Betting: US Open Tennis Preview
Minty Bets is joined by Pamela Maldonado and VSiN’s Gill Alexander to preview the Men’s and Women’s US Open.
Video Transcript
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MINTY BETS: The US Open takes place on Monday. I'm Minty Bets. And joining me to talk a little tennis is Yahoo's very own Pam Maldonado and our very special guest today, the host of a numbers game on VSN, Gill Alexander.
Guys, we need some picks. We need some winners here. So, Pam, let me start with you. Who do you have to win the US Open?
PAM MALDONADO: One of the best bets that I am looking at for the US Open on the men's side of the draw is Daniil Medvedev to win the first quarter at plus 140 odds. Now, look, the playbook is out for how to defeat Medvedev, and the way you do that is by implementing a slice game, a drop shot. You bring him-- Mr. Long Arms, Long Legs-- front and back and side to side.
The problem with that, and that benefits Medvedev is that on his quarter of the draw, there is no such player who has that type of style of play. There are two players on this side that could be a threat to him, and that is Nick Kyrgios and Pablo Carreño Busta. But these are two baseline games in the best of five, and a slower surface than what we have seen in the last few weeks.
I'm not at all worried that Medvedev did just lose to Kyrgios, because that was on a faster surface at the Canadian Masters, and that was right immediately in a match after Medvedev had just won a tournament in Los Cabos. So it was definitely more of a letdown spot in my opinion.
Now, Medvedev, the way he can combat that serve from Kyrgios is by standing further behind the baseline and returning a deep shot to extend those rallies. And, Nick, I just don't believe that he has the patience to play long rallies needed in a best of five tournament, like the US Open.
Now, against Busta, I am confident that he is, yes, coming into this with some really great form, just won the Canadian Open. But if you look at the players that Busta played in order to win that title, you're talking about Matteo Berrettini, Jannik Sinner, Daniel Evans, and Hubert Hurkacz. None of those players are solid baseliners. And Medvedev is the second best baseliner in the world behind only Novak Djokovic. And I don't trust PCB to play how he should, which is a non-baseline game. I do expect this to be a little bit competitive, though. I am expecting, potentially, for this to go a full five sets.
So, potentially, there is a value on grabbing PCB to win the quarter at 10 to 1. But Medvedev, 20 and 4 at the US Open, with two losses against Rafael Nadal and Dominic Thiem. Those are two supreme baseliners. And those are players that you just don't see in his quarter of the draw. So give me Medvedev at plus 140 to win the first quarter.
MINTY BETS: Ooh, OK. Now, Gill, I know that you've got some picks on the women's side. So who do you like for the US Open?
GILL ALEXANDER: Dude, thanks for having me. Well, first of all, I have picks already in pocket where the numbers aren't there anymore. Those are, namely, Iga Swiatek, the number one player in the world, who I got the night that Ash Barty retired back earlier this year at 7 to 1. You won't find Iga with that number right now. And quite frankly, after the draw, whatever number you can get her at right now, not a good wager.
I do have two long shots, one-- both of these, by the way, pre-draw, and one of them, Beatriz Haddad Maia at 50 to 1. She didn't end up in a very good quarter, either, in quarter number three. That's filled with Simona Halep, Maddie Keys, Camila Giorgi, Coco Gauff, Bianca Andreescu, Caroline Garcia. It is just absolutely loaded. So I don't like those two bets, quite frankly, that I have in pocket. Well, I like the Iga one, but she was done no favors in her Q1 as well.
There is the third one that I have, though, that I still would recommend, and that is a young Chinese player, 19-year-old, who is in Iga's quarter, in quarter number one, but almost pulled off the upset against Iga at the French Open on clay. And I'm talking about Qinwen Zheng, Qinwen Zheng, who has a tough match in an opener, in the first round, against Jelena Ostapenko, a slam winner in her own right.
But I think Zheng is really a good, solid bet on the quarter, and, yes, for the entire US Open as well. You won't be able to find, perhaps, the 55 to 1 that I got just a couple weeks ago. But shop around. You might be able to get something very close to that.
If you're landing, though, right now, and you're just looking at the women's draw as a whole, Q1, Q2, Q3 very competitive. The easiest of all the quarters is quarter number four. And right now, that is so wide open, because, I guess, really, Anett Kontaveit, Ons Jabeur, Shelby Rogers, those are really the biggest names in that quarter.
Conspiracy theorists might say it was opened up for Serena Williams to have herself a good run. My bet there would be in the quarter-- and this is a bit of a long shot-- Ludmila Samsonova, whose hardcore data is very, very solid. So if you're going to take a shot in Q4, she would be the name that I would gravitate towards.
MINTY BETS: All right. All very good stuff. Thank you, guys.
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