The Massacre of the Seeds (OT)

A sporting post, in honor of Summer—but first, Happy 4th of July to my fellow Americans. Formally called Independence Day, it commemorates the ratification of the Declaration of Independence by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, establishing the United States of America. Three Founding Father Presidents died on this day—John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, both signers of the Declaration, died on the same day, the country's 50th birthday in 1826, and James Monroe, the fifth President, died five years to the day later. Curious coincidence. 

Is it just here, or are celebrations muted elsewhere? I haven't heard a single firecracker yet. Formerly the cacophony started in June, though it's been more subdued in recent years. But on to tennis.

Jack Draper. Photo by si.robi.

Upsets and surprises
Malcolm Gladwell wrote a whole book on outliers. Outliers are by definition atypical, and rare.

The UK's top-ranked male tennis player, Jack Draper, the No. 4 seed at Wimbledon in the men's draw, lost yesterday, to Marin Čilić, an unseeded player from Croatia. Čilić is a former major winner, but he won his single major more than ten years ago, in 2014; and he peaked at No. 3 in the rankings, but that was seven and a half years ago. His win over Draper was the first time he had beaten a top-10 player at a major in three years, and, at 36, he became the third-oldest player ever to beat a top-10 player at Wimbledon. It was, in other words, quite an upset.

Draper, however, joined 18 other seeded players in the men's draw (among 32 seeded players total) who are now out of the tournament. The same thing has happened on the women's side—17 seeded players are out, for a total of 36 in both draws. More than half of all seeds, men and women.

In the first two rounds, more seeded men lost in 2002: 20, compared to this year's 19; and the same number of seeded women, 17, fell in 2013 and 2016. But the total of 36 seeds losing across both draws makes this year the absolute outlier. More seeded players lost in the first two rounds of Wimbledon this year than ever before at Wimbledon, and indeed ever before at any major* tennis tournament.

The wily Djokovic, ranked and seeded sixth, now sees this as his best opportunity to add a 25th major to his record 24—even though no player, male or female, has ever won a major at his age, which is 38.** But the top two seeds in the men's draw are still alive. No. 2 seed Carlos Alcaraz of Spain (pronounced as though the "z" is a "th," despite what you hear constantly on English-speaking media), who almost fell during a five-set scare in the first round against Fabio Fognini, and Jannik Sinner, of Italy, the No. 1 seed, are both still in it. Sinner is 23 years old, Alcaraz 22. Both are in their prime: between them they've won all six of the last six majors.

Despite a recent three-month suspension, Sinner is by far the World's No. 1-ranked player, with 10,430 ranking points vs. 9,300 for the second-ranked Alcaraz. The amazingly consistent Sinner has put some awe-inspiring beat-downs on lesser players, for example his lopsided 6-1, 6-1, 6-3 thumping of Aleksander Vukic yesterday (Sinner seemed to apologize for his weak showing in the third set at his press conference), but he seems unable to beat Alcaraz, who has already won Wimbledon twice. Alcaraz is ahead 8-4 against Sinner in their lifetime head-to-head score, and has won all five of their last five meetings.  

So it's going to be a very interesting Wimbledon. But whatever happens, it's already an outlier. Outliers are by definition atypical, and rare—but then, they have to happen sometime.

Mike

*Now despicably called "grand slams," which they are not. A Grand Slam means winning all four majors in one calendar year. Only two male tennis players have ever won a real Grand Slam: Don Budge, during the amateur era in 1938, and Rod Laver. Laver did it twice, once in 1962 as an amateur and again in 1969 as a professional. Laver wasn't allowed to compete in major tournaments in the intervening years, because he turned professional and the majors were amateur-only until the Open Era began in 1968. The major tournaments are the Australian Open; the French Open, now called "Roland-Garros" [sic] after its venue; Wimbledon; and the U.S. Open. Tennis has taken to calling all the majors "grand slams" for marketing reasons. It's a sleazy swindle, which steals valor from those who have actually accomplished that ultimate feat. Among women players, Maureen Connolly (in the amateur era), Margaret Court, and Steffi Graf have won the real Grand Slam—Graf's is called "the Golden Slam" because she won an Olympic Gold Medal in the same year. Jack Crawford, Serena Williams, and Novak Djokovic all came within one match of winning the real Grand Slam, but failed.

