AO 2018 - Yoda Cup

If I had to describe Driver's teams in one phrase, that phrase would be "Low Hanging Fruit". Smart picks all around, but essentially a collection of big names and obvious selections. She did use a Top 16 on Novak. Curious how many of us went the same route.

Adunar DID take the bait on Goerges. Probably the most tempting bait in either draw, since she's won the last THREE tournaments she's played. However, using a Top 16 on a player who has never made the QFs of any Slam is inherently risky. Could it pay off?
He's also got Sasnovich as his Unseeded. Not only is her section ultra weak, but she's in good form. I wonder how many others spotted her? I sure didn't.

Tenedab's got a couple picks on the Men's side that could set him apart: Cilic and Pouille. Unlikely too many of us have either. He's also gone with Pliskova as his Champ, forgoing the many tempting form players from the beginning of the year.

Mike's teams are pretty straightforward on strong, but he has taken one hail mary: Venus. If Bencic is on her game, that's a -16 for Mike, and it's a Top 16 pick. However, of course, Venus is defending runner up here, so going for this one could be huge. His Champ pick is Svitolina.

Edu's teams are amazing, completely solid. However, there are two possible weak spots on his women's teams: Mugu and CarGar, both of whom seemed to have some injury concerns. If both of them are healthy, though, they should get him plenty of points.

Dtrain not only has Venus (as Champ), but he also has Wawa, Raonic, Ferrer, Sloane, and Christina McHale. Looks like Ol' D is just closing his eyes and swinging as hard as he can to start the year. And sometimes, you know, that just happens to work.

Newcomer and Pokemon Trainer Marco19 has two excellent teams. His most interesting pick would be Ryan Harrison, who has two very winnable matches to start, and then he's in with a shot to get Marco some BPs.

Wimbledonut has perhaps a perfect Women's team, but his Men's is unorthodox, featuring names like Schwartzman and Shapovalov. The men's side could be the difference maker for him at this AO.

Spotec also has both Cilic and Pouille, interestingly. However, he has made one critical mistake: he picked Stosur in Australia. Will she shake off her hometown nerves and get him some points? Or be a -16 for a 3rd year in a row?

Charles has some solid teams; he seems to have picked by rank a bit, going with all Top 5 seeds on both sides, including Thiem of all people. If each player plays to rank, he could win himself another Yoda Cup. His lowest ranked player on either side is Monfils at #39.

Dwight's got my favorite pick so far: Hyeon Chung as his Unseeded. I would love to see that one pay off for him, but Chung will have to see off last year's surprise QFist, Mischa Zverev, in the first round to keep Dwight from getting Bombed. The rest of his teams are all pretty solid and standard and should see him competitive for the fortnight.

Aiur will be playing the roles of both Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde for this fortnight: on the Men's side, we have sensible and reasonable Aiur. On the women's, we have an Aiur who prefers anarchy; he has no Halep and no Kerber, Petra Kvitova as runner-up, and you'll never guess in a million years who he picked as Champ. I'm happy to see he's filling in the huge hole left behind by the absence of Johnny Incognito.

TE's teams are about as perfect as they come. However, he's one of a small cadre who have picked perennial Slam underachiever Svitolina to break out and win a Slam, and he also has backed Raonic, whose chances here are a total mystery. Let's see what happens for him.

Not much to remark on with Tono's teams. He has Cilic and Raonic. He will also be one of MANY who will get Bombed by Vandeweghe in the first round when Babos upsets her. Outside of that, Tono's set himself up to be competitive as usual.

CrossCourt has a very cool pick: Zhang Shuai as unseeded. Unfortunately, she's currently a set away from being our first -16 Bomb. However, she's playing Sloane, so she's still very much in it at the moment.
CC is also a rare Ryan Harrison picker, who has currently split sets with Dudi Sela.

HTS has stepped "out of bounds", so to speak, in a couple REALLY interesting ways:
1. No Rafa. He's completely left him off, seemingly so he could have Novak, Cilic AND Goffin. A bold move, but will it have results?
2. He has Cibulkova on his team, a pick I love but must admit comes with huge risks: she has in-from Kaia Kanepi in the first round. Will she Bomb HTS?

Loving OZ's teams. He's strong and sensible all the way around, but with some cool calculated risks: Ostapenko is on his team and Madison Keys is his Champ pick. I love those choices.
A choice I DON'T love, though, is his inclusion of Stan Wawrinka. It could payoff, but his chances of being properly match-fit for this tournament are quite low. We shall see.

Our second newcomer, Murree, is clearly looking to leave an impression: he's picked Alex De Minaur, despite having a first round against Tomas Berdych. Other than that his teams are pretty straightforward, so we'll see if that can give him a boost over the field. Also, his Champ pick is Maria Sharapova. Not a terrible idea, with no Serena in her way.

Snollygoster may win the Most Clever Pre-Tourney Teams title. He's left off Rafa, has two Unseeded Men (Dolgo and Simon), spotted Sasnovich, and even backed two first-time Champs: Woz and Grigor (even picking Goffin as runner-up). Fascinating!

BHP is always competitive and looks to be again in this tournament. Great picks with only small risks: Kyrgios as runner-up and Svitolina as Champ. That extra 32 points from Kyrgios could be what gets him the win here if Nick indeed makes the Final.

Our 3rd and final newcomer, Lexus-GF, hails from beautiful Cuba and we're happy to have him competing with us along with Murree and Marco. And he obviously knows his tennis: his teams are amazing! His big difference-making picks are Rafa as Champ (the only one to pick that?) and Venus/Mugu in the Women's Final. Not sure about either of those, but anything can happen here, and Rafa should never be discounted.

There's also that Arvis fella. He used a Top 16 pick on Kevin Anderson. I guess it's true what they say: you can't fix stupid.

And lastly, Yoda Cup Founder Don joins us and it is so awesome to have him to compete against. And he doesn't seem to be out of practice at all: his teams could be argued to be the most solid. He's got the same weird thing going with his Men's Unseeded that a couple others had, namely, that he has two of them and they're both Dolgo and Simon. But obviously I think those are good picks because I did the same thing. Don could be a front runner here with solid picks. His heart put his boy Rafa in the final, but he couldn't quite take him to win. Will we indeed get a repeat of 2017 here?

Yes, thanks to both.

Great summaries, Ad and Arvis!

pissed off at myself for swapping out KaPliskova for Venus... I think it was Venus' 4-0 record against Bencic that convinced me...

Great work by both of you. Love the passion everyone brings to Yoda Cup and always enjoy the detailed analysis.

Only regret so far is Vandeweghe. Thought she had a tough match up with Babos but liked her path to the quarters if she had gotten through. I wish I had known she had the flu but what can you do.

Good posts. I had no idea who to pick from the women, because nobody is convincing. I solved this problem by using a literal dartboard at work. I tried to get a bullseye, and it came up 15. I said fair enough and Pavlyuchenkova is my gal.

We were at the Coco match, didn't look or act like she was sick. Just her usual argumentative self.n.a.

Good grief.  Sorry, spotec.  She did have a pretty good draw, eh?

Hahaha @ Jamie

Great stuff Arnie and I like your analysis too Arvis.