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<\/a><\/p>\nThis urn, Tiafoe confirmed when we spoke at the Australian Open today, had been his tool of choice a few months ago as he attacked the viral \u201c75 Hard\u201d challenge<\/a>\u2014billed as a \u201ctransformative mental toughness program.\u201d One of the five core components of the 75 Hard regimen is drinking a gallon of water each day.<\/p>\n Tiafoe finished the 75-day quest \u201ca while ago,\u201d he told Bounces, but the canister lingers weightily among his equipment for sentimental reasons.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve got an emotional attachment to it now,\u201d Tiafoe said.<\/p>\n Emotions of many kinds have been running strong in Tiafoe\u2019s orbit in recent months. A loss to 144th-ranked qualifier Jan-Lennard Struff at the U.S. Open last September became the inflection point for Tiafoe not only to shake up his entire coaching team, but for the staging of a series of conversations with the backsliding 27-year-old that he describes like an intervention.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was the people closest to me, speaking at me in a very urgent manner,\u201d Tiafoe said. \u201cLike, \u2018Alright, let\u2019s hit the [panic] button, let\u2019s figure this out\u2019\u2014in not-so-calming words.\u201d<\/p>\n Those forceful words came from people including Tiafoe\u2019s parents as well as his longtime girlfriend, Ayan Broomfield, and his agent Jill Smoller.<\/p>\n \u201cImmediately after the U.S. Open I had a very serious conversation with my girlfriend and my two agents,\u201d Tiafoe said. \u201cIt\u2019s one of those things where you\u2019re not really even saying anything; you\u2019re just getting cooked and you\u2019ve kind of got to take it. And don\u2019t argue it, don\u2019t try to fight it\u2014that\u2019s kind of what it was.\u201d<\/p>\n The words were simple and blunt.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was very thorough and for a kid to understand\u2014let\u2019s just put it that way,\u201d Tiafoe said. \u201cIt was like: you\u2019re either doing it or you\u2019re not, right? Let\u2019s stop making excuses, stop doing this and that. You\u2019re either doing it or you\u2019re not\u2014and it definitely hit home. Hence why I just kind of went dark: trying to figure out what that looked like. Now I\u2019ve got a bunch of clarity and feel ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n Tiafoe played\u2014poorly\u2014at Davis Cup and a couple tournaments in Asia, but otherwise shut down his season to be able to process the crossroads his inner circle told him he was facing. This rescheduling included Tiafoe\u2019s surprise withdrawal from Laver Cup, where he\u2019s been a fixture.<\/p>\n \u201cI had the funnest talk with [Laver Cup chief executive] Steve Zacks after that,\u201d Tiafoe said, laughing. \u201cBut yeah, Laver Cup is incredible, man.\u201d<\/p>\n Losing out on the lucrative exhibition event was a small price to pay, hopefully, for what Tiafoe hopes will be a lasting change in his career.<\/p>\n \u201cFrom people that are closest to me\u2014people that I know genuinely want the best for me\u2014it hits me much harder,\u201d Tiafoe said of the tough talk. And this is the first time I really did something about it. I was like, \u2018OK, let\u2019s really dive in and let\u2019s see what happens.\u2019 <\/p>\n \u201cAnd it\u2019s going to be a continuing evaluation of this,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not like just because I made a choice for a couple months that [snaps] things are going to happen. Can it? Sure. But if it doesn\u2019t, I\u2019m still going to stay on it. I\u2019m still going to continue to find ways to be better, find ways to continue to push myself and be uncomfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n Tiafoe, who turns 28 this week, said he\u2019s still trying to find the right path to where he wants to go.<\/p>\n \u201cI just have to figure out what I really want out of it,\u201d he said. \u201cYou know, what really makes you tick, what\u2019s really going to make you get up in the morning and want to do it, and do it the right way. The biggest thing is just the price of regret is far greater than the price of discipline; so that\u2019s kind of just been my thing. I don\u2019t want to look back and be like, if \u2018I would have… I should have…\u2019\u2014I\u2019m not trying to do that. I\u2019ve had a lot of conversations about that, and that\u2019s kind of what inspires me right now.