If there had been any doubt that Juan Martin Del Potro would get a wild card into the U.S. Open, his epic run to silver at the Rio Olympics erased all of it. As expected, Del Potro was on the initial wild-card list that the tournament revealed on Tuesday afternoon.
The 27-year-old Argentine won the U.S. Open in 2009, clobbering Rafael Nadal in the semis before outlasting Roger Federer in a five-set final. Recurring wrist injuries have prevented Del Potro from building on that triumph with additional Grand Slam success, but he captured the bronze medal at the London Olympics in 2012 prior to his Rio de Janeiro heroics last week. The former world No. 4 stunned Novak Djokovic in the first round and ended up beating Nadal in the semifinals before succumbing to Andy Murray in the gold-medal match.
Our 2009 #usopen champ @delpotrojuan headlines this year's men's wild cards. https://t.co/aXeHRzErnr pic.twitter.com/qziV4AGVlB
— US Open Tennis (@usopen) August 16, 2016
Joining Del Potro in the main draw of the U.S. Open with wild cards will be Rajeev Ram, Bjorn Fratangelo, Frances Tiafoe, Mackenzie McDonald, Michael Mmoh, and Ernesto Escobedo.
Ram is coming off a silver-medal performance in mixed doubles with Venus Williams. The 32-year-old reached a career-high of No. 56 in the world a few months ago but is currently 103rd and just barely missed the U.S. Open’s direct-entry cut line. Fratangelo, who took a set off Djokovic in Indian Wells, has played in the main draw of previous three majors in 2016. The 18-year-old Tiafoe is the third youngest player in the top 200.
McDonald, Mmoh, and Escobedo all won their wild cards. McDonald is the reigning NCAA champion, Mmoh recently captured the boys’ 18’s title at Kalamazoo, and Escobedo earned the most points during the USTA Pro Circuit U.S. Open Wild Card Challenge.
Yes!! I was hoping Rampras would get one. He deserves it. He could be dangerous with the right draw. Also tiafoe getting one and Del Po is of course awesome. Was hoping Opelka would get one but he got one into qualies so that’s good. Hopefully he gets through to the main draw because he could make some noise. Plus it would benefit him if he got three matches in before the main draw because his game probably doesn’t drain much energy with the quick points he plays so he would be warmed up and maybe not as fatigued as most would be. Won’t be easy for Reilly though as he will probably not be seeded unless he has a great week in cincy and even then it would have to like an insane run here for him to be seeded in the qualies. He has a great chance at qualifying though in my mind, based off of form at least. Also should be interesting to see how Escobedo McDonald and Mmoh fare. It would be huge for them to just get a W. Fratangelo could actually make a mini run with a good draw as he’s so solid off the ground and a really gritty player. Hopefully he does well too. It’ll be interesting to see which French and Australian players get the wildcards. I’m thinking French one will be someone like Halys or Millot cuz I think they’re the two highest Frenchmen outside top 100 and Halys is a good young gun but Millot has been in much better form than Halys and he’s a solid veteran. I’m gonna guess Millot gets it. De schepper or Roger Vasselin are possibilities as well but I’m thinking Millot gets the French WC. For Australia someone like kokkinakis could get it but he may have only played Olympics cuz it’s Olympics and may not be better physically still. Lots of other guys could get it like Whittington who has been great at challengers lately or some youngsters like jasika and Mott. More could be matosevic groth ebden duckworth mitchell Barton smith and saville. I don’t really know who should get it but I’m gonna guess the Aussie wildcard is Groth just because he’s probably the most well known Aussie of those who are low ranked now and could still do some damage with his serve.
Wait I don’t know if France does a wildcard for sure. Thought they did but they may not.
I know very little about slam wildcards, but I thought that each of the four “slam” nations got a wildcard from each of the others. A tit for tat arrangement.
nope. sometimes 1 gets 1 from the other, but rarely more.
Ok so I’m pretty sure it’s just Australia because there are already seven of eight wildcards chosen anyways and I’m positive Australia is giving a WC and that’s actually the only one left. I’m pretty sure they give eight WCs. If they give nine France will probably give one but I think it’s eight.
I am not surprised that Delpo got wild card for the USO. I am happy for him. I am also pleased that Tiafoe got a wild card among the Americans.
Something they’re talking about during the Stan vs Donaldson match, which Jared is winning 4-2, is that Jared didn’t get a wild card. Didn’t really realize that at first but that’s kind of surprising. Maybe they didn’t give him it because they gave him one in 2014 lol. And I kinda thought Harrison may get one as well. The WCs they gave were pretty solid though. So many guys were good options so it must’ve been tough for the USTA.
Besides they could only give four that weren’t decided by results like the wild card challenge and NCAA and Rampras, Tiafoe, Fratngelo, and Del Po are all very good choices.
Ricky says: “The 27-year-old Argentine won the U.S. Open in 2009, clobbering Rafael Nadal in the semis.”
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Whatever is the topic, Rafa always gets remembered! 🙂
At the 2009 US Open, Rafa had a right abdominal muscle injury. He got injured in Cincinnati and the tear was getting worse at the US Open.
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01476/rafael-nadal_1476208c.jpg
🙂 Even Rafa once got a bit fed up with hearing about how he’d been “clobbered” by JMDP at the ’09 USO. He said that Del Potro had been playing at a very high level and would probably have won the match anyway, but he would not have lost it 2 and 2 and 2 had he been healthy.
Really glad that Delpo is in, and it could sure throw a huge wrench into the draw…nobody will want to be near him. Also glad that the younger kids are in…they’ve earned a spot and I hope they can go a round or two.