In a wide-open women’s field at this year’s French Open, it seems fitting that one of the most dangerous players in the draw isn’t even seeded. Serena Williams has played only four matches–none of them on clay–since returning to tour after giving birth. As such, her official WTA ranking is No. 453, and her current match-play level is anyone’s guess.
Because her ranking is low, she needed to use the ‘special ranking’ rule to enter the tournament, and the rule doesn’t apply to seedings. (I’m not going to dive further into the debate about how the rule should work–I’ve written a lot about the rule in the past.) As an unseeded player, she could have drawn anyone in the first round; in that sense, she was a bit lucky to end up opposite another unseeded player, Kristyna Pliskova, in the first round. Her wider draw section is manageable as well, with a likely second-round match against 17th seed Ashleigh Barty and a possible third-rounder with 11th seed Julia Goerges. If she makes it to the round of 16, we’ll probably be treated to a big-hitting contest between Serena and Karolina Pliskova or Maria Sharapova.
According to my Elo-based forecast, a best guess about the level of post-pregnancy Serena is that she’s the 7th best overall player in the field, and 9th best on clay. That gives her about a 40% chance of winning her first three matches and reaching the second week, a 6.2% chance of making it to the final, and a 3.1% chance of adding yet another major title to her haul.
What if she were seeded? Seeds are a clear advantage for players who receive them, as a seeding protects against facing other top contenders until later rounds. By simulating the tournament with Serena seeded, we can get a sense of how much the WTA’s rule (and the French Federation’s decision not to seed her) impacts her chances.
Seeded 7th: Let’s imagine a bizarre world in which my Elo ratings were used for tournament seedings. In that case, Serena would be seeded 7th, knocking Caroline Garcia down to 8th and sending current 32nd seed Alize Cornet into the unseeded pool. That would be a clear advantage: 50/50 odds of reaching the fourth round, a 9% chance of playing in the final, and a 4.4% shot at the title, compared to 3.1% in reality.
Seeded 1st: If seeds were assigned based on protected ranking, Serena would be the top seed. You can’t get much more of an advantage than that: The top seed is protected from playing either of the other top-four seeds until the semifinals, for instance. (It’s no insurance against a meeting with 28th seed Sharapova, but Serena, of all people, isn’t worried about that.) Moving from 7th to 1st would give her another boost, but it’s a modest one: As the top seed, her chances of sticking around for the second week would still be 50/50, with 10.1% and 4.7% odds of reaching the final and winning the title, respectively.
Here’s a summary of Serena’s chances in the various seeding scenarios. The final column is “expected points”–a weighted average of the number of WTA ranking points she is expected to collect, given her likelihood of reaching each round.
Scenario R16 Final Title ExpPts Actual 39.8% 6.2% 3.1% 273 Unseeded* 34.4% 6.2% 3.0% 259 Seeded 7 50.3% 9.0% 4.4% 356 Seeded 1 50.5% 10.1% 4.7% 371
* the ‘unseeded’ scenario represents Serena’s chances as an unseeded entrant, given a random draw. She got a little lucky, avoiding top players until the 4th round, though her chances of making the final end up the same.
Seeds matter, though there’s only so much they can do. If Serena really is at a barely-top-ten level, she’s a long shot for the title regardless of whether there’s a number next to her name. If my model grossly underestimates her and she’s back at previous form–let’s not forget, she made the final the last time she played here, and won the title the year before that–then the rest of the field will once again look like a bunch of flies for her to swat away, regardless of which numbers they have next to their names.