From the New York Times, I'm Sabrina Tavernice and this is The Daily.

Over the weekend, the U.S. Open tennis tournament crowned its winners.

But for a lot of people, this year's open was not about who won.

It was about a player who wasn't even on the court last week, Serena Williams.

Today, my colleague Natalie Ketroweff speaks with New York Times' culture critic, Wesley Morris,

on the tennis grade's retirement and on her impact on tennis, sports, and the country.

It's Monday, September 12th.

Hi Wesley, welcome back.

Oh my God, Natalie, hi!

Okay, so I want to start with a disclosure, some real Ta.

What's Ta?

Which is that a little bit ago, we taped an entirely different episode about Serena Williams,

who announced last month that she would be retiring from professional tennis.

And we made said episode anticipating that she would be out after the first round of the U.S. Open

because you, Wesley, two-time Pulitzer prize winning culture critic

in lifelong tennis fan, you were absolutely certain of it.

I mean, look, yes, I did think that in round one of the 2022 U.S. Open,

her very last professional tennis tournament, I thought she was going to lose.

Right, but then she went on this run, not a long run, but not a tiny one either.

And we're going to get to that.

But the crazy thing about it, about how we blew it, is that that's the idea behind this episode.

It's how Serena Williams always seems to defy expectations.

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