Andy Murray's Chances of Winning a Major: 50-50

There are many top, talented players who will most likely never win a Grand Slam tournament. Mardy Fish, Gael Monfils, David Ferrer and Robin Soderling, to name a few.

It's not that they aren't awesome tennis players. They've got the game to stay in the top echelons of the game for years. However, they just don't quite have the right combination of talent, heart, mind and weapons to win a major.

I certainly do not put Andy Murray in this category of "highly unlikely" players. He is definitely better than the others mentioned. At his best, he can beat anyone outside of the Grand Slams, and he has beaten Rafael Nadal a couple of times in them.

He has reached three Grand Slam finals, something many others have not done. Not to mention, only six other players in history reached all four Grand Slam semifinals in a year, as Murray did in 2011. His consistency over a year is unmatched by almost anyone.

I think Murray's chances of winning a major are neither high nor low; not extremely likely, but by no means very unlikely either. It's really split down the middle at 50-50.

If we go according to statistics, there are a mix of stats that don't work in favor of Murray, and others that do. For starters, very few players in history have won their first major at 24—Murray's age. Most of them won their first slam several years earlier in age.

For Murray, it may be a case of now or never for him to get that elusive first.

As many fans know, Murray lost his first three Slam finals. But he joins the company of several great champions who lost at least their first three major finals: examples include Ivan Lendl, Andre Agassi and Goran Ivanisevic.

All of them finally got over their hurdle and won their first major; Lendl and Agassi went on to win many more. Ivanisevic finally got his first major win at the age of 29.

At 24, Murray (to some extent) has time on his side. I believe that he can get over whatever mental hurdles ail him.

However, unlike those three great examples, Murray barely gave much of a challenge in his three Slam final losses. In fact, he did not win as much as a set in those finals.

Without question (at least to me), Murray needs much more work on his mind than his game, especially in the biggest occasions.

People constantly say Murray needs to play more aggressively. Perhaps it is true to an extent, but  I don't think it's so clear-cut. I feel it's more about playing with the right attitude—playing to win, rather than not to lose.

As Henri Leconte said recently, he needs to relax more on the big occasion. He's just more prone to getting negative on court than many other players. Again, this makes him play not to lose rather than to win, which in turn makes for much more defensive play.

Regarding Murray, his attitude matters much more than such a sharp focus on more aggression.

There are definitely positive stats working for Murray. I cannot think of any male player who lost his first three Slam finals and never won a major. Murray also joins an elite list of players who got to the Top 10 before the age of 20.

According to former tennis professional Greg Rusedski, only one player never won a major who got to the Top 10 before this age: Marcelo Rios.

Now, there's no denying that Murray needs some work mentally, but he's surely better than Rios when it comes to head cases.

Furthermore, everything has been a step-by-step improvement for Murray: He went from winning his first smaller pro tournament, to winning his first Master Series, to getting to his first Grand Slam final in 2008 to having his best year this year.

All of this happened in relative succession, and it's all step-by-step for him. I think it is very possible that the next step is his first Major win.

It will depend largely on how well Murray can improve the relative fragility of his mind. It will also depend on the performances of Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer—three of the all-time greats.

It's tough to say for sure how each of them will do in 2012. All three of them have played a lot of tennis in 2011 or are getting "old" for tennis years.

We'll see how it goes. I think Andy can get that elusive first major. He has hurdles to overcome—both within and without, but the possibility is far from remote.