Past Melog rankings: 2012

2012 was a strange tennis year in some ways. Most notably, it was the first time in nearly a decade that the four Grand Slams were won by four different players. The previous eight years had been dominated by Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal almost exclusively, with Novak Djokovic sprinting past both of them and seizing the top spot in 2011. But the relative parity of major success in 2012 might have seemed like an indicator that the tennis commoners would soon have their chances to move up in the world again. (Sure, the four Slam winners were Djokovic, Nadal, Federer, and Andy Murray, and they exclusively faced each other in the finals. On the other hand, David Ferrer won the Paris Masters, the first non-big-four player to take a title at that level in two years, and Juan Martin del Potro won the Olympic bronze medal, beating Djokovic to clinch third place after losing an epic to Federer in the semis.)

Let's take a closer look and see if there really was reason for hope for the sport's proletariat.

As always, the table comes first, and as always, it will include everyone in both the Melog top 75 and the ATP's:

Rank	Player	Melog	ATP Rank	ATP Pts
1	Novak Djokovic	86.5	1	12920
2	Roger Federer	62.4	2	10265
3	David Ferrer	53.1	5	6505
4	Andy Murray	52.7	3	8000
5	Rafael Nadal	50.7	4	6690
6	Tomas Berdych	45.7	6	4680
7	Juan Martin Del Potro	42.7	7	4480
8	Jo Wilfried Tsonga	29.4	8	3490
9	Nicolas Almagro	22.5	11	2515
10	Richard Gasquet	20.4	10	2515
11	Milos Raonic	19.3	13	2380
12	Janko Tipsarevic	17.9	9	2990
13	Stanislas Wawrinka	15.3	17	1900
14	Tommy Haas	15.2	21	1695
15	Juan Monaco	14.5	12	2430
16	Marin Cilic	13.4	15	2210
17	John Isner	12.5	14	2215
18	Philipp Kohlschreiber	12.1	20	1770
19	Kei Nishikori	11.8	19	1830
20	Sam Querrey	11.5	22	1650
21	Gilles Simon	10.5	16	2165
22	Mikhail Youzhny	9.5	25	1335
23	Andreas Seppi	9.2	23	1560
24	Mardy Fish	8.7	27	1255
25	Radek Stepanek	8.7	31	1135
26	Alexandr Dolgopolov	8.6	18	1855
27	Marcos Baghdatis	8.5	36	1070
28	David Nalbandian	8.2	82	635
29	Fernando Verdasco	7.3	24	1490
30	Kevin Anderson	6.9	37	1065
31	Martin Klizan	6.9	30	1175
32	Thomaz Bellucci	6.7	33	1112
33	Julien Benneteau	5.8	35	1075
34	Feliciano Lopez	5.0	40	1005
35	Andy Roddick	4.9	39	1015
36	Gael Monfils	4.9	77	660
37	Grigor Dimitrov	4.8	48	866
38	Santiago Giraldo	4.8	57	778
39	Jarkko Nieminen	4.6	41	927
40	Denis Istomin	4.5	43	897
41	Florian Mayer	4.2	28	1215
42	Nikolay Davydenko	3.8	44	885
43	Jeremy Chardy	3.6	32	1131
44	Jerzy Janowicz	3.4	26	1299
45	Michael Llodra	3.2	53	823
46	Ivo Karlovic	3.1	100	556
47	David Goffin	3.0	46	868
48	Edouard Roger Vasselin	3.0	102	545
49	Benoit Paire	2.9	47	867
50	Lukas Rosol	2.8	73	679
51	Nicolas Mahut	2.8	108	515
52	Viktor Troicki	2.7	38	1055
53	Albert Ramos	2.6	50	830
54	Ryan Harrison	2.6	69	710
55	Igor Sijsling	2.6	68	712
56	Yen Hsun Lu	2.5	59	759
57	Steve Darcis	2.4	93	571
58	Carlos Berlocq	2.4	66	720
59	Paul Henri Mathieu	2.4	58	763
60	Bernard Tomic	2.4	52	825
61	Xavier Malisse	2.3	63	746
62	Tommy Robredo	2.2	114	495
63	Victor Hanescu	2.1	62	753
64	Lleyton Hewitt	2.1	83	625
65	Andrey Kuznetsov	2.1	78	660
66	Brian Baker	2.0	61	756
67	Roberto Bautista Agut	2.0	80	648
68	Marcel Granollers	1.9	34	1100
69	Benjamin Becker	1.9	65	741
70	Lukasz Kubot	1.9	74	675
71	Aljaz Bedene	1.8	86	583
72	Alejandro Falla	1.6	54	809
73	Horacio Zeballos	1.6	85	615
74	Go Soeda	1.6	60	758
75	Fabio Fognini	1.5	45	880
77	Leonardo Mayer	1.5	71	702
80	Gilles Muller	1.4	67	719
83	Robin Haase	1.2	56	780
90	Jurgen Melzer	1.0	29	1177
93	Bjorn Phau	1.0	75	668
96	Marinko Matosevic	0.9	49	845
100	Paolo Lorenzi	0.8	64	744
102	Ivan Dodig	0.8	72	695
103	Daniel Gimeno Traver	0.7	70	704
114	Lukas Lacko	0.5	51	827
119	Pablo Andujar	0.4	42	915
156	Grega Zemlja	-0.1	55	782

