Everyone knows Wimbledon is the premier grass court tournament.  What few people outside of avid tennis fans know is there’s another grass tournament in the US.  Normally, because so few players actually like grass–many prefer hard courts or clay much better, the draw at Newport, site of the Tennis Hall of Fame, is often weak as the weaker players in a Slam.

Recall a Slam has 128 players which is typically twice as big as the next biggest tournament so it can be challenging for players ranked 70 or lower to make it into the main draw of a smaller event, even an ATP 250 event.  This is why many players ranked 70 or worse play in Challengers, because they can make it deeper into those tournaments.

Thus, players like Nicolas Mahut, who would generally have to qualify to get into an ATP 250 event can make it into the main draw at Newport.

With the conclusion of Wimbledon, there was talk of the next group of players to break through.  Novak Djokovic played Bernard Tomic in the quarterfinals.  Tomic is one of a handful of names that experts predict will begin to move up the ranks.  He’s mentioned with Milos Raonic, Grigor Dmitrov, and American Ryan Harrison.

However, Harrison isn’t the only American that is looking to move up.  Two other Americans are sometimes mentioned with each other: Jack Sock and Denis Kudla.  Kudla trained in College Park, Maryland near the university campus, and he’s having a breakthrough tournament of sorts.

He beat big serving Ivo Karlovic in the first round in three sets.  He then took out Grigor Dmitrov.  Dmitrov gave Tsonga all he could handle.  It says something that Dmitrov is the second seed as he is ranked 60 in the world.  Kudla will now face Michael Yani, another American, who made it past veteran Tommy Haas, who retired in their match.  This is a great chance for Kudla to reach the semis of an ATP tour event.

Another American that had a decent Wimbledon, given his ranking, is Alex Bogomolov, Jr.  Bogomolov made it to the third round of Wimbledon beating fellow American, Donald Young, in the first round, then Juan Ignacio Chela in the second round, before losing to last year’s Wimbledon finalist, Tomas Berdych.

Bogomolov, who is actually seeded, beat German, Zverev in the opening round, then Belgian player Bemelmans in the second round, now faces top seed, John Isner.

Ryan Harrison, who is hoping to move up the rankings, lost to veteran Arnaud Clement rather easily.  Clement used to give Roger Federer fits back in 2003, but he is 33 years old and ranked in the low 100s.  This is the kind of match Harrison should win, or at least lose closely.  Admittedly, French players seem to age gracefully.  Clement lost to John Isner.  This is an interesting bit of trivia but prior to Isner’s marathon match over Mahut, the longest match played was a match between Fabrice Santoro and Arnaud Clement in the 2004 French Open.

Speaking of Mahut, Nicolas Mahut won one round, but lost to the shortest man in the top 100, Olivier Rochus.  Donald Young won one round, but lost to Tobias Kamke in the next round.