1. Federer
2. Laver
3. Nadal
4. Sampras
5. Djokovic
6. Borg
7. Rosewall
8. Lendl
9. McEnroe
10. Connors
An interesting an honest appraisal in the comments section. In wonder how many Nadal fans on this site feel the same:
“Salut Mssr. Federer. As a life-log Nadal fan, you have been my nemesis, my arch enemy, and my secret and very private joy to watch. I have often thought your legacy overrated for numerous reasons. But in the end, not even I can deny what really is obvious. You are the greatest male player to ever lift a racket. This is axiomatic. It is inescapable. And although I think Tignor is utterly bonkers for ranking Rafa behind Laver and has, therefore, very little of my respect, even a blind monkey would understand that you are the best player ever, let alone the Open Era.”
Fedegraphica : A Graphic Biography Of The Genius of Roger Federer
– is a book written by Mark Hodgkinson, a tennis journalist who interviewed tennis legends such as Boris Becker, John McEnroe or Novak Djokovic, as well as the greatest tennis coaches.
Actionable insights
Roger uses the same ball-toss and the same body position regardless of the serve performed. Thus, the opponent never knows what to expect and Federer controls perfectly his gesture.
Two success factors are his independence and his emotions’ control. As a child, Roger made his own decisions. He also learned to master his anger on the tennis court.
Contrary to popular belief, Roger prefers to win by playing bad than to lose by playing well.
In addition, Roger has worked enormously his only weak point, the backhand. He has turned it into a formidable weapon and has developed a very effective sliced backhand to vary his game and to surprise his opponents.
The variety of his game has become his main asset. In the tense moments of the game, the opponent never knows what to expect.
Roger also has a phenomenal mental ability, especially to recover from defeats. He is insanely optimist.
Moving is a crucial aspect of his game that makes him gain time over his opponents.
Many people think that Roger has the perfect body to play tennis. In reality, what counts above all is the match between your body and your playing style.
The way Roger has changed his tennis to preserve his body, his intact will to win and especially his willingness to experiment are the three pillars of his longevity.
The Swiss tennis icon,
who reclaimed the world No 1 ranking after overcoming a serious knee injury and winning his 20th Grand Slam title at the Australian Open last month,
fought off competition from Cristiano Ronaldo and Rafael Nadal to land the Sportsman of the Year award.
Roger Federer’s awards were his fifth and sixth since the Laureus Awards began in 2000, making him the most decorated winner in its history.
Williams, Navratilova, Graf, Big 3, Laver, and Sampras.
As of 2018, if there were a Mount Rushmore-like monument made of the greatest tennis players of the modern game, and I was asked to select the players, these are the 8 individuals I would personally have on that mountain. For every argument somebody tries to make for why any one of these players should be considered all-around “greater” than the other seven, I have an argument for why they should NOT be considered definitively greater than the others. They are all so great for their own reasons unique to them, that I just don’t believe it is at all possible to declare that one of them deserves to be held in a higher regard than the other seven.
I admit that there are a few other players who I would not argue against being on that mountain as well if somebody successfully argued to me on their behalf. In my opinion, those players are Borg, Evert, Connors, King, Emerson, and (as much as I HATE it) Court. However, as of now I just don’t find these players to be quite on the level of the aforementioned Big 8. Players like my personal favorite, Agassi, or McEnroe, are unquestionably all-time greats, however they just aren’t quite on the same level as the others I mentioned because, as in the case of Agassi, they underachieved and didn’t win as many majors as they should have, or in the case of McEnroe, they maybe weren’t great enough on all the surfaces to offset there relatively lower number of majors.
It will always disappoint me that more people don’t choose to discuss the greats of tennis in this way. However, I’m not too naive to know that people are often biased toward their favorite player, often have negative bias toward the rivals of their favorite player, and that the media knows that having consensus GROUP of all-time greats is just not as sexy/profitable/controversial as pushing the narrative that there MUST be one who is “greater” than all the rest… ONE RING TO RULE THEM ALL!
Joe Smith asks the same questions over and over expecting answers whilst ignoring questions put to him about failing to even think of Serena Williams, a woman, as the greatest of all sport ever.
I think that Joe Smith owes all women an apology and by association humankind that look for gender equality for failing to even think that a woman could be the greatest of all sport ever.
Seriously, what’s astonishing is how difficult it is to get *any* Rafa fan on this forum to engage in a reasonable discussion about this topic. Most of them appear to believe that Federer’s achievements count for less because of weaker competition, but few if any are willing to subject that claim to critical scrutiny.
It gets back to my observation that the beliefs of many Rafa fans on this subject have a religious-like fervor to them.
Yeah,and they never seem to remember that Federer has been winning many titles over a 15 year period, while others have come and gone. Cant all be weak era.
No one said it was.
#RIP2008-016
#THASP
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis put Federer in his place where he should be pointing out the weaker competition. Another article I pointed out points to the weaker competition since 2017 as opposed to a change of stick.
We all (unbiased folk) know the weaker competition factor. That is probably the biggest factor, to me, why Federer is not greater than the other 7 players I mention. I do not believe, however, that the weaker competition factor means that Federer is definitively NOT as great as Rafa or Novak or whoever. Because just like I refuse to ignore factors like the weaker competition for Fed, I refuse to ignore factors about why other players aren’t definitively greater than Federer. At some point, I got tired of hair splitting, nit picking, and going in circles trying to decide something so ridiculously subjective that I concluded it just isn’t possible to objectively declare someone as the “greatest”.
I still respect anyone who thinks that Rafa is a greater all-around tennis player than Federer, or that Federer is a greater all-around tennis player than Rafa. I just don’t believe them. And I never will.
On my clay Mount Rushmore? That is a very specific thing we are measuring. In the case of clay, there is CLEARLY one who is a billion times greater than the others. If we are only measuring one single factor, then it’s very simple to decide who is the greatest.
When we ask the question, who is the greatest TENNIS PLAYER of all-time, there are seriously dozens of factors to measure. And the amount of importance that one puts on each of those factors is completely subjective. So when there are endless factors, and everything is so subjective, and all the greatest players are so great for so many different reasons, what is even the point of trying to figure out which player is “greater”? How do we come to an agreement on what makes a player great? How do we come to a definitive agreement on which which of the million factors are the most important? It is just soooo subjective that it becomes splitting hairs.
I believe it is waaaay easier to anoint players as the greatest in each individual factor. Because then there is very little that is subjective. Although in the case of clay, I believe that it is still subjective as to who the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th greatest clay players are. However, with clay there actually truly is one player who is objectively, unquestionably the greatest clay player ever because he is the best at all the different factors we use to measure clay greatness- Roland Garros titles won, clay masters won, win percentage on clay, win percentage in RG finals, winning RG nearly every time he showed up there, who he beat in those RG title runs, etc. Rafa wins all of those factors, so he is OBJECTIVELY the greatest clay court player of all-time, and no one else is even close.
Here’s the important part- the Rafa of the clay goat list DOESN’T exist in the “Greatest Tennis Player of All-Time” list! Nobody has had an overall tennis career that was nearly flawless and objectively so much better than everyone else the way that Rafa was objectively so much better than everyone else on clay.
Maybe I’m just missing the point you were trying to make by asking about clay? Or maybe you weren’t trying to make a point and truly just wanted my opinion on the greatest clay players ever? Help me out here, Joe! 🙂
Well, Kev, as you can see from my post below, I agree with you that the question of overall GOAT isn’t as straightforward. But that’s not because it’s more “subjective.” It’s because it’s just much more obvious: as you say, Rafa is clearly better, by just about any criterion you might want to pick.
But just because a question isn’t as clear doesn’t mean it can’t be sensibly posed. In fact, the very same problems that you alleged plague any attempt to pick one (overall) GOAT arise in any attempt to say who is on Mt. Rushmore and who isn’t.
You say that you wouldn’t object to having Borg, Connors, Evert, even Margaret Court on your list. Maybe Mac and Agassi, too. But why stop there? What about Lendl, Becker, Jim Courier, Stan Smith? Your own words provide the beginning of an answer to this question: “…they underachieved and didn’t win as many majors as they should have, or in the case of McEnroe, they maybe weren’t great enough on all the surfaces to offset there relatively lower number of majors.”
Precisely. Those are objective criteria (winning majors, not winning on all surfaces, and so forth) that can be applied to the question whether, for instance, Federer or another player is greater overall. Again, I agree that the answer won’t be as clear cut as the question of clay GOAT. Nevertheless, it can be sensibly posed, and progress can be made on answering it.
Needless to say, to anoint Federer the GOAT is not to denigrate any other player! Of course they’re all incredible players. I myself play at a very high club level; I know how amazing the level of journeymen on the challenger circuit is, never mind anyone being considered for a GOAT list. By all means, let a thousand tennis flowers bloom.
I really can’t argue much with anything you said, Joe. A big part of this is also that because there are just so many endless factors and definitions of greatness to this debate, I guess it feels disrespectful to the other greats sometimes when we declare that one player’s factors are “better” than another player’s. When it comes down to it, as pertains to your argument, I just believe there is very reasonable doubt when it comes to questioning if Federer is “greater” than everyone else. Enough reasonable doubt that it just makes the most sense to me to declare that he and some others are the greatest players of the modern game. Like I said at the end of my post, I respect that you think he greater than everyone. But you’re also a die-hard fan of his, so of course you’re going to say he’s the greatest! 🙂 Even if deep down you didn’t think he was, you would still probably SAY he was! That’s how it works! To end, I agree with you completely that he is the greatest. I just also think that a few others are too haha!
Well, Kevin, I appreciate that you agree with what I wrote above. I understand what you say here, as well, though I would enter in a partial response: many Federer fans believe it is disrespectful when Rafa fans constantly bring up the allegedly weaker competition that Federer has faced in winning his titles. You evidently don’t think that is disrespectful? I’ll continue that topic in a separate thread.
Regarding my bias as a Federer fan, it might be a lot less than you suppose. First, it is important to see that taking a given stand or position (pro or con) doesn’t, in and of itself, show bias. Second, unlike many Rafa fans here, I don’t back Federer invariably, and I have players than I like more, including Dolgopolov. I rooted very strongly for Agassi in the 2005 USO final, and in general I back older players, something that dates back to seeing Rosewall get crushed by a young Jimmy Connors. These days, I’ll cheer for Diego Schwartzman over just about anyone, certainly Fed.
Actually, a position taken based on subjective opinion is biased.
Amazing.
Joe, you mentioned the Rafa fans but the Djoko fans and many fans of other players also said the same thing about Fed’s weaker competition during 2004-2007; just go to other tennis websites to read the comments by some other fan groups!
I mean if its a truth that competition then was weaker than the era that came after it, we just couldnt kid ourselves by saying no, the competition level was always the same!
And, that doesnt mean that we’re saying Fed isnt a great player, its just that he’s not the Goat as what many Fed fans want to make him to be.
I think you get it wrong, that you think we’re saying that Rafa or Djoko or other greats are > Fed; in fact most of us recognize how great Fed is, but that doesnt mean that he’s definitely the Goat.
Kevin just nailing it now.
Woot!
Kevin I absolutely agree with your answer about subjectivity and GOAT.
In case it wasn’t obvious, my own answer to the clay Mt. Rushmore question:
Someone who said that there was a clay Mt.Rushmore of, say, Vilas, Borg, Wilander, Kuerten, and Nadal would be badly mistaken. To deny that Nadal is the clay GOAT would be, in the words of the above commentator, to be “a blind monkey.” Ditto for Chris Evert on the women’s side.
Now, the question of overall GOAT is obviously not as straightforward. Not even close, because no one has ever dominated tennis the way that Rafa has dominated clay court tennis. But the question is perfectly sensible, and anyone who denies it (as Kevin apparently does) is being disingenuous unless he is also prepared to say the same thing regarding the question who is the greatest player on clay.
It’s not disengenuous, though, because we WOULD be able to objectively declare an all-around goat if it was that obvious! But it’s not. And there really is enough reasons of why it really just isn’t fair to say that Federer is a greater tennis player than, say, Rafa and Novak. At the same time, I would never think that Rafa and Novak are greater than Federer!
I’m just saying that because it is so close if we factor in aaaaaaaall the factors, I just don’t see how it would be fair to declare Federer as definitively greater than the others. Believe me, if I thought it was clear that Federer is the lone GOAT, I would say it!
You seem to think that I’m saying you can’t think Federer is the GOAT. I’m sorry if I mis-typed. I just disagree with you. That’s all.
Thanks Hawks- you know I’m passionate about this stuff. 🙂 I’m definitely not as competitive as you, though haha! You’re like Michael Jordan- you wanna obliterate your opponent, humiliate them. On the other hand, I’m all like, “Aw Joe! I respect you and your arguments! Let’s be friends!” 😂
I don’t suffer close mindedness and one sided absolute thinking forcing one’s opinions upon others very well.
More power to you. It will serve you well.
Kevin, you say:
“We all (unbiased folk) know the weaker competition factor. That is probably the biggest factor, to me, why Federer is not greater than the other 7 players I mention.”
Ok, good. Strength of competition is, of course, an empirical measure. Now I’ll ask you a simple question: how do you measure strength of competition?
You’re right, Joe, I shouldn’t call it “weaker competition”. That really isn’t a fair way to put it. What I mean to say is that I think it helps Rafa and Novak’s case that they beat each other and Fed more in the big tournaments. That isn’t a knock on Fed. The main reason he didn’t have to beat them en route to his major titles nearly as much is because those two guys weren’t even close to their primes when Fed won his first 12 majors. Unlike other people, I don’t see that as a reason to downgrade Fed’s greatness, rather, I see it as an overlooked reason that ADDS to the other two guys’ greatness. Remember, this is not about proving that they are better than Fed (to me)- it’s about proving why they are just as great. But this goes back to what I was trying to say before. Some people might think that Novak having 12 major titles, but having to beat a prime Rafa, and/or Andy, and/or not-prime-but-still-great Fed in every single one of his 12 major wins, could be considered just as good Fed winning 20, but not necessarily having to CONSISTENTLY have to climb as high of a mountain as Novak did. And once again, people use that as a negative toward Fed, and I think that’s bullshit. In that example, it would be a POSITIVE toward Novak. You see what I’m getting at here?
Thanks for making me realize that calling it “weaker competition” wasn’t what I was going for, though…
On the flip side, some people argue that Fed having 8 more majors than Novak (thus far) is enough to offset the argument that Novak had a harder mountain to climb. So how do we decide which side is right on all these kinds of factors? Both achievements in this case are so incredible, I just hate to have to settle for deciding one is just definitively greater than the other achievement.
And we as fans should respect those opinions as opinions, not facts.
Extreme fandom would argue that GOAT is not just opinion and therefore wrong if it contradicts their construct. It becomes threatening to their belief.
Aside: Did you know that flat earthers claim to have followers around the globe?
Well, Kev, I have no problem with the concept “strength of competition.” Absolutely, I think it’s important, especially in very clear cases. For instance, years in which scabs have filled in for professional baseball or football players. In tennis, Evert and other top players skipped the French Open from 1976-78 -when Chrissie was in the midst of her incredible clay winning streak- to play World Team Tennis. The champions from those years were comparative unknowns who perhaps should have an asterisk next to their names.
However, in the context of the debate amongst the big 3 (and especially between Federer and Nadal), strength of competition is much more problematic -again, not in concept, but in application. ELO is the best known empirical measure, and Nadal has a slightly higher peak ELO than Federer (. However, what that shows is by no means agreed upon.
One fact is especially relevant here. Nadal’s peak ELO rating overall relies very heavily on his dominance on clay. In particular, he has scored many important finals victories, at slams and masters, over Federer. He was able to score those victories, of course, only because Federer was able to make it to so many clay court finals. Nadal’s overall ELO would have been lower, had Federer not been so good on clay.
So we face a question: How much weight in a GOAT comparison should we give Nadal’s very slightly peak ELO rating over Federer? (2563 vs. 2558 according to this list):
You seem to think that it is the most important factor in denying the GOAT title to Fed over Rafa. In response, I would make two points:
1. It is very small indeed, not enough to overcome 4 slams, 6 WTF titles, and close to twice as many weeks at #1.
2. A good case can be made that Nadal’s slightly higher ELO says more about Federer’s prowess on clay (consistently less, to be sure, than Nadal’s) than it does about anything else!
But Jeff Sackmann quantifies that Roger is not the defacto GOAT as religion would compel all to believe in his epic ELO analysis entitled “Sorry, Roger: Rafael Nadal is not just the king of clay”:
“Both Mr Federer and Mr Nadal have faced some easy draws and some hard ones—that’s the nature of a sport in which every tournament begins with an empty bracket and a lottery. But the lotteries—and the career trajectories of the strongest members of tennis’s supporting cast—have tended to benefit Mr Federer. The average grand-slam title run requires beating a set of opponents that the typical champion would defeat 23% of the time. Only eight of Mr Federer’s 19 major titles have come against competition more difficult than that. But 13 of Mr Nadal’s 16 championships have required him to confront harder-than-average obstacles. Suddenly, the difference between 19 and 16 isn’t as clear-cut as it initially seemed.
In fact, when we adjust those two numbers for difficulty, the King of Clay ends up with the strongest claim to the throne for the entire kingdom. On average, Mr Nadal’s titles are worth 1.18 majors apiece, while Mr Federer’s work out to 0.98 each. I’ll save you the multiplication: Mr Nadal comes out on top by the narrowest of margins, 18.8 to 18.7. The adjustment gives Mr Djokovic more credit as well, upping his total from 12 to 15.3 and swapping his fourth-place position on the traditional list with Pete Sampras’s third. It’s a promotion Mr Djokovic deserves, as all 12 of his major titles have required him to fight through tougher-than-average draws.”
“As the sport’s greatest rivals continue their quest in 2018, it is important to remember that the Spaniard’s easy draw was an aberration, and that his career record in grand slams is every bit as good as Mr Federer’s.”
Coupled with the JIM Smith’s excellent assessment…
“Much has also been made of Federer’s astonishing improvements late in his career. The switch to a larger racquet that has turned his backhand into a major weapon being chief amongst them. But there is arguably a more significant factor in aiding Federer’s return to the top of the sport. And that is the injuries that all of his major rivals are suffering from. Nadal has withdrawn from or retired during his last six tournaments. Djokovic, Murray and Wawrinka have all been forced to resort to surgery for long-term injury problems.
Without those challengers, it is in many ways unsurprising that Federer is now the dominant force in the game. Before his injury hit 2016 he was playing at a high level, making three Grand Slam finals across the 2014 and 2015 seasons. Only Novak Djokovic was a more regular presence in Major title matches in that period reaching six, and it took the Serb to deny Federer on those three occasions. In essence then what we can see is that Federer’s level in 2017 and 2018 is arguably at a similar level as it was before his injury. The difference is in his opponents.”
“There is no shortage of great players. Federer numbers amongst them. But can he truly be said to rank before them? I think not.”
A succinct response to the undergraduate Jim Smith, who looks about 12 in his photo and has probably never played serious tennis:
“How many world tour finals has nadal won ?
How many weeks at number one has nadal been ?
Please remove all clay court titles and then measure both of their successes.
Please remove all clay court matches and measure the head to head.
