For that matter, Ivan Lendl should obviously be ahead of Djokovic. Maybe someday Djokovic will be ahead, but not quite yet.
I’m intrigued by the fact that virtually all recent Grand Slam titles have been dominated by three guys. In the last six plus years only three men - Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, and Rafael Nadal - have won Slams, with one exception; Juan Martin del Potro, who of course had the week of his life at the US Open in 2009.
I’m not really sure what to make of that. To pick a year at random, say 1985, in the six years starting in 1985, eight different men won titles. In the six years from 1995 to 200, ten men won Slams. Does that means we just happen to be seeing the most dominant tennis trio ever, or is the field not as good as it used to be?
Rod Laver: The only Men’s singles two-time Grand Slam winner (1962&1969),
also the last man to accomplish the feat. Laver would have been a strong candidate
for a third or more GS during the several years ~1963-68 when under the rules
of the time he could not as a professional compete in any GS event.
**Pancho Gonzales: **Toiled as a GS-ineligible pro for something like 20 years.
Until today I always thought he was by acclamation considered top-5 at worst.
I think the list shafted Ivan Lendl a bit (should be close to #10) but it’s pretty good overall. Also entirely possible that Rafa will make it to #2 in his career.
This is my WAG, but I’d imagine that the era of power tennis has come to favor the few who can actually play it really, really well. Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic all can hit very well but most importantly they have the perfect footwork to chase down tough balls and the shot placement to end the point where they need to. It’s so much more difficult nowadays for Brad Gilbert-types who rely on their wits and finesse to topple giants because they hit the ball so damn hard.
I really find it hard to believe that Becker is placed below Lendl, a guy he defeated in three grand slam finals,(1986 Wimbledon,1989 US,1991 Australian).
I disagree with the assessment re Sampras and Fed. Federer won at least 2 and usually 3 grand slams a year from 2003 to 2007 and also in 2008 and when he did not he invariably lost to the winner. Sampras won 2 a year from1993 to 1995 and in 1997. From 1997 to 2001 his only Grand slams were Wimbledon and he had defeats against lower ranked players (he lost to Phila-whats-his-name) at the 1996 Australian Open crashed out early in the 1997 US and 1998 Australian as well as other touranments. On the other hand, Fed almost always lost to the winner.
But you don’t just play a final do you? you also have to win all the games up to that point. For 33 majors in a row he has reached qtr or better. He had a streak of 23 semi finals in a row when the previous best was 10! And that of course means playing the best out there, on all surfaces for 6 years! That, more than anything cements his status as best ever.
But the reverse is also true. Federer would have less, Borg would have less, Sampras would have less…etc. If you are going to play that game then you have to throw Nadal into the mix as well and you end up with him hurting Borg far more than he does Federer (or Sampras for that matter)
And it is fun to do this. But all things considered I think Federer beats Sampras on a hard court and on the old faster grass courts perhaps Sampras edges it. On the new Wimbledon set-up? Federer takes it. He could serve volley almost as well as Sampras should the game require it. I don’t think the same could be said of Sampras and the baseline game.
I actually just learned this fact this morning from a friend who’s a huge tennis geek. It’s a staggering statistic.
I am reminded of the thread “what’s wrong with German soccer?” where someone complains the Germans keep losing finals and semifinals; as I pointed out there, if you’re losing finals and semifinals, there’s nothing wrong. Federer is like that, except unlike the German soccer team, he usually wins. But when he loses it’s never a second round blowout.
As to the argument Sampras was a better grass player, even if that’s true, they still play on other surfaces. Hardcourt and clay count, too. If one were to argue Sampras was the superior grass player I think there is an argument to be made there, but we aren’t just talking about Wimbledon.
Well Federer won their only meeting, at Wimbledon 2001. While Sampras was clearly past his peak then, Fed was at the start of his career and Sampras still had two more Grand Slam finals and 1 title in him.
The virtual death of the dedicated serve-and-volleyer might also have something to do with it. The announcers were pointing out that, on the Wimbledon courts, a serve-and-volleyer benefits from the wear along the service line, but with fewer people actually coming in (and thus relatively pristine service lines) it sets up a negative feedback loop. I’d love to see the powers-that-be dial back the racket technology, but they won’t, just like the golf PTB’s haven’t dialed back club technology and decided instead that the courses had to spend millions of dollars lengthening their courses instead if they wanted to host majors.
Comparing male and female players is so difficult I don’t know where to get started with it, and the sport has changed so much and expanded so much that comparing 1962 to 2012 in tennis is probably like comparing 1921 to 2012 in baseball, or possibly even further back. I do think Federer has established himself as the greatest men’s player. The list of records he’s gained is amazing. The most Grand Slam championships, the most time at #1 including four and a half years uninterrupted, the most Grand Slam finals - 18 out of 19 in a row at one point - and the record for semifinals, the still-active quarterfinal streak. This one gets comparatively little attention, but he’s been in the top five (usually top three or better) for almost 10 years straight. He has just been phenomenally good for a ridiculous period of time.
