PPA Kansas City Open and APP Philadelphia Open – Live Random Thoughts

📸 @ppatour

All eyes will be on Ben Johns and Anna Leigh after their miss of TOC and surprise Singles performance at Takeya Showcase. Extra eye-balls will also be on the brackets to see if we get some very interesting re-matches or old partner face-offs.

12:10 PM EST (NML): The singles brackets are under way but the big news of the day, is that it appears that gambling has officially made it’s way to the PPA, and professional pickleball. Regardless of how you feel about gambling, this is certainly a big milestone for sport and big for the PPA to the first ones to do it.

https://geniussports.com/newsroom/ppa-tour-becomes-first-professional-pickleball-organization-on-sports-betting-market/


Championship Sunday, August 27th

In a somewhat unexpected result, WD Bronze goes to Jade K./Koop over Jackie K./Tereschenko (3,9)
Order of Gold matches hasn’t been announced but presumably starts with mixed and ends with singles like most of the time.

12:00 pm EST (Waggish) – MXD: Johns/Waters vs Newman/Irvine. Game 1. See 2-0 where Ben strings Riley along at baseline just where he wants him to get the empty corner for his winning shot. Johns/Waters driving the balls and finding it easy to read the weak returns for put-aways. Game 2, Every single ball seems to be a pop-up. I feel like I’m watching a 3.0 team. Is this what 2024 will be like? Game 3. Pace has slowed down and we see some actual dinking. We now get to see AL stringing Riley along at net, moving him further and further from the sideline then making a passing shot. (1,1,2)

1:40 pm EST (Waggish) – MD: Johns/Wright vs Frazier/Johnson. Slow start in game 1 for JW/Dylan but they eventually accumulate points to make it to 8. Game 2 starts the same way for them but gets tied at 8. JW made simple UE near the end that almost cost them the game. But they get a sloppy win 11-9. Unfortunately, JW/Dylan didn’t clean up their errors and didn’t bring the aggression or enough speed-ups for a match win. (8,9-,7,3)

3:05 pm EST (Waggish) – WD: Waters/Parenteau vs Bright/Dizon. There’s something about AL playing with CP that I like better – seems like they make smarter decisions. We are seeing a terrific fight from Bright/Dizon showing their head is in this match. Waters team look worried in their huddle at the end of game 2. The huddle must have worked because they get the strong lead and hold it in games 3 and 4. In #3 and #4 games, they did a lot of drives and speed-ups. (7,7-,3,4)

3:55 pm EST (Waggish) – MS: Johns vs McGuffin. Johns is demolishing McGuffin with his angles. Tyson picked up some energy from the crowd and looked more alive in game 2. See 8-10 that leads to 9-10! Johns wins but that was impressive performance at the end by McGuffin. (2,9)

4:45 pm EST (Waggish) – WS: Waters vs Parenteau. Game 2 could have gone either way with good play from the ladies and tie at 9. In this case, it went to Waters. (6,9)

6:30 pm EST (Waggish) – APP results:
MS: Yates Johnson over Jack Foster went to a tiebreaker with Yates win: (9,2-,4-) then 15-7.
MD: Daescu/Nunnery over Klinger/Mick (5,8)
MXD: Daescu/Barr over Glozman/Nunnery (7,5)
WD: Jardim/Todd over Humberg/Harris (4,6)
WS: Devidze over Christa Gecheva (4,7)

BONUS! I put my medal counts on airtable. Hopefully this link works:
https://airtable.com/app096qW2YNjMMPRI/shrgmH4GXZCQiaxUM
AL is at the top of the list with 36 PPA 2023 medals. The airtable has the source of the medals too, not just the count.


Saturday, August 26th – Doubles

1:40 pm EST (Waggish) – Signings are being announced by PPA Vibe and MLP. That could effect who PPA decides to show on the live stream. GS stream on YT seems to have gone down. The YT chat is again turned off today.

No real upsets in round 1. Minor might be the Hewett/Goldberg loss in first round to Caden Nemoff/Ivan Jakovljevic (3,1). Vich and Stone beat Kyle Yates and Phillip Locklear (8,1-,10). Tardio/Garnett had a fight on their hands in game 2 against Merchant/Weinbach (7,14). Well-done by the seniors to give the young ones such a battle. Tardio/Garnett play Ignatowich/McGuffin next but it won’t be streamed. It would have been very fun to watch.

