RG '26: Osaka gets BACKLASH for black party, Baptiste survives, Djokovic tested

Naomi Osaka has yet to compete at Roland Garros and has already upset a corner of the internet. Osaka hosted a black party celebrating Black tennis players, but was criticized for being "exclusionary." Hailey Baptiste earned another impressive comeback victory vs Barbora Krejcikova while Marta Kostyuk reveals sad news after her opening round win. Novak Djokovic gets a surprising opening round test from Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard.

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Transcript

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Naomi Osaka has once again pissed off people during a slam, and she hasn't even played yet this time. I'll discuss the honestly silly backlash around her black party and delve into day one Rolling Girls results from Hayley Baptiste's Houdini Escape, Djokovic's Stern Test, Marta Kostruck's emotional win, and Taylor Fritz's upset defeat. Bonjour, J mypel Christian Bass Night at Benevenu, I love Christian's Court where I cover tennis from all angles. If you have not yet already, make sure you subscribe and hit that notification bell so you're notified whenever I post my day two rolling arrows recap. And speaking of subscribers, I do want to thank you all for helping me reach 45,000 subscribers. It really means a lot. I love every milestone and appreciate every milestone that I reach. So hopefully 50k before US Open starts. I also want to share that I'm a contributor for Sports Illustrated's tennis platform served on SI. And I wrote my first article that was published today, Sunday, and it was about pretty much seven women who are unseated who I think can cause problems for a lot of the women in the field at Rolling Garrett. So make sure you check that out. The link to that will be in the bio. So getting into things, Naomi Osaka, she co-hosted a black party alongside Taylor Townsend, uniting black players competing at Rolling Garrett's this year. Coco Goff, Gal Monfis, Asia Mohammed, and Chris Eubanks were in attendance, and Naomi made a notes at message on Instagram essentially saying that there's a camaraderie among black players and that seeing them all exist in this predominantly white space of professional tennis is a win in itself. So she was just pretty much celebrating black excellence. It seemed pretty self-explanatory to me. And word to Jay-Z and Kanye, we're in Paris. Like I love to see it. It really wasn't much to it. But unfortunately, people just changed something that was pure innocent fun into drama. Quite a few critics actually accused Naomi of being exclusionary and even racist. I saw a number of people saying, What if there was an all-white party? And Osaka responded to such critics on thread saying, I can only speak from my experiences in my own life. Growing up as a tennis player, I didn't see many people that look like me. And I feel like it's important to celebrate them. I feel like it's important to know that there have been all white dinners and parties. I don't know how else to tell you this. I literally see them all the time and never had an issue with it at all. To the people who asked this question, I want you to ask this question too. What is it about PLCs getting together that unsettles you so much? I want to end this by saying I grew up watching my dad get discriminated against, having the cops called on him multiple times at the tennis court. There are multiple things I will apologize for in my life, but celebrating being black and appreciating who we are would never be something I would consider saying sorry for. Thanks. Then Naomi added, actually I lied, I am sorry. I'm sorry for the people who cannot comprehend in their brains that this is not about exclusion. This is a celebration about how far we have come. I'm disappointed yet not surprised that some people found an issue with Naomi's dinner. We live in a society where critical thinking and nuance is rare and grifters are everywhere. Wait, that was kind of a bar right there. Wait, wait, that kind of round too. That kind of round too. But being for real, there's also been a recent shift to establish a sort of colorblind society where racism, oppression, and marginalization are just totally made-up concepts. But they persist and will unfortunately persist long after all of us are dead and gone. There are a growing number of black players on tour, but that does not change the fact that tennis long remains a predominantly white sport. On a personal level, I was the only black tennis player at my college that's men's or women's team. And I don't care what race you are, it's not easy being the only one of something. And yes, I attended a PWI, but even at some historically black colleges and universities, black players are outnumbered. My nearest HBCU, Norfolk State, has zero black guys on the men's tennis roster. To me, this black party doesn't require an explanation if you're remotely aware of just basic human history. And history isn't always pleasant to confront, but trying to erase it only puts a band-aid over how deeply it continues to shape the world we live in today. Honestly, I wish Naomi didn't do any further explaining because people find issues with any little thing nowadays. If