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I'm doing some research for a possible blog article, and thought I'd share some of it to get some conversation going. Basically I'm looking at big titles, and if there is any correlation in terms of when a player wins their first big title and how good they become after. Nothing super surprising so far, but some interesting tidbits to share.
First of all, I'm expanding the definition of "big title" slightly to include not only the usual Grand Slams, ATP Finals, Masters, and Olympics, but also the Grand Slam Cup in the 90s and the WCT Finals in the 70s and 80s, as both were at least as competitive as Masters titles.
I'm looking at the entire Open Era (1968-present), but 1970 marks the first year of the Grand Prix Super Series, which is the ancestor to the Masters ATP 1000. From 1970 on, the big titles have been pretty consistent, with additions and subtractions of the WCT Finals (1971-89), Grand Slam Cup (1990-99), and Olympics (1984-present).
OK, the data. All of this is rough but should be accurate or close to it. Here are some various tid-bits:
GENERAL INFO ON BIG TITLES
*Total Number of Big Title winners (Open Era): 116. Of those 116, 56 (48%) won Slams.
*Birth Year Range: 1928 (Pancho Gonzales, who won the LA Pacific tournament in 1971 at age 43, the oldest big title winner, defeating a 19-year old Jimmy Connors in the final), to 1997 (Alex Zverev, who on 2017 Rome).
*Age Range: 17 (Borg, Wilander, Becker, Chang) to 43 (Gonzales).
*Slam Counts: 16 on 6+ Slams, 15 won 2-4 Slams, 25 won a single Slam, 59 didn't win any Slams
*Rankings of Big Title winners: Of the 116 big title winners, 31 reached #1 (both before and after the ATP era), 50 reached #2-5, 29 reached #6-10, 4 reached #11-20, and 3 never ranked in the top 20.
*Lowest Ranked Big Title winners: The honor goes to Roberto Carretero, who never ranked higher than #58, despite winning the 1996 Hamburg Masters. After him, Vincent Van Patten (who happens to be Dick's son) reached #26, Andrew Pattison #24, Phil Dent #17, Mark Edmondson #15, Andrei Pavel #13, and David Wheaton #12.
*Most Big Titles: Roger Federer holds the big title lead with 50, followed closely by Novak Djokovic (47) and Rafael Nadal (45), then a big jump down to Ivan Lendl (37), John McEnroe (34), Pete Sampras (32), Bjorn Borg (29), Jimmy Connors (28), Andre Agassi (27), Boris Becker (24), Andy Murray (20), Stefan Edberg and Mats Wilander (16 each).
*Most Big Titles Without a Slam: Marcelo Rios, with six big titles and no Slams. Not coincidentally, Rios is the only #1 without a Slam trophy. After Rios, several players won four big titles and no Slams: Miroslav Mecir, Andriy Medvedev, and Nikolay Davydenko.
Oldest First Big Title: The oldest player is actually Marty Riessen, who won his first and only big title at age 33. But Riessen was born in 1941, so played many years before the Open Era, so in a sense is disqualified as some of his amateur era titles might have been the equivalent of a big title. Andres Gimeno is also disqualified, as a “tweener.”
Among players who played all, or almost all, of their careers in the Open Era, the oldest first big title winner is Ivan Ljubicic, who won his only big title, the 2010 Indian Wells, at age 31. The only other players to win their first big title after turning 30 are Cedric Pioline, who won the 2000 Monte Carlo Masters at age 30, and David Ferrer, who won the 2012 Paris Masters at age 30.
Oldest Big Title: As mentioned above, that honor goes to the amazing Pancho Gonzales, who won the 1971 LA Pacific at age 43, 4 months, 11 days. He's the only player in the Open Era to win a big title after turning 40; actually, no other player has won a big title after turning 38 - he was more than six years older than the next oldest big title winner, Ken Rosewall, who was 37 and 1 month when he won the 1972 Australian Open.
Youngest Big Title: Several players won big titles at age 17, in chronological order: Bjorn Borg with Rome in 1974; Mats Wilander with 1982 Roland Garros; Boris Becker with 1985 Wimbledon; and Michael Chang with 1989 Roland Garros. Chang was the youngest of them, at 17 years, 3 months, 7 days. Becker actually won two big titles at age 17, a Slam and a Masters.
PREDICTIVE INFO
Of the 116 players, I only could find first big title info on 114 of them, and a few of the 114 were estimates based upon available information, because six or seven of them won their first big titles before the Open Era started, and there was no clear demarcation between big and minor titles, other than Slams. But other than that, the info is pretty solid.
Age at which # of Slam winners won their first big title...
*6+ Slam winners: Ages 17 to 23. Of the 16 players who won at least 6 Slams, 15 of them won their first big title at age 21 or younger, and 14 of them won their first big title at age 20 or younger. John Newcombe won his first Slam in 1967 at age 23. It is very possible that he won a tournament before that, which was equivalent to a Masters, but the data is unclear without further research. The 21-year old was Rod Laver.
