What to know about tennis in 2015 before the Australian Open

After a lengthy, days-long offseason, the 2015 tennis campaign begins where the last one left off: with an aging top tier fending off a host of up-and-comers.

After a lengthy offseason that spanned literally days, the 2015 tennis season is in full swing. The men's tour is finishing up tournaments in Doha (semifinals: Roger Federer vs. Grigor Dimitrov, Kei Nishikori vs. Milos Raonic), Brisbane (Ivo Karlovic vs. David Ferrer and Tomas Berdych vs. Andreas Seppi), and Chennai (top seeds remaining: Stan Wawrinka, Roberto Bautista Agut); the women are in Brisbane (finals: Maria Sharaova vs. Ana Ivanovic), Auckland (Caroline Wozniacki vs. Venus Williams), and Shanzhen (Simona Halep vs. Timea Bacsinszky).

In just over a week, the tennis world will converge in Melbourne for the Australian Open, the first Slam of the year. Here are a game's worth of early-year thoughts about the tennis universe.

15-love. The big four are still the (slightly smaller) big four.

On the men's tour, 2014 saw a sea change ... and little change at all. Tennis' big four -- Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Andy Murray -- only accounted for five of eight slam final appearances and only two titles. That's down from 2013, when those numbers were seven and four, respectively. These four have dominated so thoroughly, and for so long, that they have redefined what we think of as dominance.

Heading into 2015, these four are more of a run-of-the-mill dominant, a Becker-Edberg-Lendl level of dominant. When healthy, they're the safest bets to win any tournament in which they appear, but they're not in fifth gear quite as frequently as they used to be.

And they're still the top four players in the most recent Advanced Baseline rankings.

