Beijing and Tokyo

Between these two Asian tournaments, one is clearly the stronger field. Beijing has Nadal, Djokovic, Roddick, and five of the other top fifteen players among their eight seeds. The number one seed in Tokyo is JMDP, but the rest of the seeds are not quite at his pedigree. While China has Davydenko, Verdasco, Soderling, Gonzalez, and Cilic filling out its top players, all of whom have had strong performances in the last few months, Tokyo has Tsonga, Monfils, Simon, Berdych, Stepanek, Wawrinka, and Hewitt. Now they're all strong players, all in the top 26 at the moment, but with the exception of Monfils and Simon, none has done anything of note during the Summer hardcourt swing.

As for the breakdown of the quarters, Nadal is seeded to meet Gonzo, but his section is packed, so here's hoping he's recovered from his injury. Baghdatis first round, James Blake second, and then he could just as easily get Safin, Acasuso, or Ferrer instead of Gonzalez. Tough draw for the world number 2. The second quarter is less stacked, with Davydenko seeded to meet Cilic, if each can survive the few dangerous floaters, Andreev, Kohlschreiber, and Karlovic.

In the third quarter, Soderling is seeded to meet Andy Roddick, who has never beaten the Swede in two meetings. But they've had three tiebreakers in four sets. If it gets there, it should be interesting. Soderling would have to get through Jeremy Chardy and Tommy Robredo. Roddick should have an easier time against qualifier Lukasz Kubot, who beat Donald Young, who already taken out the much tougher opponent Feliciano Lopez. Strange. After that, Roddick gets either Mathieu or Ljubicic, which should be a good match on its own. The fourth quarter is also strong, with Verdasco seeded to meet Djokovic, but also featuring Victor Troicki, Nicolas Almagro, Robby Ginepri, and Juan Carlos Ferrero.

Back over in Tokyo, JMDP is seeded to meet Hewitt, which should be an interesting match - they've had a few great ones this year already. Santoro is also in that quarter, on his farewell tour. Simon and Berdych are in the second quarter, along with Bellucci and Youzhny. The third quarter features Wawrinka against Monfils, along with John Isner and Dudi Sela. The final quarter has seeds Stepanek and Tsonga, along with Richard Gasquet. Qualifying isn't done yet, but I'm hoping that Gulbis makes it in. Come on, Ernests!

So even though this draw isn't quite as strong, overall, it's still got some good matchups, and should produce some interesting tennis. Both of these tournaments should present an interesting picture of how the run-up to the end-of-year finals is going to go. Five spots have already been settled (Federer, Nadal, Murray, Djokovic, Del Potro) with the sixth nearly a sure thing (Roddick), but the last two are almost up for grabs.

The current top two, Davydenko and Tsonga, have a fair amount of points to defend in the coming weeks. Tsonga could actually drop down to 13 or 14 in a month. The next few (Verdasco, Simon, Soderling, and Gonzalez) all have a chance to grab one of those spots. Let's see how they do!