Week 41 - ATP Masters 1000 - Shanghai, China (hard)

JonH · All-time great

Week 41 - ATP Masters 1000 - Shanghai, China (hard)

christ · Futures level

indiana wrote:
... his record against top 10 players is Won 2, Lost 3 and against top 16 is Won 5, Lost 4.

Yes, but obviously he didn't beat any decent top 10 (16) players!! Self evidently he only beat the poor ones.

christ · Futures level

JonH wrote:
Just looking at the prizemoney listing on Live Rankings, I see Kyle has won just shy of $2m ($1.94m) in prizemoney this season, not bad at all. Plus all of sponsorships etc.

What surprised me most was that after Cam in 2nd in GB list at around $500k, Andy Murray has in fact won $238k this season, which is frankly astounding. Clearly with all his endorsements and interests, that $238k is almost meaningless to him but does the work he has put in really deserve to earn that much? Maybe another discussion (and I am a big Andy fan so not meant as a troll in anyway, just an observation, does he really deserve that much?)

The system is (inadvertently?) designed to make the rich richer, and (as an unfortunate side effect) keep the poorer poor. Everything is geared to getting the higher ranked (... and paid) players in front of the audience, as that is what TPTB believe the audience want to see. I can't imagine that anyone would stop playing if the winners money was cut by half in the ATP/ WTA tournaments, but instead the tournaments are in a never-ending arms race to brag about paying the most, and the unfortunate side effect of the way things are is that all the big money is funnelled into the pockets of the people that least need it.

Jaggy1876 · Grand Slam Champion

Yes impressive 2 million earned, less than that for tax reasons as we know which is a disgrace but covered already. Some good challenger wins here and a good tournament getting to the quarters, the top players still ahead by some distance.

Regarding Andys earnings that does seem a high amount to earn for court time but then again its not really his fault, the earnings should be bumped up further down to reflect more in challengers and futures but is unlikely to happen. ChrisT is spot on the whole system is unfair.

JonH · All-time great

One of the things that has always troubled me is that in tennis the system works as a sort of pyramid. The event winner wins $1m, RU gets half that, Semis get a quarter, qf stage gets an 1/8th down to the guys, in last 32 who get 1/32nd. I know it isnt precise, each event varies slightly in how the distribute but it is basically that.

Initially it feels intuitively correct to do it that way, reward the winner the most but in reality does the event winner deserve double what the RU gets and 4 times the SF's? They play one more match...I dont know but maybe you are right (ChrisT and Jaggy) that the system and the structure is very much out of kilter and certainly not fair.

JonH · All-time great

Jamie and Bruno won their semifinal today and so Jamie is into a final of a Masters 1000 again. Other semi tomorrow, on the fast court that is Shanghai (I read an article where Shanghai measures on the TCI for speed as the fastest at 1000 level and I think fastest at any level along with Washington) Jamie and Bruno should really stand a good chance of winning this event

JonH · All-time great

Here is one source - Shanghai measuring as top with Australia and London also up there, Wimbledon middling

www.perfect-tennis.com/court-speed-2017/

this first article above looks at SLams and Masters level events

www.tennisworldusa.org/tennis/news/Tennis_Stories/52466/acapulco-is-the-slowest-atp-500-hardcourt-event-while-the-fastest/

This second looks at ATP 500 level events, suggesting Washington as fastest and Acapulco as slowest.

Shhh · Challenger level

They play one more match John but win two more. I take your point though, an interesting take.

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

SF: (6) Jamie Murray/Bruno Soares (BRA) CR 23 (11+12) defeated (5) Juan Sebastián Cabal & Robert Farah (COL/COL) CR 15 (8+7) by 3 & 4 biggrin

Hardly dared hope for that. Marach & Pavic (2) or Kubot & Melo (3) in the final.

mike55 · Lower Club Player

JonH wrote:
One of the things that has always troubled me is that in tennis the system works as a sort of pyramid. The event winner wins $1m, RU gets half that, Semis get a quarter, qf stage gets an 1/8th down to the guys, in last 32 who get 1/32nd. I know it isnt precise, each event varies slightly in how the distribute but it is basically that.

Initially it feels intuitively correct to do it that way, reward the winner the most but in reality does the event winner deserve double what the RU gets and 4 times the SF's? They play one more match...I dont know but maybe you are right (ChrisT and Jaggy) that the system and the structure is very much out of kilter and certainly not fair.

The system you describe means that each round has the same amount of money allocated to it, but split between fewer players as the tournament progresses. It seems a logical way of approaching the distribution of prize money, however that doesn't necessarily make it fair. But then 'fair' is difficult to pin down - fair for whom? Given a fixed amount of prize money increasing it for one group means reducing it for another.

The real unfairness is the differences between tournaments (rather than the distribution within a tournament) - players on the Futures circuit are barely grinding out a living, and in many cases are relying on their parents. That's not right IMHO.

JonH · All-time great

Kubot and melo win to play Jamie and Bruno in tomorrow's final, and qualify for tour finals in the process.

Should be a good match in the final.

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Final: (6) Jamie Murray/Bruno Soares (BRA) CR 23 (11+12) vs (3) Lukasz Kubot & Marcelo Melo (POL/BRA) CR 10 (5+5)

JonH · All-time great

JonH wrote:
So the list of runners as Shanghai reaches the last 8 is:Rankings are Live RACE

5. Zverev
6. Cilic
7. Anderson
8. Thiem
9. Isner
10. Nishikori
11. Fognini
12. Edmund (up one more place to live 12)
14. Coric

Tsitsipas is at 13 but as he is out of Shanghai he can't get enough points to qualify (although clearly others above may drop out of London so I guess he still has something to aim at)

The last 8 is:

Federer v Nishikori - they havent played in 18 months, Federer is 5-2 up over career although not playing that convincingly this week. He is doing the old Pete Sampras act, just enough to win it seems, but still think he will edge out KN is 3

Coric v Ebden - never played before. If Coric wins (and he must be favourite) he will go ahead of Kyle in the Race if Kyle loses.

Kyle v Zverev - met 3 times and all to Zverev incl Beijing last year in straight sets. Zverev is obviously favourite but you never know. I am not sure a loss would finish it for Kyle. After this week there is an ATP 250 next week for him in Antwerp, then ATP 500 and ATP 1000 events. He would need 1600 points to get past Thiem and presumably would need to win all events remaining to make that realistic - unless he can keep going here. But presumably he wont be able to max out his points in that ATP 250 event if he has some counting already, maybe someone else knows the details for Kyle?

Anderson v Djokovic - 6-1 head to head for Djoko and Anderson last won in 2008....

Djoko must be favourite to win the tournie but Coric looks an interesting pick in the top half to make it to the final...

Oh, I'm good at this

Michael D · All-time great

Yes you are Jon, can take over from Castle or Petchey any day! wink

JonH · All-time great

I'd take that job anyway! Beats being a management consultant!