you get it, you get it. Don't, don't. Too bad, so sad. There's no need explaining things to people who refuse to understand you no matter how hard you try. And I also think there's a conversation to be had about how Naomi gets a lot of hate. She's gotten a lot of hate lately, the past few years. And I think it's interesting how a lot of people have switched up on her since she first won her maiden slam at the US Open in 2018. I think that's something I want to talk about, maybe in a members only video. But, anyways, Matt props to Naomi for this. I love to see this. My only note is that can the black people in tennis media get an invite perhaps next time? Please and thank you. But getting into the actual tennis of it all, day one of Roland Garrett's kicked off today, and I honestly was pretty unmoved by the order of play. There weren't too many matches that piqued my interest, but I was for sure sat for the clear marquee matchup between world number 26, Haley Baptiste, and 2021 champion Vabora Karechikova. Baptiste was the favorite here due to her recent match fitness and success. She reached the semifinals in Madrid, beating Sablanka in the process. Krechikova, meanwhile, is still pretty early on on the comeback trail after suffering a left thigh injury. She recently made the finals of a WTA 125 on Palmer, though. So I anticipated her to test Baptiste and she did just that. Krachikova had two match points, but Baptiste saved them both to prevail, winning 6-7-7-6-62. This match didn't disappoint at all. We saw quite a few entertaining rallies between these women who both have a lot of tools in their arsenal. I just think Baptiste's match fitness and mental toughness made the difference. She had a set point in the opening set but couldn't convert, and she also had two set points at 6'5 in the second that came and went, and Keshikova had the match on her racket up 6'4. But you cannot teach match toughness. And this would have been Baboda's biggest win by ranking since September last year. And I think she felt the moment. She made two pretty poor sitter forehand unforced errors, and the rest was history. Haley deserves credit too, because she had to, you know, put the ball in play. And I thought she might throw in a double fault on the second match point because that second serve was looking a little bit shaky, but she got it in. And in the third set, Kishikova kind of looked like she ran out of gas, while Baptiste's improved fitness was evident. She was the stronger player and ran well with the match. I think Haley is quickly growing a reputation of being one of the most mentally tough players on tour. I really noticed it in Madrid and her matches against Belinda Benchic, and of course, that Salenko win. And I think Haley could be poised for a big run here in Paris. Her draw is tough as she would likely have to face second seed Alana Robacina, but I wouldn't be shocked at all if Baptiste did her big one in that match. There's something about Baptiste's aura, even before this match. She made a post before the match saying one more sleep, something like that. So I think she's really preparing to do something big here. And I think now with her saving match points, she's even more dangerous because when players save match points in a tournament, they tend to play more free with them being so close to defeat. Also, Baptiste tested Robakina quite a bit in their previous meeting at Indian Wells this year. So again, wouldn't be shocked at all if Baptiste got the upset in the third round. By the way, shout out to another crafty American, Katie McNally, who also earned a tough comeback win. She defeated Alexanovich 367-663 after trailing the Aussie by a set in Love 3. This was her first main draw win at Roland Garros. Up next for McNally is 11th seed Belinda Benchic, who got through in straight sets. 21st seed, Clara Towson was also in this section, but she lost to Daria Schniger in three sets. Towson was the only seed to fall today. Mira Andreva, the eighth seed, won her opening match against Giona Farrow 3-3. It was a pretty so-so match for Mira, wasn't her best, but hopefully she can play better as the tournament progresses because I picked her to win the title. 15th seed, Marta Kostuk improves to 13-0 on clay this year after defeating Oksana Selekmektava, 6-2-6-3. Kostuk was pretty emotional after the win and later revealed that a missile destroyed a building about 100 meters away from her parents' house. Russia committed a large-scale attack on Kiev, Ukraine, launching dozens of missiles and drones. Ukrainian officials said four people were killed and 83 people injured. Kostjuk showed an image of the scene during her post-match press conference and said that her mother, sister, and great aunt were all home when the missile struck. I didn't know how my focus was going to be, how I'm going to be able to control my emotions or my thoughts, Kostuk said. There were obviously times in the match when I would go back to thinking about it because most of the morning I felt sick just about the thought if it was 100 meters closer, I probably wouldn't have a mom and a sister today. That is very deep. And Kostuk's very brave, of course. It's not easy knowing that your family was that close potentially to passing. And I also think