Andy Murray wasn’t expected to win the Rome Masters this week at the Foro Italico tennis complex. In the same breath, the Scotsman also didn’t figure to bow out in his first match at this venerable claycourt event. One bad day at the office is a fact of professional sports, but Murray’s great misfortune is that his misstep in Rome will likely reverberate through the next month.

Murray, you see, didn’t merely lose his round-of-32 match on Wednesday to Argentina’s Juan Monaco, 1-6, 6-3, 7-5; the No. 4 player in the world missed out on a great chance to secure a coveted prize in the realm of men’s tennis.

Just what did Murray miss when he lost to Monaco, just one month after topping the South American at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami? Murray lost much more than a chance to win a clay title or earn a rematch with Rafael Nadal on the upcoming weekend; the most promising male tennis player without a Grand Slam trophy frittered away an opportunity to gain the No. 2 seed at the French Open, the year’s second major tournament.

Here’s a brief overview of the rankings battle at the top of the ATP Tour, which explains why Murray’s three-set failure in Rome rates as a significant event.

Before reaching the semis at Monte Carlo a week and a half ago, Murray had never gone past the round of 16 at any claycourt tournament. This means that under the ATP’s rankings system, Murray stood to gain a ton of points with a big spring swing on the red dirt of Europe. Under ATP guidelines, the points from one year’s event are added or subtracted based on the following year’s performance at the same tournament. For example, if a player made a 2008 semifinal at a Masters event, and then made the semis at that same tournament in 2009, the distributed point totals would basically stay the same (a slight difference would exist in this particular tennis season only because the ATP made a minor tweak in its point allotments; fundamentally, though, the basic principle remains intact).

Here’s a more precise look at the numbers involved in the rankings chase: This year’s Monte Carlo semifinal result gave Murray 360 rankings points, a 210-point increase over his 150-point (round of 16) showing at the same event in 2008. When Federer–a Monte Carlo finalist in 2008, good for 700 points–crashed out of the 2009 tournament in the round of 16, the world No. 2 registered just 90 points under the ATP’s adjusted numerical formula, which created a net loss of 610 points for Federer. Murray’s big gain and Fed’s far greater forfeiture of points suddenly created an almost-unthinkable reality: Strong showings at Rome and then Madrid (beginning on May 11) would enable Murray to overtake Federer for No. 2.

This loss to Juan Monaco is so damaging for Murray, then, because it put an abrupt halt to the Scot’s pronounced ascendancy. By losing in the round of 32 in Rome, Murray will accumulate just 45 points, a 25-point decline from his 70-point showing last year in Italy. Another semifinal would have allowed Murray to bank an additional 290 points in Rome, but this flameout means that Federer–a quarterfinalist last year (250 points)–can add to his points lead over Murray by making the semis this week at the Foro Italico. With a 6-4, 6-4 win on Wednesday over Croatia’s Ivo Karlovic, Federer punched a ticket into the round of 16, meaning that he’s only two wins from notching a points gain over Murray, and only one win from avoiding an appreciable point loss.

Murray has already announced that his next tournament will come at the Madrid Masters in mid-May. Murray could have opted to play in lower-tier tournaments to accumulate points before the French Open, but by going straight to Madrid, the Scot now has to thread the needle just to have a chance at surpassing Federer for second place on the ATP Tour. The Murray-Federer competition will be easier to dissect once Roger’s run in Rome is over, but one thing can safely be said: Murray will have to outdo Federer by at least one round in Madrid, and probably two, in order to have a realistic chance at No. 2.

Why all the fuss about this topic, you might ask? Isn’t Rafael Nadal the reigning No. 1 in men’s tennis, the man who deserves every accolade at the present time? Isn’t the battle for “Numero Uno” the only thing that matters? Yes, Rafa should be praised from the rooftops, and yes, being the very best is the only way a tennis player gets remembered. With that being said, the fight for No. 1 simply isn’t a source of debate or drama in the tennis community. In the short run, “Who’s Number Two?” is actually a more pressing question, for a surprisingly simple reason: Whoever holds the No. 2 ranking come May 25 of this year will be the second seed at the French Open.

While it’s true that all tennis players aspire to be No. 1, there’s more than a little value to being No. 2 as well. Murray and Federer–like any other male tennis players not named Nadal–desperately want to be the second seed at Roland Garros so they can reside in the other half of the draw and avoid Rafa until the final. The No. 3 player in the world might avoid Nadal in the French semis if the chips fall favorably, but the No. 2 man is guaranteed to miss the Spanish superpower until the final Sunday in Paris. Being No. 2 in tennis is rarely thought of as a huge prize, but in light of the Nadal juggernaut that’s emerged over the past year, it’s worth a lot of dollars (and rankings points) to avoid the mesmerizing Mallorcan until the last match of any tournament, especially a slam.

Andy Murray has been playing the best tennis of anyone other than Nadal over the past several months. Yet, in the course of one awful afternoon, the up-and-comer suddenly saw his path to a French Open final get a lot tougher. Round-of-32 matches at non-slam events are rarely cause for alarmist themes or pronounced emotional reactions, but this is the exception that proves the rule. Barring a Federer collapse, the Swiss legend–once on the precipice–will likely be able to preserve his No. 2 ranking for a few more weeks, and earn the right to avoid Rafa Nadal for as long as possible at the French Open.

OTHER NOTABLE SCORES FROM WEDNESDAY IN ROME:

Jurgen Melzer d. (7) Nikolay Davydenko, 7-5, 7-6 (5)

Richard Gasquet d. (9) Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, 7-6 (2), 6-4

Paul-Henri Mathieu d. (11) David Ferrer, 6-3, 2-6, 6-2

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