Taylor Fritz, Tommy Paul, Frances Tiafoe and Reilly Opelka grew up training, traveling and competing together on the junior circuit. Today, their relationship extends to the ATP Tour, where they trade titles and ranking points. They are best friends, espousing the virtues of off-court camaraderie, sometimes at the expense of on-court success.
“These are some of my absolute closest friends,” Fritz said at a news conference last month during the U.S. Open. “I’ve known them for so long and we’ve traveled all around the world together. The team events, where I get to spend a lot of time with them, is always a lot of fun.”
The Americans Fritz, Tiafoe, Paul and Ben Shelton were supposed to compete together for Team World alongside Francisco Cerundolo and João Fonseca at the Laver Cup in San Francisco, which begins Friday. Team Europe will feature the newly crowned U.S. Open champion Carlos Alcaraz along with Alexander Zverev, Holger Rune, Casper Ruud, Jakub Mensik and Flavio Cobolli.
But Paul and Shelton are injured and had to withdraw from the cup. Tiafoe withdrew after being upset by Jan-Lennard Struff in the third round of the U.S. Open. His ranking has dropped out of the top 25. The three have been replaced by Opelka, Alex de Minaur and Alex Michelsen.
Fritz and Tiafoe are 27, while Paul and Opelka are 28, which means they were almost always in the same age groups for junior competition. They were dorm mates at the United States Tennis Association training center in South Florida and often competed at the same tournaments, sometimes challenging each other as to who could finish their matches the fastest.
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The post Friends or Competitors? These American Tennis Stars Are Both. appeared first on New York Times.
