Andy
Roddick recently revealed in an interview that he discarded most of his
trophies, but he kept the one from the
US Open.
The former
world No. 1 is one of the most significant American tennis players in history,
having reached the pinnacle of the ranking alongside Jimmy Connors, John
McEnroe, Jim Courier, Pete Sampras, and Andre Agassi.
Roddick
achieved the world No. 1 ranking in 2003, a year in which he won two Masters
Series titles in Canada and Cincinnati, in addition to his lone Grand Slam at
the US Open, where he defeated Juan Carlos Ferrero in the final.
He held the
ATP ranking's top position for 13 weeks and was the last world No. 1 before the
Big-4 era, as Roger Federer claimed the top spot from him in February 2004 and
held it for 237 weeks (over 4 years).
Throughout
his career, Roddick accumulated 32 singles titles, six of which were won in
2003. He mentioned in a recent interview with GQ that he no longer has most of
the trophies he won:
“I thought,
‘I don't really need these. Anyone who's in our house kind of knows what I
did,’” Roddick said.
He added,
“No one's benefited more from one win."
Roddick
remains the last American male tennis player to have won the US Open, and this
edition marks the 20th anniversary of his achievement. The hopes of the
American public for a local male player to reclaim the title will rest on their
two main candidates, world No. 9 Taylor Fritz and world No. 10 Frances Tiafoe.
Fritz,
being the higher-ranked of the two, has reached the third round of the US Open
in 2018 and 2019 as his best result. On the other hand, Tiafoe has come closer
to the title, as he reached the semifinals in 2022, defeating Rafael Nadal
along the way, but eventually falling to the eventual champion Carlos Alcaraz.