Round 2 early result. Correction on bracket: Devilliers/Bar were defeated by Wilson/Patrick Smith (6,9). Winners play JW/Dylan in the QF. Staksrud/Tellez defeats Auvergne/Long by a landslide (2,1).

2:55 pm EST (Waggish) – Rain delay and from the clouds could have more delays later. DLR/Newell vs Wright/Johns. Newell/DLR win 11-5 when DLR does a between the legs shot at NVZ! But as usual, Ben needed the warm-up game and they get the expected win. (5-,3,3).
Young/Loong vs Rettenmaier/Koller. Close games 2 and 3. Young/Loong looked solid together. Rettenmaier seemed to keep having to lift Koller’s spirits. They celebrated with a chest bump on a fairly minor shot by Koller. Young/Loong win (5,10-,8)
Ignatowich/McGuffin win against Tardio/Garnett (8,2).

3:35 pm EST (Waggish) – Newman/Arnold over Vich/W.Stone in a tight 2nd game (8,10).
QF #1: Johnson/Frazier vs Wilson/Smith. JW/Dylan can make it look so easy at times. They kept Wilson/Smith to 2 in game 1. Game 2 was 4. Everyone was smiling and enjoying it. So much better energy to watch than grumpy players.

4:30 pm EST (Waggish) – QF #2: Newman/Arnold vs Ignatowich/McGuffin. James’ hands better than Riley’s in their fire-fights and his team wins game 1 11-6. Game 2: Ignatowich team have 8 before Newman team gets 1. They are trying Arnold on left. Never say die and Newman team get to 9 but can’t force the game 3. (6,9)
QF #3: Wright/Johns defeat Young/Loong (3,3).
In a round 2 match, Patriquin/Dawson pushed Alshon/Navratil to the brink but were unable to win. (6,10-,8). In the non-streamed QF #4, Alshon team played Staksrud/Tellez in highly contested games 1 and 2 then have a comfortable game 3. (10,10-,5)

WD has some upsets: Rohrabacher/Valdes defeat Jansen/Irvine (6,9). Oshiro/Rane defeat Smith/Kovalova (4,7). Kawamoto/Koop defeat Stratman/Mary B. (5,8). Johnson/David vs Schneemann/Black goes to a tight game 3. Match win for Black team. (8,7-,10).

5:45 pm EST (Waggish) – Ignatowich/McGuffin vs Frazier/Johnson. Wow! A pickle in SF #1. Game 1 started like it’d be a good competition. But JW/Dylan settled into their rhythm and controlled all the way to the finish. (5,0) McGuffin made a lot of dink errors in game 2.
WD: Both Kawamotos make it to a SF. QF #1 Jackie K. and Irina beat Oshiro/Rane (3,5). QF #2 Jade K. and Koop defeat Rohrabacher/Valdes (8-,5,2). AL/CP have an easy QF against Newell/Buckner (1,3). QF #4 Bright/Dizon struggled against Schneemann/Black in game 2 but otherwise had a smooth run in games 1 and 3. (2,10-,2)

6:20 pm EST (Waggish) – Wright/Johns vs Alshon/Navratil SF #2. Game 1. See rally at 4-8 that leads to 5-8-2! Zane played well enough to get them close to a win. Game 2. Tied at 5 where unfortunately Navratil team gets stuck. Alshon needs better feel/touch on his paddle. Some of his blocks and dinks were gravy for Wright/Johns. (8,5)

6:40 pm EST (Waggish) – APP: MD: As expected, Daescu/Nunnery make it to Sunday. In QF, they defeated Erik Forsythe/Bruno Faletto (9,1). In SF, they defeated C. Klinger/Andre Mick. Klinger/Mick will double dip them on Sunday. The bronze went to Livorne../DeHeart.
APP WD: As expected, Jardim/Todd make it to Sunday. They defeat Ryann Foster/Kelsey Grambeau (2,0). In QF, they defeat Bohnert/Ava Kalist (1,1). They other QF was Mari Humberg/Allison Harris vs Vivian Glozman/Alix Truong who won (9,7). In SF, Jardim team over Glozman team (0,5). These were some big blow-out matches in a thin field. Humberg/Harris get to the bronze match against Glozman/Truong to see who plays on Sunday. Pisnik/Emmrich had a good run in the backdraw until they met up with Humberg/Harris. (7). Ava Ignatowich/Dominique Schaefer withdrew from the match.

