Grades are in: Big Four pass with flying colors through Week 1 at Wimbledon

Kurt Streeter, ESPN Senior Writer

LONDON -- The first week is over at Wimbledon,
and the Big Four -- Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal,
Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray -- all have
survived without much of a test. A look here their
first-week report card.
Novak Djokovic
It is Novak Djokovic's unworldly return game --
solid, forceful, seemingly incapable of wilting under
pressure -- that powered one of the great periods
of dominance in the history of men's tennis. From
2011 through the 2016 French Open, the Serb won
10 Grand Slams and placed a vice grip on the No.
1 ranking. Then the trouble began. Starting with
last year's third-round upset loss Wimbledon,
Djokovic hasn't won a single Grand Slam and has
often looked out of sorts. But change may be on
its way.
The first week of Wimbledon 2017 has seen
Djokovic look much more like his old metronomic
self. A particularly good sign? The way he's been
hitting his returns. On Saturday afternoon, he teed
off again and again as he stared down serves from
his Latvian opponent, Ernests Gulbis, whose first-
serve speed clocked in at an ear-popping average
of 126 miles per hour. Despite that kind of speed,
and despite the slick Wimbledon grass that makes
every return an adventure, Djokovic's replies
consistently caused his Latvian counterpart to
backpedal.
In three sets, Djokovic held 11 break points and
always seemed to be making his opponent fight to
hold serve. No single shot is more key to
understanding the state of the Serb's game -- and
his mind -- than his return. As good as the return
has been, so has been Djokovic's start.
Grade: A
Rafael Nadal
What's a perfect Wimbledon opening week look
like? Well, it looks a lot like the start of this
tournament in 2017 for Nadal. It took just one look
at Nadal on Centre Court in his Monday first round
match to allay any worry that he'd be overly
fatigued after winning a record 10th French Open
in Paris last month.
He wasn't just spry as ever; he seemed to be
walking with an unerring, shoulders-back bravado
we haven't seen from the Spaniard at this
tournament in years. Two words define his play so
far: razor sharp. After winning every set he played
at the French, he has hasn't dropped a set at
Wimbledon.
His third opponent here was 21-year-old Russian
Karen Khachanov, an up-and-comer with a savvy
all court game. This was a match Nadal could
easily have lost if he'd been off-kilter, especially
against an opponent like Khachanov, primed for an
upset breakthrough at a big tournament against a
top player. But Nadal hit 41 winners, made
unforced errors and throttled his young rival.
A hidden key for the Spaniard, who still somehow
remains saddled with a reputation he's not fully
comfortable with full-throttle, attacking play: He
won 17 of the 21 times he approached net.
Grade: A
Roger Federer
Sure, Federer won a Wimbledon warm-up
tournament in Halle, Germany, and true enough,
he's the surprise 2017 Australian Open champion,
but it only makes sense to question how easily the
Swiss would reacquaint himself with the
pressurized Grand Slam environment after he
chose to skip the entire European clay-court
swing.
Just as he did in Australia after missing the last
six months of 2016, the first few Federer matches
at the All England Club have been more a matter of
getting out the rust than cruising along in a state
of free and easy Federer perfection. So far, so
good. Federer didn't have to play more than a set
and three games in his opener Tuesday, since his
opponent, Alexandr Dolgopolov, surprisingly
withdrew because of injury.
On Saturday, German Mischa Zverev took the
seven-time Wimbledon champion to a tiebreaker in
the opening set, but mostly this was a routine
affair. Federer stared down his opponent's
aggression, handled the court's sunbaked speed,
and put another high-stress match in the books.
What he really wanted out of these first few days
was simple: make it through and finish feeling
good and fresh. Mission accomplished.
Federer always points to this tournament and
emerging from the second week victorious, as the
pinnacle of his year. In 2017, he made it an even
bigger focus when he skipped the French and
announced months ago he was fully focused on
winning an eighth Wimbledon. So far, there's
nothing to suggest he can't.
Grade: A-
Andy Murray
Has there ever been a No. 1 seed here, and a
defending champion, for whom so little is
expected? By his standards, the Brit (by way of
Scotland) has had a troubling year. He's won just
a single title, and by his own admission hasn't
played anywhere near the level he did in 2016,
when he became won Wimbledon for a second
time and also captured Olympic Gold.
But if there's one tournament that can turn his
season around it is, of course, Wimbledon, played
about a half hour from his Surrey home. He's
certainly looking more comfortable than many had
expected. Murray swept through his first two
matches with relative ease, showing little sign of
the hip injury that some speculated would cause
him to pull out of Wimbledon before it began.
His opponent in the third round was dangerous.
Italian all-courter Fabio Fognini is as
temperamental and quixotic a player as there is on
tour, and also one of the game's great ball-
strikers. He'd beaten Murray before, including a
May match at the Rome Masters. The fact that
Murray fended off a quality opponent like Fognini
in four tight sets bodes well for the Scotsman.
Murray did appear at times to be hurting, but it's
hard to take a whole lot from that. He has a
reputation for grimacing and limping around with
an aghast, injured look ... and then suddenly
springing to life, retrieving balls like a bloodhound
and winning majors along the way. He's injured,
maybe badly so, but that's not enough to count
out the grinding, often irascible two-time champ.