Credit: San Diego Air and Space Museum Archive

Curiously, Roland Garros the man was not a tennis player but an aviator. He was the first man to fly across the Mediterranean, and became a French flying ace in WWI. He was shot down and killed over the Ardennes in 1918, only one month before the end of the war, one day shy of his 30th birthday. Garros was also a close friend of the legendary automobile maker Ettore Bugatti, and an early Bugatti was also named for him. Why the odd hyphen in the tournament name? Beats me. [UPDATE: See Yves Papillon's Featured Comment below.]

**Ken Rosewall won the 1972 Australian Open at 37 years, 2 months, and 1 day, which has been the record ever since. He reached the finals of Wimbledon and the U.S. Open two and a half years later, in 1974, at the age of 39, but was shellacked in both tournament finals by Jimmy Connors. Connors, for his part, was dominant enough that he might have won a real Grand Slam—but he was banned from the French Open during his best years because of his affiliation with a now-forgotten league called World Team Tennis. 

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Lisa s. Gorrell: "As much as I enjoy watching some of the seeded players, I also like it when an underdog upsets them. These underdogs could become tomorrow's winners."

Yves Papillon: "About hyphens in French. If it is a name, no hyphen. If it is a place, building or else named to honor a person, it takes an hyphen. Sorry for my frenchglish."

Mike replies: That's all right, it's better than my Englench. And merci for explaining that.

Comments

[Ned Bunnell]

Mike, Happy 4th of July photo of my favorite gal in our neighborhood. From my morning walk with Max. iPhone 13 in one pocket. Ricoh GRIIIx in the other.
Cheers, Ned

https://flic.kr/p/2reHTRR

[John Buie]

Federer also came within a match of winning a calendar-year Grand Slam, twice: 2006 and 2007, losing to Nadal in the French Open final each time. Federer could plausibly be argued as the 2nd best clay court player in the world during that time, it was just his bad luck to continually encounter the greatest clay courter of all time.

As far as I'm concerned, Fed is the GOAT (male), with 10 consecutive major finals and 23(!) consecutive major semifinals. I admit that I do not like Djokovic, and there is nothing he could accomplish that would make me change my mind. :-)

[I agree on both Federer and Djokovic. I think the "almost" with Fed is a little different--Serena and Djoker got to the US Open finals with only one match to win for the GS and lost. I agree that Fed lost in the finals of the French and THEN won Wimbledon and the US Open, so technically he fell one match short, but he had already blown the GS going into Wimbledon, so it's a bit different. All in how you look at it I guess. —Mike]

[robert e]

It's crazy! The upsets have been so widespread that seed-killers are already meeting in the third round. Some nice dark-horse / Cinderella / comeback stories already. Emma Raducanu may be all of those in one, at the ripe old age of 22, but she's up against #1 Sabalenka today.

[Jeff Hartge]

One quick note on winning a grand slam. When Laver and Budge achieved their Grand Slams there were only two surfaces: clay (French) and grass (the other three).

Andre Agassi is the only player to win on all four surfaces when they were all distinctly different. While the Australian and U.S. were both hard court, they were still distinctly different versions of hard court.

Today, all of the surfaces have more similar playing characteristics. The grass of Wimbledon is all rye now and allows for a harder surface while the stiffer grass slows the ball. The hard court surfaces are nearly identical and contain more surface grit to slow the ball.

[Paul]

Impossible to compare eras in almost any sport. Short of a court, racquet and ball, there are few similarities. As Jeff Hartge points out, the surfaces on all courts have changed. Most notably the grass at Wimbledon. It is a more homogenized game where nearly any player within the top 100 could win on any surface. In the past, with a few exceptions (Borg in particular), the surface often determined the eventual champion based on style of play. Nadal's dominance on clay is unprecedented but he would never have won Wimbledon in Borg's era. He did not have the serve and volley game required. Lendl came close but also failed for the same reason.

[BIll Tyler]

One more quick note on hyphens. It's common English usage to use a hyphen when combining two words to form an adjective. For example, photographer-friendly website. However, English doesn't do this with proper names. French seems more consistent.