Syntax issues aside, it seems New York really is the "concrete jungle where dreams are made of". At least, in a tennis sense.
"I'm not sure why but there's something special with this place," Casper Ruud said after he reached the semis at the US Open.
"This year there will be a new first-time winner also. It shows that it's possible to do it here in New York. It's sort of a city of dreams, I guess."
And while we can't speak to any sort of mysticism, the stats back up his claims.
There were no grand slam winners on the men's side of the draw at this year's US Open since the fourth round, when Rafael Nadal, Marin Čilić and Daniil Medvedev were knocked out.
In the end, with his maiden major crown in his first final, Carlos Alcaraz joined a long line of tennis stars for whom Flushing Meadows will forever be the site of their breakthrough on the biggest stage.
And while names like Sloane Stephens, Naomi Osaka, Emma Raducanu, Leylah Fernandez, Flavia Pennetta and Roberta Vinci will also elicit memories of breakthrough titles and surprise finals runs at Arthur Ashe, the women's draw at every major has been less predictable for the past two decades than the men (Serena Williams aside, of course).
In New York, you can be a new man
Since Novak Djokovic made his first major final at the 2007 US Open, New York has remained the best hope to break the Federer-Nadal-Djokovic-Murray stranglehold at the slams.
Of the past 30 men's finalists at the US Open, 12 come from outside that 'Big Four' group (compared to nine at Roland Garros, eight at Wimbledon, and just six at the Australian Open).
It is also the only major that has mixed up the champions with any sort of regularity.
Juan Martin del Potro (2009), Čilić (2014), Stan Wawrinka (2016), Dominic Thiem (2020), Medvedev (2021) and Alcaraz all won the final slam of the year, giving us almost an even 8-6 split between the Big Four and the rest of the field in the past 14 years.
And if we go back even further, to Nadal's first title at the 2005 French Open, only eight of the past 70 men's singles slams have been won by players not named Federer, Djokovic, Nadal or Murray, and the US Open has contributed six of those eight outliers.
In that time, only New York has hosted a men's final without any member of the Big Four.
And it's happened three times, with Čilić taking down Kei Nishikori in the 2014 decider, Dominic Thiem edging Alex Zverev in 2020, and this year's clash between Ruud and Alcaraz.
Since Djokovic's maiden decider in '07, the US Open has also played host to nine first-time men's finalists, which is almost twice as many as the French Open's five, which is the second-highest mark.
And perhaps more importantly, six players have won their first grand slam title in NYC in that time — Del Potro, Murray, Čilić, Thiem, Medvedev and Alcaraz.
Ruud, who reached his first major final at this year's French Open only to get waxed by Nadal, said the history in New York was "helping me with my game and my motivation".
So what is it about the US Open that makes it different?
Why do so many make it over the hump in Flushing?
The timing of the tournament certainly has a lot to do with it.
Coming towards the end of the year, many of the biggest names have had massive schedules, including deep runs at three majors, by the time the US Open rolls around.
There are also big Masters 1000 tournaments crammed into a brief window of a bit more than a month between Wimbledon finishing and the US Open starting.
Those Masters events are also on hard courts, and in a sport where the vast majority of players are heavy-hitting baseliners, pounding the pavement for long rallies day after day takes a major toll on the lower body in particular.
This year we saw Nick Kyrgios pull out of the Atlanta Open singles just days after playing the Wimbledon final, not citing any particular injury but rather general soreness and fatigue.
After his quarter-final loss in New York, during which he struggled with a knee issue, Kyrgios acknowledged that everyone on tour was dealing with some sort of niggle at this point in the year.
And that goes triple when you're constantly reaching finals in best-of-five, 128-player tournaments like the slams.
Since 2007, both Federer and Nadal have missed the US Open four times, with the Swiss falling before the semis five times and Nadal doing so on four occasions.
Murray has only failed to suit up twice, but he averages about a fourth-round exit, which makes it comfortably his worst major of the lot — perhaps unsurprisingly for a man who has battled so many leg injuries.
On the flipside, Djokovic, so famous for his fitness and durability, is odds on to make the final every year, having done so in nine of his past 14 trips to the US Open (for three wins).
It is, however, the only place where he has had back-to-back exits before the quarter-finals since 2007 (out in the fourth round in 2019 and 2020), and the only slam he has missed for non-COVID reasons in his career, sitting out in 2017 with an elbow injury.
In 2021, Djokovic was on track to become the first man in more than half a century to claim a calendar-year Grand Slam, but was rolled in straight sets by Medvedev.
Djokovic was far from his dominant self throughout the tournament and broke down sobbing before the final game of the final, showing the toll that a hectic year on tour can take on the mind as well as the body.
It's just a hard court
Hard court is also the most equal surface of the lot — not too slow, not too fast — unlike the somewhat specialised grass and clay.
So why has the Australian Open been the slam most dominated by the Big Four of late if it's also played on hard court?
Well, it's a tricky beast.
Melbourne Park used to have a reputation for unearthing bolters after Marcos Baghdatis, Fernando Gonzalez and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga reached the final from 2006 to 2008, but things reverted to the mean after that.
It's the first major of the year, played in often inhospitable conditions. It's a long journey for almost all players and comes shortly after an off-season break.
All that means preparation is more important than ever, and that's easiest if you've won more than $150 million in prize money during your career. It helps to be able to afford luxuries in terms of accommodation and facilities that are not available to every player, most of whom aren't global superstars.
But that dream of superstardom can start with one shining tournament in New York.
Will this be the launching pad to that level for Ruud or Alcaraz, who is the youngest men's world number one ever, or will he and Ruud be consigned to history as just another flashy guy in Flushing?
