Coach Craig Boynton may have just been let go by his student of nearly four years, John Isner, but he still believes the 14th-ranked American can compete with the game’s best players.
“I know what he can do,” Boynton told TENNIS.com. “He’s beaten Novak [Djokovic] and Roger [Federer] and Jo-Wilfried [Tsonga]. The real key is can he do it back-to-back-to-back matches at a Grand Slam? As Tim Gullikson used to say, you can’t win a Slam in the first week, but you sure can lose it. If John is spending a lot of time in the first week, it's a tough turnaround the next week, but if he can come close to what I know he can do, he’ll definitely be holding up some big hardware.”
Boynton, who is the academy director at Saddlebrook Tennis in Tampa, said he was somewhat surprised that Isner decided to go another direction and hire another American coaching veteran, Michael Sell, but realizes that coach-pupil relationships do have a shelf life.
“John and I were for all intents and purposes together for four years and that’s well above the average,” Boynton said. “We are still really good friends, and in his own words, he needs another voice in his career and these careers aren’t very long. Sometimes things go sideways. There was no ‘Aha’ moment to why this blew up. Sometimes you just need a change.”
While Isner did achieve a career-high year-end ranking in 2012, he suffered four five-set losses at the majors. Boynton said that part of his lack of success at the Grand Slams came down to fatigue. In 2012, Isner added three Davis Cup ties and the Olympics to an already packed schedule.
“I think you saw in the longer matches he wasn't as sharp physically as he might have been,” Boynton said. “He definitely ran out of gas at Aussie and U.S. Opens. Recovery always been a big piece of the puzzle for John, but if you play too much you are not only physically tired, but mentally you get burned out.
Boynton, who once coached Jennifer Capriati and Jim Courier, said the big-serving American did grow frustrated at his inability to break serve in some big matches.
“He’s holding at such an easy clip and if you can’t break it just wears on you, then you get a little tired, then mentally you are not as tough as you could be. The funny thing about it is he does return well, and if you look at Pete Sampras, he would have four or five awful return games, but then in one return game he’d really take advantage of his break points and the opponent would be like, ‘that was 50 minutes, and for 47 minutes I thought I had a chance.’ That's something that I worked hard with John to adopt, but it was hard for him to brush away not playing the return points as well as he does the break points on his own serve.”
Isner is still working at Saddlebrook, which has a pro tour division. Boynton is hoping to find another raw and talented American he can help rise toward the top echelons of the game.
“We do pro tennis pretty well at Saddlebrook and I’m always looking to cultivate talent in our touring pro division, and I’d like to bring someone just as I did with John from the mid-100s or 200s into the Top 10 the Saddlebrook way.”