How Easy Was That?

We always look at how hard it is to win a professional tennis event, but for some reason I got to wondering who had the easiest route to a title in 2012. (These are the kind of things that I think about with a week off of work) I think it occurred to me because of the rise in the number of 28 man draw events that allow the top four seeds to play only four matches to win an event, rather than the traditional five matches in a 32 man draw event.

So, here we go. To make this evaluation I considered the average ranking of the players beaten to win the event and the size of the draw.

32 Man Draw Events
Buenos Aries/151.6, David Ferrer won this event in his usual dogged style of running down every ball and punching the clock like a UAW factory worker. He earned $87k by beating players with an average ranking of 151.6. Two of his opponents were ranked over 230 in the world another over 160.
Delray Beach/156.4. Kevin Anderson won his first professional event in singles. He will probably not have an easier path to his second trophy as the average ranking of his opponents was 156.4. His opponent in the first round was ranked #502 and the player he beat in the final was ranked #173. To Kevin's credit, he did beat John Isner, ranked #11 in the semi-final.
St. Petersburg/177.8 The easiest road to a title in a 32 man event came to Martin Kilzan who's win in St. Petersburg came at the toll of playing opponents with the average ranking of 177.8. He lost one set of the eleven he played. Kilzan was ranked #45 at the time of the event and he only had to beat one played ranked higher than him, Mikhail Youzhny ranked #29. This was Martin's first tournament victory and earned him a career-high payday of $70,365. I am sure he will have to work harder to win his second.

28 Man Draw Events
Kitzbuhel/118.75. Robin Haase won his first professional event on the big tour by beating opponents with the average ranking of 118.75 over the four matches he played.
Metz/164. The acrobatic Wilfred Tsonga won this event by beating his first round opponent ranked #502 and by beating his other three opponents of which none were ranked higher than #28. His average match lasted 83 minutes and he only lost one of the nine sets he played. Not bad for $107k!
Casablanca/191. Pablo Andujar must be living right. He was lucky enough to win this event for the second time by beating opponents with an average world ranking of 191. Casablanca is traditionally one of the weakest tournaments of the year because of it's position on the calendar at the beginning of the clay court season. Andujar was ranked #58 at the time of the event  and he only had to beat one player ranked higher than him, Albert Ramos ranked #52, in the final. He also only lost one set of the nine he played. When he won the event in 2011 the average ranking of his opponent was #57.

It is good work if you can get it!

I did not look at Masters Series Events or Majors, there is no easy road to winning any of those events. Although, I do have some thoughts on the easiest Major to win and I will post that blog at a later date.

I do have a few predictions for 2013. The Canadian Milos Raoncic will come of age in 2013 and be firmly planted in the top five by the end of the year. The Joker will win two Majors. Federer will not win a Major in 2013. Nadal will not win the French Open is 2013. Tipsarevic will drop out of the top ten. Del Potro will take his place in the top five and win his second Major.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Number 88 With a Bullet

Congratulations to Michael Russell who climbed back into the Top 100 by winning the ATP Challenger Event in Knoxville, TN. By reaching the number 88 spot Michael should post his third straight Top 100 season, all after the age of 32. No one works harder at improving his craft. You have to take your hat off to a guy who is pushing himself to new heights while other pros his age are looking for a local club to teach tennis to middle aged hacks like myself.

Keep it up Michael Russell.

All Mixed Up

This summer I did something I have not done in a long time, I played mixed doubles. I was playing with a friend at the Indian Village Tennis Club in Detroit and a couple of the women members approached us to play a set of doubles. As the rules of the club are to give up the court to doubles players, to maximize the court usage, we gladly agreed to play. It was a lot of fun, but it was a more controlled kind of fun that the slam-bang singles match I was counting on.

It got me to thinking about the lost art of mixed doubles. It seems like a game of a gentler time. When I think of mixed doubles I think of men playing in white linen pants and women playing in long white dresses and iced tea on the veranda following the match. While it is probably the most social form of tennis, it also seems to generate the least amount of exercise.

There is also a mixed doubles culture. There is an unwritten rule that the man cannot 'go after' the woman with a big serve or a body shot while at the net. It is a very polite, gentile form of the game.

I remember when John Lloyd won the Wimbledon mixed titles in 1983 and 1984 with Wendy Turnbull. He was the first British man to win a Wimbledon title of any kind in a number of years. That seemed like a pretty big deal to the people of England at the time.

