2020 Preview: Tennis hasn't been this good in a long time

Jan 7

Jan 7 2020 Preview: Tennis hasn't been this good in a long time

Tennis’s 2020 season has technically already started with the simultaneously newfangled and Byzantine ATP Cup for the men, and the much more normal slate of real tournaments for the women in Brisbane, Auckland, and Shenzhen. However, the pre-Australian Open slate remains extremely strange and borderline not real, so this season preview is actually delivered right on time, thank you very much.

One quick note about the ATP Cup before we start: I really want to hate it. This event essentially killed the Hopman Cup, a superbly fun exhibition that paired an ATP and WTA star in a just-competitive-enough atmosphere that provided both good tennis and good fun. The ATP Cup in its current iteration is a jarring hybrid of an event. It’s half exhibition, half real tournament (there’s no doubt that it lacks the intensity of even the Laver Cup, but it still has just enough gas that players aren’t half assing it). It’s half Futures/Challenger event, half Masters (you have players like Georgia’s Aleksandre Metrevelli, No. 678 in the world, losing 0-6, 0-6, but also an incredibly dialed in Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal, to say nothing of Team Event Kyrgios). There’s no way this event should really give out ranking points, and yet it’s been an absolutely awesome watch. All credit to the Aussie fans and the Aussie team who have provided enough juice off their own rackets to carry the event themselves.

2020 will be good, trust me…

2019 was not quite the transformative year I had expected it to be. Roger Federer, despite obviously being in a fairly steep decline, still was easily the third best player on tour, and was one point away (more than once!) from winning yet another Wimbledon title. Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal cleaned up nearly every other meaningful title themselves, and played at a berserkly high level that no one else could touch. So much for the cracks in their armor. Djokovic and Nadal enter 2020 as the players to beat. With the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo throwing an extra Slam-level tournament into the mix, 2020 should be a long and busy year.

The women also mostly had more of the same of their post-2015 trend, which is to say a crop of as few as 10 and as many as 17 players who can win any title at any time. Ashleigh Barty had an extremely good year, but there’s almost nothing separating her from any of her top-ten compatriots in the rankings. Then you have players like Madison Keys (ranked 13), Sonia Kenin (14), Angie Kerber (18) and (humor me, I own too much real estate on Muguruza Island) Gabi Muguruza (35) who have proven big game experience. A quick look at the list of big event winners (Naomi Osaka in Melbourne, Bianca Andreescu in Indian Wells, Barty in Miami, Kiki Bertens in Madrid, Barty in Paris, Halep at Wimbledon, Andreescu again in Toronto, Keys in Cincinnati, Andreescu AGAIN in New York, and Barty in the Tour Finals) shows a breadth and depth of interesting, cool, and talented as hell mostly youngsters. 2020 should see more of the same in the WTA.

The WTA, it must be repeated, is maybe the best sports league doing it right now. Serena has been so close so many times to getting her first post maternity slam, yet has somehow lost four consecutive Slam finals going back to 2018. If there weren’t a football team worth of great U-25 players in her way, she’d have it right now. Bianca Andreescu, in her first full season on tour, went 44-5 while also missing months with injuries. Her only losses: in a final to Julia Goerges, in a three-setter to Anastajia Sevastova in Melbourne, deep in a third set semifinal battle with Kenin, a three setter to Naomi Osaka, and a medical retirement. Kenin was the only one in the group who was outside the top 15, and she’s rightfully up in the top 15 now. Andreescu had one of the best seasons imaginable, and we should talk about it more. If she can stay healthy for 10 months, she’s going to set the tour on fire. Again, FIRST FULL SEASON ON TOUR!

(That’s not even mentioning the raft of young Eastern European players who smack the crap out of the ball and can beat anyone.)

The NextGen is really going to happen…

Tennis beatniks have been beating the drum for a long time saying that the men’s answer to the litany of great young WTA stars is finally ready. The takes have been plentiful and they have been universally wrong. So take the following with a rather large heaping of salt:

This is the year it happens.

Really.

“It” will probably not be “A Non-Big Three Guy Wins A Slam.” Nadal and Djokovic are too far ahead of the rest, especially in best of five. But what it absolutely will be is a year where the meat of the tennis story is genuinely the kids.

There will be gaps in that story, such as the aforementioned majors or The Entirety Of The Clay Season where Rafael Nadal continues to manically organize his water bottles with his right hand and pounding his helpless opponents into the fine red dust with his left. But the crop of the usurpers is too deep, and for the first time in almost twenty years too fucking good to be just background noise in 2020.