8:05 pm EST (Waggish) – WD SF #1: No surprises in this one. CP/AL win over Jade K./Koop (3,3)
WD SF #2: Bright/Dizon vs Jackie K./Tereschenko. Game 1 gets tied at 8. Late in Game 2, it gets tight.
Team Jackie/Irina targeted Dizon. Irina aggressive and poached a lot. Game 3, Irina making too many mistakes to win the critical tie-break which seemed to feed into Jackie making errors. (11-8, 8-11, 11-2). We get to see team AL/PPA versus team AB/Partly MLP (Dizon unknown) on Sunday.
MD Bronze: Ignatowich/McGuffin win over Alshon/Navratil (8,7). I thought the score would be closer based on how well Zane played in the SF and the errors coming from McGuffin in his SF.


Friday, August 25th – Mixed

6:00 am EST (Waggish) – APP: Yates and Simone won’t have an easy first match as they meet Tamaryn Emmrich and Amrik Donkena first thing. Then they are likely to have to battle it out with Daescu and Barr in the QF. If Hunter can play today after some kind of injury to make him retire from Singles on Thursday, he and Parris half don’t have the kind of formidable opponent as Daescu/Barr but a contender is Pisnik and DeHeart.

PPA: Stratman and Tellez have a tough road. They could get Alshon and Black in their first match then Johns/Waters. #4 Bright/Ignatowich could meet #5 Johnsons in QF. #2 Newman/Irvine could face Jackie and Zane in Round 16 then Wilson/David in QF. #3 McGuffin/Parenteau are likely to have Wright/Kovalova in their QF but if Koop is playing well Frazier/Koop may do them a favor and knock them out.

1:05 pm EST (Waggish) – UPSET ALERT: #30 Tardio/Rane defeat #3 Parenteau/McGuffin (6,9)! No word on what happened but McGuffin may have overdone it yesterday in singles. Or maybe he’s distracted as the new face of MLP (if true). Other noteworthy result, #17 Alshon/Black defeated #16 Stratman/Tellez (0,4-,4). They play Johns/Waters next. I had not noticed before but Staksrud isn’t playing Mixed. An interesting tidbit is PPA has turned off chat on YT, possibly to prevent talking about MLP/PPA news or no volunteers to monitor it.

1:40 pm EST (Waggish) – Wow. Another UPSET! #28 Brendon Long/Bobbi Oshiro defeat the #5 Johnsons in close games 2 and 3 (4-,12,10). AB/James got past Jamie Haas and Querrey (6,5). Arnold/Dizon defeat Hewett/Rohrabacher (8,9). Rettenmaier/Jade K. defeat Mary Brascia/Dawson (6,1). Wright/Kovalova took 3 games to defeat Auvergne/Padegimaite (4-,4,7). Frazier/Koop also had to go to 3 to defeat Loong/Rianna Valdes (9-,5,9).

3:55 pm EST (Waggish) – Johns/Waters were pushed in good play from Alshon/Black in game 2. (4,9-,5) Newman/Irvine defeat Jackie K/Navratil (2,4). Arnold/Dizon face the Johns team in QF after they defeated Jones/Devilliers (4,6). #7 David/Wilson vs #10 Jansen/Patriquin each traded a game. Game 3 was close with tie at 5. After the end-change, David/Wilson struggled while Jansen/Patriquin ran off points. A lot of errors from Thomas/Wilson while Patriquin was ready with the aggression and speed-ups. (8-,6,7). #11 Koop/Frazier vs #6 Kovalova/Wright. Frazier was on fire in front of his home state crowd. He was getting to everything with fire power that K/W couldn’t answer (5,5). Tardio/Rane defeat P.Smith/Tereschenko (7,2) to meet Frazier/Koop in QF. It was not a fluke that Long/Oshiro defeated the Johnsons. They also defeated Bar/Smith (9,9) to make it to a QF. That QF seems to be stalled out with no update on the last round 16 match. Maybe all the players are meeting with Pardoe right now (rumored to be on site trying to save PPA players from the snatches of MLP).

