It took a long time for Angelique Kerber to reach the top of the tennis world. She's been hitting the fuzzy, yellow ball since the age of 3 - she's 29, now - and she's been a pro since 2003. In 2005, her WTA highlights read as, "Fell in WTA qualifying five times". Glamorous life, huh? Not easily waylaid, Kerber was forced to kick a lot of ass in ITF play - the tennis minors - which earned her the right to fall in WTA qualifying no less than eight times in 2007. Then seven more times in 2009. Sure, a lot of those qualifiers were taking place at smaller tournaments with tight fields, but that couldn't mask the fact that Kerber DIDN'T have any big weapons, and DID have a cream puff of a serve. She was on the pudgy side, an awkward lefty. No way she was even the best German lady of a very solid crop nurtured in the post-Graf era. Kerber thought differently, hitting top-50 in 2010, and exploding in 2012 for her first two WTA titles, a Wimbledon semi, and a French quarter. By the start of '16, Kerber had become a top-10 stalwart, and that seemed to be a nice, feel-good story and ceiling for the scrapper from Bremen, right? So, so wrong. Kerber beat Serena Williams for an Australian Open title, drove off in a new Porsche at Stuttgart, lost to Williams in a Wimby final, took silver in Rio, and then won the U.S. Open to become the uno, world #1. No more minor leagues, no more questions, and about - oh - $20 million in career earnings. It's been a career that a little girl with a starter racquet in her hands could only dream about.
On Sunday, all of that cachet earned Kerber a first round exit out of Roland Garros - 6-2, 6-2 - courtesy of Ekaterina Makarova. First top-seeded lady to ever lose in the first round at the French Open. The only surprise is that none of us are really surprised...unlike Kerber's rise to the top, we could see this one coming around the bend for a while. Angie has been pedestrian in 2017 and she limped into Paris after a second-round loss in Rome to qualifier Anett Kontaveit in which she was unceremoniously fed a dreaded "goodbye bagel", 6-4, 6-0. How, and why does this happen to such an accomplished player? All sorts of reasons. Although she's had her moments on the dirt, clay would never be Kerber's surface of choice, she's more of a reactive counter-puncher and faster surfaces cater to her uncanny ability to absorb and redirect pace. Tough draw, too, as Makarova is #40 in the world, and has seen the semis in two Slams. Fine, but go ahead and throw out the French...what about '17 as a whole, including her poor showing on the early-season hard courts? Those answers may rest in some weary legs and lungs, but also more certainly inside the mind of a woman who's done the unthinkable and isn't quite sure of what comes next.
Kerber may or may not have used people's relative lack of expectations for her career as fuel for the fire - only she knows - but if she did, those days are long gone. Whether from the outside world, or from her own self, expectations are now sky-high for the two-time Slam winner. With Serena taking leave during her pregnancy, even more so! Kerber is now a player expected to put butts in seats, to make consistent runs at every tour stop, to promote the WTA, tennis, and hordes of sponsors in a positive manner...in short, she's expected to win. Not every time, but most of the time. Falling short of expectations can be a grim, lonely experience in professional tennis because the "failure" almost has to rest solely on the individual player's shoulders...there are no teammates to help share the blame, it's just Angie Kerber out there taking the "L". And while Kerber may posses - for the most part - the same game that most of us thought would be lucky to land her inside the top 20-30 in the world(She's absolutely improved her strength and conditioning), she'll never be a true "underdog", again. You can't be an underdog at #1, forget it, and that realization heaps a ton of accountability upon a player who didn't wear the rankings crown until the advanced tennis age of 28.
Our new WTA #1 can also forget about slipping into a match even remotely under the radar, as she has a huge "X" marking her every spot...with Serena out, Kerber is suddenly the biggest scalp in the women's game, and she's going to get everybody's best effort from first point to last. That's just life at the top, and when was the last time Kerber was, officially, THE top dog? Locals, juniors, ITFs, maybe? Either way, it takes most folks in any arena some time to adjust to that type of standing, so don't write off Angelique Kerber off as a shooting star, just yet. She's proven to be a deft problem-solver up to this point, and somewhere inside her mind may lie a new way to attack her career, a new way to set and reach goals, maybe a new way to prove people - even, herself - wrong. There's no question that her journey to superstardom has been long and arduous, but if Kerber can learn to appreciate the view from the penthouse, she may decide she wants to stay for a while.
