[Brian Swartz]

Wentz is an intriguing case. He's won four HC Masters in a row now and I do think he's overall the best hardcourt player in the world, but he had quite close matches in Canada against Hart and Jung, and in Cincinatti in the final against Perez. So I don't think he's quite as good as all the titles indicate. But if he can win in Flushing Meadows, or even make the final, he figures to move up to #2. Either way, both top seeds for the USO will definitely be rooting for him to be drawn in the opposite half.

Argentina likes Cincy for some reason - Perez has done better there than Canada the last couple of years, and three of the top-half's four quarterfinalists were Argentine. Tobias Velilla made an impressive run as an unseeded semifinalist. The WTF battle heats up with Jung making the Canada final and Solberg reaching the Cincinatti semis, but neither being consistent in both. Aviles losing in the third round of each won't help his total. That trio at least need to be at their best for the USO to solidify their candidacies.

Sushant Chiba had a first-round exit in Canada, then turned back the clock to upset (13) Emilien Mathou in Cincinatti before a third-round defeat to the surprising Acke Kjaerstad in a battle of unseededs. Split a pair of tiebreaks before a 6-3 defeat in the decider. Amrik Kasaravalli got the same three singles matches in these masters as he did a year ago, but it was a heck of a three. Narrowly defeated Abinati and had close losses to #10 Tim de Jong and #5 Srba Dogic. He's playing well enough recently that it no longer feels like he needs a lucky break - he has a chance to exit early but also has a chance to hang with most players on clay or hardcourt. With the right draw, it's not out of the question that he makes his first second week of a Slam at the USO or the AO to start next year.

Meanwhile, for the first time Nasir Chittoor entered a Challenger where I expected him to win it. The #4 seed in CH2 Trani, he made good on that to finally break through and get his first title. The higher-seeded players were mostly badly fatigued, including Luca Mondello who he stomped 6-2, 6-2 in the final. Might have been favored over them anyway, but a 0.4/0.4 malus is highly painful. At 20y 37w, he's the oldest of any of my players save Kasaravalli to get a challenger trophy, but that's still six weeks faster than Fitz who 'only' has two. Smith of course has been much faster, but really I'm just chalking this up to how much more competitive things are than they've been in the past. Hopefully Chittoor can grab some more hardware by year's end. . Satyagit Guha qualified in singles and had a competitive first-round loss to the 6-seed, one of his better showings, while the pairing escaped a 11-9 super TB in the first round only to suffer a defeat in the semis by a similar score. That's two out of the last three events they haven't won, showing that while they are a strong challengers double team they are not yet invincible.