Bagel Bites: In da club

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• Previously on The Bagel: Slip slidin' away.
• H/T Discord Jeff: If you're in New York on Tuesday, there's an awesome tennis panel in Brooklyn featuring Giri Nathan, Kevin Nguyen (no relation), the GOAT Chloe Cooper Jones, and Brandon Taylor. (McNally Jackson)
• I made some jokes about Daniil Medvedev's passion for sodium bicarbonate.

• Todd Spiker goes long on the return of the Queen (and a few missives about an ESPN commentator): What a tournament Zheng Qinwen is having. 5-0 down to Madison Keys in the third? Wins the match. 5-0 down to Iga Swiatek in the first? Wins in straight sets. From outside the Top 100 and battling it out in qualifying, to her first Grand Slam quarterfinal since 2024. Now she's the one standing in the way of Elena Rybakina and the No.1 ranking. We love a Drama Qween. (WTA Backspin)

Zheng becomes just the fourth qualifier to reach the U.S. Open women's QF, after Barbara Gerken (1981, likely *decades* before she didn't invent pickleball), Kaia Kanepi (2017) and Emma Raduanu (2021).

Her next task: reaching a second career slam SF and, you know, seeing if she can stop a player who only needs to beat *her* to claim the #1 ranking.

• With Iga Swiatek and Naomi Osaka's losses on Monday, my prediction that Iga would qualify for the WTA Finals and Naomi would finish the year in the Top 10 took a punch right to the kidney.
• And so, the women's quarterfinals are set and they feature No.1s-6, the reigning Olympic champion, all four reigning Grand Slam champions, and a Billy Bowl!
  • [1] Aryna Sabalenka vs. [6] Linda Noskova
  • [3] Jessica Pegula vs. [26] Emma Navarro
  • [5] Mirra Andreeva vs. [4] Coco Gauff
  • [Q] Zheng Qinwen vs. [2] Elena Rybakina

• Despite Qinwen's dramatics and Mirra's three-set tussle with Anastasia Potapova, Monday belonged to the men. I can't say enough about how riveting the five-setters were between Karen Khachanov and Learner Tien, and Arthur Gea and Botic Van de Zandschulp.

• Seriously, if you have three hours, pull up the last three sets of Gea-Van de Zandschulp. I loved every second of it. Which is saying something, because that match lasted an ungodly 5 hours and 13 minutes.

• My man in Amsterdam saved match point to come from two-sets down to make his second Grand Slam quarterfinal. His first came in New York five years ago. I find it funny that this dude, who looks utterly miserable all the time, excels at the Extrovert Slam. He'll face Alexander Zverev next.

• Here are the men's quarterfinals:
  • [1] Alexander Zverev vs. Botic Van de Zandschulp
  • Karen Khachanov vs. [28] Alexander Blockx

Khanochov vs. Blockx for a spot in the Barnett Cup semifinal ?

— Tony (@tjc05.bsky.social) September 7, 2026 at 6:40 PM

• [11] Frances Tiafoe vs. Alex Michelsen
• [8] Ben Shelton vs. [2] Carlos Alcaraz

• It's time for a mid-tournament check in with Ben Rothenberg and Tumaini Carayol, and to no surprise, they are loopy. And deservedly so. Is it too late to ship them Roland Garros hard hats?

