The last bout on the undercard — the undercard in men’s tennis really being anything that doesn’t involve Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner — ended a few minutes before 11 o’clock at Arthur Ashe Stadium on Friday night. At that point, Sinner was in the process of finishing off Felix Auger-Aliassime, pounding one backhand after another at him as if he were willing to do that all the way into Saturday morning until Felix, punched out by then, finally hit one long. Sinner was in another U.S. Open final. Alcaraz was already waiting for him. Now Alcaraz and Sinner are set to do it again on Sunday afternoon, this time for our country’s national championship in men’s tennis. And that is big stuff.
It is big stuff and a big deal because of everything that has already happened between them this year. They’ve already played a final in Paris as thrilling as anything that has ever happened on either side of their sport. Alcaraz got out of three match points in the fourth set that day, finally came all the way back from having been two sets down to win in a fifth-set match tiebreaker. Sinner came back in the Wimbledon final and beat him in four. Now all they do on Sunday is fight for the year in their sport, and for No. 1. And against each other Just all that. If not for those three match points saved by Alcaraz at the French Open, Sinner would be playing today for the calendar Grand Slam. Throw that in there, too.
“They’ve elevated the sport,” John McEnroe said on Friday night, more than 40 years since he and Bjorn Borg did the same in their rivalry.
Alcaraz and Sinner have done that, and now try to do it again at Ashe. This time they will do it on a football Sunday in America and in New York, with both New York football teams opening their seasons and the Yankees finishing an important series against the Blue Jays at Yankee Stadium. No matter. Alcaraz and Sinner will once again make tennis matter across the street from Citi Field.
They have played 14 times already. McEnroe and Borg played 14 times before Borg suddenly retired after the Open final of 1981. That was the end of what Mary Carillo once called the “James Dean of rivalries.” Alcaraz and Sinner, 22 and 24 respectively, are just getting started, this soon after the remarkable two decades and more when Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal combined to win 66 major titles.
Already Alcaraz and Sinner have combined to win nine. Alcaraz will win his sixth at Ashe Stadium on Sunday, or Sinner will win his fifth. Never before in the history of men’s tennis have the same two men played three Grand Slam finals in the same year until now and until the two of them. Here are these two young guys with this latest chance to make their own rivalry into something for the ages, at these amazingly young ages. Maybe tennis will wise up one of these days and change its calendar so the Open ends on Labor Day, and this gets a better place in this country’s overall sports calendar.
A few years ago Alcaraz and Sinner played a quarterfinal match at the Open that went five sets before Alcaraz finally won at around 2:50 in the morning. Maybe this one will go that long, if not ending that late. Say it again: There are other rivalries in sports right now. Not like this one. One more big match for them, in the big city this time.
YANKS NEED TO STOP WHINING ABOUT THE UMPS, TIMELESS FACTS ABOUT MARTINA & SOTO HITS WAY INTO MVP TALK …
It should have surprised no one on Friday afternoon, especially not Novak Djokovic, that the 22-year old Alcaraz rolled the 38-year old the way he did.
An ending like that in tennis, in a match with that kind of age difference, is almost always as predictable as the tide.
Before the weekend is over, it would be nice if the Blue Jays stopped daddying the Yanks, right?
So wait — Kawhi Leonard has another no-show job besides basketball?
Listen: Everybody watching Wednesday night’s game against the Astros knows the Yankees got the baseball equivalent of a bad whistle at the end on balls and strikes.
Still: It doesn’t change the fact that there isn’t a team in baseball, not one, that does more whining about the umpires than the Yankees do.
To act like a bigger quack, Robert F. Kennedy would have to go through life sounding like Donald Duck.
Somebody please explain, in September now, why David Stearns, who has a World-Series-or-bust team same as the Yankees do, didn’t make a bigger play for a starting pitcher at the trade deadline.
I thought Elena Ostapenko behaved as badly as you possibly could after losing her U.S. Open match to Taylor Townsend.
I also didn’t think she acted like a racist, despite the way the whole thing was treated in the overheated moment.
It’s going to be very interesting, starting this Sunday, to see if Jayden Daniels can do it again.
And wouldn’t be something if the Sons of Eli could steal the opener off him today?
Two weeks until Season 5 of “Slow Horses” but, hey, who’s counting?
And just know that the new Mick Herron novel about Jackson Lamb and them, “Clown Town,” goes on-sale on Tuesday.
If you love the theater, and are able to get tickets, try to see Bobby Cannvale and James Corden and Neil Patrick Harris in “Art” at the Music Box while you still can.
The performances are all terrific, especially Cannavale, but then he’s pretty much terrific in everything.
Jerry Jones ought to be paying himself overtime for the way he’s been working ESPN to sell his cockeyed version of the Micah Parsons deal.
The Yankees better hope that No. 99 can play the outfield for real by the time the postseason starts.
Because he sure wasn’t playing it for real Friday night with those lollipop throws.
Every time there’s a major tennis championship going on, and people get to talking about who the GOAT really is for that sport, I like to present a few timeless facts about Martina Navratilova, who had her own rivalry-for-the-ages against Chris Evert:
Martina won 18 major singles titles, even going up against Chris in both their primes.
In addition, Martina won 31 major doubles championships.
And she won 10 more in mixed doubles.
If you’re keeping score at home, that’s 59 in all.
She also won her last major, in mixed, at the age of 49.
Is all.
Somebody catch me up:
Are we still supposed to be worried about Juan Soto being a sad-face emoji because he didn’t stay with the Yankees?
You know what Soto has done since his bad start?
Hit his way into the MVP conversation.
Is all.
I saw where Bill Belichick had banned Patriots scouts away from North Carolina football practices and I thought, hold on, Belichick still thinks he’s got players they actually want to scout?
By the way, my favorite meme of the week was the one that had Belichick’s girlfriend already in the transfer portal after TCU gave Carolina that beatdown last Monday night.
What, too soon?
