In a mere hours, the Australian Open (AO) will release the draw for this year’s tournament.  People will speculate who might win, but of course, it depends on how the draw turns out, among many other things.

Who are the favorites heading into the AO?  Once upon a time, you looked at the big 3 to contend for the majors (Federer, Nadal, Djokovic).  This year, there’s no clear favorites.  Of course, Roger Federer is picked to do well because he always does well at Slams, but 2008 and 2009 showed Roger having trouble closing out the deal, and losing in smaller tournaments.  Federer, of course, is as confident as ever, and feels he’s got a lot more within him.  Even so, he lost in an exhibition to Soderling, then to Nikolay Davydenko.  People pick Roger not so much because he’s looking better than ever, but because he shows consistency in Slams despite uneven patches in smaller tournaments.

Although Rafa is generally considered a favorite, the way he ended 2009 was a bit disconcerting.  Rafa hasn’t won a title since Rome.  He’s reached enough finals, and even reached the semifinals of the US Open, but he’s suddenly become vulnerable to many more players.  In particular, Juan Martin del Potro has shown he can just outhit Rafa.  Davydenko has also beaten Rafa a few times, enough to have a winning head-to-head record.  Nadal appeared to be striking the ball quite well in Doha, but he still ended up losing.  At least he looks a lot better than he did at the end of November, so he still seems like a legitimate threat to win.  Nadal tends to perform well at Slams, so it’s hard to go against his success.

Djokovic won the most matches of anyone in 2009, but didn’t perform well at the Slams or at the ATP World Tour Finals.  The guy can clearly play, but there are questions about his fitness, and his ability to beat his rivals.  He can beat anyone, but he can be beaten by anyone too.  Witness his tame performance in the Kooyong exhibition in a loss to Verdasco.

Like Roger Federer, Andy Murray has shown confidence in his ability to win Slams.  Unlike Roger Federer, he hasn’t had the kind of performance to justify his confidence.  2009 was, in a sense, a backward step for Murray.  He had worked hard to reach the quarters of Wimbledon and then the finals of the US Open.  But he lost to Verdasco in the AO, lost to Gonzalez in the French, lost to Roddick at Wimbledon, and lost to Cilic at the USO.  In the Hopman Cup, Murray was trying to apply more pace to his groundies, especially his backhand (he had an injury to his wrist at the USO last year).  Even so, Robredo was able to outhit Murray and Murray found himself scrambling around court to fetch balls.  The good news is that he appears to be moving quite well.  The bad news is that he needs to move that well to retrieve shots.  He would tire himself less if he could take more control of points.

Juan Martin del Potro has the kind of game that can strike fear in most players.  It’s probably safe to say that his forehand is the biggest in the game.  Perhaps not the most versatile, but in terms of sheer pace, he can really crank the speed.  Del Potro showed he plays up for the big tournaments.  However, he’s also shown fatigue issues in the heat.  Davydenko made del Potro look slow.  Along with Federer and Nadal, del Potro has to be considered a favorite to win, with the heat being the big question mark for del Potro.

Speaking of Davydenko, here’s a guy that has beaten Federer, Nadal, and del Potro in the same tournament, then beat Federer and Nadal again in another tournament.  Davydenko is playing really good tennis right now, but the big question mark is whether he can do it for 7 matches in best of 5 situations.  Still, he comes into the AO as perhaps the hottest player.

The favorites, in my mind, are Federer, Nadal, Davydenko, and del Potro, in about that order.  Davydenko is playing the best tennis coming into the AO, but his previous performances at Slams lead me to be suspicious of him making it all the way through.

Now to the interesting part.  The Australian Open has had its share of surprise finalists.  It’s so early in the year that fast starters tend to do well.  Maybe it’s no surprise that Andre Agassi won more Slams at the AO than any of his other major titles, often against surprise finalists.  Frankly, it’s difficult to predict these finalists.  How many people thought Tsonga would reach the finals in 2008?  How many people even knew who he was in 2008?

It’s popular to pick players that did well in previous years to do well again.  For example, Verdasco reached the semifinals in 2009.  People think he might do it again in 2010.  Verdasco didn’t use that semifinal appearance to vault him to the top 5 though he stayed roughly in the top 10 all year.  The surprise name last year was Robin Soderling.  Had he not bumped into Federer three times in three Slams, would we have seen him do much better?  No one is mentioning his name much, but he has a dangerous game.  What about old timers like Lleyton Hewitt?  He came close to reaching the Wimbledon semifinals, before Roddick eked out a five set win.  What about Roddick?  He handles the heat about as well as anyone, and should be fairly fresh.  He has claimed he’s not 100%, however.

Marin Cilic just defended his title at Chennai.  Is he ready to play well at the AO?  He’s another of these tall players like del Potro, Berdych, Soderling, Querrey, Isner that have sprouted up in the last 2 years, and he seems the most mobile of the tall players.  Does he have the mental tenacity to win, however?

This year’s Australian Open is tough to call because each favorite has some issue that makes people less than confident to pick them.  That should make for surprise upsets and hopefully a few great matches.