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John Isner, Jack Sock, Sam Querrey, and Steve Johnson recently put past men's tennis legends like Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, and Bjorn Borg, among other big names, in a fantasy bracket where each player faced off based on their "aura". The results, voted in by fans, didn't have a positive reception as Sampras bundled out the mercurial two-time Major winner Marat Safin in the first round.
Pete Sampras is one of the greatest players of all time, with 14 Major titles and 286 weeks at the World No. 1 position to his name. The American legend retired from the game following his 2002 US Open triumph. Safin, meanwhile, competed on the ATP Tour from 1998 to 2009, enjoying Grand Slam tournament victories at the 2000 US Open and the 2005 Australian Open while also spending nine weeks as the numero uno player in 2000-01.
For what it's worth, a large part of the Russian's appeal was his authentic personality that had so much fanfare that he picked up the ATP Fans' Favorite Award twice—only Roger Federer has won it more times (19). In that context, it came as a shock to a large majority of Nothing Major (held by John Isner and his compatriots) podcast's followers on Tuesday (May 20) when Pete Sampras, who wasn't particularly known for his personality, ousted Marat Safin in the first round of the "Aura Draw".
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One fan summarized the collective reaction well, writing in the replies to the above Instagram post.
"Sampras is the perfect example of big champion and absolute legend who has absolutely NO aura..." they wrote in the comments of Nothing Major podcast's Instagram post on Tuesday.
A few other fans echoed the sentiment that Marat Safin was the far superior player as far as "aura", which is an indicator of how cool a person is, was concerned.
"Safin is the definition of aura. No one will ever come close to that guy," one fan claimed.
"I love Sampras but in no way does have have more aura than Safin," another asserted.
"In what kind of world Safin loses against Sampras?!" one fan questioned.
"Safin got robbed," another insisted.
"I'm sorry. Sampras beating out Safin 100% invalidates this entire draw," one fan asserted.
"Rematch safin and sampras!!" another wrote.
One fan, meanwhile, questioned the authenticity of the competition since most of the podcast's followers who voted were American.
"Not fair putting Marat with Sampras when your audience is mostly American and Sampras had results in tennis. Marat is the aura GOD," they wrote.
Pete Sampras on his tame personality in 1990: "I'm a nice kid with a good attitude on court"
Pete Sampras has previously exhibited increasing self-awareness about his rather well-tempered demeanor, having said in a 1990 interview with the Los Angeles Times that he wanted to preserve his "good attitude" on the court for a clean image. This approach was at odds with that of his archrival Andre Agassi by his own admission.
"I’m a little bit more normal than Andre in the way I look and who I am. I’m a nice kid with a good attitude on the court. And I’m not going to change," a 19-year-old Pete Sampras had told LA Times in 1990. "[I avoid] any fights or anything which might ruin my image."
For what it's worth, Sampras' tendency to stay away from histrionics served him well during his career. The American was by far the most dominant player of the 1990s, losing at Wimbledon only once between 1993 to 2000 en route to his seven title victories there.