\u201d<\/p>\n I was struck, as Tiafoe described the harsh-but-helpful reckoning, by how seldom conversations like this seem to happen in tennis, even in careers that are clearly careening off track. <\/p>\n Here\u2019s our exchange when I suggested that:<\/p>\n Ben Rothenberg, Bounces: I feel like it\u2019s pretty rare for people to tell the truth to tennis players. I feel a lot of tennis players walk around in bubbles, with people not having tough conversations with them, just telling them that everything is OK all the time\u2026 Do you appreciate when people are willing to be straight with you, to be direct and not sugarcoat things? Because people are looking out for their jobs, looking out for meal tickets. <\/p>\n And sometimes in this sport, you get people who are sugarcoating everything all the time. So having direct conversations sounds like it would be a blessing and a rare kind of thing to get in this world.<\/p>\n Frances Tiafoe: Look, you said it, not me. And that\u2019s, hence, why a lot of things are new and different for me right now\u2014because of that thing, that very thing you just said. <\/p>\n It\u2019s totally true. But the thing is, if you don\u2019t do it, then the cycle will stay the same. Because we\u2019re not going to get out of our own way\u2014why would we? We\u2019re making money, we\u2019re playing across the world, people scream our names. We\u2019re comfortable; why change? <\/p>\n But then people tell you, \u2018OK, what you\u2019re doing, it\u2019s not going to work. If you want to keep doing this, this is the result. And if that\u2019s what you\u2019re going to live with, and are going to be comfortable with, then OK\u2014we\u2019ll stop talking. But if you\u2019re trying to go to The Moon, this right here is not it. <\/p>\n Ben Rothenberg, Bounces: And you\u2019re trying to go to The Moon? <\/p>\n Frances Tiafoe: Hell yeah!<\/p>\n Perhaps fittingly for a moon mission, Tiafoe enlisted a scientist.<\/p>\n Tiafoe has brought on Dr. Mark Kovacs<\/a>, best known as a performance physiologist and biomechanics researcher, to be his main coach at this Australian Open.<\/p>\n But technique and biomechanics, Tiafoe said, wouldn\u2019t be Kovacs\u2019 only areas of concern.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m working on a bunch of things in my game; I think everything can get better,\u201d Tiafoe said. \u201cHe\u2019s great with moving as well. So yeah, I mean, he\u2019s super knowledgeable about the game, on and off court, so I thought it was a great hire.\u201d<\/p>\n Kovacs told Bounces that the hire only happened \u201cin the last few weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe was making some changes, and asked if I could help him,\u201d Kovacs told Bounces. \u201cOriginally it was just really to try to help him for a week or two, reset, get him on the right track. And then he asked me if I can come to Australia and start working with him a bit more\u2014and that\u2019s where we\u2019re at right now.\u201d<\/p>\n Kovacs (PhD, FACSM, CTPS, MTPS, CSCS,*D, USPTA, PTR<\/a>), who was an All-American tennis player at Auburn in his undergrad days, told Bounces that his approach would reflect the holistic nature of the sport.<\/p>\n \u201cDoing more of the day-to-day coaching as well is obviously something that we\u2019ve talked about a lot,\u201d Kovacs said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s fun to have a little bit more say in some of those areas as well, because it all ties in together.\u201d<\/p>\n But though he understands the core movements of the sport, Kovacs said there would be no full-scale rebuild in store.<\/p>\n \u201cFrances is in the middle of his career\u2014he\u2019s going to be 28 pretty soon, so you\u2019re not making drastic changes,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s more about: how do you maximize him and his game and his ability that he has, and try to get him to be the best version of himself?\u201d<\/p>\n Kovacs, who told Bounces that he has known Tiafoe since the player was only 12 years old, wanted to make sure before committing to the job that the former prodigy wouldn\u2019t be prodigal with his talent.<\/p>\n \u201cI mean, I\u2019ve known Frances a very long time, and we had some non-negotiables that we talked about,\u201d Kovacs said. \u201cIf I was going to help him, these things had to happen\u2014and he\u2019s done them. He\u2019s been phenomenal. He\u2019s committed to his health, his fitness. He\u2019s improved his habits. It\u2019s a lot of non-tennis stuff, obviously, as well. But on the on-court side, it\u2019s just trying to make him the most aggressive version of himself and make sure that he can play as well as he can in the Slams and for the regular season.