2010 Tennis Rankings: Numbers 20 through 11

Before we get to the good stuff, a side note: It seems beneficial to have a name for my ranking system, in order to keep from having to refer to it simply as “my ranking system,” which is both clunky and overbearing. So here’s what I’m using at the moment; the name is of course subject to potential future modification.

The rating system is based on an Elo model, but one that’s multiplicative rather than additive. So let’s call that Melo (for multiplicative Elo, or modified Elo, or whatever other applicable M-word you can think of). The Melo ratings are then turned into full-year performance measures by comparing the player’s performance to what would be expected of the #75-rated player and taking the logarithm of the odds of #75 exceeding him. If you combine Melo and logarithm, you come out with Melog. And since we’re using #75 as the basis for comparison (which may not always remain the case), we’ll use Melog 75 as the name for the system.

With that out of the way, here are the second 10 of the Melog 75 rankings for men’s tennis in 2010.

Number 20: Jurgen Melzer, Austria (5.5)

Match record 47-25; Set record 112-77; Service game record 997-884 (.530). ATP rank: 11.

Draw: Melzer’s opponents would give the #75 player in the world an expectation of a .478 service game winning percentage. This ranks as the 28^th-hardest draw in the world, one of the easiest slates faced by anyone in the top 20 of these ratings. 13 of his 72 matches came against players ranked in the ATP’s top 10 at the time; 20 came against players ranked #100 or worse.

Troubles: Ten of Melzer’s 25 losses came against players ranked #49 or lower. He lost eight matches in the first or second round, including an opening-round defeat at the Australian Open and early slip-ups at four of the nine Masters events.

Highlights: Melzer won a title in Vienna, and also reached a final in Hamburg. More significantly, he made his first Grand Slam semifinal at the French Open, upsetting Novak Djokovic in the quarters to get there. He reached the round of 16 in two other Slams, and made the quarterfinals at three different Masters events.

The French Open semifinal is obviously a rather big deal, and Melzer is not entirely bereft of other achievements – but his other showings don’t exactly back up the big one, either. That’s the kind of year that will often push a player higher in the ATP’s ratings than in Melog’s, and Melzer is no exception. (On the brighter side, Melzer is also an accomplished doubles player, and this season set him up to be ranked in the singles and doubles top 10 simultaneously for a brief period in 2011.)

Number 19: Marin Cilic, Croatia (5.7)

Match record 40-22; Set record 98-68; Service game record 883-762 (.537). ATP rank: 14.

Draw: Cilic’s slate of opponents was actually slightly easier than Melzer’s, with a W%75 of .479. He faced 7 ATP top-10 opponents in his 62 matches, as compared to 8 players ranked outside the top 100.

Troubles: Cilic absorbed nine losses in first- or second-round matches. He played all nine Masters events without making it as far as the quarterfinals in any of them; he also lost in the first round at Wimbledon, and the second round at the US Open.

Highlights: Cilic’s best work was concentrated early in the year – his first three events of 2010 brought a title at Chennai, a semifinal run at the Australian Open with upsets over two top-10 players (Juan Martin del Potro and Andy Roddick), and a title at Zagreb.

Cilic’s year ends up being strikingly similar to Melzer’s – a Slam semifinal, some good performances in smaller events with weak fields, and not much else. The season did not entirely live up to its promising beginning, but it was still a fine effort for a player of any age. For a 21-year-old, it was promising indeed.

Number 18: Viktor Troicki, Serbia (6.2)

Match record 36-27; Set record 89-70; Service game record 812-729 (.527). ATP rank: 28.

Draw: Troicki faced the eleventh-toughest group of opponents in the world in 2010, with a W%75 of .465. Eight of his 63 matches came against top-10 players, and 11 against players outside the top 100 – but neither of those numbers is exactly a fair representation of Troicki’s slate, because five of those 11 non-top-100 matches were against players ranked between 101 and 110, and six of the eight top-10 matches were against either Rafael Nadal or Novak Djokovic, who were both ranked in the top 3 all year.

Troubles: Troicki suffered from a general lack of deep runs in big events – he didn’t make it out of the third round of any major, and only made the round of 16 in one Masters event. His low ATP ranking kept him from being seeded at the big tournaments, thus giving him early matchups with top-drawer players – most notably a first-round contest against Djokovic at the US Open.

Highlights: Troicki turned in a workmanlike performance as the #2 singles player on the Serbian Davis Cup team, which won the title. He did absorb a few losses against excellent players in this role, but also had key wins in the matchups against France and the US. Troicki also won his first (and to date only) career title in Moscow, and made it to semifinals in Doha (losing to Nadal), New Haven, Tokyo (losing to Nadal), and Basel (losing to Djokovic).

