There was a worry, oh, about a year ago, that men’s tennis might fall off a cliff when The Big 3 are gone.
That Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic had been so dominant, for so long, that there would be a period of, well, I don’t want to call it mediocrity, but more like, parity.
And maybe there wouldn’t be an all-time great ready to take their place.
Yeah, I don’t think we tennis fans need to worry about that. There’s a very worthy heir to the Big 3’s throne.
And he is so damn exciting to watch.
Carlos Alcaraz is still only 21 years old, and Sunday he won his third major title. On his third different surface. Alcaraz won his second straight five-setter, Sunday beating Alexander Zverev (a twice-accused, not convicted, domestic abuser) of Germany for his first Roland Garros championship.
Alcaraz did it with a dazzling array of forehands, backhands, drop shots, big serves, and wow, does he have EVERY shot in his toolkit.
Watching Alcaraz play is electrifying, because he combines the speed of Djokovic, the grace of Federer, and the warrior spirit of Nadal. There were a few times Sunday when I just laughed out loud at the outrageousness of what Alcaraz was doing; announcer for NBC Mary Carillo was cackling, too.
He’s an all-court player, a good kid and someone who can still get a lot better (just look at this wholesome content of Alcaraz celebrating with the French Open ballkids). Wow is he fun, and while I’m not closing the book on Djokovic yet (he got injured last week and who knows when he’ll play again, hopefully at the Olympics at end of July), it looks like Alcaraz and new No.1 Jannik Sinner will be carrying the torch for men’s tennis for awhile.
And that’s just fine by me.
On the women’s side, the dominance of Iga Swiatek on clay continued. She won her fourth Roland Garros crown, having just one scare (in the second round when Naomi Osaka had her down 5-2 in the third set) and asserting that she is certainly the top women’s player right now.
A few more weeks until Wimbledon!
**Next up today, Friday saw the end of an incredible run of television. Pat Sajak, who has hosted “Wheel of Fortune” for more than 40 years, did his last show as host. It was an incredible run for a man who basically asked people to pick letters, encouraged them when their spin came up bankrupt, and made jokes with them for a few minutes before the game.
Combined with the beautiful Vanna White, Pat made “Wheel” must-watch TV for millions. He even had a short-lived late-night talk show, that I think me and 5 other people used to watch.
Here was Pat’s goodbye to the audience, and yeah, it’s OK if you get a little choked up.
**And finally, I know I am unconscionably late on this, considering it’s one of my favorite televised events of the year, but I finally got around to watching the Scripps National Spelling Bee last week, and I have a few thoughts.
First, it’s gotten harder and harder to find the Bee in recent years; it was an ESPN stalwart for many years, then when spelling got “hot” for a while it was on ABC, and now it’s on something called ION network, which I have to look to find every year.
And second, wow was this telecast padded more than the outfield wall at a ballpark. They started with only eight finalists, many fewer than usual, and I don’t know if the producers of the live show didn’t think these kids were any good, or what, but they did SO many things to stretch out the telecast. A ton of interviews with past winners, sooo many commercials, quite a few skits and backstage things, that I was practically yelling at the TV “Just let us watch the kids spell, please!!!” It was ridiculous how much non-spelling content they made us sit through.
OK, got that off my chest. This year’s Bee was super-exciting toward the end because we had a Spell-off between two boys; basically a spell-off is a lightning round to see who can spell the most words, the fastest.
And wow, did Bruhat Soma, of Florida, kick some butt. Using his fingers to mime-type the words, Soma was amazing.
Man I love the Bee. These kids are sensational, every year.
Wide World of Stuff 