Wimbledon 2011

[Yoga]

I predict Rafa wins in a 5 set thriller over Novak

Novak proved me wrong. Its nice to see someone else beside Rafa and Fed win the major grandslams.

[Jugs]

good match last night. dont know why I got so excited I dont even like nole

[Slava]

Great to see Djoker win this. Now Imma go watch the tivo'd game.

[Ong_dynasty]

(Federer never won Roland Garros, Wimbledon, US Open in the same season. That's the hardest thing to do in a season, especially now that all 3 are on completely different surfaces. Rafa is the only man in history to win Roland Garros, Wimbledon, US Open in the same season on 3 completely different surfaces [Rafa won those 3 slams in a row last year, and he also became the first player ever to win 3 Masters Shields in a row. He also made the Final of the Indoor World Tour Finals, a year after going winless in that event]. I guess Rafa will have to win 4 slams in a row to dominate a season as much as you'd hope)

Let me try to be really precise here:

For me it's not about Nadal's 3 slams being less than others winning 3 slams. It's about factoring in everything a player plays to get the best picture of his ability to dominate. Of course I weigh the slams more than other matches, but this notion that non-major matches are completely different from the slams is silly.

3 players in question, here are their # of losses in their 4 best seasons before this year:

Federer: 4, 5, 6, 9
Nadal: 10, 10, 11, 12
Djokovic: 17, 18, 19, 19

It would be one thing if Nadal constantly disappointed in non-majors, and constantly dominated in the majors, but that's never been the case, people just get that impression because he's won in the finals at majors. However, before the finals he's much less dominant than someone like Federer.

Which is why Federer has 2 years where he won 3 majors and lost in the 4 finals of the 4th, an additional year where he made the finals in all tournaments, has two separate streaks where he made 10 & 8 finals in a row, while Nadal's for even making the semi's in a row is only 5 (and Fed's semi streak was of course 23).

Also, just for perspective, if we take out the French, here's how the 3 players in question look at major finals:

Federer 15-3
Nadal 4-3
Djokovic 3-2

The scale of which people perspective is skewed simply because Nadal's the clay GOAT, and Federer's easily Top 5 of all-time on clay, is utterly mind-blowing. If Federer were worse on clay, people would actually think he had a stronger case for overall GOAT.

Huh? how can you take out clay? If we take out Grass and Hard. how wouold there perspective major finals look like?
You cannot do that. As I said before I think Clay court players get the short end of the stick becuase Grass and Hard are very similar so in theory if you are good in one, you will naturally be good in the other. While in clay, you dont have that. and why I think it is harder to rack up majors and why I think what Nadal is doing is impressive. (but maybe I am biased)
And the reason I used to rate and still rate Federer quite highly is because he was not inept in Clay, he just went against probably the best player in clay of all time.

My problem with Federer has always been i felt he played and racked up trophies in a weaker era than what nadal and djokovic will be doing. He was able to rack up a few before he actually started having real competition (and that was only initially clay). His inability to actually overcome Federer in the french and his poor record against him also makes me irk in calling him the G.O.A.T (but i do).

If Nadal will have problems with Novak the way Federer did with Nadal, than the criticism will be the same.

As I said before I think if Nadal reaches say 12 - 14 (while winning a few more hard courts / wimbledon titles) you can make an argument as best ever without needing to surpass Federer's titles. now that is a big if considering how Novak is playing.

With regards to the match. I thought Nadal played bad. But Novak for 1 set and 1/2 was phenomenal.
I thought rafa was good for 1 set. I have said before as well, I feel rafa's "peak" in games is not as high as alot of players, but he plays in such a consistent level that players like federer struggle to keep it up.
My criticism of nadal is that in the 4th, he kinda gave the set away without making novak work hard, you can see Novak was tentative but he never had the same intensity as the 3rd to take advantage. His serve was piss poor when he needed it the most.

[KING JAMES1978]

As I said before I think if Nadal reaches say 12 - 14 (while winning a few more hard courts / wimbledon titles) you can make an argument as best ever without needing to surpass Federer's titles. now that is a big if considering how Novak is playing.

Nadal will never be greater than Federer and Sampras.It's not only the titles.Federer is by far the most fun to watch player ever(imo with Sampras second) and technically is miles better than Rafa.
Federer's playing style is the best in Tennis history.Rafa's isn't even top-5.

