Here is What Happened in 2018

2018 Year Review

With the end of the year I decided to do a year retrospective and go over a couple events that I consider important. First let’s talk about some of the top guys and their achievements this year. One of my favorites on the tour, Kei Nishikori, started the year playing Challengers and ranked #27 after not competing due to a wrist injury. Kei made the finals in Monte Carlo beating Alexander Zverev and Marin Cilic on the way to the finals. He also made it to the round of 16 at the French Open losing a 4 set match against Dominic Thiem, who reached his first Grand Slam final that same week. Kei also made the semi finals in the US Open, where he had his best result ever in 2014. Kei played the finals in Vienna and Tokyo finishing the year ranked #9, which allowed him to play the ATP Finals.

Novak Djokovic started the year ranked #21 and finished #1. He found his rhythm again after a difficult start of the year losing in the first rounds of Indian Wells, Miami and Barcelona against players out of the top 100. After that, his year completely changed; Novak made the quarterfinals in the French Open, finals in Queens, became the Wimbledon and Cincinnati champion. By winning Cincinnati he became the first player to win all Masters 1000 events. Djokovic won the US Open, won the Masters 1000 in Shanghai and made the finals in Paris and London.

Rafa Nadal only played 9 tournaments in 2018 and posted a 45-4 record for the year. Unfortunately, he retired in the Australian Open quarterfinals and US Open semifinals. He won Monte Carlo, Barcelona and Roland Garros for the 11th time each and Rome for the 8th time. Rafa lost in the semifinals of Wimbledon against Djokovic 10/8 in the fifth set and won Toronto after that. Rafa’s record on clay is 400-35, believe it or not, becoming the player with the highest winning percentage on that surface, winning 91.9% of his matches on clay.

Roger Federer made history once again by becoming the oldest player to hold the #1 spot at the age of 36, and the oldest grand slam champion since Ken Rosewall, who won the Australian Open in 1972 when he was 37 years old. Roger won the Australian Open, Rotterdam, Stuttgart and his home tournament in Basel for the 9th time reaching the 99th title mark. He also surprised us in Wimbledon wearing Uniqlo, after playing with Nike since he was a junior.

Alexander Zverev had a very successful season winning Munich, Madrid, Washington and the ATP Finals. He still did not get the grand slam results he wanted. However, he made progress playing best of five sets matches: in Roland Garros he won three 5-setters in a row to get to the round of 16. Playing that many sets resulted in a disadvantage because it took so much from him, not letting him play his best against Thiem. Going through those matches made him believe that he can go the distance in best of five sets matches. Lendl has joined Zverev's coaching team which serves as another stepping stone for Mischa's breakthrough in the slams.

Stefanos Tsitsipas started the year as #91 and finished #15, while also winning his first ATP title. Jack Sock finished 2017 as a top 10 and won three titles in that year. During 2018 he got out of the top 100, but won two grand slams, ATP Finals in doubles with Mike Bryan, and is now #2 in doubles. Whether his season was positive or negative, is up to you. For me, the biggest disappointment of the season was Grigor Dimitrov; he is one of the guys that I cheer for the most. Last year, he won Cincinatti and ATP Finals, finished #3 his best ever ranking, and had all the momentum to have a great year in 2018. Everyone was expecting him to have some long runs on the slams which did not happen. Dimitrov's end of year ending ranking is #19.

The Laver Cup was probably the most exciting event of the year; all I did on those three days was watching the matches. Seeing McEnroe and Borg coaching, Roger on the sidelines jumping around to celebrate with his teammates, and the players being more relaxed and competitive. The Laver Cup is always a great event for tennis and I'm really looking forward the next one in Switzerland.

Controversial events of the year:

Women’s US Open final: I believe that in 2019 the coaching rule will be changed or put into vote. In the US Open qualifying, coaches were able to communicate with the players from the stands when the player was on the same side of the court as the coach. WTA allows the coaches to come on the court during change overs. I don’t want to address all the drama that happened in NY during that final, but we have to agree that it started with the coaching rule. That is a highly controversial topic and many coaches and players have different opinions on it. I believe that it is an issue that will be highly discussed in the coming year and is very likely to be changed.

