Delray Beach and Antalya 2021

The first tennis tournaments of 2021 are here and they are in… Delray Beach, Florida AND Antalya, Turkey?

Sure. Right.

These tournaments are so sought after that the average rank of the entrants has plummeted to 144 and the waterfall of withdrawals has left Delray Beach with zero top 20 players in the field and Antalya with three, while the bottom of the brackets have been filled out with players well outside the top 200.

Well, whatever. If there is a tennis tournament, with an outright market, anywhere in the world, no matter how absurd, I’m going to bet it. Or at least try to.

Delray Beach

Let’s start in Delray Beach where the field is not as top heavy as Antalya and contains a whopping 13 home court American players in the 28 man draw.
Of the two tournaments this week, Delray Beach has been the most beset by serious withdrawals - Raonic, Nishikori, and last years champ Reilly Opelka.
What’s left is a tad wanting but still interesting. Particularly because of two of the old guard, still trying to represent the “serve bots” on tour. John Isner is Mr. USA when it comes to winning meaningless 250 level events on American soil and Dr. Ivo Karlovic happily pulled out of the Aussie Open to compete in this bastardized version of a 250 that kicks off the year. I point out these two gentleman because the history of Delray Beach is replete with big hitters in the winners circle and amoung the semi-finalists. Since 2015 (the beginning of my detailed stat collection) 17 of the 24 semi-finalists in Delray Beach have had a hold percentage on hard courts of more than 80%. Over the same time period an incredible 9 of the 12 finalists held serve more than 80% of the time. That’s a lot. In fact, if you go back even further, just looking at finalists for the last decade, there have only been five players who held serve less than 80% and none of them missed by much:

It’s going to be hard to not pick someone who serves big and holds his deal a vast majority of the time. Of course, because of the truncated 2020 season and some very up and down performances there are actually only eight entrants this week with a hold percentage of 80% or better. The history is strong enough though that I’ll be focusing on just these 8 guys.

Being that 2020 and 2021 are apparently the Twilight Zone, Delray Beach is moving from mid-February to the beginning of January. That makes it reasonable to research how these guys tend to start the year. There are some interesting tidbits within. For instance, in 2018 and 2019 Kwon and Isner, two of the guys with the magical serve number, went a combined 0-10 in the month of January. Across the last five years Isner is 10-14 in January; Kwon is 5-10. Querrey and Tiafoe, two more guys on the watchlist (Tiafoe would be the 9th on my list as he just misses the 80% mark but recently won this tournament), have middling records at the beginning of the year but with serious warts. Querrey is 8-12 with almost every one of his eight wins bringing a question mark (two by retirement, two over guys outside the top 150, and one over a semi-retired Lopez). Tiafoe is 14-14 in January since 2015 but only four of those wins came at the ATP level and all four came in the same event (2019 Aussie). The one guy with an interesting January history is Hurkacz. He has progressed steadily the last four years from ITF events in 2017, to CH events in 2018, to CH events and ATP qualies in 2019 to all ATP events in 2020. He’s gone 17-11 across those four seasons in the opening month and 2020’s start was a banger for the Pole as he won his first six matches. That’s something to keep an eye on.

