Who's Who from the US in the Men's Singles at the Australian Open?

And we’re off! The new tennis grand slam season is under way in Melbourne, Australia.Over the next two weeks, ending on Sunday, January 26, the numbers will be whittled down to two, one of whom will walk away with the Australian Open first place trophy. With sixteen hours difference between the east coast of Australia and the east coast of the United States, we in Florida wakened to find thirty-two of the starting cast of a hundred twenty-eight players already packing their bags and booking flights home.

Let’s begin the event with a look at the ten men who call the United States home. Of those players, six are widely scattered across the continent.

• Steve Johnson – (Walk Over) – 24 – 6’2” – Orange, CA – 1 previous appearance at the Australian Open

• Bradley Klahn – (Unseeded) 23 – 6’ – Poway, CA – This will be his first appearance at the Australian Open.

• Denis Kudla – (Qualifier) – 21 – 5’11” – Arlington, VA [Originally from Kieve, Ukraine] – 1 previous appearance at the Australian Open.

• Sam Querry – (Unseeded) – 26 – 6’6” – Las Vegas, NV [Originally from San Francisco, CA – 7 previous appearances at the Australian Open.

• Michael Russell – (Unseeded) – 35 – 5’8” – Houston, TX [Originally from Detroit, MI] – 8 previous appearances at the Australian Open

• Rhyne Williams – (Qualifier) – 22 – 6’1” – Knoxville, TN – 1 previous appearance at the Australian Open

 The remaining four players claim residence in my adopted home state of Florida.

• Ryan Harrison – (Unseeded) – 21 – 6’2” – Boca Raton, FL [Originally from Shreveport, LA] – 4 previous appearances at the Australian Open

• John Isner – (Seeded 13^th) – 28 – 6’10” – Tampa, FL [Originally from Greensboro, NC] – 4 previous appearances at the Australian Open. Isner is especially remembered for his epic  11-hour and 5-minute victory over Nicolas Mahut in the 2010Wimbledon Grand Slam event.

• Wayne Odesnik – (Qualifier) – 29 – 5’11” – Weston, FL [Originally from Johannesburg, South Africa] – 3 previous appearances at the Australian Open

• Tim Smyczek – (Unseeded) – 26 – 5’9” – Tampa, FL [Originally from Milwaukee, WI] – 1 previous appearance at the Australian Open

As of yesterday evening (this morning here in the Eastern Time Zone)

• Kudla has been easily defeated by Florian Mayer of Germany  in three sets  6-1  6-4 6-2

• Johnson put up a little more of a fight before being defeated by Adrian Mannarion of France  7-5 7-5 6-2

• Querry bested Santiago Giraldo from Columbia in a hard-fought, five-set match 3-6 7-6(3) 6-7(3) 6-3 6-3

• It took Dmitry Tursunov from Russia four matches to send Russell home 1-6 6-4 7-6(4) 6-2

With one out of four retired from the Open, the remaining six United States players will face their challengers in the second half of the first round tomorrow.

More details on these and other players at the AustralianOpen can be found at the official site.