't winning that rally when he was driving traffic to his backhand side.

Speaker 1: 4:05

So the adjustment made in the second set Zverev goes massive on forehand, attacking Carlos's strength, attacking his forehand side over and over and over right, creating space, and then, anytime he got two feet under him on the forehand side, upping his risk profile, going to Carlos's forehand and it starts working. So already it's bananas right that Alcaraz is getting the better of back-in-to-back-in rallies and then the adjustment is to attack the strength, to create space to the weakness. Great adjustment by Zverev creating space, forcing the backhand line a little bit more, living with the errors created by that adjustment. The other thing that was phenomenal early on in that Zverev kind of adjusted with his serving is. Zverev is a master at serving high but serving wide to create space on the next ball.

Speaker 1: 4:55

Alcaraz, as soon as the toss went up in the first set, especially on the deuce side, was cheating over a step to cover forehand so that he wasn't like leaning and chipping. It was basically willing to give up the backhand side for defense because even if he's on defense after returning the first serve from Zverev, he's in the middle of the court to play defense. So basically cheating and stealing that wide serve from Zverev on the deuce side. He was getting over there in time to take full cuts on the forehand, having it like loop up deep down the middle to where Zverev kind of had to hit that little T-Rex ball. You know foul ball off off to the other side. What's up, producer Mike?

Speaker 2: 5:33

Well, I was just while you're on that point. You know he was had so much depth they were talking about it. You know, on the broadcast a lot like Alcaraz was completely back. How much control does that give him on this Right Like he eats up, that he changes the distance on the serve speed? You know, talk about the context, what you're just talking about well again.

Speaker 1: 5:47

So it's all dependent on who you're, who you're playing, right? So, uh, I'm playing federer. He is in because he knows that if he chips down on my back end I'm neutral. Right, he's mission accomplished. Just play it back against rafa. Roger can't do that. He chips in the middle of the quarter, chips to the. You know what, know what would be my back? And all of a sudden Rafa's munching on on forehands. Right, and he's stuck.

Speaker 1: 6:10

So it's not all the same, like the the, the thing where it's like people, oh, he returns up, he returns back. Well, no, that's not the way it works. Uh, carlos, basically put a premium on going all the way back and make sure that he could get a full swing on it, right, even if he got beat in the corners with aces, if he picked the right spot. It's like a baseball player looking for a pitch. Right, you're sitting on a fastball, because when you get that fastball, your heels are coming off the ground. Right, you're not trying to like, just make contact. You're not choking up on the bat. Basically, he was going to take his best pattern away by getting wood on that first serve, wasn't just trying to make first serve returns, was taking full cuts and it worked.

Speaker 1: 6:47

In the first set, zverev all of a sudden started picking off the tee a little bit more, made the adjustment cruises through the second set, alcaraz giving him the more makeable serve. You know tee on both sides. So it was just this like I'm watching this progression of adjustments two adjustments, two adjustments, two adjustments. All the while there are some some kind of common ground with what I'm watching. Simply, if you can't move, if you can't move at an elite level in tennis anymore, you can't win a slam. You don't have average movers like me winning slams.

Speaker 1: 7:28

You look at Medvedev. The guy's six foot seven and moves his ass off Zverev full slides into backhands. Getting neutral off of Alcaraz forehands is absurd, alcaraz, he is the outlier. You have to be six foot four unless you're the most electric body that tennis has ever seen, the way that he takes off the explosiveness. You cannot win a major unless you move your ass off. Federer moves, Rafa moves, novak moves and you can no longer be kind of all offensive. You know. You look at players from the past like a, like a McEnroe. Pete basically took the racket out of your hand with Luxalon and the ability to manipulate the ball with, with spins and take. Like, if Carlos Alcaraz has all gut strings in a racket where the head is 80 inches instead of you know, 97, he can't go back and take full swings.

Speaker 1: 8:25

So it's like, why don't people serve and volley anymore? Because they're so good at manipulating? It'd be like giving the best bowlers on earth, uh, another foot on each side to create spin, to knock down spares. Like you have to be able to move and you have to be able to play defense now, otherwise I don't think you're winning a major. You have to be a complete player. We used to have very incomplete players win majors. Right, I was. I was extremely incomplete player and won a major and almost won others. You know, I just don't think in this moment in time in history, uh, especially on the on the men's side, that I don't. You just I wrote this down you can't win a major unless you can move your ass off Like you just can't.