So, as I often do, I started thinking about the history of mixed doubles and if men make better mixed doubles players than women.  Also, why is there no formal professional mixed doubles rankings? I thought that because it is a sport where the men and women play equally together it would be a great idea to come up a ranking, regardless of man or woman to determine who is currently the best mixed doubles player in the world. Again, this ranking would be blind to being male or female and simply be a ranking of who has the best mixed doubles record in 2012,

Normally there are only four professional mixed doubles tournaments each year, held at the major events;  The Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon, and The U.S. Open. There is a bonus this year because the Olympic Games added mixed doubles to the agenda for the first time since 1924. (This gives us one more data point)

So, lets get to it. There are four grand slam tournaments that have mixed doubles plus the Olympic Games. Interesting enough, there were ten different players who won a mixed doubles title. (Five different men and five different women, duh.) They were:

Australian Open: Sands-Mattek/Tacau
Roland Garros: Mirza/Bupathi
Wimbledon: Raymond/M. Bryan
U.S. Open: Makarova/Soares
Olympics: Azarenka/Mirnyi

Using the same ranking point system for Grand Slam tournaments from the professional men's tour and allowing the same number of points for Olympic Games as for a men's Masters event, the top ten player rankings for mixed doubles for 2012 are as follows:

1. Leander Paes/India, 3,780 points. The veteran from India did not win one of the major events but his consistency won out. He was a finalist at the Australian Open and Wimbledon with Vesnina. He was also a Semi-finalist at Roland Garros. Leander has won six major mixed doubles titles in his career.
2. Elana Vesnina/Russia, 3,480 points. Elana also did not win one of the major events, but she teamed with Paes at the Australian Open and Wimbledon. She has not yet won a major mixed doubles title in her career.
3. Sania Mirza/India, 3,470 points. Sania won the title at Roland Garros with Mahesh Bhupathi. She has also won the 2009 mixed doubles title with Bupathi at the Australian Open.
4. Lisa Raymond/USA, 3,160 points. Lisa won the Wimbledon title with Mike Bryan. She also won the Olympic Bronze medal with Mike Bryan. Lisa has won four other mixed doubles titles in her career.
5. Mahesh Bhupathi/India, 2,990 points. Mahesh won Roland Garros with Mirza. Mahesh has won eight major mixed doubles titles in his career.
6. Mike Bryan/USA, 2,960 points. Mike won the Wimbledon title with Raymond and also won the Bronze medal at the Olympic games with Raymond. Mike has won three major mixed doubles titles in his career.
7. Bruno Soares/Brazil, 2,450 points. Bruno won the US Open title with Ekaterina Makarova, it was Bruno's first Major title of any kind.
8. Max Mirnyi/Belarus, 2,260 points. Max won the Olympic title with #1 women's player Victoria Azarenka. Max has won three major mixed doubles titles in his career in addition to the Olympic title.
T9. Bethanie Mattek-Sands/USA, 2,180 points. Bethanie won her first major title of any kind at the Australian Open, the first major tournament of the year.
T9. Horia Tecau/Romania, 2,180 points. Horia was another first-time major winner with Mattek-Sands partnering with her to a win at the Australian Open.

Ten different people from six different countries. I wonder what it says that 3 of the top 5 players are from India.

Historically the best mixed doubles player was Margret Court from Australia who won 19 major mixed doubles titles during her career. The man with the most major mixed doubles titles is Owen Davidson also from Australia with 15 titles.

However, if we constrain our results to only the Open Era, since 1968, Martina Navratilova has the most mixed doubles titles with 10. The man with the most major mixed doubles titles in the open era is Mahesh Bhupathi with 8 titles.

So, there you have it. This year's mixed doubles top ranking goes to Leander Paes from India. Leander, there is no fancy trophy or big fat bonus check that come with the title, but there is the satisfaction of knowing that one man in Michigan recognizes your greatness in a game that has become a lost art.

Congrats to Michael Russell

Congrats to Michael Russell, Detroit native, who reached his first ATP final (singles or doubles) in Atlanta this week. At the age of 33 that is a great accomplishment. With that performance Michael reaches his career high double's ranking of 145. Oh yeah, he also reached the singles quarterfinals to push his singles ranking up to number 83.

Bring Back the Bonus Points!

