After a week off for Labor Day, the PPA Tour returns with the Veolia Cincinnati Showcase presented by Six Zero. The tournament will take place at the Lindner Family Tennis Center, which recently underwent a $260 million renovation, making it one of the finest tennis/pickleball venues in the country. This is a Slam tournament with the points and prestige of being one of only four Slams on the PPA Tour. All the best players will be there.

 

 

Following up on the thrilling semifinal match in Las Vegas, where Jorja Johnson and Tyra Black gave Anna Leigh Waters and Anna Bright their first taste of defeat, everyone will be anticipating a rematch. If it is going to happen, it will have to be in the gold medal final, as #1 seed Waters/Bright and #4 seed Johnson/Black are on opposite sides of the draw. The toughest opponents for Waters/Bright in the top half of the draw are #3 Rachel Rohrabacher/Lea Jansen and #6 Jade and Jackie Kawamoto. I do not anticipate Waters and Bright having much difficulty getting to the final.

 

For the bottom half of the draw, the #2 seed goes to Catherine Parenteau and Parris Todd. The bottom half of the draw is sprinkled with quality teams. Anticipated Round of 16 matchups include #5 Etta Tuionetoa/Allyce Jones vs. #12 Brooke Buckner/Zoey Wang, and #7 Kate Fahey/Tina Pisnik vs. #9 Mari Humberg/Lucy Kovalova. The Johnson/Black combo is the class of the group in the bottom half, but can they defeat the several teams they need to win against to obtain that much-anticipated rematch against the top seed?

 

 

 

Top seed Ben Johns/Gabe Tardio will look to continue their streak of gold medals. They have a favorable draw. With the return to action this week of JW Johnson, we again have the Big Four of men’s doubles all in action. Johnson and CJ Klinger get the #4 seed and would face Johns/Tardio in the semifinals.

 

The other two of the Big Four are in the bottom half of the draw, #2 Federico Staksrud/Hayden Patriquin and #3 Christian Alshon/Andrei Daescu. The men’s field is loaded with quality teams, but can any knock off one or more of the Big Four?

 

There are a number of earlier round matches that should be a treat to watch. In the Round of 32, #21 Jack Sock/Donald Young will look to take on #17 Connor Garnett/Zane Navratil. The Sock/Young duo is the hardest hitting in the draw, and while Garnett and Navratil can certainly hit with power, they will use their superior pickleball shotmaking to try to keep the pace of Sock/Young off balance. 

 

If they both win their early round matches, #7 Riley Newman/Jay Devilliers will face #9 Eric Oncins/Matt Wright. It will be one of the very few times Newman and Wright have played each other since their well publicized 2024 partnership breakup. Expect some smack talk to be exchanged in that one.

 

Two lower seeds I am interested in following are #10 Pablo Tellez/Jonathan Truong and #19 AJ Koller/Yuta Funemizu. Truong is a rising youngster who is now playing with top level partners; can his performance measure up? Before Las Vegas, I had predicted a nice run for Koller/Funemizu and they made me look good by making the quarterfinals. Their draw is conducive to them making another nice run in Cincinnati.

 

 

 

Anna Leigh Waters and Ben Johns enjoy the top seed and the simple question is whether they are beatable. The best teams on their side of the draw are #3 Catherine Parenteau/Christian Alshon and #8 Rachel Rohrabacher/Noe Khlif. While those are both quality teams, I do not see either as very likely to beat Waters/Johns. Parenteau just does not look herself when playing against Waters; I think to some extent she finds it mentally difficult to play her best against her old doubles partner.

 

In the bottom half of the draw, there are some good teams who could challenge Waters/Johns in the final. #2 seed Jorja/JW Johnson have beaten Waters/Johns before and are a threat to do so in Cincinnati, if they can get to the final. Two big roadblocks are #4 Anna Bright/Andrei Daescu and #6 Tyra Black/Hayden Patriquin; but, those two teams will face each other in the quarterfinals, so the Johnsons can likely just wait and take on the winner. Another interesting match early match is in the Round of 16, with #5 Etta Tuionetoa/Federico Staksrud likely to take on #9 Tina Pisnik/Eric Oncins. That will be a fun match to watch, but I do not expect the winner to get past the Johnsons.

 

 

Anna Leigh Waters returns to singles action in Cincinnati and the obvious question is whether anyone can challenge her. #4 Parris Todd is on her side of the draw. Parris is playing good singles; is this the time she breaks through against Waters?

 

#2 seed Kate Fahey has the more difficult side of the draw. Her main challenger is #3 Kaitlyn Christian. Before they can meet in the semifinal, they have to get through #5 Brooke Buckner, #6 Lea Jansen, and #10 Salome Devidze. Look for a great semifinal from two of that group, but as always it is hard to see anyone topping Waters.

 

 

If you thought the men’s doubles draw was loaded with great players, just look at the men’s singles draw. Men’s singles remains, by far, the most difficult event to predict or to win. The men’s singles draw is so difficult that Ben Johns is only a #5 seed and this week he gets #57 Chris Haworth as a first round opponent! Johns vs. Haworth would be a perfectly acceptable final; instead they have to play each other in the Round of 64. 

 

The draw is just littered with great early round matches. Another Round of 64 match is #25 Donald Young vs. #35 James Ignatowich. PPA needs to put a radar gun on that match, as the ball will be flying in that one. For likely Round of 32 matches, we have #15 Zane Ford vs. #22 Grayson Goldin, #14 Gabe Joseph vs. #17 JW Johnson, and #2 Federico Staksrud vs. #32 Alex Crum. Crum has beaten Staksrud twice in a row, and he will look to make it three in a row in Cincinnati.

 

Last week’s gold medalist, John Lucian Goins, gets the #8 seed and a relatively easy draw. He is likely to meet up with #3 seed Connor Garnett in what will be a very entertaining match.

 

It is not an exaggeration to say that there are 40-50 players in the men’s singles draw who are perfectly capable of winning the gold medal. Top seeded Hunter Johnson has about as easy of a draw as you can get in men’s singles, but he still has to fight through five really good players to make the final. Expect the unexpected in men’s singles.

 

I had some big hits and big misses in Las Vegas. On the good side, I hit the mixed doubles final and result exactly and had the right two teams in the men’s doubles final. I missed the Johnson/Black upset and whiffed on both singles finals. Not too bad, as you may as well use a coin flip in picking men’s singles, and women’s singles without Waters is also tough to predict.

 

For Cincinnati, I expect Waters to be fired up and get a Triple Crown, defeating Kaitlyn Christian in singles, the Johnsons in mixed, and Johnson/Black in women’s doubles, getting revenge for Las Vegas. On the men’s side, look for Johns to be locked in so that Johns/Tardio defeat Staksrud/Patriquin in doubles. In men’s singles, I flipped several coins, and came up with Christian Alshon defeating longshot Alex Crum in the final. 

 

Enjoy the action on Pickleballtv. Follow me on X @pickleball_jim. Let me know your picks, especially on the impossible task of predicting men’s singles!