\u201d<\/p>\n The detail-oriented Kovacs said those \u201cnon-negotiables\u201d often meant that Tiafoe had to be \u201cdoing the boring stuff consistently\u201d day-in, day-out.<\/p>\n \u201cPractice plans are something that we\u2019re following pretty closely and he\u2019s doing a great job with that. He\u2019s sticking with the things that all the greats do on a daily basis that people don\u2019t really always see. That\u2019s something that he\u2019s gone up and down on doing throughout his career, so that\u2019s something we\u2019ve been working on. And he\u2019s done a fantastic job doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n Like his player, Kovacs spoke of reducing possibilities for future frustrations.<\/p>\n \u201cThese careers are finite\u2014players only have a small window to play at their best\u2014and you want to optimize that,\u201d Kovacs said. \u201cThat\u2019s a lot of the discussion: how do you optimize what you have and how do you get the most out of your game, so that when you\u2019re done with this great journey you don\u2019t have significant regrets or concerns at the end of it?\u201d<\/p>\n Once I knew Tiafoe was going to be the subject of today\u2019s Bounces dispatch, I was curious to get the thoughts of a couple of his American contemporaries. <\/p>\n I didn\u2019t ask Tommy Paul, who came up in the same junior cohort, about Tiafoe directly, but instead about his own transformation. No one in my years covering tennis has flipped the switch as dramatically and lastingly as Paul: he had a hard-earned reputation as a party boy as he tried to transition from a successful junior career to the pros, most direly demonstrated when he showed up to a doubles match at the 2017 U.S. Open still drunk from the night before and got himself and his partner double bageled.<\/p>\n Paul told Bounces on Saturday that the rewards made the reform worthwhile. <\/p>\n \u201cOnce I made that decision to really be on myself and pushing myself to be very professional, it kind of got to the point where I enjoyed it, you know?\u201d said Paul. \u201cI want to. I hate losing; I want to win, and I know that\u2019s what it takes to win. Everyone\u2019s different, but for me, I need to be professional, I need to take care of my body, I need to practice, and have like a good routine. And I enjoy it because I know that it\u2019s going to help me.\u201d<\/p>\n The second American I wanted to ask about Tiafoe on Saturday was someone who in some ways is his polar opposite, albeit while clearly with a great deal of affection for him: Jessica Pegula. <\/p>\n Pegula spoke about Tiafoe at length, so I thought it would make more sense to embed the video to do her entire answers justice.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s such a fine line with not taking away who he is and what makes him so good, and you don\u2019t ever want to mess with that,\u201d Pegula said of efforts to change Tiafoe. \u201c\u2026when I\u2019ve seen him [and] he has a new coach or something, I\u2019m more [thinking] \u2018Gosh, I hope they don\u2019t take away what makes him him.\u2019 Because that\u2019s always going to be, at the end of the day, what makes him so good.\u201d<\/p>\n When I spoke to Kovacs earlier, he assured that changing Tiafoe\u2019s nature was not on the table.<\/p>\n \u201cFrances is a great human being, great person, very fun-loving\u2014and that\u2019s not going to change,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not about changing him; it\u2019s more [about] just doing this daily work that needs to be done. And throughout his career, he\u2019s done it at different times, but [we\u2019re] trying to get that to be just more consistent. And you would say the same with most players out here: they\u2019re all trying to figure out that way to do that good-quality daily work, day-in, day-out.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/a>Frances Tiafoe in listening mode again during a practice break with Mackie McDonald. Enormous water bucket still in tow. (Photo by Ben Rothenberg for Bounces)<\/p>\n<\/a>Frances Tiafoe and Mark Kovacs on the practice courts on Saturday at the Australian Open. (Photo by Ben Rothenberg for Bounces)<\/p>\n<\/a>Frances Tiafoe, Mark Kovacs, and Brian Kubik on the practice courts on Saturday at the Australian Open. (Photo by Ben Rothenberg for Bounces)<\/p>\n<\/a>Frances Tiafoe keeps his eye on the ball as Mark Kovacs and Brian Kubik keep their eyes on him on the practice courts on Saturday at the Australian Open. (Photo by Ben Rothenberg for Bounces)<\/p>\n