Top 20 breakthroughs in professional tennis circuit this year: Part 10 – Tennis Special
6. Brian Baker (the United States of America)
Yet another American player comes in my list of most impactful breakthroughs of the current season but he is not a new comer to the professional circuit. When he made his debut at the ATP World Tour, a lot of tennis critics started
to rate him as the next top American player but his cameo didn’t last for long.
27-year-old Brian Baker has been one of the finest players the United States ever produced. However, a non-ending series of niggling injuries has literally ruined the career of this talented American professional. Being at the
start of his professional career, Baker went through multiple injuries, which never let him play tennis freely. Nevertheless, the passion for the game always drags him back to the courts once he find himself fit to lift a tennis racket. His aggression towards
the game and stroke play used caught the focus of other tennis players in no time but Baker had to remain sidelined from the ATP Tour for a substantial part of every season.
The long-awaited return of Baker finally materialised this year when the tennis lovers almost forgot his name from their memories. He took off the 2012 ATP season as the 456 ranked contestant but it was his sheer class and hard
work that he stands at number 61 in the world rankings after almost 10 months of his return. Such rapid improvement in the rankings certainly says it all for the man and his fans hope he does not catch another gruelling injury. It is probably the last time
he has returned to the professional circuit and another serious injury might prove career-ending for him.
Baker spent the opening five months of the current season playing lower-tiered Future tournaments to regain his form. Once getting his eye set in the game, the American turned his focus towards the more competitive ATP World Tour
and entered Open de Nice Cote d’Azur tournament in France. He cruised through the qualifying rounds of the tournament without dropping a single set and entered the main draw with a sky-high confidence. Baker outplayed the likes of Sergiy Stakhovsky, Gael Monfils,
Mikhail Kukushkin and the former world number three Nikolay Davydenko to reach his career’s first ATP World Tour final match. His dream run came to an end at the hands of the Spanish tennis ace, Nicolas Almagro, in the title match but his rankings swelled
to the 141st spot.
He ended in the second round of the French Open but his biggest breakthrough of the season came at the coveted Wimbledon Championships. Baker outclassed Rui Machado, Jarkko Nieminen and Benoit Paire in his initial main draw encounters
before falling to the German contender, Philipp Kohlschreiber, in the fourth round of the Grand Slam event.
His exquisite performance at Wimbledon broke him into the Top-100 rankings but he couldn’t carry on playing with the similar sort of intensity in the tournaments to follow. Baker was ejected in the second round of the US Open Championships
at the hands of the Serbian number two, Janko Tipsarevic, followed by opening-round exits in Kuala Lumpur and Beijing ATP events.
Baker’s return this season has been extremely convincing and he is anticipated to carry on his impetus next year to break into the Top-50 ATP World Rankings.
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