Speaker 2: 9:07

And now these guys, these guys are doing 6'6". Yeah, you're talking about 6'6 guys, and it made me think, like that's Kobe Bryant's height, that's Michael Jordan, right. Like to see these guys out there being as athletic as they are at that height and be able to cover that ground Like they're. They're not all equal, right, but to be that large, like you don't think of a tennis player being that large and moving like that.

Speaker 1: 9:29

Well, yes, and lateral movement, yeah, like the taller you get, generally the worse you are. Laterally, side to side now, front and back, like Usain Bolt's a monster and he runs downhill straight ahead. But like these guys, moving side to side is is just a joke and I say it all the time. Um, but like it's, it's absurd. And then I have this thing like okay. And then also I just love seeing, like, like I like it when I you don't see players make the same mistake twice. Right, there's an adjustment with. Carlos Zverev comes back. And now I'm not saying like it's perfect, cause you still have to execute. You can know what's happening.

Speaker 1: 10:07

But the reason this match was so weird, right, like it was high quality, then it was scratchy. When matters right, we can't see and feel wind when we're watching. It was disgusting out there today. So the difference between when you're playing 10 miles an hour downwind versus, you know, into the wind is unbelievable. To see the adjustments these guys were making against the wind Carlos coming in more right, taking that first ball, taking more risk, not wanting to get deeper into a rally, same with Zverev. And you just see these guys not getting fooled the same way multiple times, right, even if you want to project.

Speaker 1: 10:39

Last year Carlos's body abandoned him. He has had cramping issues, mostly in extreme heat, right, you rarely see him, you know, at Wimbledon he's not struggling in five setters. When he won in New York a couple of years ago when he was really young, he won a bunch of five setters all at night. All of his physical ailments have been during the day sun, heat related. This year. What's he doing in the third set Already in the third set, not physically compromised, doing the pickle juice or whatever the hell he was demanding and he was pissed when it wasn't there. Those adjustments and the discipline to always kind of solve that problem. He's not going to make the same mistake for an extended period of time.

Speaker 1: 11:18

The other thing I've written down here with Alcaraz and is he has this like shooters mentality, right, like Larry Bird, wanted the ball, wanted to shoot it, could live with the misses, thought he was going to make the next one Like one of the biggest misses. That, like players, can just turn it on and off. If that was a decision, we would just leave it on Like it's not really. Michael Jordan had, on a percentage shooting basis, shot 2% or 3% worse in the playoffs than he did for the regular season, but was still able to produce in the most significant moments. Obviously, you know it has to take more control of the game. Shot clock's winding down.

Speaker 1: 11:59

Carlos Alcaraz is like this insane thing to watch because he has all the shots. He can do everything, but he always takes his shot. It's it's Roger Always. You always felt like he was playing on his terms, right, like he was going to step in, especially later in his career when he had lost maybe half a step. It was on his terms.

Speaker 1: 12:19

Alcaraz still makes way more errors than prime Nadal, federer and Djokovic Way more unforced errors, but most of the errors are on his terms. He's trying to do something. He might miss a forehand wildly, but you're going yeah, that was probably the right shot, he just missed it. You can live with that. But the shooter's mentality I didn't have it. If I started missing, I'm like, oh shit, I'm gonna try to keep the ball on the court right, he can miss a shot. Roger was the same. He could dump a forehand halfway up the net and then he would try. He would up the risk profile, almost like he would go in and try the same shot he just knew he was going to make the next one.

Speaker 1: 12:54

Carlos was spotty in this match. First set was about as flawless a set of tennis as we saw. This entire tournament Goes down. Serves four to five, three in the third kind of chokes it away. A little bit, gets broken again, is in kind of a full panic mode, steps in the fourth set, keeps hitting his shot. I didn't have that. A lot of lesser players don't have that. He has that like old school shooters mentality. Pete Sampras, chips are down, I'm going to hit my second serve, a buck 22 on a big point, and I'm going to live with it. That is such a like a weird mental thing to be able to do. It's just. It's just phenomenal.

Speaker 1: 13:35

I have Zverev back in one of the best I've seen, six foot six out of the corners. Again, he will purposely leave that area open just so he can slide into it and get neutral. You can cover it. His forehand is good by tour standards. It's just not as good as the rest of his game. But the fact that he can kind of drift over to that side and protect his weakness on that forehand side because he knows he has this extreme advantage and movement and strength and ball flight on that backhand side is, uh, is is just insane. Also like oh, by the way, like something that doesn't get talked about. I have this written down as very being a diabetic and actually giving himself insulin on switchovers during matches.

