Mega-thread on Tennis Generations and the Changing of the Guard (UPDATED with PART 5 - COMPLETE!)

[El Dude]

Preliminary Note
This post is the first in a planned series in which I explore related topics, such as tennis generations, the current sea change that (I believe) is finally occurring, and perhaps a look at the up-and-coming generations, to try to sort out who will rise to the top. I will add new posts to this thread over the next weeks, rather than start new threads, so if interested, keep checking the thread for further installments.

PART ONE: FINALLY...THE CHANGING OF THE GUARD​

The Era of the Big Three Winds to an End...or Does It?
With Daniil Medvedev's victory over Novak Djokovic at the US Open, it is tempting to say--finally--that the changing of the guard is here. It seems like it's been years now that we (or, admittedly, I) have been expecting this to occur, but the proverbial "Big Three"--Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, and Novak Djokovic--kept re-asserting themselves over younger generations.

I don't need to recap in detail just how dominant those three players have been, but perhaps the best single stat is that since Roger Federer won his first Slam at Wimbledon in 2003, the three are responsible for 60 of 73 Slams. That 19-year span (2003-21) includes eight years in which those three players won all four Slams.

What is particularly striking is that the dominance came in several waves. The first was the classic "Fedal Era," when Roger and Rafa won every Slam from Roland Garros in 2005 to Wimbledon in 2009, with the lone exception being Novak's first Slam at the 2008 AO. After Juan Martin del Potro's upset of Federer at the 2009 US Open, the Fedal duo won every Slam in 2010, and then were joined by Novak in 2011, and then Andy Murray joined the mix in 2012, winning a Slam in both that year and 2013. So if 2004-10 was the Fedal Era, 2011-13 was the era of the Big Four.

But the first sign of the end of Big Three (or Four) dominance came in 2014, when they dropped not just one but two Slams to other players, upstarts Stan Wawrinka and Marin Cilic. But Novak reclaimed dominance over the tour in 2015, having his best year, even as Fedal were slam-less for the first time since 2002. In 2015-16 it looked like Rafa was finally losing the war of attrition to Father Time, and Roger seemed unable to get past Novak, so it seemed that the era was finally ending. But then 2017 happened, and we saw both Roger and Rafa reclaim a high level, splitting the four Slams, and the Big Three won 14 straight Slams from AO 2017 through the 2020 French Open.

Part of the problem was the weak "Lost Gen," those players born roughly from 1989 through 1993 or so (plus or minus a year, depending upon how you want to cut the cake). Until Dominic Thiem won the 2020 US Open, no player born after 1988 (Cilic and del Potro) had a Slam title to his name. In other words, as of pre-US Open in 2020, no player age 30 or younger had a Slam title - unprecedented in the Open Era, if not all of tennis history.

Thiem broke the ice for the younger generations, but then Novak re-asserted himself and won the first three Slams of 2021 before Medvedev upset him at the US Open.

So it would seem that--if we only look at Slams--there is no changing of the guard, just a couple younger guys sneaking in a Slam title in each of the last two years.

But let's dig deeper. While the Grand Slams are the crown jewels of the tournament, they aren't the only important titles. In total, there are 14 "big titles," which are essentially the main events of the ATP tour: four Slams, nine Masters and the singular year-end World Tour Finals, with every fourth year yielding a fifteenth, the Olympics. There are about a dozen ATP 500 tournaments in any given year, and about forty ATP 250s, plus a few non-tour tournaments. But these are basically "non-essential." Most top players play a few every year, but every top player--barring injury or some other circumstance--shows up for the big titles.

In other words, by looking at the big titles we can see that the guard is, indeed, changing.

A Detour into Generation Theory
Before getting into my chart below, let's take a brief detour into what I call "Generation Theory," which is a tool in which one can categorize tennis cohorts by five-year spans. This is, of course, subjective, and shouldn't be taken too seriously, both because every player develops differently, and also because any such demarcation is arbitrary. Meaning, there are always exceptions; for instance, while I group David Ferrer chronologically with Federer's generation, he really was more of a peer to Nadal and Djokovic.

But as a general rule, any given generation dominates the tour for about half a decade before giving way to the next, and using it as a hermeneutic tool yields some interesting data.

When I first came up with the idea some years back, I took the convenient fact that the two greatest players of the first decade of the 20th century, Federer and Nadal, were born five years apart, in 1981 and 1986. So I used those two years as the center-points for their respective generations, so that "Generation Federer" are those players born from 1979-83 (+/- two years from Roger's birth year, 1981), and "Generation Nadal" (now Djokodal or Nadalkovic) is 1984-88. After them is the previously mentioned Lost Generation, born in 1989-93, and then Next Gen (1994-98), and what I'm calling the Millenial Gen (1999-2003).

The Chart: Generational Big Titles, 2000-21

​

As you can see, the changing of the guard can be seen in the non-Slam big titles, with Next Genners winning six of seven of them, and six of ten big titles overall this year. In other words, the Djokodal Gen has won 40% of big titles this year compared to 62.5% in 2020. Even if they win the WTF and Paris, that still will yield them only half of all big titles this year.

As you can see from the chart, the changing of the guard really began in 2017, but only tentatively. 2016 saw the Djokodal Gen win all 15 big titles -- only the second time (after 2013) that they won every big title. But with Roger's resurgence in 2017, and strong performances by Grigor Dimitrov and Alexander Zverev's first big title, younger generations began to take away some of those big titles. And it was gradual, with 2018-19 still seeing that shift delayed, with younger generations still not breaking through at a Slam.

Thiem's win of the US Open in 2020 was a significant milestone; as previously mentioned, he became the first player born after 1988 to win a Slam. But he did so without defeating any of the Big Three. This year, Medvedev not only beat #1 Djokovic, in the process he prevented the Serbian great from capturing the first true Grand Slam since Rod Laver in 1969.

As a side note, 2020 also saw a Next Genner win more titles than anyone else: Andrey Rublev with 5, with Novak winning 4. But given that it was an abbreviated season and Rublev did not win any big titles, it must be marked with an asterisk. This year, four players are tied with a tour-leading four titles: Djokovic, Medvedev, Zverev, and Casper Ruud (who, being born in December 22, 1998, is technically a Next Genner, but on the cusp of the Millenial Gen).

Alright, I'll leave that there for now, but will follow-up with some further angles on this, to explore this changing of the guard, and related topics.

 

[El Dude]

PART TWO: GENERATIONAL DOMINANCE​

To further explore this idea of a “changing of the guard,” let’s take an in-depth look at tennis generations, with an emphasis on more recent generations.

A Stroll Through The (Active) Generations

In the previous installment, I equated the term “Next Gen” with those players born between 1994-98, and the “Millenial Gen” as those born from 1999-2003. Again, these are artificial demarcations. In some sense, Dominic Thiem—born September 1993—belongs more with Next Gen than he does with the “Lost Gen” (1989-93). In truth, there are no distinct generations, just new players arriving every year. On the other hand, it does seem that players can be grouped in cohorts, so the generations offer us a handy perspective for looking at the evolution of the game.

Currently, the oldest player with any ATP points is Toshihide Matsui, born on April 19, 1978. Meaning, he’s actually of the pre-Federer generation (b. 1974-78), by my five-year spans. Or to put it another way, he’s closer to Gustavo Kuerten (b. 1976) than Roger Federer (b. 1981). But given that you’ve probably never heard of him, and that his career high ranking is #261, to find someone that we all have heard of, we have to go to Ivo Karlovic at #200.The 42-year old Dr Ivo was born in February of 1979, and thus on the older side of Generation Federer (1979-83) but after a late career spike that saw him finish 2016 with his highest year-end ranking (#20), he seems to be (finally) fading.

On the other side of the spectrum, there are several 16-year-olds with ATP points, but to find someone with significant points, we go to 18-year-old Carlos Alcaraz Garfia (b. 2003), ranked #38 and the highest ranked teenager (#14 Jannik Sinner turned 20 a month ago). The next highest ranked teenager is 19-year old Lorenzo Musetti at #57; the next highest ranked 18-year old is #133, Holger Nodskov Rune, who is a week older than Alcaraz. Alcaraz, Musetti, and Rune are the only players born in 2002 or later who are ranked in the top 250.

If you’re wondering, the highest ranked 17-year old is the French Arthur Fils, born in June of 2004 and all the way down at #676. As a general rule, a ranking outside of the top 200 denotes players who aren’t even yet on the Challenger circuit, so there’s no reason to pay too close attention to Fils. It is interesting to note that he defeated one Bernard Tomic in the first qualification round at Roland Garros, before falling to Marc Polmans in his next match.

So, the span of active ATP players—who are actually on the ATP circuit, or close to it—could be said to run from 18 to 42, or 1979 to 2003. Or really, 18-40, unless Karlovic’s ranking increases substantially. That gives us five generations to consider. Here are the top ten ranked players, by generation:

As you can see, Roger’s generation is all but done – he’s the only player who turns 38 or older in the top 100 and, to be frank, is mainly holding onto that top 10 ranking due to the strange ranking rules currently in place. For the ATP Race rankings, he’s at #61. Of his generation, the only other big title winner left is Tommy Robredo, ranked outside the top 300. If you’re wondering, Robredo’s last appearance was losing in the 2021 Wimbledon qualifications to the #144 player, Tomas Machac.