Rk	Player	Overall	Country	Last Jan.	Change	Clay	Rk	Hard	Rk	Indoor	Rk	Grass	Rk
1	Novak Djokovic	96.2	SRB	1	0	97.0	2	97.5	1	94.3	1	91.0	2
2	Roger Federer	94.4	SUI	3	1	92.9	4	96.1	2	93.8	2	92.2	1
3	Rafael Nadal	94.4	ESP	2	-1	99.2	1	95.4	3	87.0	4	86.4	4
4	Andy Murray	89.9	GBR	4	0	87.0	11	93.3	4	86.9	5	87.3	3
5	Kei Nishikori	88.9	JPN	16	11	88.1	8	92.2	5	85.7	7	81.3	7
6	Marin Cilic	87.9	CRO	15	9	85.6	17	90.4	6	88.2	3	83.4	5
7	Milos Raonic	86.4	CAN	13	6	83.3	18	90.4	6	86.4	6	77.8	10
8	Grigor Dimitrov	85.2	BUL	19	11	86.6	14	85.5	11	84.0	9	81.9	6
9	David Ferrer	84.9	ESP	6	-3	93.5	3	84.5	14	75.5	13	74.5	12
10	Tomas Berdych	84.8	CZE	7	-3	85.7	16	85.7	10	83.7	10	79.2	9
11	Jo-Wilfried Tsonga	84.7	FRA	9	-2	81.9	22	88.4	8	81.6	11	81.3	7
12	Gael Monfils	84.1	FRA	18	6	87.7	9	85.4	12	81.1	12	72.4	14
13	Stanislas Wawrinka	82.8	SUI	11	-2	90.5	5	85.0	13	70.3	17	68.5	20
14	Ernests Gulbis	82.0	LAT	17	3	87.0	11	80.3	15	84.2	8	71.2	17
15	Roberto Bautista-Agut	77.6	ESP	54	39	78.8	28	79.9	16	72.2	15	71.3	16
16	Tommy Robredo	77.0	ESP	22	6	88.8	7	76.0	23	63.6	28	65.7	23
17	Richard Gasquet	75.9	FRA	10	-7	80.2	25	76.8	21	69.6	18	68.5	20
18	Philipp Kohlschreiber	75.6	GER	21	3	78.8	28	76.6	22	68.3	20	72.2	15
19	John Isner	75.5	USA	24	5	68.5	47	86.1	9	65.4	23	64.3	25
20	David Goffin	75.4	BEL	65	45	83.2	20	73.6	26	72.3	14	65.0	24
21	Alexandr Dolgopolov	74.7	UKR	41	20	80.2	25	78.8	18	59.9	33	61.9	29
22	Kevin Anderson	72.9	RSA	23	1	69.7	43	79.0	17	65.1	24	66.8	22
23	Fabio Fognini	72.8	ITA	31	8	90.0	6	68.2	33	59.4	35	61.5	30
24	Feliciano Lopez	71.0	ESP	37	13	69.1	46	75.3	24	58.8	37	75.2	11
25	Radek Stepanek	70.8	CZE	20	-5	73.4	38	68.6	32	72.2	15	70.9	18
26	Leonardo Mayer	70.6	ARG	81	55	87.6	10	65.0	38	59.9	33	60.5	32
27	Nicolas Almagro	69.9	ESP	14	-13	86.3	15	66.1	37	56.0	51	58.2	38
28	Gilles Simon	68.5	FRA	30	2	67.7	48	72.6	27	65.5	22	57.1	41
29	Dominic Thiem	68.0	AUT	141	112	80.7	23	64.4	39	60.8	30	57.0	42
30	Marinko Matosevic	67.1	AUS	77	47	56.5	77	78.3	19	56.8	44	64.0	26
31	Viktor Troicki	66.9	SRB	64	33	79.0	27	63.1	45	60.1	32	57.9	40
32	Jerzy Janowicz	66.7	POL	40	8	73.0	39	62.8	46	69.5	19	61.1	31
33	Jeremy Chardy	65.8	FRA	57	24	75.5	33	63.6	41	56.4	47	60.3	33
34	Ivo Karlovic	65.4	CRO	61	27	62.0	59	67.4	36	64.1	27	68.8	19
35	Bernard Tomic	65.3	AUS	48	13	54.4	83	77.1	20	53.1	62	63.2	27
36	Lleyton Hewitt	65.1	AUS	27	-9	58.2	72	69.4	30	60.9	29	73.0	13
37	Pablo Cuevas	65.1	ARG	N/A	N/A	86.9	13	56.0	58	56.1	49	54.3	50
38	Julien Benneteau	64.0	FRA	38	0	58.4	71	69.2	31	65.0	25	56.1	45
39	Mikhail Youzhny	63.8	RUS	12	-27	64.9	54	63.3	42	64.2	26	62.0	28
40	Fernando Verdasco	63.6	ESP	32	-8	76.6	31	59.4	52	53.8	60	58.4	37
41	Sam Querrey	63.3	USA	36	-5	54.4	83	71.7	28	60.3	31	56.7	43
42	Simone Bolelli	62.9	ITA	N/A	N/A	82.4	21	53.7	66	54.3	58	58.9	36
43	Marcos Baghdatis	62.5	CYP	44	1	49.4	100	73.7	25	58.0	39	58.2	38
44	Lukas Rosol	62.3	CZE	68	24	73.5	37	59.3	53	56.9	43	50.5	61
45	Nick Kyrgios	62.0	GRE	220	175	58.6	70	67.6	35	53.0	63	60.2	34
46	Jiri Vesely	61.9	CZE	74	28	71.8	42	58.5	55	56.2	48	55.6	47
47	Jack Sock	61.8	USA	100	53	62.0	59	63.2	43	58.7	38	59.5	35
48	Ivan Dodig	61.4	CRO	26	-22	60.9	61	61.6	50	65.9	21	54.9	49
49	Denis Istomin	60.7	UZB	50	1	56.6	76	68.1	34	50.1	71	55.7	46
50	Martin Klizan	60.6	SVK	85	35	83.3	18	49.5	76	54.3	58	51.6	57

(A full set of men's top-300 AB rankings can be downloaded here.)

Nadal is fighting his way back from his most recent injury (first a wrist issue, then appendicitis) and got knocked out by a qualifier in the first round in Doha. So he's not currently playing at the level of the No. 3 player in the world. But one assumes he'll have the rust knocked off pretty soon, and when he does, the new/old top four will be in place.

15-all. Still, the gap has closed

It was a great year for tennis' second tier, and not only because the top four actually shared some of the big spotlight. Stan Wawrinka completed a late-career peak, winning the Australian Open at 28 and holding the No. 3 ATP ranking for much of the spring and early summer. He's still a solid fourth.