This week Tommy Haas in the midst of another comeback from injury beat the #5 ranked player Jo-Winfried Tsonga at the BMW Open in Munich. This is a tremendous feat for a guy coming back from injury. Haas is currently ranked #134 in the world. In the old days Haas would not only would have been awarded the standard 20 points for winning the second round match he would have also been awarded 45 bonus points for beating the 5th ranked player. Instead his effort garners him the same ranking effect as Marcos Baghdatis got for beating the #138th ranked qualifier Dustin Brown. That makes no sense to me. Extraordinary effort should be awarded and reflected in the player's ranking. Bring back the bonus point system to men's tennis.

Davis Cup Stunner

I am still amazed that John Isner beat Federer in a Davis Cup match in Switzerland. What a monumental effort. Then Fish and Harrison won the clincher in the doubles. Beating the Swiss without the Byran Brothers? That was a great weekend for USA Tennis.

What a Match!

Hello, welcome to Pat's Tennis Blog 2012.

So, I had to get up at 4:20 AM on Sunday morning to let our dog outside to 'answer nature's call'. Being the tennis addict that I am, I knew that the Australian Open men's final was being broadcast on ESPN. I flipped on the television and watched the middle of the first set for about 15 minutes. When I went back to bed I was secure in knowing that when I got up later in the morning I would be able to watch the re-broadcast starting at 9:00 EST. At 8:00 AM, I got up to make a pot of coffee, toast a bagel, and read some of the New York Times before the 9:00 deadline. I instinctively turned on the tv, which was still on ESPN from the night before, and the men's final was on. At first I thought that I had read the cable guide wrong and that the re-broadcast started at 8:00 instead of 9:00. It took me a few moments to realize this was the same live match that I turned off about 4 hours earlier. The fifth set had just started I was treated to one of the most dramatic sets of tennis that I can remember.

Back and forth between Nadal and Djokovic. Nadal was hitting the ball harder in the fifth set than he had in the first set. Both men were staggering around the court from exhaustion (think of the end of Rocky, and Rocky II for that matter) When Nadal broke Djokovic I thought that it was curtains for 'The Joker.' But, he broke right back and it was nip and tuck until Djokovic put away the wining forehand. At one point Djokovic fell down after a 26 shot rally. I thought that he was close to throwing in the towel, except he played on. Nadal was also looking spent and for the first time that I can remember, he actually looked frail at the end of the match. It was great theatre and a great performance from two great players.

The woman's final had none of the suspense or drama and was fitting for a less than memorable women's Australian Open. A one-sided affair that was notable more for the level of the grunting than the level of tennis. The biggest thing that I got from the final was that it took Azarenka 25 tries to win her first major. Like it is a sin to mature at your craft rather than be an instant phenon. So, I did some research......

Azarenka is far from the woman who waited the longest to win her first major. In the Open Era, on the women's side the award for perseverance goes to Jana Novotna who won the 1998 Wimbledon final in her 45th major tournament. I remember seeing that final and it was it very gratifying to see her win after being devastated the year earlier.

For the men the award goes to Goran Ivanisevic who won the 2001 Wimbledon final in his 48th major. That match was played on a Monday after the event was decimated by two weeks of rain delays. I was pulling for Goran to beat Pat Rafter, if only because I thought that Goran would throw himself into the Themes if he lost the final for the 4th time. Ivanisevic could not even get into Wimbledon based on his ranking and needed a wild card just to get through the front gate.

The minimum number of attempts to win a major award for the women goes to Monica Seles and Barbara Jordan, each winning a major on their 4th try. Barbara Jordan is an interesting story. Her sister, Kathy, was a top ten player in the 1980's and by rights Kathy should have been the sister who captured a major. But, Barbara was lucky enough to play the Australian Open during it's down period and she capitalized on her opportunity by playing the legendary Sharon Walsh in the final. She reached a career high of #78 and never advanced past the 3rd round of any other major she played.

For the men the the award is shared between Mats Wilander (1982 French Open) and Gustavo Kuerten (1997 French Open) who each won in their 3rd major. I saw both of those finals on tv and they were both great. Wilander at 17 years old was very monumental coming on the heals of Borg's retirement from tennis in 1981. It started the 2nd generation of Swedish players to be be inspired by Borg. (Edberg, Nystrom, Sundstrom, Jarryd, and my idol Mikeal Pernfors)

That is it for this week. Hopefully I can post more in 2012 than in the past. Happy New Year to all.