First Quarter Report Cards Continued

By Mike McIntyre

Last week I handed out report cards to the top five of Nadal, Federer, Djokovic, Murray and Del Potro. Here are the rest of the top ten as the rankings were at the end of the hard court swing.

6 - Andy Roddick (26-5)  B+

A fantastic start to 2009 for American Andy Roddick. His first Grand Slam semi final in two years at the Aussie Open and one tournament victory, one final, and two other semi final appearances during the first quarter of the season. Still the alpha male of American tennis and with no signs of slowing down, Roddick is a model of consistency on tour these past six years. He has defeated Novak Djokovic twice this season already, yet has lost to Roger Federer twice as well. With all of Federer's struggles, he still has Andy's number I guess. Fresh off his wedding to Sports Illustrated swimsuit model Brooklyn Decker, Roddick will be looking to carry his honeymoon momentum into the clay court season. After a semi final appearance in Rome last year, don't be surprised if Roddick's excellent season continues on the red dirt.

7 - Gilles Simon (14-10)   C

Not a great follow up to his excellent record in 2008. While Simon did manage to make his first ever Grand Slam quarter final in Australia, he has not had wins over any top ranked opponents as of yet. It took a while for Simon to get going last year so there is still time to turn this season around. He won two clay court tournaments in 2008 so maybe that will help get him going once again.

8 - Fernando Verdasco (17-5)   B+

Verdasco has started 2009 on a real hot streak and has finally managed to attain his potential on tour. To what can we attribute this to - his relationship with Ana Ivanovic? His faux-hawk haircut? Whatever the answer, Verdasco has been one of the hottest players on tour this season. Having never before made it past the round of sixteen at a Grand Slam, he marched his way to the semi's at the Aussie Open defeated favorite Andy Murray along the way before falling in a thrilling five set classic against Rafael Nadal. His losses this season to Federer,  Djokovic and Murray reveal the fact that he is yet to consistently hang with the big guns but he is a deserving member of the top ten.

9 - Nikolay Davydenko (4-2)   Incomplete

It is really impossible to rate Davydenko yet this season due to his injury problems. It appears that the Russian is healthy now and had a solid win against David Nalbandian last week in Monte Carlo before bowing out to Andy Murray. Dangerous on all surfaces, there is still plenty of season left for Davydenko to maintain his ranking spot.

10 - Gael Monfils (15-8)   C+

Nice to see Monfils justify all the hype from his junior career by making the top ten. He has made one final and two semi's so far in 2009, and reached the round of sixteen at the Australian Open. Still prone to a lack of consistency and I feel that Monfils will likely bounce out of the top ten soon enough. At only 22 years old, Monfils still has lots of time to develop into a regular fixture in the top ten. Not everyone can have six Grand Slams by his age like Nadal does, right?

First Quarter Report Cards

By Mike McIntyre

Now that the initial hard court season is finished I thought it would be appropriate to give out the first quarter report cards on the ATP tour. I'll take a crack at the top five today and round out the top twenty over the next week. Feel free to agree or disagree and hopefully we can get some good discussion going here. The players records prior to Monte Carlo are in brackets.

1 - Rafael Nadal (24-3) - A

How could Rafa not earn top marks for his outstanding start to 2009? He finally attained a hard court Grand Slam which should silence the critics out there who felt the need to constantly ask him about his "shortcomings" on his least favorite surface. Nadal has defeated some solid hard court players this year. Aside from his stellar run at the Aussie Open, he beat Nalbandian, Del Potro, Roddick and Murray en route to the Indian Wells title. He hasn't yet reached Federer-levels of dominance on hard courts but two titles out of five tournaments isn't bad at all. If he had another couple of tournament victories I would have given him an A+, but he does still have room to improve on hard courts. Now comes the portion of the season where he will really shine.  He suffered only a single defeat on the surface in all of 2008 and I can totally see him improving on that mark. If he's smart he'll try not to burn himself out in order to stay healthy for his Wimbledon defense.

2 - Roger Federer (17-4) - B+

Some might argue that Federer's performance this year is far below a B+, yet he has reached three semifinals and one final out of four tournaments in 2009. His losses were to top notch players in Nadal, Novak Djokovic and twice to Andy Murray. The good news is that all of the losses went the distance. The bad news is that he couldn't win any of them. If Roger is going to win any more Grand Slam titles he will undoubtedly have to get through these three players. No doubt some coaching assistance of some kind would help with the strategic variation he requires to accomplish this. All is not lost though Rog, I did give you a plus for finally marrying Mirka! The switch to clay courts is a welcome one for Roger this year and while pundits make a point that this is his worst surface, he has been the best clay court player in the world aside from Nadal these past few years.

3 - Novak Djokovic (22-8) - B

I almost typed in Andy Murray's name there for a second until I realized he has not yet taken over the number three spot in the rankings. Djokovic has not built on his excellent finish to 2008 where he won the Tennis Masters Cup in Shanghai. He had a slow start to the year and suffered another humiliating Grand Slam retirement in Australia. Quite simply he has not shown the toughness you'd expect from a top three player. Winning in Dubai against a weak field did nothing to impress me - anything less than a title there would have been a disapointment. He was trounced by David Ferrer and Nadal on clay in the Davis Cup. It finally looked like he was ready to go on hard courts after defeating Federer in the semi's in Miami, but then looked lackluster in defeat to Murray in the finals. Perhaps the new racquet is still taking some adjustment.

4 - Andy Murray (26-2) - A -

Clearly playing like the number two in the world, Andy Murray only gets an A minus mostly for the fact that he failed to live up to his potential at the Australian Open. Credit must go to Fernando Verdasco for the incredible tennis he was playing down under, yet Murray still should have progressed further than the round of sixteen. Otherwise what can you fault him on in 2009? He has beaten everyone above him in the rankings and won three titles. His confidence level is through the roof and all we're waiting for is when (no longer "if") he will break through on the Grand Slam stage. Can't wait to see how worked up the British press gets at Wimbledon this year!

5 - Juan Martin Del Potro (19-5) - B -

Del Potro seems to have cooled from the pace he set in 2008 although he has still amassed a nice record to start the season. He won his first tournament of the year in New Zealand, but was then thoroughly embarrassed by Federer in Australia where he lost 3-6, 0-6, 0-6. Ouch! Beating Nadal in Miami was a nice result, but he couldn't build upon it. It will be interesting to see how his clay court season develops. This was the surface that got his amazing winning streak going last year when he won at Stuttgart and Kitzbuhel back to back. 

U of Miami player hits with Rog and Rafa

Talk about a week to remember! Check out the story of Eric Hechtman who got the rare opportunity to hit with both Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal in the same day in Miami. Earlier in the week he also hit with both Williams sisters.