Richard Gasquet and Fifty-Win Seasons

When Richard Gasquet beat Kei Nishikori to reach the quarterfinals in Paris this week, he won his 50th match of the year, putting him in that rarefied company for the first time in his career.  Six years after his near-miss 49-win 2007 campaign, he finally becomes the 123rd player in the professional era to post such a total.

Given the shorter ATP schedule favored by top players these days, a 50-win season isn’t as easy to come by as it once was.  Between 1972 and 1982, there were six 100-win seasons, while no one has even played 100 matches in a season since Yevgeny Kafelnikov did so in 2000.

Gasquet is one of only six players to reach the 50-win mark this year–the others are Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, David Ferrer, Juan Martin del Potro, and Tomas Berdych, while Stanislas Wawrinka could get there with one win in London.  Six is the lowest total since 2004, when only five players reached the 50-win plateau.

Going back to the 1970s, however, the ATP sported 50-match winners in double digits every season from 1971 to 1980, peaking with 16 in 1974 and 1975.   In recent years, 10 players have reached the mark only once since 1994.

With only 123 players in ATP history, the list of 50-match winners is a select one.  Jimmy Connors tallied 50 wins 14 times, Ivan Lendl 12 times, Roger Federer 11 times, Guillermo Vilas and Stefan Edberg 10 times each.  Nadal is up to eight, while Djokovic is right behind him at seven.

The next highest active player on the list, David Ferrer, is an interesting case, especially in the context of Gasquet’s maiden 50-win season.  Aside from the stars of the early 70s, most of the biggest names in tennis posted their first 50-win campaign in their early 20s, if not sooner.  Connors and Lendl did so at 20, while Federer did so at 21.  Ferrer, on the other hand, is finishing up his fifth 50-win season, despite having none until age 25.  The only modern-era player who compares is Thomas Muster, who had four 50-win seasons, the first of which when he was 26.

Gasquet is 27, and while he’s not the only man to start tallying 50-win seasons so late, he enters an awfully small group.  Again setting aside players of the early 70s, only 12 men posted their first 50-win season at age 27 or later.  Among them are some familiar recent names, including Nicolas Almagro last year, Janko Tipsarevic the last two years, and Jurgen Melzer in 2010.  The Austrian is the record-holding oldest of the bunch, having enjoyed his 50-win campaign at age 29.

While many of us hope that this is a breakout season for Richard, these comparisons aren’t encouraging.  Of the 11 other players in this group, only two–Tipsarevic and James Blake–posted another 50-win season.  Melzer, for instance, hasn’t topped 30 since his big year.  If we are entering the Gasquet era, it will likely be a short one.

The same reasoning, alas, applies to Wawrinka, who may yet reach the 50-win plateau.  About 15 months older than the Frenchman, he would be second only to Melzer as the oldest player to register his first 50-win season.  The Ferrer comparison offers a glimmer of hope, as it is increasingly common for players to enjoy late peaks.  But if we’re seeing Gasquet or Wawrinka win 50 matches in, say, 2015 or 2016, it would be far more noteworthy than their excellent current seasons.