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The story
On October 6, men’s tennis player Kei Nishikori (36) appeared at his retirement ceremony at Tokyo’s Ariake Coliseum, where he received a message from a player of the “Big Four” generation. Nishikori lost in the first round of the Japan Open on the 1st to Frances Tiafoe, closing out a 19-year professional career. On 5ch, while the identity of the sender was still being withheld, posters speculated it might be Shuzo Matsuoka or Shohei Ohtani; once the real identity was revealed, opinions split based on the two players’ head-to-head record.
Kei Nishikori — Message From a ‘Major Star’ at Retirement Ceremony: “I’m so happy… I almost cried”
Kei Nishikori (36, Uniqlo), former world No. 4 in men’s tennis, appeared at his retirement ceremony on the 6th at Tokyo’s Ariake Coliseum. Honoring Nishikori’s career, a member of the golden-era “Big Four” sent him a message.
On the 1st, Nishikori lost 4-6, 4-6 to second seed Frances Tiafoe in the first round of the Japan Open (Tokyo, Ariake), bringing his 19-year career to a close.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Now I'm too curious what got left out — slept like a baby (yeah right)
Nice
Probably the Uniqlo connection
Djokovic's impulsive and stirs up plenty of controversy, but he's also got a lot of genuinely nice-guy stories.
Passionate, for better or worse.
Federer too, though
There's apparently another Nishikori event on Sunday, and word is Federer's coming to that one instead
It's Sakamoto, from the Yomiuri Giants
he probably would've won a Grand Slam or two.
Because he's the strongest in the human world, after all
But I'll never forget that US Open semifinal.
I genuinely thought beating Djokovic meant he'd won the whole tournament.
What about Roger Federer?
I've never once seen one
The Australian Open and Wimbledon aired on NHK terrestrial, live or recorded, so you could've watched if you wanted to.
But tennis match times only get set the day before, so you'd miss it if you weren't checking closely lol
Tennis fans would know, but it was on constantly — to the point it'd get called 'Ohtani harassment' by today's standards.
Counting the BS satellite channels, every tournament he entered got coverage.
It was all over the news too.
Maybe that's why Uniqlo held him back lol
Surprise
Boom-Boom
Edomae
Pirozhkinov
Dandy
Sucharaka
Bravo
Uncle Sam
Umezo
Wild Rule
Katsurou
(fan-invented joke nicknames for various players)
Why's everyone treating him like such a huge deal
Japanese players are money-makers
He was world No. 4 while playing in the same era as the Big Four.
There wasn't a single top player from that era who didn't have Nishikori on their radar.
At a time when taller and taller players were taking over, it was fun watching a small, stereotypically built Asian guy compete on technique instead of power.
I wasn't that big a fan of his, but he's a player who'll stick in the memory of tennis fans worldwide.
vs Djokovic: Nishikori 2-18
vs Nadal: Nishikori 2-11
vs Murray: Nishikori 2-9
vs Federer: Nishikori 3-8
There aren't many players who managed to rack up 9 total wins against the Big Four, legends that they were
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
Kei Nishikori reached the 2014 US Open final and climbed to a career-high world No. 4, but his era was dominated almost entirely by the “Big Four” — Federer, Nadal, Djokovic, and Murray — who swept the Grand Slams during that period. The head-to-head records cited in the thread (2 wins and 18 losses against Djokovic, 2-11 against Nadal, and so on) illustrate just how brutal that era was — context a single runner-up finish alone doesn’t convey. Opinions split over how to weigh that record: some called the ‘big star’ framing excessive, while others argued he was one of the few players who managed to beat members of the Big Four at all. Before the identity of the ceremony’s message sender was revealed, many posters guessed it might be Shuzo Matsuoka or Federer himself, and reactions stayed divided even after the real sender was confirmed. Posters also noted that Federer is reportedly visiting Japan for a separate event a few days later to meet Nishikori in person — cited as a possible reason he didn’t appear at the ceremony itself.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geisokuhō+) thread “[Tennis] Kei Nishikori — Message From a ‘Major Star’ at Retirement Ceremony: “I’m so happy… I almost cried”.”
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