[SuperG]

Two major finals at AO and US Open. Should have also been in the finals of Wimbledon but he blew a 5-1 fifth set lead to Malivai Washington in the semis, and would have had a good shot to beat Krajicek in the final. Todd lost his other two finals to Pete and Andre. Martin had a very solid career, mostly overshadowed by Pete, Andre, Courier and Chang. Pure tennis player, like the embodiment of the old time era guys Tilden Budge. Now he's the boss at the Hall of Fame. Favorite Martin match was when he was down two sets to Moya at US Open night match on Ashe and then he turned into wildman Todd and won it in 5 at around midnight. Roaring fist pumping high fiving fans, Todd totally went out of character and it sparked his best tennis. Sweet serve, money backhand, good forehand, good volleys, nice old school player to watch. Perfect form on everything. One of the first big men who had a complete game. Best memories of Todd?

Biofile: Todd Martin Interview · Tennis-Prose.com

www.tennis-prose.com

 

[florentine]

Pure tennis player, like the embodiment of the old time era guys Tilden Budge.

I see him as one of the last representatives of these young us players coming from the university championships, who competed for the qualifications at the US Open, in the 80's and 90's.
They sometimes created a (bad) surprise for seeds.


Tim Mayotte, better known of course (Martin reminded me of him), but also shooting stars, Eric Korita, Chip Hooper etc.

McEnroe had been there too.
And Gilbert.

Arias, Krickstein, Agassi, Courier etc also came out of the academy .. but from Nick Bollettieri academy

 

[Matthieu]

Krickstein

To this day Jimmy Connors is still living rent free inside Kricksteins head.

 

[florentine]

Connors and McEnroe mentor were latinos Pancho Segura and Toni Palafox

 

[SuperG]

Good analogy Mayotte and Martin, both gentleman and maybe too nice to be great champions. All the great champions have an element of ruthless cuthroatness to them. Martin and Mayotte were total gentleman on and off court. Becker took advantage of Mayotte's niceness one year at Wimbledon as defending champion he was losing to Mayotte and quit the match on center court and then changed his mind and continued and won the match! That was some monkey business.

 

[florentine]

too nice

😐
Head To Head | Ivan Lendl vs Tim Mayotte H2H


He was very close to releasing Lendl in US 82, but after that, except for another hung match at Wimbledon, he never worried him again.

 

[The Hero Cop Mark]

is Taylor Dent the legend of the game?

 

[allpro]

i was never a fan of martin, but i'll always remember him for his brief stint with djoker, lol..

 

[SuperG]

Martin tried to coach a few players, Djokovic, and I can't remember the other two Americans, maybe Harrison and Fish? You would think he would be the perfect coach, intelligent, overachiever, technically sound, engaging, not a big ego, but for some reason his coaching alliances did not succeed. Makes no sense.

 

[BodyServe]

USTA youtube channel recently uploaded his match against Robby Ginepri at the 2003 US Open in good quality.

I was impressed how strong his backhand slice was.

 

[Snowwy]

Kinda crazy that despite playing essentially the exact same era, Krajicek and Martin only played twice.

 

[SuperG]

Kinda crazy that despite playing essentially the exact same era, Krajicek and Martin only played twice.

I remember one of the matches too, it was a five setter at US Open, an afternoon match. Great match. And it was controversial after because a female reporter questioned Krajicek after about a comment he had made earlier in the year about saying most of the wta women were fat and out of shape. )She was trying to roast him about it again though he did apologize earlier in the year. Then an American male reporter quickly asked a different question which saved him from having to answer to the woman reporter who tried to set him up.

 

[Phillo]

i was never a fan of martin, but i'll always remember him for his brief stint with djoker, lol..

One more reason to thank his lucky stars for Vajda.

 

[Djoker]

Unique player for sure, but a massive underdog to Agassi and Sampras, though strangely competitive against Krajicek (Sampras' nemezis).

(on a sidenote, a boring and obnoxious Djokovic hating troll took his name here 5 years ago, but was permabanned, thanks for the moderation. such nutcases never ceased to amaze me on this site)

 

[Djoker]

Kinda crazy that despite playing essentially the exact same era, Krajicek and Martin only played twice.

I can find only the USO match everywhere, which was the other one?

 

[Snowwy]

Martin beat Krajicek at 1996 Dusseldorf. Who knows if that should even count but Tennis Abstract counts it.