Retired WTA players Ana Ivanovic of Serbia, Flavia Pennetta of Italy and Cara Black of Zimbabwe are among nominees for the International Tennis Hall of Fame. Together with them are three nominees from men’s tennis: Carlos Moya, Daniel Nestor, and Leander Paes.
Ana Ivanovic won her sole Grand Slam title at the 2008 French Open and subsequently secured the world No.1 ranking, which she maintained for 12 weeks, ultimately spending 91 weeks inside the world Top 5. In the summer of 2016, she wed soccer player Bastian Schweinsteiger and retired later that year. They are now proud parents of three boys.
Flavia Pennetta made history in 2009 as the first Italian woman to break into the WTA Top 10. She reached a career-high world ranking of No.6 in singles and secured 11 titles. Additionally, she excelled in doubles, holding the world No.1 ranking for 18 weeks and claiming 17 doubles titles, including victories at the 2011 Australian Open and the 2010 WTA Tour Championships with partner Gisela Dulko. The peak of Pennetta’s career arrived at its very end with her first Grand Slam singles title at the 2015 US Open.
Cara Black achieved the world No.1 doubles ranking and maintained it for an impressive 163 weeks. She remained in the doubles Top 10 for a remarkable total of 569 weeks. Her illustrious career includes 60 doubles titles, with victories at Wimbledon, the Australian Open, and the US Open. Additionally, Black clinched five mixed doubles major titles, earning her a spot among the three women in tennis history to achieve a career Grand Slam in mixed doubles in the Open Era (since 1968).
Follow this link to cast your vote. You can select as many candidates as you think are deserving of induction into the International Tennis Hall of Fame. Then you will enter your email address, submit your vote, and click the link in the verification email to make your vote official.
The Top 3 players in the Fan Vote will receive bonus percentage points on their result from the ITHF Player Voting Group, comprised of approximately 140 tennis journalists, historians, and Hall of Famers — +3% for the 1st place, +2% for the 2nd place, and +1% for the 3rd place. To get inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame, a candidate must receive 75% or higher affirmative votes.
A year ago, Women’s Tennis Blog published an article about Ana’s nomination to the hall of fame. I love this blog and respect Ana. After seeing this article, I had many thoughts that needed to be written down.
I love the sport and many of its players, but I dislike the Tennis Hall of Fame. I don’t even like the idea of a hall of fame. Why?
For every player smiling, happy, fulfilled, and honored to be in the hall of fame, there are players who are disrespected and marginalized because they are not in the hall of fame. The institution is elitist and arbitrary. In that regard, it is the ultimate representation of what has always been wrong with the sport.
Tennis has a small number of influencers and self-proclaimed elites that have outsized influence on the sport, including what matches spectators see on television, commentary about players, and even the selection of those that get into the tennis hall of fame.
Worse, their operation — a business — is based on a product, and that product is the reputation of people who dedicate their lives to tennis. Many such players who pushed through barriers and even injury to do well, only to be subjected to the judgment of these people after their career is finished.
Getting into the hall of fame is not like judging whether a ball is in or out. Often, the decisions made don’t make sense and are bad for tennis. As of 2024, there are no Serbian women in the hall of fame. How can anyone be the best player in a large, tennis-playing country; be respected by millions, and not be in the hall of fame? How can a player be found to have used performance enhancing drugs and be nominated? How can a player make physical threats to officials, be fined, yet still be inducted? How can a player with an otherwise mediocre career, win a grand slam event, and based on two weeks of play, nearly be guaranteed to get nominated?
Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic grew up in a war and went on to become world #1 ranked players.
Jelena has 644 career singles wins which placed her in the top 12 of all women in the sport of tennis.
Jelena has 15 titles and ten consecutive years in the top #50, in addition to #1 status in 2008
Jelena has 2 GS semifinal wins and a GS mixed doubles title
Ana won the FO (in which she played Jelena in the SF)
Ana has 478 career singles wins, 15 singles titles, and 11 consecutive years in the top #50
In what universe are both Ana and Jelena not hall of fame players? As a tennis fan, I believe the only usefulness of a hall of fame in any sport is to create conversation over beer in bars. I believe that the idea that a small number of people who deem themselves to be worthy of judging the accomplishments of others is kind of obscene. I truly wish and hope that Ana, Jelena, and any other great player in any sport should care nothing about a hall of fame.
When you take up a sport and work to be #1 in the world you don’t need your picture hanging in some empty building to know the mountain you’ve climbed.