16 Takeaways from Roland Garros

Another French Open has come and gone, along with those dastardly bouts of rain that Mother Nature dropped on Paris for a few days. A new major-event queen was coronated, and the best player in men's tennis finally found himself king of Roland Garros after falling short a few times. Here are the Spin's highlights and lowlights from two weeks at RG16:

16

None other than Maria Sharapova opined in a timely fashion on the French Open women's final result.

This also begged the question: Would she have tweeted had Serena won?

15

Serena Williams downed Kristina "Kiki" Mladenovic in a tense match, 6-4, 7-6 (10). That round took more than two and a half hours to complete, after which a tender locker-room moment was captured on video. Advantage: everyone.

14

Similarly, Judy Murray and Djana Djokovic, mothers of five men between them, present to you that it doesn't all have to be high stress and vicious back-and-forth between families in this rather solitary sport.

13

Adidas' erratic-zebra or drunken-referee prints, whatever you referred to them as, were the talk of the tournament, sartorially speaking. While that's not necessarily a grand thing, the brand will probably sell through on the shoes. But who will actually sport those outfits in, say, a league match at one's local club? Then again, if you think major-event style is bound to that, and should be above the common consumer, that look was more or less a win.

12

Talk about consistency. Via Jon Wertheim's "50 Parting Shots" piece for Sports Illustrated, David Ferrer has now reached more Roland Garros quarterfinals than did Bjorn Borg, a five-time RG singles champion.

11

Shelby Rogers and Kiki Bertens made dream runs, to the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively, and mowed down a few seeded players to do so. (Among them: two-time Wimbledon winner Petra Kvitova.) The former, an American ranked in the 100s, and the latter, little known outside her native Netherlands, won not just scads and oodles of confidence but also some sure-fire padding to their bank accounts.

10

Of all the ballyhoo about players' verbal run-ins with chair umpires recently, Venus Williams delivered the far-and-away best exchange, dusting up Carlos Ramos from below before heading back out to see off Alize Cornet. Good on Venus for sticking up for herself; bad on Ramos for accusing the sportswoman of such a thing when her reputation is impeccable on tour.

9

Speaking of Cornet, while not technically against the rules of the game, she certainly breached decorum and then some in her win over Tatjana Maria before falling to Venus. Her reputation, as if it didn't already, precedes her into every tournament she enters moving forward. Maria was outraged and claimed that more than 100 fellow touring pros reached out to her after her after the match. In the end, well, we'll always have that memorable, literal finger pointing.

8

Can we please retire that Andre Agassi–Steffi Graf + Parisian children + Eiffel Tower tennis court ad from Longines? Can we do that forever? Great. That or the Slam-grabbing pair has to go to their next beloved Halloween celebration as the Pied Pipers.

7

The wire camera, or spider-cam if you will (and I will), proved a nuisance on this event's stadium court, so much so that Andy Murray complained about it in the midst of losing the men's singles final to Novak Djokovic. It's just wrong when a well-meaning promotional concept inserts itself in the match conversation.

6

After falling to 2-8 in major finals, Murray took the high road about fans' reactions to him over the course of the championship match—or rather to their relative adoration of Djokovic, who they haven't always loved. And take the high road he should: Every player faces down a hostile crowd from time to time, and a Davis Cup champion, two-time major winner, and Olympic gold medalist has to know that.

5

Martina Hingis capped off a Career Slam herself over the weekend, winning the Roland Garros title alongside Leander Paes—and beating her women's doubles partner, Sania Mirza, to do so.

4

Caroline Garcia and the aforementioned Mladenovic may not be Bonnie Raitt fans, but they still gave their home-country "something to talk about" in winning the women's doubles title at Roland Garros. In doing so, they defeated 2013 French Open champs Elena Vesnina and Ekaterina Makarova. Maybe a bit of Serena's winning ways rubbed off on Kiki during their fleetingly filmed locker-room chat.

3

Feliciano Lopez and Marc Lopez (no relation) defeated Mike Bryan and Bob Bryan (every relation) in a tight, three-set men's doubles final. Don't look now, but the Bryans, winners of 16 Grand Slam men's doubles titles haven't garnered a major crown together since the 2014 U.S. Open. Separately: How does Feli Lopez, now a major titlist, look so fresh after a protracted doubles championship?

And yes, Nicolas Mahut is your new ATP No. 1 in doubles action. (See, there's life after suffering The Most Debilitating, or Most Drawn-out, Wimbledon Loss Ever.)

2

Judy Murray again, this time making hay of "Muguruthless," the Spin's favorite player-name pun since we christened Elena Dementieva as Demented.

Many sources reported that Garbine Muguruza, upon seizing her maiden major singles trophy, remarked that she thought to herself, "Rafa has won nine of these?" And lest we forget, yes, the sky—or the WTA penthouse itself—is the limit for this 22-year-old, who plays for Spain by way of Venezuela.

1

Novak Djokovic composed himself well to clamp down on his first Roland Garros championship and 12th overall major. And in doing so, his assault on Roger Federer's 17-major record ramped up.

FiveThirtyEight's Carl Bialik has much more on that. And as to why the Djoker has made life no laughing matter for his primary foes, the Wall Street Journal's Tom Perotta writes that it's all about his serve. As in, he fixed it.

From here, the rightly heralded City of Light leans into the grass-court season, and Wimbledon awaits. Storylines from Serena's determination to match Steffi Graf to Djokovic's quest for the calendar-year Grand Slam—yea, even a Golden Slam—will play prominently o'er that fortnight. Questions about the Hingis-Mirza partnership, the health of Federer and Nadal, and more loom large as well. Pimm's cups, strawberries and cream, await us.

Follow Jon on Twitter @jonscott9.