2026 US OPEN DAY 4: Jodar Falls To Lucky Loser, Alcaraz Rolls & More

I have my dream job, but even dream jobs have not so dreamy parts. That's where ServiceNow's AI Specialist come in. They don't just tell you what to do about your busy work, they actually do it. That way your team can focus on what matters. To learn how to put AI to work for people, visit ServiceNow.com. Welcome to QuickServe, brought to you by ServiceNow. We are in the Cadillac Studio, which means we're in a Cadillac Escalade IQ. Yeah, doing show. Correct, with an AKG Studio reference audio system with Dolby Hatmos. And what we just discovered, three zones of climate control. I mean, because Sean was just sitting back there DJing and baking. He had no air on. Yeah, then you give him the old, the old triples owner. DJ Catty Sean. DJ likes to sweat too much. He's going to get the next, sweat, sweat. The next, the next jam. Alright, let's run through. Sobel Enka, she made her night a little shorter. I mean, less than an hour. When we said like, beginning of the term, if she looks good in the first two rounds, she kind of resets us right there at the top. She's kind of getting there. Yeah. She looks good. Forehand, to me, is kind of like the litmus test for whether she's finding former dot. Okay. Right. Forehand when she was, you know, Canada, Sensei, spraying a little bit. Didn't look fully committed on it. Forehand's been landing. She's kind of sweeping around the outside of it. The forehand to forehand, she seems to be going to a little bit more. Arena looked amazing. Pagula looked great. Again, Sofia Cannon. I mean, she's doing exactly what she needs to do. Place Leila Fernandez, who won. The next matchup. That'll be interesting. Little lefty. Mojoba has not played. Had not played since Wimbledon. Yep. Had a small surgery after Wimbledon and looks fantastic. Only a drop, four games. Yeah. She looks really good. She's so much fun to watch. She hit a silly passing shot off her shoecobs. Like, actually, was able to create time. It was great. It was so good. It was like, right when they panned over to her. It was fantastic. Yeah. Costiac just continuing to win Grand Slams. Either Yovic. Roll him. See that Yovic, y'all, let's see. Third round. She was fired up, too. Like, she looked even at the end of the match. She looked very intense. Like, she looks very, very fun. She's, she's a grown-up. Yeah, she's very fun. I know she's young, but she acts like a grown-up on the court. Yeah. She's really good. Gets inside the court. She looks great. Happy to see Emma Navarro get through. It was a long match, too. Yeah. And it's, it hasn't been an easy year for her to see kind of that smile at the end. And she's, she's been doing work, too. She's been one of the rain holdovers, long matches, bossan today. Really good work. For her. Oh. The next one. Hmm. I mean, I don't know how your brackets are, but I took Taylor Talon's third round. It did, did you? You did. Yeah. You did. I know, maybe I did. Idiot. Idiot. I don't know. I don't remember, but I do know that she is our service now stat of the day. Oh. Are you ready for this? Why? 100%. That's the number that was Taylor Talon's win percentage on first serve for this match. She was a point on her first serve. 100%. 23 for 23. I don't think I ever did that. Really? No, no chance. I'm not losing a single point on your first serve. No. What about Taylor Talon's? I mean, bro, she was dialed in. And honestly, her fits pretty sick. Yeah. She was doing something really good. I just saw, like, there's some tassels. It was HPCU day to day. Yeah. And so she was talking about her sister went to a couple of schools. Oh, cool. She's had some inspiration, but her outfit was her outfit. She was in the context of that. Yeah. And I saw her on TV, but I couldn't hear it. When you're walking by. Like, what is this? She's amazing. I don't know. I follow her on Instagram and she's always posting all these fashion things. I'm like, she definitely has a long career after she steps off the court. 100 and almost whatever she wants. 100%. Yeah. She could have a job. I mean, I think she's done some stuff already. Yeah. I think there's a seat being kept warm for her on a broadcast set, for sure. 100%. But she's doing work. Not ready for that yet. Paul Badoso gets through. Paul Badoso plays Coco next. Badoso has a five and three career record against Coco. Now, I know she's been her and I know it's not the same as, you know, Badoso was two in the world at one point. But matchups matter. Like sometimes if she's going to be feeling a ton of pressure, obviously Ash is a little bit different. But matchups been good for Badoso. And then as I guarantee you that has Coco's attention, Spitalina gets through in a tough three-setter. Schneider gets through. We talked about Leyla playing Pagula. Kirsteia can't quit. She can't retire. She can't do it. She has her best year of her career. She can't do it. Can't just walk away from that. Like, great. You wouldn't. No. You wouldn't walk away. No, I've never done anything. You did your best production or Sean did his best DJing that he's ever done. He wouldn't just walk away. No. He's like, I just discovered my best transmographer. He might after this