After an on-and-off season and an attempt to find an exit on his own terms, Rafael Nadal announced on Thursday that he would be retiring after one last Davis Cup go-round in November. It was confirmation of an ending we knew was coming, but it is a significant moment all the same.
Nadal retires as, unquestionably, the greatest clay-court player of all time, the winner of an impossible 14 French Opens, 12 Barcelona Opens, 11 Monte-Carlo Masters, 10 Italian Opens and 544 career clay-court matches.
Despite playing in an era that featured maybe all three of the greatest men’s players ever — the other two were Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, both of whom considered him their No. 1 rival — Nadal forced his way into 30 Slam finals and won 22 of them, second-most behind only Djokovic. He won a gold medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics and was part of five Davis Cup-winning squads (with one more to go).
Nadal’s game was physical in a way we hadn’t really seen: The way he seemed to put 100% effort into every point of every match and the otherworldly torque and spin he put on his shots seemed nearly superhuman.
But his body often rebelled against him. From his Slam debut in 2003, he would miss 17 Slams in his career and significant time because of injury, especially these past two. He always charged back, winning matches and titles with nothing but brains, guile and aura while not in peak form, then rising again to No. 1 when he was 100%. He spent more than 200 total weeks and parts of 10 years ranked first in the ATP rankings.
In this sport, however, the Slams are what we remember most. Let’s commemorate his career by looking back at all 22 of his Slam titles, ranking them by both match quality and overall significance.
22-21. 2017 French Open and 2017 US Open
Result: def. Stan Wawrinka (6-2, 6-3, 6-1); def. Kevin Anderson (6-3, 6-3, 6-4)
After a 2016 wrist injury, Nadal charged back, reaching three Slam finals in 2017 and winning two. First, he rolled through his most dominant fortnight at Roland Garros, dropping only 35 total games in seven matches (!!) and offering Wawrinka, the 2015 French Open champion, nary a single ounce of hope.
After a fourth-round exit at Wimbledon, he found himself the top seed in the US Open. After losing…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at www.espn.com – TENNIS…