Djokodal Gen is hanging on, although outside of Rafa and Novak, only a few guys are hanging out on the edge of the top 20, though there are still ten players in the top 50. Meaning, they too are aging out. Stan Wawrinka (currently #47) and Andy Murray (currently #116) are shadows of their former selves, Tomas Berdych has retired, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (#93) is likely not far behind, Marin Cilic (#40) has seriously faded and Juan Martin del Potro hasn’t played in over two years, his last event being Queen’s Club in June of 2019 (after defeating Denis Shapovalov in R32, he withdrew).

Lost Gen is…well, lost Gen. The top players, outside of Thiem (who is on the edge of that generation), are far down the rankings, with Kei Nishikori outside of the top 50. Meaning, other than Thiem, there are no serious Slam contenders, and we don’t yet know how Dominic will come back from his wrist injury.

Next Gen is clearly dominant, with the the best overall rankings of the five generations. Not only do they have five of the top seven rankings, but four more in the top 20. Meaning, they comprise 45% of the top 20. Only Daniil Medvedev has won a Slam, but Alexander Zverev, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Karen Khachanov, and Hubert Hurkacz have all won big titles. Consider that’s already more players (five) who have won big titles than all of Lost Gen (Dimitrov, Sock, and Thiem).

The Millenial Gen is rising, with three players on the edge of the top 10, and one of their youngest members in the top 40, and several others on the rise.

A large percentage of top players were born in the 1996-98 range, with six of ten top 10 players born in those three years. The other four are Federer (1981), Nadal (1986), Djokovic (1987) and Thiem (1993). Furthermore, ten of the top 14 were born in 1996 or later, with Felix Auger-Aliassime (b. 2000), Denis Shapovalov (b. 1999), Hubert Hurkacz (b. 1997), and Jannik Sinner (b. 2001) rounding out #11-14.

Or to put that in even more striking terms, of the top 14, the fifth oldest player is Daniil Medvedev, born in 1996. Meaning, 10 of the top 14 players (71%) are 25 years or younger.

To put all of that information in another visual aid, here’s another chart:

This chart clearly illustrates that the top of the rankings has migrated ore centrally to players born in the mid-90s, that is, Next Gen. The Times They Are A Changin.

Focus Players

Let’s take a slightly different angle. Below is a list of the players by birth year, from 1927 to the present, who have won at least 6 majors—Amateur, Pro, or Open Era Slams:

1927: Frank Sedgman (8)
1928: Pancho Gonzales (14)
1930: Tony Trabert (7)
1934: Ken Rosewall (23)
1936: Roy Emerson (12)
1938: Rod Laver (19)
1944: John Newcombe (7)
1952: Jimmy Connors (8)
1956: Bjorn Borg (11)
1959: John McEnroe (7)
1960: Ivan Lendl (8)
1964: Mats Wilander (7)
1966: Stefan Edberg (6)
1967: Boris Becker (6)
1970: Andre Agassi (8)
1971: Pete Sampras (14)
1981: Roger Federer (20)
1986: Rafael Nadal (20)
1987: Novak Djokovic (20)


A few things to note. One, from 1927 to the present, no two 6+ major winners have been born in the same year. Two, the gaps in years between the 6+ major winners are: 0, 1, 3, 1, 1, 5, 3, 2, 0, 3, 1, 0, 2, 0, 9, 4, 0.

Meaning, the longest gap—by far—was between Sampras and Federer, a span of nine years (1972-80) with no 6+ major winners. The sixteen other gaps are between 0-5 years, with 14 of 17 gaps between 0-3 years. The average gap is 2.1 years.

Novak Djokovic, born in 1987, is the youngest player to win 6+ majors. For the first time in tennis history, there is no active player aged 32 or younger with 6+ major titles. Even more startling, only four players aged 32 and younger have won majors, all of them singletons, and two of them turning 32 this month.

This will, of course, inevitably change. But given the lay of the land right now, it seems that the first year which could yield a 6+ major winner is 1996, with Daniil Medvedev. So, unless Thiem comes back even better than before, we’re looking at an 8+ year gap. If Medvedev doesn’t win 6 majors, the next possible candidates are probably Alexander Zverev (b. 1997) and Stefanos Tsitsipas (b. 1998).

In other words, we’re looking at a gap similar as that between Sampras and Federer, when multi-Slam winners were Sergi Bruguera (born in 1971, same as Sampras), Patrick Rafter (1972), Yevgeny Kafelnikov (1974), Gustavo Kuerten (1976), Marat Safin (1980) and Lleyton Hewitt (1981, a few months before Federer).

Or to put all of that pictorially, here is the final, fanciest chart yet:

To clarify the above chart, the graph itself includes all Slam winners by birth year, with one cell per Slam. The names listed below the graph are all multiple majors winners (2+), and the key explains the color-coding.

The area for the players born in the 1930s is a bit exaggerated, because it includes both Amateur and Pro Slams. If they had been consolidated, some of those graph pillars would be lower (probably most notably Roy Emerson).

After Laver’s 1938 group, the pillars are greatly reduced in size, with smaller peaks for 1952 (Connors and Vilas), 1956 (Borg), 1959 and ’60 (McEnroe and Lendl, respectively), the great trio of Northern Europeans in 1964-67 (Wilander, Edberg, and Becker), and then 1970 (Agassi and Courier) and 1971 (Sampras).

After 1971, there is a long period with no players winning more than 3 Slams, that being Gustavo Kuerten in 1976, until 1981 (Federer), then another gap until 1986 and ’87 (Nadal and Djokovic, respectively).

As you can see, the chart terminates in 2000, but as mentioned, there is now one player born as late as 2003 (Carlos Alcaraz Garfia) in the top 40. But the “dark space” after Djokovic is rather striking, speaking of the sheer dominance of Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic, and also the weakness of the players born in the first half of the 90s. As the next few years progress, we should expect to see the latter half of that decade fill out with more color and extended into the 21st century.


Final Thoughts

One big takeaway from all the above is that we’re past due for another 6+ major winner. As mentioned, the oldest best candidate is Daniil Medvedev, born in 1996 (again, Thiem, who just turned 28, is probably unlikely to reach 6).

In the next part we will look more in-depth at the younger generations and attempt to predict who—at least based on past precedents—is most likely to take up the mantle of “all-time great,” or at least win multiple Slams.

 

[El Dude]

Note: This series just keeps getting longer and longer. I was tempted to split this one, the longest yet, into two parts, but it works better as a cohesive whole, I think, and finishes laying the ground-work before getting on to addressing the question at the heart of the series. So if such things interest you, bear with me; I hope the read is worth it!

PART THREE: THE ROAD TO THE TOP 100​

The question at the heart of this series is this: When we look at the younger generations, how do we assess what sort of careers they might have, and who among them has the best chance of greatness (by whatever definition)? In order to address that questions, there are a variety of factors that must be considered, thus the meandering path we're taking. In this part, we’ll look at the path players take as they rise up the rankings, as well as the way the tour has aged over the five plus decades of the Open Era. In the next part, we’ll look at the statistical benchmarks that great players have, and a few other related bits and pieces. Finally, in the fifth and (hopefully!) concluding part, we’ll assess the actual young players and try to sort through them and determine who has the best chance to be the next great player.

The “Minor Leagues” of Tennis
Statistics can only tell us so much. They tell us the results of a player’s performance, but don’t necessarily describe the talent involved, or whether or not the player will develop into an elite player. For every Rafael Nadal there are dozens of Bertram Mottrams, Jimmy Browns, and Borna Corics (that is, players who reached the top 100 at very young ages but didn’t develop into an elite player; we'll touch more upon these others in later installments).

I will return to baseball as an analogy because, as with tennis, it has a long professional developmental period. Baseball prospects are drafted either after high school, during or after college, or signed internationally, and then enter the minor leagues, which usually takes several years (with rare exceptions). Your typical good prospect who is bound for a major league career will take, on average, 4-6 years, as a study from several years ago indicates – and that’s only 1st and 2nd round draft picks. Only about 15% of those prospects will reach the majors in three years or less, and the vast majority of minor leaguers never reach the majors.

Similarly with tennis. While we, as fans, tend to focus on the top, let us not forget that at any time, there are thousands of players with ATP points. As of this writing, there are 2138 players with at least 1 ATP point, which is earned either through participation in a Futures match, or a Challenger qualifier.

The Futures and Challengers are the tennis world’s version of baseball’s minor leagues. Once you start gaining regular entry into ATP level events (250 or higher), you’ve essentially made it to the “majors.” This roughly corresponds with a top 100 ranking, although many lower ranked players do participate in 250 and higher tournaments, although mainly through making it through qualification.

Tennis players who are just starting generally begin with Futures, run by the International Tennis Federation (ITF), work their way up to Challengers, and then once they’ve accumulated enough points via Challengers (which offer up to 125 ATP points for a win), they jump into the top 100 and don’t have to qualify for many events. Grand Slams actually have the biggest field, with 104 players making it through their ATP ranking, 16 through qualifying, and 8 through wild cards (128 total). Meaning, if you’re in the top 100, you don’t have to go through qualifications.

Fun fact: The record older for most Challenger titles is Taiwanese Lu Yen-hsun with 29, his first in 2001, his last in 2017. Born in 1983, Lu played from 2001 to 2021, retiring after his July 25 loss to Alexander Zverev at the Olympics. His career high ranking was #33 in 2010, and his best Grand Slam result was reaching the QF of Wimbledon in 2010, which he lost to Novak Djokovic in straight sets, although right after defeating fifth seed Andy Roddick in an epic five-setter.​

Lower-level tournaments have smaller fields (usually 16, 32, or 64) but also fewer participants, so there are more opportunities for lower ranked players to gain direct entry.

