Taylor Fritz Explains why is Djokovic G.O.A.T.

Tough luck to Taylor, you must be disappointed, but also you can take a lot of positives out of this hard-fought match. Yeah, for sure. I played a really high level for the first two sets, and they were physical tough two sets. It was like two and a half hours by the time we finished the two sets, so I need to get to the point where I can do that for five hours. Is it kind of astonishing how hard it is to win points, games, much less sets and matches from Novak? Can you describe why it's so much tougher, seemingly, than against anyone else? I think one of the biggest things is just the fact that he's so fast, he doesn't really miss a lot of balls, so he definitely makes you really work and hit quality shots to win points. But it's also just the lack of free points he gives you, and that's also why the first two sets are so long as well. I never just hit a second serve and he just misses it, it just doesn't happen. Even when I'm going after my second serve, hitting second serves that are consistently 100-105 miles per hour, jamming him, he still just puts it on the baseline. So it's definitely tough when you don't get those free points and you just have to work for every single point. You saved the first 15 break points that you faced. That must be uplifting in a way. I know you're coming off a loss, but you must take some goodness out of it. Yeah, it's great to win that many big points in a row. I think I got to a point where I just saved so many. I was playing the break points so well because I didn't even care if I got broken anymore, because in my mind I was like, he deserves to break me at some point. So I was playing him loose and I was playing him so well, but I also honestly shouldn't have faced that many break points. I definitely could have played the games and served better to not put myself in that position, but how I was playing from the ground, like after take-out return, take-out serve, how I was playing from the back of the court, I'm super happy with. Taylor, when you last spoke, you spoke about the fact that Novak had an 8-0 record and if you were him you wouldn't change too much because things are working. How do you get yourself from knowing that to the point where you're out on court believing that you can win in that dogfight? For me, the record looks pretty bad, but at least five of those matches were played when in my mind I was a completely different player. I was younger and I was nowhere near as good as I am now. And then the sixth meeting, it was actually pretty close. Prior to this match, I'd actually played against him and I'd improved a lot as a player and that was relatively close. And then the next two matches, I feel like I played very poorly. And so I look at 8-0 and I see, okay, there's only one match here where I really feel like I played well, I feel like I'm a better player. I served for a second set in that match, it wasn't a beatdown by any means. The record sounds very discouraging, but I'm constantly improving as a player. If I play the way that I played the first two sets, if I bring that level for five sets, then it's possible. Taylor, you've played Novak over a period of five years now. Do you see any signs that Novak is showing any kind of weaknesses? Maybe a little bit slower, maybe hitting the ball not that hard, or is there no signs at all? No, I mean, from what I can recall from the first times we've played, to me, I think he's just as good as ever. Taylor, looking ahead the next year and maybe even a year ahead of that, there's talk about merging the WTA and the ATP. I was wondering, do you have any particular thoughts on that and can it work? I mean, why do you think it's kind of taking so long and it's been talked about for a while? I mean, as far as how it's taking so long, that's a really easy answer. There's so many logistics around it. It's such a nightmare to get all these tournaments to cooperate and all the play. There's just so many things that need to get done. It obviously depends how it happens. If it happens in a way where we can all be, I guess, united and sell our licensing agreements as a package deal, and there's a way that it becomes beneficial for everyone because we're all united, then it makes a lot of sense. Do you put the drop-off down to in the third and the fourth sets? Obviously, it was really hot out there. I think it got up to about 31 degrees. Was it frustrating for you at all to have to wait around until, I think it was nearly five o'clock by the time you got on call? Yeah, I mean, the fact that we waited that long, to be honest, it cooled down quite a bit as the match went on. It was hot in the beginning, I think. The third and fourth, just the level of my serve decreased and I needed it to be better. I needed to be getting more free points. I can't be out there having to work incredibly hard for every single point of my serve and then turn around and have to do it returning as well. I really needed my serve to go for me in the third and the fourth, and I just had some games where I'd make first serves, but the spots on the serves would be awful. It can't be like that against him. He'll just return it. And then also, there's a drop-off. It was two sets, but I've played four sets in that time. It was two and a half hours of really physical tennis. It's tough to just sustain that level for probably two or three more hours than I needed to when I haven't really gotten to play at that level and play against that level that often. It's tough to prepare for something like that, especially when I've had an off-season with injuries and trying to get healthy and haven't really been able to put as much time as I wanted to into the workload on the court and in the gym. I've done what I can, but it's tough to prepare you for playing at that physicality for potentially four or five hours. There's a prospect that another men's best-of-five set match could be starting close to 11pm here. A. How do you think that will affect the two guys playing? And B. How do you think it will affect them when they have to play in a semi-final? Yeah, I think it's rough. I was talking about that with a group of guys before because he finished that one match so late.