Sooooo I'm doing a deep dive on Kei RIGHT NOW. Because I heard the commentator say he was now 23-6 and the leader of active players in the percentage of 5 set wins. Novak is under him, but has more wins at 29-9. That's .763 to Kei's .793. The record of course has him at 21-6 at .778. But that's lacking this weeks matches. So. There's that. I'd of course give the edge to Djokovic there because his 5 set wins are against Roger and Rafa quite a bit. Kei has like 1 against Fed and a couple against Murray. I'm compiling the list right now. But as I mentioned in a previous post, that sparked my deep dive, he's not got 3 5 setters against Paire. He's got 2 against Bolelli at Wimbledon in 2 straight years. Won both. But didn't do well after that. And gave a walkover to Giraldo after the second one in 2015. And he probably partially did that because he'd played a 5 setter with Giraldo early on in his career. Which he won. But still.
I quoted the original post though because I noticed Borg doing work in it and Borg holds the best career winning percentage in 5 setters at 27-6. .818. He's actually tied with a Jean Boratra. I don't know that person. Looked him up. He's from the 1930s. Doesn't diminish his record though. Robredo is technically still active on tour and technically above Djovovic with a 17-5 record. Johan Kriek sits at .818 with 18-4. Followed by Bill Tilden and Henri Cochet at .8 with 16-4. Kei is currently right below them at 6th all time. It may not stay there. Probably won't stay there. But it might get better before it falls. He needs 2 wins without a loss to pass Tilden and Cochet. Just 1 win to tie them. Obviously needs 5 wins without a loss to pass Borg. He'll almost certainly have a loss before he wins 2 more or 5 more. Currently on an 8 match win streak in 5 setters. Unless I'm missing a Davis Cup loss. I don't have all of those yet and I'm still looking. I've got 3 Davis cup 5 setters so far. I think I'm looking for 2 or 3 more. Then I should have everything. I don't think their in the 8 match win streak time frame though. It dates back to a 2017 RG win over Chung. I found an old post on the talk tennis forum at Tennis Warehouse, with a google search, that had a list of current 5 set records for active players in June of 2010. 2010! Nishikori was already at 5/1. My list currently only has 2 in that time frame from grand slam play. So looking for 4 apparently.
Other notables from that 2010 list. Dolgolpolov sat at 7-2 at the time. June 2010. He now sits at 8-7. Tough. Nadal was at 16-5. Cilic was at 15-6, he's now at 30-16. So 15 wins to 10 losses over the last 9 years. Not as good as his first years on tour. But still a 5 set titan. I think he's got the second most wins behind Fed amongst active players. And I haven't looked at the entire list of the percentage leaders. But I think Sampras has the highest wins count at 33. Cilic could be 3rd all time in 5 set wins. I mean. I'd need to look hard to be sure. But it looks like he's top 10 or even top 5 easily. I can't think of too many others who would have been able to come close to that win total. Djokovic was at 17-7. He's gone 12 and 2 in the 9 years since the post. Ferrer was at 17-9. Federer currently sits at 31-20. Back then he was at 20-16. So he's only lost 4 in 9 years. Won 11. Much better than his first 12 years or so on tour. Hewitt was at 31-19.
Fun to look at the difference. Though... I've highlighted most of them. Some of the people on the list are retired now. Roddick, Black, Hanescu, Hewitt. Looks like Roddick never played another 5 setter after this post. I'm pretty sure his 5 set record is set at 13-16 and he that's what the post has it at. Someone else posted a list of inactive players records. So that's there for you. I got mine from the ATP website though.
LINK!
https://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/index.php?threads/atp-5-set-records-five-set.335267/
https://www.atptour.com/en/performance-zone/win-loss-index/career/5thset/all/
EDIT:
I thought looking for 4 more Davis Cup 5 setters BEFORE 2010 was high. I only found 1. And that rounded out the 29 matches I needed. It was a loss to Rohan Bopanna by the way. In India. On GRASS y'all. Nishikori was like 18 maybe 17.
But. I legit have NO idea how this person posted that Kei had a 5-1 record in 5 setters in JUNE of 2010 when Kei had only played 3 up until that point. He played a 4th at the US Open in 2010. But that's in September. I'm tempted to go check some of the other players record by that time to see when this person actually posted and figure out why the time stamp is off. Buuuut.... not even I have that kind of time. Or patience. Plus there is tennis to be watched.
