The Aftermath of Andrey Rublev’s On-Court Outburst and Default

What the 26-year-old’s punishment means for the ATP. Plus, recapping the Netflix Slam and the most lucrative major in this week’s tennis mailbag.

Editors’ note, upon publishing: Questions in this mailbag were lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

Hey everyone …

• You can find my breakdown of Simona Halep’s appeal and reduced doping ban here.

• Here’s this week’s Served podcast with Andy Roddick.

While a) congratulating Joel Drucker on being named to the NorCal Tennis Hall of Fame … b) wondering if I was the last person to realize that prodigiously talented painter Noah Davis was the son of Keven Davis (longtime agent/lawyer) for Venus and Serena Williams … c) looking forward to Indian Wells …

Onward …

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Jon, what did you make of the Netflix Slam? From my [vantage] point (I didn’t go but I watched) it was awesome!! How did we get more of these events?

Josh K.

• What’s not to like? Two A-list players. We get tennis royalty, starting with Andre Agassi, who’s continued his reemergence into the public eye. We had celebrities ringing the courtside seats and a full crowd. One is always skeptical about the effort level of an exhibition, especially when one player is nursing an injury, let alone two. But this wasn’t hit-and-giggle. No complaints about the production.

Realistically … this was a best-case scenario. You have Rafael Nadal in the autumn of his career, so there was an element of tribute. You have Carlos Alcaraz—a countryman—taking the baton, or the Spanish equivalent if we want to torture analogy. Because Indian Wells is next on the calendar, it was possible to hold this event in Las Vegas, a magnet of celebrities and home to a tennis legend (and his wife!). In other words, a lot of assets. Would this work as well under other conditions? Is there a commensurate women’s event? Does this play in Asia? Who knows … but this was an auspicious start. And if it augurs more tennis as viable streaming programming, so much the better!

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Rublev will retain his prize money and ranking points earned after being defaulted at the Dubai Tennis Championships :: Jayne Kamin-Oncea/USA TODAY Sports

[Andrey] Rublev’s default is the biggest mainstream tennis story since Djoker got deported from Australia 

James, Portland

• This, happily, is quickly headed to the spam folder of old news. But, yes, L’Affaire Rublev was a hot topic. Roddick and I discussed it minutes after the fact and I’m not sure much has changed in my eyes. Quickly:

a) Rublev is the author of his misfortune. At odds with his off-court personality, he is often a ball of rage on the court. Some of it is self-directed. Some of it has resulted in close—like, millimeters, close—calls. Last week, he was out of line and was defaulted. He bears the brunt of the blame and we’ll see if he makes good on the promise made in a social media post and reforms himself.

b) It is inherently problematic, granted, but officials need to account for context. Yes, rules are rules. But we are better off when those enforcing the rules have some leeway. Go five miles over the speed limit at midnight, the police might let you go. Go five miles over the speed limit as school lets out, you can expect a ticket. Check two carry-on bags on an empty flight and the counter agent ought to let it slide. Commit a touch foul late in a fourth-quarter NBA blowout and we’ll expect the refs to let it slide. So much so we have the phrase “swallow the whistle.” Deep in the third set of a semifinal match, dock Rublev a point for his unacceptable behavior. But a mic-drop default? Seems awfully harsh.

c) In team sports, an athlete can behave obstreperously and, while they may be ejected, the game goes on. In individual sports, ejection means the end of the play. Fans—who often paid handsomely—go home unfulfilled. An opponent gets a walkover. (Props to Alexander Bublik for asking to play on.) Tennis really needs to think long and hard about automatic withdrawals.

d) I would differentiate between acts of violence—that create physical danger—and ones that are merely antisocial. In no way is this to minimize intimidating an official or using profanity. Fine him to the gills. Make him go to kids’ clinics until his hands are covered in calluses. But it’s strange that he gets the automatic hook while players rifling a ball into the crowd are allowed to continue playing.

e) Profanity is profanity. One of you suggested that Rublev’s sin was somehow minimized because the recipient didn’t speak Russian and therefore didn’t realize the offense until the translator insinuated himself. Sorry, don’t buy it. The burden should be on the offending party, not the recipient.

f) As a rule, there is way too much aggression and disrespect toward officials in the ATP. (And, yes, let’s differentiate tours.) This didn’t come out of nowhere. There has been a culture of offloading anger at officials. It’s out of control. Maybe—optimistically—this is a hinge point.

g) For the record, the ball Rublev swore (literally) was out, was good. His behavior was indefensible regardless. But if you are going to lose it over a call, at least be right. He wasn’t. On the flipside: these disputes are another reason why electronic line-calling can’t come soon enough.

h) We need to talk about Alexander Zverev. The ATP has really looked feeble here. Most of us agree. And it’s created quite a precedent. First, for the peanut gallery. Player after player—even mild-mannered Adrian Mannarino—weighed in defending Rublev, clearly abreast of what happened and holding opinions. Yet when the same players are asked about a colleague accused by multiple women of domestic violence suddenly profess no opinions and plead ignorance about the details. More macro, at a minimum the optics are questionable when a player gets an automatic default for verbal abuse, while a player accused of domestic violence—multiple times; by multiple women; after committing the worst act of on-court violence in memory—is allowed to play on? Sorry, no.

i) To the ATP’s credit, they rescinded the initial ruling stripping Rublev of all his points and prize money for the week. This is correct. And it suggests the capacity for common sense departures from the letter-of-the-law rulebook. Fine and suspend a player going forward. But retroactively stripping him of his labors earlier in the week makes no sense.

