{"id":69564,"date":"2026-09-09T13:19:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T13:19:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/69564\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T13:19:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T13:19:12","slug":"bill-simmons-doubles-down-on-controversial-tennis-take-amid-ben-shelton-carlos-alcaraz-us-open-classic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/69564\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill Simmons doubles down on controversial tennis take amid Ben Shelton-Carlos Alcaraz US Open classic"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\/ Follow us on Google Discover <\/a> <\/p>\n

Bill Simmons has doubled down on his hot take about Grand Slam tennis matches taking too long.<\/p>\n

Simmons shared his controversial opinion on social media earlier this week, ahead of the 2026 US Open quarter-finals.<\/p>\n

Many tennis fans will now consider the QFs a perfect example of why he is completely wrong about best-of-five-set matches.<\/p>\n

Ben Shelton defeated Carlos Alcaraz in a five-set thriller<\/a>, while Frances Tiafoe beat Alex Michelsen from two sets down.<\/p>\n

Even though the US Open<\/a> QFs produced some all-time great battles, Simmons reiterated that they took too long.<\/p>\n

\"CarlosPhoto by Matthew Stockman\/Getty ImagesBill Simmons says tennis matches are too long despite epic US Open quarter-final<\/p>\n

Bill Simmons<\/a> explained earlier this week that tennis matches should never take 4.5 hours, as they often do at the Grand Slams.<\/p>\n

There have been many examples of five-set matches taking over 4 hours at this year\u2019s US Open, and fans generally enjoy the drama.<\/p>\n

However, Simmons insisted that nothing designed for entertainment should take so long, no matter how impressive it is.<\/p>\n

He said, \u201cTennis matches are too long. We\u2019ve lost the narrative with this. These guys are too good. These matches are routinely 4.5 hours now, and I just think it\u2019s absurd. <\/p>\n

MORE US OPEN TENNIS STORIES<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve talked about this forever \u2013 I don\u2019t think anything should be 4.5 hours: movies, sporting events, a dinner, anything. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to do anything for 4.5 hours that is supposed to be entertainment. I just think they really have to rethink this.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the tennis purists are going to be like, \u2018That\u2019s crazy. F\u2013 you. Go f\u2014 yourself.\u2019 I get it. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut I think they should seriously think about changing the sets from six [games] to five to win the set.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked about the incredible match between Frances Tiafoe and Alex Michelsen<\/a>, Simmons doubled down on his take.<\/p>\n

Anthony Dubbundo wrote: \u201c22 combined unforced errors in the first seven games of the Tiafoe\/Michelson 4th set. This is the tennis that Bill Simmons wants to take away from you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Simmons responded: \u201cI\u2019m watching \u2014 I\u2019ve carved out the next 3 hours for the 4th and 5th sets.\u201d<\/p>\n

The sports podcaster is clearly not going to change his mind, but the majority of tennis fans disagree with his take.<\/p>\n

The two men\u2019s quarter-final matches on Tuesday night were spectacular, and it would have been a shame to cut them short.<\/p>\n

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\"\"\/ Add to Preferred Sources <\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Follow us on Google Discover Bill Simmons has doubled down on his hot take about Grand Slam tennis…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":69565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[419,26455,271,28,616],"class_list":["post-69564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-ben-shelton","tag-bill-simmons","tag-carlos-alcaraz","tag-tennis","tag-us-open-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}