As with baseball’s minors, most tennis players “flame out” somewhere on the way up. For every baseball player that makes the majors, there are many minor leaguers who never make it, stalling out somewhere in the minor league system, which has at least six levels (extended camp, Rookie ball, A, A+, AA, and AAA). But just as every baseball prospect is working towards that promotion to the majors, young tennis players work towards the top 100 and bypassing Grand Slam qualification.

The next big jump, once a tennis player reaches the top 100, is seeding at Slams, which is usually the top 32 ranked players, although each tournament has the ability to adjust this somewhat. Given that there are always several top 32 players who miss any given Slam, it rarely happens this way; for instance, at the 2021 US Open, the 32 seed, Filip Krajinovic, was ranked #38, meaning there were six players ranked higher than him that didn’t play.

Seeding is essentially a way of optimizing the chances of top players facing each other in later rounds; at a Slam, the 32 seeded players cannot face each other until the third round (or round-of-32), and then the 1st seed can only play the 32nd seed, the 2nd seed the 31st seed, etc. As a side note, no Grand Slam third round has ever include only the 32 seeded players.

In other words, reaching the top 100 basically means entering the main draw of many tournaments, and thus making it to the “majors.” Reaching the top 40 or so, means possible seeding at Slams. The whole system has an element of tenure to it; once you make it to a certain level, it can be maintained by consistent play.

The next big benchmark on the way up is probably the top 10, although it doesn’t correlate to a specific tour element like the top 100 does with Slam qualification or the top 30-40 does (roughly speaking) to Slam seeding; perhaps the closest thing is the ATP World Tour Finals, which involves the top 8 players, although sometimes one or two don’t make it.

When a player reaches the top 10, it means he’s a “big name” – an elite, or near-elite, and someone who has either won a bunch of ATP 250s and 500s, a big title, gone deep in multiple Slams – or some combination of the above. There is no single path to the top ten; some players do it through playing well at Slams, others through building up lower-level titles.

For example, the current #10 player, Casper Ruud, has 3440 ATP points, but his best Slam result in the past year is only the fourth round (180 points), and he hasn’t made it past the semifinal of a Masters, nor won an ATP 500 event. But he does have five ATP 250 titles. Meaning, he has reached #10 through consistently good performance, but with little sign of truly elite performance (e.g. going deep in Slams or a big title).

On the other hand, #11 Felix Auger-Aliassime has accrued his 3368 ATP points somewhat differently. He also hasn’t won a big title—or any title at all—but he’s reached one Slam SF, another QF, as well as a 4R, and he’s gone deep in many ATP 500s and 250s.

Or we could look at #12 Hubert Hurkacz, who has reached that high mainly through two results: a Masters title (1000 points) and a single Slam SF (300), but also has two other ATP 250 titles.

Reaching the top 5 is even harder, because it not only implies consistently very good performance, but some sort of significant accomplishment. Of course, just as I say that, we have Andrey Rublev currently at #5, who has yet to win a big title. But Rublev has won three ATP 500s, an ATP 250, and consistently goes deep at Masters, and fairly deep at Slams.

Looking at rankings is one angle and generally illustrates the level of consistency over the last calendar year, but titles are perhaps more indicative of what the peak performance a player is capable of. An ATP 250 title generally indicates a player is good, a fixture in the top 100. An ATP 500 title indicates a player is very good, a top 40 player. But the big titles are where it’s at for tennis accolades, with a Masters indicating a player is not only a fixture in the top 20, but possible a “second tier” type: someone who will spend time in the top 10. And, of course, what every player truly wants is a Grand Slam title, which usually implies elite status and enters them into the history books.

As I said elsewhere, a #1 ranking is actually more rarified than a Grand Slam title. There is only one #1 player in the ATP era (1973-present), Marcelo Rios, who hasn’t won a Grand Slam, while there are 28 Slam winners who never reached #1 (in the ATP era, 1973-present).


Tiers of Active Players
To sum up, we could imagine players grouped in the following tiers, which roughly correspond to the levels of baseball:

6th tier: Futures circuit, outside top 250 or so ("Low minors")​

5th tier: Grand Slam qualifications, Challenger circuit, ranked 100-250ish (""High minors")​

4th tier: Grand Slam main draw, ATP 250 contender, top 100 player ("major league regular")​

3rd tier: Grand Slam seed, Masters dark horse, ATP 500 contender, top 40 player ("impact major leaguer")​

2nd tier: Grand Slam dark horse, Masters contender, top 10-20 player ("star major leaguer")​

1st tier: Grand Slam contender, top 5 player, possible #1 ("MVP candidate")​

“0 tier”: Grand Slam winner, #1 ranked player in the world ("best player in the game")​

Or something like that. As with any such taxonomic tool, consider this as a general guideline, not an absolute rule. “Tiers” are artificial, but they do illustrate how players go through various stages on their way to the top, not unlike “leveling up” in video and roleplaying games.

Or in terms of our inquiry, how to tell which players will go from 6th tier to 1st or 2nd tier? Or to put it another way, as a young player—say, a teenager—enters the top 100 (4th tier), what are their chances of going all the way to the top?


Age Fluctuation over Time
The first and truest answer to those questions is: We don’t know. But that’s a cop-out; we can, at least, look for indicators.

This study is focused on quantifiable data: what can be seen in the record. I would argue that, especially for very young and lower tiered players, the data doesn’t really matter. As of this writing, there are three 17-year olds with at least 25 ATP points: Martin Damm (#622), Arthur Fils (#673), and Luca Van Assche (#736). But there’s no way to tell any of these young players end up being the next all-time great or never reaching the top 100, at least not without watching them play and having the tools to assess their games.

That said, once a player starts moving up the tiers, they are “on the clock” – their rise can be measured and compared to other players. Those three are still in the vast “sixth tier,” and thus can’t really be assessed via age-related rankings.

When looking at questions around age and ranking, one problem we run into is what could be called the “static era fallacy” – as if each era follows the rules of every other era. This simply isn’t the case, because the game changes decade by decade, even year to year. One way this is illustrated, and which will relate to this study, is the changing ages of top players, both when they break through and the age of players in the top 10.

We’ll go into more detail in a moment, but in terms of the general arc of the Open Era, the early 1970s were dominated by older players, holdouts from the pre-Open Era amateur and pro tours. As we moved deeper into the 70s, a “youth movement” arose, with a young Jimmy Connors and then younger Bjorn Borg becoming the dominant players. The average age of top players decreased into the 80s and remained relatively low through the 90s and into the 00s, but then started increasing in the 2010s, as an aging Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, and Novak Djokovic maintained their stranglehold on the tour. In the last two years, this is finally swinging back the other way, as we illustrated in the last part.

We can see this general trend illustrated by the chart below:

As you can see, the Open Era dawned with older players dominating the Grand Slams: with 30-somethings Rod Laver, Ken Rosewall, and Andres Gimeno winning 10 of the first 17 Slams. In 1974, a huge shift occurred, as 21-22 year old Jimmy Connors and 18-year old Bjorn Borg ushered in a youth movement, Connors winning three Slams and Borg one. The Slams re-balanced in 1975 somewhat, with Borg sharing the Slams with older players John Newcombe, Arthur Ashe, and Manuel Orantes. But from 1976 through about a decade ago, the Slam winners skewed younger and the average age was relatively consistent, with only minor fluctuation.

Another prominent pattern is the ladder-like pattern over the last decade or so, as the "Big Three" grew older and remained dominant.

This year, Daniil Medvedev was the first 25-year old since Marin Cilic in 2014 to win a Slam, and he was about half a year younger. To find a younger player, you have to go back to Andy Murray at the 2012 US Open, and he was basically the same age (25 and a few months). The last Slams won at age 23 and 24 were by Djokovic in 2011, the last 21 year old was Juan Martin del Potro in 2009, the last 20 year old was Novak in 2008, and the last teenager was Rafa in 2005.

Compare that to 1982-90, when eight Slams were won by teenagers.

Roger’s two Slam titles in 2017 at age 35, and then another in 2018 at age 36, were not only the first Slams won by a 35 year old since Andres Gimeno in 1975, but the first by anyone age 33 or older since that date. When Andre Agassi won his last Slam, the 2003 Australian Open, at age 32, he was the oldest player to win a Slam since Gimeno. In other words, from 1973 to 2002, no 32-year old won a single Grand Slam, and from 1973 to 2016, no 33-year old. And of course since then, Nadal won 2020 Roland Garros at age 34, Novak the 2021 Australian Open at age 33 and both Roland Garros and Wimbledon at age 34.

So, in the early 70s, the tour was dominated by older players, many of them in their 30s, and then the game got progressively younger, peaking (or “valleying”) in the mid-to-late 80s, then remaining very young through the 90s, with an increase in the late 90s, before skewing younger again. For the last decade or so, tour dominance has aged as the same top players have aged.

But that is changing. We’re seeing it first in Masters and the World Tour Finals, but also now in the rankings, even if no player born after 1987 has yet reached #1.

