Roger Federer won his 100th ATP title at the Dubai Tennis Championships. Federer, the 37-year old Swiss, beat Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas. It took Federer a little over a month to avenge his Australian Open defeat to Tsitsipas. Federer is only the second man, after Jimmy Connors in 1983, to reach that benchmark. The victory in Dubai makes Federer no. 4 in the world.
Federer won his first singles title in 2001. To put that date in perspective, it was around the time of Y2K. Remember that? When the world was worrying if the computers were going to crash at the turn of this century?
Federer mused about his age when he questioned if Tsitsipas was even born when Federer won his first title. (Tsitsipas was born in 1998). Through the years Federer has had the opportunity to play against tennis greats, including Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi, as well as Tsitsipas, who represents a new era of future tennis champions.
Last summer, Federer parted company with Nike and signed a $300 million, 10-year contract with Japanese mass retailer Uniqulo. I like the new wardrobe with the Uniqulo embroidery on the polo shirts and henleys, but Federer’s model good looks certainly help. With that contract, only LeBron James and Cristiano Ronaldo currently have comparable endorsement incomes, and Federer’s endorsement earnings in the aggregate could reach an amounts achieved only by Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods.