Nadal is the greatest clay court player of all time but he’s 14-6 in slams vs Sampras (never mind Federer) when you take away the French Open.
Nadal simply can’t be considered as his record is very heavily weighted towards his clay court success’s.
His injuries are a result of having to play a particular type of game that was always going to leave him injury prone. Thus, he’s injured because of his success and it’s not a case that he’d be more successful if he wasn’t injured.”
One might add: Nadal has never, in some 15 years as a professional, been able to defend a tournament not played on clay. In other words, he has never won a HC or grass title that he won the year before.
Again, Nadal is the greatest ever player on clay, a surface on which approximately 1/4 of professional tennis is played. His unparalleled success on that surface has enabled him to enter the conversation of all time greats, but it obscures the fact that off clay (3/4 of the season), he is much closer to 10th than 1st.
As I’ve said before, I think Djokovic can make the strongest claim regarding strength of competition in the context of a GOAT argument. However, although he is closer to Fed (than Rafa) in weeks @#1 and WTFs, and is ahead in masters 1000s, he is a full 8 slams behind Fed. That puts him at #2 in some people’s books (including mine).
The point can be made more strongly using Murray, who arguably can make a strength of competition case even more effectively than Djokovic, since he’s had to play his entire career against the big 3 in their prime. However, Murray’s 3 slams is so far behind Fed’s 20 (not even getting to weeks @#1 and so forth) that he’s rightly not a part of the conversation.
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis quantified these differences concluding quite effectively that Pederer is not the defacto GOAT.
And Bill Smith easily dismantles the big racquet change as the reason for Ped’s recent success showing that it is due to lack of competition because of injuriies just as the lack of competition during the weak era.
But to fail to mention Serena just goes to show the limited thinking here.
Joe, don’t know what you’re talking about. If you’re talking about HCs, Djoko is only three slams behind Fed, one WTF behind and one masters ahead of Fed! I don’t see where you get 8 slams behind, you seemed confused. Not forgetting Djoko is six years younger and joined the tour at least five years later than Fed.
You talked about Goat, but who says Djoko is Goat? And who are you to talk as if Djoko’s 12 slams weigh > than Sampras 14 or Rafa’s 16?? And your total disregard of Rafa’s same number of masters titles as Djoko’s; though Djoko has five WTFs but Rafa has four more slams!
Sampras has more weeks at number one and five WTF with two more slam titles than Djoko so who says Djoko is > Sampras?
In the context of a GOAT discussion, all slams are relevant, so Novak is 8 slams behind Fed. Even if strength of competition is relevant (which it is), and Novak has played stronger competition overall (arguable), it’s not enough of a difference to overcome 8 slams.
The main point is really this: strength of competition is only *one* factor in the GOAT debate, and certainly not the most important. If you want to seriously take it into account, you have to argue that it has a certain weight in relation to other factors (most obviously, # of slams, weeks at #1, and so forth).
actually tries to do this. It assigns a numerical value to several factors that it considers relevant to the GOAT debate, including ELO, which is the most widely accepted proxy for strength of competition.
As you can see, the list acknowledges that Federer’s peak ELO is below that of both Djokovic and Nadal (in the latter case, only 5 points lower). However, as you can also see, neither of those players is even close to Federer in the overall assessment: he’s well ahead of both of them, overall, and on grass and HC.
If you or anyone else seriously wants to contest that assessment, an obvious first step is to take a look at the list, make an effort to understand its methodology, and then say where it goes wrong.
‘If you or anyone else seriously wants to contest that assessment, an obvious first step is to take a look at the list, make an effort to understand its methodology, and then say where it goes wrong.’
Agree. And the analysis is as objective as someone can be and it includes ELO, which is very good and fair. Now I’m not saying that table depicts perfectly the situation of the best players. It certainly cannot include some subjective factors as: genetics, mentality, hard-work or even scheduling….but it reflects those aspects in numbers. I would definitely be fine if FED was 2nd in that list if that was the case. I’m interested in TRUTH much more than him being 1st.
Of course everyone would have, could have, should have …..if… then maybe. But let’s comment just the pure facts. Nobody can trick the numbers.
Thanks, Eugene. Taking a closer look at the whole thing, it’s obviously anything but a simple slam count, and tries to take into account everything that should be relevant to overall tennis performance.
The thing is, the allocation of points – how one determines how many points given for this or that? That in itself is rather subjective.
I feel that the number of titles won, the type of titles won, the ranking points won during a season, rankings during a season etc adjusted for whatever ELO etc could be used instead but would be rather tedious in calculation. Some players are playing in the tour longer than others too.
I doubt Sampras would rank behind Djoko in the whatever Goat list as 1) Sampras won more slams, 2) he had more weeks at no.1, 3) he had more YE no.1, 4) his competition wasn’t much easier than Djoko’s, 5) he also had 5 WTF (YEC) titles though fewer masters.
Rafa at the moment may be ranked behind those three but if he wins some big titles this season and gets back the top rankings, things will change and he may at least go ahead of both Sampras and Djoko in that list. So, you can see that list is rather meaningless when things can and may change rather quickly.
Another one year or two and that list may see some drastic changes, who knows.
Jeff Sackmann’s analysis of why Federer wasn’t goat makes it plainly obvious and weights the weak era fairly.
Bill Smiths article explains quite effectively that peds lack of competition since 2017 is the main reason for his recent success. As it was during the weak era.
But to ignore Serena without mention and having the audacity to instead leap to a male cricket player is disappointing to say the least.
The GOAT list is published by Ultimate Tennis Statistics, which appears to be the most complete set of tennis statistics available online. You can find some more information here, including their GOAT formula and legend:
Worth noting is that the formula assigns points for “Big Wins,” wins at the end of big tournaments against high-ranked or high-ELO opponents. Looking it over, the formula is totally objective and extremely comprehensive.
The whole project is very sophisticated, obviously not the work of a kid sitting in his basement. In fact, it reads:
“Data on which the statistics is based is from open source tennis data repository by… Jeff Sackmann [!!!!]”
Had to chuckle at that one.
It has an email for questions, as well as a link to Github.
That’s ok joe smith. I chuckle at you all the time.
Jeff Sackmann’s data is simply numerical facts.
It’s like saying that a made for TV movie is “based on” a true story.
The site has a twitter link. The basement dweller has 20 followers.
The site allows anyone to apply weight factors any way they choose to create their very own preconceived personalized GOAT.
In other words, opinion.
But to omit any mention of Serena to look for a goat beyond men’s tennis instead comparing a male cricket player is inherently sexist. I think an apology is in order from you to be quite honest.
Jeff Sackmann’s own ELO analysis makes it more than clear that pederer is not the goat.
And Jim smiths advice of don’t believe the hype regarding the bigger tennis racquet quite clearly shows the most significant reason for pederer’a recent success is lack of competition due to injuries recreating a weak era not unlike the weak era prior to 2008.
And, at least he’s still playing and winning ten years after his detractors were writing him off.His longevity is amazing, not what you’d expect from someone benefitting from a weak era.
Its not unheard of for a new racquet to give players a new lease of life.Vilas,Connors?
Judging by the size of the racket some people are making trying to deny this, there must be some truth in it.
Some interesting “numerical facts” based on ELO, courtesy of the ultimate statistics site, based on Jeff Sackman’s data.
First, as I argued back in December, Nadal’s very slightly higher peak ELO over Federer is almost entirely due to his dominance on clay. The U.S. site allows you to see this, as it customizes ELO by surface. As it turns out, Federer’s peak ELO on HC is over 100 points higher than Nadal’s:
Federer peak HC ELO: 2702 (March 7, 2007)
Nadal’s peak HC ELO: 2588 (Sept. 30, 2013)
Note that Fed’s much higher peak on HC occurs at the end of the so-called “weak-era”! On a hard court, the “weak-era” Federer of early 2007 was considerably better than Nadal at his 2013 best, and would be expected to win approximately 2/3 of the time. It’s hard to believe Sackman missed this obvious point so badly in his slam analysis.
Second, the only higher peak ELO on HC ever recorded is by Djokovic:
Djokovic peak HC ELO: 2706 (Feb. 1, 2016).
Note the date: at the end of Novak’s four slam victories over Fed (3 finals, 1 SF); and during a time when Nadal was far from his best.
Finally, and most interesting, consider the period from 2010-2013. That period captures the years in which both Nadal and Djokovic were supposed to at their best, particularly the period of 2011-12 when they fought so many slam finals. What do we find when we examine their peak HC ELO during this period?
The highest ELO HC rating that *either* player recorded during this four year period was by 2637, by Djokovic on March 4, 2013. (Nadal’s highest, as we have seen, was 2588).
In other the words, the highest ELO rating on HC (2637) by either Nadal or Djokovic at the height of the so-called “strong era” was considerably *lower* that the peak HC ELO that Federer recorded at end of the so-called “weak-era” (2702). Again, that prime version of Fed could be expected to beat either Novak or Rafa of 2010-13. A HC match-up between 2007 Fed and 2016 Novak, meanwhile, would pretty much be a toss-up, at least based on ELO.
Just another nail in the coffin of the weak-era hypothesis.
Ha ha Joe, you’re assuming ‘that’ version of Fed would beat both Rafa and Djoko on the HCs but for how long Fed could play that way???
You just can’t assume that Fed would play that way all the time! It’s a fact that Djoko had to handle both peak Rafa and a Fed who’s still in his prime on the HCs many times and he won most against Rafa and also against Fed during 2011/2012 ( if you want to say that Fed was past his prime after 2012).
Djoko had it hardest on the HCs; Rafa OTOH got to beat Fed and Djoko on clay, and also Stan, all three were FO champions. Rafa also had beaten Albert Costa, Ferrero, Moya and Gaudio on clay, all of whom were former FO champions.
I feel it’s on grass that prime Fed had his upper hand on most if not all players he had played against – Agassi, Hewitt, maybe Rafa (he’s 2-1 vs Rafa on grass) who had at least a Wimbledon title or two. Djoko was 2-1 vs Fed on grass but one could argue that Fed was past his prime during 2014-2015 when he lost to Djoko.
Also, you keep talking about Rafa on clay but what’s wrong with Rafa being overwhelmingly good on clay? It’s as if you’re penalizing Rafa for being head and shoulders over all others on clay!
What you’re trying to prove is that Fed is > than Rafa on grass and HCs whilst Rafa is only better than Fed on clay but so what with that? Clay is also a legitimate surface and makes up close to 40% of the playing surfaces in the tour.
The fact is that Rafa is still good enough on other surfaces in addition to his dominance on clay, that he’s easily the top three or four in that whatever Goat list, playing in the era where two HC Goats exist.
The fight for grass Goat in the open era is between Fed and Sampras, whilst the fight for HC Goat is between Fed and Djoko but both are not done yet and may still have many encounters on the HCs, but time is on Djoko’s side as long as he’s fit and healthy again, he’ll benefit from the ‘weak era’ at the tail end of his career whilst Fed had his during his peak, if we believe in ‘weak era’ hypothesis.
Lucky, you say: “What you’re trying to prove is that Fed is > than Rafa on grass and HCs whilst Rafa is only better than Fed on clay but so what with that?”
That’s not what I’m trying to prove, though I believe (as the GOAT list shows) that Federer is clearly the best player ever on both HC and grass.
My main opponent is the “weak era” defender, who constantly tries to denigrate Federer’s achievements by saying that they occurred during weak era #1 (2004-07) or weak era #2 (2017-18). What I’ve tried to show is that the belief that 2004-07 was a “weak-era” on HC and grass is simply false. Federer’s peak ELO on HC and grass during those years (and his average ELO, as far as I can tell) was higher than *either* Novak or Rafa during their supposed prime years of 2010-13.
That’s all. I agree completely that Nadal is head and shoulders above all others on clay. As I’ve said many times, he’s much better than others on that surface than anyone has ever been on any surface.
Well, Lucky, you have to remember the context: many people (including you, if I’m correct) discount Federer’s slam titles won during 2004-07 because they say it was a “weak era”.
Now, the best known and most widely-used measure for strength of competition is ELO. The problem for the “weak era” hypothesis is that Fed’s peak HC ELO from 2007 (2702) is higher than the peak HC ELO (2637) of *either* Nadal or Djokovic at any point between 2010-2103. On grass, the difference is much more pronounced: Federer’s peak grass ELO during 2007 (2626) is some 250 points higher than either Nadal or Novak’s peak grass ELO (2380 for Nadal) from 2010-2013.
In short, on HC and grass -3/4 of the tennis season- Fed’s non-clay wins during the “weak era” were, according to the standard ELO formula, *more* impressive than Nadal and Novak’s non-clay wins between 2010-13.
To be fair, both Fed and Nadal’s current ELO are off their peak. The strength of competition is indeed lower since Djokovic tailed off dramatically from his peak in the 2nd half of 2016, as one would expect. But if there’s any justification for calling this a “2nd weak era,” then the first one was between 2010-13, not 2004-07, at least off clay.
Of course, all of what I’ve just is based on the numerical formula known as ELO. I wouldn’t necessarily put money on peak 2007 Fed beating peak 2013 Nadal 2/3 of the time on HC; that’s just what the ELO numbers predict.
What it does show is that the burden is squarely on the shoulders of any “weak-era” advocate to say why 2004-07 should count as a “weak-era” for HC and grass.
Incidentally, you say that clay makes up 40% of the surfaces on which tennis is played. I have no idea whether that’s true, but it’s a far larger percentage than the top players actually play on clay. In practice, clay makes up roughly 1/4 of the tennis season for most top players.
Take Nadal, who can be expected to play as much as possible on clay for a top player. Last year, he played 18 tournaments, 5 of which were on clay, for a percentage of 27.7%. That’s very much on the high end; other top players played a lower percentage, and of course Fed played no clay tournaments last year.
Look at Thiem, a top ten player, he certainly played more on clay – the clay golden swing in Feb, the main clay season in April/early June, and there’s a possibility of him playing on clay during July, on clay in Europe, if he doesnt do well to defend his points on clay during April-early June.
Alex Zverev may also play at Hamburg his home event. When Ferrer was top ten, he used to play the Feb clay golden swing and also the July European clay season in addition to the main clay season from April to early June.
It all depends on the strength each player has, whether hes best on whatever surface, chances of him playing more on his better surface > on other surfaces.
Fed played at Istanbul when he skipped MC one year; he also played at Hamburg and Bstaad in 2013. Even Cilic played at BA or Rio this year!
Davydenko, when hes a top ten player, used to play on clay after Wimbledon. Gasquet, Simon too when theyre in top ten. There’re no shortage of players playing many events on clay.
Both played a lower percentage of clay tournaments than Nadal in 2017.
What are you talking about? Thiem didn’t play 21 events on HC in 2017! Where DID you get that 21? He played at best 14 on the HCs, vs 7 on clay and 2 on grass, ie 60%, 30% and 10% respectively.
You can’t deny that the others that I mentioned, like Ferrer or Davy when they were top ten, did play very often on clay, in Ferrer’s case as high as 8 or even 9 events a season.
Also there’re many events played on clay, up to 40% of the tour events are played on clay! Rafa on his comeback trail in 2013, played 7 events on clay, 1 on grass and 8 on HCs; not forgetting Rafa’s own 2005 where he played 10 events on clay out of 21 events played.
It’s all possible to play the FO, 3 clay Masters, 2 clay 500s and 4 clay 250s and Wimbledon, and 5 HC Masters plus the 2 HC slams during a season to make up 18 countable events ( when one gets exemption from playing all mandatory masters events). Though that may be an extreme case, there’s the possibility!
One of his clay tournaments I counted wasn’t ATP but ITF. But yes, Thiem played 21 HC tournaments last year.
Sorry, Thiem played 21 non-clay tournaments last year. My claim was that top players tended to play 1/4 or less on clay.
Rafa does not play “as much as possible on clay”. He plays the 3 pre RG clay masters and Barcelona. In 2013 he played 3 clay tournaments in February for his “comeback”. He tried playing a couple from the Golden Swing in 2014 and 2015 but he wasn’t that happy with those tournaments, mainly because of the high humidity in SA that time of year, I think. You’re better off looking at some of the other Spanish or Argentinian players if you want someone who plays on clay “as much as possible”. Cuevas might be a good example too.
Yep, Rafa played five events on clay last year, it’s just that he didn’t play as many HC and grass court events as Thiem did so his % of events played on clay was > Thiem’s.
I was just quoting an extreme case of a player who could play as much as 8 or 9 events on clay, Ferrer was a good example during his heydays.
You didn’t read carefully, Ramara. I said: “Take Nadal, who can be expected to play as much as possible on clay for a top player.”
Of those currently in the top 10, no one played a higher percentage of clay tournaments last year than Nadal did.
homophobe joe smith
Nope, I counted, Thiem played 15 HC events in 2017 (not 14) – 2 HC slams, 6 HC Masters, 1 WTF, Doha, Acapulco, Washington, Chengdu, Tokyo and Vienna – definitely not 21!
I don’t know where you get that from!
Ok I made a mistake, it should be 18 when he played at Brisbane and Sydney (Doha was in 2018) and played Sofia and Rotterdam instead of BA and Rio, so he played 18 events on clay in 2017, not 21.
In 2018, he shifted his focus back to clay and so he played at BA and Rio, just like in 2016.
You still haven’t got it right! Thiem played 18 HC tournaments in 2017, plus 3 grass, for 21 non-clay (compared to 7 clay), for 25% clay, just as I said.
Re: my post of 5.04am, it should read ‘so he played 18 events on HCs, not 21’.
Also, you brought out the ELO at early 2007 but thats just one particular ELO when Fed scored higher than Djoko or Rafa, but that didnt prove that Fed had it tougher than Djoko, if Fed’s ELO during 2004-2006 and the rest of 2007 were < Djoko's.
Fed even lost to young Djoko on HCs in 2007, at Montreal final. Fed lost twice to Nalby too in two HC masters at Madrid and Paris, but Nalby wasnt any slam holder, a top tenner perhaps.
The Ultimate Statistics site doesn’t provide ELO averages, but it allows you to draw a customized chart for a given time period. If you draw the HC chart for Fed from 2004-07, and compare it to the HC chart for Rafa and Novak from 2010-2013, two things stand out:
1. Federer is clearly better than Nadal for almost the entire relevant periods. Fed’s lowest HC ELO (Jan 1, 2004) is 2372, and Nadal HC ELO was below that for the large majority of 2010-13 (Nadal’s peak of 2588 i Sept. 2013 was very short-lived).
2. Though not as large as the contrast with Nadal, 2004-07 Federer is still clearly better, on average ELO, than 2010-13 Djokovic. You can check the chart out yourself to see. Again, the relevant differences on grass are even larger.
It’s only the 2015-16 world-beating Novak that compares to Fed in his prime on HC (again, Fed on grass is clearly better than even 2015-16 Novak on grass). Comparing Djokovic HC ELO from September 2015-2016 against Federer HC ELO from March 2006-07, they both range roughly between 2600 and 2700, though Fed starts from a slightly higher base and doesn’t quite reach Novak’s peak. It’s almost impossible to tell which is better on average, though to my eye it looks like Federer comes out slightly ahead. Someone who cared enough to do the calculation week-by-week could say for sure.
