NEW YORK — The first day of the U.S. Open’s mixed doubles extravaganza was effervescent and emphatic, again breathing renewed life into the format. I was thinking that, of all the days on the tennis calendar, it might be one that I’d most recommend attending. It was awesome, and I raved about it on Bounces.
On the second and final day, it was most striking how much the air had gone out of the place. The three matches were all competitive and there were worthy champions in the end, but the first day’s star power had dimmed out considerably, and the stakes felt muddled and unclear as three matches were overstuffed into one night session.
Without the first day’s potent “x” factors, mixed turned into something closer to mid.
What went wrong? Let’s do an autopsy on a strange dud of a night.