US Open Day 2

Day 2 was completely, even weirdly packed with tight matches and upsets. We're still in the first round, here! It's expected that people should be cruising through their matches, as often as not. Well, that wasn't really the case today. I can go through pretty much every court and talk about at least one big upset or near miss.

On the main stage, the day session went about as long as it could have. Jelena Jankovic nearly lost to Romanian teen Simona Halep, who actually served for the match in the third set, but couldn't close it out. After that, Djokovic was down two sets to one, and a break in the fourth set, while clearly hurting from the heat. The sun started to set, the court cooled down, and Djokovic somehow managed to pull that match out in five. And then Jarmila Groth took the first set from Sharapova with some hard-hitting tennis before the former champ managed to come through. There were stretches where all of those players, who are contenders to go deep this fortnight, looked like they were down for the count.

The top seeds, who made up the night matches on Ashe, were never in quite the same dire straits. Nadal won in three sets against Teymuraz "Tsunami" Gabashvili, but the Russian held his own for about 30 games, which is no small accomplishment. But for a couple missed shots in the tiebreaks, that could have been a completely different match. Caroline Wozniacki breezed past her opponent, the current NCAA champ who has never played a pro match. Despite the fact that they're the same age, the gap in experience was vast.

Louis Armstrong had a trio of seeded players upset, shockingly. Marcos Baghdatis, who had a great summer and nearly won the U.S. Open series, fell in the fifth set to French vet Arnaud Clement. Disappointing for Marcos, who has never had a good tournament in New York. I find that odd, since the conditions aren't that much different than the Australian, where he made the final. After his loss, one of the flying Bondarenko sisters upset Na Li, the first of the top ten seeds to fall on either side. She was clearly troubled by the heat, which was the deciding factor in a lot of today's matches. Blake and Zvonareva both won, but then Nadia Petrova lost to the German Petkovic in a third-set tiebreak. Petrova's section of the draw is not especially strong, and I had her getting through to the quarters, so that was not a strong performance.

The Grandstand managed to avoid any actual upsets, but the first three matches were all damn close. Kuznetsova needed three sets to get past 39-year old Kimiko Date Krumm. After that, Mardy Fish has a bizarrely topsy-turvy match in which he needed five sets to win, but in the three sets he won, he dropped only a single game. And then Fabio Fognini nearly repeated his upset of Fernando Verdasco (the Italian won at Wimbledon in the first round) but Hot Sauce was too strong, getting past Fognini 6-3 in the fifth set. The less said about Coco Vandeweghe's subsequent one and love drubbing by Lisicki, the better.

The outside courts were maybe not quite as exciting as the main show courts, but they still had more than their fair share of shockers. Mirjana Lucic beat Alicia Molik, and while they're both veterans, Lucic has essentially been out of the top level of competition for seven years. Any win from here is an upset, but it's good to have her back. Tamira Paszek beat Lucie Safarova, and Peter Polansky beat Juan Monaco. David Nalbandian nearly went down the same way that Baghdatis did, but the Argentine managed to get past Rik De Voest in five sets. He probably could have won in four, if not for a net cord winner on set point during the tiebreak. Good for him for recovering from that setback.

On lucky court 13, two seeded players fell. Jeremy Chardy beat Ernests Gulbis, who was hating the temperature and playing in the heat of the early afternoon. If he can either find a way to beat the heat or get a favorable weather report during his two weeks here, he can do well at this tournament. As it stands, he was winless in the grand slams this year. On the plus side, there's no where to go but up. Radek Stepanek also lost on court 13, but considering his injuries of late and the quality of his first round opponent, I was not particularly surprised by this result.

Way out on court 15, Lourdes Dominguez Lino upset 30th seed Yaroslav Shvedova. I know what you're thinking - Shvedova really got a seed? Still, it's an upset. That's ten seeds out in the first round, and it's not even quite done yet! Pretty brutal, if you ask me.

Looking ahead to tomorrow, we'll conclude the first round on the men's side, and get the ball rolling on the second round. We have yet to see Andy Murray, Sam Querrey, John Isner, Almagro, or Wawrinka. They're all in action tomorrow, in addition to a trio of young Americans who each have a shot at an upset.

Jack Sock takes on Marco Chiudinelli - he's the least experienced of the three American young guns, but he also has the easiest opponent, arguably. I don't know enough about Sock's game to know if he's got a chance, which makes me think it's not terribly likely. Ryan Harrison gets Ivan Ljubicic, which is a pretty brutal first round draw, but we haven't heard much Ivan since he won the first hard-court Masters event earlier this year. It's a battle of youthful vim and vigor against age and experience. It would be a big upset for Harrison, no doubt. But he's got a shot. The most anticipated of these matches is going to be Donald Young against Gilles Simon, which is another tough one. Simon is a former top ten player who's hoping to get back to his former heights, and Young has yet to live up to his potential. This one could go either way, depending on which Simon shows up, and how Young can deal with the pressure. He's not getting any younger.

If you're looking for fun matches, check out Sela-Malisse on court 7, and definitely go to see Dustin Brown open the day on court 8. He's a ton of fun to watch, and he can play some great ball. Unfortunately, that doesn't happen that often and when it does it doesn't last for very long, but it's great to see if you can catch it. He's a tremendously fun player who I hope develops some much-needed consistency in the coming years. Also, watch for Stakhovsky-Luczak tomorrow. Stakhovsky is another player who needs to average out his performance from day to day. He won a tournament last week, but he did that the week before Wimbledon as well, and he lost in the first round there. In fact, he's only won a single Grand Slam match in his entire career.

Tomorrow's night matches are pretty exciting, as they feature Kim Clijsters and Andy Roddick. Clijsters goes up against Australian teen Sally Peers, while Roddick gets the significantly more formidable challenge of facing Janko Tipsarevic, who bested him at Wimbledon in 2008 and pushed Federer to five sets at the Australian Open that year. Tipsy is a legitimate threat, particularly if Roddick is not feeling completely fresh. The conditions of a night match should suit Roddick, for this sort of a contest. It will be the first of many tests that the top American will have to pass if he hopes to make a run this year, considering how brutal he may find his section of the draw. Here's hoping it's a good one!