Again, ELO is only one measure, but it’s the most widely accepted and objective measure out there for gauging strength of competition. And the numerical facts clearly show that on HC and grass, 2004-07 Federer had a higher ELO, both peak and on average, than either 2010 Nadal or Djokovic.
Again, the burden is on the “weak-era” defender to show how, in the face of these facts, 2004-07 was a weak era.
You use 2010-2013 for Djoko? Shouldn’t you use 2011-2014 or 2015 on the HCs? And you used 2015-2016 for Djoko on grass? Why not 2014-2015?
Fed may have a higher ELO on grass but I doubt if you compare objectively and not pick and choose periods that favor your pro Fed bias, that Djoko is any worse off than Fed if not better or the same.
And why not include 2009 on the HCs for Rafa, since he missed at least two HC slams from 2012 to 2013? Rafa was playing very well early part of 2009 before injury struck him; and imo he’s at his physically peak during 2008/2009 but too bad he’s down with injuries.
Lucky, please read this sentence again carefully:
“Again, the burden is on the “weak-era” defender to show how, in the face of these facts, 2004-07 was a weak era.”
I would love to see you try to engage with that claim. Say something about it!
Of course we can both pick and choose our time-frame. But since 2004-07 is the four year period in which Federer won the majority of his slams, it makes sense to compare it to another 4 year period. 2010-13 is a natural one because it includes the period when Nadal and Djokovic were thought to be in their prime and fought their hardest battles. I would say it has the best claim to being the “strong era” that people have in mind in contrast to the “weak era” of 2004-07.
But by all means, you can choose another period if you like, and you can read the chart as well as I can.
Novak’s best period on HC in terms of ELO spans from roughly April 2011, when it peaked at 2568, to Feb. 2016, when it peaked at 2706. In between there were a few peaks and valleys, as you’d expect, but it never dipped below 2422. That is indeed impressive, but not much different from Fed’s HC ELO between 2004 and 2007.
Again, I hate to keep having to say this: it is not my intention to denigrate any other player or his accomplishments. I do not claim that 2004-07 Fed was clearly better than Novak at his HC best. But the common belief that Fed’s HC and grass wins during 2004-07 were worth less is simply false.
Nadal’s peak HC ELO in 2009 was 2443 (March 23). That is lower than Federer’s HC ELO for virtually the entire period of 2004-07 (only a few months at the beginning of that period was Fed’s ELO lower).
Joe, when did I say Rafa’s HC ELO peaked in 2009? I said he’s at his physical peak but too bad injury struck, and his season ended not too well. His HC ELO during Feb to Aug that year in 2009 wasn’t that far off vs Fed’s Feb to Aug 2004, maybe for the full year to Dec too, bearing in mind that Rafa came back from injury to play the USHC swing in August hence his ELO dropped as he was losing every HC event played since, right up till the USO2010 which he won.
Rafa only played four events on HC in 2012 as he was having his six months break due to injury. He missed the AO in 2013 and only played at IW and won, hence his ELO went up a little bit in March after winning IW.
Rafa had ELO ratings above 2500 from Aug 2013 to Jan 2014 (with 4 Nov 2013 being the lowest in that period when it went down to 2496), and that was better than most of Fed’s 2004 through early 2005; and only slightly below Fed’s from Mar to Aug 2005. It was from Sept 2005 onwards that Fed reached his peak performance on the HCs when his ELO ratings went above 2600 for the entire period up till July/Aug 2007 peaking at Mar 2007 at 2702.
Actually Rafa and Djoko did not have many battles during 2010; 2010 was a relatively poor year for Djoko when he suffered from his breathing problem and had to skip a clay Masters and did poorly in the other clay events. They had only met twice in 2010 on the HCs, Rafa won both.
It’s during 2011 that they had their battles and Djoko won all their encounters. Djoko had his back issues after their USO epic final, hence we could see his ELO went up to 2601 in Sept after winning the USO that year but was down to 2400+ in Nov when he came back from injury and started losing matches on the HCs.
They had met only once on the HC in 2012, ie that epic AO final. I can’t say that match didn’t affect both of them, for Rafa had to skip a 500 event in Feb which he’s originally scheduled to play, and he had to withdraw from playing the Miami SF (vs Murray) due to injury. Djoko lost in SF at Dubai (which he won the previous year) to Murray and lost in SF at IW to Isner if Im not wrong (which Djoko was also the defending champion). Djoko’s HC ELO went below 2500 after a brief surge in Feb 2012 for winning the AO and its until Oct that year that it went up above 2500 when he started winning at Beijing, Shanghai and WTF.
They did have battles during 2013 and were 2-2 on the HCs and so we saw their ELO moved up to above 2500. Djoko also had battles vs Murray, who by then was already a slam winner so I supposed that added a bit of weight to Djoko’s ELO when he beat Murray at the AO. It’s until Sep in 2014 that Djoko’s ELO dropped to 2478 after losing in the SF of the USO, but after that Djoko started winning his many HC titles – Beijing, Paris and WTF in 2014 and his another 8 HC titles in 2015, hence his ELO stayed consistently above 2500 and from April 2015 stayed at above 2600 and peaked twice at 2706 (Feb 1 and Aug 8 2016) with a rare dip to 2547 on Aug 23, 2015.
Djoko’s highest ELO > Fed’s and Djoko had to fight against ( and sometimes lost to) big four guys Rafa (2013), Murray and Fed (2015 especially) when they’re ranked in top 2 or 3 and they’re multiple slam winners and two of them fellow ATGs. I suppose losing to a fellow ATG certainly won’t help in the ELO ratings compared to winning against one!
Ok, Lucky, so tell me: how does what you just said support 2004-07 being a weak-era on HC? Fed’s average HC and grass ELO during that period is still higher than Nadal’s average during any 4 year period.
One thing I noticed, all three of them seemed to peak on the HCs at or around mid to late 20s – Fed peaked during 2006/2007 ie when he’s 25-26; Rafa peaked during 2013 when he turned 27; Djoko started peaking in 2015 when he’s 28 going on 29.
Joe, isn’t that simple, that Rafa had to battle against three other fellow big four guys and he’s not the best guy on the HCs?
Fed’s HC results from 2009-2012 weren’t as great as his 2004-2007 too despite him playing close to his 2004-2007 level for most of the period.
It seems to me that you’re evading the question: how does what you’ve said support 2004-07 being a weak era on HC?
I agree that nothing is that simple, but that should incline you away from, not toward, the “weak-era” hypothesis. That Rafa had to battle 3 of the other big four is common to all of them, but at any rate the ELO takes that into account.
I also agree that all three peaked in their mid-late 20s, which is the prime for most players. Fed’s decline *began* in 2010, which is not to say that he wasn’t capable of playing great tennis after that. But his (small racquet) best was between 2004 and 07.
Joe, I asked that question, would losing a match vs fellow big four increase one’s ELO > winning a match against them? Now if Djoko for example won all his matches vs the big four, his ELO would certainly be much higher than when he had to lose some to them I believe.
I would say Djoko wasn’t as dominant during 2011-2015/2016 compared to Fed during 2004-2007.
No question that winning matches against top competition raises your ELO much more than losing against them. And Novak lost a lot of matches (but won even more) against the other members of the big four between 2011-16.
I certainly agree that Novak wasn’t as dominant during that period as Fed was between 2004-07, but despite that, he has a higher overall ELO. The reason, again, is mostly due to his better record on clay.
Using this factor (clay performance), one could certainly argue that Djokovic faced superior competition overall from 2011-2016. On the numbers I think he did, though it is hard to ignore that for the last two years of that period (when Djokovic’s clay ELO was highest), Nadal was far from his best.
Anyone who failed to think of Serena and continued with strawman arguments doesn’t deserve thoughtful debate.
Sackmann and Jim Smith said it best.
Pederer is no goat because of the weak era and the racquet is a ruse. All comes down to lack of competition.
Joe Smith doesn’t get it. Owes everyone particularly Serena a big apology neglecting even a mention instead comparing ped to a male cricket player for goat of all sport.
Keep it up joe smith. It’s obvious your mouth is big enough for your other foot. Just a matter of time.
The idea that not mentioning Serena is some sort of problem is rubbish. There are probably 100 sportspeople who could be considered for something like ‘best sportsperson/athlete of all time’, it’s such a difficult thing to assess, and you’re inevitably not going to mention most of them. There are some people who still rate Graf and Court higher than Serena anyway, just as there are people who rank Nadal or Laver over Federer.
And it’s not unreasonable to mention Bradman before many others. As wiki notes, ‘Bradman’s career Test batting average of 99.94 is often cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport’. I recall once reading some poll of sports fans from around the world in which, after seeing the stats, fans rated Bradman as one of the very best. Basically it’s not at all unusual for him to be mentioned in this sort of conversation. Personally I’d say there are a few decent arguments you can make against him being even the best *cricketer* of all time, but that’s neither here nor there.
P.S. You might also want to ask Johnny McEnroe for an apology too while you’re at it, have a listen to his response to the question ‘why not call Serena the greatest tennis player of all time’.
When addressing the argument(s) proves too difficult, play the person instead and bring up irrelevant stuff for distractions. Everyone will buy into this excellent strategy which is not at all obvious.
Btw pretty sure Bowie, if he was alive and reading tennis forums, wouldn’t have any problem with what I wrote. But I doubt he’d be interested at all. I am a Bowie fan, but that has no relevance to what I’ve said either way.
You are not a bowie fan to be so male-centric. Like Joe Smith.
Say something intelligent for a change before you expect the same in return – no point arguing with someone like you and joe smith with preformed conclusions repeating the same old shite over and over (so you get the same in return and can’t understand it).
Once a fan has cast their allegiance, they’re not open to changing their mind about anything that could detract from the team/player that they back. Arguments are refuted with cherry-picked out of context half-facts or simply false statements (including strawman arguments) that reinforce their preformed conclusions. The guy who says “spot on” to your comments calls me a “dickhead” with a “sore butt”. That’s hypocritical.
It’s not “difficult” arguing with you or Joe – it’s simply pointless. You and Joe are not open to intelligent discussion. I’ll prove it.
Yes others DO rank players differently based on opinion, but they DO at least compare them. Joe Smith didn’t even THINK to consider a woman as best athlete. THAT’s my point.
You have presented no evidence that I’m male-centric whatsoever. I never said there was anything wrong with mentioning Serena. There is in fact a good basis FOR mentioning her. All I said was that you can’t reasonably conclude that it’s unfair not to mention ANY given sportsperson in an argument about the best sportsperson of all time. That’s just an absurd assertion without any logical basis, no matter if it’s Serena, Graff, Court, Ali or Michael Phelps.
“like you and joe smith with preformed conclusions repeating the same old shite over and over”
I didn’t repeat any arguments in that post.
“(so you get the same in return and can’t understand it)”
That would just be hypocritical anyway. Tempting as that might be, if you think some of us Federer fans are just posting trash, try *not* posting trash and lead by example. Most Rafa fans on here do just that. Because one can’t criticise people for posting garbage if they’re going to then proceed to do the same, that would just be hypocritical.
“Once a fan has cast their allegiance, they’re not open to changing their mind about anything that could detract from the team/player that they back. ”
Maybe for some. Personally I can admit I have biases and that my view is subjective, like virtually everyone else. I can and have conceded certain arguments with Rafa/Djokovic fans on many occasions. See e.g. recent debates with Luckystar and other reasonably minded, honest posters on here.
“Yes others DO rank players differently based on opinion, but they DO at least compare them. Joe Smith didn’t even THINK to consider a woman as best athlete. THAT’s my point.”
He mentioned barely a few names off-hand in a discussion, not mentioning someone isn’t actually proof of *anything*, as I’ve already said. If that makes you suspicious of sexism, maybe just ask Joe Smith ‘How do you consider Serena/Graff in the context of the greatest tennis player debate?’
I’ve read The Guardian article before. I do think it’s a fairly compelling case, although of course it is just that, one side of a case, and a pretty good one could probably be made for Graff too, for instance.
“Oh, and GOAT is opinion, not fact. There is no right or wrong. Get over it.”
I never said that it was, you’re creating an argument that I’ve never made. A ‘straw man’, some might say. I’ve never been big on ‘GOAT’ assertions’ and have previously noted the many difficulties in trying to make like-for-like comparisons between eras before.
P.S. Hope this post doesn’t contain too many words. I know it’s a lot, but sometimes when you try and address arguments you necessarily end up using quite a few words.
You still evade my point and make excuses because of selective confirmatory bias on both counts regarding sexism through omission, confirmatory bias preventing open organic debate among factions, and continuing insults all the whole continuing to prove my points.
You are not a Bowie fan nor are you open to anything but stale rigid viewpoints.
And you accuse me of making it personal to which joe agrees yet no comment from you when joe smith does much worse
Joe Smith’s attempt at humour directed at me in the link above through innuendo is an insinuation that I want to digitally penetrate big al. He’s repeatedly referred to me having a sore behind and referred to me as a “d***head”
How is that for a tennis argument.
But no comment from the Bowie fan when he does that all because of who we back as tennis players. Again, you prove my point.
The majority of posters on sports or political forums are there to bash the other side refusing to budge from their position instead repeating tired cherry picked statements qualified with insults.
Fans like lucky, vr, rc, Mira andi, Benny, Kevin and Eugene are among the too few exceptions.
What point specifically is being evaded?
No excuses need to be made, because as per my above post, there’s nothing unreasonable in not mentioning any one given player. Ironically, you didn’t even address those arguments, yet are complaining that I’ve evaded points. But amusingly, when people address every little point they get told ‘your posts are too long’.
“Selective confirmatory bias on both counts regarding sexism through omission, confirmatory bias preventing open organic debate among factions, and continuing insults all the whole continuing to prove my points.”
For any of these things to be actual arguments you have to back them up with evidence, i.e. what I’ve said. Otherwise it’s just a wiki list of cognitive biases. Where are the continuing insults?
“You are not a Bowie fan nor are you open to anything but stale rigid viewpoints.”
Another baseless assertion, you have know way of knowing whether I or any other random person on here is a Bowie fan. Of course, it doesn’t have one ounce of relevance anyway, hence the focus on it & the avoidance of actual arguments/substance.
I didn’t accuse you of making it personal. Where in my post did I say that/words to that effect?
There goes that ‘argument’.
And yeah, I’d agree that insults shouldn’t be hurled, and that people shouldn’t call others dickheads, even if, for example, they may feel another poster is attempting to make arguments personal.
Could only get through the first third of your post.
More of the same proving all of my points.
Been there. Done that.
Someone who’s so obviously not a Bowie fan is not worth the effort of open discussion.
THASP. Nadal is the obvious GOAT. Weak Era all over again. Yada yada yada.
For your points to be proven you’d actually have to, well, posit some.
More trolling about David Bowie, great stuff. Funny how this recent run of wins for Federer seems to be resulting in a few certain tennis fans baiting Fed supporters. Incessant, repeated insult posts popping up on the Roger Federer page and all. Fed is on PEDs (evidence – we don’t need no stinkin’ evidence), it’s the Weak era again, it’s the rigged tournaments, it’s the favoritism, it’s [insert straw you’d like to clutch at here]. Hell, maybe it’s all of them combined, yes, that makes sense! Funny then, if it’s all true, that it should cause such consternation & mental gymnastics.
Ah well, I’m sure it’ll all be okay in the end. Just remember to rock back and forth and repeat ‘Nadal is the GOAT, Nadal is the GOAT’. If you chant it enough times, it might just be true. If you’re really feeling insecure, sorry, confident, try a ‘Sampras was definitely better too’.
TLDR for brevity’s sake –
#MoreSaltThantheAegean
Why should I repost what I already posted? By refuting them, you’ve already admitted I’ve posted some. Now you say I haven’t. Proving my point again.
No, not baiting Fed supporters because of Fed’s success. Joe Smith’s first post here about a year or so ago was admitting his stated goal of stirring things up because posters here were too polite. Ironically, more often than not, you seem to appear here when the crap starts to fly, and rarely to discuss tennis.
And all the other shite is simply reflecting crap same old same old. It’s called cheap effortless parody because it’s all that is deserved in most cases – again, my point. OTOH, I’ve had great discussions with the posters I’ve mentioned above fedfans and rafans alike without the tired echo chamber crap you’ve mentioned.
And when it’s repetitious with nothing new, yes, brevity beats quantity every time hands down.
Hawks, thinwhiteduke said “posit” not “post.” Just letting u know
Which I’ve already done BG. But thanks.
You haven’t posited anything though. As soon as I responded to the Serena topic, you start talking about Bowie instead of sticking to the arguments.
The baiting is all over the Roger Federer pages, among others. Posts with brevity but zero substance, repeated ad nauseam – ‘Pederer, #Reusable’. The same hashtags, the same evidence-free claims. Not constructive, and not actually talking tennis, just bait.
The reasonable Rafa fans (of which there are many here) don’t bother with this tit for tat garbage, they are not hypocritical. They know how unfair the doping accusations against Rafa were, and they’re not going to post the same bs about Fed just because Fed (or Djokovic) fans posted it about Rafa. Parody? If it were parody it might be original, constructive, clever, or witty, for a start. Instead it’s just the same crap but from the opposite direction, no point pretending otherwise.
Exactly. Bad parody is all you deserve.
You either intentionally miss the point on Serena or you’re not very bright. I suspect the former but either way, your dime a dozen approach doesn’t warrant thoughtful response because experience shows it falls on deaf rigid selective bias filtering.
There’s no point unless it’s just to raise ire as Joe Smith admitted when he started posting here was his objective.
You disappear and only seem to reappear when something bothers you so you fall into the same category. You and joe smith are not here to discuss tennis. You’re here to “stir things up” in the homophobe’s own words. Admit it.
I must ‘not [be] very bright’, cause I’m not sure what point I’m missing re: Joe Smith and not mentioning Serena Williams. There are probably dozens of other athletes who could’ve been mentioned, not mentioning *anyone* in one off-hand post demonstrates zilch. I don’t think Joe Smith mentioned Steffi Graf either, maybe he has a prejudice against female German athletes. Didn’t mention Joe Frazier? Must have a prejudice against black athletes. The whole point is so obviously arguments ad absurdum, as I indicated. Yeah, we’re on a tennis forum, and anyone could mention Serena Williams and make a case for her being the sports ‘GOAT’, but it’s not some grievous oversight or injustice that Don Bradman gets mentioned and she happens not to, it’s just listing a few possible candidates, nothing more. I doubt you’d even bother to take another poster to task over all this, except for the fact that it’s a Fed fan you don’t like.
I have no interest in raising ire or ‘stirring things up’. As pretty much all my posts to other posters show, I’m here to discuss/debate tennis. I don’t go around making inflammatory remarks like ‘Pederer’, accuse people of biases without backing it up, or incessantly state ‘[insert poster here] doesn’t get it’ because I think they’re making a bad argument. To me there’s nothing interesting about that.
Then you are sexist.
“…as pretty much…” Is a Greudian slip.
‘Then you are sexist’
Another evidence-free personal sledge, ho-hum. When you can’t cope with arguments, attack the commentator.
“as pretty much is a Greudian slip”
It’s not even a slip at all though, it’s an explicit and *deliberate* acknowledgment that like most users on here, I’ve occasionally made off-topic/non-tennis related posts.
The evidence is plain to see unless you are sexist.
