
One of the year’s biggest events is this coming weekend; the 2025 Golden State Open, the brainchild of two former touring pros in @David ” Bobby” Horn and @Adam Manilla, hosted by two of Stockton’s legends @John Ellis and Steve Cook. Both pro tours are onsite at the Bay Club Pleasanton in the East Bay portion of the San Francisco bay area, which means a huge prize purse fundraising effort was done and we get Mixed Pro Doubles for the second time in as many months.
R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=48678
There’s 38 men’s pros and 21 Women’s pros on hand, with fireworks and unexpected results anticipated. By the time you read this play has already started, with the round of 64 on the mens side getting a rare Wednesday evening start.
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Let’s preview the Draws. We’ll do the two singles draws and then the Mixed Pro draw. They’re hosting Open doubles draws for both genders, but the top pros are not entered.
Men first: as we covered in our IRTclub Fantasy Fastbreak podcast with @BBrian Pineda (see here for the link if interested: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1590097114629503/?multi_permalinks=3794248374214355&hoisted_section_header_type=recently_seen ), we are missing the top three ranked players out of this draw and four of the top 10. Kane and Jake both have weddings (separate weddings we believe), Andres had a family commitment, and Lalo is elsewhere along with his girlfriend Herrera.
This leaves Rodrigo Montoya to get a #1 seed, a career high. In fact, most of the top 8 at this event are at career high seedings: Mar at #2, Natera at #3, Alonso at #6, and Carter at #8 are all career-best seeds, and the mashed up top 8 is going to give us some new and unexpected head-to-heads here.
More importantly, the absence of Kane in particular historically has been a big indicator that we may get a first time winner.
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In the round of 64 and 32, here’s a few matches to watch for:
– Mauro Rojas vs Emir Martinez: Rojas a former US Junior National champ, and Emir a former top Junior from Mexico. Tough opener, and as it turns out it went three before Rojas fell.
– There’s a few unknown Bolivians who made the trip and who could make waves: Arnez & Borja in particular. Santiago Borja is the two-time defending World 14U junior champion. Both won their openers to face off against top ranked pros in the 32s.
– Sendrey vs Wolfe in the 32s is a solid test for the teenager to see if he can take out a semi-regular IRT touring player.
– Mexican Junior Santiago Castillo, who owns a slew of Mexican Jr National titles including the 2024 16U title, faces off against IRT veteran @Thomas Carter in a match he can’t look past.
– Carrasco-Mendoza in the 14-19 matchup could be close: how much is Mendoza improving versus how quickly is the aging Carrasco’s skills fading?
– If Borja wins his first, he plays into #2 Mar. A good pro debut for the 15yr old.
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Round of 16:
– Martell-Carter in the 8/9 is an interesting matchup; they’ve never met in a top-level event.
– We’re projecting two lefties who both play out of the Bay Area a lot in Collins and Manilla into the 16s.
– Tough draw once again for Parrilla: last week Moscoso played into him early, this week is Garcia, who’s demonstrated his ability to beat nearly anyone on tour.
– Gastelum-Alonso could be close: they met at 2024 Mexican Nationals and Alonso prevailed in three, but Gastelum has come a long way. This is Pineda’s big upset pick.
– the dangerous Miranda meets Moscoso in the 7-10 matchup; this is too bad for Miranda, who has been eyeing a deep run.
– #2 Mar faces off against #15 Flores in a huge trouble area for the Mexican. If Flores plays up to his capabilities, this might be a huge upset.
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Projected Qtrs:
– Montoya over the Carter/Martel winner: Montoya will be favored no matter who comes out here, and has to like his draw this weekend in general. No crazy bolivian junior world champs, no Moscoso seeded 16th, etc.
– Manilla-Garcia: Manilla made a massive run here last year as the host; can he do it again?
– Natera v Alonso: both players are probably looking at each other going, “hey i should win this” and get back to the semis. Could be close
– Moscoso will be favored over whoever comes out of that bottom half, whether its a huge shock like Borja, an upset-minded Flores, or Mar holding serve against two top Bolivian juniors he’s set to face early.
Semis:
– Montoya over Manilla/Garcia winner: Montoya’s only obstacle to the final this week is injury.
– Moscoso over Natera/Alonso winner: this could be over fast.
Finals; I’m calling a Moscoso-Montoya final, with Conrrado taking the title.
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Women’s Pro Singles preview:
Like with the Men’s draw, the ladies draw is missing a few key players. Herrera is out, as is Lawrence and Salas (surgery). So that’s three top 10 ladies missing. What we do have in this draw is a bunch of top Junior Mexicans who we rarely see, including the Perez-Picon sisters. Plus, we get a rare sighting of Rhonda Rajsich, which is awesome to see the future Hall of Famer.
Preview of the draw:
round of 32s to watch for:
– top Mexican U21 player Cynthia Gutierrez makes her LPRT debut and faces Maria Renee Rodriguez-Josey in a tough one for the veteran
– Andrea Perez PIcon, the reigning Mexican 16U champ and finalist at World Juniors last December, faces Norcal’s ERica Williams. Andrea’s older sister Estefania feeds into the Legend Rajsich.
Projected 16s of note:
– The 8/9 between Centellas and Parrilla will be awesome.
– #4 Gaby Martinez projects to play rising USA player Annie Sanchez, who’s played some top players close lately.
– Mejia could face Rhonda in a generational battle of top players
– Munoz-Laime is probably the match of the round.
– Amaya-Lotts will be a battle.
Qtrs on: From here, I see the top four ladies advancing as they typically do: there’s such a gap between Longoria/Mejia/Vargas/Gaby to the rest of the tour right now, it’s hard to predict any upsets. I see Longoria topping Mejia in the final.
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Mixed Pro Doubles
I love Mixed pro doubles: we just have no idea who’s going to win some of these early matches. Normally I look at the two women’s players and try to use that as a determining factor (thinking that the weakest link on the court will get the most shots and will play the biggest part in the match result), but that doesn’t always tell the whole story, and the doubles acumen of the players involved needs to be given more weight. With Salas missing (one of the best mixed doubles players ever) and Longoria skipping out, there’s some new teams and tough matchups.
Here’s some matches to look for and some guesses how this draw will go:
In the 16s, easily the match of the round is the Manilla siblings versus the Argentine mixed national team of Garcia/Vargas: how this is an opening round match is beyond me.
In the quarters:
– Mar/Mejia should advance
– I like Natera/Munoz over the Parrilla sisters
– Moscoso/Martinez should beat whoever comes out of the above 6/11 match, but once again this is the toughest part of the bracket.
– Montoya/Laime is an amazing team and should top Miranda/Mendez.
Semis:
– Mar/Mejia should beat Natera/Munoz … but when these two teams met in the 2023 World Doubles competition it was an 8,9 win for the Chileans. So who knows. I think Munoz is a better doubles player than her counterpart, but Mejia is the harder hitter. Mar-Natera is probably a wash on the left, but Mar is a superior doubles player when he plays with Montoya on the right.
– Moscoso/Gaby over Montoya/Laime, but I have no confidence here. Montoya won the 2025 World Doubles mixed title with Paola in both 2023 and 2025, and Gaby should hold her own as a solid doubles player on the right. But, Laime is no doubles slouch and they could surprise here. Great match.
In the final, i’ll go with the winner of the bottom semi, who i’m thinking is going to be Moscoso/Gaby.
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IRT Club Fantasy: If you’re in the IRT Club, sign up to play Fantasy Racquetball along with myself, Brian Pineda, and other club members. Also, be sure to tune into our Fantasy Fast Break podcast, which we do before and after every IRT Tier 1 event!
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