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Kyrgios has been praised for his skills as a tennis commentator.  :: Mike Frey/USA TODAY Sports

If you could pick one current player from the ATP and WTA tour who would benefit the most from a coaching change, who would you pick? Also, what coach would you think would be the best for your selections?

Bob Diepold

Charlotte NC

• Thanks. I am going to steal this for the podcast and ask Andy. I guess my fallback is Nick Kyrgios. (Too obvious?) He can try and outwit himself. He can try and convince himself that he is/was injury-prone or “unlucky.” Now he has discovered that he can make a living—without the vulnerability of losing—as a talking head. But player after player has predicted that eventually he will mature, and he will look back on his career and say, “Why didn’t someone grab me by the lapels and tell me to stop squandering my talent.” And it will be too late.

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Jon, how do you rank the majors by how much money they can help you to make in endorsements? As a Scot, Andy Murray probably got the most endorsements after winning Wimbledon, whereas winning the US Open was ideal for American Andy Roddick. But for a player who isn’t born in Australia, France, England or the U.S.A., how do the majors rank for helping you to earn off-court income?

Kevin Kane, Kingston, Ontario, Canada

• Good question. I still think it depends on the circumstances. If a Chinese player wins Australia—the major Grand Slam of Asia-Pacific, it matters more than if, say, Sofia Kenin wins. If a player wins dramatically (Emma Raducanu? Alcaraz takes down Novak Djokovic in a five-set final.) it matters more than if they cruise. Did they win over fans in the process?

Commercially, I might contend that the U.S. Open is the most valuable. All that sloshing commerce. All those tastemakers in the luxury suites. The New York Fashion Week and Met Gala tie-ins.

Here’s something interesting though: I have seen some player endorsement contracts. For most, there is a bonus for “winning a major” and it doesn’t differentiate which one. In theory, brands (or the negotiating agent anyway) see the majors as equal in the marketplace.

Raducanu shot to stardom after her unprecedented 2021 U.S. Open run :: Robert Deutsch/USA TODAY Sports

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Jon,

Love the mailbag and now the podcast with Andy. Can we put a stop to this nonsense about folks complaining how it’s incorrect to say “Jannik Sinner won a grand slam” or “Aryna Sabalenk has won 2 grand slams”? It is 100% correct to call the Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open a “Grand Slam tournament’ thus the winners of any of the tournaments to say they have won “a grand slam”. Consider this analogy:

• There are 4 brothers in the Smith Family: Austin. Rollie, Wim and Usher.
• Austin, Rollie, Wim and Usher make up the Smith Family.
• Austin, Rollie, Wim and Usher are Smith brothers
• Austin is a Smith brother.
• So, it’s fair to say “Coco Gauff has won a Grand Slam (tournament)”. She hasn’t won “the Grand Slam”.

Mike, Glen Mills, PA

• I’ll buy that. A “Grand Slam tournament,” though is different from “a Grand Slam.” Gauff has won one of the tournaments comprising the Grand Slam. She has not, of course, won THE Grand Slam. Zverev (he of the frosty handshake in defeat to a countryman) has won an Olympic event. He has not won The Olympics.

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Hi Jon,

Do you look at stats indicating how many of your online readers are American vs those in the rest of the world? In your last mailbox you said “do you want to be varsity or jayvee?”

I understand that varsity means university but the rest of the sentence doesn’t make any sense to me. I assume it might make sense to those from the US, but not quite sure.

Do you occasionally think ‘oh no, this comparison (eg a phrase or naming some American football player to compare [them] with a Djokovic etc) won’t strike a chord with those from overseas?

Regards - GT

• Good point. And one I ought to consider more. I don’t have data on our audience but tennis is a global sport and the audience, we ought to assume, is global as well. Do you want to be Google; or do you want to be Bing? Do you want to be La Compagnie or ValuJet?

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Love the podcast with Andy Roddick.

In light of your SI article about Djokovic and your discussion with Roddick about Djokovic’s GOAT status, I think it would be interesting to have Jeff Sackmann on the podcast to discuss his Heavy Topspin 128 and, among other things, his selection of [Rod] Laver #1.

https://www.tennisabstract.com/blog/2022/02/01/introducing-the-tennis-128/

Thanks, Andrew L.

• Let this double as an opportunity to call attention to the work of Jeff Sackman, tennis treasure.

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Shots:

• Breaking grammar news.

• Ahead of the 2024 BNP Paribas Open—to be held March 3-17 at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden—the tournament has launched a portfolio of new digital experiences across both web and mobile, providing fans with a more engaging, personalized way to enjoy tennis paradise whether on-site or following the action from afar.

• Everyone must buy my friend Julie Kliegman’s new sports (and more) book: Mind Game: An Inside Look at the Mental Health Playbook of Elite Athletes.

• Here’s a beautiful piece on Caitlin Clark that also touches on tennis.

• Two additional major champions have entered the player field for the 2024 Charleston Open, the largest women’s-only professional tennis tournament in North America. Victoria Azarenka, the 2012 and 2013 Australian Open champion, and 2021 Roland Garros champion Barbora Krejcikova will join fellow major champions Jelena Ostapenko, Sloane Stephens and Kenin on March 30-April 7 in Charleston, South Carolina, in a field that also features four top-10 players and five former Charleston champions.