Educate yourself.
And no, that most of your posts here are about tennis is a revisionionistic fabrication (a lie).
You have a misunderstanding of the word occasionally.
“The evidence is plain to see unless you are sexist.”
In other words, you have no argument(s). Great.
“And no, that most of your posts here are about tennis is a revisionionistic fabrication (a lie).”
If you (or anyone else) actually look at my posting history you’ll see that’s factually incorrect. It’s almost all tennis discussion, except for this exchange, obviously, because you refuse to address the subject here despite all my attempts. I don’t go around posting rubbish like ‘#Pederer’ ‘[insert poster here] doesn’t get it’ ‘Nothing new from Fed fawns’ again and again. Happy to leave that stuff to the ‘fans’ who want to play tit for tat.
Since you don’t appear to have any interest in addressing substantive arguments at this time, I’m done with this exchange.
Yes. I’ve posted them already. Not here to spoon feed you.
Get over yourself.
“Except for this exchange”
Another revisionististic fabrication.
There have been several other altercations.
TWD, I’m sure you can see that you’re spinning your wheels trying to have a rational conversation with hawkeye. He’s temperamentally and probably intellectually incapable of it. Despite what he says, it really is too hard for him.
What I really liked was your suggestion that he lead by example (of civil behaviour). It’ll never happen, of course, but the idea applies to all of us and it’s good to be reminded of it. Actually, this whole forum is remarkably civil except for Hawkeye. I’ve off-handedly insulted him a couple of times out of pure exasperation, but 99.9% of my posts are straightforward tennis analysis/opinion and non-personal.
homophobe sexist hypocritical joe smith is just in his own words here to “stir things up” as he also does with personal attacks on other poster here :
Rather subjective to say that the Sampras era wasn’t weak
As is this whole debate,players can only play who’s there,no reason to take away from their achievements.
I don’t agree at all that Sampras had to face any stiffer competition at Wimby than Federer ever did… I would say Roddick and Goran are equals in terms of how good they were on grass. The only reason Roddick never won it was because he never got that 4th chance in a Final to face a player he could actually beat, just like Goran got when he got Rafter in the final instead of Pete again.
Then there was Agassi who Pete had to face twice there, but Pete was just a million times better than Agassi on grass. I’d say the equivalent to that for Fed was Rafa, who you consider the GOAT. Fed had to beat him twice for the title.
Fed also beat Novak and Murray for another title. Sampras did have to to beat Becker, although he was passed his prime, but I will give you that one because Becker is an all-time great.
This is an extremely close and subjective comparison. I agree that you could choose Sampras as having faced a little more competition on grass, but there is no question that you could argue just as easily that Federer had it harder on grass. Let’s not pretend like it’s just night and day between the two at Wimbledon…
Roddick didn’t win Wimbledon because he really was not a top level player, even on grass, despite playing that one great match in 2009. As soon as the so-called “weak era” ended Roddick sank into the bottom of the Top 10, where he stayed quite consistently.
Roger’s been lucky – and unlucky – lucky to play much of his tennis against players who simply weren’t as good as he is, and unlucky to have to play against younger players who are, at their best, quite simply better than he is. But it all counts, and to paraphrase Rafa: Roger’s got the records but Novak reached a higher level. In short, longevity counts, health counts, consistency counts, and luck counts. But is there a GOAT? Baaaahhhhh
GOAT is based on results. All else is subjective opinion. And “weak-era” is unsupported by ELO.
FWIW, the highest level of tennis I’ve ever witnessed (live and several times since), is McEnroe’s annihilation of Connors in the 1984 wimby final. He was using a graphite racquet by then, and imo would been competitive and quite possibly beaten any player since, including Federer, Sampras, or Djokovic at their best on grass.
In the entire 3 set match (6-1, 6-1, 6-2), McEnroe hit 10 aces, no DF, a gazillion winners, and only 3 enforced errors. It was an insane performance.
Joe Smith doesn’t understand that GOAT is based on subjective interpretation of facts to form an opinion.
But he doesn’t get that the best athlete in the world doesn’t have to be male.
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis quantitatively proves that pederer is not the defacto GOAT and Jim Smith provides a strong argument that says don’t believe the hype explaining that injuries severely weakened ped’s competition back to Weak Era levels and the racquet is a ruse to cover for that and possible use of PEDs by the only player in top 10 north of 32 winning just about everything.
But it bears mention again, to dismiss Serena without mention says a lot about the stale thinking from a certain claimed fan of tennis.
This is the tricky part about arguing what-ifs. Just like we have to recognize that the other 2 GOATS weren’t at their primes pre-2008, we also have to be fair and recognize that Federer just was not the same player after 2007. Rafa really hit his prime, and Novak won his first major as well as the WTF, but Federer was clearly not the same. I don’t deny that having mono or whatever was a factor, but I think it’s just that most players have their absolute peak, and then they start to fall off. 5 to 6 years is typically how long a players absolute prime, at least physically speaking, lasts. That’s the age difference between Federer and Rafa/Novak. We can argue until the cows come home who we think would have won had 2005/2006 Federer, 2008 Rafa, and 2011/2015 Novak played Wimbledon at the same time, or if 2005/2006 Fed, 2010/2013 Rafa, and 2011/2015 Novak played at the US Open at the same time, etc. But there’s just no way to measure this, especially when the game was so different even just between when Fed was in his prime and when Rafa/Novak were in their primes. It’s another reason of a million why the idea of one of these guys somehow being considered objectively “better” than the other two is just so proposterous to me…
Rafa could rarely play at his best all year ,he was either injured or simply tired.
But,that’s a result of the type of game he played/plays,no need to blame anyone else.Like saying it was because of Djoko that he was injured in 2009,thus making it easy for Fed.
You have to take into consideration Rafa’s congenital foot issue to start with. Don’t blame his injuries on the type of game he played; Djoko played a similar game and wasn’t that injury prone. It’s more to do with poor scheduling – Rafa just stick to playing a full schedule almost always even though he’s given exemption to skip some; Djoko in some seasons played only 15 or 16 events.
Rafa also tends to grind on clay even when he’s good enough to play a more aggressive game to beat his opponents more quickly. Given that he’s so successful on clay that means he plays more matches on clay than most of the other guys, he’s bound to feel the physical strain more than the other players who played fewer matches on clay.
He’s one who prefers to rally than to serve big to finish points quickly so he’s doing more harm to himself when he’s playing on the HCs which he said it’s more damaging to the joints.
Rafa has always scheduled a normal number events. The narrative “Rafa’s poor scheduling” has been a product of Fedfans’ propaganda machine. Rafa fans shouldn’t let themselves be influenced by Fedfans’ propaganda.
Oh right. Never heard that one before .So together with the congenital thing ,tough match in Madrid, poor scheduling, I guess Federer deserves very little credit for his 2009 successes.
Not at all. Ive always given credit to pederer for capitalizing when the top four are injured and for backing out when they’re not (only player to default a wtf final not because he couldn’t play but, according to Fed, because he’d have no chance to beat Nole. Only to play in and win dc final a few days later. Not to mention skipping the whole clay season last year but watch him slink in to clay if Rafa is away.
How many times has Federer defaulted or retired through injury ?
Better to retire when injured than withdraw admitting he couldn’t win which is what Federer did just days before a miraculous recovery to win Davis Cup having only deciding to play dc that year days after Nole pulled out and Nadal already our.
Full credit where credit is due.
Big Al has never updated himself about Rafa yet he’s here arguing about him with the Rafa fans?? You’ve never heard of it that doesn’t mean it never existed or happened!
It’s well documented that Rafa has/had his foot issue and he was absent for three to four months from late Oct 2005 to Feb 2006 because of his foot issue. He had to wear special insole in his shoe for his left foot, apparently he and his father went searching for a good shoe maker to help with Rafa’s foot issue during that period of time but wasn’t successful until Nike decided to make a special insole for him and he’s playing tennis with that insole in his shoe since.
The insole helped a bit when Rafa was able to play for two years without injury after coming back in Feb 2006, but had developed knee tendinitis late 2007 ( many suspected that’s due to him trying to accommodate that foot issue that it affected his knees). He was plagued by knee tendinitis since.
Many said his injuries were due to his style of play but should he not be compromised by his foot issue, I very much expect him to be fine just like Djoko, who played a similar style to Rafa,
I had seen an aggressive Rafa who’s almost impossible to beat even without a great serve the like of Fed’s, so he’s more than capable of playing a more offensive style to win his matches in shorter time and not much grinding. It’s just that 1) he played more matches on clay than his fellow top players because he’s more successful than them and had generally played one more event (Barcelona) on clay, so he had generally spent more time on court compared to them, on clay where longer points were played; 2) he’s brought up as a counterpuncher and so tend to rally more before counterattacking, rather than winning points with aces or one two punches.
Well,that all maybe true,I’m not arguing,but I don’t understand why you keep bringing it up as a reason why Rafa hasn’t won more.
A similar case could be made for other players.Things happen as they happen,no point in its,buts and maybes.
Eg,Sampras started out as a baseline,if he hadn’t changed his career would have followed a very different path.
As far as Federer goes,that bit of luck was there too,in kick-starting his success.
Nope, I don’t always talked about it unless the Fed fanatics started denigrating Rafa and his achievements, as if he could only win on clay. Just ask yourself, do you think Fed would win his FO in 2009 when he met Rafa in the final? You can’t deny Fed did take advantage of Rafa’s misfortune even though you’re unhappy we talked about it; Fed was ready to take advantage while others, like Delpo, for example, couldn’t, and I give him credit for that.
Well, Lucky, do you see how referring to 2004-07 as part of a “weak-era” is denigrating Federer’s incredible achievement during that era?
Especially when the ELO numbers show that off clay (that is, on the surfaces in which Federer actually won his titles) 2004-07 was as strong if not stronger than any other period in recent tennis history?
Well, Joe Smith, do you see how referring to a male cricket player without even a mention of Serena as part of an “all sport GOAT” is denigrating Serena’s incredible achievement during that career?
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis easily shows that pederer is no defacto GOAT and Bill Smith shows how the lack of competition since 2017 is the reason for Federer’s recent success.
#DontBelieveTheHype
#RacquetRuse
#RememberSerena
Of course Djoko was a big factor in 2009, don’t forget he beat Fed twice, at Miami and Rome, and later beating Fed in his own backyard Basel that year.
Rafa and Djoko killing each other in that 4 hour epic Madrid SF match had definitely damaged their chances at the FO that year, leading to Rafa having knee issue and had to miss Wimbledon and Djoko losing early at the FO.
Djoko wasn’t affected by injuries, but Rafa was; don’t forget Rafa suffered injury prior to meeting Djoko, at Rotterdam final, that Madrid SF had done him in, adding salt to his wound.
You’re quoting a poor example about Sampras as s baseliner. I can also say the same thing about Rafa starting out as an attacking player instead of being a counterpuncher, but that’s different from suffering from injuries. You don’t choose to get injured while you can choose what style you want to adopt.
You can’t choose your opponent either and in Rafa’s case, he couldn’t beat Djoko sooner in the match because Djoko was an ATG in the making and happened to be a real threat on clay, more so than Fed was.
Yeah we got no clue if Rafa would have even been effective with an all out aggression kind of style. These guys usually play the way they played as they grew up and learned the sport. It’s not like Rafa took every ball early growing up then decided to counterpunch when starting on the tour. There’s a reason Rafa counterpunches. It’s because it’s what he’s best at.
Nope, Toni even mentioned that Rafa was way more offensive when he was younger; and looking at how he played during his younger days, it’s not difficult to see that he could be a good to great attacking player.
It was Toni who trained him to become a thinking player, even told him not to serve too quickly but to think before he served, after noticing that Rafa was quick when he serve. I do feel that Toni was/is more a tactical coach than a technical coach, and I feel that may be why Rafa was lacking in his serve and took years to get to possess a reasonably good serve now.
I’ve mentioned earlier that perhaps Toni thought that on clay the serve wasn’t that crucial; and it took them until 2010 to figure out that Rafa needed a big serve to win the USO and so they engaged some outside help. I’m not sure that prior to that, did they seek help from other sources where Rafa’s serve was concerned.
Without a good to great serve, it’s more difficult to be a good to great attacking player, perhaps Toni thought that it’s better that Rafa became a counterpuncher instead.
And Benny, one need not always take the ball early to be an attacking player; look at Delpo or Cilic or Berdych, they need not take the ball early but could attack from the baseline with sheer pace and power plus a great serve.
Rafa was more willing to move forward to attack when he could seize the chances during his early days, but as he became more successful on clay, he started staying back and played his rallying game. It’s not difficult to see that Rafa has the skill sets to play and win at the net when he chooses to come forward; he doesn’t acquire those skills overnight, but from playing in doubles as and when he could throughout his career and so picked up those skills.
lucky, your tennis knowledge is unmatched on this site.
VR quite good too.
fedfans should be paying you for the schooling you give them for free.
Time to recap a bit on the “weak-era” hypothesis.
First, the main point of that hypothesis is, and has always been, to denigrate Federer’s unparalleled record from 2004-07. No male player has ever won 11 slams in a four year period (to go with 2 finals and 2 SF), and Fed’s detractors have -rather pathetically- felt the need to minimize that achievement.
One way is simply to pronounce it part of the “weak-era,” but that’s obviously sheer subjective opinion without supporting argument. Do the “weak-era” supporters have any arguments? We’ve seen two; let’s consider them in turn.
First, it’s said that 2004-07 had few if any strong champions except for Federer (and Nadal on clay). Specifically, players like Hewitt, Roddick, and Safin weren’t able to win multiple titles during that period. This is a terrible argument, and in itself shows nothing.
Imagine 60 players at the same level as peak Federer, who all maintained that level for 15 years. That would obviously be the strongest era ever -past, present or future. Yet one would expect, on the odds alone, that each of those 60 players would win only one slam title in 15 years -and appear in only one other slam final. So the first argument shows nothing.
The second argument is based on numerical facts, namely, ELO ratings. The main piece of evidence is that Federer’s peak overall ELO (2558) is lower than both Nadal’s (2563) and Djokovic’s (2623), obtained after 2007. The problem with this argument, as I’ve shown, is that it is heavily influenced (especially in Nadal’s case) by Nadal and Djokovic’s ELO rating on clay.
That in itself is not a problem, but if one focuses on HC and grass -3/4/ of the tennis season- the ELO case for 2004-07 being a “weak era” disappears. 2007. Compared to Nadal, 2004-07 Federer has a higher peak and average ELO on both HC and grass. Compared to Djokovic, 2004-07 Federer has a higher peak and average ELO on grass. On HC, 2004-07 Fed and 2011-16 Djokovic are almost indistinguishable, both in terms of average and peak ELO.
In short, the two main arguments for 2004-07 being a weak era collapse when they are examined closely. Proponents of the idea can and no doubt will mindlessly continue to refer to it in that way, but anyone who cares to use their mind to think should recognize that it’s sheer biased opinion.
Thanks, Al. I’m still waiting for one single Rafa fan to rationally engage with the argument, since the fans on this thread appear to be unwilling or unable. Maybe VR will put down his books and have a go.
Given all your talk about my sore bum, calling me d***head and references to anal play, I’m guessing that you might be the one in the closet Joe Smith. Sounds like you’re holding a lot of shame about it too.
Arguably the GOAT of tennis writers on unarguably the GOAT of tennis players:
http://www.tennis.com/pro-game/2018/03/50-greatest-players-open-era-m-no-1-roger-federer/72475/
Tignor’s top 10 male players:
1. Federer
2. Laver
3. Nadal
4. Sampras
5. Djokovic
6. Borg
7. Rosewall
8. Lendl
9. McEnroe
10. Connors
An interesting an honest appraisal in the comments section. In wonder how many Nadal fans on this site feel the same:
“Salut Mssr. Federer. As a life-log Nadal fan, you have been my nemesis, my arch enemy, and my secret and very private joy to watch. I have often thought your legacy overrated for numerous reasons. But in the end, not even I can deny what really is obvious. You are the greatest male player to ever lift a racket. This is axiomatic. It is inescapable. And although I think Tignor is utterly bonkers for ranking Rafa behind Laver and has, therefore, very little of my respect, even a blind monkey would understand that you are the best player ever, let alone the Open Era.”
Federazzi media just placating their readers and sponsors. It’s called knowing your audience.
Jeff Sackmann’s excellent ELO piece was analytical and quantitative as opposed to merely subjective preformed conclusion.
How you neglected to even think of Serena instead of going to a male cricket player was quite revealing.
#CricketsChirping
Fedegraphica : A Graphic Biography Of The Genius of Roger Federer
– is a book written by Mark Hodgkinson, a tennis journalist who interviewed tennis legends such as Boris Becker, John McEnroe or Novak Djokovic, as well as the greatest tennis coaches.
Actionable insights
Roger uses the same ball-toss and the same body position regardless of the serve performed. Thus, the opponent never knows what to expect and Federer controls perfectly his gesture.
Two success factors are his independence and his emotions’ control. As a child, Roger made his own decisions. He also learned to master his anger on the tennis court.
Contrary to popular belief, Roger prefers to win by playing bad than to lose by playing well.
In addition, Roger has worked enormously his only weak point, the backhand. He has turned it into a formidable weapon and has developed a very effective sliced backhand to vary his game and to surprise his opponents.
The variety of his game has become his main asset. In the tense moments of the game, the opponent never knows what to expect.
Roger also has a phenomenal mental ability, especially to recover from defeats. He is insanely optimist.
Moving is a crucial aspect of his game that makes him gain time over his opponents.
Many people think that Roger has the perfect body to play tennis. In reality, what counts above all is the match between your body and your playing style.
The way Roger has changed his tennis to preserve his body, his intact will to win and especially his willingness to experiment are the three pillars of his longevity.
https://www.amazon.com/Fedegraphica-Graphic-Biography-Genius-Federer/dp/1781317585/
The Swiss tennis icon,
who reclaimed the world No 1 ranking after overcoming a serious knee injury and winning his 20th Grand Slam title at the Australian Open last month,
fought off competition from Cristiano Ronaldo and Rafael Nadal to land the Sportsman of the Year award.
Roger Federer’s awards were his fifth and sixth since the Laureus Awards began in 2000, making him the most decorated winner in its history.
http://www.skysports.com/tennis/news/12110/11270150/roger-federer-wins-sportsman-and-comeback-of-the-year-at-laureus-awards
Roger Federer/Bill Gates vs Sock/Guthrie – Match for Africa 5 Highlights
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwDfTevdUXU
Roger Federer and Bill Gates Pre match l Match for Africa 2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwuNYpD7OOg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoV5qwlOLIE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dm30znq_rA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdphk3kx5p8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntV9eLoamt8
Just had a look at this, Fed 20. It really is very good; thanks for the tip.
Martina Navratilova: “The Greatest Of All Time – Roger Federer” 2018 Laureus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJJMofrtuQ8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpLCz89YLc8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZpAaaCxuVs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJBt0ZLOlP4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pk2X4R9zaxk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0v9heiZMlE
Williams, Navratilova, Graf, Big 3, Laver, and Sampras.
