Ep 33: Farewell, Davis Cup World Group Playoffs

FromThe Tennis Abstract Podcast

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Ep 33: Farewell, Davis Cup World Group Playoffs

FromThe Tennis Abstract Podcast

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Length:

61 minutes

Released:

Sep 17, 2018

Format:

Podcast episode

Description

Jeff is joined by guest host Peter Wetz, who reports from the Austria-Australia World Group playoff tie in Graz, Austria, and helps make sense of the radical new format for Davis Cup in 2019 and beyond.

Released:

Sep 17, 2018

Format:

Podcast episode

Titles in the series (100)

Jeff Sackmann talks tennis and analytics with a rotating cast of experts and superfans.

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Ep 13: Kvitova vs Barty, Serena vs McEnroe, and Federer vs The Field: How the Wimbledon draw is shaping up, and what to think about McEnroe's comments about Serena. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
76 min listen
Episode 1: Indian Wells, Miami, and the Renewal of Federer-Nadal: Carl and Jeff cover the events of the March Sunshine Double, and dig into the nitty gritty of the Roger-Rafa matchup. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 8: Zverev's Title, Emerging WTA Favorites, and a New Match Format: A youngster finally wins a big ATP event, Elina Svitolina steps up, and the stage is set for the French Open. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Episode 4: La Decima, a Wild Fed Cup Weekend, and Sharapova's Return: This week's topics: Nadal and the underwhelming competition, Ilie Nastase overshadowing some memorable Fed Cup tennis, and a changing of the guard on the WTA tour. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
58 min listen
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Ep 34: Laver Cup and the Changing Tennis Landscape: Our take on a star-studded event that doesn't fit the usual definition of a tennis tournament. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Episode 5: Sharapova in Stuttgart, Nadal in Barcelona, and a Dose of Doubles: This week's topics: Sharapova, Siegemund, Nadal, wild cards, drop shots, and doubles. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 9: Roland Garros Preview and the Value of Surface-Specific Forecasts: Nadal goes after his 10th French Open title, and research proves that the women's title is up for grabs. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 76: US Open Recap: Breakthroughs for Bianca Andreescu and Daniil Medvedev, along with the latest additions to the miles-long resumes of Rafael Nadal and Serena Williams. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 31: US Open Week Two: Only sixteen players are left, and Federer isn't one of them. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 20: Five Tournaments, Lots of Decisions: With two weeks of tennis all over the globe, players have some choices to make. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 12: Fed's Match Points, Vika's Return, and Wimbledon's Seeding Formula: Grass is back, and tennis's most unpredictable surface gives us a lot to talk about. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 6: Djokovic Goes Coachless and Sharapova Looks Dangerous in a Patchy Madrid Field: Madrid is wide open, with WTA seeds falling in the first round and Djokovic raising even more questions about his future. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 19: Comeback Stories: All those players who were out? They're coming back. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 46: Australian Open Recap: This week's big winners, Naomi Osaka and Novak Djokovic, widen the gap between themselves and the rest of the field. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 40: Fed Cup, the ATP Tour Finals, and a Sandbox Full of Rule Changes: Federer and Djokovic duke it out in London, while the youngsters contested different formats last week. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
57 min listen
Ep 22: Davis Cup, Present and Future: Rafa's back, Russia crashed, and the ITF is about to do something unwise. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 60: Goodbye, David Ferrer. Hello, Cristian Garin: With the usual suspects retiring and underperforming, a new crop of clay-court specialists have a chance to shine. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 36: Knights of the Federer Roundtable: Federer is still widely considered to be the greatest of all time, but the conversation is getting more complicated. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 116: Tennis 128 Wrap-Up: This year, I ranked the top 128 players of the last 100 years. I wrote long-form essays about each one, which I've published over the last eleven months. Carl Bialik joined me for a podcast episode to mark the end of the project. We solicited questions, and many of you came through--we ended up with a list of over 200 questions! Spoiler alert: Even after three hours, we didn't get through them all. I may write something in the next couple of weeks touching on some of the questions we didn't have time for. We talk about the algorithm, players with controversial rankings (or no rankings at all), reactions to the project, and much, much more. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 115: Jeff McFarland on Jim Courier and GOAT Algorithms: Jeff McFarland is the proprietor of the analytics site HiddenGameOfTennis.com, and like me, he has tried his hand at various mathematical approaches to rank the best players of all time, in both tennis and baseball. We start this jumbo episode by talking about Jim Courier--#107 on my Tennis 128 list--a player with a reputation that outstrips his career record, though both are outstanding. Jeff weighs in on the Courier-Chang comparison, and we talk about how Jimbo's inside-out forehand changed the game. We consider whether the early 1990s were a deceptively weak era, how much weight the slams deserve, which current players are most like Courier, some possible limitations of Elo for GOAT rankings, and--in more than one and half hours of tennis talk--a whole lot more. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 114: Ana Mitric on Goran Ivanisevic and Tennis in the Former Yugoslavia: Serbian-American writer Ana Mitric joins me to discuss the latest entry in my Tennis 128, Goran Ivanisevic. Ana was a Goran fan even before she took a broader interest in tennis, and she is particularly sensitive to how the breakup of the former Yugoslavia affected players on all sides of the conflict. We talk about the state of Yugoslav tennis before the wars, Goran's status in his native Croatia, and how his attitude to the conflict differed from older players. We also discuss how Ivanisevic attracted so many fans despite a one-dimensional game that was often boring in less-mercurial hands, why his outspokenness didn't seem to turn people off, and what he now brings to Team Djokovic. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 113: Grace Lichtenstein on A Long Way, Baby and Women's Tennis in 1973: In 1973, New York Times reporter Grace Lichtenstein was approached to write a book about the fledgling women's professional tour. It turned out to be a pivotal season in the sport's history, and the book concludes with an in-person account of the famous Battle of the Sexes match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs. The subtitle of the book is, "Behind the Scenes in Women's Pro Tennis," and Grace got to know the players--including Billie Jean--well enough to deliver exactly that. In our conversation, we talk about how the book came about, how it was received, and what press coverage was like for women's tennis in 1973. We also discuss how Billie Jean King has changed in the last half-century, the difficulty of covering tennis in such an intimate way today, and what it would take to write a behind-the-scenes look at a contemporary player such as Serena Williams. by The Tennis Abstract Podcast
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Ep 33: Farewell, Davis Cup World Group Playoffs

Ep 33: Farewell, Davis Cup World Group Playoffs

Description

Titles in the series (100)

More Episodes from The Tennis Abstract Podcast