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Fun With Umps

10:49 AM EDT on August 13, 2021

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By Giri Nathan

[vc_empty_space height="15px"]Daniil Medvedev is the No. 2 player on tour, but No. 1 in terms of on-court chatter. Nobody is better at letting the viewer in on their unmediated stream of consciousness. Tennis is a sport of constant psychic ups and downs, and Medvedev, while famously understated in his triumphs, graciously invites us into his mind palace whenever he’s pissed off. This was especially true through the spring, as he constantly abused the clay, sometimes physically, always verbally, culminating in this classic observation: “It’s the worst surface in the world for me. But if you like to be in the dirt like a dog, I don’t judge.” It should be noted that Medvedev’s nonstop burbling, when aimed at umpires, has been both very funny and ugly in the past. But his incident this week in Toronto skewed toward the former.