As of 2018, if there were a Mount Rushmore-like monument made of the greatest tennis players of the modern game, and I was asked to select the players, these are the 8 individuals I would personally have on that mountain. For every argument somebody tries to make for why any one of these players should be considered all-around “greater” than the other seven, I have an argument for why they should NOT be considered definitively greater than the others. They are all so great for their own reasons unique to them, that I just don’t believe it is at all possible to declare that one of them deserves to be held in a higher regard than the other seven.
I admit that there are a few other players who I would not argue against being on that mountain as well if somebody successfully argued to me on their behalf. In my opinion, those players are Borg, Evert, Connors, King, Emerson, and (as much as I HATE it) Court. However, as of now I just don’t find these players to be quite on the level of the aforementioned Big 8. Players like my personal favorite, Agassi, or McEnroe, are unquestionably all-time greats, however they just aren’t quite on the same level as the others I mentioned because, as in the case of Agassi, they underachieved and didn’t win as many majors as they should have, or in the case of McEnroe, they maybe weren’t great enough on all the surfaces to offset there relatively lower number of majors.
It will always disappoint me that more people don’t choose to discuss the greats of tennis in this way. However, I’m not too naive to know that people are often biased toward their favorite player, often have negative bias toward the rivals of their favorite player, and that the media knows that having consensus GROUP of all-time greats is just not as sexy/profitable/controversial as pushing the narrative that there MUST be one who is “greater” than all the rest… ONE RING TO RULE THEM ALL!
I’ll ask you again, Kevin: which five are on your clay Mt. Rushmore? Are they five equals? If not, why not?
Joe Smith asks the same questions over and over expecting answers whilst ignoring questions put to him about failing to even think of Serena Williams, a woman, as the greatest of all sport ever.
One might call that just a tad hypocritical.
I think that Joe Smith owes all women an apology and by association humankind that look for gender equality for failing to even think that a woman could be the greatest of all sport ever.
You keep bring her up, just to divert from the main discussion p
oint, the male GOAT .
You know, AL, it’s almost like he has…OCD!
Seriously, what’s astonishing is how difficult it is to get *any* Rafa fan on this forum to engage in a reasonable discussion about this topic. Most of them appear to believe that Federer’s achievements count for less because of weaker competition, but few if any are willing to subject that claim to critical scrutiny.
It gets back to my observation that the beliefs of many Rafa fans on this subject have a religious-like fervor to them.
Yeah,and they never seem to remember that Federer has been winning many titles over a 15 year period, while others have come and gone. Cant all be weak era.
No one said it was.
#RIP2008-016
#THASP
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis put Federer in his place where he should be pointing out the weaker competition. Another article I pointed out points to the weaker competition since 2017 as opposed to a change of stick.
We all (unbiased folk) know the weaker competition factor. That is probably the biggest factor, to me, why Federer is not greater than the other 7 players I mention. I do not believe, however, that the weaker competition factor means that Federer is definitively NOT as great as Rafa or Novak or whoever. Because just like I refuse to ignore factors like the weaker competition for Fed, I refuse to ignore factors about why other players aren’t definitively greater than Federer. At some point, I got tired of hair splitting, nit picking, and going in circles trying to decide something so ridiculously subjective that I concluded it just isn’t possible to objectively declare someone as the “greatest”.
I still respect anyone who thinks that Rafa is a greater all-around tennis player than Federer, or that Federer is a greater all-around tennis player than Rafa. I just don’t believe them. And I never will.
Preach it Kevin. Couldn’t have said it any better. You sir are a truly discerning and knowledgeable tennis fan.
#Respect
On my clay Mount Rushmore? That is a very specific thing we are measuring. In the case of clay, there is CLEARLY one who is a billion times greater than the others. If we are only measuring one single factor, then it’s very simple to decide who is the greatest.
When we ask the question, who is the greatest TENNIS PLAYER of all-time, there are seriously dozens of factors to measure. And the amount of importance that one puts on each of those factors is completely subjective. So when there are endless factors, and everything is so subjective, and all the greatest players are so great for so many different reasons, what is even the point of trying to figure out which player is “greater”? How do we come to an agreement on what makes a player great? How do we come to a definitive agreement on which which of the million factors are the most important? It is just soooo subjective that it becomes splitting hairs.
I believe it is waaaay easier to anoint players as the greatest in each individual factor. Because then there is very little that is subjective. Although in the case of clay, I believe that it is still subjective as to who the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th greatest clay players are. However, with clay there actually truly is one player who is objectively, unquestionably the greatest clay player ever because he is the best at all the different factors we use to measure clay greatness- Roland Garros titles won, clay masters won, win percentage on clay, win percentage in RG finals, winning RG nearly every time he showed up there, who he beat in those RG title runs, etc. Rafa wins all of those factors, so he is OBJECTIVELY the greatest clay court player of all-time, and no one else is even close.
Here’s the important part- the Rafa of the clay goat list DOESN’T exist in the “Greatest Tennis Player of All-Time” list! Nobody has had an overall tennis career that was nearly flawless and objectively so much better than everyone else the way that Rafa was objectively so much better than everyone else on clay.
Maybe I’m just missing the point you were trying to make by asking about clay? Or maybe you weren’t trying to make a point and truly just wanted my opinion on the greatest clay players ever? Help me out here, Joe! 🙂
Well, Kev, as you can see from my post below, I agree with you that the question of overall GOAT isn’t as straightforward. But that’s not because it’s more “subjective.” It’s because it’s just much more obvious: as you say, Rafa is clearly better, by just about any criterion you might want to pick.
But just because a question isn’t as clear doesn’t mean it can’t be sensibly posed. In fact, the very same problems that you alleged plague any attempt to pick one (overall) GOAT arise in any attempt to say who is on Mt. Rushmore and who isn’t.
You say that you wouldn’t object to having Borg, Connors, Evert, even Margaret Court on your list. Maybe Mac and Agassi, too. But why stop there? What about Lendl, Becker, Jim Courier, Stan Smith? Your own words provide the beginning of an answer to this question: “…they underachieved and didn’t win as many majors as they should have, or in the case of McEnroe, they maybe weren’t great enough on all the surfaces to offset there relatively lower number of majors.”
Precisely. Those are objective criteria (winning majors, not winning on all surfaces, and so forth) that can be applied to the question whether, for instance, Federer or another player is greater overall. Again, I agree that the answer won’t be as clear cut as the question of clay GOAT. Nevertheless, it can be sensibly posed, and progress can be made on answering it.
Needless to say, to anoint Federer the GOAT is not to denigrate any other player! Of course they’re all incredible players. I myself play at a very high club level; I know how amazing the level of journeymen on the challenger circuit is, never mind anyone being considered for a GOAT list. By all means, let a thousand tennis flowers bloom.
And to overlook Serena without a mention as goat of all sport is close minded and just a bit sexist in my opinion.
Jeff Sackmann’s excellent ELO analysis clearly lays out why Federer is not the definitive GOAT. As does this piece written by Jim Smith.
https://realsport101.com/news/sports/tennis/roger-federer-dont-believe-the-hype/
I really can’t argue much with anything you said, Joe. A big part of this is also that because there are just so many endless factors and definitions of greatness to this debate, I guess it feels disrespectful to the other greats sometimes when we declare that one player’s factors are “better” than another player’s. When it comes down to it, as pertains to your argument, I just believe there is very reasonable doubt when it comes to questioning if Federer is “greater” than everyone else. Enough reasonable doubt that it just makes the most sense to me to declare that he and some others are the greatest players of the modern game. Like I said at the end of my post, I respect that you think he greater than everyone. But you’re also a die-hard fan of his, so of course you’re going to say he’s the greatest! 🙂 Even if deep down you didn’t think he was, you would still probably SAY he was! That’s how it works! To end, I agree with you completely that he is the greatest. I just also think that a few others are too haha!
Well, Kevin, I appreciate that you agree with what I wrote above. I understand what you say here, as well, though I would enter in a partial response: many Federer fans believe it is disrespectful when Rafa fans constantly bring up the allegedly weaker competition that Federer has faced in winning his titles. You evidently don’t think that is disrespectful? I’ll continue that topic in a separate thread.
Regarding my bias as a Federer fan, it might be a lot less than you suppose. First, it is important to see that taking a given stand or position (pro or con) doesn’t, in and of itself, show bias. Second, unlike many Rafa fans here, I don’t back Federer invariably, and I have players than I like more, including Dolgopolov. I rooted very strongly for Agassi in the 2005 USO final, and in general I back older players, something that dates back to seeing Rosewall get crushed by a young Jimmy Connors. These days, I’ll cheer for Diego Schwartzman over just about anyone, certainly Fed.
Actually, a position taken based on subjective opinion is biased.
Amazing.
Joe, you mentioned the Rafa fans but the Djoko fans and many fans of other players also said the same thing about Fed’s weaker competition during 2004-2007; just go to other tennis websites to read the comments by some other fan groups!
I mean if its a truth that competition then was weaker than the era that came after it, we just couldnt kid ourselves by saying no, the competition level was always the same!
And, that doesnt mean that we’re saying Fed isnt a great player, its just that he’s not the Goat as what many Fed fans want to make him to be.
I think you get it wrong, that you think we’re saying that Rafa or Djoko or other greats are > Fed; in fact most of us recognize how great Fed is, but that doesnt mean that he’s definitely the Goat.
Kevin just nailing it now.
Woot!
Kevin I absolutely agree with your answer about subjectivity and GOAT.
Very very well said.
Bravo.
In case it wasn’t obvious, my own answer to the clay Mt. Rushmore question:
Someone who said that there was a clay Mt.Rushmore of, say, Vilas, Borg, Wilander, Kuerten, and Nadal would be badly mistaken. To deny that Nadal is the clay GOAT would be, in the words of the above commentator, to be “a blind monkey.” Ditto for Chris Evert on the women’s side.
Now, the question of overall GOAT is obviously not as straightforward. Not even close, because no one has ever dominated tennis the way that Rafa has dominated clay court tennis. But the question is perfectly sensible, and anyone who denies it (as Kevin apparently does) is being disingenuous unless he is also prepared to say the same thing regarding the question who is the greatest player on clay.
It’s not disengenuous, though, because we WOULD be able to objectively declare an all-around goat if it was that obvious! But it’s not. And there really is enough reasons of why it really just isn’t fair to say that Federer is a greater tennis player than, say, Rafa and Novak. At the same time, I would never think that Rafa and Novak are greater than Federer!
I’m just saying that because it is so close if we factor in aaaaaaaall the factors, I just don’t see how it would be fair to declare Federer as definitively greater than the others. Believe me, if I thought it was clear that Federer is the lone GOAT, I would say it!
You seem to think that I’m saying you can’t think Federer is the GOAT. I’m sorry if I mis-typed. I just disagree with you. That’s all.
BOOM Kevin gets it!
Joe simply doesn’t.
Subjectivity and absolute measurement are two different things. Something that fandom taken to the extreme can no longer comprehend.
Great posts Kevin.
Thanks Hawks- you know I’m passionate about this stuff. 🙂 I’m definitely not as competitive as you, though haha! You’re like Michael Jordan- you wanna obliterate your opponent, humiliate them. On the other hand, I’m all like, “Aw Joe! I respect you and your arguments! Let’s be friends!” 😂
You’re more forgiving Kevin.
I don’t suffer close mindedness and one sided absolute thinking forcing one’s opinions upon others very well.
More power to you. It will serve you well.
Kevin, you say:
“We all (unbiased folk) know the weaker competition factor. That is probably the biggest factor, to me, why Federer is not greater than the other 7 players I mention.”
Ok, good. Strength of competition is, of course, an empirical measure. Now I’ll ask you a simple question: how do you measure strength of competition?
You’re right, Joe, I shouldn’t call it “weaker competition”. That really isn’t a fair way to put it. What I mean to say is that I think it helps Rafa and Novak’s case that they beat each other and Fed more in the big tournaments. That isn’t a knock on Fed. The main reason he didn’t have to beat them en route to his major titles nearly as much is because those two guys weren’t even close to their primes when Fed won his first 12 majors. Unlike other people, I don’t see that as a reason to downgrade Fed’s greatness, rather, I see it as an overlooked reason that ADDS to the other two guys’ greatness. Remember, this is not about proving that they are better than Fed (to me)- it’s about proving why they are just as great. But this goes back to what I was trying to say before. Some people might think that Novak having 12 major titles, but having to beat a prime Rafa, and/or Andy, and/or not-prime-but-still-great Fed in every single one of his 12 major wins, could be considered just as good Fed winning 20, but not necessarily having to CONSISTENTLY have to climb as high of a mountain as Novak did. And once again, people use that as a negative toward Fed, and I think that’s bullshit. In that example, it would be a POSITIVE toward Novak. You see what I’m getting at here?
Thanks for making me realize that calling it “weaker competition” wasn’t what I was going for, though…
On the flip side, some people argue that Fed having 8 more majors than Novak (thus far) is enough to offset the argument that Novak had a harder mountain to climb. So how do we decide which side is right on all these kinds of factors? Both achievements in this case are so incredible, I just hate to have to settle for deciding one is just definitively greater than the other achievement.
And we as fans should respect those opinions as opinions, not facts.
Extreme fandom would argue that GOAT is not just opinion and therefore wrong if it contradicts their construct. It becomes threatening to their belief.
Aside: Did you know that flat earthers claim to have followers around the globe?
Well, Kev, I have no problem with the concept “strength of competition.” Absolutely, I think it’s important, especially in very clear cases. For instance, years in which scabs have filled in for professional baseball or football players. In tennis, Evert and other top players skipped the French Open from 1976-78 -when Chrissie was in the midst of her incredible clay winning streak- to play World Team Tennis. The champions from those years were comparative unknowns who perhaps should have an asterisk next to their names.
However, in the context of the debate amongst the big 3 (and especially between Federer and Nadal), strength of competition is much more problematic -again, not in concept, but in application. ELO is the best known empirical measure, and Nadal has a slightly higher peak ELO than Federer (. However, what that shows is by no means agreed upon.
One fact is especially relevant here. Nadal’s peak ELO rating overall relies very heavily on his dominance on clay. In particular, he has scored many important finals victories, at slams and masters, over Federer. He was able to score those victories, of course, only because Federer was able to make it to so many clay court finals. Nadal’s overall ELO would have been lower, had Federer not been so good on clay.
So we face a question: How much weight in a GOAT comparison should we give Nadal’s very slightly peak ELO rating over Federer? (2563 vs. 2558 according to this list):
http://www.ultimatetennisstatistics.com/goatList
You seem to think that it is the most important factor in denying the GOAT title to Fed over Rafa. In response, I would make two points:
1. It is very small indeed, not enough to overcome 4 slams, 6 WTF titles, and close to twice as many weeks at #1.
2. A good case can be made that Nadal’s slightly higher ELO says more about Federer’s prowess on clay (consistently less, to be sure, than Nadal’s) than it does about anything else!
I wonder how you would response to these points.
Yet you never wondered about Serena when you looked at the GOAT of all sport, instead comparing a male tennis player to a male cricket player.
Speaking of crickets…
#SexismLives
#StanleyIsNotAlone
But Jeff Sackmann quantifies that Roger is not the defacto GOAT as religion would compel all to believe in his epic ELO analysis entitled “Sorry, Roger: Rafael Nadal is not just the king of clay”:
“Both Mr Federer and Mr Nadal have faced some easy draws and some hard ones—that’s the nature of a sport in which every tournament begins with an empty bracket and a lottery. But the lotteries—and the career trajectories of the strongest members of tennis’s supporting cast—have tended to benefit Mr Federer. The average grand-slam title run requires beating a set of opponents that the typical champion would defeat 23% of the time. Only eight of Mr Federer’s 19 major titles have come against competition more difficult than that. But 13 of Mr Nadal’s 16 championships have required him to confront harder-than-average obstacles. Suddenly, the difference between 19 and 16 isn’t as clear-cut as it initially seemed.
In fact, when we adjust those two numbers for difficulty, the King of Clay ends up with the strongest claim to the throne for the entire kingdom. On average, Mr Nadal’s titles are worth 1.18 majors apiece, while Mr Federer’s work out to 0.98 each. I’ll save you the multiplication: Mr Nadal comes out on top by the narrowest of margins, 18.8 to 18.7. The adjustment gives Mr Djokovic more credit as well, upping his total from 12 to 15.3 and swapping his fourth-place position on the traditional list with Pete Sampras’s third. It’s a promotion Mr Djokovic deserves, as all 12 of his major titles have required him to fight through tougher-than-average draws.”
“As the sport’s greatest rivals continue their quest in 2018, it is important to remember that the Spaniard’s easy draw was an aberration, and that his career record in grand slams is every bit as good as Mr Federer’s.”
https://www.economist.com/blogs/gametheory/2017/09/draws-tennis
Coupled with the JIM Smith’s excellent assessment…
“Much has also been made of Federer’s astonishing improvements late in his career. The switch to a larger racquet that has turned his backhand into a major weapon being chief amongst them. But there is arguably a more significant factor in aiding Federer’s return to the top of the sport. And that is the injuries that all of his major rivals are suffering from. Nadal has withdrawn from or retired during his last six tournaments. Djokovic, Murray and Wawrinka have all been forced to resort to surgery for long-term injury problems.
Without those challengers, it is in many ways unsurprising that Federer is now the dominant force in the game. Before his injury hit 2016 he was playing at a high level, making three Grand Slam finals across the 2014 and 2015 seasons. Only Novak Djokovic was a more regular presence in Major title matches in that period reaching six, and it took the Serb to deny Federer on those three occasions. In essence then what we can see is that Federer’s level in 2017 and 2018 is arguably at a similar level as it was before his injury. The difference is in his opponents.”
“There is no shortage of great players. Federer numbers amongst them. But can he truly be said to rank before them? I think not.”
https://realsport101.com/news/sports/tennis/roger-federer-dont-believe-the-hype/
Hawkeye, 👏👍
A succinct response to the undergraduate Jim Smith, who looks about 12 in his photo and has probably never played serious tennis:
“How many world tour finals has nadal won ?
How many weeks at number one has nadal been ?
Please remove all clay court titles and then measure both of their successes.
Please remove all clay court matches and measure the head to head.
Nadal is the greatest clay court player of all time but he’s 14-6 in slams vs Sampras (never mind Federer) when you take away the French Open.
Nadal simply can’t be considered as his record is very heavily weighted towards his clay court success’s.
His injuries are a result of having to play a particular type of game that was always going to leave him injury prone. Thus, he’s injured because of his success and it’s not a case that he’d be more successful if he wasn’t injured.”
One might add: Nadal has never, in some 15 years as a professional, been able to defend a tournament not played on clay. In other words, he has never won a HC or grass title that he won the year before.
Again, Nadal is the greatest ever player on clay, a surface on which approximately 1/4 of professional tennis is played. His unparalleled success on that surface has enabled him to enter the conversation of all time greats, but it obscures the fact that off clay (3/4 of the season), he is much closer to 10th than 1st.
One who would rule out 50% based on gender should stop preaching about greatest of anything.
Add ageism to sexism.
Lucky @ 2:10am:
As I’ve said before, I think Djokovic can make the strongest claim regarding strength of competition in the context of a GOAT argument. However, although he is closer to Fed (than Rafa) in weeks @#1 and WTFs, and is ahead in masters 1000s, he is a full 8 slams behind Fed. That puts him at #2 in some people’s books (including mine).
