🔗 Share this article

I have some thoughts about that comments delivered by the sports network broadcaster Chris Fowler after the Serbian champion's victory over the American player in the US Open last eight. Look – Fritz is the United States, the commentator is from the US – and athletic competitions often encourage nationalism. A little bit of letdown would have been appropriate. Instead, he brought up the continued drought of US male players at the majors: not one of them has won a title since the last American champion in 2003, and Fritz had been the final representative in the competition.

We all enjoy a storyline, myself included. But come on. Even if Fritz had beaten Djokovic for the first time, phenomenal talent Carlos Alcaraz was looming in the next round, whom he has yet to beat in an official match. And had he somehow gotten past that, it would have been defending champion Jannik Sinner, versus him Fritz had lost 10 of the last 11 sets. The two young stars had also split the last seven grand slams (and Alcaraz went on to defeat a tired Serbian in the subsequent match). Fritz said in post-match interviews after the loss that he in fact preferred his draw, because it offered the opportunity to beat the three best players in the sport in succession. He is well within his right to aspire to the achievement; an athlete is meant to believe in themselves. But entering that Djokovic last eight match what other person in their right mind had the lack of American champions in mind?

Coco Gauff’s weaker delivery the sole barrier between her and sustained success

The American, 28, is placed fourth in the world starting this week’s ATP World Tour Finals and has secured his previous six matches over third-ranked Alexander Zverev with growing comfort. Presumably he might claim that position for himself in the coming years. But evidently that at present, that’s as high as he can climb: Sinner and Alcaraz lie a vast gap of ranking points away. Fritz’s top-class serve and concussive power on each front side and reverse side are sufficiently enough to dispose of the majority of opponents on the professional circuit. Against the handful of once-in-a-lifetime players, though, Fritz is frequently overmatched. The last several years has witnessed the curious rise of tall, gangly athletes who can nevertheless move around with the surprising quickness and fluidity of smaller men. Fritz is six-foot-five and looks it. His footwork is stiff, as if he hasn't fully adapted to his limbs. So he’ll rarely win a rally that the other player was controlling, and hitting a soft shot against him is typically a reliable tactic. That serves as a quite severe limitation on his upside.

Fritz has achieved a several significant, unexpected improvements throughout his career. At the beginning of the ten-year period, he was hovering around the lower end of the world's best thirty. 24 months later, he was sniffing the elite ten. Last year, he unexpectedly exploded to No 4 – and maintained the spot. But the next leap, mixing it up with and defeating legendary figures like Alcaraz, Sinner, and including a declining Serbian, is the highest of all. What was the commentator have been thinking? That the American, in 2025, was a legitimate contender to beat them all back-to-back? That it was worth mentioning the continuing slump of American men winning grand slams when Fritz had departed the US Open in the quarter-finals? The thirst is simply excessive and the appreciation for the magnitude of the task insufficient.

The American star made a career-best run to the All England Club semi-finals in July.

Fritz’s play in that very quarter-final ought to have been enough of an indication. Djokovic won in four sets, a win that only felt uncertain for moments towards the conclusion, when Fritz had saved a few match points and had a opportunity to maintain serve for 5-5. The duo looked well-balanced during the exchanges, with the American creating plenty of chances to break. But the champion rescued service break opportunity after service break opportunity, extending the run to the point of agony. When Fritz eventually did claim one of the chances at 5-5 in the middle stanza, he immediately produced a terrible service game to drop serve once more; Djokovic had lulled him into a skirmish peripheral to the real battle and compelled him to use far too much energy to win it. Facing match points in the last game, Fritz’s first serve floated to heaven. He prolonged the match twice on his backup delivery, but ultimately double-faulted. It was not a collapse, I didn’t think, just a result of having to hit too many weaker deliveries.

The match was fairly compelling evidence that Fritz is not good enough to defeat any version of Djokovic, that lost to Alcaraz in the next round and did not especially seem like he believed he could win. This is absolutely fine – the Serbian is the greatest of all time, and might not be at the peak of his physical powers now, but has developed enough knowledge and strategic intelligence to compensate for a significant portion of the decline. The issue is those who were anticipating the American to win, and putting pressure on him to achieve that, when he was yet to accomplished anything that suggested he would.

Fritz is an valuable contributor to the tour nonetheless. He’s a calm, thoughtful voice in press conferences, more so than virtually everyone on the ATP aside from the Russian star, willing to not only express how he feels or the tactic he believed decided a match, but explain it. That he ought to bear the brunt of the blame for America failing to produce a men's grand slam winner since Andy Roddick feels unfair. (Now that Ben Shelton is rubbing shoulders with him in the standings, maybe they can share that burden.)

ATP Finals: Singles Groups

American legend Division

• The Spanish phenom
• The American contender
• Alex de Minaur (Aus)
• The Italian stylist

Bjorn Borg Division

• Jannik Sinner (It)
• The German powerhouse
• The rising American
• The Canadian talent

“I’d probably dwell on it indefinitely if I fail to do it,” Fritz informed an interviewer in the summer of claiming a grand slam. I hope he understands that he’s not unsuccessful if he doesn’t achieve that objective, that breaking through the Spanish and Italian's dominant, formidable empire is in fact extremely improbable for all other players. {