Kostuk is important, her using her platform to highlight this because she raises further aware awareness of what's going on in the world. And I honestly don't know if I would have known about the latest attacks otherwise if it weren't for her. And I think unfortunately a lot of people think the Russian-Ukraine conflict isn't as bad as it once was, or maybe they just don't care anymore. But I think this proves that argument about sports and politics shouldn't mix is silly to me. And I also think the lack of handshakes among Ukrainians and Russian or Belarusian players, however upsetting that might be to some people, it's a constant reminder and an important reminder that war is still very much going on and people's lives are being affected on the daily. I hope that Marta's family is okay and safe and that she can just focus on the tennis for the rest of the tournament. Now back to Kachikova, she was one of three major champions to fall on day one. Sloan Stevens, who came through qualifying, lost to 20-year-old Czech Sarah Bailick, 6'3, 6'2. Sloan has won just two two-level main draw matches since the 2024 Woman Championships. So this result was a bit expected. But Bailick was on a four-match losing streak, so I thought Sloan maybe had a shot, but the lefty was too solid. Obviously disappointing for Sloan, but at least she got a nice 100k check for her efforts. And now she can clock into her TNT duties to collect another check for the next two weeks. Another US Open champion, Amaratakanu, lost to round number 68, Solana Sierra, 6 love, 7-6. Emma once said that she sometimes wishes she hadn't won the US Open. And I fully understand why she said this because every time she loses early at a big tournament, the poor woman gets dragged from here and back. People were clowning her bad. I saw a number of jokes about the Uniqlo executives being unsatisfied with their investments. There are also more tweets questioning just how she won the 2021 US Open. But I think real ones who follow tennis or follow women's tennis closely knew that she was probably gonna lose this match. It was just her second match on clay this year as she skipped Miami, Madrid, and Rome due to illness. Sierra is also no pushover. She has had some decent clay results this season, and she led Coco Golf by a double break in the third set of their Rome round of 32 match not too long ago. So the woman can ball. And I felt like this honestly would have been an upset if Rod O'Connor won the match. Emma also did well to make this a little bit more competitive as she was down one four double break in the second set but fought back. But it's drawing for a major champion to have not reached another slam quarterfinal five years after winning that slam. But Emma's tennis journey is just really one of one. No one will ever probably win a slam as a qualifier without dropping a set. And that's why there's still been this much attention on her, despite her not really being able to back up those results since winning the US Open. But I still wish people would take it a bit easy on her. Like, be nice. You know, kindness wins. Word to Madison Keys. Now on the men's side, Novak Djokovic, he lost the opening set of his opening round match at Roland Garros, but he still prevailed, taking a 5-7-7-5-6-1-6-4 win over Giovanni and Petri Pedicard. I did not expect Mpetchi Pedicard to test Djokovic that much, being totally honest. Yes, Novak was severely low on match reps, losing his lone clay match of the season to Dino Prismich in Rome. Meanwhile, Impetri Peticard's lone two clay events before Rolling Garros were Rome and a challenger in Bordeaux. The ward number 83 was dealing with the wrist injury at the beginning of the clay season, and I did not expect his huge serve to cause that much damage on the clay, but I was very wrong. Novak himself said he has zero chance on Giovanni's first serve in the opening set, and that the 22-year-old has one of the most tremendous serves he's ever faced, which is very high praise coming from the GOAT. Now I have to give Djokovic praise for him holding his composure so well, especially in that second set. Because not only was the crowd a lot and them trying to get their man to get the upset, but Djokovic could not break serve to save his life. Some of it was in Petchipiticart just being crazy clutch, but Novak had some pretty unfortunate misses too. It took the Joker 10 total break points before finally getting his first break of the match, which also earned him the second set. And Penchipiticart also started to feel his wrist issue in the final two sets, leading to a drop in his first surf speed. And Djokovic, of course, got better looks at breaking and took control of the match accordingly. I said before the tournament that Novak would need to limit his lengthy matches early on in the tournament in order to make a deep run. This match was two hours 52 minutes, but he will have about an extra day of rest thanks to the Sunday earlier start. Now like Novak, Taylor Fritz had a difficult opening round test, but he did not pass it. The number ninth seed fell to what number 148, Nishes Bash of Aretti, 76766761. Bass of Aretti made a bit Bass of Aretti made a bit of history, becoming the first American man to score a top 10 win at Roland Garros since 