Taylor Fritz will probably want to refrain from street interviews for a while after a clip of him went viral a few days back, where he made an unsuccessful attempt at solving a math problem. Even though it made for a hilarious TikTok video, the tennis player attempted to explain why he wasn’t able to get the right answer.
In the clip posted by the Instagram account @alfredopastadonn, the interviewer asked Fritz how much 50 $20 bills would sum up to. The American, who said that he was a little drunk after coming out of the ESPYs, thought about the answer for a while and replied:
“Let me think for a second. Uh, every five is a hundred, so… every five is a hundred, so that’s… I’ve been drinking too much tonight. Every five is a hundred, so… there’s ten fives—I mean… it’s $10,000.”
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The interaction garnered attention from fans as well as his compatriot Ben Shelton, which then boiled over to his press conference at the Citi DC Open. When he was quizzed on whether the influencer attempted to embarrass Fritz by putting that video up, he admitted that he shouldn't have said yes to it while he was drunk and called it a 'setup'.
"I shouldn't have said yes to doing that. I knew it was one of those. I had just left the ESPYs after party... I'm actually pretty happy with how it turned out, because when I did the interview, in my head, I thought that I was, like, going to sound super drunk (smiling). But I actually sounded very coherent, like normal. I don't think you'd ever tell from watching the video. I was happy about that."
"I know those street interviews are such a setup too. He said he was going to interview me, ask me some questions, and he hit me with a math question. It's really bad. It's really, really bad," said the 27-year-old.
Taylor Fritz's failed attempt at defending himself in math
Taylor Fritz made a hilarious attempt at another math problem when asked by reporter Ben Rothenberg after his first-round win at the Mubadala Citi DC Open. He entertained another math problem from Rothenberg after he was asked about his viral math fail, but failed to solve that as well, which made for hilarious interaction.
Ben Rothenberg: What's 80 x 12?
Taylor Fritz: That's actually pretty tough, I'm not gonna lie (laughs). I might actually need a second for that one. I know 8...OK, so 8 times. It's hard, man.
Ben Rothenberg: You want me to-
Taylor Fritz: No, I think, OK: I think 8 times 12 is 72-1 think it's 720.
Ben Rothenberg: Uh, close, it's 960.
Taylor Fritz: I'm not doing myself any favors.
Irrespective of his multiplication mishaps, Fritz keeps adding wins to his name as he races through the first two rounds in Washington, DC, and will be taking on Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in the quarterfinals of the tournament.
