{"id":7561,"date":"2025-04-25T10:56:42","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T10:56:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/?p=7561"},"modified":"2025-04-25T11:02:22","modified_gmt":"2025-04-25T11:02:22","slug":"monthly-roundup-4-april-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/2025\/04\/25\/monthly-roundup-4-april-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Monthly Roundup #4: April 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The “Babes”–Evelyn Colyer and Joan Austin–at Wimbledon in the 1920s<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Previous: March<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lots of tennis this month, and I have an even-more-mixed bag than usual for you:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1.<\/strong> The Match Charting Project<\/a> hit a fun milestone a few days ago, as we added our 2,000th unique player, Hanna Chang. She was quickly followed by 1989 Australian Open semi-finalist Jan Gunnarsson. We’re also just a few charts away from 7,000 women’s matches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2.<\/strong> Stat of the month has go to Jenson Brooksby, who saved match point in three separate matches en route to the Houston title. Voo de Mar has some context: It was the first time for such a feat in nearly 25 years<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Runner-up stat of the month might be that Patrick Maloney–ranked 390th when he lost to Brooksby in Houston qualifying–came back a week later and knocked Brooksby out of the first round of the Tallahassee Challenger. As Mike Cation put it: Tennis, man.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

3.<\/strong> Hollywood agent Ari Emanuel, with partners, is buying the Miami and Madrid tournaments from IMG as part of a $1 billion deal<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I generally don’t care much about who owns which tournaments, but in this case, there could be impact on the tennis itself. Not necessarily positive or negative: IMG likes to give wild cards to its own up-and-coming clients. 16-year-old Moises Kouame was one beneficiary this week, for instance. New owners might favor youngsters, too, but presumably not IMG clients in particular.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

4.<\/strong> Hugh recaps<\/a> the Barcelona final:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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If we cast our eyes back to the first break point of the match that Alcaraz won, we\u2019ll note that he had to do just that: win it. In other words, Rune wasn\u2019t\u00a0giving<\/em>\u00a0anything in this match. He played the role of counterpuncher perfectly from a deeper court position, yet never abandoned his forecourt instincts when the opportunity arose. Perhaps the rashest shot he hit all day was the forehand return he threaded on set point.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

5.<\/strong> Speaking of Barcelona, did you know it now plays slower than Monte Carlo? I did not. Here are my surface speed ratings<\/a> from the last 52 weeks:<\/p>\n\n\n

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(A few tournaments are included twice because their 2024 editions fell less than 365 days before the current one.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For many years, Monte Carlo was the most extreme of any event above the 250 level. By my metric, at least, it has now swapped places with Barcelona, which suddenly got slower in 2023. It was never fast<\/em>, by any means, but 2023-25 is a new era for conditions at the event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

6.<\/strong> The college tennis season is hotting up, which means it’s time to point you to CollegeTennisRanks<\/a>. Chris does an impressive job, from upcoming schedules<\/a> to his mind-bogglingly complex What-If scenarios<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

7.<\/strong> Archive video of the month is courtesy of the USTA, with a 1989 US Open second-rounder between Jimmy Connors and Bryan<\/em> Shelton:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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