Winners of the 2023 ATP Awards were announced last week. As expected, a successful year from start to finish and an especially dominant conclusion led to Jannik Sinner being one of the major players involved in these season-ending festivities.
Sinner was named the tour’s Most Improved Player after surging from No. 15 to No. 4 in the rankings. The Italian’s 2023 campaign was highlighted by his first Masters 1000 title in Toronto to go along with three other triumphs plus a trio of runner-up performances at the Rotterdam 500, Miami Masters, and Nitto ATP Finals. Sinner, who compiled a 64-15 record, wrapped up the year by leading Italy to the Davis Cup title–upsetting Novak Djokovic in a thrilling semifinal singles rubber along the way. Ben Shelton, Chris Eubanks, and Matteo Arnaldi were also considered.
Because of Sinner’s efforts, Coach of the Year honors went to Darren Cahill and Simone Vagnozzi. Sinner was also named the Fans’ Favorite for singles, while Russians Andrey Rublev and Karen Khachanov made up the Fans’ Favorite doubles team.
The Comeback Player of the Year is Jan-Lennard Struff. After missing three months last season and being absent from the main tour for most of the second half of 2023, Struff plunged to 167th in the rankings. He is up to No. 25 now thanks to winning 25 ATP-level matches this year, including runs to finals in Madrid (lost to Carlos Alcaraz) and Stuttgart (lost to Frances Tiafoe). Also in the mix for this award were Alexander Zverev, Gael Monfils, and Dominic Koepfer.
With Roger Federer having retired and Rafael Nadal missing basically the entire year due to a hip injury, the Stefan Edberg Sportsmanship Award was entirely up for grabs. Carlos Alcaraz became a first-time winner. The other nominees were Sinner, Grigor Dimitrov, and Hubert Hurkacz.
The one category that had absolutely no suspense was Newcomer of the Year. That honor was always going to Arthur Fils–and that’s exactly the way it went. Fils was by far the highest-ranked player of the nominated group at No. 36. The 19-year-old Frenchman won his first ATP title on the red clay of Lyon and recently finished runner-up at the NextGen ATP Finals. He beat out compatriot Luca Van Asshe in addition to Flavio Cobolli, Alex Michelsen, and Dominic Stricker.
Felix Auger-Aliassime earned Humanitarian of the Year honors. The 23-year-old has engaged in various educational initiatives in his father’s homeland of Togo, Africa. Additionally, Auger-Aliassime has become the spokesperson for the Grow Beyond Campaign of the Montreal-based CHU Sainte-Justine Foundation, the charitable arm of the hospital in which he was born. The Canadian also started the #FAAPointsForChange program at the 2020 Indian Wells event, which has since donated $20 to EduChange for every point he has won on tour.
The year-end No. 1 awards, of course, had already been determined. Djokovic clinched that singles distinction during the Nitto ATP Finals, while Ivan Dodig and Austin Krajicek did the same in doubles.
As for Tournaments of the Year, Indian Wells was the winner among Masters 1000s, Queen’s Club topped the ATP 500 list, and Bastad was the best 250.
thoughts?
I feel next year Sinner will do better than Alcatraz who will suffer a bit of a letdown.
Indian Wells is always going to be hard to beat.Not sure what so special about Bastad.
As for Stuff, it was a somewhat short lived comeback,wasn’t it?
*Strutted his funky struff
Sinner is a better player than Alcaraz.
Really proud of Felix AA for winning that Humanitarian Award. I lived in Togo for 2 years, as did my wife, and it’s a wonderful country.