set up. That's exactly what I'm saying. You're just going to walk away. You might hang him up. You're just going to go Sampress O2 open and just be like, thank you. Thank you. I've done enough. Thank you for your attention. But while you're ahead. Yeah. No scoop out gets through. Do we have sleeper picks? Are we doing any updates on that? We can. We can. We can. But I didn't know if you wanted to get through some of the other scores. Well, I can, but I just have one that I'm kind of circular. Are we doing it? Are we doing an update on sleeper picks? I'm just predicting the next one. So we did in the draw show. We did our sleeper picks brought to you by our friends. It ate sleep. By the way, I don't know how you guys are sleeping without it. It's fun. It's fun. I can't wait to get up. Oh my gosh. What was your score? We all stayed up late to watch the bear. I didn't know if you were up or not. Yeah. But how is your sleep score been with like this? I had 94. I had an 88. And last night was somewhere. I had a guy to get. I put in a good effort. Well, it just cools the right time. Oh, it's so good. You know, it's going to show up at the right time. Like our sleeper pick, hopefully. Yeah. Yeah. But so in the draw show, we picked our sleeper picks. Here's, here's some of the names we threw out. And let's, let's see if we all see a problem here. I don't think this is going to be good. I don't know what happened. I mean, one two, what happened? He said, and I read, like, I don't often go back and read all the transcripts. Yeah. I had to read that one because like, was he hurt? They asked him 17 times if something was wrong. They asked him the same question a bunch of different ways. And if he was hurt, I respect him for not saying it. Yeah. He said he wasn't. I don't know. Just lost a match I guess. Yeah, my boo. Yeah. Boo. Boo, boo. Which by the way, I heard a thing. Boo is, uh, his grandfather played in the US Open 68 years ago. Really? Yeah. His grandfather's last US Open win was in 1958. What? Yeah. It's Casio Buse. Or no, do you lose the Buse or boo? So which-- Oh, so I lost a boo. I said that wrong. Oh, you were a boo saying? I was boo saying. Instead of boo. You were boo saying the wrong thing. It's been a long day, okay? All right. Well, listen. First lucky loser to beat a top 15 seed in US Open history. I knew I had a boo with one. Yeah. You got a boo. You got a boo. Would you say you blew the boo? I blew the boo. All right. Let's move on. All right. Nakashima was another sleeper pick. Gosh. Out. I'll tell you, Mikkelson-- Mikkelson played great. And we talk about the guys that are coming in and the five seed in the top 16 for Americans. I'm just 1996. T.P. Can't ignore Tommy Paul, who also advanced. Mikkelson is the guy that's kind of been there. He kind of always been ranked higher than Nakashima until this year. We talked about it all last night's show that that's always kind of when you know someone better, when you see their game a lot. He's probably not as affected by the results that Nakashima's had. Nakashima played fine. Mikkelson just came out and beat him. It was the perfect great forehand win after it. Sometimes he can miss on that side. The backhand's rock solid came forward a ton. I mean, he just beat Nakashima, a very informed player, start to finish. Extremely focused, extremely clear. It was about the best match I've seen Mikkelson play. Like start to finish. And he's-- he looked great. And he has a real opportunity in that pocket of the draw. It's Etchivarian and all those guys. But he has a real shot to make the quarterfinals here. Well, I think one of the other names we threw out there was Michael Shang. He's still alive. Yeah. He's still up. He played the-- he won his first round the day on day 17 tournament. We're three years into this tournament. And Michael Shang won. Yeah. That's fantastic. It's been 100 years. He beat Merozion if I'm not mistaken. He is. Good way. He's winning matches in every slam. Like he's going to be-- like he's just going to be a really good pro. Yeah. These guys that come out of college are ready to play. Like totally ready to play. Do we have any other sleeper picks that we messed up? No. I think-- I mean, Tia Froden was won on one side in-- Yeah. And Sarah Bygelick. Hi, Sarah Bygelick. Hey. My jacket. My jacket. My jacket. Sorry, but-- He lit her name. He lit her. He lit her. He lit her. They're both out. But that was on the women's side. So women's side, we get a fresh pick. I think we're going to keep riding with Michael Shang for our sleeper pick. No, why you wouldn't? I mean, we put Tia Froden on there, because she was playing Robocona. We didn't know whether Robocona was-- So we might as well continue to try and go booze this Minero. See if Robocona is still healthy. Let's go. And she can keep throwing it in our face. Yeah. I mean, I don't-- I said it last night. I don't think she plays this tournament. She's ranked 8th in the world. I think she's playing for the number one ranking. Yeah, even saying like, I'm trying to use different footwork on my forehand side, something she said. That's not something you do with the US Open. I mean, it was amazing that she got through the first mobile. We'll see what the future brings. Thanks for listening to "Served," we will be right back. As tennis fans, we hear so much about the toll the slams take on players. But we rarely dig in on the core thing that keeps players rested. Sleep and recovery. 