4:30 pm EST (Waggish) – Another UPSET. #4 Bright/Ignatowich defeated by #13 Rettenmaier/Jade K. (6-,6,7). Last week, they lost in first round at TOC, which at the time I thought was due to altitude. Today it might have been the heat. Not much of a QF between AL/Ben and Arnold/Dizon (1,2).
APP: Not much progress through the draw. Hunter and Parris withdrew, presumably due to whatever injury Hunter incurred yesterday in singles.

6:10 pm EST (Waggish) – QF #2: #30 Tardio/Rane vs #11 Frazier/Koop. Game 1 Tied at 10. Tardio is impressive with his length and speed, almost a Flash blur. I’m surprised they didn’t win but Frazier always ready to take advantage of their weak shots. Game 2. Tardo/Rane again get the early lead like in game 1. Can they keep it? Watching Tardio swing that paddle around makes me think he’d be awesome with the Oya that has the 7″ paddle; though Tardio was never a tennis player, its marketing demographic. Tardio/Rane take game 2, mainly by controlling the net while one or both opponents never gained the net. Game 3. Tardio/Rane have a reason to look fresh with their momentum win from game 2. They play game 3 like game 2: getting to the net then keeping one or both of their opponents off the line. Koop is wandering around like she’s lost in transition. Dylan should just take over like Tardio has done. At 8-0, Dylan finally taking some control and pushes opponents off the line. A point! 1-8. Foot fault on Gabe’s Erne for match point (10-5). Wow! Frazier/Koop go from 0 at 8 to 9. Koop tries to call the match point ball in when Tardio team called it out. Ref said he couldn’t over rule so we get a video challenge– after everyone taps paddles? Not clear because Fleming was talking when ref was explaining. It is so frustrating when announcers – almost always Fleming – does that. Let us hear the officials talk. Ball out. (10-,5,9)
Bonus draw: Johnsons play and win! Stand-up thing to do in this heat! Tyson/CP, Castillo/Young, Stratman/Tellez all withdrew. Johnsons matches were (5,1,3,3). They played Locklear and Rachel Fisher in the final.
APP: Sobek/Martina Frontova play Tisnik/DeHeart in QF after Tisnik/DeHeart defeated Nunnery/Glozman (7,12). Livorne…/Truong defeated Jardim/Yates J. (8,6). Unknown what Daescu/Barr’s match is doing against Fudge/Lanier – no score updates.

6:45 pm EST (Waggish) – QF #3: #2 Newman/Irvine vs #10 Jansen/Patriquin. Newman/Irvine were in trouble at times in game 1. But game 2 wasn’t even close, both played with an eye/respect for their partner abilities. In other words, Newman didn’t try to do too much and Irvine knew when to switch sides to let Newman go after a ball. (9,2) In the interview, Riley admitted some players are probably distracted by the MLP/PPA news. Good for him to mention the elephant in the room.

7:25 pm EST (Waggish) – QF #4: #28 Long/Oshiro vs #13 Rettenmaier/Jade K. Announcers lost interest and talked about minor league sports – football I think. That was funny. Travis’s time off treated him well. He moved better than I’ve seen in a long time. They had some fights in game 1 but an easy time in game 2. Long/Oshiro fought off multiple match points. Jade’s style is completely different than his old partner Lea and I assume it suits him as he made the SF against Ben/AL. (6,3)

