Nadal needs to prove himself before he can be bet on for a title again.
Rafael Nadal is the number 2 seed heading into the BNP Paribas Masters. However that ranking is largely reflective of play from the former half of 2009, not the latter
Nadal has 8,845 ranking points but the bulk of them come from events prior to his loss at Roland Garros to Robin Soderling. He has 2000 points to protect in a couple months at the Australian Open, and then 3800 more points to protect in Rome, Monte Carlo, Barcelona, Rotterdam, and Indian Wells in February/March/April 2010. With the majority of his tour points coming from the early part of the year Nadal should be targeted for an upset in Paris this week.
Nadal still hasn't beaten anyone better than Fernando Gonzalez since coming back to the tour during the summer hard court season. In fairness, he still hasn't lost to anyone worse than Marin Cilic either but there are plenty of great players in the field in Paris playing at a high level of tennis right now.
Looking at the draw for Nadal at the BNP Paribas Masters he has the bye afforded to the seeds and then he may draw Marco Chiudinelli, a player at a career high for his ranking who played Federer tough a few days ago in Basel. Later on, if Nadal is still around, Jo Wilfried Tsonga or Novak Djokovic could easily take Nadal out.
Our recommendation is to avoid Nadal in the futures market for this event while targeting him for a potential upset at long odds.
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