Top 5 ATP Players of 2022, No. 5: Taylor Fritz

Most Memorable Moment: In his victory speech at Indian Wells, Fritz said: “Winning this tournament is one of those crazy childhood dreams that you really think is never going to happen.”

Missed Opportunity: Playing his first Grand Slam quarterfinal, at Wimbledon, Fritz had Rafael Nadal in a fifth-set tiebreaker. The American would go on to drop it, 7-4; the Spaniard would withdraw from the tournament before his next match—against the mercurial Nick Kyrgios—due to injury.

2023 Projection: Fritz should be able to consolidate on the gains he made in 2022 because he has learned his lessons the hard way, and is young enough to see more road in front of than behind him.

Taylor Fritz has always been a good scout: diligent, mature beyond his years, dedicated to his craft, reluctant to call extraneous attention to himself, or to inconvenience others. Observing scouting’s famous motto he’s now prepared for stardom.

The good scout turned into bad news for his elite rivals this year. Fritz belted his way into the Top 10 and qualified for the ATP Finals, where he made the final four. Fritz won the Indian Wells Masters (often called the game’s “fifth Grand Slam”), and he posted an impressive record (6-7) against Top 10 opponents—even though he didn’t hit his career-high ranking of No. 9 until late November.

Those accomplishments earned Fritz consideration in TENNIS.com’s Player of the Year poll.

The rangy, 6'5" Californian is still just 25, but he’s been a fixture on the pro tour since a sensational debut in 2016. He’s made steady progress over the years, but Fritz’s recent trajectory would have seemed implausible just 18 months ago. He tore the meniscus in a knee on the final point of a second-round loss at the 2021 French Open. Fritz balked at leaving the court in a wheelchair, explaining later, “It’s kind of weird, but I felt like getting wheeled off is going to inconvenience other people.”

Fritz underwent surgery and made a surprisingly quick recovery in time to compete at Wimbledon, where he took a third-round loss to No. 4 seed Alexander Zverev. That failure left a bitter aftertaste, but it also sparked the strong finish that set up Fritz for 2022.

Fritz has always been able to raise his game against top-tier opponents, but in the past often struggled with the lesser lights (“I was just too scared to lose, so I couldn’t play the way I wanted to play,” Fritz told me at the end of last year). Then there was that “third-round jinx” at majors, which had swollen to 0-7 by the end of 2021.

He was tired of being bogged down—and he blew those impediments out of the way this year with the help of his co-coaches, Michael Russell and Paul Annacone. They helped Fritz develop the bolder, more aggressive style he embraced toward the end of 2021 and this year. Fritz began using his forehand more as a weapon than a rally tool. He no longer had to live or die by his potent serve. He adopted a first-strike mentality, and developed his versatile two-handed backhand into a more creative, dangerous stroke. Fritz began playing with greater risk, for which he reaped greater rewards.

This year began with a jinx-breaking performance as Fritz advanced to the fourth round at the Australian Open (he then harried No. 4 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas through five tough sets before losing). Two months later, Fritz had a career-altering experience at Indian Wells, the tournament that has had an outsized impact on his life and career.

Fritz had attended the BNP Paribas Open every year while growing up nearby in Rancho Santa Fe. In his own mind, the “turning point” leading to his success in 2022 was his quarterfinal win over No. 4 seed Alexander Zverev in the unusual 2021 edition of the event (due to the Covid pandemic, Indian Wells was played in October). Some five months later, on the same court, Fritz won that coveted Masters title. And, oh, in what fashion.

The biggest day of Fritz’s career began with an ear-splitting shriek. Ready to warm up for this final against Rafael Nadal, Fritz pushed off on a previously injured ankle and experienced a bolt of pain so intense that his alarmed team encouraged him to forfeit the final.

Fritz ignored their advice and, after mastering Nadal (who himself was hampered by a cracked rib)—and apologizing to his team for overruling them—he told reporters, “I can't even begin to describe how ridiculous it is that I was able to play today. I've never experienced worse pain in my life before a match.”

But even that wasn’t the laconic champion’s year-defining effort—that would occur in Tokyo, some six months later, in the midst of Fritz’s big push to qualify for the ATP Finals.

Entered in the late-September ATP 250 event in Seoul, South Korea, Fritz tested positive for COVID-19 as the tournament was about to start. He spent the subsequent week in full quarantine, cleared to fly out of Korea on the morning he was scheduled to play his first match in the prestigious ATP 500 Japan Open. Fritz went on to win the title to keep alive his hopes of qualifying for the ATP Finals, where he made the semifinals.

Fritz will go into the new year with a solid, hard-won foundation, a wealth of experience, and most of the technical and strategic boxes ticked.

“Taylor’s success didn’t come out of the blue as it did for, say, Emma Raducanu (who as a qualifier, won a Grand Slam event in just her second try), says Tennis Channel analyst Pam Shriver. “Taylor has gotten where he is through a lot of hard work, and a really nice progression.”

Fritz knows where he’s been and seems to have a handle on where he’s going. As he said at the ATP Finals, “It's definitely not easy to be in the Top 10, to accumulate all the points. There is, I guess, added stress to produce the consistent results that you need to stay in it. [But] I think I've proved that I belong in the Top 10 and I belong here (in Turin). I just need to keep working hard.”

In other words, Fritz needs to stay prepared.