Jon Wertheim, Andy Roddick discuss a 'seismic shift' in tennis on 'Served with Andy Roddick' this week
Topics include: Saudi Arabia as the new host for the WTA Finals, Rafael Nadal's withdrawal from Monte Carlo, and USTA player development.
The 2024 tennis season started out with much anticipated returns from Naomi Osaka and Rafael Nadal, and has since seen the ATP Top 10 rankings lose the one-handed backhand for the first time ever (and then, get it back); Simona Halep have her doping suspension shortened on appeal and return to tennis; Danielle Collins’ biggest career win shortly after announcing her retirement; and many more notable storylines since then.
All the high-profile headlines have meant noteworthy discussions on Served with Andy Roddick, as the weekly episodes covered everything with weekly guests like Jon Wertheim, Kim Clijsters and James Blake, to name a few.
“It seems like there’s a seismic shift in the game,” Roddick says this week, where discussion notably dives into the WTA’s deal with Saudi Arabia to host the WTA Finals for the next three years, offering insights on both praises and concerns, while looking ahead as to what this means for women’s tennis, and the sport itself.
“The league of Billie Jean King hat's predicated on social justice and equality and feminism is going to Saudi Arabia where women still need male permission to get married,” Wertheim said.
“Right now it's really strange. All the more so given that Steve Simon basically said we're leaving China because these values don't are consistent with ours.”
Nearly half of the episode is dedicated to breaking down the controversial announcement, and later, the topic of the USTA and its development of tennis players first discussed in last week’s episode is revisited.
Only then did Roddick realize that they “haven’t even gotten to the fact that the greatest clay-court player of all time,” who withdrew from Monte Carlo and the start of the clay season.
Roddick admits he’s “had this hope that [Nadal’s] going to get healthy ... maybe not winning, but some sort of version of him in the next two months."
"I want that for him," the former No. 1 said.
“In all of our sadness, we need to realize, I didn’t think he was going to play past 30 years old with the way he plays,” he continued. “It’s like feeling sad for someone living to 107 and then passing away.”
“This is one of the great tragedies of sport,” Wertheim said. “You don’t get to author your own ending. It’s going to be a very interesting French Open in six weeks.”
This hour-long episode is jam-packed with heavy conversations. Tune into T2, Tennis Channel's second network, Sunday night for the episode and Served Media podcast channels on the following Tuesday.