The point can be made more strongly using Murray, who arguably can make a strength of competition case even more effectively than Djokovic, since he’s had to play his entire career against the big 3 in their prime. However, Murray’s 3 slams is so far behind Fed’s 20 (not even getting to weeks @#1 and so forth) that he’s rightly not a part of the conversation.
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis quantified these differences concluding quite effectively that Pederer is not the defacto GOAT.
And Bill Smith easily dismantles the big racquet change as the reason for Ped’s recent success showing that it is due to lack of competition because of injuriies just as the lack of competition during the weak era.
But to fail to mention Serena just goes to show the limited thinking here.
#THASP
Joe, don’t know what you’re talking about. If you’re talking about HCs, Djoko is only three slams behind Fed, one WTF behind and one masters ahead of Fed! I don’t see where you get 8 slams behind, you seemed confused. Not forgetting Djoko is six years younger and joined the tour at least five years later than Fed.
You talked about Goat, but who says Djoko is Goat? And who are you to talk as if Djoko’s 12 slams weigh > than Sampras 14 or Rafa’s 16?? And your total disregard of Rafa’s same number of masters titles as Djoko’s; though Djoko has five WTFs but Rafa has four more slams!
Sampras has more weeks at number one and five WTF with two more slam titles than Djoko so who says Djoko is > Sampras?
In the context of a GOAT discussion, all slams are relevant, so Novak is 8 slams behind Fed. Even if strength of competition is relevant (which it is), and Novak has played stronger competition overall (arguable), it’s not enough of a difference to overcome 8 slams.
The main point is really this: strength of competition is only *one* factor in the GOAT debate, and certainly not the most important. If you want to seriously take it into account, you have to argue that it has a certain weight in relation to other factors (most obviously, # of slams, weeks at #1, and so forth).
The GOAT list I keep linking to:
http://www.ultimatetennisstatistics.com/goatList
actually tries to do this. It assigns a numerical value to several factors that it considers relevant to the GOAT debate, including ELO, which is the most widely accepted proxy for strength of competition.
As you can see, the list acknowledges that Federer’s peak ELO is below that of both Djokovic and Nadal (in the latter case, only 5 points lower). However, as you can also see, neither of those players is even close to Federer in the overall assessment: he’s well ahead of both of them, overall, and on grass and HC.
If you or anyone else seriously wants to contest that assessment, an obvious first step is to take a look at the list, make an effort to understand its methodology, and then say where it goes wrong.
‘If you or anyone else seriously wants to contest that assessment, an obvious first step is to take a look at the list, make an effort to understand its methodology, and then say where it goes wrong.’
Agree. And the analysis is as objective as someone can be and it includes ELO, which is very good and fair. Now I’m not saying that table depicts perfectly the situation of the best players. It certainly cannot include some subjective factors as: genetics, mentality, hard-work or even scheduling….but it reflects those aspects in numbers. I would definitely be fine if FED was 2nd in that list if that was the case. I’m interested in TRUTH much more than him being 1st.
Of course everyone would have, could have, should have …..if… then maybe. But let’s comment just the pure facts. Nobody can trick the numbers.
Thanks, Eugene. Taking a closer look at the whole thing, it’s obviously anything but a simple slam count, and tries to take into account everything that should be relevant to overall tennis performance.
The thing is, the allocation of points – how one determines how many points given for this or that? That in itself is rather subjective.
I feel that the number of titles won, the type of titles won, the ranking points won during a season, rankings during a season etc adjusted for whatever ELO etc could be used instead but would be rather tedious in calculation. Some players are playing in the tour longer than others too.
I doubt Sampras would rank behind Djoko in the whatever Goat list as 1) Sampras won more slams, 2) he had more weeks at no.1, 3) he had more YE no.1, 4) his competition wasn’t much easier than Djoko’s, 5) he also had 5 WTF (YEC) titles though fewer masters.
Rafa at the moment may be ranked behind those three but if he wins some big titles this season and gets back the top rankings, things will change and he may at least go ahead of both Sampras and Djoko in that list. So, you can see that list is rather meaningless when things can and may change rather quickly.
Another one year or two and that list may see some drastic changes, who knows.
Jeff Sackmann’s analysis of why Federer wasn’t goat makes it plainly obvious and weights the weak era fairly.
Bill Smiths article explains quite effectively that peds lack of competition since 2017 is the main reason for his recent success. As it was during the weak era.
But to ignore Serena without mention and having the audacity to instead leap to a male cricket player is disappointing to say the least.
Also Jeff Sackmann’s credentials and proven objectivity only adds further weight to his analysis and conclusion that pederer is not goat.
Ridiculous link by some fedfan sitting in his basement putting Lendl ahead of Sampras?
No wonder that person doesn’t put his name on it.
Laughable.
The GOAT list is published by Ultimate Tennis Statistics, which appears to be the most complete set of tennis statistics available online. You can find some more information here, including their GOAT formula and legend:
http://www.ultimatetennisstatistics.com/about
Worth noting is that the formula assigns points for “Big Wins,” wins at the end of big tournaments against high-ranked or high-ELO opponents. Looking it over, the formula is totally objective and extremely comprehensive.
The whole project is very sophisticated, obviously not the work of a kid sitting in his basement. In fact, it reads:
“Data on which the statistics is based is from open source tennis data repository by… Jeff Sackmann [!!!!]”
Had to chuckle at that one.
It has an email for questions, as well as a link to Github.
That’s ok joe smith. I chuckle at you all the time.
Jeff Sackmann’s data is simply numerical facts.
It’s like saying that a made for TV movie is “based on” a true story.
The site has a twitter link. The basement dweller has 20 followers.
The site allows anyone to apply weight factors any way they choose to create their very own preconceived personalized GOAT.
In other words, opinion.
But to omit any mention of Serena to look for a goat beyond men’s tennis instead comparing a male cricket player is inherently sexist. I think an apology is in order from you to be quite honest.
Jeff Sackmann’s own ELO analysis makes it more than clear that pederer is not the goat.
And Jim smiths advice of don’t believe the hype regarding the bigger tennis racquet quite clearly shows the most significant reason for pederer’a recent success is lack of competition due to injuries recreating a weak era not unlike the weak era prior to 2008.
#THASP
And, at least he’s still playing and winning ten years after his detractors were writing him off.His longevity is amazing, not what you’d expect from someone benefitting from a weak era.
Its not unheard of for a new racquet to give players a new lease of life.Vilas,Connors?
Judging by the size of the racket some people are making trying to deny this, there must be some truth in it.
His detractors at that time were mostly his own fair weather so called fans.
A lot of them became Nadal or Djokovic fans at that point .
‘The King is dead’ remember that?Fed had the mono, he was really thin.
Athletes that take performance enhancing drugs have increased risk of contracting mononucleosis.
#THASP
Incredible that one can now get 18/1 odds on Federer winning the French Open (Betfair). Very tempting and if it hits 20/1 I won’t be able to resist.
Before that ,I hope he plays Monte Carlo and wins .And Madrid.
I’ve already put $200 on him to win it outright.
If Rafa plays, he will skip the French and it will be no contest.
If Rafa skips, Ped will win.
Money is safe either way.
#THASP
Some interesting “numerical facts” based on ELO, courtesy of the ultimate statistics site, based on Jeff Sackman’s data.
First, as I argued back in December, Nadal’s very slightly higher peak ELO over Federer is almost entirely due to his dominance on clay. The U.S. site allows you to see this, as it customizes ELO by surface. As it turns out, Federer’s peak ELO on HC is over 100 points higher than Nadal’s:
Federer peak HC ELO: 2702 (March 7, 2007)
Nadal’s peak HC ELO: 2588 (Sept. 30, 2013)
Note that Fed’s much higher peak on HC occurs at the end of the so-called “weak-era”! On a hard court, the “weak-era” Federer of early 2007 was considerably better than Nadal at his 2013 best, and would be expected to win approximately 2/3 of the time. It’s hard to believe Sackman missed this obvious point so badly in his slam analysis.
Second, the only higher peak ELO on HC ever recorded is by Djokovic:
Djokovic peak HC ELO: 2706 (Feb. 1, 2016).
Note the date: at the end of Novak’s four slam victories over Fed (3 finals, 1 SF); and during a time when Nadal was far from his best.
Finally, and most interesting, consider the period from 2010-2013. That period captures the years in which both Nadal and Djokovic were supposed to at their best, particularly the period of 2011-12 when they fought so many slam finals. What do we find when we examine their peak HC ELO during this period?
The highest ELO HC rating that *either* player recorded during this four year period was by 2637, by Djokovic on March 4, 2013. (Nadal’s highest, as we have seen, was 2588).
In other the words, the highest ELO rating on HC (2637) by either Nadal or Djokovic at the height of the so-called “strong era” was considerably *lower* that the peak HC ELO that Federer recorded at end of the so-called “weak-era” (2702). Again, that prime version of Fed could be expected to beat either Novak or Rafa of 2010-13. A HC match-up between 2007 Fed and 2016 Novak, meanwhile, would pretty much be a toss-up, at least based on ELO.
Just another nail in the coffin of the weak-era hypothesis.
Good God man you need to look up the word succinct. Who’s going to read all that from you?
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO proves pederer is no goat and Bill Smith shows the racquet is a ruse.
Brevity is boss.
#THASP
#WeakEra2.0
#RememberSerenaNextTime
#GenderEqual
Ha ha Joe, you’re assuming ‘that’ version of Fed would beat both Rafa and Djoko on the HCs but for how long Fed could play that way???
You just can’t assume that Fed would play that way all the time! It’s a fact that Djoko had to handle both peak Rafa and a Fed who’s still in his prime on the HCs many times and he won most against Rafa and also against Fed during 2011/2012 ( if you want to say that Fed was past his prime after 2012).
Djoko had it hardest on the HCs; Rafa OTOH got to beat Fed and Djoko on clay, and also Stan, all three were FO champions. Rafa also had beaten Albert Costa, Ferrero, Moya and Gaudio on clay, all of whom were former FO champions.
I feel it’s on grass that prime Fed had his upper hand on most if not all players he had played against – Agassi, Hewitt, maybe Rafa (he’s 2-1 vs Rafa on grass) who had at least a Wimbledon title or two. Djoko was 2-1 vs Fed on grass but one could argue that Fed was past his prime during 2014-2015 when he lost to Djoko.
Also, you keep talking about Rafa on clay but what’s wrong with Rafa being overwhelmingly good on clay? It’s as if you’re penalizing Rafa for being head and shoulders over all others on clay!
What you’re trying to prove is that Fed is > than Rafa on grass and HCs whilst Rafa is only better than Fed on clay but so what with that? Clay is also a legitimate surface and makes up close to 40% of the playing surfaces in the tour.
The fact is that Rafa is still good enough on other surfaces in addition to his dominance on clay, that he’s easily the top three or four in that whatever Goat list, playing in the era where two HC Goats exist.
The fight for grass Goat in the open era is between Fed and Sampras, whilst the fight for HC Goat is between Fed and Djoko but both are not done yet and may still have many encounters on the HCs, but time is on Djoko’s side as long as he’s fit and healthy again, he’ll benefit from the ‘weak era’ at the tail end of his career whilst Fed had his during his peak, if we believe in ‘weak era’ hypothesis.
Lucky, you say: “What you’re trying to prove is that Fed is > than Rafa on grass and HCs whilst Rafa is only better than Fed on clay but so what with that?”
That’s not what I’m trying to prove, though I believe (as the GOAT list shows) that Federer is clearly the best player ever on both HC and grass.
My main opponent is the “weak era” defender, who constantly tries to denigrate Federer’s achievements by saying that they occurred during weak era #1 (2004-07) or weak era #2 (2017-18). What I’ve tried to show is that the belief that 2004-07 was a “weak-era” on HC and grass is simply false. Federer’s peak ELO on HC and grass during those years (and his average ELO, as far as I can tell) was higher than *either* Novak or Rafa during their supposed prime years of 2010-13.
That’s all. I agree completely that Nadal is head and shoulders above all others on clay. As I’ve said many times, he’s much better than others on that surface than anyone has ever been on any surface.
Well, Lucky, you have to remember the context: many people (including you, if I’m correct) discount Federer’s slam titles won during 2004-07 because they say it was a “weak era”.
Now, the best known and most widely-used measure for strength of competition is ELO. The problem for the “weak era” hypothesis is that Fed’s peak HC ELO from 2007 (2702) is higher than the peak HC ELO (2637) of *either* Nadal or Djokovic at any point between 2010-2103. On grass, the difference is much more pronounced: Federer’s peak grass ELO during 2007 (2626) is some 250 points higher than either Nadal or Novak’s peak grass ELO (2380 for Nadal) from 2010-2013.
In short, on HC and grass -3/4 of the tennis season- Fed’s non-clay wins during the “weak era” were, according to the standard ELO formula, *more* impressive than Nadal and Novak’s non-clay wins between 2010-13.
To be fair, both Fed and Nadal’s current ELO are off their peak. The strength of competition is indeed lower since Djokovic tailed off dramatically from his peak in the 2nd half of 2016, as one would expect. But if there’s any justification for calling this a “2nd weak era,” then the first one was between 2010-13, not 2004-07, at least off clay.
Of course, all of what I’ve just is based on the numerical formula known as ELO. I wouldn’t necessarily put money on peak 2007 Fed beating peak 2013 Nadal 2/3 of the time on HC; that’s just what the ELO numbers predict.
What it does show is that the burden is squarely on the shoulders of any “weak-era” advocate to say why 2004-07 should count as a “weak-era” for HC and grass.
Incidentally, you say that clay makes up 40% of the surfaces on which tennis is played. I have no idea whether that’s true, but it’s a far larger percentage than the top players actually play on clay. In practice, clay makes up roughly 1/4 of the tennis season for most top players.
Take Nadal, who can be expected to play as much as possible on clay for a top player. Last year, he played 18 tournaments, 5 of which were on clay, for a percentage of 27.7%. That’s very much on the high end; other top players played a lower percentage, and of course Fed played no clay tournaments last year.
Look at Thiem, a top ten player, he certainly played more on clay – the clay golden swing in Feb, the main clay season in April/early June, and there’s a possibility of him playing on clay during July, on clay in Europe, if he doesnt do well to defend his points on clay during April-early June.
Alex Zverev may also play at Hamburg his home event. When Ferrer was top ten, he used to play the Feb clay golden swing and also the July European clay season in addition to the main clay season from April to early June.
It all depends on the strength each player has, whether hes best on whatever surface, chances of him playing more on his better surface > on other surfaces.
Fed played at Istanbul when he skipped MC one year; he also played at Hamburg and Bstaad in 2013. Even Cilic played at BA or Rio this year!
Davydenko, when hes a top ten player, used to play on clay after Wimbledon. Gasquet, Simon too when theyre in top ten. There’re no shortage of players playing many events on clay.
In 2017:
Thiem: 21 hard, 7 clay = 25% clay
Zverev: 20 hard, 6 clay = 23% clay
Both played a lower percentage of clay tournaments than Nadal in 2017.
What are you talking about? Thiem didn’t play 21 events on HC in 2017! Where DID you get that 21? He played at best 14 on the HCs, vs 7 on clay and 2 on grass, ie 60%, 30% and 10% respectively.
You can’t deny that the others that I mentioned, like Ferrer or Davy when they were top ten, did play very often on clay, in Ferrer’s case as high as 8 or even 9 events a season.
Also there’re many events played on clay, up to 40% of the tour events are played on clay! Rafa on his comeback trail in 2013, played 7 events on clay, 1 on grass and 8 on HCs; not forgetting Rafa’s own 2005 where he played 10 events on clay out of 21 events played.
It’s all possible to play the FO, 3 clay Masters, 2 clay 500s and 4 clay 250s and Wimbledon, and 5 HC Masters plus the 2 HC slams during a season to make up 18 countable events ( when one gets exemption from playing all mandatory masters events). Though that may be an extreme case, there’s the possibility!
On Thiem last year:
http://www.atpworldtour.com/en/players/dominic-thiem/tb69/player-activity?year=2017&matchType=Singles
One of his clay tournaments I counted wasn’t ATP but ITF. But yes, Thiem played 21 HC tournaments last year.
Sorry, Thiem played 21 non-clay tournaments last year. My claim was that top players tended to play 1/4 or less on clay.
Rafa does not play “as much as possible on clay”. He plays the 3 pre RG clay masters and Barcelona. In 2013 he played 3 clay tournaments in February for his “comeback”. He tried playing a couple from the Golden Swing in 2014 and 2015 but he wasn’t that happy with those tournaments, mainly because of the high humidity in SA that time of year, I think. You’re better off looking at some of the other Spanish or Argentinian players if you want someone who plays on clay “as much as possible”. Cuevas might be a good example too.
Yep, Rafa played five events on clay last year, it’s just that he didn’t play as many HC and grass court events as Thiem did so his % of events played on clay was > Thiem’s.
I was just quoting an extreme case of a player who could play as much as 8 or 9 events on clay, Ferrer was a good example during his heydays.
You didn’t read carefully, Ramara. I said: “Take Nadal, who can be expected to play as much as possible on clay for a top player.”
Of those currently in the top 10, no one played a higher percentage of clay tournaments last year than Nadal did.
homophobe joe smith
Nope, I counted, Thiem played 15 HC events in 2017 (not 14) – 2 HC slams, 6 HC Masters, 1 WTF, Doha, Acapulco, Washington, Chengdu, Tokyo and Vienna – definitely not 21!
I don’t know where you get that from!
Ok I made a mistake, it should be 18 when he played at Brisbane and Sydney (Doha was in 2018) and played Sofia and Rotterdam instead of BA and Rio, so he played 18 events on clay in 2017, not 21.
In 2018, he shifted his focus back to clay and so he played at BA and Rio, just like in 2016.
You still haven’t got it right! Thiem played 18 HC tournaments in 2017, plus 3 grass, for 21 non-clay (compared to 7 clay), for 25% clay, just as I said.
Re: my post of 5.04am, it should read ‘so he played 18 events on HCs, not 21’.
Also, you brought out the ELO at early 2007 but thats just one particular ELO when Fed scored higher than Djoko or Rafa, but that didnt prove that Fed had it tougher than Djoko, if Fed’s ELO during 2004-2006 and the rest of 2007 were < Djoko's.
Fed even lost to young Djoko on HCs in 2007, at Montreal final. Fed lost twice to Nalby too in two HC masters at Madrid and Paris, but Nalby wasnt any slam holder, a top tenner perhaps.
The Ultimate Statistics site doesn’t provide ELO averages, but it allows you to draw a customized chart for a given time period. If you draw the HC chart for Fed from 2004-07, and compare it to the HC chart for Rafa and Novak from 2010-2013, two things stand out:
1. Federer is clearly better than Nadal for almost the entire relevant periods. Fed’s lowest HC ELO (Jan 1, 2004) is 2372, and Nadal HC ELO was below that for the large majority of 2010-13 (Nadal’s peak of 2588 i Sept. 2013 was very short-lived).
2. Though not as large as the contrast with Nadal, 2004-07 Federer is still clearly better, on average ELO, than 2010-13 Djokovic. You can check the chart out yourself to see. Again, the relevant differences on grass are even larger.
