Hey, everyone …
• If you can explain this moment in Rotterdam, you win …
• Tennis unity … at its best. If only this were the default mode …
• ICYMI, Here’s Jessica Pegula and what she has endured recently
Onward …
Mailbag
Jon,
I think men’s tennis will be just fine sans the Big Three. There are some really gifted players on the rise. I was particularly impressed with Wu Yibing and the 18-year-old Arthur Fils. Carlos Alcaraz, Casper Rudd, Jannik Sinner, Holger Rune, Andrey Rublev, Felix Auger Aliassime and Taylor Fritz are among the many young talents that will take tennis into the next decade and beyond. I don’t know if we will have a “Big Three 2.0,” but there is much to celebrate on the ATP tour. I know I will be watching.
Donald, Tennessee
Amen. I would add Ben Shelton. I would add serve-and-volleying dervish Max Cressy. I would add Yoshi Nishioka …
Social media (media media?) rewards for hot takes and extreme positions. The Big Three is overrated and we will soon forget them! No, wait … men’s tennis is dead after the Big Three retires! Here’s the less sexy take: The Big Three is/were extraordinary and we are unlikely ever to see again three men play concurrently and amass more than 60 majors among them over two decades … when they exit, the sport will experience a decline and an adjustment … and then a bounce back, as new stars emerge and new rivalries harden.
Furthering Donald’s point: (a) Wu Yibing and Arthur Fils (and, for that matter, Shelton)? At the start of the year—i.e., six weeks ago—who was talking about them? Plots move fast in tennis; (b) among the aforementioned names, note the variety in games and nationalities and body types and personalities. We can acknowledge the weight and heft and (made-up word) unprecedentedness of the Big Three without forfeiting optimism for the future of men’s tennis.
Jon,
I don’t get it. You often say that Nick Kyrgios is good for tennis and you like his energy. Then you (correctly) criticize him for the news last week [pleaded guilty to] assaulting his [former] girlfriend. Which is it?
Charles, Brooklyn, N.Y.
This comes up a lot. “You praise a player for X, but then criticize him for Y. Where’s the consistency?” Fandom is wonderful. Fandom is the engine that drives sports. Fandom is an expression of who we are and what we stand for. That said, fandom is, by definition, not a rational exercise. And it does not tend to lend itself to nuance.
Divorced from (unencumbered by?) fandom, it’s easier to look at players objectively. And, like all Homo sapiens, players contain multitudes; they are complex, capable of the awesome and the indefensible. Win 23 majors? Great. Threaten to asphyxiate an official with a tennis ball (and then lie when questioned about it)? Less great. Win 22 majors—and organize a de facto players union? Great. Go unvaccinated against COVID-19, test positive for COVID-19, go out in public without revealing you’re COVID-19-positive (and let Nigel Farage into your home)? Less great. Win 22 majors? Great. Open a fancy restaurant in Saudi Arabia, part of the country’s effort to cleanse its image as it jails dissidents and ranks among the worst human rights abusers? Not great. Shake up tennis with your brutal candor and uncommon approachability and disdain for convention? Great. Plead guilty to assaulting your former girlfriend. Not great.
Again, if you’re a fan you’re inclined toward blanket, unconditional love. Any criticism must come from a hater or a media jackal or hypocrite or a [fill-in-the-blank]ist. If you’re not a fan, you’re likely more inclined to acknowledge that people are complicated, capable of good and ill … and shouldn’t be immune from having their complexities and polarities explored and called to attention.
So, no, I do not feel like a hypocrite for commending Nick Kyrgios for his candor and color and disruption of tennis, and then condemning his pleading guilty to a physical assault of a former girlfriend. In fact, it would be weird (malpractice?) to mention one and not the other.
Aside:
So last week, a reader asked whether Brad Gilbert might be a suitable coach for Jenson Brooksby. I responded that Brooksby might be better served (pun intended) by a coach who improves his point-starting, and not a coach accustomed to winning ugly. A former player reached out and made a fair/excellent point: Coaches adapt to the player, and don’t necessarily impart their own games and styles on their protégés. Juan Carlos Ferrero is not encouraging Carlos Alcaraz to hang and counterpunch from the baseline. Goran Ivanišević is not encouraging Novak Djokovic to switch to a lefty serve-and-volleyer. For that matter, Brad Gilbert did not encourage Andre Agassi or Andy Roddick to junk up rallies. Who knows whether Brad and Brooksby would have chemistry together. But Gilbert’s style when he was a player in the 1980s isn’t really relevant to whether he would be fit for the job.
Hello Jon,
Enjoyed last week’s opening question about the overwhelming success of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic and how other players have reacted to this. Discussions of the success of the Big Three often leave out the person who broke through with repeated success while Nadal, Djokovic and Federer were at the peak of their success—Stan Wawrinka. The generation of players who never won a major–Berdych, Tsonga, Monfils, Raonic, Nishikori—and those actively competing for ones such as Zverev, Tsitsipas, Rublev—can opt to focus on the historical success of the trio or can look to Wawrinka as a model to emulate.