• I saw a some people tweeting on the hellsite, criticizing the on-site journalists for a Pegula R16 press conference that only lasted four minutes. To that all I have to say is: tell me you've never been a working tennis journalist on deadlines at a major tournament without telling me you've never been a working tennis journalist at a major tournament. Baby-brained stuff.
  • Ok fine, I won't vaguepost and I'll be very specific here and show my work: On that day (Saturday), Jess defeated...Sorana Cirstea in...straight sets. She was set to play either...Anna Kalinskaya or....Emma Navarro in the quarterfinals.
  • On that same day the following happened: Aryna Sabalenka beat Taylor Townsend to set up a showdown with Wimbledon finalist Linda Noskova. Carlos Alcaraz played the best match of his tournametn in dismantling Tommy Paul to set up a (see above) de facto final against America's great hope, Ben Shelton. Ben Shelton himself bested Stefanos Tsitsipas. ALLLLSO Frances Tiafoe played perhaps the best match of his career to beat former champion Daniil Medvedev.
  • Given ALLLLLL those things, not to mention preview content for the next day that featured Qinwen-Iga, Elena-Naomi, Coco-Jovic, let me put it simply: What were the top two stories that day? Hell, I'll be nice and expand it to the top four stories. What were they? If you put Jess in that Top 4, you're very incorrect!
  • OH AND LET'S NOT FORGET: THIS WAS SATURDAY. You know what happens on Saturdays? OTHER SPORTS. And a lot of times, THOSE SPORTS ARE BIGGER THAN TENNIS. And you know what that means? THERE IS NO ROOM IN THE NEWSPAPER OR WEBSITE FOR AN ARTICLE ABOUT JESSICA PEGULA'S STRAIGHT SET WIN OVER SORANA CIRSTEA TO MAKE HER ELEVENTH GRAND SLAM QUARTERFINAL WHERE SHE WILL FACE ANNA KALINSKAYA OR EMMA NAVARRO NEXT.

• So yeah, if you're gonna criticize journalists for not wasting a player's time – in this case, a player who has been MORE THAN GENEROUS WITH HER TIME in her previous 10+ minute pressers – show your work like I did. Otherwise, you just look like someone who has no idea how this world works. But gosh golly, aren't you loud and confident about thinking you do.

• Wimbledon says it won't be going the influencer route next year. (ESPN)
• Doug Robson rounds up the influencer discourse for the LA Times. (MSN)

Unlike Wimbledon’s manicured restraint or the French Open’s Parisian chic, New York has long offered something more unruly, with night tennis, celebrity, noise and spectators willing to make themselves part of the show. The atmosphere isn’t incidental to the tournament’s identity. It is part of the product.

If the USTA’s new chief executive has his way, there will be more of it. Craig Tiley, who took over the organization in July after two decades helping transform the Australian Open into an entertainment festival, said in a pretournament news conference he wants the U.S. Open to become a “tennis Disneyland.” He did not mean it as a warning.

• I had the pleasure of popping on NPR's "Morning Edition" at 6:30am to do a quick hit on the influencer situation. Cut me some slack, it was 3:30am my time. I'm an NPR-head though, so it's always a pleasure, never a chore. (NPR)
• Why has this whole influencer situation overtaken the discourse and why has it made it into the mainstream? What started as just an eyerolling annoyance for tennis fans has become a clean and clear distillation of what everyone is experience everywhere. It doesn't matter what country you live in, what public space you frequent, or what social media platforms you use: EVERYONE has a visceral reaction to the narcissistic behavior we see in public spaces these days. Call us boomers, call us killjoys, call us squares, but there is a very large segment of the global population that simply cannot understand what feels like an open breach of the social contract.

• As for tennis, I think a big reason this has spiked everyone's blood pressure is because the selfie/content/influencer/creator behavior used to be confined to the open outer grounds. This year's US Open feels like the first time it has moved inside the stadium. What's the big deal? Well, when people are doing whatever they're doing around the Unisphere, or the fountain, or snapping a pic of the Honey Deuce at the bars, I can just...avoid it. I can walk around it, keep my space, and move along my merry way. But when you bring that into the stadium, it's unavoidable, by nearby patrons and, in some instances, players and umpires.
• That being said, "influencers" – a term that no one is using in the same way to define the same type of person or behavior – are most certainly being scapegoated for a problem that has ALWAYS existed in Arthur Ashe Stadium since the roof was plopped on in 2018. Kicking influencers out isn't going to fix THAT problem. And THAT problem is waaaaaay more annoying than a ring light here and there.

Will hordes of influencers, weed smokers and mid-point talkers bring down the US Open?