It’s only the 2015-16 world-beating Novak that compares to Fed in his prime on HC (again, Fed on grass is clearly better than even 2015-16 Novak on grass). Comparing Djokovic HC ELO from September 2015-2016 against Federer HC ELO from March 2006-07, they both range roughly between 2600 and 2700, though Fed starts from a slightly higher base and doesn’t quite reach Novak’s peak. It’s almost impossible to tell which is better on average, though to my eye it looks like Federer comes out slightly ahead. Someone who cared enough to do the calculation week-by-week could say for sure.
Again, ELO is only one measure, but it’s the most widely accepted and objective measure out there for gauging strength of competition. And the numerical facts clearly show that on HC and grass, 2004-07 Federer had a higher ELO, both peak and on average, than either 2010 Nadal or Djokovic.
Again, the burden is on the “weak-era” defender to show how, in the face of these facts, 2004-07 was a weak era.
You use 2010-2013 for Djoko? Shouldn’t you use 2011-2014 or 2015 on the HCs? And you used 2015-2016 for Djoko on grass? Why not 2014-2015?
Fed may have a higher ELO on grass but I doubt if you compare objectively and not pick and choose periods that favor your pro Fed bias, that Djoko is any worse off than Fed if not better or the same.
And why not include 2009 on the HCs for Rafa, since he missed at least two HC slams from 2012 to 2013? Rafa was playing very well early part of 2009 before injury struck him; and imo he’s at his physically peak during 2008/2009 but too bad he’s down with injuries.
Lucky, please read this sentence again carefully:
“Again, the burden is on the “weak-era” defender to show how, in the face of these facts, 2004-07 was a weak era.”
I would love to see you try to engage with that claim. Say something about it!
Of course we can both pick and choose our time-frame. But since 2004-07 is the four year period in which Federer won the majority of his slams, it makes sense to compare it to another 4 year period. 2010-13 is a natural one because it includes the period when Nadal and Djokovic were thought to be in their prime and fought their hardest battles. I would say it has the best claim to being the “strong era” that people have in mind in contrast to the “weak era” of 2004-07.
But by all means, you can choose another period if you like, and you can read the chart as well as I can.
Novak’s best period on HC in terms of ELO spans from roughly April 2011, when it peaked at 2568, to Feb. 2016, when it peaked at 2706. In between there were a few peaks and valleys, as you’d expect, but it never dipped below 2422. That is indeed impressive, but not much different from Fed’s HC ELO between 2004 and 2007.
Again, I hate to keep having to say this: it is not my intention to denigrate any other player or his accomplishments. I do not claim that 2004-07 Fed was clearly better than Novak at his HC best. But the common belief that Fed’s HC and grass wins during 2004-07 were worth less is simply false.
Nadal’s peak HC ELO in 2009 was 2443 (March 23). That is lower than Federer’s HC ELO for virtually the entire period of 2004-07 (only a few months at the beginning of that period was Fed’s ELO lower).
Joe, when did I say Rafa’s HC ELO peaked in 2009? I said he’s at his physical peak but too bad injury struck, and his season ended not too well. His HC ELO during Feb to Aug that year in 2009 wasn’t that far off vs Fed’s Feb to Aug 2004, maybe for the full year to Dec too, bearing in mind that Rafa came back from injury to play the USHC swing in August hence his ELO dropped as he was losing every HC event played since, right up till the USO2010 which he won.
Rafa only played four events on HC in 2012 as he was having his six months break due to injury. He missed the AO in 2013 and only played at IW and won, hence his ELO went up a little bit in March after winning IW.
Rafa had ELO ratings above 2500 from Aug 2013 to Jan 2014 (with 4 Nov 2013 being the lowest in that period when it went down to 2496), and that was better than most of Fed’s 2004 through early 2005; and only slightly below Fed’s from Mar to Aug 2005. It was from Sept 2005 onwards that Fed reached his peak performance on the HCs when his ELO ratings went above 2600 for the entire period up till July/Aug 2007 peaking at Mar 2007 at 2702.
Actually Rafa and Djoko did not have many battles during 2010; 2010 was a relatively poor year for Djoko when he suffered from his breathing problem and had to skip a clay Masters and did poorly in the other clay events. They had only met twice in 2010 on the HCs, Rafa won both.
It’s during 2011 that they had their battles and Djoko won all their encounters. Djoko had his back issues after their USO epic final, hence we could see his ELO went up to 2601 in Sept after winning the USO that year but was down to 2400+ in Nov when he came back from injury and started losing matches on the HCs.
They had met only once on the HC in 2012, ie that epic AO final. I can’t say that match didn’t affect both of them, for Rafa had to skip a 500 event in Feb which he’s originally scheduled to play, and he had to withdraw from playing the Miami SF (vs Murray) due to injury. Djoko lost in SF at Dubai (which he won the previous year) to Murray and lost in SF at IW to Isner if Im not wrong (which Djoko was also the defending champion). Djoko’s HC ELO went below 2500 after a brief surge in Feb 2012 for winning the AO and its until Oct that year that it went up above 2500 when he started winning at Beijing, Shanghai and WTF.
They did have battles during 2013 and were 2-2 on the HCs and so we saw their ELO moved up to above 2500. Djoko also had battles vs Murray, who by then was already a slam winner so I supposed that added a bit of weight to Djoko’s ELO when he beat Murray at the AO. It’s until Sep in 2014 that Djoko’s ELO dropped to 2478 after losing in the SF of the USO, but after that Djoko started winning his many HC titles – Beijing, Paris and WTF in 2014 and his another 8 HC titles in 2015, hence his ELO stayed consistently above 2500 and from April 2015 stayed at above 2600 and peaked twice at 2706 (Feb 1 and Aug 8 2016) with a rare dip to 2547 on Aug 23, 2015.
Djoko’s highest ELO > Fed’s and Djoko had to fight against ( and sometimes lost to) big four guys Rafa (2013), Murray and Fed (2015 especially) when they’re ranked in top 2 or 3 and they’re multiple slam winners and two of them fellow ATGs. I suppose losing to a fellow ATG certainly won’t help in the ELO ratings compared to winning against one!
Ok, Lucky, so tell me: how does what you just said support 2004-07 being a weak-era on HC? Fed’s average HC and grass ELO during that period is still higher than Nadal’s average during any 4 year period.
One thing I noticed, all three of them seemed to peak on the HCs at or around mid to late 20s – Fed peaked during 2006/2007 ie when he’s 25-26; Rafa peaked during 2013 when he turned 27; Djoko started peaking in 2015 when he’s 28 going on 29.
Joe, isn’t that simple, that Rafa had to battle against three other fellow big four guys and he’s not the best guy on the HCs?
Fed’s HC results from 2009-2012 weren’t as great as his 2004-2007 too despite him playing close to his 2004-2007 level for most of the period.
It seems to me that you’re evading the question: how does what you’ve said support 2004-07 being a weak era on HC?
I agree that nothing is that simple, but that should incline you away from, not toward, the “weak-era” hypothesis. That Rafa had to battle 3 of the other big four is common to all of them, but at any rate the ELO takes that into account.
I also agree that all three peaked in their mid-late 20s, which is the prime for most players. Fed’s decline *began* in 2010, which is not to say that he wasn’t capable of playing great tennis after that. But his (small racquet) best was between 2004 and 07.
Joe, I asked that question, would losing a match vs fellow big four increase one’s ELO > winning a match against them? Now if Djoko for example won all his matches vs the big four, his ELO would certainly be much higher than when he had to lose some to them I believe.
I would say Djoko wasn’t as dominant during 2011-2015/2016 compared to Fed during 2004-2007.
No question that winning matches against top competition raises your ELO much more than losing against them. And Novak lost a lot of matches (but won even more) against the other members of the big four between 2011-16.
I certainly agree that Novak wasn’t as dominant during that period as Fed was between 2004-07, but despite that, he has a higher overall ELO. The reason, again, is mostly due to his better record on clay.
Using this factor (clay performance), one could certainly argue that Djokovic faced superior competition overall from 2011-2016. On the numbers I think he did, though it is hard to ignore that for the last two years of that period (when Djokovic’s clay ELO was highest), Nadal was far from his best.
Anyone who failed to think of Serena and continued with strawman arguments doesn’t deserve thoughtful debate.
Sackmann and Jim Smith said it best.
Pederer is no goat because of the weak era and the racquet is a ruse. All comes down to lack of competition.
Joe Smith doesn’t get it. Owes everyone particularly Serena a big apology neglecting even a mention instead comparing ped to a male cricket player for goat of all sport.
Keep it up joe smith. It’s obvious your mouth is big enough for your other foot. Just a matter of time.
The idea that not mentioning Serena is some sort of problem is rubbish. There are probably 100 sportspeople who could be considered for something like ‘best sportsperson/athlete of all time’, it’s such a difficult thing to assess, and you’re inevitably not going to mention most of them. There are some people who still rate Graf and Court higher than Serena anyway, just as there are people who rank Nadal or Laver over Federer.
And it’s not unreasonable to mention Bradman before many others. As wiki notes, ‘Bradman’s career Test batting average of 99.94 is often cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport’. I recall once reading some poll of sports fans from around the world in which, after seeing the stats, fans rated Bradman as one of the very best. Basically it’s not at all unusual for him to be mentioned in this sort of conversation. Personally I’d say there are a few decent arguments you can make against him being even the best *cricketer* of all time, but that’s neither here nor there.
P.S. You might also want to ask Johnny McEnroe for an apology too while you’re at it, have a listen to his response to the question ‘why not call Serena the greatest tennis player of all time’.
Bowie would not approve of your statement.
(You are not a Bowie fan.)
When addressing the argument(s) proves too difficult, play the person instead and bring up irrelevant stuff for distractions. Everyone will buy into this excellent strategy which is not at all obvious.
Btw pretty sure Bowie, if he was alive and reading tennis forums, wouldn’t have any problem with what I wrote. But I doubt he’d be interested at all. I am a Bowie fan, but that has no relevance to what I’ve said either way.
Spot on, TWD.
You are not a bowie fan to be so male-centric. Like Joe Smith.
Say something intelligent for a change before you expect the same in return – no point arguing with someone like you and joe smith with preformed conclusions repeating the same old shite over and over (so you get the same in return and can’t understand it).
Once a fan has cast their allegiance, they’re not open to changing their mind about anything that could detract from the team/player that they back. Arguments are refuted with cherry-picked out of context half-facts or simply false statements (including strawman arguments) that reinforce their preformed conclusions. The guy who says “spot on” to your comments calls me a “dickhead” with a “sore butt”. That’s hypocritical.
It’s not “difficult” arguing with you or Joe – it’s simply pointless. You and Joe are not open to intelligent discussion. I’ll prove it.
Yes others DO rank players differently based on opinion, but they DO at least compare them. Joe Smith didn’t even THINK to consider a woman as best athlete. THAT’s my point.
Why Serena Williams is the greatest sportsperson ever
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/sep/07/serena-williams-greatest-sportsperson-ever
Oh, and GOAT is opinion, not fact. There is no right or wrong. Get over it.
You have presented no evidence that I’m male-centric whatsoever. I never said there was anything wrong with mentioning Serena. There is in fact a good basis FOR mentioning her. All I said was that you can’t reasonably conclude that it’s unfair not to mention ANY given sportsperson in an argument about the best sportsperson of all time. That’s just an absurd assertion without any logical basis, no matter if it’s Serena, Graff, Court, Ali or Michael Phelps.
“like you and joe smith with preformed conclusions repeating the same old shite over and over”
I didn’t repeat any arguments in that post.
“(so you get the same in return and can’t understand it)”
That would just be hypocritical anyway. Tempting as that might be, if you think some of us Federer fans are just posting trash, try *not* posting trash and lead by example. Most Rafa fans on here do just that. Because one can’t criticise people for posting garbage if they’re going to then proceed to do the same, that would just be hypocritical.
“Once a fan has cast their allegiance, they’re not open to changing their mind about anything that could detract from the team/player that they back. ”
Maybe for some. Personally I can admit I have biases and that my view is subjective, like virtually everyone else. I can and have conceded certain arguments with Rafa/Djokovic fans on many occasions. See e.g. recent debates with Luckystar and other reasonably minded, honest posters on here.
“Yes others DO rank players differently based on opinion, but they DO at least compare them. Joe Smith didn’t even THINK to consider a woman as best athlete. THAT’s my point.”
He mentioned barely a few names off-hand in a discussion, not mentioning someone isn’t actually proof of *anything*, as I’ve already said. If that makes you suspicious of sexism, maybe just ask Joe Smith ‘How do you consider Serena/Graff in the context of the greatest tennis player debate?’
I’ve read The Guardian article before. I do think it’s a fairly compelling case, although of course it is just that, one side of a case, and a pretty good one could probably be made for Graff too, for instance.
“Oh, and GOAT is opinion, not fact. There is no right or wrong. Get over it.”
I never said that it was, you’re creating an argument that I’ve never made. A ‘straw man’, some might say. I’ve never been big on ‘GOAT’ assertions’ and have previously noted the many difficulties in trying to make like-for-like comparisons between eras before.
P.S. Hope this post doesn’t contain too many words. I know it’s a lot, but sometimes when you try and address arguments you necessarily end up using quite a few words.
You still evade my point and make excuses because of selective confirmatory bias on both counts regarding sexism through omission, confirmatory bias preventing open organic debate among factions, and continuing insults all the whole continuing to prove my points.
You are not a Bowie fan nor are you open to anything but stale rigid viewpoints.
And you accuse me of making it personal to which joe agrees yet no comment from you when joe smith does much worse
https://tenngrand.com/roger-federer/comment-page-27/#comment-296027
Proving my points again.
Joe Smith’s attempt at humour directed at me in the link above through innuendo is an insinuation that I want to digitally penetrate big al. He’s repeatedly referred to me having a sore behind and referred to me as a “d***head”
How is that for a tennis argument.
But no comment from the Bowie fan when he does that all because of who we back as tennis players. Again, you prove my point.
The majority of posters on sports or political forums are there to bash the other side refusing to budge from their position instead repeating tired cherry picked statements qualified with insults.
Fans like lucky, vr, rc, Mira andi, Benny, Kevin and Eugene are among the too few exceptions.
What point specifically is being evaded?
No excuses need to be made, because as per my above post, there’s nothing unreasonable in not mentioning any one given player. Ironically, you didn’t even address those arguments, yet are complaining that I’ve evaded points. But amusingly, when people address every little point they get told ‘your posts are too long’.
“Selective confirmatory bias on both counts regarding sexism through omission, confirmatory bias preventing open organic debate among factions, and continuing insults all the whole continuing to prove my points.”
For any of these things to be actual arguments you have to back them up with evidence, i.e. what I’ve said. Otherwise it’s just a wiki list of cognitive biases. Where are the continuing insults?
“You are not a Bowie fan nor are you open to anything but stale rigid viewpoints.”
Another baseless assertion, you have know way of knowing whether I or any other random person on here is a Bowie fan. Of course, it doesn’t have one ounce of relevance anyway, hence the focus on it & the avoidance of actual arguments/substance.
I didn’t accuse you of making it personal. Where in my post did I say that/words to that effect?
There goes that ‘argument’.
And yeah, I’d agree that insults shouldn’t be hurled, and that people shouldn’t call others dickheads, even if, for example, they may feel another poster is attempting to make arguments personal.
Could only get through the first third of your post.
More of the same proving all of my points.
Been there. Done that.
Someone who’s so obviously not a Bowie fan is not worth the effort of open discussion.
THASP. Nadal is the obvious GOAT. Weak Era all over again. Yada yada yada.
For your points to be proven you’d actually have to, well, posit some.
More trolling about David Bowie, great stuff. Funny how this recent run of wins for Federer seems to be resulting in a few certain tennis fans baiting Fed supporters. Incessant, repeated insult posts popping up on the Roger Federer page and all. Fed is on PEDs (evidence – we don’t need no stinkin’ evidence), it’s the Weak era again, it’s the rigged tournaments, it’s the favoritism, it’s [insert straw you’d like to clutch at here]. Hell, maybe it’s all of them combined, yes, that makes sense! Funny then, if it’s all true, that it should cause such consternation & mental gymnastics.
Ah well, I’m sure it’ll all be okay in the end. Just remember to rock back and forth and repeat ‘Nadal is the GOAT, Nadal is the GOAT’. If you chant it enough times, it might just be true. If you’re really feeling insecure, sorry, confident, try a ‘Sampras was definitely better too’.
TLDR for brevity’s sake –
#MoreSaltThantheAegean
Why should I repost what I already posted? By refuting them, you’ve already admitted I’ve posted some. Now you say I haven’t. Proving my point again.
No, not baiting Fed supporters because of Fed’s success. Joe Smith’s first post here about a year or so ago was admitting his stated goal of stirring things up because posters here were too polite. Ironically, more often than not, you seem to appear here when the crap starts to fly, and rarely to discuss tennis.
And all the other shite is simply reflecting crap same old same old. It’s called cheap effortless parody because it’s all that is deserved in most cases – again, my point. OTOH, I’ve had great discussions with the posters I’ve mentioned above fedfans and rafans alike without the tired echo chamber crap you’ve mentioned.
And when it’s repetitious with nothing new, yes, brevity beats quantity every time hands down.
Hawks, thinwhiteduke said “posit” not “post.” Just letting u know
Which I’ve already done BG. But thanks.
You haven’t posited anything though. As soon as I responded to the Serena topic, you start talking about Bowie instead of sticking to the arguments.
The baiting is all over the Roger Federer pages, among others. Posts with brevity but zero substance, repeated ad nauseam – ‘Pederer, #Reusable’. The same hashtags, the same evidence-free claims. Not constructive, and not actually talking tennis, just bait.
The reasonable Rafa fans (of which there are many here) don’t bother with this tit for tat garbage, they are not hypocritical. They know how unfair the doping accusations against Rafa were, and they’re not going to post the same bs about Fed just because Fed (or Djokovic) fans posted it about Rafa. Parody? If it were parody it might be original, constructive, clever, or witty, for a start. Instead it’s just the same crap but from the opposite direction, no point pretending otherwise.
Exactly. Bad parody is all you deserve.
You either intentionally miss the point on Serena or you’re not very bright. I suspect the former but either way, your dime a dozen approach doesn’t warrant thoughtful response because experience shows it falls on deaf rigid selective bias filtering.
There’s no point unless it’s just to raise ire as Joe Smith admitted when he started posting here was his objective.
You disappear and only seem to reappear when something bothers you so you fall into the same category. You and joe smith are not here to discuss tennis. You’re here to “stir things up” in the homophobe’s own words. Admit it.
I must ‘not [be] very bright’, cause I’m not sure what point I’m missing re: Joe Smith and not mentioning Serena Williams. There are probably dozens of other athletes who could’ve been mentioned, not mentioning *anyone* in one off-hand post demonstrates zilch. I don’t think Joe Smith mentioned Steffi Graf either, maybe he has a prejudice against female German athletes. Didn’t mention Joe Frazier? Must have a prejudice against black athletes. The whole point is so obviously arguments ad absurdum, as I indicated. Yeah, we’re on a tennis forum, and anyone could mention Serena Williams and make a case for her being the sports ‘GOAT’, but it’s not some grievous oversight or injustice that Don Bradman gets mentioned and she happens not to, it’s just listing a few possible candidates, nothing more. I doubt you’d even bother to take another poster to task over all this, except for the fact that it’s a Fed fan you don’t like.
