👋 Welcome back to The Daily Theory, our morning rundown to help you stay on top of your favorite sport. I’m Allen McDuffee, your guide to all things tennis.

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On tap today: Taylor Fritz can’t find his footing, Naomi Osaka doesn’t see what Badosa does, Richard Gasquet isn’t saying goodbye just yet, Joao Fonseca takes on Hubert Hurkacz, plus more in today’s tennis news.

Let’s tennis!

Four Points

🎾 Fritz out: World number four Taylor Fritz took his earliest exit from Roland-Garros since 2018 when he lost to Daniel Altmaier on Monday. To be clear, it’s not as if the French Open is Fritz’s favorite tournament on the calendar, having reached the fourth round only once in his career. Still, a loss to a player outside the top 50 is a tough pill to swallow.

  • What he said: “My movement on court is really bad. I don’t know what’s going on,” Fritz said in his news conference. “A lot of times when I’m sliding, I’m off balance, I’m not timing it correctly. I don’t know. I’m getting wrong-footed a lot, slipping a lot.” He added: “I think I’m playing generally fine. I am just playing horrendous tennis on a lot of the important points.”
  • An assessment: Yes, like most Americans, Fritz struggles with movement on clay. But there’s more to it than that. There’s just not enough action on Fritz’s shots to hurt a solid clay courter. His ball is too straight, too short, and lands right in his opponent’s strike zone. Nothing gets up in the shoulder height range to make them uncomfortable. Until that changes, it’s hard to see a change in results.

🎾 A juxtaposition: After their three-set battle, which we had on our Unfortunate First Rounds list, Paula Badosa and Naomi Osaka had very different interpretations of Osaka’s performance and prospects after Badosa won, 6-7, 6-1, 6-4.

  • What she said: “Naomi lost, but she played very good tennis. I’m sure she’ll be where she wants to be very soon,” said Badosa in her on-court interview.
  • And what she said: “I think as time goes on, I feel like I should be doing better,” Osaka said during her press conference when asked if the losses are harder than they used to be. “But also—and I’ve talked about this before, maybe a couple of years ago, or maybe recently — I hate disappointing people. So, like, even with Patrick [Mouratoglou, her coach], I was just thinking about this… He goes from working with, like, the greatest player ever — Serena [Williams] — to, like, ‘What the f** is this?’ You know what I mean? Sorry for cursing—I hope I don’t get fined.”

🎾 Not done yet!: Richard Gasquet is preparing to say goodbye to professional tennis in Paris, but that moment has been staved off after a first-round win over countryman and fellow wild card Terence Atmane. In a match that ended in cramping, it was surprising that it wasn’t the 38-year-old whose body failed. Gasquet won, 6-2, 2-6, 6-3, 6-0, in two hours and 17 minutes.

  • What he said: “I’ve had a month where I’ve been in a lot of pain, it’s been difficult to prepare, I’ve had a lot of injuries, but I really wanted to come here,” Gasquet said during his on-court interview with Lucas Pouille. “This is the last time, and it’s very special for me. I’m happy to have won this first round, I didn’t know what to expect.”

🎾 Notification: Men’s and women’s doubles draws kick off on Tuesday, so be sure to catch some of those matches. Catch Alex Eala, Americans Lammons-Withrow and Dolehide-Krawczyk, plus a whole bunch of other doubles stars in action.