What To Watch This Week - Del Potro To Ignite US Open Summer? | Thebigtip

This week on the ATP tour we get three ATP tournaments, all of them 250 level events. The US Open Summer Series continues in Los Angeles this week, where defending champion Sam Querrey will miss the tournament with an injury and will fall to around #70 in the World. Mardy Fish is the #1 seed here, fresh off his victory in Atlanta.

The real intrigue in Los Angeles this week, though, is the no.2 seed Juan Martin Del Potro. The Argentine makes his return to the US summer hard courts, not having competed on this surface since dominating the field en route to wins in Washington and the US Open (and a runner-up in Montreal) in the summer of 2009.

Fans are anxious for his return to this surface, where many hope that he can challenge Novak Djokovic if he reaches his 2009 form.

An interesting player to check out in this draw is Steve Johnson. As the 2011 NCAA tennis champion, he will receive a Wild Card and compete in the US Open. He is playing in Los Angeles this week and will meet Gilles Muller in the first round (with the winner to meet Fish). He has talent and could surprise someone at the US Open, so it might be worth checking out his form now.

We also have an ATP event on clay in Umag, Croatia. The field is a little weak this year with no top 20 players competing. However, Fabio Fognini is in the draw and he is always worth checking in on. He will meet Rui Machado in the first round.

Also worth looking at in this draw is Juan Carlos Ferrero - a former World  no.1 and still recovering from an injury earlier this year. He won a 250 event two weeks ago in Stuttgart before falling in the first round this past week in Hamburg. He is defending a title here in Umag and will fall out of the top 100 unless he at least reaches the final.

The final event this week is on clay in Gstaad, Switzerland. Defending champion Nicolas Almagro is competing here for no apparent reason. He will move back into the top 10 tomorrow with his runner-up in Hamburg this past week and has already won three 250 level titles this year.

Top players cannot count more than two 250s in their rankings each year (although for some reason the ATP is currently letting him count three 250s and only three 500s) so Almagro cannot gain anything from this tournament.The amount of 250s that he plays is also just puzzling.

However, Almagro has very limited expectations on hard courts and probably wants to earn as much prize money as possible while there are still clay tournaments to be played. Gstaad has a strong lineup, with Stanislas Wawrinka, Fernando Verdasco, Mikhail Youzhny, and Feliciano Lopez also competing.

To read my entire thoughts from this week (Mardy Fish is playing too much), please click here.

Follow on Twitter at twitter.com/yesh222TSHQ