2011 Year in Review

To establish the context for the 2011 rankings, here is a narrative summary of the year in (men’s singles) tennis in 2011. (In hindsight, it would have made more sense to do this post before putting up the rankings. Live and learn.)

As 2011 dawned, Rafael Nadal stood as the unchallenged king of the tennis world. 2010 had ended with Nadal winning the last three Grand Slams, which meant that the Australian Open would be his chance to hold all four of the biggest titles in tennis at once.

Things did not exactly work out that way. Nadal played an opening-week event in Doha and made the semifinals before losing to occasional nemesis Nikolay Davydenko (the only player with a winning record against him in a significant number of matches). The Australian opened promisingly enough for the Spaniard, as he strolled into the quarterfinals without dropping a set. But an injury-hampered match in that round saw David Ferrer come away with a straight sets win over Rafa, ending his bid for the consecutive Slam.

On the other side of the bracket, second seed Roger Federer had to work rather harder than Nadal to make the quarters, but secured a victory once there to make the semifinals in Melbourne for the eighth consecutive year. He there ran into perennial #3 Novak Djokovic, who upended him in three close sets and went on to face Andy Murray, who’d beaten Ferrer in four, in the final. Djokovic cruised, securing his second Slam title (and only the third won by anyone other than Federer or Nadal since 2005) and sending Murray to his third loss in three finals played.

February passed with the usual token appearances from the top players, most notably another tournament win from Djokovic in Dubai, beating Federer in the final. Robin Soderling won a pair of events, bringing his season total to three (he also took a title before the Australian Open). Nicolas Almagro also won two crowns, both on South American clay. David Ferrer and Andy Roddick secured a title each, and 2009 US Open champ Juan Martin del Potro, who had missed nearly all of 2010 with an injury, began his return to prominence with a win at Delray Beach.

The year gained steam, as it often does, with the pair of American hard court Masters events played in March. Still ranked an easy #1, Nadal steamrolled the top half of the bracket at Indian Wells, dropping only a single set on his run to the final. But Djokovic was on a similarly dominant run in the bottom half, trouncing three consecutive seeded opponents to make the semis (dropping a stunningly low total of 12 service games in 4 matches along the way), then beating Federer again to earn his first match of the year against Nadal. Djokovic won, overcoming the loss of the first set to take his third title of the season. The victory slipped the surging Serb ahead of Federer and into the #2 spot in the rankings.

The Miami masters unfolded similarly. Nadal once again hammered the top half of the bracket, dropping only one set and not being pushed past 6-4 in any of the others. And with Federer now seeded third, it was Nadal pasting him in the semis, 6-3, 6-2. Djokovic had an even easier time with the bottom half, dropping no sets and 18 games in the 5 matches that took him into the final. Once again, Nadal took the first set, and once again, Djokovic rallied, taking the match in a third set tiebreak.

April marked the beginning of clay season, during which Nadal traditionally dominates. And indeed, a pair of titles in the optional Monte Carlo Masters (beating Murray in the semis and Ferrer in the final) and Barcelona (over Ferrer again) seemed to indicate that some semblance of order was being restored to the universe. Djokovic took a small title in Belgrade (in his native Serbia), and Davydenko and del Potro also won crowns leading into the two mandatory clay court Masters events in May, Madrid and Rome.

Both events provided the final that everyone had to be hoping for at this point. In Madrid, Djokovic dropped a couple of sets (one to Ferrer in the quarters, one to Thomaz Bellucci in the semis), while Nadal lost only one (to Federer in the semis) in setting up their third clash of the year. Despite the change in surface, Djokovic triumphed again, this time in straight sets. Rome provided more of the same; Nadal lost his first set of the week in a tiebreak before running off eight in a row, while Djokovic hammered Soderling in the quarters and beat Murray in three sets in the semis before taking Nadal 6-4, 6-4 in the final.

All eyes now shifted to the French Open. Nadal had won five titles there in six years, and was typically a colossal favorite. But Djokovic was coming into the event unbeaten in 37 matches on the year, having handled Nadal four times already, including twice on clay. The potential final between them looked to be one for the ages.