Here is a chart showing the top 20 rankings over the last two plus decades, color-coded by generation:

If you're wondering why I chose 1998 as the cut-off, the main reason is that it is the first year that a member of Generation Federer (born 1979-83) is in the year-end top 50--you can see Marat Safin at #49; actually, the highest ranked member of that generation at the end of 1997 was 17-year old Safin at #203. Meaning, 1998 is their first somewhat-significant appearance in the rankings.

This chart illustrates a few things. One, you can see both how dominant the Rafa-Novak generation has been (in pale blue), and also how weak the Lost Gen has been (in light green), which probably peaked in 2017 with the rise of Thiem and the big titles of Dimitrov and Sock.

But more relevant to this study, you can see the gradual but inexorable rise of Next Gen over the last few years, with the Millenial Gen right on its heels. And more to the point, these last two generations seem to have much better candidates for greatness than their predecessor, the so-called Lost Gen. Their rise, in terms of age, might not be as quick as the elites of the past, but it does seem to be reverting somewhat closer to historical norms.

Furthermore, both Next Gen and, perhaps even more so, the Millenial Gen show more early promise than Lost Gen. Maybe not quite that of Djokodal or Federer, but probably stronger than Kuerten's cohort, which lacked all-time greats but had a solid group of big title winners.

But what about age? Next Gen—if we define it as those players born 1994-98—is turning 23 to 27 years old this year, which is pretty much the historical prime. Meaning, as strange as it sounds, Next Gen is no longer young; they’re in what should be—at least historically—their prime years.

This next chart shows the same time period, but with the year-end ages of players ranked in the top 50:

First a note on the color coordination. I have given green shades to “young players,” those age 23 and younger, and pink shades to “old players,” age 30 and above. Players in what is traditionally prime years, or age 24-29, are in shades of white to grey. But please note: every player is different, and different eras have seen players peak at different ages. But I chose these age ranges because--as a general rule--once a player reaches 24-25, chances are they're as good as they'll ever be. Again, there are always exceptions, both players who peak later (e.g. Stan Wawrinka) and those who are already declining by 24-25 (e.g. Lleyton Hewitt), but over the course of most of the Open Era, 24-25 is the most common peak, with 2-3 years before and after being the overall prime.

I won't go into details as this part is already overly long as it is, but it does seem that the great players of the 60s and early 70s tended to peak a bit later, while starting in the mid-70s with Connors and Borg, players began to peak younger, and pretty much all the 6+ Slam winners afterwards had their best season sometime within the range of 22-26. This changed with Novak Djokovic, whose statistically best season (2015) was the year he turned 28, although some would claim that due to the down years of Federer and Nadal and the fact that Next Gen hadn't yet risen, his dominance was largely due to a weak year overall, and thus his best year might have been 2011, when he turned 24.

But the point is, the general trend is that players reach their peak sometime in the 21-25 range and start fading sometime around or after 30. Thus the color-coding. But all of this might be changing; it could be that what was once the prime years of 22-26 is now shifted back to, say, 24-29. But only time will tell.

(Side note: I don't want to extend the baseball analogy too far as that would lead to unfortunate speculation, but there was a recent era in baseball in which players were extending their peaks: the 1990s and early 2000s, when steroids were prevalent. But I'll just leave this one dangling...)

Back to the chart, it is rather striking to note the “rise of pink” over the last ten years, pink signifying players in their 30s or, in the context of that portion of the chart, Federer’s generation and then, later, the Djokodal generation. Federer turned 30 in 2011; he’s that “30” in the #3 slot. As you can see, his generation was fading by that point.

But what is noteworthy is that the pink actually increased. This corresponded with a period of time in which there were very few young players in the upper rankings. In 2011, for instance, there is only one player age 23 or younger (green) in the top 20, Juan Martin del Potro at #11. For the next half decade, the top 20 was nearly empty of young players, with the rankings dominated by aging players. This began to change about five years ago, first in the lower part of the top 50, and then more noticeable starting in 2017, when 20-year old Alexander Zverev finished at #4, the highest a 20-year old has ranked at the end of the year since Novak in 2007. Over the last few years, the top 20 and 50 has filled out with more and more young players, as Next Gen—and then, the Millenial Gen—began to mature.

The 2021 ranking is as of September 27 this year, although probably won’t change all that much. We have the rarity of a 40-year old in the top 10, a feat which hasn’t occurred since 43-year old Ken Rosewall finished 1977 at #12. As you can see, more and more green and white/grey players are filling out the ranks, and pink is (finally) falling somewhat.

Coming Up...
In the next part we'll examine what I call the "benchmarks of greatness"--those accomplishments that every all-time great of the Open Era has achieved by a certain age--as well as examine the history of teenagers in the ATP rankings.

​

 

[El Dude]

PART FOUR: SOME FACTORS ON THE ROAD TO GREATNESS​

The Pace of Development
I’ll start this next part of my study by once more drawing from the analogy of baseball. In the previous part, I compared the development of a baseball prospect through the minor leagues to a tennis player on the ITF Futures and ATP Challenger Tours. As a general (but not absolute) rule, the better the baseball prospect, the quicker they rise through the minor leagues. This—again, generally speaking—holds true for tennis players, but isn’t always the case.

Furthermore, as a young tennis player rises, generally speaking, the quicker they “master” each tier, the higher their upside. If we see a handful of new teenagers leave the Futures circuit and enter the top 200, those with lesser upside might stall out on the Challenger circuit and hang out in the #100-200 range for a year or three, while those with more upside will quickly break into the top 100. Or to put it another way, great players usually don’t stall out—at least not for long—at any level or tier of development.

Or to summarize, we have two factors at play:

1. The age a player reaches the top 100 (and other tiers)
2. The pace at which they rise through various tiers

Ever heard of Stefan Kozlov? In June of 2016 he broke into the top 200 at the age 18, reached #116 by the end of the year, and seemed primed to reach the top 100 before his 19th birthday in February. But it wasn’t to be (at least not yet); since then, Kozlov hung around the 100-200 range for a couple years, and has fallen farther since, currently ranked #253.

A study in contrasts: Borna and Matteo
Let's compare and contrast two players, Borna Coric and Matteo Berretini, to see how these two factors interplay. On October 27 of 2014, Coric did something that no player had done since Rafael Nadal and Richard Gasquet in 2003: he entered the top 100 as a 17-year old, reaching #93 a couple weeks before turning 18. But then he stalled out in the middle of the top 100 for a few years, before rising to #12 at age 22, but then falling back again to the 20-40 range for the last two years. He seems to have settled into what I called a “third tier” player in the previous segment.

Berretini, on the other hand, didn’t turn pro until he was 19, and didn’t enter the top 100 until he was almost 22, but is now #7 in the world and a bonafide second tier player. He’s considered a darkhorse at Slams, especially Wimbledon, while Coric may never win even a Masters.

But even in their respective paths, we can see an important general principle at play: where Coric stalled out for years at a time, Berretini’s rise was consistent and upward. Berretini ended 2016 (age 20) at #435, 2017 at #135, 2017 at #54, 2019 at #8, and he’s been in the top 10 ever since. Meaning, he rose consistently until he reached the top 10 near the end of 2019 (and “second tier”) and has maintained that level for about two years now. While it only took Coric about a year to reach the top 100, it took him five years to reach the top 20, and he wasn’t able to sustain it for more than about a year.

Benchmarks on the Road to Greatness
So, the question, again, is how to tell which young players will be any good, and how good? A few years ago, when I tried to ascertain the benchmarks that all great players (6+ Slam winners) met, I came up with the following:

Again, every 6+ Slam winner of the Open Era has met these benchmarks, including Jimmy Connors, Bjorn Borg, John McEnroe, Ivan Lendl, Mats Wilander, Stefan Edberg, Boris Becker, Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, and Novak Djokovic (Connors was 21 when the ATP rankings started, but Ultimate Tennis Statistics (UTS) has extrapolated rankings for the 1868-72 years, and Connors fits the bill).

Mind you, though we don’t have rankings for before the Open Era, we can be reasonably certain that players like John Newcombe and even Rod Laver wouldn’t meet those benchmarks, though Ken Rosewall probably would have. Meaning, these benchmarks apply only to the nature of the Open Era, in which players have tended to rise and peak earlier than in older eras.

If we loosen it up to multi-Slam winners (2-4), we get:

Meaning, the benchmarks are far less stringent for 2-4 Slam winners, and more prone to players setting new precedents, as Stan Wawrinka did when he won his first Slam at age 28. “Stanimal” remains a great reminder for aging players; he is the only multi-Slam player in Open Era history to win his first Slam at age 28.

To some extent, I think these benchmarks can be thrown out the window, or at least seen as general indicators rather than hard rules. It seems that players are not only reaching their prime at a later age than for much of the Open Era, but also maintaining their primes for longer. But I do think they should be considered when evaluating young players, if only as one lens to look through. Meaning, while we might see a future 6+ winner who reaches the top 100 after age 18, it probably won’t be much later than that (Daniil Medvedev will be a test-case, as he didn’t reach the top 100 until he was 20; more on him in the next part).

What about the converse? Meaning, those benchmarks are shared by all “greats” (6+ Slam inners) and “near-greats” (2-4 Slam winners) of the Open Era, but certainly not every player who met those benchmarks, or at least the early ones, ended up at that level? In particular, how many players who reach the above benchmarks, or the younger ones, went on to be great or near-great?

Or to put it another way, how many players who reached the top 100 at age 18 went on to be all-time greats or even pretty good?

