Disclaimer: Most of these Blogs are off the top of my head.  I will look up certain things to see if I remember them correctly.

I LIKE Stefanos Tsitsipas from Greece. He is an Australian Open and Rolland Garros Finalist (both losses to Novak Djokovic) but I have a big issue with his game.  I his baseline game is good but its weak.

Stefanos is Crazy Dramatic

Let me Back up.  Stefanos is a great player.  He trains very hard and he has a great team with his Dad and his Mom hidden somewhere.  He’s one of those crazy players because he believes he should win every match.  He used to get really mad when he didn’t. He is pretty salty in the press conferences too.

His mom was a pro that played on the same Fed Cup team as Alexander Zverev’s mommy.  But Steph and Alex don’t really like each other.

One time Stefanos got mad and smashed his racket.  He accidentally hit his dad.  Then his mom came out of nowhere to yell at him.  I watched  that like 20 times.  I’ve never seen any tennis player yelled at by their mom on international TV.

At the time of writing, Stefanos has a relationship with Spain’s Paula Badosa.  She is the daughter of two supermodels.  She’s Aight.  Both of them started losing more when they started dating.  But they look great on social media!!!

Stephanos trolled Nick Kyrgios one time by posting Kyrgios’ real number online on the day of his birthday.  It was jacked up and Nick had to make a video begging people to stop calling him.  That was classic.

He got a lot of flack once because Alexander Zverev called him out for taking to long in the bathroom.  Alex accused Steph of taking his phone with him and getting coaching from his dad LOL. 

Which doesn’t make sense because his dad runs his mouth constantly.  He’s ALWAYS coaching.  Also his dad looks like Sylvester Stallone to me LOL

Fortunately for Stephanos, coaching is allowed now. Particularly spiteful coaches can weaponize it to tick other players off. I’m sure someone will exploit it to the point there will be more rules.

Here is the thing though.  Stephanos was in the final of Roland Garros that same year I believe and he was up 2 sets to love against Novak Djokovic.  Novak went to the bathroom and came back and played better.  Stephanos says it was like he was a new man. 

Now either Novak had to poop or Novak pulled the same crap (no pun) Alexander was complaining about.  But Stephanos got all the hate for it.  Like he was getting boos EVERYTIME he went to the bathroom.  It was pretty funny. 

The Game

The problem is that even though Stephanos is a very hard worker.  He doesn’t have some of the weapons the other guys have.  So he tends to take random losses to player he shouldn’t.  Lets talk about his game from my perspective before I see a video made about him LOL.

When I think about Stephanos, I think about how clean his techniques are.  Its like he was made in a factory.  During Roland Garros he made like 30 something first serves in a row. IN A ROW!

The best part of his game to me….are his VOLLEYS.  I mean….I honestly don’t know why he doesn’t get so much credit for them.  His volleys are RIDICULOUSLY GOOD.  He’s got so much touch at the net that he hits QUIET volleys.

When I look at volleys I think of a defensive technique.  Some people volley forward.  They step into volleys and give the pace back with only enough spin to accomplish the task.  The bryan brothers are a good example of this.  If you want to learn how to maximize the pace of volleys they are the ones to watch.  Even though they are retired.

John MacEnroe was like this too.  Even though his volleys werent so hard, he would just deflect a flat ball forward with as little energy possible so that the other player had no energy to pass him with. 

But Stefanos is different.  He has a pretty good amount of touch and spin.  He is abnormally good at carving slices into his volleys.  When he is at the net his volley stick to the ground and skid.  And he can maximize the spins in his drop shots too.  That why I call them quiet.  He hits them like macenroe but with underspin.  

Another strength again is the regularity with which Stefanos makes his first serve. However the EFFECTIVENESS of his serve is another point. Some would say that his first serve percentage is high because he’s not trying to get enough free points. But I think he needs to be good an making first serves because otherwise he won’t get a short ball to attack.

Here is why he makes me cringe.  When you volley well, the idea is to get to the net!!!  HOW DOES STEPHANOS GET TO THE NET?  He wins the point most of the time he comes there.

Although Stephs groundies and serve are great.  They are pretty flat compared to most professional players.  So he only throws opponents off balance if he finds the corners extremely well.  Unfortunately he doesn’t go for corners.  Especially on the backhand side.  And he is missing those shots that a lot of players have where they come up with a winner out of nowhere.  They get tired of running and say “Screw it” and pop off a shot powerfully down the line or angle cross court.  These sorts of shot blow the point wide open.  But with Stefanos…you don’t get that.  He is really cautious. With all the training he does, you would think that he has these shots everywhere. But the internet doesn’t really show players working on specialty shots because the people watching these videos need ONE technique to feel smart.

So for Steph, his ironclad chance to get to the net is his serve.  So he holds serve well.  He can serve, get that short forehand, and volley all day.  But when he is returning its just a bunch of high energy safe shots.  Not enough spin to push people back like his contemporaries like Alcaraz, Sinner and Ruud.

Also, not enough consistency to outlast players like Zverev and Medvedev.

Why not up the risk when you can hold serve well?  Then you can open up more chances to hit those awesome volleys.  OR he can make a weapon out of his forehand. Its good but it isn’t devastating. Seriously, if his dad is coaching him all the time, where is the planning for that? I think when he comes to the net, his chances of winning pop up. Even if his approach shot SUCKS.

I’m writing this while watching him play Jannik Sinner in the Aussie Open 2023.

Its just, his groundies don’t set him up for ANYTHING LOL!  I can’t stand it.  Get to the NET!!! 

Anyway, that was fun!!! I like Stef and this article reminded me why I do like him. But I want to see the all court game that I feel he should be displaying. I feel like once he starts devising plans to get more attackable shortballs from his baseline game he will win a slam or two.