And it might have been – had it occurred. Nadal had an early hiccup against big serving John Isner, getting pushed to five sets before prevailing – and then resumed his normal form at Roland Garros, dropping nary another set on the way to the final and beating Robin Soderling (the only man he’d ever lost to at the French) in the quarters and Murray in the semis. Djokovic wasn’t unduly troubled in the early going, losing one set to del Potro in the third round and benefiting from a quarterfinal walkover courtesy of Fabio Fognini. That set up a semifinal matchup with Federer, who’d already gone down to Djokovic three times this year.

But not this time. Federer took a tiebreak in the first set and won the second 6-3. Djokovic took the third, also by a 6-3 score, but the fourth brought another tiebreak and another Federer win. Djokovic absorbed his first loss of the year and missed out on a shot at Nadal in the final; Rafa would face Federer instead, and beat him again, this time in four sets.

A quartet of grass events came after the French and before Wimbledon. Nadal played the Queen’s Club tournament in London, losing to Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the quarters; Tsonga would make the final before losing to Murray, who also beat Roddick on the way to a pretty impressive tournament win. The top players didn’t participate in the other Wimbledon leadups, mostly saving their energy for Wimbledon itself.

It was worth saving energy for. Nadal, still the top seed, dropped a set to del Potro in the fourth round and one to Mardy Fish in the quarters, but still made the semis without exerting himself too extremely. Meeting him there once again was Murray, who caught a break when unseeded Feliciano Lopez came through to face him in the quarters, but also handled his earlier opponents without an overabundance of trouble. Djokovic, like Nadal and Murray, had two four-set matches in the early rounds but no serious problems in making the last four. So if Federer, whose successes at Wimbledon have been chronicled in story and song, could join them, it would be a second consecutive identical set of Slam semifinalists.

Federer faced Tsonga in the quarterfinals, and won the first two sets. He then dropped the third by a 6-4 score… and then the fourth, 6-4… and then the fifth, 6-4, for a come-from-ahead five set defeat. Djokovic took advantage, beating Tsonga while Nadal handled Murray (both matches lasting four sets) to arrange their fifth meeting of the year.

This encounter had the same result as the previous four. Djokovic took the first two sets, lost the third, and finished the match in four. It was his first Grand Slam title in the Northern Hemisphere, and it gave him the first #1 ranking of his career.

The tour typically quiets down for a month or so after Wimbledon, and 2011 followed that pattern with one exception: a small tournament in Bsstad, Sweden, which saw Soderling hammer Tomas Berdych in the semifinals and Ferrer in the final, taking his fourth title of the year. The win over Ferrer in the final was the last match of Soderling’s season, as he came down with mononucleosis and to date has yet to recover sufficiently to resume his career. Other noteworthy players who won titles in July include John Isner (Newport), Juan Carlos Ferrero (Stuttgart), Gilles Simon (Hamburg), and Fish (Atlanta).

The world’s best returned to the court in August at the Canada Masters event, held in Montreal this year. Occupying the bottom half of the bracket, Nadal and Murray both lost their first matches in the event, opening things up for semifinal runs from Janko Tipsarevic and Fish. Tsonga upended Federer in the third round and also made the semis, and with the rest of the Big Four out of his way, Djokovic cruised to victory over Tsonga in the semis and Fish in the final. The Cincinnati event the following week played out slightly more favorably for the elite quartet, as all of them made the quarterfinals. Nadal lost to Fish at that point, however, and Federer fell to Berdych. Djokovic and Murray thus met in the final, and Murray took the first set and a had a two-break lead in the second when the top seed withdrew from the match.

The next week saw Isner take the title at Winston-Salem, and the week after that began the US Open, the final Slam of the year. Djokovic was the top seed at a major for the first time ever, and played like it, not dropping a set through four rounds before losing one to Tipsarevic in a tiebreak in the quarters. He recovered promptly, running off nine consecutive service games before his countryman withdrew from the match. Federer was in Djokovic’s side of the draw, and also made the quarters with relative ease, dropping a single set to Marin Cilic. The Swiss legend then faced another matchup against Tsonga, and this time handled the Frenchman in straight sets. Nadal and Murray both won through to the semis in the bottom half, both beating American underdogs in the quarters (Nadal over Roddick, Murray over Isner).