New Davis Cup format: To summarize it briefly, the Davis Cup matches starting 2019 will be played in two days, with best of three sets format and the teams can have five players instead of four. Many players, coaches and tennis fans were not happy with the decision, but for a lot of players and the ITF it was a necessary change. Here is the link with detailed information about the format: https://www.daviscup.com/274206?channel=daviscupnews

New ITF ranking: The new ranking starts in 2019 and is called ITF Transition Tour, where ATP points will be given only at final rounds of 25k tournaments and Challengers. The 15K tournaments will only give transition points. With this change, it is expected that the ATP ranking will have approximately 750 players, representing basically one quarter of the players that are currently ranked. Many players are not happy with the change, mostly because points will be “lost” transitioning from 2018 to 2019 season. Here is a link with detailed information about the new ranking system: https://www.itftennis.com/news/278962.aspx

Big names that retired in 2018: (career high singles – titles, career high doubles – titles)

André Sá: career high singles #55, career high doubles #17 and 11 doubles titles.

I have the privilege to be friends with Andre and to witness how respected he is among all the players. I also had the pleasure to travel on the tour with him and met many people through him. He always made sure I was learning and always shared all his knowledge and experience with me which I am really grateful for. Please check out the farewell video that ATP prepared for him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug5GWvEY6h0&t=46s

Mikhail Youzhny (RUS) #8/10, #38/9

Max Mirniy (BLR): #18-1, #1- 52

Tommy Haas (GER): #2- 15, #82-1

Alejandro Falla (COL): #48-0 (singles)

Daniel Nestor (CAN): #58-0, #1-91

Gilles Muller (LUX): #21-2 (singles)

Jurgen Melzer (AUT): #8-5, #6-13

Florian Mayer (GER): #18-2 (singles)

Marinko Matosevic (AUS): #39-0 (singles)

Julien Benneteau (FRA): #25-0, #5-12

Scott Lipsky (USA): #21-16 (doubles)

2018 first time ATP title winners (name, age, tournament won)

Daniiel Medvedev (RUS) 22 - Sidney

Mirza Basic (BIH) 27 - Sofia

Roberto Carballes Baena (ESP) 25 - Quito

Frances Tiafoe (USA) 20 - Delray Beach

Marco Cecchinato (ITA) 26 - Budapest

Taro Daniel (JPN) 25 - Istanbul

Marton Fucsovics (HUN) 26 - Geneva

Mischa Zverev (GER) 31 - Eastbourne

Matteo Berretini (ITA) 22 - Gstaad

Nikoloz Basilashvili (GEO) 26 - Hamburg

Yoshihito Nishioka (JPN) 23- Shenzen

Stefanos Tsitsipas (GRE) 20 - Stockholm

Kyle Edmund (GBR) 23 - Antwerp

Stats Leaders 2018

Serve

Serve standings takes into consideration 1st serve %, 1st serve points won, 2nd serve points won %, service games won %, Avg Aces/ Match, Avg Double Faults/Match

1. John Isner

2. Ivo Karlovic

3. Milos Raonic

Return

% 1st serve return points won, % 2nd serve return points won, % return games won, % break points converted

1. Rafael Nadal

2. David Goffin

3. Diego Schwartzman

Under Pressure Standings

% break points converted, % break points saved, % tie breaks won, % deciding sets won

1.Kei Nishikori

2.Rafael Nadal

3.Martin Klizan

Hope this post refreshed your memory on what happened during the year of 2018 and maybe surprised you with events that you did not realize happened, such as Rafa winning 5/9 tournaments, Federer being the oldest #1 in history or Nishikori starting the year playing Challengers and finishing it at the ATP Finals.

Thanks for reading the blog this year. In 2019 I will be posting more often. Next post will be in the new year with Scott Del Mastro sharing the third part of the Learning How To Win series that you have already been in contact with. See you then!