[Ong_dynasty]

^^
most fun - best ever?

So where does darius miles rank? did you see that oop to oop?

Rafa's playing style is boring or not even better than sampras is a joke.

I also love when people say with certainty "never". it cracks me up.

[KING JAMES1978]

^^
most fun - best ever?

So where does darius miles rank? did you see that oop to oop?

Rafa's playing style is boring or not even better than sampras is a joke.

I also love when people say with certainty "never". it cracks me up.

Joke is if you believe that Nadal's style is better than Pete's.Big Joke!
Sampras technically is the 2nd best ever only behind Federer.
Also Borg>Nadal technically.

[Raps in 4]

As I said before I think if Nadal reaches say 12 - 14 (while winning a few more hard courts / wimbledon titles) you can make an argument as best ever without needing to surpass Federer's titles. now that is a big if considering how Novak is playing.

Nadal will never be greater than Federer and Sampras.It's not only the titles.Federer is by far the most fun to watch player ever(imo with Sampras second) and technically is miles better than Rafa.
Federer's playing style is the best in Tennis history.Rafa's isn't even top-5.

You could already make a case that he's better than both. He has a 17-8 record against the supposed "GOAT". Yes, I know that most of those wins came on clay, but that is an impressive record nonetheless. I think with a few more slams under his belt (especially on hardcourts) he'll be in the discussion a lot more.

[Doctor MJ]

Huh? how can you take out clay? If we take out Grass and Hard. how wouold there perspective major finals look like?
You cannot do that. As I said before I think Clay court players get the short end of the stick becuase Grass and Hard are very similar so in theory if you are good in one, you will naturally be good in the other. While in clay, you dont have that. and why I think it is harder to rack up majors and why I think what Nadal is doing is impressive. (but maybe I am biased)
And the reason I used to rate and still rate Federer quite highly is because he was not inept in Clay, he just went against probably the best player in clay of all time.

My problem with Federer has always been i felt he played and racked up trophies in a weaker era than what nadal and djokovic will be doing. He was able to rack up a few before he actually started having real competition (and that was only initially clay). His inability to actually overcome Federer in the french and his poor record against him also makes me irk in calling him the G.O.A.T (but i do).

If Nadal will have problems with Novak the way Federer did with Nadal, than the criticism will be the same.

As I said before I think if Nadal reaches say 12 - 14 (while winning a few more hard courts / wimbledon titles) you can make an argument as best ever without needing to surpass Federer's titles. now that is a big if considering how Novak is playing.

Let me be clear: When I evaluate the players, I do not take out the clay. What I'm doing here is trying to clear up a distorted perspective others have.

If Federer were worse on clay and could never get to the Finals of the clay tournaments, there Nadal would lose essentially the only argument he has over Federer right now. There would be no reason at all to say Nadal was better on the biggest stage, and Nadal wouldn't even have a significant edge in the head-to-head.

If Player A getting worse can make people less likely to say Player B > Player A, what we have is people with poorly thought out analysis that needs to be corrected.

Re: weaker era. This is an important thing to consider, no doubt. Some perspective though:

1. In Federer's best year (2006), he lost to only 2 people all year. In Nadal's best year (2010), he lost to 10 different people.

2. Thus far, Nadal has only made the semi-finals in all majors in a given year once, in 2008. Federer did it for 5 straight year from 2005 to 2009.

3. Even more amazing: In Federer's 5 year run, his only losses in majors came at the hands of the eventual champion. By contrast, in both Nadal's non-wins in 2008, he lost to the eventual finals loser.

I don't know your opinion about how eras change in strength, but to me it's quite clear: If nothing seriously disrupts a sport, the general talent level stays about the same in consecutive eras. It is the outlier talent that rises and falls.

I'm right there with you that the outlier talent right now is amazing. However, that outlier talent does not include guys like Melzer, Lopez, Garcia-Lopez, or Ljubicic. Yet it is those type of guys who have kept Rafa from dominating with the consistency Federer did, not Novak Djokovic.

It thus becomes unreasonable to give Nadal a major boost based on era.

Re: "If Rafa struggles with Djokovic, I'll criticisize him too"

What will you do if?