Well, according to my research, there have been 87 players from 1970 to the present who have reached the top 100 while still 18 years old. I might be a few, I think that’s accurate within a few players. Of those 87 players, only 16 went on to fufilll every benchmark of an all-time great—the 12 6+ Slam winners, as well as four more players: Jim Courier, Marat Safin, Lleyton Hewitt, and Andy Roddick.

What happened to those guys? Well, all went on to in at least one Slam, and Courier won four, but all fell short of joining the ranks of all-time greats.


The Case of Courier
Courier, a contemporary of Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi and the third best player of that cohort, was, for a few years, one of the best players on tour. He didn’t show up as early as Agassi (who reached the top 100 at age 16), and he was over a year older than Sampras, but he rose alongside Pete and, for a little over a year, from early 1992 to early 1993, was probably the best player on tour, winning all four of his Slams in less than two calendar years, and number one for 58 weeks. In fact, his four Slams from 1991-93 were as many as Sampras (3) and Agassi (1) combined through that point, and he remains the only 22-year old to have reached the finals of all four Slams.

As Pete rose to supremacy in 1993, Jim fell, at first slowly—he finished 1993 at #3--then more quickly, ending 1994 at #13, 1995 at #8, and then out of the top 10 for good in 1996. After 1995, he never reached a Slam semifinal or won a Masters, retiring in 2000 at the age of 30.

The reasons for Courier's early and relatively quick decline are somewhat mysterious; as one random person on the internet said, “not even Jim knows.” Some claim he was burnt out, others that he lost his intensity, still others cite a nagging arm injury; yet another suggestion is that his power game was equaled and nullified by others. Perhaps the truth is some combination of all of the above. But Courier, not unlike Lleyton Hewitt, is an example of a player who becomes the best in the sport but is unable to sustain it for very long.

The other three all share one thing in common: they were contemporaries of 20-Slam winner Roger Federer. Like Courier, all three reached #1 before their better contemporary, but once Federer took over, they all faded into the background. While we can’t entirely blame Federer for their diminishment—they all had their own reasons—he certainly played a role, especially with regards to Roddick. Safin was a notorious underachiever who never seemed to take the game as seriously as his immense talents deserved.

As for Hewitt, well, I would say two factors played a part on his early fall: One, he suffered from injuries that, despite being relatively minor, diminished his greatest strength as a player: his speed. The second factor a bit more harsh, but one could argue that Hewitt was more of a transitional #1, rising in an era when two all-time greats were fading (Sampras and Agassi), and the next two were either a bit slower to fully blossom (Federer) or still very young (Nadal). Hewitt simply couldn’t keep up with those two.

As for Roddick, well, he was just utterly dominated by Federer, as illustrated by his 3-21 record vs the Swiss Maestro, including 0-8 at Slams, four of those losses in Slam finals.

Big Title Winners
Let’s take another angle on this question, by looking at big title winners.

In the Open Era, there have been 127 players who have won big titles (defined as Grand Slams, Masters, Tour Finals, Alternate Tour Finals, and Olympics). In order to have accurate data for the Open Era, I’m going to eliminate any player born before 1949; meaning, any player who wasn’t a teenager when the Open Era started in 1968. That reduces our number to 110 players, from Manuel Orantes to Stefanos Tsitsipas.

I looked at career spans of these 110 players, and considered:

• The age they turned professional
• The age they won their first title
• The age they won their first big title

Note that I wrote “age” and not “year” – I wanted to see specifically at what age the player was. While I did look at first Slams, I was more interested in noting when they won their first big title, as this is more indicative of reaching an “elite” level.

As an aside, with this sort of approach we might be tempted to believe the erroneous view that a player who has won a given level of title is better than all those who haven’t. While there is some correlation, and we can say in a general sense that a player is a “Masters winner” or an “Grand Slam champion,” there are many exceptions. One striking case is Roberto Carretero, who by my estimation, is probably the worst player (at least in terms of their career accomplishments) to ever win a big title. Carretero was known for coming out of nowhere to win the 1996 Hamburg Masters at the age of 20, upsetting players like Yevgeny Kafelnikov and Alex Corretja. Carretero would not only never win another title, but his career-high ranking was #58, by far the lowest for any big title winner in the ATP era.

I’m sure that you can name plenty of players who were better, who never won a big title: just recently, Gael Monfils, Richard Gasquet, Milos Raonic, and Kei Nishikori. Actually, by UTS’s GOAT Points, Nishikori is the best player never to win a big title, and Carretero the worst (followed closely by Albert Portas and Chris Woodruff). And of course no one would claim that Mark Edmondson, Thomas Johansson or Gaston Gaudio--all "one-Slam wonders"--were better players than Slamless players like Miroslav Mecir, Marcelo Rios, David Nalbandian (at his best), or David Ferrer.

But to our 110 big title winners, they break down as follows:

• 12 6+ Slam Winners
• 11 2-4 Slam Winners
• 25 1 Slam winners
• 26 Multiple big title winners
• 36 Single big title winners

Or to depict this visually:

(As with all of my charts, it is more legible if you click on the image for the larger version)

As you can see, the vast majority of the 110 players won their first big title between age 19 and 26, or 92 out of 110 (84%). This range includes 86 out of 92 multiple big title winners (93%).

Perhaps of especial note, 12 of 13 big title winners who won their first at age 27 or later are one-time winners, with the exception of Wawrinka. Meaning, 91 of 92 multiple big title winners won their first by age 26.

It perhaps goes without saying that these categories are as of this writing; presumably some active players will change their category; e.g. it is hard imagining that Daniil Medvedev is done winning Slams, or that players like Alexander Zverev and Stefanos Tsitsipas won’t win at least one Slam, or Andrey Rublev and Matteo Berritini—among others—won’t win big titles.

In summary of the above, the historic precedents are:

• 6+ Slam winners: First big title by age 21
• 2-4 Slam winners: First big title by age 28 (most by 24)
• Single Slam winners: First big title by age 26
• Multiple big title winners: First big title by age 26
• Single big title winners: As late as age 32

The above re-emphasizes what a historic outlier Stan Wawrinka is. Not only is he the only multi-Slam winner who won his first Slam after 25, but he’s the only Slam winner to win his first big title after age 26, and the only multiple big title winner to win his first after age 26.

Now the recency of Wawrinka may imply that times are changing. Or it may just be that he’s an outlier. Either way, it seems that age 26 gives us a relatively solid cap by which we should see an eventual multi-big title winner win their first.

This also means that when we look at the current tour, any player born in 1995 or earlier is in grave danger of missing the cut of being potential multiple big title winners.

So what does this really tell us? How much can these numbers be trusted for projecting current and future young players? Well, tennis changes and every era is different. Just as there are far fewer 18-year olds reaching the top 100 in the current era, so too does it seem that players are reaching their peak at a later age. So while all of this gives us historical trends and indicators, we cannot know the future.

In the next part, we’ll discuss the actual young players on tour, and see who among them might be the best candidates for becoming the next all-time great, or six-Slam winner.

 

[El Dude]

PART FIVE: THE CANDIDATES

THE LIMITATIONS OF BENCHMARKS​

To re-emphasize a point, assessing age-related accomplishments, like I’m doing with these benchmarks, only gets us so far. It isn’t unlike trying to get a sense of a person on external factors: how they dress, their mannerisms, job, etc, but without having a conversation with them, or understanding how they interact with people, or knowing what lives within their heart and mind.

A fuller assessment of a player’s potential would require analyzing their game, skillset, mentality, and whether it is projectable or not. And, of course, that doesn’t account for unforeseen injuries and life events. There are so many factors that go into what a player becomes, and whether or not they fulfill their potential, and no statistical analysis can fully capture all of the subtleties. That said, we can, at least, get a sense of probabilities.

I talked about Borna Coric in the last part, who is the only recent player to reach the top 100 at 17 years old, since Rafael Nadal and Richard Gasquet in 2003. While some were excited about his potential—it was at a time, 2014, when the tour had been lacking good young players—it soon became clear that his game was a bit toothless; he was not unlike a far lesser version of Novak Djokovic, all defense but without the offensive skills that put Novak over the edge. Could Coric have developed those skills (and can he still now)? That’s debatable, but my point is that analyzing his actual game led people to (rightly) think his upside was limited, despite his early rise.

Actually, Nadal and Gasquet are a relevant pair, because one became one of the very best players in tennis history, and the other never won a big title or reached a Slam final. Now it is not that both were viewed as of equal upside in 2003 when they were 16-17 years old, but that no one probably imagined just how greatly their careers would diverge. Both were seen as very promising youngsters, and their career paths represent just how widely players can diverge from a similar starting point. The 1980s, in particular, was filled with players who broke into the top 18 at a very young age, with Aaron Krickstein being a striking example. He is the youngest player in the Open Era to win a title, winning two ATP 250s at age 16 (only Michael Chang and Lleyton Hewitt won titles at age 16), and he reached #9 at age 17 but never won a big title, reached a Slam final, or ranked higher than #7.

Or to visualize it:

The external factors do mean something. They tell us how all greats have historically progressed, and thus give us a framework within which to consider deeper, subtler factors. But back in 2003, there was no way to tell from statistics and ages the qualities that have made Rafa the player he’s been, as well as the qualities that have kept Gasquet from being better than he was. You can see their divergence in 2005: where Rafa supernova-ed to #2 and never looked back, Gasquet peaked out in the top 20, and only peeked into the top 10 in a few spikes over the course of his career.