Speaker 1: 14:22

never gets talked about, ever I don't think I got mentioned in the broadcast at all it did finally, because they showed it at the end and for a lot of his career he wasn't allowed to inject on court to have some rule against it. And finally he is now, but he has this little, this little like it looks like a dob kit that you would take if you went to stay, uh, in the Hampton Inn Myrtle beach for like three days. Like right, like he has this little thing that you would take and he has all of his stuff checking his, his insulin and adjusting if needed. He used to have to go off court to do it, but like not a big enough deal is made that Zverev is playing these matches. He spent 25 hours on court as a type one diabetic, are you? I get tired. It's crazy. I did a walking Peloton treadmill thing yesterday. I was dying because I had to walk uphill a little. My insulin's fine, not enough made of that.

Speaker 1: 15:15

If we're going to be good storytellers in tennis, the fact that that doesn't get mentioned to the point where we're sick of it is absurd. I don't know that. I fully understood the life consumption of a type 1 diabetic my wife's father is a type 1 diabetic. The constant monitoring, the dings on the phone when stuff gets too late, it's just nonstop, nonstop. And the fact that he's negotiating a five set gram slam final while also having to monitor uh insulin intake for being a type one diabetic and the fact that that's not like that. That's not normal, like tennis, isn't normal being isolated for that long, like the nba finals, and god love them. It's my favorite thing to watch playing 42 minutes in air conditioning, having an off day and then coming back again, like the NBA finals, and God love them. It's my favorite thing to watch Playing 42 minutes in air conditioning, having an off day and then coming back again. Try playing five hours, 25 hours over the course of two weeks, while also practicing on off days, while also apparently managing your insulin. It's I don't know how, how we don't talk about that more. It's I don't know how, how we don't talk about that more Shotspot just needs, like the fact that we have umpires still like reading marks.

Speaker 1: 16:24

I have this like Shotspot call. Totally screwed Zverev. In the fifth set. Alcaraz literally double and listen, zverev gets. He got some arguments wrong. Great, he's a little busy playing a match. The umpire has one job. Zverev has a million, apparently managing insulin also. But the fact that Roland Garros chooses to have all of the technology available to not miss line calls and yet we're still leaving it up to umpires to translate marks that might be half a millimeter is one of the dumber things that I just don't understand it. I think it's getting remedied, but like and also umpires and this is probably just me going to a player mentality umpires coming down and explaining how a ball travels to a player makes me want to throw myself into a wall.

Speaker 2: 17:27

Can we talk about their, uh, their help, their hat cams, what's?

Speaker 1: 17:30

the plan. It's like. It's like. It's like a Blair Witch project. Yeah, it's like a Blair Witch project messed up, fucking up reading marks, like what, like, like, like, as if we needed another angle to watch you suck at your job.

Speaker 2: 17:48

Like they didn't even cut to it on some of them too, and they were like I was like what's the?

Speaker 1: 17:50

point of this thing? Why do we have a head cam and then not use it when zverev is this close to your face like this, like why? Why do we have a head cam?

Speaker 2: 17:59

and why are we all this money?

Speaker 1: 18:01

in this thing that is largely dumb. And then when zverev's grabbing your arm and go like kind of fully fishbowling, you, you don't, you don't go straight to the head cam in that moment, like what the fuck are we actually doing with tennis broadcasts? Bring on the machines. Like we don't watch blockbuster anymore because there are better options. Like yeah, well, umpires, they love their job. I loved my job as a tennis player and I'm not good enough to do it anymore.

Speaker 2: 18:33

Well, I just don't get when you, when you have great technology, you know that can improve the quality of the game, like, isn't that the point, right? I mean it shouldn't, you shouldn't have that god bless I just that drives me insane.

Speaker 1: 18:44

uh, we talked about, uh, how slippery the court was. A lot of players may be complaining about more often than usual. Listen, players want more prize money. Always A lot of times the biggest source of revenue is TV. Now, when we have something to put on TV more often, that's great. That's more money in your pockets Requires a roof.

Speaker 1: 19:11

Maintaining a clay court indoors versus maintaining a clay court outdoors very different. When it rains for a week straight and you're basically maintaining for an indoor court, it's going to be a different process than when it all of a sudden breaks and you're dealing with heat the rest of the time. Like those are unpredictable things that they have to deal with. So I understand being pissed about it. Also, long view, looking backwards, there's no such thing as a perfect scenario for weather that doesn't have consequences elsewhere. Right, we want all the money from the TV. We would like for that to trickle down into prize money. It's going to be imperfect sometimes in some way, and it's going to be great, because we wouldn't have had a first week at Roland Garros this year had there not been a roof.