Well. The top of that table seems to present quite the glass ceiling to anyone outside the top 7. (Del Potro's rating of 42.7 would have placed him 3rd, 4th, and 4th in the years 2013-15; this year, it gets him #7.) If anything, the top tier looks bigger and stronger in 2012 than it had previously, because there were more upper-echelon guys banding together to oppress the masses.

Let's compare 2012's top 7 to two other sets of players. We'll use top 7 from 2013 (the same group of players in both years, in both the Melog and ATP ratings), as well as the top 7 from 2003, the last year before 2012 in which the Slams were split four ways. (Once again, the ATP and Melog systems agree on the top 7 that year - you can look up who they are if you want, but I'm not spoiling Melog's order among them).

Overall records of the top 7 players:

2012: 446-101 (.815 W%)

2013: 402-106 (.791)

2003: 451-133 (.772)

By the most basic measurement, 2012 seems to have the most dominant top group (if you're OK with the relatively arbitrary selection of 7 players, at least). But raw winning percentage isn't everything, especially because the top players in tennis generally spend quite a bit of time facing each other, which will always result in a loss for one of them. So what happens when we account for that?

Records of the top 7 against players outside the top 7:

2012: 383-38 (.910)

2013; 351-55 (.865)

2003: 419-101 (.806)

The difference gets even bigger - mostly because there were more matches between top-7 players in 2012 (63) than in either of the other years (51 in 2013, 32 in 2003).

Clearly, the fact that the Slams were split four ways in 2012 wasn't so much representative of a return to parity in tennis as it was a result of the kind of infighting you'll sometimes see while an oligarchy solidifies itself in power.

Before we finish up, here are the usual tables of players on whom Melog and the ATP disagreed in 2012.

Melog liked:

Player	Melog	ATP	2012 Age	2013 ATP
David Nalbandian	28	82	30	229
Ivo Karlovic	46	100	33	78
Gael Monfils	36	77	26	31
Edouard Roger Vasselin	48	102	29	52
Nicolas Mahut	51	108	30	50
Tommy Robredo	62	114	30	18
David Ferrer	3	5	30	3
Steve Darcis	57	93	28	164
Tommy Haas	14	21	34	12
Santiago Giraldo	38	57	25	69

Wait, Santiago Giraldo is on Melog's good list this time? He's been in the opposite group multiple times. Melog needs to make up its mind.

Anyway... this list looks pretty good. Nalbandian, Darcis, and Giraldo did not support Melog's good opinion of them going forward (Nalbandian's career was nearly over at this point), but Melog nailed Monfils, Roger Vasselin, Mahut, Ferrer, and Haas, and Robredo jumped hugely in both systems in 2013 as he completed his injury comeback. Karlovic is the only guy on the list who settled comfortably between the two ratings the next year.

ATP liked:

Player	Melog	ATP	2012 Age	2013 ATP
Jurgen Melzer	90	29	31	27
Grega Zemlja	156	55	26	121
Pablo Andujar	119	42	26	48
Lukas Lacko	114	51	25	81
Marcel Granollers	68	34	26	38
Marinko Matosevic	96	49	27	61
Jerzy Janowicz	44	26	22	21
Fabio Fognini	75	45	25	16
Paolo Lorenzi	100	64	31	109

That list is much worse. The only clear Melog win out of the nine players is Lorenzi; you can argue for Zemlja and Lacko, but both are pretty firmly established in between their ratings in the two systems. And Melzer, Andujar, Granollers, and Janowicz all maintained their positions in the ATP ratings, while Fognini climbed even higher. (There are some caveats there - for instance, Janowicz's 2012 and 2013 ATP rankings are both based on one big run at an important tournament, and he's slipped considerably after failing to duplicate that success in the following two years. But it's still not a great-looking list.)

Next time we take a step back, it'll be to 2011. We will eventually reach a year in which Melog does not have Novak Djokovic at #1, but given that Novak's 2011 is one of the great seasons in tennis history, it probably won't be that year.