(The point being, it seems that winning a first big title before turning 21 is a pretty strong benchmark for being a 6+ Slam winner)
*2-5 Slam winners: Ages 20 to 28. That said, if you take out Stan Wawrinka (age 28), the range is 20 to 25 for the other 14 players, so we have another strong benchmark: age 25 or younger is probably necessary for winning a first big title and being a multi-Slam winner, although Stan proves that it is not absolutely necessary.
*1 Slam winners: Ages 17 to 26 for 24 players. Here we have a different indicator, as Michael Chang is the only player who won their first big title as a 17-year old and only won a single Slam, and only one of four teenage big title winners who didn't win more than a single Slam. We'll get to that later.
*0 Slam winners: Ages 18 to 31 for 59 players. This is quite a range and pretty well distributed, so doesn't really tell us much.
Slam Count by Age of First Big Title
*17 years old: As mentioned, four players won their first big title at age 17. Three won 6+ Slams (Borg, Wilander, Becker), and one only won a single Slam (Chang).
18 years old: Three players. Two won 6+ Slams (Rosewall, Nadal), one no Slams (Jimmy Arias).
19 years old: Seven players. Five won 6+ Slams (McEnroe, Edberg, Agassi, Sampras, Djokovic), and two won none (Mancini, Medvedev).
Teenagers: 14 players. 10 won 6+ Slams, 1 won a single Slam, and three didn't win any Slams.
20 year olds: Sixteen players. It splits more widely here, with 4 winning 6+ Slams, 5 winning 2-4 Slams, 1 a single Slam, and 6 no Slams.
Ages 21 to 25 have a similar distribution, although slightly veering towards fewer and fewer Slams.
Age 26 and older includes 18 players, only one of whom won multiple Slams (Warinka), and only two a single Slam.
Most Slams (Pro + Amateur + Open) with Age of First Big Title
23 Rosewall (18)
19 Laver (21)
18 Federer (20)
14 Gonzales (20)
14 Sampras (19)
14 Nadal (18)
12 Djokovic (19)
11 Borg (17)
8 Connors (20)
8 Lendl (20)
8 Agassi (19)
7 Newcombe (23)
7 McEnroe (19)
7 Wilander (17)
6 Edberg (19)
6 Becker (17)
4 Vilas (22)
4 Courier (20)
3 Ashe (25)
3 Kodes (24)
3 Kuerten (20)
3 Wawrinka (28)
3 Murray (21)
2 Nastase (23)
2 Smith (23)
2 Kriek (23)
2 Bruguera (20)
2 Rafter (24)
2 Kafelnikov (22)
2 Safin (20)
2 Hewitt (20)
OK, that's a ton of info to digest.
First of all, I'm expanding the definition of "big title" slightly to include not only the usual Grand Slams, ATP Finals, Masters, and Olympics, but also the Grand Slam Cup in the 90s and the WCT Finals in the 70s and 80s, as both were at least as competitive as Masters titles.
I'm looking at the entire Open Era (1968-present), but 1970 marks the first year of the Grand Prix Super Series, which is the ancestor to the Masters ATP 1000. From 1970 on, the big titles have been pretty consistent, with additions and subtractions of the WCT Finals (1971-89), Grand Slam Cup (1990-99), and Olympics (1984-present).
OK, the data. All of this is rough but should be accurate or close to it. Here are some various tid-bits:
GENERAL INFO ON BIG TITLES
*Total Number of Big Title winners (Open Era): 116. Of those 116, 56 (48%) won Slams.
*Birth Year Range: 1928 (Pancho Gonzales, who won the LA Pacific tournament in 1971 at age 43, the oldest big title winner, defeating a 19-year old Jimmy Connors in the final), to 1997 (Alex Zverev, who on 2017 Rome).
*Age Range: 17 (Borg, Wilander, Becker, Chang) to 43 (Gonzales).
*Slam Counts: 16 on 6+ Slams, 15 won 2-4 Slams, 25 won a single Slam, 59 didn't win any Slams
*Rankings of Big Title winners: Of the 116 big title winners, 31 reached #1 (both before and after the ATP era), 50 reached #2-5, 29 reached #6-10, 4 reached #11-20, and 3 never ranked in the top 20.
*Lowest Ranked Big Title winners: The honor goes to Roberto Carretero, who never ranked higher than #58, despite winning the 1996 Hamburg Masters. After him, Vincent Van Patten (who happens to be Dick's son) reached #26, Andrew Pattison #24, Phil Dent #17, Mark Edmondson #15, Andrei Pavel #13, and David Wheaton #12.
*Most Big Titles: Roger Federer holds the big title lead with 50, followed closely by Novak Djokovic (47) and Rafael Nadal (45), then a big jump down to Ivan Lendl (37), John McEnroe (34), Pete Sampras (32), Bjorn Borg (29), Jimmy Connors (28), Andre Agassi (27), Boris Becker (24), Andy Murray (20), Stefan Edberg and Mats Wilander (16 each).