8:35 pm EST (Waggish) – SF #1: #2 Newman/Irvine vs #30 Tardio/Rane. Newman went after Tardio enough to neutralize him and keep him out of the mix. Quick game 1. Game 2: Rane doing some heavy lifting in game 2. At 4-2-2, Tardio thought the point was over and turned towards baseline but Rane kept it going. Good fire-fight at 5-2-2 that led to 6-2-2. See Tardio at 6-7-1. Uh, oh, Riley does an antic at 6-7-2 but ball wasn’t dead so he doesn’t get the point. They lose serve. Game 2 goes into overtime at 11-11! Wow! Wow! See 11-11-1 when Jessie serves. Even Hannah looks glued to the action! Nice to see players on the same page instead of guessing or reading a completely different book. If Riley doesn’t immediately ask Tardio to be his partner, he is out of his mind! Great game 2. The length of Tardio and Riley and their athleticism was fire to watch. But the women also held their own and stepped up when needed. Newman/Irvine win. Sadly no game 3 but it might have been anti-climatic after that match! (4,13) Don’t drink coffee – just watch game 2 to get your blood pumping tomorrow. In interview, Riley said he had to be careful what he said about ref’s fault call on his antic so he wouldn’t be fined. First I’ve heard that you can get fined by PPA for stating your opinion about ref’s call!

9:20 pm EST (Waggish) – SF #2: #1 Johns/Waters vs #13 Rettenmaier/Jade K. Rettenmaier starting out aggressive trying to cover that middle. Fun to see him so fired up, ready to ball. Unfortunately for him, Ben is still Ben and ready to get to Sunday. Good point at 3-5 to get to 4-5-1. #1 wins but better showing in the SF than QF from their opponents. (6,4)

9:00 pm EST (Waggish) – MXD Bronze: Rettenmaier/Jade K. over Tardio/Rane with a close games 2 and 3. (2,11-,9)
APP: Frontova/Sobek made it to SF after defeating Pisnik/DeHeart (5,9). In SF, they were defeated by Daescu/Barr (9-,10,5). Unknwn who they’ll play in Gold as backdraw still in progress though very late in Philedelphia.
Glozman/Nunnery fight their way in the backdraw and fight Harris/Mick for who gets to play for bronze or chance at Gold. Nunnery team wins (14) and now play Frantova/Sobek for a chance to go for Gold against Daescu/Barr.


Thursday, August 24th – Singles

1:15 pm EST (Waggish)UPSET ALERT! JW loses in his first round to #28 Matthew Barlow (6-,6,10). Rafa beat Tyler in 2 then lost to Staksrud in 2. Staksrud faces either Frazier or Rettenmaier in QF. Frazier had a rough 3 game first round against Eveloff (2,11-,5) I think because the score is messed up on brackets site. Tyson cruised into QF where he’ll face Garnett. Garnett beat Tellez (7,9) in his round 2. Another UPSET: Devilliers loses to #29 Aanik Lohani in 3: Very long first game. (13-,7,7). Lohani plays Patriquin next in round 2.

1:40 pm EST (Waggish) – Vich vs Alshon: At 4-6 in 2nd game, Alshon loses his cool and swats the ball back towards the fence. It looks like the ref gives him a warning – unknown if it is TW but presumably verbal as she didn’t make a formal announcement at net. Vich into QF against Johns or Duong. After Barlow’s defeat of JW, Arnold had no problem with his win (6,0) to make it into QF.

2:40 pm EST (Waggish) – Johns vs Duong: Terrific fight from Duong despite his low score. Johns just had to play out the point with patience to win. (4,4)
Staksrud vs Fazier: Very long and close game 1 after a slow start from Staksrud. Dylan expending a ton of energy running after balls, even some out of bounds. Dylan has a long conversation with the ref at 9-6 but can’t tell what it’s about. Ref talks to Staksrud afterwards. Staksrud wins (9,7).
Bonus Draw: Most of the pros withdrew: Jay, AJ, Tyler, JW. Presumably Newell and Tardio going through at least 1 match.

2:50 pm EST (Waggish) – McGuffin v Garnett: Close game 1 and much quicker than what we saw in Staksrud match. Garnett, like Dylan, expended tons of energy in game 1 and had nothing for game 2. (9,2) McGuffin meets Staksrud in SF. McGuffin and Staksrud both used the angles to force as much effort as possible out of their opponents.
WS: Castillo defeats Schneemann (8,2) for the presumed QF with CP. Jorja over Yana (7,4) for a QF against Mary Brascia.