Troicki faced his countryman Djokovic in 118 service games in 2010; it was the fourth-most common matchup of the year. Combine that with his presence on the same Davis Cup team, and you get a good look at a player who had a perfectly decent season while still only being noticed when he appeared in someone else’s highlight videos.

Number 17: Gael Monfils, France (6.3)

Match record 46-20; Set record 112-68; Service game record 951-844 (.530).  ATP rank: 12.

Draw: Monfils’s opponents have a .472 W%75, the eighteenth-toughest on the tour. He played 11 matches against top-10 opposition, and 12 against players outside the top 100.

Troubles: Monfils missed about two months of the season, between Indian Wells and Madrid. He also lost in the third round or earlier at all but one Slam, and in four of the six Masters events he played.

Highlights: Monfils won a title at Montpellier, defeating three top-20 players on the way there. He also made it to finals in Stuttgart, Tokyo (losing to Nadal), and the Paris Masters event (losing to Robin Soderling). Finally, he played well in Davis Cup competition, winning his first four matches in helping France reach the final before losing the decisive matchup against Djokovic.

Monfils’s career has been characterized by inconsistent brilliance, such as his run of three straight top-10 wins to reach the final in Paris. It has also been marred by injury, like the one that cost him two months of this season. All of that makes 2010 a fairly standard Gael Monfils year.

Number 16: Mardy Fish, USA (6.7)

Match record 38-14; Set record 89-45; Service game record 718-595 (.547). ATP rank: 16.

Draw: Fish’s foes would be expected to provide a .477 W%75, the 24^th-toughest group in the world. He faced eight top-10 opponents (not counting the time he withdrew before a match), and nine players outside the top 100.

Troubles: Fish’s last appearance of the year was in Beijing in October; he withdrew before his second-round match and did not return to the court in the last month of the season, indicating a return of his all-too-common health problems. He also lost in the first or second round of thee of the four Slams.

Highlights: These were entirely concentrated in the months of June, July, and August. Fish made it to the final of the Queens Club grass court tournament, then won titles at Newport and Atlanta, and proceeded to make the final at the Cincinnati Masters, upsetting Fernando Verdasco and Andy Murray on the way.

Four of the first five players listed here have had startlingly similar profiles – one big run (either a Slam semi or a Masters final), and one or two smaller titles. Fish fits into that group perfectly, and as a result he joins them in this area on the list.

Number 15: Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, France (6.8)

Match record 31-15; Set record 81-46; Service game record 683-580 (.541). ATP rank: 13.

Draw: Tsonga faced a .469 W%75 schedule, one of the toughest we’ve seen so far and #15 on the year. He faced six top-10 players, and only five who ranked outside the ATP’s top 100 at the time of the match.

Troubles: Tsonga did not win a title in 2010, the only time since 2007 he has failed to capture at least one. Moreover, he did not so much as advance to a single final during the season. And if that’s not enough, he also missed about three and a half months during the year, from Wimbledon to the Tokyo event in October.

Highlights: If someone didn’t make it to a final and still has a high ranking, you can assume they made it to a number of semifinals, or at least quarterfinals. Tsonga did just that, making three semis (with a final four run at the Australian Open, thanks to a quarterfinal upset of Djokovic, being the biggest), and five additional quarters, including Wimbledon and the Masters tournaments in Miami, Rome, and Shanghai. His losses at that stage included Nadal once and Murray twice, all which are understandable.

Tsonga’s season did not overstock his trophy case or put him front and center in the tennis world on a regular basis. It did, however, feature a number of deep runs at important events and a high overall caliber of play when he was able to step onto the court, and that’s why he gets this spot.

Number 14: Richard Gasquet, France (6.8)

Match record 43-23; Set record 99-61; Service game record 860-717 (.545). ATP rank: 30.

Draw: Gasquet’s opponents have a W%75 of .481, the 33^rd-hardest schedule in the world and the weakest of any top-20 player. He played seven top-10 matches, and 11 against players outside the top 100. (Gasquet did win one Challenger event, which doubtless weighs his draw down.)

Troubles: Gasquet lost eight first-round matches, including two in Slams and (more embarrassingly) one in a Challenger level event. (To be fair, it was the Sunrise Challenger, which was typically one of the toughest of the year due to its scheduling between the two 96-man Masters events in March; his opponent was Gilles Simon, who is much better than your standard-issue Challenger matchup.) He was plagued by injury issues, missing Wimbledon after withdrawing from Queens Club, and also pulling out of events in Washington and Metz.

Highlights: Gasquet won a title in Nice, beating Fernando Verdasco in the final; he also made finals in Sydney and Gstaad, and triumphed in a fairly tough Challenger in Bordeaux.