2001. I expected an early exit for Fritz at the tournament due to this being his second clay match really this year due to a knee injury, but I honestly didn't see him losing to Bassavaretti. This was a very interesting match. Nasesh doesn't have a whole lot of power at all. He's not a big server by any means, but he was only broken once in this match. Bassavaretti not only neutralized Fritz's pace well, but he defended great and he also hit with consistent depth. And also the drop shot of Bass of Retti was a huge shot here. He beat Fritz so many times with the drop shot, and I think that was a smart play too to test the Americans' movement as Fritz was out due to uh again that knee issue. Fritz acknowledged this in the press and said that he thought he played alright in the match. He did finish with 71 winners to 48 unforced errors, but his inability to make inroads on the return really cost him in this one. Bassaveretti's match reps on clay, I think, also made a difference. He played 17 matches on the dirt this year leading into this match compared to Fritz's one. Still, this result is surprising because Bassaveretti had lost his last 11 matches against top 50 opposition, and he had never before beaten a top 20 player. So it's by far the biggest win of his career. Fritz's exit opens the section a little bit more for 19-year-old Rafa Hodar to make the second week. The number 21st seed, Alejandro Davidovich Fakina, is still alive, but barely. He battled through cramps and saved a match point to down Demir Jummer in five sets. Gabriel Diallo's here, and he's really had a miserable season that continues after retiring during his opening round match to James Duckworth siding heat stroke and his defense. The temperatures were pretty hot today. Some other youngsters that had more success today include 20-year-old Dino Prismich, who earned his first slam main draw win after defeating Michael Zhang 6'1-6163. Prismich's win sets up a next gen clash with 19-year-old Joao Fonseca in round two, who also won his opening round match in straight sets. I'm really looking forward to this one. Both guys are talented. Prismich has been really on the rise this clay season, scoring two top 10 wins over Djokovic and Shelton. And the winner of this one could actually get Novak in round three. 22-year-old Serbian Haman Majedovich is also in this section, and the 2023 next gen finals winner got past Yannick Humphrey in a tight four-set match. He will likely play Kaspar Root in round two, so really just a tough draw for the Norwegian. 20-year-old Belgian and Madrid semifinalist Alexander Blokch earned his first slam main draw victory, defeating lucky loser Coleman Wong, 6'3, 6'4, 6'2. He'll likely get Alex Dibonor, the 8th seed in round two. And like Casper, Alex has a brutal draw. The odds he could also face Mengik or Novone in round three. But on the bright side, at least Dibonor has an easier opening round opponent compared to Andre Rublev, who starts against 22-year-old Peruvian Ignacio Buse, who just won a 500 title than Hamburg. Nuno Borges and Mirmi Kesmanovich are dangerous unseeded players too. Man, this draw is really a bloodbath. Finals favorite Alexander Zverev eaves through to the second round with a pretty comfortable straight sets victory over Benjamin Bonzi. The second round against Tamas Mahash could be pretty challenging as the Czech can definitely play, and he was the only man to take a set off of center in Monte Carlo. With feast out, Karen Hachinoff is the likely opponent for Alexander Zverev in the fourth round, assuming the German makes it that far. The 13th seed now faces 36-year-old Marco Chungoliti, who won his first slam main draw match in four and a half years, and his third slam main draw match overall today. Also, shout out to 19-year-old Federico Tina for earning his maiden slam win against Raleigh Opelka in five sets. Looking at day two's order of play, Igos Fiantek and Atlanta Robacana open up things on Philippe Chadrier. And then it's nothing but Frenchmen to close things out with Ugol and Bear against Adrian Manorino, followed by Gail Monfils against Ugo Gaston. On court, Suzanne Longland, another Frenchman, Arthur Renanesh opens up play there, followed by Alina Svetilina, who will play against Ana Bandar. After that, Americans, Amanda Anna Simova, and Ben Shelton wrap up play on that court. On court Simon Mathew, there's Jasmine Paulini against Diana Yastremska. Sam Barrinka plays Jesper DeJong, and then Casper Root and Carolina Mohova wrap up things on that court. That's all I have for this Roland Garrett's day one update. Let me know your thoughts on Osaka's black party and the backlash it got. Do you think that the backlash was silly, or do you somehow understand where the critics are coming from with that one? Also, let me know your thoughts on the results at Roland Garrett's. Do you think that Haley Baptiste has the potential of going deep at this tournament and maybe even upsetting Ravakana? As well as how far do you think Novak can go in this tournament? Again, make sure you subscribe and click that notification bell so you are notified whenever I post that day two Rolling Garrett's recap. Thank you all so much for watching and for your support. And I'll see you all next time here on Christian's Core.