“Andy Murray should follow Roger Federer’s example,” the headlines read last July in London, after Great Britain’s best player limped out of Wimbledon with a hip injury. Former No. 1 Boris Becker, as well as one of Murray’s own former coaches, Miles McLagan, advised him to do what Federer had done in 2016—i.e., pull the plug on the rest of his season and come back at full strength for the Australian Open in January.
The idea was all the rage at the time. In short order last summer, Novak Djokovic (elbow), Kei Nishikori (wrist), and Stan Wawrinka (knee), followed the Federer route by cutting their seasons short near the halfway point and trying to get their bodies right for 2018. Milos Raonic (wrist, calf) joined them a couple of months later. They had all seen what a little extra rest had meant for Federer; two of them, Nishikori and Wawrinka, had experienced it first-hand when they lost to the 35-year-old in five-set matches in Melbourne last year. The future of health-management on the ATP tour seemed clear: Do what Federer did in 2017, use whatever exemptions from mandatory events that you have earned, and play only when you’re fully fit.
Now we know, if any of us still had any doubts, that what works for Roger Federer doesn’t necessarily work for everyone—or anyone—else. Six months off, it seems, wasn’t enough for what ails these players. On Thursday, Murray and Nishikori pulled out of the Australian Open, while Djokovic said he would decide whether or not to play after participating in two exhibitions Down Under. For his part, Rafael Nadal withdrew from his first scheduled event, in Brisbane, due to knee pain that flared last year, while Raonic gingerly tested the waters at that same event before making an early exit. As for Wawrinka, he’ll wing it in Melbourne with little warm-up work. The highly-anticipated reunion of the Big 4 (plus Stan) in 2017 will have to wait. Now we have to hope that the Big 4 era isn’t ending as we speak.
