{"id":622,"date":"2007-06-23T11:13:15","date_gmt":"2007-06-23T19:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/?p=622"},"modified":"2007-06-23T11:13:15","modified_gmt":"2007-06-23T19:13:15","slug":"atp-fantasy-tennis-wimbledon-picks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/atp-fantasy-tennis-wimbledon-picks\/","title":{"rendered":"ATP Fantasy Tennis: Wimbledon Picks"},"content":{"rendered":"

ATP Fantasy Tennis Season<\/a> starts this week with Wimbledon. I\u2019ve posted a Fantasy Tennis Guide<\/a> with fast facts, strategies, and statistics to help you play the game.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sign up and join our subleague<\/a>! It\u2019s called tennisdiary.com. We send weekly email updates to all subleague members before the submission deadline.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Rear View Mirror<\/strong> – a look at last week\u2019s picks<\/p>\n

I picked six of the eight quarterfinalists at Nottingham and zero quarterfinalists at \u2018s-Hertogenbosch. That zero wasn\u2019t entirely my fault. Marcos Baghdatis dropped out, two qualifiers got to the semifinals, and Ivan Ljubicic reached his first grass court final. I should have picked Tommy Robredo, though, he reached the semifinals twice at this event and I missed that.<\/p>\n

Read more about Nottingham below.<\/p>\n

WIMBLEDON<\/strong><\/p>\n

Federer\u2019s Half of the Draw<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m picking Philipp Kohlschreiber as Roger Federer\u2019s sacrificial lamb in the quarterfinals and that means I have Kohlschreiber over Fernando Gonzalez and James Blake. Gonzalez has been blowing his stack way too much this year and Kohlschreiber beat Blake at Halle. So here’s the deal: if you want to be conservative, take Blake or Gonzalez, that way no one can give you a hard time because you were silly enough to pick Kohlschreiber.<\/p>\n

Andy Roddick has the easiest path to the quarterfinals. I’m not sold on him but he doesn’t have any of those younger, better players in his draw and Ivan Ljubicic doesn’t perform well at slams. That, by the way, encompasses our theme for this tournament: which young player is ready to step up and get into the quarterfinals of a slam? Richard Gasquet, Andy Murray, and Tomas Berdych have never gone past the fourth round.<\/p>\n

Below Roddick there is a fascinating French triangle containing the toughest decision in this draw. Arnaud Clement beat Gasquet at Nottingham this week and they could meet again in the second round if Clement can beat Nicolas Mahut. Mahut, however, beat Clement at London\/Queen\u2019s Club last week and had a match point to win that tournament. The question is: can Mahut beat Gasquet?<\/p>\n

This is a tough choice because the winner will probably meet Murray for a spot in the quarterfinals and Murray hasn\u2019t played since he hurt his wrist at Hamburg. The answer to the question is: I don\u2019t know if Mahut can beat Gasquet. But it might not matter and here\u2019s why.<\/p>\n

Even if Gasquet got past Mahut and met Murray in the fourth round, Gasquet hasn\u2019t shown me that he\u2019s mentally ready to get to a slam quarterfinal. I might not like Murray\u2019s foul mouth and incessant mutterings \u2013 actually, I find them intriguing and embarrassing all at the same time, I feel like I\u2019m sitting in a session at his therapist\u2019s office \u2013 but there\u2019s no question that he\u2019s a fiery competitor. And, I saw his coach Brad Gilbert get Andre Agassi through to a French Open title off a bum shoulder, so if anyone can get Murray and his wrist to the quarterfinals, Gilbert can.<\/p>\n

As for Mahut, he could go a long way but I\u2019ve taken enough chances for one week by picking Kohlschreiber.<\/p>\n

[Correction<\/strong>: Murray has pulled out of Wimbledon due to his wrist injury. Mahut is ranked below 100 and only the top 100 players can be chosen for an ATP fantasy team. Therefore I’m replacing Murray with Gasquet in the quarterfinals. Not much choice really.]<\/p>\n

Nadal\u2019s Half of the Draw<\/strong><\/p>\n

Except for consecutive third round appearances at the US Open, Novak Djokoivc has steadily progressed to later rounds in each slam so I expect him to get past Lleyton Hewitt and meet Baghdatis in the quarterfinals.<\/p>\n

Berdych has the least competitive fire of all those youngsters, but he also has three clay court players in his immediate section and only has to beat Joan Bjorkman to get to his first quarterfinal.<\/p>\n

Since I\u2019m one of those people who doubt Rafael Nadal\u2019s grass court skills, who should I pick to beat him? Robin Soderling doesn\u2019t function well at slams and Mikhail Youzhny is not a good grass court player. Next is Berdych who\u2019s beaten Nadal every time they\u2019ve met on a fast surface. I don\u2019t think Berdych can do it either, reaching a quarterfinal is a stretch for him.<\/p>\n

Djokovic has reached a slam semifinal and Baghdatis a final but Djokovic is in much better shape so I\u2019m counting on him to beat Nadal. I hope he does else I\u2019ll look bad.<\/p>\n

Wimbledon Draw<\/a><\/p>\n

Picks<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here are my picks for the quarterfinalists (who also comprise the eight players on my fantasy team): Federer, Kohlschreiber, Roddick, Gasquet, Baghdatis, Djokovic, Berdych, and Nadal.<\/p>\n

Who will Federer beat in the final to match Bjorn Borg\u2019s record of five consecutive Wimbledons? Probably Djokovic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ATP Fantasy Tennis Season starts this week with Wimbledon. I\u2019ve posted a Fantasy Tennis Guide with fast facts, strategies, and statistics to help you play the game. Sign up and join our subleague! It\u2019s called tennisdiary.com. We send weekly email updates to all subleague members before the submission deadline. Rear View Mirror – a look […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,22,40,94],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-atp-players","category-atp-tournaments","category-fantasy-tennis","category-wimbledon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ninarota.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}