On the surface, this is a very rough year for the Frenchman – he only made it out of the first round in one of the four Slams, and his other results were mostly less than overwhelming. But in his two first-round Slam losses, Gasquet faced Mikhail Youzhny and Andy Murray, both of whom we’ll be seeing higher on the list, and took them to five sets. It still wasn’t an ideal season, but it showed enough signs of better things to come that Melog is relatively impressed.

Number 13: Nikolay Davydenko, Russia (7.1)

Match record 30-19; Set record 73-51; Service game record 664-551 (.547). ATP rank: 22.

Draw: Davydenko’s foes check in at a .471 W%75, good for 17^th-most difficult in the world. Seven of his opponents were in the top 10 (plus a matchup against David Ferrer when he was ranked #11), and eight were outside the top 100 (with one of those being David Nalbandian as he was starting his comeback from injury).

Troubles: Speaking of injury, Davydenko missed about three months in 2010, withdrawing from Indian Wells in March and not playing again until after the French Open. He also had eight first- or second-round losses, including Wimbledon and the US Open.

Highlights: Davydenko opened the season with a title in Doha, which has often been one of his best events. On the way to that title, he beat Roger Federer in the semifinal, and Rafael Nadal in the final, which is… impressive. He then made the quarters at the Australian Open (losing to Federer) and the semis in Rotterdam (losing to Soderling) before the injury. There were a few decent runs after he returned (most notably quarterfinals at the Cincinnati and Paris Masters), but his best work came in the season’s first month and a half.

It’s tempting to look at a season like Davydenko’s 2010 and focus on what might have been if he’d stayed healthy. But it’s better to keep our attention on what actually was. And even though the Doha title only earned him 250 ranking points from the ATP, the fact that it came through Federer and Nadal is enough to make this a season worth noticing even without any other titles or finals. The three quarterfinals in large events are gravy, albeit of a rather delicious variety.

Number 12: Mikhail Youzhny, Russia (7.7)

Match record 43-20; Set record 108-63; Service game record 919-764 (.546). ATP rank: 10.

Draw: Youzhny’s calendar yields a .479 W%75, the 30^th-most formidable on tour. He squared off against five top-10 opponents (a low total partly offset by three of those matches being either Djokoivic or Nadal), and fifteen who were outside the top 100 (although he faced early-comeback Nalbandian not just once, but twice).

Troubles: Youzhny lost his first match in eight separate events. He also played eight Masters events and made it out of the round of 32 only once, which is not great.

Highlights: Youzhny grabbed titles in Kuala Lumpur and Munich, and also made finals in Rotterdam (losing to Soderling), Dubai (losing to Djokovic), and St. Petersburg. The main feather in his cap, however, was a run to the semifinals of the US Open. Throw in quarterfinals at the French Open and Miami, and you’ve got a healthy list of achievements.

Youzhny had his share of big runs at events both large and small. The only issue, as it often has been with him, is getting those results on a more consistent basis. If he’d have done that, he’d have been in the next post instead of this one.

Number 11: David Nalbandian, Argentina (8.0)

Match record 28-10; Set record 64-32; Service game record 512-416 (.552). ATP rank: 27.

Draw: Nalbandian faced a .459 W%75 schedule, the seventh-toughest in the world and the most difficult of any player outside the top 10 on this list. Nine of his 38 matches were against top-10 competition, with eight more coming against players ranked from 11-20, and only four against people outside the top 100.

Troubles: You may have noticed that Nalbandian only played 38 matches all year, a remarkably low total for a player of his caliber. He missed three of the four Slams, which are the best opportunity players generally have to get attention (and ranking points), and only made it out of the quarterfinals in one event all year.

Highlights: The one event in which Nalbandian made the semis was the Washington tournament, which he won while dropping only one set in six matches against a pretty salty field. He also made quarterfinals in a pair of Masters events, beating Youzhny in Monte Carlo and Soderling in Canada on the way, and led the Argentine team to the Davis Cup semifinals with straight-sets victories against Youzhny and Davydenko.

A season like Nalbandian’s 2010 is an excellent test case for the handling of injuries in tennis analysis. He missed vast swaths of the season, but he was also among the very best in the world when on the court (with a 9-8 record against ATP top-20 players). Melog 75 sees a player who was top-10 caliber when on the court and played roughly half a season, and puts him here, considerably higher than the ATP does. But for a player who’s always been excellent when he’s been healthy, and who peaked at #3 in the traditional rankings in past years, this placement doesn’t seem unreasonable.

There is a significant amount of divergence between Melog's ratings and the ATP's in this area - seven of the ten players listed here have a discrepancy of at least five slots, as compared to the total of four such players from 11-20 in the 2011 rankings. Next, we'll check to see how much of that disagreement carries into the top 10.