Federer and Nadal and Djokovic are that dominant. The rest of the field is very good, but the top three have pushed each other to heights that are just crazy. Nadal became one of the best ever to compete with Federer on grass and hardcourts, and Djokovic isn’t in the top 10 all-time yet, but the season he had last year was about as good as Federer and Nadal at their best. The athleticism and versatility of these guys is amazing. It is exhausting to watch Nadal play against Djokovic, particularly on hardcourts.
One thing that I think deserves emphasis in talking about the state of tennis now - and talking up Federer and Nadal and Djokovic by comparison - is the fact that they have both been routinely doing things nobody in tennis had done in decades. Nobody won a career slam between Emerson in 1964 and Agassi in 1999, and then Federer and Nadal finished the job in consecutive years in 2009 and 2010 and Djokovic may do it in the next few years. Mats Wilander won three Slam titles in 1988, before that, no man had done it since Connors in 1974. Sampras never quite did it. Then Federer did it in 2004… and again in 2006… and again in 2007… and then Nadal did it in 2010 and Djokovic did it in 2011. So it happened once in 30 years, and then five times in eight years. I have a feeling people are going to complain that nobody had a great year this year because nobody’s going to win three as if that were the minimum standard for a great season.
The way I compare Sampras and Federer is this: they spent a similar time at number one and their best individual seasons [1994 vs. 2006] were very similar. I do think Federer’s 2006 was a bit better (he managed to win three majors that year), but they’re similar. The difference is that Federer had two more years that were about equal to his best season (2004 and 2005) and Sampras didn’t quite do that. It’s true that Sampras was not good enough on clay to win the French Open, but his results there were not terrible. It’s only in recent years (with the changes in the game, the versatility of the best guys now, and the fact that the surfaces play a bit more alike than they used to) that it seems like a major demerit that he won 14 majors but didn’t win the French. He came close several times and the guys he lost to were very strong clay court players.
If you want to give Sampras some bonus points for playing against better overall competition, I can see the logic. But it’s also true that Federer has remained at or near the top of the game and continued to win majors as Nadal also became an all-time great. Nadal won the French Open for the first time in 2005 and finished the year as the #2 player in the world. Federer won two slams that year. In 2006, Nadal won the French again and stayed #2 and Federer won three more majors. In 2007, same thing, but Nadal was slowly improving off clay (he lost to Federer in the Wimbledon final). In 2008 Nadal made the semis of all four majors, won the French again, beat Federer at Wimbledon, and became the #1 player in the middle of the year. That’s after Federer had been ranked #1 for four and a half years straight. Nadal beat Federer in Australia in 2009, then Federer won the French for the first time and Wimbledon again as Nadal dealt with injuries. So it’s true that Nadal usually beat Federer head to head and he eventually passed him, but Nadal did not immediately blow past Federer. Federer stayed on top longer than that.
I think Sampras never winning the French is more than a few demerits, it takes him out of consideration as the greatest ever. He never even made the final!
Connors didn’t play the French in '74 due to a dispute he was having with the PTA. I think he would have won the calendar grand slam if he had.
My point about Sampras at the French is this: he did pretty well there several years. His losses in the quarterfinals were to Agassi, Courier (the two-time defending champion at that point) and Brugera (who also won the French twice). In the semifinals he lost to Kafelnikov, who won the tournament that year and was a very consistent, very durable player. After that semifinal appearance his results dropped off because clay was his worst surface to begin with. My vote goes to Federer and the fact that Federer won the French Open and is a much better clay court player than Sampras ever was has to count for a lot in Federer’s favor. He’s probably better on hard courts, too. And because there’s more to tennis than four tourmanets, I’ll add this: Federer has 10 career titles on clay and 10 other losses to Nadal in clay court finals; Sampras won 3 titles on clay. My point is only that the style of play and expectations have changed. Federer himself has to get a big chunk of the credit for that, but so do changes in racquets, surfaces, and playing style.
I don’t think that allows you to waive off the massive issue Sampras had with clay. None of the players you mentioned, with the exception of Agassi, can hold a candle to Nadal. Federer would have at least five French open titles but for Nadal. Sampras just couldn’t cut it at the very top in clay. Courrier was a fine player but he wasnt a dominant one Surely he could have adjusted his game? One semi final is simply not good enough. So no, for a player of his calibre he didn’t do that well at the French and not good enough in this sort of discussion. As such, he can’t be considered the greatest tennis player of all time.
I’m not waving anything off. I think Federer is the best and the fact that he is a much better clay court player than Sampras is a big point in his favor in this discussion. I’m saying Sampras’ French Open results were not as bad as people are saying. They do come up far short of Federer’s (one title, four finals, two semis) and their overall clay court records make the difference more obvious: Federer has won more clay court Masters Series titles (six) than Sampras won on clay period (three).
We disagree. His performances were sub par. He couldn’t adapt his game to clay and that’s the real knock against him. Agassi, Borg etc. all managed to. Federer has had the juggernaut of Nadal whereas Sampras has had Jim Courrier. It’s the glaring weakness in his history to never had even made a final. He lost in three sets in his only semi final appearance (and was blown out in the final two sets). Of his three clay court wins, two of the were in prestigious tournaments. So I do think it is as bad as people are saying particularly in this type of conversation.
Put another way, do you think he could beat any one of Federer, Borg, Connors, Wilander, Nadal, Agassi on clay?