Kei Nishikori surged to fifth in both the ATP rankings and AB rankings. His ran into a 6'6 buzzsaw, getting thumped by Marin Cilic in the U.S. Open finals, but he still made the finals. And while Wawrinka is toiling at 11th in the AB rankings, Nishikori is a favorite of both ATP points and Colin Davy's spreadsheets. He is best on hard courts, and with a good draw, he could have strong odds of making the Aussie semifinals this year.

A year ago, Marin Cilic ranked 37th (ATP) and 15th (AB) while finishing up a suspension related to performance-enhancing drugs. Today, he's ninth and sixth, respectively. He's currently dealing with arm and shoulder issues, but his surge to the U.S. Open title was stunning.

Milos Raonic had himself a year; he reached the French Open quarterfinals and the Wimbledon semis and starts the year in the top 10 of both ATP and AB. Grigor Dimitrov is 11th and eighth, respectively. Ernests Gulbis made the French semis and is 13th and 14th.

Add to this some impressive movement from players like Roberto Bautista Agut, David Goffin, Alexandr Dolgopolov, Dominic Thiem, Marinko Matosevic, and Nick Kyrgios, and you've got a deep men's field moving forward. That's especially true considering the big four still look mosty strong, and that one-time U.S. Open champion Juan Martin del Potro is almost back from injury. Get Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Nico Almagro back from their injuries, and we're really cooking.

30-15. Still Serena

Maria Sharapova had a nice rebound in 2014, as did Ana Ivanovic, Carolina Wozniacki, and Petra Kvitova. Their surges offset Li Na's and Victoria Azarenka's regression. And Simona Halep's exciting breakout has pushed human backboards like Aga Radwanska and Angelique Kerber down in the women's hierarchy and all but guaranteed some pretty exciting slam quarterfinal matchups.

But No. 1 is still No. 1, even at age 33.