This year, the noise at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center has officially become A Problem. But changing it would mean changing society

The GuardianAaron Timms

Tournament organizers have no standing to complain about all those naughty influencers when they themselves have so cravenly courted the very commercial dollar that brings influencers through the gates; a tournament built on brand activations and clammy promotional partnerships, with all its associated chaos, is very much a creature of their own making. If the USTA was actually serious about reducing the impact of influencers at the Open, it would reduce its own dependence on the brands that solicit them. But that, of course, will never happen.

But also: we live in a society! Yes, the smell of weed is unavoidable on the streets of New York, and sometimes (though I’ve never smelled it personally on the grounds of the National Tennis Center) that trademark skunk will waft on to the courts at the US Open. So what? Part of making a substance legal – as marijuana is in New York state – is that the odor of that substance is also legal. This city has always been an intensely odiferous place, and the land on which the US Open is now held has its own rich olfactory heritage; the ash heaps that used to dominate the point where the National Tennis Center now stands – made famous as the “Valley of Ashes” in F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby – were probably not, one imagines, all perfume and roses. As a nod to local tradition, what could be more appropriate than a US Open that’s consistently smelly?

I’m joking, of course, but part of coexisting with other humans is dealing with the externalities they generate – their sounds, their smells, their movements and outbursts. The debate over odor, noise, and influencer inanity exposes a deeper crisis in tennis and organized sport more generally. Every US Open now begins with a week of hand-wringing over ticket prices, hundred-dollar chicken-and-caviar nuggets, and the prospect of tennis’s flashiest tournament turning into a compound for the super-rich; the USTA then goes into crisis mode and activates all its standard messaging about “access” during the pre-tournament fan week, the underappreciated democratic benefits of demand-driven dynamic pricing, and the important work done to reinvest the windfall generated by the Open into grassroots development of the sport.

• In the course of prepping for that NPR hit, I looked into how the influencer economy has effected professional golf, another sport where players and traditionalists expect peace and quiet and minimal disruption. Here are some good reads:

The Masters bans cell phones. Here’s why everyone loves it

Scottie Scheffler says Augusta National’s cell phone ban at the Masters creates \

Golfweek, Golfweek

Golf tournaments blighted by rise in drunken fans and heckling, making it worse for everyone

As Rory McIlroy stood on the tee at Bethpage Black last September, trying to focus on the biggest team event in golf, thousands of fans packed around him. Some cheered. Many more jeered. Earlier,…

New York PostGavin Newsham

‘Happens more often than you think’: Why fan misbehavior could be golf’s next big problem

With gambling becoming more prevalent in pro golf, fans heckling players is becoming more impactful than ever before.

GolfZephyr Melton

• A must read: In 2024, a 19-year-old called in a bomb threat at the US Open to try and void a $100 bet on a WTA match. (Inquirer)
• It's so funny that the savior of men's tennis is equal parts baby girl and endearingly wholesome:

• Every time someone would ask me what the deal was between Hsieh Su-Wei and the Chans, my answer would be a heavy sigh and a vague, "It's...a lot." So thank you @hsieh_and_wong on Twitter for summing up, blow-by blow.

• And after Hsieh Su-Wei and Jelena Ostapenko's doubles win over Angel Chan and Maya Joint, it's all kicked off some more:

• H/t Discord Grey: Tinder is sending influencers to the US Open. (Instagram)
• H/T Disocrd Grey: No surprise, Kader Nouni is a bit hit. (Instagram)
• If you've heard the "khia" verbiage used in and around WTA standom, this is worth watching. You will quickly see the parallels in WTA tennis stan culture.

• I CANNOT EVEN ATTEMPT TO CONTAIN MY EXCITEMENT FOR THIS:

• I spent all of Monday researching antivirus and privacy protection software and finally bit the bullet and PAID MONEY for proper software. I feel very adult. I am also EXHAUSTED from sending over 50 emails to companies asking them to delete my account and all my data. But it was worth it. Big recommend! I ended up picking Bitdefender over Norton, but they are apparently both great.
• Jonathan Newman is back from the US Open and I was excited to hear his take from the first week:

• Bop of the Day: Get it? 50? 5-0?