Miaimi Open, ATP 1000

[jimlosaltos]

I believe the average speed of Mensik's first serve is around 130mph while his average second serve speed is 95mph. That's a huge difference in serve speed for a tour level player, which is strange for a player with such a good serve. He's a wonderful player and will take a lot of confidence from the win. I mean, it's not as if Novak his playing badly. His last two matches in the run up to the final were superb. I tend to agree that Novak has become an amazing spot server and it's a major factor in keeping him up there with the youngsters. Looking forward to getting Sinner back and an interesting ahead...

Tend to agree with GG that Mensik is a great mover and shows signs of becoming a great match player.

Mensik's match success so far is largely based on an astonishing win rate in tiebreakers.

Per Jeff Sackman, Tennis Abstract, Mensik's tiebreak record is 30-13, a 70% win rate. For context, Djoko is the all time leaker at 66% (min 400 TBs), only a handful of stars are over 60%, and non-elite players "tend to stick around 50%".

Since Sackman has the database, he's able to pull this kind of stuff. How does Mensik's start compared to others?

Sackman: Let's get some context. Mensik has played 43 tiebreaks, so here are the players (born 1975 or later) with the best records in their own first 43.


Player W-L Win%

Pablo Cuevas 33-10 76.7%
Novak Djokovic 32-11 74.4%
Marcelo Rios 31-12 72.1%
Lucas Pouille 30-13 69.8%
Jakub Mensik 30-13 69.8%
Sergiy Stakhovsky 29-14 67.4%
Tommy Haas 29-14 67.4%
Sebastien Grosjean 28-15 65.1%
Marcos Baghdatis 28-15 65.1%
Bernard Tomic 28-15 65.1%
Milos Raonic 28-15 65.1%
Botic van de Zandschulp 28-15 65.1%
Alexei Popyrin 27-16 62.8%
Kei Nishikori 27-16 62.8%
Roberto Bautista Agut 27-16 62.8%
Felix Auger-Aliassime 27-16 62.8%
Lukas Lacko 27-16 62.8%
Philipp Petzschner 27-16 62.8%
Kristof Vliegen 27-16 62.8%
Dominik Koepfer 27-16 62.8%


Jeff's point being " Can Mensik maintain this rate?" Probably not. Djokovic couldn't. But, here's an interesting take.

"There's another reason why Isner--and Mensik--might outperform expectations. It's not that they get better in tiebreaks, it's that their serves are so good that they don't get worse.

"I looked at tiebreak tactics a few years ago and discovered that servers, on average, become more conservative. Rallies stretch out. Here were the key findings:

* Serve points won -6.5%
* Aces -6.1%
* First serve in "1.3%
* Returns in play +8.5%
* Rally Length +18.9%

So, if Mensik has the confidence to keep his first serve going in tiebreakers, his odds of continuing to win TBs at a high rate will be up.

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[jimlosaltos]

Here's Mensik's record vs Top 10 players, through Draper at Miami, i.e. not including beating Fritz and Djokovic there. Mensik is now 8-5 vs top 10 players.

Not only does Mensik have a winning record vs the ATP Top 10, but even in the matches he lost, he's usually in the match, getting into a tiebreaker or taking a set. Two exceptions are his first at US Open vs Fritz, and Rotterdam vs de Minaur.

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[stotty]

Mensik's match success so far is largely based on an astonishing win rate in tiebreakers.

Per Jeff Sackman, Tennis Abstract, Mensik's tiebreak record is 30-13, a 70% win rate. For context, Djoko is the all time leaker at 66% (min 400 TBs), only a handful of stars are over 60%, and non-elite players "tend to stick around 50%".

Since Sackman has the database, he's able to pull this kind of stuff. How does Mensik's start compared to others?

Sackman: Let's get some context. Mensik has played 43 tiebreaks, so here are the players (born 1975 or later) with the best records in their own first 43.


Player W-L Win%

Pablo Cuevas 33-10 76.7%
Novak Djokovic 32-11 74.4%
Marcelo Rios 31-12 72.1%
Lucas Pouille 30-13 69.8%
Jakub Mensik 30-13 69.8%
Sergiy Stakhovsky 29-14 67.4%
Tommy Haas 29-14 67.4%
Sebastien Grosjean 28-15 65.1%
Marcos Baghdatis 28-15 65.1%
Bernard Tomic 28-15 65.1%
Milos Raonic 28-15 65.1%
Botic van de Zandschulp 28-15 65.1%
Alexei Popyrin 27-16 62.8%
Kei Nishikori 27-16 62.8%
Roberto Bautista Agut 27-16 62.8%
Felix Auger-Aliassime 27-16 62.8%
Lukas Lacko 27-16 62.8%
Philipp Petzschner 27-16 62.8%
Kristof Vliegen 27-16 62.8%
Dominik Koepfer 27-16 62.8%


Jeff's point being " Can Mensik maintain this rate?" Probably not. Djokovic couldn't. But, here's an interesting take.

"There's another reason why Isner--and Mensik--might outperform expectations. It's not that they get better in tiebreaks, it's that their serves are so good that they don't get worse.

"I looked at tiebreak tactics a few years ago and discovered that servers, on average, become more conservative. Rallies stretch out. Here were the key findings:

* Serve points won -6.5%
* Aces -6.1%
* First serve in "1.3%
* Returns in play +8.5%
* Rally Length +18.9%

So, if Mensik has the confidence to keep his first serve going in tiebreakers, his odds of continuing to win TBs at a high rate will be up.

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Strange Rafa and Roger aren't on the list. Granted big serving has a lot to do with it but you also need to be a great match player to win the majority of tiebreaks you play. Roger had a great serve and was a great match player, and Rafa one of the greatest ever match players.

I guess from the underdog's point of view you are hoping to get the a tiebreak and putting all your efforts into it once you get there...it's a game plan for the big serving underdog.