5:05 pm EST (Waggish) – WS: Chao Yi Wang must have gotten injured/sick. Brackets show a withdrawal in match against Irina in first game at 2 points. Stratman defeats Irina (9,1) in QF. Parenteau had some lopsided games against Castillo (0,8-,2) in their QF. Jorja defeats Brascia with a close second game (7,8). Jorja to play CP in SF.
MS: Ben looked very strong against Vich – not even in the same league (4,4). Arnold defeats Patriquin in their QF (4-,7,5) to face Johns in SF.

5:55 pm EST (Waggish) – AL vs Lina Padegimaite SF: AL was looking rusty against Lina. She drops game 1, goes big in game 2, then has a lead that looks weak at beginning of game 3. She gets it done though. (8-,3,3) She plays Stratman in SF after her win over Irina (9,1). Is PPA letting players take unlimited time-outs due to the heat? Seems like there’s a time-out every 3 minutes — certainly seems like more than 4 time-outs per game by a good margin in some games like this one.

6:45 pm EST (Waggish) – Staksrud vs Tyson SF. Staksrud gets to game point, Tyson takes a time-out. Uh-oh. You know what can happen then. Tyson get 3 points while Staksrud remains stuck. Staksrud now calls the time-out. But more points keep coming Tyson’s way. Goes from 3 to tie at 10 then wins game 1! Incredible that Tyson can keep doing this in tournament after tournament. Staksrud making good angles on defense but he can’t get any points on his serve. Lots of side-outs with score stuck at 5-10. Finally Tyson gets that last point to reach a Sunday outing. (10,5)

7:40 pm EST (Waggish) – CP vs Jorja SF. Line call challenge game 1 at 9-1. Fleming “I have no idea what they are looking at. That is a blatant miss. I’d tell you if it was close.” Score changed to 1-8 for CP. What an egregious review act. Are the cameras used on the review really that bad or the stream is showing lines weirdly? CP then gets to 4 before time-out from Jorja. CP is fired up and keeps accumulating points. Tied at 8! Darn! Jorja looks like she’s given up when she had been dominating with energy and confidence. Sad to see. CP wins. Game 2. Jorja looks like she’s checked out. But after a time-out she puts up more of a fight to give CP a scare that she’ll catch up to her 9. And eventually Jorja does catch up – tie at 10! What looked like might be the upset of the decade turns out to be just another win for CP. (8,11) Jorja’s play was 100% impressive when she was playing in the present.

9:40 pm EST (Waggish) – Singles for Sunday: Johns to play McGuffin for Gold, surprisingly for the first time in 2023. Waters to play Parenteau for Gold for the first time since Orange County Cup in San Clemente. Waters SF defeated Stratman (5,3) Johns SF defeated Arnold (7,5).
Bonus Draw: Christopher Haworth over Roscoe Bellamy (6).

APP: Salome had an easy path to try for Gold. Shelby Bates withdrew from QF. In SF, Simone came back from behind to win the first game against Salome then retired. Salome plays Christa Gecheva for Gold. Simone got bronze as she would have played Gecheva for it but withdrew and got it anyway.
Hunter retired at 1 point in game 1 of his first match which presumably means he had an injury. Rising star Sobek was defeated by Spencer Lanier, tough third game 13-11. Yates Johnson did well with several blow-out games. He’ll play for Gold. Opponent TBD.

10:10 pm EST (Waggish) – Bronze Winners: Staksrud over Arnold (9-,3,3). Jorja over Lauren Stratman (1,8)

11:45 pm EST (NML) – On the PPA side it was a fairly chalk day for the most part, besides JW Johnson and Jay Devilliers both losing in the first round. Tyson following up his triple crown at TOC with another Championship Sunday performance on this brutally hot day, was extremely impressive. It seems like the guy has found the fountain of youth. He will have to play his old nemesis Ben Johns on Sunday though. On the women’s side Catherine Parenteau and Anna Leigh Waters both took care of business, it will be interesting to see if Catherine can push or beat Anna Leigh on Sunday. Jorja picked up a bronze, and it was her best singles results in some time, but it should also be noted that Lauren Stratman, continues to get much improved singles results on a regular basis now. Lauren has quietly really improved her game this year, in both singles and doubles.