Rk	Player	Overall	Country	Last Jan.	Change	Clay	Rk	Hard	Rk	Indoor	Rk	Grass	Rk
1	Serena Williams	94.2	USA	1	0	91.2	2	97.7	1	91.8	1	91.2	1
2	Maria Sharapova	92.8	RUS	3	1	93.5	1	94.8	2	87.9	4	89.2	2
3	Simona Halep	88.9	ROU	7	4	91.1	3	89.1	5	86.1	6	85.3	3
4	Ana Ivanovic	88.0	SRB	8	4	88.7	4	88.8	6	86.9	5	84.4	4
5	Caroline Wozniacki	85.9	DEN	10	5	79.9	8	89.6	4	88.0	3	83.8	5
6	Petra Kvitova	84.6	CZE	13	7	79.8	9	86.5	8	88.9	2	83.5	6
7	Na Li	84.3	CHN	4	-3	78.9	10	90.0	3	82.4	7	78.0	9
8	Agnieszka Radwanska	83.5	POL	5	-3	80.8	7	86.9	7	79.1	9	82.8	7
9	Angelique Kerber	79.0	GER	6	-3	75.0	17	81.3	11	79.5	8	80.3	8
10	Victoria Azarenka	77.8	BLR	2	-8	74.0	19	84.2	9	71.0	13	70.4	15
11	Lucie Safarova	76.5	CZE	28	17	76.6	13	77.6	13	76.6	10	71.2	14
12	Venus Williams	76.4	USA	12	0	69.0	23	83.4	10	72.4	11	73.3	13
13	Eugenie Bouchard	75.8	CAN	35	22	78.9	10	75.7	16	71.4	12	73.6	12
14	Carla Suarez Navarro	75.1	ESP	30	16	81.2	6	76.0	15	65.6	19	67.2	17
15	Garbine Muguruza	74.3	ESP	51	36	74.4	18	77.5	14	69.9	14	66.2	18
16	Andrea Petkovic	73.4	GER	20	4	81.9	5	71.9	22	66.7	18	64.7	19
17	Samantha Stosur	72.9	AUS	11	-6	78.5	12	74.2	17	65.2	21	62.0	23
18	Ekaterina Makarova	72.5	RUS	14	-4	68.8	24	77.8	12	62.4	25	74.5	11
19	Jelena Jankovic	72.1	SRB	15	-4	76.4	14	71.8	23	69.2	15	64.6	20
20	Sabine Lisicki	71.4	GER	16	-4	70.4	20	72.7	19	67.2	17	74.7	10
21	Svetlana Kuznetsova	70.5	RUS	18	-3	75.6	16	72.4	20	62.1	27	58.8	29
22	Dominika Cibulkova	70.0	SVK	23	1	70.4	20	72.9	18	65.3	20	62.9	22
23	Flavia Pennetta	66.8	ITA	27	4	64.4	30	72.0	21	62.4	25	57.5	31
24	Alize Cornet	66.1	FRA	43	19	66.3	27	69.3	24	58.1	32	63.2	21
25	Madison Keys	65.7	USA	29	4	62.9	33	68.0	28	62.9	24	68.1	16
26	Timea Bacsinszky	65.5	SUI	121	95	69.4	22	66.8	30	57.8	34	59.8	26
27	Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova	63.9	RUS	32	5	60.7	37	65.9	31	68.7	16	57.0	34
28	Sara Errani	63.9	ITA	9	-19	75.8	15	60.0	37	58.1	32	54.1	38
29	Monica Niculescu	63.4	ROU	41	12	59.9	38	68.1	27	60.3	29	57.4	32
30	Sloane Stephens	62.7	USA	26	-4	65.7	29	63.0	33	58.5	31	58.4	30
31	Karolina Pliskova	62.6	CZE	98	67	58.7	42	69.0	25	56.1	38	55.5	36
32	Camila Giorgi	62.4	ITA	64	32	62.1	34	62.4	34	63.8	22	61.4	24
33	Shuai Peng	62.3	CHN	53	20	59.2	41	68.2	26	52.6	45	60.0	25
34	Elina Svitolina	62.0	UKR	95	61	59.5	40	67.9	29	57.2	35	49.9	46
35	Belinda Bencic	61.1	SUI	113	78	61.0	36	61.6	35	60.9	28	59.2	28
36	Roberta Vinci	60.2	ITA	17	-19	63.8	32	60.8	36	54.7	39	54.8	37
37	Varvara Lepchenko	59.2	USA	50	13	66.6	26	58.2	40	52.2	47	51.6	42
38	Kaia Kanepi	57.0	EST	19	-19	61.5	35	55.1	45	56.5	36	52.4	40
39	Mona Barthel	56.9	GER	34	-5	56.8	44	56.4	43	63.0	23	50.7	44
40	Zarina Diyas	55.3	KAZ	135	95	51.9	54	58.5	39	52.1	48	56.3	35
41	Casey Dellacqua	55.0	AUS	91	50	45.7	70	65.8	32	44.7	67	49.6	48
42	Petra Cetkovska	54.8	CZE	45	3	66.0	28	52.3	50	43.3	72	49.8	47
43	Barbora Zahlavova Strycova	54.7	CZE	74	31	50.0	58	57.3	42	53.3	43	59.6	27
44	Magdalena Rybarikova	53.6	SVK	39	-5	45.7	70	60.0	37	53.4	42	49.1	49
45	Alison Riske	53.2	USA	79	34	44.7	76	58.0	41	52.9	44	57.4	32
46	Irina-Camelia Begu	53.2	ROU	116	70	64.3	31	46.1	65	56.4	37	46.6	57
47	Heather Watson	53.1	GBR	85	38	54.0	51	50.6	52	58.8	30	52.9	39
48	Polona Hercog	52.9	SLO	37	-11	67.1	25	47.3	62	46.5	58	45.5	58
49	Kiki Bertens	51.9	NED	99	50	59.6	39	47.3	62	54.4	40	45.4	59
50	Caroline Garcia	51.4	FRA	133	83	52.9	52	53.2	48	45.6	61	47.8	55

(Again, download the entire women's top 300 here.)

30-all. Eyes on Azarenka

The New York Times' Chris Clarey had an interesting feature this week on Victoria Azarenka, one of tennis' most unique personalities and someone who, a year and a half ago, was the closest thing to an equal Serena Williams had on the WTA tour. After a series of injuries and the collapse of a relationship, Azarenka lost the plot a bit in 2014. She has fallen to 42nd in the WTA rankings and 10th in AB.