I have no interest in raising ire or ‘stirring things up’. As pretty much all my posts to other posters show, I’m here to discuss/debate tennis. I don’t go around making inflammatory remarks like ‘Pederer’, accuse people of biases without backing it up, or incessantly state ‘[insert poster here] doesn’t get it’ because I think they’re making a bad argument. To me there’s nothing interesting about that.
Then you are sexist.
“…as pretty much…” Is a Greudian slip.
‘Then you are sexist’
Another evidence-free personal sledge, ho-hum. When you can’t cope with arguments, attack the commentator.
“as pretty much is a Greudian slip”
It’s not even a slip at all though, it’s an explicit and *deliberate* acknowledgment that like most users on here, I’ve occasionally made off-topic/non-tennis related posts.
The evidence is plain to see unless you are sexist.
Educate yourself.
And no, that most of your posts here are about tennis is a revisionionistic fabrication (a lie).
You have a misunderstanding of the word occasionally.
“The evidence is plain to see unless you are sexist.”
In other words, you have no argument(s). Great.
“And no, that most of your posts here are about tennis is a revisionionistic fabrication (a lie).”
If you (or anyone else) actually look at my posting history you’ll see that’s factually incorrect. It’s almost all tennis discussion, except for this exchange, obviously, because you refuse to address the subject here despite all my attempts. I don’t go around posting rubbish like ‘#Pederer’ ‘[insert poster here] doesn’t get it’ ‘Nothing new from Fed fawns’ again and again. Happy to leave that stuff to the ‘fans’ who want to play tit for tat.
Since you don’t appear to have any interest in addressing substantive arguments at this time, I’m done with this exchange.
Yes. I’ve posted them already. Not here to spoon feed you.
Get over yourself.
“Except for this exchange”
Another revisionististic fabrication.
There have been several other altercations.
TWD, I’m sure you can see that you’re spinning your wheels trying to have a rational conversation with hawkeye. He’s temperamentally and probably intellectually incapable of it. Despite what he says, it really is too hard for him.
What I really liked was your suggestion that he lead by example (of civil behaviour). It’ll never happen, of course, but the idea applies to all of us and it’s good to be reminded of it. Actually, this whole forum is remarkably civil except for Hawkeye. I’ve off-handedly insulted him a couple of times out of pure exasperation, but 99.9% of my posts are straightforward tennis analysis/opinion and non-personal.
homophobe sexist hypocritical joe smith is just in his own words here to “stir things up” as he also does with personal attacks on other poster here :
https://tenngrand.com/roger-federer/comment-page-27/#comment-296027
It’s obvious that Sampras was the goat of grass. He didn’t have the weak era to pad his grass slam count.
Same for Djokovic who is obviously the king of hard court.
Rafa is king of clay and in my opinion the goat of men’s tennis.
Rather subjective to say that the Sampras era wasn’t weak
As is this whole debate,players can only play who’s there,no reason to take away from their achievements.
Agassi, Becker just to name two.
Roddick? Please.
I don’t agree at all that Sampras had to face any stiffer competition at Wimby than Federer ever did… I would say Roddick and Goran are equals in terms of how good they were on grass. The only reason Roddick never won it was because he never got that 4th chance in a Final to face a player he could actually beat, just like Goran got when he got Rafter in the final instead of Pete again.
Then there was Agassi who Pete had to face twice there, but Pete was just a million times better than Agassi on grass. I’d say the equivalent to that for Fed was Rafa, who you consider the GOAT. Fed had to beat him twice for the title.
Fed also beat Novak and Murray for another title. Sampras did have to to beat Becker, although he was passed his prime, but I will give you that one because Becker is an all-time great.
This is an extremely close and subjective comparison. I agree that you could choose Sampras as having faced a little more competition on grass, but there is no question that you could argue just as easily that Federer had it harder on grass. Let’s not pretend like it’s just night and day between the two at Wimbledon…
Roddick didn’t win Wimbledon because he really was not a top level player, even on grass, despite playing that one great match in 2009. As soon as the so-called “weak era” ended Roddick sank into the bottom of the Top 10, where he stayed quite consistently.
Roger’s been lucky – and unlucky – lucky to play much of his tennis against players who simply weren’t as good as he is, and unlucky to have to play against younger players who are, at their best, quite simply better than he is. But it all counts, and to paraphrase Rafa: Roger’s got the records but Novak reached a higher level. In short, longevity counts, health counts, consistency counts, and luck counts. But is there a GOAT? Baaaahhhhh
GOAT is based on results. All else is subjective opinion. And “weak-era” is unsupported by ELO.
FWIW, the highest level of tennis I’ve ever witnessed (live and several times since), is McEnroe’s annihilation of Connors in the 1984 wimby final. He was using a graphite racquet by then, and imo would been competitive and quite possibly beaten any player since, including Federer, Sampras, or Djokovic at their best on grass.
In the entire 3 set match (6-1, 6-1, 6-2), McEnroe hit 10 aces, no DF, a gazillion winners, and only 3 enforced errors. It was an insane performance.
Joe Smith doesn’t understand that GOAT is based on subjective interpretation of facts to form an opinion.
But he doesn’t get that the best athlete in the world doesn’t have to be male.
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis quantitatively proves that pederer is not the defacto GOAT and Jim Smith provides a strong argument that says don’t believe the hype explaining that injuries severely weakened ped’s competition back to Weak Era levels and the racquet is a ruse to cover for that and possible use of PEDs by the only player in top 10 north of 32 winning just about everything.
But it bears mention again, to dismiss Serena without mention says a lot about the stale thinking from a certain claimed fan of tennis.
This is the tricky part about arguing what-ifs. Just like we have to recognize that the other 2 GOATS weren’t at their primes pre-2008, we also have to be fair and recognize that Federer just was not the same player after 2007. Rafa really hit his prime, and Novak won his first major as well as the WTF, but Federer was clearly not the same. I don’t deny that having mono or whatever was a factor, but I think it’s just that most players have their absolute peak, and then they start to fall off. 5 to 6 years is typically how long a players absolute prime, at least physically speaking, lasts. That’s the age difference between Federer and Rafa/Novak. We can argue until the cows come home who we think would have won had 2005/2006 Federer, 2008 Rafa, and 2011/2015 Novak played Wimbledon at the same time, or if 2005/2006 Fed, 2010/2013 Rafa, and 2011/2015 Novak played at the US Open at the same time, etc. But there’s just no way to measure this, especially when the game was so different even just between when Fed was in his prime and when Rafa/Novak were in their primes. It’s another reason of a million why the idea of one of these guys somehow being considered objectively “better” than the other two is just so proposterous to me…
*Meant to say 2008/2010 Rafa for Wimby
Agreed. To the point that it’s laughable when you look at their respective incredible accomplishments.
Unless you restrict the conversation to just clay as opposed to just men’s tennis.
I’m talking about grass competition from 2002-07.
The weak era didn’t start in 2003 as a certain fed-centric Serena-dismissive fanboy thinks.
But Kevin and Al, you completely get the subjective nature of it all.
Two or three here don’t.
Agree Kevin, Roddick was as good if not better than many players in the Sampras era. His record on grass is pretty damn good.
Roddick LOL. One slam wonder and former No. 1 in the midst of the Weak Era and abuser of umpires and lines persons. One of federers many minions.
Rafa could rarely play at his best all year ,he was either injured or simply tired.
But,that’s a result of the type of game he played/plays,no need to blame anyone else.Like saying it was because of Djoko that he was injured in 2009,thus making it easy for Fed.
You have to take into consideration Rafa’s congenital foot issue to start with. Don’t blame his injuries on the type of game he played; Djoko played a similar game and wasn’t that injury prone. It’s more to do with poor scheduling – Rafa just stick to playing a full schedule almost always even though he’s given exemption to skip some; Djoko in some seasons played only 15 or 16 events.
Rafa also tends to grind on clay even when he’s good enough to play a more aggressive game to beat his opponents more quickly. Given that he’s so successful on clay that means he plays more matches on clay than most of the other guys, he’s bound to feel the physical strain more than the other players who played fewer matches on clay.
He’s one who prefers to rally than to serve big to finish points quickly so he’s doing more harm to himself when he’s playing on the HCs which he said it’s more damaging to the joints.
luckystar AT 6:48 PM.
Rafa has always scheduled a normal number events. The narrative “Rafa’s poor scheduling” has been a product of Fedfans’ propaganda machine. Rafa fans shouldn’t let themselves be influenced by Fedfans’ propaganda.
Big Al is wrong.
Nadal admitted to not training properly after AO in 2009 because his parents separated.
Oh right. Never heard that one before .So together with the congenital thing ,tough match in Madrid, poor scheduling, I guess Federer deserves very little credit for his 2009 successes.
Forgot to mention Rafas poor choice of tactics , but that’s more Tonis department.
Small al has such sour grapes lol.
Not at all. Ive always given credit to pederer for capitalizing when the top four are injured and for backing out when they’re not (only player to default a wtf final not because he couldn’t play but, according to Fed, because he’d have no chance to beat Nole. Only to play in and win dc final a few days later. Not to mention skipping the whole clay season last year but watch him slink in to clay if Rafa is away.
Yes. Full credit to him.
What a list of excuses for Nadals losses.
How many times has Federer defaulted or retired through injury ?
Better to retire when injured than withdraw admitting he couldn’t win which is what Federer did just days before a miraculous recovery to win Davis Cup having only deciding to play dc that year days after Nole pulled out and Nadal already our.
Full credit where credit is due.
Big Al has never updated himself about Rafa yet he’s here arguing about him with the Rafa fans?? You’ve never heard of it that doesn’t mean it never existed or happened!
It’s well documented that Rafa has/had his foot issue and he was absent for three to four months from late Oct 2005 to Feb 2006 because of his foot issue. He had to wear special insole in his shoe for his left foot, apparently he and his father went searching for a good shoe maker to help with Rafa’s foot issue during that period of time but wasn’t successful until Nike decided to make a special insole for him and he’s playing tennis with that insole in his shoe since.
The insole helped a bit when Rafa was able to play for two years without injury after coming back in Feb 2006, but had developed knee tendinitis late 2007 ( many suspected that’s due to him trying to accommodate that foot issue that it affected his knees). He was plagued by knee tendinitis since.
Many said his injuries were due to his style of play but should he not be compromised by his foot issue, I very much expect him to be fine just like Djoko, who played a similar style to Rafa,
I had seen an aggressive Rafa who’s almost impossible to beat even without a great serve the like of Fed’s, so he’s more than capable of playing a more offensive style to win his matches in shorter time and not much grinding. It’s just that 1) he played more matches on clay than his fellow top players because he’s more successful than them and had generally played one more event (Barcelona) on clay, so he had generally spent more time on court compared to them, on clay where longer points were played; 2) he’s brought up as a counterpuncher and so tend to rally more before counterattacking, rather than winning points with aces or one two punches.
Well,that all maybe true,I’m not arguing,but I don’t understand why you keep bringing it up as a reason why Rafa hasn’t won more.
A similar case could be made for other players.Things happen as they happen,no point in its,buts and maybes.
Eg,Sampras started out as a baseline,if he hadn’t changed his career would have followed a very different path.
As far as Federer goes,that bit of luck was there too,in kick-starting his success.
Nope, I don’t always talked about it unless the Fed fanatics started denigrating Rafa and his achievements, as if he could only win on clay. Just ask yourself, do you think Fed would win his FO in 2009 when he met Rafa in the final? You can’t deny Fed did take advantage of Rafa’s misfortune even though you’re unhappy we talked about it; Fed was ready to take advantage while others, like Delpo, for example, couldn’t, and I give him credit for that.
Well, Lucky, do you see how referring to 2004-07 as part of a “weak-era” is denigrating Federer’s incredible achievement during that era?
Especially when the ELO numbers show that off clay (that is, on the surfaces in which Federer actually won his titles) 2004-07 was as strong if not stronger than any other period in recent tennis history?
Well, Joe Smith, do you see how referring to a male cricket player without even a mention of Serena as part of an “all sport GOAT” is denigrating Serena’s incredible achievement during that career?
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO analysis easily shows that pederer is no defacto GOAT and Bill Smith shows how the lack of competition since 2017 is the reason for Federer’s recent success.
#DontBelieveTheHype
#RacquetRuse
#RememberSerena
Of course Djoko was a big factor in 2009, don’t forget he beat Fed twice, at Miami and Rome, and later beating Fed in his own backyard Basel that year.
Rafa and Djoko killing each other in that 4 hour epic Madrid SF match had definitely damaged their chances at the FO that year, leading to Rafa having knee issue and had to miss Wimbledon and Djoko losing early at the FO.
In Djokos case they was probably more mental.He was disappointed at coming so close.
Djoko wasn’t affected by injuries, but Rafa was; don’t forget Rafa suffered injury prior to meeting Djoko, at Rotterdam final, that Madrid SF had done him in, adding salt to his wound.
You’re quoting a poor example about Sampras as s baseliner. I can also say the same thing about Rafa starting out as an attacking player instead of being a counterpuncher, but that’s different from suffering from injuries. You don’t choose to get injured while you can choose what style you want to adopt.
You can’t choose your opponent either and in Rafa’s case, he couldn’t beat Djoko sooner in the match because Djoko was an ATG in the making and happened to be a real threat on clay, more so than Fed was.
Ls,it’s still a big what if that Nadal would have been as successful as an attacking player,just as Sampras or Edberg as baseline grinders.
Yeah we got no clue if Rafa would have even been effective with an all out aggression kind of style. These guys usually play the way they played as they grew up and learned the sport. It’s not like Rafa took every ball early growing up then decided to counterpunch when starting on the tour. There’s a reason Rafa counterpunches. It’s because it’s what he’s best at.
Nope, Toni even mentioned that Rafa was way more offensive when he was younger; and looking at how he played during his younger days, it’s not difficult to see that he could be a good to great attacking player.
It was Toni who trained him to become a thinking player, even told him not to serve too quickly but to think before he served, after noticing that Rafa was quick when he serve. I do feel that Toni was/is more a tactical coach than a technical coach, and I feel that may be why Rafa was lacking in his serve and took years to get to possess a reasonably good serve now.
I’ve mentioned earlier that perhaps Toni thought that on clay the serve wasn’t that crucial; and it took them until 2010 to figure out that Rafa needed a big serve to win the USO and so they engaged some outside help. I’m not sure that prior to that, did they seek help from other sources where Rafa’s serve was concerned.
Without a good to great serve, it’s more difficult to be a good to great attacking player, perhaps Toni thought that it’s better that Rafa became a counterpuncher instead.
And Benny, one need not always take the ball early to be an attacking player; look at Delpo or Cilic or Berdych, they need not take the ball early but could attack from the baseline with sheer pace and power plus a great serve.
Rafa was more willing to move forward to attack when he could seize the chances during his early days, but as he became more successful on clay, he started staying back and played his rallying game. It’s not difficult to see that Rafa has the skill sets to play and win at the net when he chooses to come forward; he doesn’t acquire those skills overnight, but from playing in doubles as and when he could throughout his career and so picked up those skills.
lucky, your tennis knowledge is unmatched on this site.
VR quite good too.
fedfans should be paying you for the schooling you give them for free.
Time to recap a bit on the “weak-era” hypothesis.
First, the main point of that hypothesis is, and has always been, to denigrate Federer’s unparalleled record from 2004-07. No male player has ever won 11 slams in a four year period (to go with 2 finals and 2 SF), and Fed’s detractors have -rather pathetically- felt the need to minimize that achievement.
One way is simply to pronounce it part of the “weak-era,” but that’s obviously sheer subjective opinion without supporting argument. Do the “weak-era” supporters have any arguments? We’ve seen two; let’s consider them in turn.
First, it’s said that 2004-07 had few if any strong champions except for Federer (and Nadal on clay). Specifically, players like Hewitt, Roddick, and Safin weren’t able to win multiple titles during that period. This is a terrible argument, and in itself shows nothing.
Imagine 60 players at the same level as peak Federer, who all maintained that level for 15 years. That would obviously be the strongest era ever -past, present or future. Yet one would expect, on the odds alone, that each of those 60 players would win only one slam title in 15 years -and appear in only one other slam final. So the first argument shows nothing.
The second argument is based on numerical facts, namely, ELO ratings. The main piece of evidence is that Federer’s peak overall ELO (2558) is lower than both Nadal’s (2563) and Djokovic’s (2623), obtained after 2007. The problem with this argument, as I’ve shown, is that it is heavily influenced (especially in Nadal’s case) by Nadal and Djokovic’s ELO rating on clay.
That in itself is not a problem, but if one focuses on HC and grass -3/4/ of the tennis season- the ELO case for 2004-07 being a “weak era” disappears. 2007. Compared to Nadal, 2004-07 Federer has a higher peak and average ELO on both HC and grass. Compared to Djokovic, 2004-07 Federer has a higher peak and average ELO on grass. On HC, 2004-07 Fed and 2011-16 Djokovic are almost indistinguishable, both in terms of average and peak ELO.
In short, the two main arguments for 2004-07 being a weak era collapse when they are examined closely. Proponents of the idea can and no doubt will mindlessly continue to refer to it in that way, but anyone who cares to use their mind to think should recognize that it’s sheer biased opinion.
Weak-era hypothesis, RIP.
More like brevity RIP. Get over yourself Joe Smith. Nobody gonna read all that from you lol.
Jeff Sackmann’s ELO is a better read on why pederer isn’t goat. He writes from a position of experience, intelligence and objectivity.
You’re just another fanboy (with sexist views at that ignoring Serena instead going all the way to look at a male cricket player).
Show some small thread of originality and objectivity before writing excessively. Who gonna bother with all that?
But to ignore Serena like that and call yourself a tennis fan? Seriously man you need to apologize.
I think Joe has put a rational argument there,in contrast to the personal attack following.
“and Fed’s detractors have -rather pathetically-”
is not how a rational argument begins (unless you’re a fellow fedfan).
(and certainly ISN’T “in contrast to the personal attack following.”
#ConfirmatoryBias
#AndThisIsWhyYouFail
#AndThisIsWhyIdontBother
#THASP
Thanks, Al. I’m still waiting for one single Rafa fan to rationally engage with the argument, since the fans on this thread appear to be unwilling or unable. Maybe VR will put down his books and have a go.
Why? You don’t.
#PractiseWhatYouPreach
#RememberSerena
#THASP
Most career achievements: http://www.ultimatetennisst…
Peak form: http://www.ultimatetennisst…
Most records: http://www.ultimatetennisst…
http://www.tennisworldusa.org/tennis/news/Roger_Federer/52487/adriano-panatta-federer-is-the-champion-in-the-richest-era-of-champions-/
There you go.
Tango Lad, interesting anagram .Last Tango in Paris springs to mind 😉
Start to worry if he asks you to pull out your nail clipper…
Showing your true colours.
Homophobe Joe Smith.
Given all your talk about my sore bum, calling me d***head and references to anal play, I’m guessing that you might be the one in the closet Joe Smith. Sounds like you’re holding a lot of shame about it too.
There’s nothing wrong with being gay Joe.