Dominic Thiem, the eldest of the young guns at just 26, found a hard court game last year to pair with his well-earned title of Best Clay Guy Non Nadal Edition. Wins in Beijing and Vienna combined with a great Tour Finals run, where he beat both Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer, earned him a year-end ranking of 4, his highest yet.

Stefanos Tsitsipas looked for most of the year like the best real young gun (he’s still 21) on tour. A semi in Melbourne, a final in Dubai, a final in Madrid, and a semi in Rome all before the halfway point of the season was a helluva statement. At some point at the end of 2018 or in the start of 2019, Tsitsipas realized he can hit the ball as hard as he can and still paint the chalk lines. Then he went on an absolute tear. He has game suited for every surface, and you still feel like there is tons of room for growth with a serve that could stand to add some heat.

But the main storyline for the next generation was Daniil Medvedev and his extended middle finger.

First of all, Daniil kicks ass. He’s weird enough to be likable, fiery enough to be hateable, and good enough in front of a camera to be interesting. Him threatening to fight Stefanos Tsitsipas after a match in Miami remains a singular moment in sports history, according to me and two other people on planet earth.

Medvedev almost didn’t take a week off all season, playing a Thiem-esque 80 matches in the 2019 season. He won 59 of them, playing a stupid nine finals (and 12 semifinals) including three Masters and the US Open.

In a sport where Aesthetics mean so much, Medvedev delightfully is not aesthetically pleasing. You feel like he doesn’t have the weapons since he plays such a defensive style, but he 100% does, and he doesn’t miss makable shots. He’s a 6-6 pest, and it is so damn good.

You can go even deeper, and I will, because we’re not paying for this fancy Squarespace site for nothing. I’ve been a ShapoHead since the start of his 2017 Rogers Cup match against Nadal that he won, but Denis Shapovalov is actually ready for the big time. It looks like he’s added a solid ten pounds of muscle, and it’s showing in the quality and consistency of his serve, which is now one of the 15 best on tour. Paired with his electric groundstrokes and daring net attacks, Shapo is headed for the Big Time, if he isn’t there already. He made his first Masters Final at the end of 2019 and has got a chance to sniff the top ten in the front half of this season.

Alex De Minaur too has developed physically and can now truly stand up and deliver against the biggest of opponents on tour. The serve is better and his athleticism is developing quickly. Last year at around this time, he lost a heartbreaking 5-setter Davis Cup match to Sascha Zverev. This week, he came back from a set and a break down to Zverev in a 3-setter. He too is going to rise from his current ranking of 20.

Felix Auger-Aliassime will make a final of a minor clay ATP event this year.

Karen Khachanov is rediscovering his form that won him a Masters.

Andrey Rublev is back from the hinterlands of injury rehab and is in the top 25.

Even Americans have some buzz, with Taylor Fritz bursting with potential and Reilly Opelka laying claim to the title of Next Great Servebot. Francis Tiafoe should figure out his ills too.

All this legitimate talent doesn’t count the once crowned prince of the NextGen: Sascha Zverev. Unfortunately, there’s no top player more adrift mentally. It’s fascinating to see a once top three star completely forget how to hit a serve, but that’s where we are with the 22-year old. Zverev’s list of accomplishments still may have the rest of his compatriots beat, but I find myself hoping he can just have fun on a tennis court again, forget about winning, or even being competitive. Whether it’s because of a legal dispute with his former agent or something physical, he’s too good to be this lost, and it’s equal parts an interesting storyline and heartbreakingly sad.

The bandwagons are open. Pick an exciting star this year and watch them rise to prominence. It may not be this year where one of them takes a slam. But next year? I’d be shocked if they didn’t.

Some other odds, ends, and predictions…

Coco Gauff is going to be top 30 before she turns 16 in four months. Book it..
Amanda Anisimova might be even better. She’s 24th in the world and would be higher had her late season not been thrown off course by the tragic passing of her father.
There’s a very real chance that this is the last year on tour for Caroline Wozniacki (has already announced her retirement), Venus Williams (is out of the top 50 and turning 40 this year), and Roger Federer (if he wins an Olympic Gold or Wimbledon, doesn’t Basel 2020 sound like the right final performance?).
2020 is the year doubles is relevant again! Ok, maybe not quite, but full marks to the ATP Cup, Davis Cup, and Laver Cup for creating a format where top singles players feel the need to play high profile doubles matches. High-profile doubles will be on display at the Olympics as well.
Remember Jack Sock? He has no ranking points right now. Yeah, that Jack Sock who played in a Tour Finals two years ago and won a Masters. He’s going to get a heavy dose of wild cards to help him recoup his ranking, but I am beyond intrigued by what his 2020 season looks like. Remember, he could transition to a full time doubles specialist tomorrow and immediately be the top player in that discipline.