Two of the perceived big servers who’s history I didn’t dig into were Ryan Harrison and Gianluca Mager. That’s because I just don’t think they have a shot to win. Those two, along with Isner and Kwon, are the only ones I actually show a mathematical edge on in the outright market. The idea that Mager, who has three career wins on hard courts at the ATP level and has made one semi-final and final (Rio last year on clay), or Harrison, who has largely been absent from the tour in the past two years (his last match was an exhibition on July 30 and he has only 5 main draw wins since 2018), are going to win an event is hard for me to wrap my head around (I do think Harrison might be good for a round or two though!).
I didn’t too far back on Dr Ivo either. He has a huge serve and no one should be more motivated than him this week, given what he sacrificed to be here (career wise, of course). But he is 41, I show no value on his outright number, he hasn’t won a title since 2016, and he was losing in straight sets to guys like Marc Polmans and Benjamin Bonzi last fall. No thanks.
Querrey has a big serve but, as pointed out just above, he is a bit of a slow starter each year. I show no value on him in the outright market and he is coming off a strange 2020 that included him going 3-6 and having an… interesting(?) personal journey with the current COVID pandemic. Maybe he rights the ship and sticks it to everyone in the tennis community (that would be something) but I doubt it.
Tiafoe has a big serve and a title here in Delray (in 2018) but, he has a spotty January record and I don’t show value on him in the outright market. Also, his inconsistency match in and match out (he was eliminated in the first round 7 times in 16 tournaments last year and the the first two rounds 11 times in 16 tournaments) means, to me, he is probably better utilized as a match to match bet as opposed to an outright.
That leaves Isner and Kwon, who hold serve enough to make my radar and who I show value in on the outright market. They both leave a lot to be desired when it comes to playing in January. On top of that, Isner had a pretty terrible 2020. He went 10-10 and never beat anyone ranked ahead of him. He only had two top 50 wins and his only title since the summer of 2018 was a depleted field on grass in Newport (he didn’t have to beat anyone in the top 50 to win). The case FOR Isner is of course that very Newport event. Isner excels at winning tournaments at the 250 level on American soil with depleted fields. He has 15 titles, 13 of which are American and 12 of those which are 250’s (his two non-American tournament wins are also 250s). This should be his bag. I think the fact that’s it’s moved to January and he seems to be on an Ivo-like downward trend will keep me off him as a bet.
Kwon is someone I like to bet on. Especially on hard courts. He’s got a tricky game and holds serve more than you might expect. His outright number is so tasty here. The drawback though, is probably the reason why that outright number is where it is. He got the worst of the bracket. A probable path of Korda, Tommy Paul, John Isner, Mannarino/Tiafoe, Hurkacz/Garin is crazy tough. It’s apparently not crazy enough to scare off everyone though. His outright number has come in, from the low 60’s to mid 20’s. 28/1 at Bet365 is a bit tough of an ask but if you have access to Pinnacle they are still hanging at 63/1.
Ok, let’s talk Hurkacz. Big Hubie fan (see my 2019 Indian Wells outright). Early adopter. He has the hold percentage numbers. He has the recent early season success. He didn’t have a tragic 2020 (15-13, played into November, had five top 50 wins), career and stats on a nice, straight upward trajectory. Cake draw. Missed the number! I wish I had had the time to get to this earlier. I scraped the openers and Hurkacz was as high as 6/1. Money has poured in on him since the draw was released though and he comes in as the tournament favorite now. I can’t advise taking a number like 2.5/1 or 2.75/1. So, that’s a lot of writing to say throw a prayer on Kwon and roll Hurkacz’s moneyline over because I think he wins and with a path of Galan, Ivo, Garin/Querrey, Isner/Tiafoe, I think he wins and beats a 3/1 price.

(if you take Garin over Querrey, assuming the worst for the parlay: -348, -278, -349, +101 nets you +347)

Kwon 63/1, x 0.25u
Hurkacz, roll it over x 1u

Antalya

Well, this won’t be as much of a deep dive as Delray Beach was. What can you say about a brand new event, played on what amounts to club courts (Antalya is usually held at a grass venue), thrown together less than a month ago?

It’s extremely top heavy, with eight players from the top 50, but there is no meat in the sandwich, as there are also currently NINE players (soon to be joined by FOUR more qualifiers) OUTSIDE the TOP 250! I mean, wow. There are going to be some moneyline favorites the likes of which you don’t see outside even the ITF tour too often.

My angle here was similar to Delray in that I wanted to know guys who traditionally kicked off the year right, I wanted to try to discern motivation, and I wanted someone out of my traditional second or third quarters.

Here’s the motivation angle; right away I am worried about guys who have an agenda. Goffin, Basilashvili, Kecmanovic, Travaglia, and Chardy are all entered in one of the Melbourne tournaments already. Maybe that doesn’t mean much but would you put it past Goffin to win a match or two, figure out that his game is in the right place and then withdraw to head to Australia for bigger and better things?

Berrettini is one of the big dogs here but his record in January at the ATP level is 7-8 and five of those wins came in qualies (one main draw in Doha, one main draw at the Aussie). Berrettini is #10 in the world and already has three 250 level events under his belt. Is he motivated to play here or is he looking ahead to Australia?

It feels lame to take chalk in week one. Especially when that chalk is less than 3/1. But, Alex DeMinaur fits my bill. Early adopter here as well (see my 2019 Sydney outright, baby). This kid is ALWAYS motivated. No one tries harder (that may be supposition but just watch him play one match). He is NOT currently entered in either Melbourne event. Focused here. He always kicks off the year right - see 2018 Brisbane and Sydney, see 2019 Brisbane and Sydney, see 2020 ATP Cup. And he landed in the third quarter with just about the sweetest draw you will ever see. His potential path out of his quarter is Jaziri, Ilhan, Basilashvili. His quarter price is -200 and I hit that too, for two. I won’t be doing the rollover because I am not confident Goffin nor Berrettini will be there in the semis and quarters.

ADM +275 x1u
ADM quarter three -200, x2u (to win 1u)

Good Luck