Speaker 1: 19:57

It was dog shit weather and that might be offensive to dog shit Like it was. It was so bad. So I understand people nitpicking and then basically every 12 seconds on the broadcast explaining a slippery court, a slippery court, a slippery court, a slippery court. But let's acknowledge why, and that it is a tough thing to maintain. Basically, one week of indoor tennis and how you take care of that court. It's not as if the groundskeeping crew at Roland Garros doesn't know what they're doing. They're the best in the world and then all of a sudden, heat baking. It is very different At Wimbledon when it's hot out. The court was brown by the end of it. You deal with that differently than you would if it was cold and rainy and it stayed green the whole time. Like this is a moving situation for the people taking care of the courts. It's not a hard court where it's just you'll walk it out and you'll let it rip tater chip.

Speaker 2: 20:50

So when Carlos was was complaining about it, right, you know what give me, give us the context of what he is. A player was complaining about, right?

Speaker 1: 20:57

And it's not just the ball right.

Speaker 2: 20:58

It's all of it.

Speaker 1: 20:59

It's this, it's it's. It looks way slippery. Normally dummies like me look bad moving on on courts at Roland Garros, um. But people who are fluent, like Alcaraz, like, uh, rafa looked like he was losing his footing a little bit. It's just the way the court is prepared. So he's either complaining about bad balances, which is remedied by sweeping, or the fact that it's too dry, which needs to be watered. Now, you normally do that at set breaks. Maybe it needed it more often this time.

Speaker 1: 21:27

But changing like an entire maintenance protocol mid-match if that goes sideways, it's one of those things that you only hear about if it goes slightly wrong and I just think listen, I'm the first person to say do your job, sit, you know, let's just get on with it. But I think there were extenuating circumstances. I think the more that we play indoor tennis on surfaces that probably aren't native to being played indoors grass, clay courts it's going to change the way that it's maintained. It's going to lead to weird stuff as far as playability. It just is. So I would complain about it if I was on court. I'd be pissed about it and then hopefully they leave. A week later you look back and go. I understand the reasoning for it and also, can we fix it like now? That'd be great, um, cause I'm trying to win, um, win, roland Garros, um, the number one thing in this, in this entire matchup that dictated most of the rallies Alcaraz funding depth on his first strike, creating that space.

Speaker 1: 22:29

So, whether it's the return that we were talking about earlier, anytime he could pin Zverev where Zverev wasn't inside the court. If Zverev was pinned back, he could not hurt Carlos without coming up with something crazy, without attempting some shot. That's incredibly risky. The match was dictated by the depth of Alcaraz's shot. Hitting that heavy forehand looper and it's landing three feet in front of the baseline or 10 feet in front of the baseline decides everything. Easier said than done. Again, getting that depth off of a serve that's 137 while also moving six feet to your right not the easiest thing. But as soon as I saw him hit that first ball deep, whether it's middle sides, all of a sudden he's inside the court and he's doing outgrass things where he's coming in floating drop volleys, those type of things. The things that we fawn over are dictated simply by creating as much space as possible between you and your opponent, and then that sets up the ability to dance right. It's like a boxer who sets up an uppercut with a jab and if he's finding the chin with that jab, then all of a sudden he can find everything else, uh, along the way.

Speaker 1: 23:37

Um, anyways, those are just, uh, my random musings. Uh, as I'm looking through yes, like eight pages of notes to watch a match, as I'm just watching it by myself, hoping my kids are behaving inside the house, um, as I'm watching it on a patio. Um, but listen, uh, thanks for watching this. Please give us feedback. I don't know what we're going to call these little short hitters, but I hope we do more of them where it's just complete nerd out and it's not a formatted television slash pod version of of what we do. We will always do that because that that that's the most fun. Um, but I think this, these raw reactions, they're fun for me. I like writing stuff down. Hopefully you like hearing it. If not, tell me to shut up. If you do, then uh, tune in more often when we do it. Also, tune into the tennis channel plus to watch all the greatest moments of, uh, of this Roland Garros, of which there were plenty.

Speaker 1: 24:29

Um, we're going to do a full recap show right now, hopping off of this and going on with our friend Kim Kleisters. Um, if you hear this before you get to the T2 show, uh, Monday, june 10th at 7 PM long recap show talking about all of the things, not just one specific matchup where we get into the weeds. Uh, kim will be on. John Wertheim will be on. Uh, from Paris. Uh, thank you for listening. Uh to me rant like a lunatic. Cheers.