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Slams are different, the extended format is different, right? Like it's not as if you just walk into slams, and you just rinse repeat what you do in Washington. Like it's just, it's just not the same. He's a boss wins again. He doesn't, he didn't play well at the US Open when he was three in the world. First time since 2024 that Sitsabas has been in the third round of a slam, which is Rollin Garros. First time since 2021 at the US Open, maybe the third round. I mean, he had a lot of disappointment at the US Open, but created some space in the draw with Art DeFees and got through, again the night Le Hedge got through. Zach Chivita just wins, matches at Grand Slam, it's been the second week in French Open and Wimbledon wins again today. We covered Zhang, Bublik winning, just took the summer off and shows up the US Open and wins one, three, one or whatever it was tonight, placed Tommy Paul next, rematch their five center last year, which Bublik got through. Marita beats Rubelev, and as I was going through, because there's a million things going on during this week, fan week, to the RODXO and did a whole bunch of stuff. We did our four hour-ish media day live show, there was a lot going on. When I re-looked at the draw after we had made our picks, I was like, "Marita, I should have chosen." Yeah. He just informed. He hadn't won a hard court tour match until Canada, made a run there, it's been winning matches. Rubelev today, upset special, demon rolls. Navone. Who had Navone over? Novak and Baratini. Oh my gosh. You know what I want? You know what I want to get depth to the exterior courts. Yeah. Shouting into stadium that all the pundits. One of the things that, like, one life-changing result, and I know it's to that lightly, points, money, Novak, Baratini, all of it. You can't control when you get an opportunity, you can't control completely when you're playing well during the course of the year. What you can't control is your fitness. Navone didn't even look like he was breathing four and a half hours in against Novak and to come back again against Baratini. That's when, like, if you stay fit, you stay ready, that guy's fast, like he can move his ass off, props, well done, really easy to, like, feel a sense of relief, kind of have that bit of a hangover after beating Novak Djokubits. You got to beat Baratini on a fast court. You know what he is? Yeah. We were talking about him. We were watching him. And I was like, you know what he reminds me of that guy that shows up to the Rec League basketball game. You know, like, who the hell is this guy? You know, he's probably going to be, like, average. He jumps 38 on you. He's just running you up and down the court, just lay ups and dropping threes from like, and you're like, who the hell is this guy? You know what he reminds me of? I've seen in Super Bowl where Bill Hader's chasing Michael Sarah and he stresses kill life. That's him. Yeah. That's him. That's him. That's him. That's him. Shapo gets through, plays Ben Sheldon next. That's an interesting one. Lefty on lefty crime. We'll see how that goes. Ben got through against Harcox. That was a tricky draw, Greeks pouring into Harcox, not easy at this tournament, probably the toughest first two round draw in the tournament. Ben got through. Let the seconds ago that third and the fourth sets for Ben, he played fantastic. He served great. Was extending the rallies when he needed to, was knocking the slice down to Harcox, kind of making him either play back in line or switch the pattern into his forehand. He got a hold of a forehand and he made a count, was able to block enough returns back. The last two sets for Ben, for me, was like the arrival into this tournament, like in a big way. I thought he played fantastic. Carlos off to a slow start against Jaim, don't call me Jaime Faria. Was just a little off in the first set with smothering some forehands, kind of brought it down a gear, went heavy to the corners, plenty of space, wasn't trying to knock his head off, really, really great adjustment from Carlos. Found a nice groove on his serve, was under 50% in the first set, and then in the match round, 62, 63%. Last set was his best serving set, I think he's the favorite at this point. He got a little bit of a stress test, two hours and 40 on court today, had to come back from a set down. I thought that was probably good for him. The range finding early was a little bit off, like he was going big, missing props to Faria, plays this weird kind of inside out game, where if you play slowly through the middle, he'll play slowly with you, and then if you go big to the sidelines, he goes big line. It's a weird kind of, it's not natural, and you could see Carlos early a bunch of that footwork. If you normally have Carlos bruises someone, forehand to forehand, they're coming cross court, right? They're trying to find it to me to the court. Faria was able to kind of redirect line with pace when it was