On the APP side, it was a bit of an odd day on the men’s side with Hunter Johnson withdrawing and a number of upsets, but Yates Johnson made it through the winner’s bracket, while Jack Foster went on an epic run through the backdraw after losing his first match of the day to make it all the way back to the gold medal match. Backdraw runs like that one, remain fun. Jose Dominguez Alonso, who picked up the bronze is a name we will have to keep an eye on. The women’s side was not particularly interesting with Simone and Shelby Bates both withdrawing.

The most interesting thing today in pickleball seemed to be happening off the court though. Major League Pickleball announced they are signing top players, to multi-year contracts and the PPA is set to make a major announcement tomorrow, apparently about bringing back the Vibe league. It seems like just when maybe things were copacetic that the tour wars are back on in a major way. This is going to be a very interesting space to watch in the coming days as what comes could shape the future of pro pickleball not just for 2024, but for the long-term future. Tell us if you have heard that one before?

13 thoughts on “PPA Kansas City Open and APP Philadelphia Open – Live Random Thoughts

  • August 24, 2023 at 5:38 pm
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    Jorja Johnson was robbed! Shame on you PPA!

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    • August 24, 2023 at 6:46 pm
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      Az: I agree but still up to Jorja to mentally overcome and stay in the present. It’s why the veteran players can make awesome comebacks after they have a setback.

      Reply
    • August 24, 2023 at 6:45 pm
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      Jim: I don’t follow APP but added some comments above. NML (Slim as Gritty is on vacation) will add his notes over the days as time permits.

      Reply
  • August 24, 2023 at 7:20 pm
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    Well since you don’t follow APP. I’ll give you an update. Jack Foster comes off a bad first round loss and comes all the way through the backdraw and makes his first championship Sunday. You might all remember barely hearing Jack’s name as he took a Bronze in men’s doubles in St louis. He was labeled by NML ” a singles guy ” and given minal credit for his win. Now the ” singles guy ” is onto championship Sunday. Congratulations Jack!!!!!!

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    • August 25, 2023 at 4:56 am
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      Isn’t he still a singles guy since he’s into the singles final? Still no notable doubles performances… right?

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  • August 24, 2023 at 7:46 pm
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    Jim: Thank you for your contribution. Many NML readers contribute their own analysis when they watch matches or look at bracket results. More perspective on how a win/loss is viewed the better IMHO.

    Reply
  • August 24, 2023 at 10:16 pm
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    Vibe. Vibe!! Does that bring Mark Cuban back into the fold?

    If you were a MLP owner / co-owner, you’d probably struggle with identifying synergies with the PPA that helped you (I’m just guessing here).

    If you were a middling Premier level player not named Johns / Waters, you’d have to believe that an MLP schedule wouldn’t be as daunting as, say, being told you need to play in Kansas City in the afternoon in late August five days after playing in Utah.

    Reply
    • August 25, 2023 at 2:53 am
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      I think you put this on the wrong blog post. Will Cuban sell his shares in Dallas team or have a finger in each pie is an interesting conjecture. PPA doesn’t need synergies – they just want all the money and all the pros. Pros don’t like the heavy schedule now and Pardoe said there would be 40 “events” in 2024. I can’t think the pros will like it if those “events” demand their presence. I see many more injuries/excused absences in the horizon.

      Reply
  • August 25, 2023 at 2:15 pm
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    All these upsets in the PPA today certainly makes one wonder how focused these players are on this tournament. I imagine the phone calls and conversations between matches are all encompassing and probably life changing and certainly unexpected.

    Reply
    • August 25, 2023 at 2:26 pm
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      And they have to make decisions FAST so lots of pressure. And those that have already made the decision might be second-guessing themselves or worried about the fight with PPA if it’ll involve a legal battle. Lots of stress on the players today, along with the heat too.

      Reply
    • August 25, 2023 at 5:46 pm
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      No, he just got a bronze with a guy who had never had a medal in any division in men’s doubles. He is also an amazing singles player and just made championship Sunday. My sarcasm was wasted on you.

      Reply
  • August 27, 2023 at 3:32 pm
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    Time to see how the medal counts stand. See link in above Sunday’s thoughts for link to medal counts table.

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