Say this about Donald Young’s 2011: It was eventful. The 22-year-old American and former world junior No. 1 finished with a career-high ranking of No. 39, after beginning the year at No. 127. But even that surprising, semi-meteoric rise doesn’t tell the whole story of DY’s various ups and downs over the last 12 months.
It began at Indian Wells, where Young pulled out what he called “by far” the biggest win of his career, over No. 3 seed Andy Murray. After the match, Young talked about the hard work he had put in that winter with Mardy Fish and Sam Querrey at the USTA’s Southern California facility. It seemed that a corner had finally been turned in the enduringly contentious relationship between player and federation.
But in the first of many reversals, Young lost badly in the next round. A month later, the era of good feelings with the USTA appeared to be over as well. Angry at not receiving a wild card into the French Open from the organization, DY let loose with a tweet that was universally described as “expletive filled,” before shutting down his Twitter account entirely.
But all seemed forgotten a few months later, after Young apologized and made a run to the fourth round at the U.S. Open, the deepest he had ever gone at a major. Again it seemed that a corner had been turned. The potential that people had long recognized in him seemed about to be realized after Young followed up his Open run by reaching his first ATP final, in Bangkok.
Still, DY lost badly to Murray at both the Open and in Thailand, and at the end of the year his relationship with the USTA appeared to have gone south again. He said he wouldn’t use the organization’s coaches in 2012, opting instead to work with his mother. But whatever caution flags that may put up for the future, nothing can diminish that the fact that in 2011 Donald Young finally shed the label “cautionary tale” and became “a player to watch” again.
—Steve Tignor
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