Serena Williams’ pronouncement the other day that “Women’s sports is having a moment” stimulated this review of the women’s and men’s Roland Garros finals, contested last weekend in Paris.  The first tennis commentary HL has made in a long time, due mostly to our extended recovery from Rafa’s retirement.  However, since RG began this year with installation of Nadal’s sneaker print next to Court Philippe Chatrier’s netpost, that, the quality of this year’s finals, the post-match comments of the combatants and those of Serena The Influencer signaled that the time has come to resume tennis talk in this space.

This is the first year since 1984 where World 1 & 2 in both women’s and men’s have contested the RG finals.  Then, Navratilova v. Evert and J. McEnroe v. Lendl and now Sabalenka v. Gauff and Sinner v. Alcaraz.  On Saturday World 2 Gauff defeated Sabalenka 6-7, 6-2, 6-4 in 2 hours 38 minutes and on Sunday World 2 Alcaraz defeated Sinner 4-6, 6-7, 6-4, 7-6, 7-6 (10-3) in 5 hours and 29 minutes, the longest Roland Garros final.

Gauff’s defeat of World 1 Sabalenka was her second consecutive triumph over her rival in a Grand Slam final, the previous occurring in the 2023 U.S. Open.  Alcaraz’ defeat of World 1 Sinner was his fifth consecutive triumph over Sinner and the second in three weeks.  Alcaraz also beat Sinner in May in the Rome Masters final, winning the national championship of Sinner’s home country.

Aryna Sabalenka & Coco Gauff

In the objective tale of the tape, the men served half as many double faults as the women in a match more than twice as long and their ratio of winners to unforced errors was 34 percent better than that of the women.  And that does not (YET) account for the relative velocity and quality of shots produced in the two finals.  “Yet” now arrives with the subjective account and qualitative comparison.  Every one of the many commentators that reviewed both matches and that we sampled remarked that the women’s final was heavy on errors and light on precision, while also remarking that this was partially due to the windy conditions on Saturday.  The wind subsided by Sunday for the men’s final.

Those same commentators rated the men’s final among a handful of the greatest men’s Grand Slam finals in the so-called Open Era (beginning in 1968) and/or in memory.  Most often citing and comparing it with Nadal’s 2008 win over Federer at Wimbledon in five sets, taking 4 hours and 48 minutes, then a Wimbledon record; and Djokovic’s 2012 win over Nadal in Melbourne in five sets, taking 5 hours and 53 minutes, still the record for any Grand Slam final.

This commentator agrees with the consensus assessment of the women’s final.  And for the men I agree completely with respect to the drama and the quality with one significant exception.  That exception was their service games, which amount to at least one-third of tennis.  Both Sinner’s and Alcaraz’ service games were mediocre.  The latter served at only 58% and double faulted seven times, both sub-par for a top 10 player, let alone the world’s best, which Alcaraz is regardless of his World 2 ranking before and after this match.  His ATP service rating for the match was a really poor 180.  Sinner first-served at only 56%, which partially was redeemed by zero double faults.  And the World 1, but second-best male player, got a poor 183 ATP service rating for the match.

Jannik Sinner & Carlos Alcaraz

If either man had served at their pre-tournament average, neither the score nor the “points won” totals of 193 Sinner 192 Alcaraz would have been nearly as close.  Had they both served at or even near the level of the rest of their games, the match likely would have been as millimeter close as it was and fully earned its place alongside Wimbledon 2008 and Melbourne 2012, where in addition to the similar durations, closeness and spectacular quality of play, Nadal, Federer, Djokovic and Nadal served respectively at ATP ratings of 300, 303, 282, and 259.

And then there were the post-match comments of the athletes.  Sinner in defeat – this extraordinarily cruel and hair thin one – was as or more gracious than any loser or winner in memory.  And that despite the beyond obvious physical and emotional pain he was experiencing.  Alcaraz did his utmost to humbly accept victory and acknowledge his opponent’s heroically earned pain.

Rafael Nadal & Roger Federer

The only obvious rival for the greatest ever award ceremony performance is the 2009 Aussie men’s final where Federer openly wept while acknowledging his opponent’s well deserved five set victory and Nadal praised Federer as the “greatest” embraced him and rubbed their cheeks together in a scene that tennis fans have witnessed being replayed scores, if not hundreds, of times.

On the women’s side a superlative was also achieved, worst ever, with a gracious Coco unable to save Sabalenka from earning that title and doubling down on it in post-award ceremony comments.

As per Aryna, Coco won because Aryna played her worst final ever, because it was windy and because Coco’s shots consistently were hit not on her strings but the frame and somehow for winners.  According to Aryna had she not beaten three-time defending champion Iga Swiatek in the semis, Swiatek would have beaten Gauff in the final.  So as put by Serena and paraphrased here “Women’s sports had a moment” to remember.

POST-SCRIPT

A post-script to this 200th Hopelessly Liberal post is in order.  I planned for something special for 200 as I tried to do with 100.  But today the only thing truly special for a blog/newsletter that purports to be a voice for classic American liberalism is good advice to oneself and others on what to do in resistance to the federal administration’s assault on the Constitution and American democracy.  Five of the last six posts have commented on various aspects of that assault and what is recommended in those discrete situations.  But the overall formula is still in formation and will be shared with readers when it’s ready, well before HL 300.