CANDIDATES FOR GREATNESS​

So, let’s end this series by looking at some of the younger and more promising players on tour. Our range will go from Dominic Thiem, born in 1993, to a couple guys born in 2003, a span of just over a decade. As you’ll see, the list is light on players in the early years—both because they’re now in the second half of their 20s, which means they’ve likely reached their peak level, but also because the early 90s (in terms of birth year) was light on talent, with 1996 and on having a much more talented group of players.

First, let’s revisit the benchmarks and see how our list of young players look. I’ve added another benchmark, based upon the past segment: first big title won. I think this is important because, not only is it a good indicator of being an elite player, it also helps us differentiate the best from the rest: Every all-time great (6+ Slam winner) won their first big title at age 21 or younger; and 10 out of 11 2-4 Slam winners won theirs at 24 our younger (with Wawrinka being the lone exception, at age 28).

So, the big title alone suggests that all-time greats generally win their first big title by age 21, and most multi-Slam winners by age 24. But exceptions are possible.

OK, on to the heart of it:

The shades of green mean a benchmark has been met; DARK GREEN means it was met within the “Benchmarks of Greatness” parameters shared by all 6-Slam winners, MIDDLE GREEN means it was met within a year of that, and LIGHT GREEN means it was met more than a year after. The other colors indicate a benchmark hasn’t been met; the LIGHT PURPLE means it is still within a year after the age parameter and the DARK PURPLE more than a year. The YELLOW means the player has less than a year to meet the parameter (meaning, “the clock is ticking”), while the WHITE means they have more than a year.

There’s a lot to unpack here. First, I want to clarify that this is not meant to be an exhaustive list of young players; there almost certainly will be under-25 players who end up with better careers than some of those on that chart. But I tried to include the "known suspects" as well as a relatively random assortment of a few others.

As you can see, only three players haven’t missed one benchmark: Zverev, Sinner, and Alcaraz Garfia. For Zverev to meet all 10 benchmarks, he has a steep hill to climb: he must reach #1 and win his first Slam before his 25th birthday, which is in April of next year; meaning, he has to win the Australian Open. Sinner has met more than half the benchmarks and has more time; he just entered the top 10, so has already met his age 20 benchmarks. Alcaraz Garfia has met only three benchmarks but is still only 18. He has over two years (March of 2024) to meet his age 20 benchmarks.

Tsitsipas missed the first benchmark by just a couple months and has met every one since, so is close enough that I think he can be considered a player who has reached every benchmark so far. He’s got almost two years to reach the last two (#1 and his first Slam), so is well situated.

It is interesting to note that the current young player who most think has the best chance of being the next #1, Daniil Medvedev, missed every benchmark, although has reached 9 out of 10, but mostly a year or more later. His overall resume, like Dominic Thiem’s, is historically closer to a “lesser great,” or 2-4 Slam winner. He’s going to bear watching as a possible precedence changer.

The rest of the players are in various situations of having reached some benchmarks but missed others. I’ve included a wide range of young players, from the top young prospects like Alcaraz Garfia to the most accomplished youngish players like Zverev, including players like Lloyd Harris with presumably limited upside, to players like Andrey Rublev, who has an impressive resume, but hasn’t quite cracked elite.

The most extreme two players in the chart above are 28-year old Thiem and 18-year old Holger Rune, who is the second highest ranked 18-year old at #119. Thiem has a strong resume, ranked as high as #3, with 17 titles, two big titles, one of which is a Slam. But he’s 28-years old, at an age when most players are already starting to slip. Rune, on the other hand, is a baby and hasn’t yet broken into the top 100 but has a good chance with six months to go. I haven’t seen him play so can’t comment on his upside, but presumably if he’s on the cusp of the top 100, he’s got a chance of being good. But it remains to be seen whether he goes the route of Stefan Kozlov or Jannik Sinner or, most likely, somewhere in-between.

FIVE GROUPS​

Let’s look through the young players in greater depth, categorized in five groups.

GROUP A (The New Elite): Dominic Thiem, Daniil Medvedev, Alexander Zverev, Stefanos Tsitsipas

This quartet has all made it to the elite: all have won multiple big titles, reached the top 5, and either won or gone deep at Slams. The questions for all four, in terms of their future, are slightly different, but all have to do with whether or not they still have unactualized upside.

Can Thiem recover from his injury and reclaim his place in the elite? At age 28 his chances of reaching the requisite 6+ Slam for true greatness are slim, but he still has a chance of becoming a “near-great” and winning another Slam or two. In order to do so, he not only has to recover from his injury but have a later career surge, not unlike Wawrinka did in 2014-16, at age 28-31. That’s the age period that Thiem is entering, and traditionally is a player’s late prime.

Medvedev is the player best positioned to become the next #1, and would be the first since the Big Four took over that spot way back in early 2004. If Novak Djokovic doesn’t play in the Australian Open, his chances increase. Furthermore, he is the only one to accomplish the rather symbolic—and literal—feat of defeating one of the Big Four in a Slam final. But Daniil has history to contend with: He broke in at a relatively late age. While his rise was quick once he reached the top 50, he has missed every benchmark. He’s 25 years old, which is historically the tipping point from early to late prime. As mentioned, he is the best test-case for whether the benchmarks hold true today, but history is against him reaching the all-time great level of 6+ Slams, especially considering his age.

Or it another way, Medvedev has only one Slam left before his 26th birthday. By their 26th birthdays, here is how many Slams the 6+ Slam winners of the Open Era won: Borg 11, Sampras 11, Federer 11, Nadal 10, McEnroe 7, Wilander 7, Djokovic 6, Connors 5, Edberg 5, Becker 5, Agassi 3, Lendl 2.

Transitional players like Ken Rosewall, Rod Laver, and John Newcombe also won quite a few Slams before their 26th birthdays. That said, Lendl also broke into Slam winning at an older age, not winning his first until age 24. Meaning, while there isn’t a perfect precedent for Medvedev, there are one or two close ones in Lendl and Agassi, and both did it in different ways. Lendl won six Slams in a four-year period (1984-87, or age 24-27), and then a couple more after, while Agassi won Slams in two bunches, three early on in 1992-95 (age 22-24), and then five more in his second peak in 1999-2003 (age 29-32).

I’ll pair Zverev and Tsitsipas. Not only do they, along with Medvedev, round out the newly emerging “Biggish Three,” but they are both slightly problematic for different reasons, although what they share can be exemplified by the phrase, “its all in the attitude.”

Zverev is still, as of this writing, not only one of only three players to not fail to reach a benchmark, but he’s only two away from becoming just the 17th player in Open Era history to meet all of them. The problem, though, is that he’s got the two hardest remaining: winning a Slam and reaching #1 before his 25th birthday, which is just six months away. More to the point, he’s got only one Slam between now and then, so if he is going to reach those benchmarks, not only does he have to surge to #1, but win the 2022 Australian Open; the latter is possible, but the former very unlikely. Meaning, Zverev is almost certainly going to fall short of reaching all ten benchmarks, at least before he turns 25 in April. That said, he’s already won 18 titles, 7 of them big. If and when he does win his first Slam, he’ll join Andre Agassi and Andy Murray as the only players in the Open Era to have won all four types of big titles (Slams, Tour Finals, Masters, and Olympics).

Tsitsipas just missed the first benchmark, reaching the top 100 a couple months after his 19th birthday, but has reached every other one since. He’s also still just 23, so has almost two years to win his first Slam and reach #1. On paper, it could be argued that he’s an even better candidate for greatness than Medvedev and Zverev, if only because he has more time to reach the hardest benchmark of all: #1. But there’s a question about his attitude; if he can hone it towards his tennis play, he has a good chance of reaching greatness.

GROUP B (The New Second Tier): Andrey Rublev, Matteo Berretini, Hubert Hurkacz, Casper Ruud, Karen Khachanov

The next group is comprised of players who have already established a high level of play, winning multiple titles and/or going deep in Slams, and a couple even winning a big title, but not quite established themselves as true elites. Any of these players could theoretically win Slams, and one or two might win multiple, but as of this writing, it is highly unlikely that any will become true greats (5+ Slam winners) or even near-greats (2-4 Slam winners), and most seem destined for the “second tier,” along the lines of recent players like Tomas Berdych, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, and David Ferrer.

Rublev led the ATP tour with 5 titles in the pandemic-abbreviated 2020 season, but has slowed down since, winning only a single title in 2021, perhaps due to over-playing. But he’s reached two Masters finals this year and one Slam QF, and it seems like only a matter of time and opportunity before he wins a big title or two.

Similarly with Berretini, who is a strong candidate for a Masters title and a Slam darkhorse, at least at Wimbledon. Hurkacz won his first Masters earlier this year and has won three titles overall in 2021, so joins Rublev and Berretini as Slam darkhorses and bonafide second tier players.

The next two players are “tier 2.5” – on the cusp of second and third tiers. Ruud is doing in 2021 what Rublev did in 2020: he leads the tour with five titles this year, although all are ATP 250s (whereas Rublev won a handful of ATP 500s). Furthermore, Ruud has yet to reach a Slam QF, although he’s reached the QF or SF in four of six Masters he’s played this year, so is—at least—a Masters contender.