Rafa wins the head-to-head with Fed
Novak wins the head-to-head with Rafa
Fed wins the head-to-head with Novak

I think looking at these things as a way to put chinks in a guys armor can get really problematic.

[Doctor MJ]

^^
most fun - best ever?

So where does darius miles rank? did you see that oop to oop?

Rafa's playing style is boring or not even better than sampras is a joke.

I also love when people say with certainty "never". it cracks me up.

Joke is if you believe that Nadal's style is better than Pete's.Big Joke!
Sampras technically is the 2nd best ever only behind Federer.
Also Borg>Nadal technically.

I don't see Sampras' as a clearly superior example of a beautiful or technical player. Count me among those who wants to see someone with the all around game to thrive on all surfaces.

I will say that I love watching a great serve & volley player like Sampras...but I also think it's breath taking to watch anyone who has truly mastered clay. (Kind of like watching hockey)

[KING JAMES1978]

You could already make a case that he's better than both. He has a 17-8 record against the supposed "GOAT". Yes, I know that most of those wins came on clay, but that is an impressive record nonetheless. I think with a few more slams under his belt (especially on hardcourts) he'll be in the discussion a lot more.

Again Nadal hasn't the beauty in his game like Federer.Federer is an artist.
Look the Greatness in a simple video.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGggP2_dWxY[/youtube]
Also I don't think that Nadal will surpass 16 slams.
And something else.Most former and current players and analysts consider Federer as the GOAT.
At this point Nadal isn't Top-4 ever.
1.Federer
2.Sampras
3.Borg
4.Laver

[Slava]

I watched about 90% of Sampras' career and I can attest that he was one of the most boring players to watch ever. His serve and volley game is perfection but boring at the same time.

He also had a charisma to rival that of Tim Duncan.

[KING JAMES1978]

Sampras boring?Wow.
To me Nadal is one of the most boring players ever.I don't say that he isn't of the greats but his style isn't impressive like Federer,Sampras,Borg,Aggasi.
Also Novak's style to me is more exciting than Rafa's.

[AdamTheGreek]

Sampras' game was efficient and mostly consistent, not boring. No one has his serve-volley game. If anyone were to master it, they'd be winning countless grand slams right now. Even the best tennis players don't know how to consistently beat a superb serve-volley game.

[hunnygee]

so at the end Novak Djokovic takes the title.
congratulation for Novak Djokovic for winning this world's great title.

[Doctor MJ]

Sampras' game was efficient and mostly consistent, not boring. No one has his serve-volley game. If anyone were to master it, they'd be winning countless grand slams right now. Even the best tennis players don't know how to consistently beat a superb serve-volley game.

I'm not going to claim I have the definitive answer for how people would handle Sampras' serve & volley game now. However when you mention "countless grand slams", I feel the need to make clear the level of dominance of Federer relative to Sampras outside of Wimbledon.

Sampras was basically unbeatable at Wimbledon for 8 years '93 to '00.
In that time period, he won 5 hard court majors, and appeared in 7 finals in 14 attempts. So his odds of getting to a Finals on hard court was about 50%.

Of course, the man couldn't dream of getting to the Finals at the French. So a 0% chance there.

From '04 to '10, Federer played 14 hard court majors. He won 9, and went to 11 finals. He was drastically more successful on hard court than Sampras in their respective primes.

Then there's the French, where he went to 4 finals in 7 attempts. Better than 50% chance, which means he was more dominant on even clay than Sampras was on hard court if you accept the premise that Nadal was essentially untouchable.

Sampras was unbeatable on grass. That's it. He was unbeatable on grass, and so much weaker than Federer on other surfaces, because his game was so amazingly dependent on how the ball played on grass.

So here's the key: If the grass courts truly has slowed down to the point that there isn't a major difference between it and hard courts, then Sampras would play today on grass a lot more like he did on hard court - not nearly as well as Federer. If players today are more adept at handling big serves in general, that's another push in the same direction.

But as I say, I can't say definitively how much things have chanced. All I do know is that things have changed to some degree, and now no one seems to be succeeding using the strategy Sampras and others used before.

[BowmanG]

Hi guys! How do you think who does have good chances to win Wimbledon 2012 among women? Perhaps that will be someone from our country?