Nadal ousted Murray in four sets, losing only the third. Djokovic… had a bit more trouble in his semifinal. Federer took the first two sets; Djokovic evened things out by winning the next two, but Federer notched a break in the fifth and served for the match at 5-3. Djokovic proceeded to save a pair of match points on Federer's serve and run off four consecutive service games, setting up his sixth Nadal match of the year. He had considerably less trouble with Nadal than he had with Federer, winning over half of the points played on the Spaniard’s serve and breaking him twelve times on the way to a four-set triumph that gave him more Slams won than matches lost through this point in the season.

With the conclusion of the season’s last Grand Slam, the calendar shifted into a less intense period. The Asian swing, starting near the end of September and concluding with the Shanghai Masters event in mid-October, was skipped by Djokovic and Federer. The five tournaments brought a title apiece to Berdych and Tipsarevic, but were primarily dominated by Murray, who took home three trophies, including a win over Nadal in the Tokyo final and a defeat of Ferrer in the Shanghai title match.

The tour returned to Europe and shifted indoors for its last series of events. The smaller titles were shared among excellent players such as Tipsarevic, Tsonga, Cilic, and Gael Monfils. Federer and Djokovic returned to the court at the larger event in Basel; Djokovic lost to Kei Nishikori in the semis, assisting Federer in securing his first title since the season’s opening week.

It wouldn’t be his last. Federer stampeded over the field at the Paris Masters event, hammering Berdych in the semis and Tsonga in the final to secure the title without dropping a set. (Nadal did not play the event, Murray lost to Berdych in the quarters and Djokovic withdrew before he would have faced Tsonga at the same stage.) And the World Tour Finals saw the run of exceptional Swiss form continue, as Federer sprinted through the field of the world’s best players with an unbeaten 5-0 record, including wins over Nadal, Fish, and Ferrer and two defeats of Tsonga.

That brought the ATP season to a close, but one event still remained to be played – the Davis Cup. The final pitted Spain (featuring Nadal and Ferrer, both of them coming in unbeaten in the first three rounds of the event) against Argentina (led by an equally unblemished del Potro). The young Argentine fought valiantly, but was no match for the Spaniards on their home clay courts; Ferrer bested del Potro in five sets, and Nadal beat him in four and crushed Juan Monaco in three to secure Spain’s third Davis Cup championship in four years.

The human mind has a tendency to oversimplify complicated narratives; it makes them easier to process. But it also makes them less accurate. A full year of tennis will nearly always create a very complicated narrative, and 2011 was no exception to this rule. There were some highly noteworthy successes outside of the fabled top four: Ferrer made a Slam semifinal, a pair of Masters finals, was a semifinalist at the World Finals, and helped Nadal to the Davis Cup win. Tsonga also made a Slam semi, as well as finals in a Masters event and the World Finals. Fish made a Masters final of his own, along with a pair of semis. Del Potro helped Argentina reach the Davis Cup final, won a pair of titles, and rebuilt his ranking from the shambles it had been in after he missed nearly an entire season due to injury. On the opposite side of the health spectrum, Robin Soderling won a quartet of titles before vanishing from the tennis landscape with apparent permanence.

Within the top four, Nadal had a genuinely exceptional year, winning a Slam and making the finals in two others, leading Spain to the Davis Cup title, and further extending his own record for weeks spent at #2 in the rankings. Federer failed to win a Slam for the first time since 2002, but the outstanding closing run of Basel-Paris-World Finals set the stage for his return to #1 in mid-2012. And Murray made the semifinals of all four Slams and the final in one, while also winning a pair of Masters events.

It's one thing to observe that there is more than one part to the story of a tennis season, but it would be another thing entirely to downplay what was clearly the primary plot of the year. And despite a relatively lackluster close to his season, Djokovic left even less doubt about his kingship of tennis in 2011 than there had been about Nadal’s in 2010. He finished the year with 13,630 ATP ranking points, the highest total ever recorded in a calendar year (which is somewhat less impressive than it sounds because the scoring system was revised after 2008 and the point values of the events were increased, but still at least noteworthy.) Djokovic battered the tennis world as a whole to the tune of a 70-6 record, and thumped the top three not-him players on earth at an astonishing 12-2 rate. This was not a superficially-great year born of upsets of other players and favorable draws; it was unflinching, barely-challenged dominance of some of the best players ever to pick up a racket, and it deserves every bit of the recognition it gets as being among the greatest individual tennis seasons ever played.