And one more: Khachanov. I went back and forth on whether to include him in this group or the next, but decided that winning a Masters and reaching #8 earns him the right. Khachanov came up alongside Medvedev and both are of very similar age. Karen even won a big title before Daniil, but where Daniil kept on winning, Karen dropped off. In a way, their parallel rise was similar to Dominic Thiem and Jiri Vesely, although unlike Vesely, Khachanov won a big title and thus has established a higher upside and has a chance to return to the top 10.

GROUP C (Third Tier): Nick Kyrgios, Cameron Norrie, Borna Coric, Reilly Opelka, Frances Tiafoe, Taylor Fritz, Ugo Humbert, Alex de Minaur, Cristian Garin, Alexander Bublik

This is a group of mostly “older young” players with limited upside and unlikely to reach even the second tier. These are guys who are likely to be—or are, already—what could be called “third tier” players: they’ll dip into the top 20 and even skim the top 10 but will spend most of their time in the 15-50 range. These are the type of guys that fill out Slam seedings, win several ATP 250 and 500s, but probably not big titles, although they’ll likely scatter a few among them (and Norrie has, surprisingly, already won a Masters).

Kyrgios remains the great untapped potential on tour, although at age 26 it is unlikely that we haven’t already seen the best he has to offer. But of this group, he may be the most likely to have a late career spike and win a big title or two. Opelka and Bublik are big-serving, tall players who can hope to follow the career path of John Isner, who is the definition of a borderline tier two/three player. Both rose at younger ages than Isner, who didn’t really turn pro until 22, and are currently at similar places in their career as Isner was.

Tiafoe and Fritz first came to notice around the same time as Zverev and Rublev, but where Zverev kept rising, the other three hung out in the 30-50 range for a couple years, before Rublev made another jump around age 22 and Tiafoe and Fritz stagnated. But both have shown signs of recent improvement and should at least stabilize somewhere in the 15-30 range, if not have a shot to break into the top 10 at some point.

I’ve talked enough about Coric, who rose very quickly into the top 100 and then all the way up to #33 at age 18 (not unlike Alcaraz Garfia), but has settled in as a third tier player and I would be surprised at this point if he became anything better. Garin offers an interesting counter-point. Some pegged him early on for having good potential, but he stagnated around #200 or lower until age 22, but then rose quickly into the top 40 and is currently #17. At 25 years old, it is very unlikely that he becomes an elite but could be a “cuspy” player of the top 10-20 for years to come.

Humbert has an interesting trajectory: he broke into the top 100 at age 20 and has gradually risen since, reaching the top 30 at age 22 and stabilizing there for the last year or so. Another player that I don’t expect to be elite, but could be a good third tier player. De Minaur seems to be mirroring Coric’s career, although at a slightly older age. He reached the top 50 while still just 19, and has dipped into the top 20 a couple times, but hasn’t moved beyond third tier status and seems to have limited upside.

Finally, Cameron Norrie. His Masters title was a huge surprise, and may be more indicative of opportunity than ability. He did beat several good players, but the best was probably Grigor Dimitrov; meaning, he didn’t have to face any elite player, no Rafa or Novak, nor even Medvedev, Zverev, Tsitsipas, or even Rublev, Berretini, or Hurkacz. My guess is that he stabilizes as a solid third tier player.

Others that could be solid third tier players include Lloyd Harris, Soonwoo Kwon, Tommy Paul, Pedro Martinez, Jaume Munar, Mikael Ymer, and others.

The next two groups include only players age 22 or younger, and thus with indeterminate upside.

GROUP D (Elite Prospects): Denis Shapovalov, Felix Auger-Aliassime, Jannik Sinner, Carlos Alcaraz Garfia

These are the young players (age 22 and younger) who have the best chance of reaching elite status. Shapovalov is debatable, however, as he’s already 22 and still hasn’t broken through into the elite. After reaching #23 at age 19, he’s pretty much stagnated in the top 10-20 for more than three years. I would say that if he hasn’t won a big title or reached the top 5 in the next year or less, he’s probably going to max out in the second tier.

Some are disappointed with Auger-Aliassime, citing his 0-8 record in finals, but the converse is that he’s reached 8 finals already and is starting to go deeper in Slams. But the clock is ticking, and his career path is strikingly similar to his fellow Canadian, Shapovalov. While I have little doubt that he’ll be at least a second tier player (he’s very close already), I do still think he has a good chance of becoming a true elite player, if probably not a great. But I suspect he’s going to click this next year and start winning titles in bunches.

If there is one player on tour who I think has the best chance of becoming an all-time great, it is probably Sinner. Meaning, if I had to guess when in 2030 we look back at the 2020s, who the best overall player of the decade was, I’d guess Jannik. He’s already won several titles and is still very young, just turning 20 in August. Like Auger-Aliassime, he’s on the cusp of becoming a long-term fixture in the top 10, possibly higher (as of this writing, he just entered the live top 10 at #9). He looks like a complete player, including a good head on his shoulders. At the very least, he’s going to join the elite in short order and has a chance of becoming the best of them.

Finally, Alcaraz Garfia broke through in a big way this year, reaching the top 40 and a Slam QF at the tender age of 18, as well as his first title. Yet his ultimate upside is unknown at this point; his 2021 season isn’t that different from Coric’s 2014 season, and Coric seems to have stabilized as a “third tier” type. But there’s no reason not to be excited about this young player, who could be the next player to love for Nadal fans (given that Alcaraz is Spanish, from Rafa’s academy, and looks good on clay). Baby Rafa?

GROUP E (Lesser Prospects): Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, Jenson Brooksby, Sebastien Korda, Brandon Nakashima, Juan Manuel Cerundolo, Lorenzo Musetti, Holger Rune, etc.

This list could be quite a bit longer, but I tried to stick to those who have exhibited some degree of potential for the second tier or better. These are young players who haven’t reached their potential, but for a variety of reasons are in a lower category than Group D, though one or two of them could join those players within the next year or so.

Brooksby has come on really strong over the last few months. Korda rose quickly from outside the top 200 at age 20 to inside the top 40 in less than a year, so bears watching. Does the US have hope in these two? Fokina, Cerundolo, and Nakashima all bear watching as they continue to rise, albeit slower than the pace known with future elites, so they’ll likely end up as third tier players. Musetti broke into the top 100 just after turning 19 and quickly rose as high as #61, but has started to stall out a bit, but it is still too early to write the book on him. Rune is just too young to get a good read on, although keep an eye on him as he’s the second highest ranked 18-year old after Alcaraz Garfia and on the cusp of the top 100 (and reaching the first benchmark).

Others worth mentioning: Emil Ruusuvuori, Corentin Moutet, Alexei Popyrin, Miomir Kecmanovic, Mikael Ymer, Thiago Seyboth Wild, Jaume Munar, Hugo Gaston, Sebastian Baez, etc.

None of these guys are likely to be future elites or even second tier players, but several might work their way up to third tier, and maybe one or two could break into second tier.

SUMMARIZING THOUGHTS: THE NEXT GREAT PLAYER IS...​

The problem is that it is very hard to predict all-time greatness until it actually happens. When did we know that Federer was an all-time great? Probably not until the end of 2004, when he won his fourth Slam out of the last six (or maybe by Wimbledon, but let’s not quibble). Rafa? His meteoric rise in 2005 was a tell-tale sign, and even though he didn’t win a Slam off clay until 2008, it seemed only a matter of time. But even so, it probably wasn’t until third or fourth Roland Garros in 2007 or 2008 that he solidified his place as a future all-time great. What about Novak? Well, as late as January 1, 2011, it looked like he might end up more as what Andy Murray became: a mult-Slam winner and #1, but more of a “lesser great” than a true all-time great. A year later and he was marked for all-time greatness.

The converse is also true: there are far more players who are hyped as future greats who never reach that mark.

As mentioned, Sinner is the top prospect for all-time greatness because he combines what I consider to be the the two most important factors:

1. Age relative to his accomplishments (as represented by the benchmarks)
2. Talent and projectability (according to eyeball tests and analysts)

The former is quantifiable, the latter is not and highly subjective.

A player like Felix Auger-Aliassime scores highly in the latter but is showing signs of concern in the former. All signs are good so far with Carlos Alcaraz Garfia, but it is too early in the process to be more than cautiously optimistic.

And a further point, to draw upon an idea from an earlier part in this series: One key component to greatness is not only rising very young, but also not stalling out, at least not for very long. Among the last four 10+ Slam winners, Sampras reached #5 shortly after his 19th birthday, but took about a year and a half to reach #3, and then over another year to reach #1. Federer stalled out in the 10-20 range for awhile: he reached #20 at 19.5 years old, and then took almost two years to reach the top 5. Nadal was ranked around #50 for over a year, but then rose from #47 to #2 in less than half a year. Novak took only about a year to rise from #63 to #3, although then stalled out in the #2-4 range for about four years, although this was due to to Roger and Rafa.

So how do the top young players on tour compare?

What stands out is how much later, age-wise, Daniil Medvedev’s rise was. And you’ll note, he reached #65 just before turning 21, but then didn’t really start rising until halfway between 22-23, but then his rise was relatively quick.

Zverev and Sinner have risen in a similar manner to each other, and closely align with Novak’s rise. If Sinner is going to keep pace with those two, he’ll need to start winning big titles, as Zverev won two Masters at 20, and Novak, of course, won his first Slam.