She fell to Karolina Pliskova in the first round in Brisbane, and she will be unseeded at the Australian Open, a tournament she has won twice. She is still AB No. 9 on hard courts, and she will be the ultimate draw land mine, even if she hasn't yet rediscovered her top form.

40-30. Simona better win a slam

It's the only thing that can justify the hyperbole I find myself throwing her way.

In Jon Wertheim's latest Sports Illustrated mailbag, he fields an e-mail comparing Simona Halep to Arantxa Sanchez Vicario. He points out that Sanchez Vicario won four slam titles and not only reached the finals of eight others, but reached the finals of each slam at least twice. Despite having the reputation of a clay-court specialist and backboard, she was an all-surface danger, and in the era of Steffi Graf and Monica Seles, no less.

So yeah, comparing Halep to an all-time great is a little dangerous. It's even worse when you have my initial response to the mailbag question: "Well, I'd say she's ASV with quite a bit of Federer's artistry." ASV + Federer! For a 23-year old who has reached one slam final! No pressure, Simona.

Halep's combination of small stature, steady power, and creativity are confusing to the eye, and she might be my favorite player to watch at the moment. She currently stands at third in both the WTA and AB rankings; she's the top-ranked under-27 player in the game. There's no way anybody could live up to "ASV, with a litttle bit of Federer" expectations, but I would settle for a single slam title. She already came close. Her French Open final against Sharapova was quite possibly the best match of 2014.

Deuce. Sigh

Your top 10 American males according to AB:

19. John Isner

41. Sam Querrey

47. Jack Sock

55. Steve Johnson

76. Donald Young

110. Ryan Harrison

114. Denis Kudla

124. Tim Smyczek

130. Robby Ginepri

148. Wayne Odesnik

Granted, this list could be worse. Isner has rebounded a bit from a shaky 2014, and Sock, Johnson, and Young all moved up at least 30 AB spots from this time last year. Sock and Johnson moved up over 50 spots. That's good!

Less good: Isner and Odesnik are 29, Querrey and Smyczek are 27, and Ginepri is 32. Ginepri's 2005 U.S. Open semifinal appearance is the best slam result of anybody in this list.

Only Sock, Harrison, and Kudla are under 25, and a) Sock is injured, and b) Harrison has made no progress over the last couple of years.

Sigh.

Ad. At least there are the American women!

Your top 10 American women according to AB:

1. Serena Williams

12. Venus Williams

25. Madison Keys

30. Sloane Stephens

37. Varvara Lepchenko

45. Alison Riske

52. Coco Vandeweghe

56. Lauren Davis

64. Bethanie Mattek-Sands

70. Taylor Townsend

Whie there are only five American males in the AB top 100, there are 15 American women. And while the top of the list didn't really improve much in 2014 -- Keys only moved up a bit, and Stephens regressed -- it's getting harder to remember all of the American up-and-comers.

Taylor Townsend reached the third round of the French Open just a month after her 18th birthday, Victoria Duval won matches at both Wimbledon and the U.S. Open before turning 19 in November, Nicole Gibbs reached the third round of the U.S. Open at 21, 23-year old Coco Vandeweghe is coming off of a career year, 24-year old Alison Riske went 5-4 in slams in 2014 and reached the WTA top 40, Lauren Davis is into the top-60 at 21, Shelby Rogers is into the top 75 at 22, and 16-year old Tornado Alicia Black is up to No. 146.

Plus, while their 2014s may have been a bit disappointing, Keys is still only 19, Stephens is 21, and Christina McHale is 22.

Perhaps only Keys and Stephens have Future Slam Champion talent (though, holy smokes, is it easy to be seduced by Townsend's, Duval's, and Black's ground strokes), but Americans should be involved into the second week of each slam this year, and not only because Serena Williams happens to be American.

Game. ESPN is all over the Australian Open

The Worldwide Leader will be showing more than 150 hours of Australian Open programming in January, over 110 hours live. That's phenomenal. Yes, most of it comes in the middle of the night, and no, not everybody else gets up as stupid-early as I do. But I'm excited.

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