Before Wimbledon in 2019, I remember skimming over the list of men’s favorites at a number of sites. Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal … Felix Auger-Aliassime? He was 18 years old at the time and ranked 21st in the world, but no worse than the sixth-favorite anywhere I looked. Auger-Aliassime had famously owned Stefanos Tsitsipas, who beat each member of the Big Three before age 21 and enjoyed plenty of hype at the time, in juniors. Tennis hipsters had long identified Felix as a true talent. And he was having a strong grass season, making the final at the Mercedes Cup and the semifinals at Queen’s Club. Was this sufficient justification for the odds, given that he’d never won a match at a major before? Probably not. (He ended up losing in the second round.) But he was the closest thing men’s tennis had to a prodigy at the time.
The next year and a half quieted the buzz a bit. Curiously, this gifted player could not win a final for his life. Eight finals came and went, all in small tournaments that shouldn’t have invoked crippling nerves—Marseille? Cologne 1? The Murray River Open?—yet Auger-Aliassime couldn’t even win a set. He began to feel like the answer to an unfortunate trivia question: Which once-mighty prospect lost finals to Benoit Paire and Dan Evans in straight sets? At times, Auger-Aliassime looked like he should have won all those finals: At 6-foot-4, he could channel his long stride and wingspan into lanky defense like Daniil Medvedev, but had a majestic, swishing forehand on top of that. His first serve was enormous and precise. The backhand was dubious, but Felix wouldn’t need it when dictating play with that incisive forehand anyway. The idea that he could attack or hang in rallies, bolstered by the huge serve, tantalized plenty of tennis fans.