Winning the 2014 Australian Open, Wawrinka took out both Djokovic in five and beat Nadal in a final. He beat Federer and Djokovic in the 2015 French and later bested del Potro and Djokovic in winning his third slam, the 2016 U.S. Open—all while never being number one.
One cannot attribute his slam success as a fluke or luck. He challenged, competed and won against the greatest players. The question to the lost generation should be “Why can’t I be as successful as Stan?”
Cheers,
Ken Wells
Newport, R.I.
Boom. Great post. You’ll recall that Wawrinka’s catchphrase—and the titular academy run by his excellent coach, Magnus Norman—was “good to great.” A cliché, already used, you say? Fine. But that was still the organizing principle. Wawrinka essentially said, “I’m not satisfied being a number eight to twelve player. Yes, life is good, and I make millions and drive a nice car and don’t lack for companionship. But it’s not enough. I am going to commit to Big Trophy hunting. Novak? Roger? Rafa? You guys are great. But not unbeatable.”
And deep into his career, Stan beat Djokovic and Nadal to win his first major. Federer and Djokovic to win his second. Djokovic to win his third. Damn. As Ken says, you can have a lucky Raducanu-esque, Gaudio-an magical major, 14 days of bliss. You don’t get three lucky majors. (And reach the final of a fourth.) With no guarantees, Wawrinka put in the extra work—and did the mental spadework—to win majors. Much respect. Where is that attitude among today’s players?
Jon,
It was intriguing to quantity just how well Americans are doing in tennis these days. In the latest live rankings, Tommy Paul is ranked in the top 7, Paul and Frances Tiafoe in the top 14, and 2 more Americans in the top 26. The 13 Americans in the top 56 are more than twice the next most (Spain with 6), more than 3 times Argentina’s, and more than 4 times the 3 for Russia, Great Britain, France and Italy. And of the 11 Americans in the top 46, only John Isner is older than 25.
On the women’s side, it’s about the same. With the added bonus of Jessica Pegula and Coco Gauff being in the top 6 and with good chances to rise. There are 12 Americans in the top 58, with only the Czech Republic (7) and Russia (6) anywhere close.
What's your sense of why now?
Rob
Sure, a few points:
1. Of the planet’s 10 highest-earning female athletes, eight of them play tennis. There’s no NFL or NBA or Premier League poaching the best athletes. There are abundant college scholarships. All of which is to say, there SHOULD be more top U.S. women than men.
2. As for the men, the USTA comes in for credit here, no doubt. Some of the players had more of a relationship—and received more funding/attention—than others. Some succeeded with very little federation help or intervention. Still, America has currently minted more top-50 players than any other country.
3. There’s something to the clustering effect. Taylor Fritz, Frances Tiafoe, Reilly Opelka and Tommy Paul—all born within a few months—push one another and provide handy barometers against which to measure themselves.
4. The next step: quality to match quantity. An American male has been a quarterfinalist or semifinalist at the three majors running. That’s impressive. But one title—the first since Roddick in (all together now) 2003—would mean more than a high concentration of players in the top 50.
Jon,
Marat Safin, Tomáš Berdych, Koyla Davydenko, David Ferrer, Andy Roddick, Juan Martín del Potro, The Great Ball Striker David Nalbandian and Lleyton Hewitt. The so-called weak era? Not to Fernando. How do you think these greats would compete in today’s era?
Fernando
Yes, there are multiple generations that will be telling their grandkids: “I was really friggin’ good. I was just born at the wrong time.” Interesting (and of course unanswerable) question. How would the also-rans of, say, 2003–10 match up against the Zverev, Rublev, Tsitsipas, Thiem, Medvedev types? You’d like to think that sports evolve* and that today’s players would manhandle those from generations past. But I’m not so sure. Roddick against Tsitsipas? del Potro against, say, Zverev? Ferrer against Ruud? Hmmm …
*Ignore this if you are not into the NBA. But a friend and I were looking at rosters from the 1990s. It’s staggering how many players who played then would not make a roster in 2023.
Jon,
In Courtney Nguyen’s late 2022 profile of Alycia Parks on the WTA site, Parks said her goal for 2023 was to end the year in the top 10. Given what we saw of her in Lyon, is this realistic (provided she is healthy all year)? She was mightily impressive against a Caroline Garcia whose level was high.
Read all about it. She is already up to No. 51. Parks, that is. Not Courtney. Courtney’s top 10 for life.
Shots
- Who is Frances Tiafoe?
- The International Tennis Hall of Fame will announce the inductees for the class of 2023 on Saturday, Feb. 18 at the ABN AMRO Open in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The members of the class will be introduced on Centre Court during the day session, in between the ATP doubles semifinal and singles semifinal (approximately 2:30 p.m. CET, 8:30 a.m. EST). Induction into the International Tennis Hall of Fame is the ultimate honor in tennis, recognizing the sum of a person’s career as being amongst the most accomplished and impactful in the history of tennis.