strange, and it took Carlos a second because-- It's like a rhythm thing, right? He hasn't played a lot, obviously. Faria keeps him off a rhythm to start. I think it's that, but I think it's just, the Faria's game is a little awkward. He can serve one-- he served one 41 a couple times, dropping some hits. He had the highest second serve pace average through round one. He can go big, but he misses a lot of second serves, but I thought it was a good stress test for Carlos. Listen, it was a lot of unknowns. Last week, we know a lot more, right? He doesn't seem to be hampered by the wrist. I don't even think he's looked at it in two rounds, right? The serve was a little off first round. He found a nice rhythm tonight, but all of the forehands, he showed, you know, heavy one, spin, flat, inside out, inside in, was coming in, you know, slice back hands tonight. I mean, I think he's healthy. I think he's fit. Range was a little off early, but then he found it late. It had to problem-solve a little bit. I thought this was a good match for Carlos. Two rounds in, I mean, you talk about kind of people being able to reset quickly, instead of it with Saba-Lenka, if she plays well, well, if Carlos plays well, I think he just slots right in. Yeah, I mean, it's like, listen, he loses four, six, and the first, and then he goes six, six, six, three, six, two, and then just quick, quick, quick. Yeah, he turned that right around, which was a good sign for him. We got anything else? I want to get your take on Zverev last night. Yeah. You know, I mean, obviously, we didn't anticipate staying away until two, three in the morning. You know, what did you see from that? He said in the post-match on the court, he was like, I'm kind of glad I had this match. Like, I wanted to get tested. I wanted to check it off. Yeah. What do you make of that? Yeah. Yeah, that's what we tell ourselves when we play a five-setter. I think he was a bit scratchy, you know, a couple doubles at not opportune times, but you know you're really good when you play. I mean, Sanago was like seeing the ball like a grapefruit for a little while. Yeah. He was going to take boxing, he was into it the whole way. You know, the difference is, you know, Zverev, you don't want to see your grandson champion now. The ability to take someone's best shot and just get through it, right? Someone sticks you on the chin a couple times and you kind of shake it off and you win on the cards. Like, that's why he is who he is. I mean, that's why he's been one of the top players in the world for 10 years now. Now do I believe that he wants to go five sets? No. - To two o'clock in the morning. - No, I don't think that's great. But I do think there's value in being tested. You know, I remember the open in '04, I was cruising and then all of a sudden, I played Yo Kim Yo-Hunts and I ended up losing that match. I hadn't even been in a tight situation to that point. So I do think there's value. I think the sentiment of what he's saying is sometimes accurate and if you gave him the choice, he'd be like, yeah, I'll take three straight tomorrow. That's enough of that. - No, do that. He plays Quentin Halleese tomorrow night. You gotta think, he's the heavy favorite. You know, in that match and to get a lot further. But, you know, we'll see. We'll see if he improves a little bit. - I had so many, I had so many Daniel Russo means ready to go. If Sonny goes in full office. - No one's ever seen Sonny going off Macho in the same room. (laughing) The crane kick was coming for Johnny so fast. I think the last thing I want to ask you about, what are the storylines around one off the court, around the court has been this influencers, with these ring lights. - Can I say one thing before we get to this? - Yeah. - 'Cause I wanna address this. If your son goes agent, whenever he wins a match, do you instruct him to go, you know what I'm gonna say, right? Go into the center of the court, and do the herd ankle. (screaming) - The crane kick. - I mean, he has to. - Yeah. - Taking out Kobra Kai. - Yeah. - I think he has to. - That's what the influencers are there for. If he crankicked, if he cranked has a post-match celebration. - I mean, he has to start doing it. - He has to. - I'm sorry for this. - I'm sorry, do you like money? (laughing) Obviously you should do that. All right, go influencer nation, what's your take? - So obviously there's been a lot of people giving their takes on the internet, and people been talking about all of these influencers, but I think ultimately it's people coming and wanting their photos, and they look great, they're dressing great, they pay a lot of money and they go in these seats, it's a scene. Like the US Open is a scene, and that is by design, right? You raise awareness of the sports, the goal, and ultimately the problem is that people are bringing in these ring lights around their cameras, and they're taking these photos, and it's distracting, and ultimately it's like just being ring lights. So, these people are, they're just taking photos. - Yeah, I mean, okay, so here's where I fall on it. - Okay. - One, catching an influence on the wild is an incredibly awkward. - It's amazing. - It's amazing. - Like when you see someone just hamming