Tsitsipas was a bit behind the others, but with a very strong rise, before stabilizing in the #5-8 range for about two years, before rising to #3 more recently, although that is partially due to the fall of Rafa and Roger.

I've included Rublev as possibly the "best of second tier." As you can see, his trajectory is slower than the others, although is somewhat similar to Medvedev's.

There is some concern in Felix’s line, because while he reached #20 more quickly than any of the others, he has stalled out in the 10-20 range for over two years. While this is concerning, it isn’t a deal-breaker for future greatness, especially when you consider the unusual nature of the last two years. Actually, his stalling isn’t far behind Roger’s at a similar age.

It is worth noting that Alcaraz Garfia is higher ranked than any of the other players were at his age, so that bears watching.

So in summary, as stated, Jannik Sinner ranks above the pack as the most likely player to become the next all-time great. But it is far from sure thing.

Then we have the trio of Medvedev, Zverev, and Tsitsipas; Daniil has already won a Slam and is likely to win more and reach #1: it seems only a matter of time when the other two win their first Slams, and are both candidates to spend some time at #1. But if I were to guess, all three are more likely to finish as "lesser greats," in the 2-4 Slam range.

Then we have Alcaraz Garfia and Auger-Aliassime, who I see as the next best candidates for greatness. It is too soon to put those expectations on Alcaraz Garfia, and there are concerns with Felix, so both are more likely to end up somewhere below, whether as second tier, elites, or lesser greats. We can hope that in another six months or so, we can speak of Holger Rune in the same category, but that is far from a certainty.

And then we have the darkhorse candidates, with Rublev heading the pack. But it is highly unlikely that any other players that are currently on tour, and age 18 or older--other than those mentioned--will reach greatness. Or to put it another way, if we do have a future great on tour, he is almost certainly one of the six or seven players mentioned in the last few paragraphs.

ADDENDUM: RANDOM BITS

Best chance of becoming the next all-time great: Jannik Sinner

Most likely to be the next new Slam winner: Alexander Zverev and Stefanos Tsitsipas

Most likely to be the next new Masters winner: Andrey Rublev, Matteo Berretini, Jannik Sinner

Best Name: Holger Rune

 

[shawnbm]

Outstanding analysis as always El Dude! Really goes to show you the Nadalovic epoch came into its own around 2011 big time versus Federer era. His colors dominate from 2003 until then and then they dominate. Shows you how these three really ran the show in all the big titles for so many years.

 

[El Dude]

Outstanding analysis as always El Dude! Really goes to show you the Nadalovic epoch came into its own around 2011 big time versus Federer era. His colors dominate from 2003 until then and then they dominate. Shows you how these three really ran the show in all the big titles for so many years.

Yup. I actually have the full chart going back to 1927 (beginning of the "Pro Era") and the Djokodal gen is the most dominant in tennis history, with the possible exception of the Laver-Rosewall gen (1934-38).

 

[rafanoy1992]

I will say this: This win by Medvedev over Djokovic will probably propel Medvedev's career into a greater heights! Before this win, Medvedev already had 4 Masters 1000 crowns, an ATP Tour Final crown, a grass court title, and a world 2 ranking on his resume. Now, the question how high can he go in terms number of slams, titles, Masters 1000 title crowns and etc...? Also, can improve his game on Clay on which he can at least reach the FO Final? The sky is the limit for Medvedev...

I am curious to see on how both Tsitsipas and Zverev elevate/respond in their respective games in 2022 now that Medvedev finally broke through.

 

[El Dude]

I really enjoy listening to Pancho call a tennis match back in the 1970s when Connors and Borg were battling and ol’ Rocket and Muscles were still around. Gonzales knew his stuff.

I also love the fact that a 43-year old Pancho beat a 19-year old Connors for a Masters title in 1971. Pancho was a little old when the Open Era started (39), but was still a very good player into his 40s.

 

[Andy22]

Changing of the Guard then Djokovic won 3 of the 4 major titles this season silly topic by OP honesty. Maybe he can make the same topic again next season after Nadal-Djokovic win 3 out of 4 slams with same random player winning the US Open. Is this finally the Changing of the Guard been saying this for 5 years now.

 

[El Dude]

Changing of the Guard then Djokovic won 3 of the 4 major titles this season silly topic by OP honesty. Maybe he can make the same topic again next season after Nadal-Djokovic win 3 out of 4 slams with same random player winning the US Open. Is this finally the Changing of the Guard been saying this for 5 years now.

Evidently you didn't read the post or look at the chart.

A "changing of the guard" is gradual. In this case, it started in 2017 and accelerated this year.

 

[El Dude]

I will say this: This win by Medvedev over Djokovic will probably propel Medvedev's career into a greater heights! Before this win, Medvedev already had 4 Masters 1000 crowns, an ATP Tour Final crown, a grass court title, and a world 2 ranking on his resume. Now, the question how high can he go in terms number of slams, titles, Masters 1000 title crowns and etc...? Also, can improve his game on Clay on which he can at least reach the FO Final? The sky is the limit for Medvedev...

I am curious to see on how both Tsitsipas and Zverev elevate/respond in their respective games in 2022 now that Medvedev finally broke through.

I think we'll see Medvedev, Zverev, and Tsitsipas linked historically, as the "Biggish Three" of Next Gen. I think they'll all win 1-4 Slams a piece, which is a wide range, but the main point is that (I think) they all win Slams, possibly multiple, but not all-time-great level.

It seems there is a Millenial Gen Biggish Three forming as well in FAA, Sinner, and Alcaraz, but it is obviously too soon to tell, and I'm not quite ready to write Musetti off from exclusion - nor am I convinced that one of them won't emerge as dominant.

But at this point, I would be surprised if any of the Next Gen emerged as "the guy." Medvedev might end up being the first among near-equals, but I just don't see him running away with it. Maybe he wins 4 Slams and the other two win 2 a piece. But I don't see Med winning, say, 6-8, and the other winning 0-1.

But who knows.

 

[Andy22]

Y

Evidently you didn't read the post or look at the chart.

A "changing of the guard" is gradual. In this case, it started in 2017 and accelerated this year.

Yes but unless they start winning most the majors there is no Changing of the Guard sorry but its true.

 

[El Dude]

Y

Yes but unless they start winning most the majors there is no Changing of the Guard sorry but its true.

I'm not sure if English is your second language, but "changing" is an active tense verb. Meaning, it is in the process of change.

 

[Andy22]

I'm not sure if English is your second language, but "changing" is an active tense verb. Meaning, it is in the process of change.

Ok fair enough but don't think it's happening next season at least.

 

[Front242]

I will say this: This win by Medvedev over Djokovic will probably propel Medvedev's career into a greater heights! Before this win, Medvedev already had 4 Masters 1000 crowns, an ATP Tour Final crown, a grass court title, and a world 2 ranking on his resume. Now, the question how high can he go in terms number of slams, titles, Masters 1000 title crowns and etc...? Also, can improve his game on Clay on which he can at least reach the FO Final? The sky is the limit for Medvedev...

I am curious to see on how both Tsitsipas and Zverev elevate/respond in their respective games in 2022 now that Medvedev finally broke through.

I can really see ShitHisPants at home with a dart board and Medvedev's head on the bullseye shouting bullshit Russian and angrily throwing his darts

 

[shawnbm]

Dude—curious as to whether the Laver-Rosewall domination reflects input from Pancho or Hoad or Newcombe?

 

[El Dude]

Dude—curious as to whether the Laver-Rosewall domination reflects input from Pancho or Hoad or Newcombe?

Hoad, yes, but Pancho no. Hoad was born in 1934 like Rosewall, Laver in 1938, with Emerson between them in 1936. Pancho was born in 1928 and Newcombe in 1944.

Again, the gens are arbitrary, but in terms of five-year spans, you've got:

1944-48: Newcombe, Kodes, Nastase, Smith
1939-43: Ashe
1934-38: Laver, Rosewall, Hoad, Emerson, Santana
1929-33: Trabert
1924-28: Pancho, Sedgman

As you can see, there's a correlation between "Lost Gen" (b. 1989-93) and Ashe's gen (1939-43). Both came after a monster generation, and really only had one good player. Further, just as it could be argued that Ashe belongs with the later generation (he was born in 1943, after all), so too could Thiem (born 1993) be considered part of Next Gen.

So while I generally stick to five-year spans, I think a more accurate depiction would vary somewhat, so "Lost Gen" would be 1989-92, and Ashe would be part of a 1943-48 group.

Similarly, I'd prefer grouping Pancho (1928), Sedgman (1927), and Trabert (1930) all as part of the same generation.

I'm playing with the idea of a "cluster" approach; each generation is centered around great players, so it varies over time.

 

[Fiero425]

Very impressive thread! I'll have to download as much as I can to my blog! It's not as informative to me of course since I've lived it, but it needs to be transposed to hardcopy periodically because so many detractors can't seem to absorb this information! I keep hearing of a "weak era" when it isn't possible with all of the "Big 3" at the height of their powers going at it event after event! Besides that, they've also traded being YE #1 while Fedovic owned the YEC like no other 2 competing at the same time! Every record will end up being theirs not because of a weak era, but showing how special (phys./ment,) they are to reign surpreme for almost 20 years with the end seeming to close soon!

 

[shawnbm]

I really enjoy listening to Pancho call a tennis match back in the 1970s when Connors and Borg were battling and ol’ Rocket and Muscles were still around. Gonzales knew his stuff.