Angie Kerber can retire, but she can never be forgotten

After a heroic, dramatic game, Angelique Kerber loses in the #Paris2024 quarterfinals against Qinwen Zheng, thus ending her active tennis career.

German tennis legend 🇩🇪 pic.twitter.com/cKNJ88TeBr

— DW Sports (@dw_sports) July 31, 2024

In 2015, I wrote that Angie Kerber was "the very definition of 'steady progress.'" I also wrote about how she had finally overcome her excessive negative self-talk. I said that "...there is more to Kerber than fight and retrieval. She is very fast, she can be powerful, she can be quite creative, and she can be dead-on precise at a moment's notice. Every season, she gets better, and every season, she becomes more interesting to watch."

And I was on to something. The German star would go on, the next year, to win both the Australian Open and the U.S. Open, and to secure the number 1 ranking, which she held for 34 weeks. In 2018, she would also win Wimbledon, defeating Serena Williams in the final. Kerber was the runner-up at Wimbledon in 2016, when she lost to Williams.

Kerber recently announced that the Olympic Games would be her last tournament, and--despite saving three match points in a thrilling, hard-fought match--she lost in the quarterfinals to Zheng Qinwen. We hadn't really had Angie back for that long when she decided to retire--she had taken a year and a half off after giving birth to her first child. It was fitting, however, that her very last match was one in which she fought like crazy up to the very last moment.

"Fighter" may be the first word that comes to mind for some fans when they hear Kerber's name. Her defensive skills were without parallel. Kerber could find angles that no one else could find, and her perfection of the Radwanska squat shot allowed her to make returns that other players would have missed. But Kerber wasn't content just with being the best defensive player on the tour. She wanted more offensive skills, including a better serve, so she did what smart people do--she asked for help. 

After learning some new skills, the German star developed a deadly transition game, which helped her to achieve her greatest victories. In 2021, she made a Wimbledon run that had some of us thinking that she could win a second title in London. Kerber made it all the way to the semifinals, in which she lost to eventual champion Ash Barty.

Angelique Kerber made her professional debut in 2003. At age 28, she was the oldest player to debut as a world number 1. In 2016, Kerber was named both WTA Singles Player of the Year and the ITF World Champion. She also competed in seventeen ties on Germany's Billie Jean King Cup team. Kerber won fourteen singles titles, including the three majors, with her last title coming in 2022 in Strasbourg.

In 2016, Kerber won a silver medal at the Olympic Games. She was widely expected to win gold, but lost to Monica Puig in the final.

Sport provides us many metaphors for our lives--work hard, develop discipline, strive to reach your personal best, appreciate the work of others, ask for help, find ways to accept or overcome obstacles. Angie Kerber's career has been a virtual guidebook for practicing these ideals (she is, after all, an Angel). She is a beloved figure because she has always given us lessons in how to fight, how to improve, and how to be gracious and good-humored in all situations. 

And thanks to Kadir Nouni, Kerber received the nickname, "KareBear," and the next thing we knew, we were posting Care Bears all over this site when she competed; I'll never see a picture of one of those plush toys again without thinking of a great champion.

The 36-year-old Kerber leaves the sport as a tireless and very talented professional who put her heart into everything she did. Her career could serve as a guide to any athlete. She will be missed.