out? - Props. - Yeah, I know, I, you know what we should do. - What? - Can we, if you and Sean have time tomorrow, can you guys do your best influencing? - Oh my God. - For a bit, can you guys do it? Take a shot and you got it, buddy. Can you just film it? - No. - We're influencing right now. - Can you influence? - We're basically, we can do it. - We have our ring lights in the States. - Stop, you know what I'm talking about. - I do, damn it. - Yeah, like I want it. - Maybe we will. - What are we influencing? - I don't know. - I don't know what you, transmodifers. - But, many, many was asked about it. Many was asked about it. And, and he had an extremely rational type. - It's true, many, in true many fashion, he goes, super easy. - Oh, is that, Betty? You don't have to do that. You just read it. - The more we try to raise awareness about tennis, the better it is, the more popular the sport is. For sure, there is some downside. Maybe more people are gonna recognize you on the street and it'll be tougher to go to a restaurant. But in general, the more the sport grows, the better. I trust the UT. USDA, and what they're doing, and then he goes on to say, I think there's a lot more upside than downside, so let's go for it. - Yeah, so, find a cheaper way to mass market. - That's a great point. - With free tickets, and they'll probably do it. - Until that day, now, that's one thing. Like, you don't have to like it. It's so weird. Influencers in the wild is the craziest thing. They're all over the place. I've seen it, like, I'm watching it. It's like a full ham, you know, full photo shoot, like, it's awkward. - Yeah. - Awkward. Now, but, but, there's a reason that it exists. It's not 'cause people aren't watching it, or clicking on it, or choosing to engage in it. Now, stop the fucking ring lights. - Just stop the ring lights. - Stop the fucking ring lights. True story, so the ESPN terrace, right? Up top, yesterday we had to go do all of the show from there 'cause the fountain set, there was a lightning warning, so we're outside. So we did our entire show, no desk, Malika Andrews is a genius. Just doing, working off of a piece of paper, running traffic, like. - Of course she is. - And the, you know, sound system is 10 feet above our heads. And she just, she is a professional. - Yeah. - I looked at her afterwards. I said, you were a fucking professional. - Yeah. - I mean, we couldn't hear a thing. But, we also can't turn on the lights to our set in certain times in the match. - Because it's a strike. - Yes. - Yeah. - So don't use your ring light. If ESPN can't use a fucking ring light on the terrace desk, you can't use a ring light either. - It should have like a ring light. - That's it. - Lock box outside. - Just stop doing it. But you know what's gonna happen now? - What? - Is because there's been so much attention and they've named certain influencers who have used it. - Yeah. - You know what's gonna happen? People are gonna use ring lights and be the heel for more clicks. That's what's gonna happen. Now, how about this? As an influencer, you're probably the guest of some company, as some company you've purchased a box or seats from the tournament. You use your ring light. You get caught. Fucking McGoo, you're out. Blacklisted. - Blacklisted. - I mean, it's-- - See ya. Bye. - It's just-- - All wins. We still get the influencers. Just put your lights away. You dorks. (laughing) (laughing) - I think it's just like there's a time and a place, right? Anything in life, there's a time and a place in that time and place. - I'm sorry, it's not something to be serving. The dorks thing isn't like for influencers specifically. Like it's, turn your flash off, you dork. We used to have the same thing for flash photography. You used to have to make announcements and flash photography. This is the new thing. - It is funny. They used to be like, "Hey Boomer, "your flashlight's on on your phone." - Ooh. - What if you started-- - What if you started calling-- - Call it boomers? - What if you started calling on these trendy influencers boomers and just ruined it a lot? - Turn up boomer. - Turn up your ring light. - Great, great stuff. Well, I guess is that all we got? - Yeah, this has been day four. It was like day 12. - I'm gonna get cooked by all the influencers now. - Yeah. - Here we are. - Yeah. - I think honestly, our badges do say content creators on them. - Yours? - Yeah. - When you got a badge this year? - Yeah, I'm definitely not a radio person anymore. - Oh. - Yeah, I got a face roll. Now I'm torn. - You did get a-- I mean-- - We're content creators. - We're in a tough spot. We're in a tough spot. You're in a tough spot. - I won't bring my ring light. - My badge says something different on it. - It is. - But you, yeah. - But you guys are content creators. So, so here we are. We'd like if they Cadillac, the official vehicle of the US Open. This is QuickServe brought to you by ServiceNow. Turn off your ring lights. - I have my dream job. But even dream jobs have not so dreamy parts. They don't just tell you what to do about your busy work. They actually do it. - Imagine setting your makeup. Then forgetting it's even theirs. 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