*Most Big Titles Without a Slam: Marcelo Rios, with six big titles and no Slams. Not coincidentally, Rios is the only #1 without a Slam trophy. After Rios, several players won four big titles and no Slams: Miroslav Mecir, Andriy Medvedev, and Nikolay Davydenko.
Oldest First Big Title: The oldest player is actually Marty Riessen, who won his first and only big title at age 33. But Riessen was born in 1941, so played many years before the Open Era, so in a sense is disqualified as some of his amateur era titles might have been the equivalent of a big title. Andres Gimeno is also disqualified, as a “tweener.”
Among players who played all, or almost all, of their careers in the Open Era, the oldest first big title winner is Ivan Ljubicic, who won his only big title, the 2010 Indian Wells, at age 31. The only other players to win their first big title after turning 30 are Cedric Pioline, who won the 2000 Monte Carlo Masters at age 30, and David Ferrer, who won the 2012 Paris Masters at age 30.
Oldest Big Title: As mentioned above, that honor goes to the amazing Pancho Gonzales, who won the 1971 LA Pacific at age 43, 4 months, 11 days. He's the only player in the Open Era to win a big title after turning 40; actually, no other player has won a big title after turning 38 - he was more than six years older than the next oldest big title winner, Ken Rosewall, who was 37 and 1 month when he won the 1972 Australian Open.
Youngest Big Title: Several players won big titles at age 17, in chronological order: Bjorn Borg with Rome in 1974; Mats Wilander with 1982 Roland Garros; Boris Becker with 1985 Wimbledon; and Michael Chang with 1989 Roland Garros. Chang was the youngest of them, at 17 years, 3 months, 7 days. Becker actually won two big titles at age 17, a Slam and a Masters.
PREDICTIVE INFO
Of the 116 players, I only could find first big title info on 114 of them, and a few of the 114 were estimates based upon available information, because six or seven of them won their first big titles before the Open Era started, and there was no clear demarcation between big and minor titles, other than Slams. But other than that, the info is pretty solid.
Age at which # of Slam winners won their first big title...
*6+ Slam winners: Ages 17 to 23. Of the 16 players who won at least 6 Slams, 15 of them won their first big title at age 21 or younger, and 14 of them won their first big title at age 20 or younger. John Newcombe won his first Slam in 1967 at age 23. It is very possible that he won a tournament before that, which was equivalent to a Masters, but the data is unclear without further research. The 21-year old was Rod Laver.
(The point being, it seems that winning a first big title before turning 21 is a pretty strong benchmark for being a 6+ Slam winner)
*2-5 Slam winners: Ages 20 to 28. That said, if you take out Stan Wawrinka (age 28), the range is 20 to 25 for the other 14 players, so we have another strong benchmark: age 25 or younger is probably necessary for winning a first big title and being a multi-Slam winner, although Stan proves that it is not absolutely necessary.
*1 Slam winners: Ages 17 to 26 for 24 players. Here we have a different indicator, as Michael Chang is the only player who won their first big title as a 17-year old and only won a single Slam, and only one of four teenage big title winners who didn't win more than a single Slam. We'll get to that later.
*0 Slam winners: Ages 18 to 31 for 59 players. This is quite a range and pretty well distributed, so doesn't really tell us much.
Slam Count by Age of First Big Title
*17 years old: As mentioned, four players won their first big title at age 17. Three won 6+ Slams (Borg, Wilander, Becker), and one only won a single Slam (Chang).
18 years old: Three players. Two won 6+ Slams (Rosewall, Nadal), one no Slams (Jimmy Arias).
19 years old: Seven players. Five won 6+ Slams (McEnroe, Edberg, Agassi, Sampras, Djokovic), and two won none (Mancini, Medvedev).
Teenagers: 14 players. 10 won 6+ Slams, 1 won a single Slam, and three didn't win any Slams.
20 year olds: Sixteen players. It splits more widely here, with 4 winning 6+ Slams, 5 winning 2-4 Slams, 1 a single Slam, and 6 no Slams.
Ages 21 to 25 have a similar distribution, although slightly veering towards fewer and fewer Slams.
Age 26 and older includes 18 players, only one of whom won multiple Slams (Warinka), and only two a single Slam.
Most Slams (Pro + Amateur + Open) with Age of First Big Title
23 Rosewall (18)
19 Laver (21)
18 Federer (20)
14 Gonzales (20)
14 Sampras (19)
14 Nadal (18)
12 Djokovic (19)
11 Borg (17)
8 Connors (20)
8 Lendl (20)
8 Agassi (19)
7 Newcombe (23)
7 McEnroe (19)
7 Wilander (17)
6 Edberg (19)
6 Becker (17)
4 Vilas (22)
4 Courier (20)
3 Ashe (25)
3 Kodes (24)
3 Kuerten (20)
3 Wawrinka (28)
3 Murray (21)
2 Nastase (23)
2 Smith (23)
2 Kriek (23)
2 Bruguera (20)
2 Rafter (24)
2 Kafelnikov (22)
2 Safin (20)
2 Hewitt (20)
OK, that's a ton of info to digest.
