How Many Grand Slam Titles Will Djokovic End His Career With?

[Sundaymorningguy]

I hope at some point he moves to a clothing sponsor more fitting of his status Uniqlo is very meh.

 

[Riotbeard]

I was the one who "retaliated" after you claimed 2004-2009 was weak competition.

Can you prove it?

your claim that this is a stronger era than 2004-2009 is just plain delusional.

I said 2011-2016 is a stronger era than 2004-2009 http://www.tennisfrontier.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=4699&pid=227082#pid227082
You are delusional if you believe otherwise.

Old Federer and banged up past his prime Nadal and incidentally one couldn't even play the last slam and the other quit after the 2nd round. You lost me with 2011-2016 being a stronger era and delusional sorry :nono Meanwhile the guy who Novak beat at RG is a mighty 2-8 in slam finals. Am I missing something or are there other guys out there challenging Novak? :cover Stan 2 matches every decade? Last 3 slam finals Federer and Djokovic played guess who had an overwhelming advantage. Could it be the guy nearly 34/35? I think not. Pull the other one with the nonsense that this is a strong era in tennis right now please 'cos no one at all is buying that.

Seems to me your problem is you see the names Nadal and Federer and because they were once great you make out this "era" is strong but that is not the case as they haven't been great for a long time now. To his credit, Djokovic is clearly playing fantastic a lot of the time (not all of the time mind you as he wasn't particularly impressive for long stretches even when winning tournament after tournament as the competition he faces are far from great) and it's not his fault players are old/well past their primes and near retirement (Federer and Nadal), poor (Berdych, Ferrer, Tsonga, etc) Murray in slam finals (horrendous 2-8 record as aforementioned) and you can only play who is in the final at the time but to say these old, banged up or inconsistent players make it a strong era is just fairy tale stuff I'm afraid.

To be fair, Fed's slam final opponents were Andy Roddick (1-4 in slam finals), Mark Philippoussis (0-2), Marat Safin (2-2), Leyton Hewitt (2-2), Old Agassi (8-7), Marcos Bagdhatis (0-1), Rafa, Fernando Gonzalez (0-1), Robin Soderling (0-2), Andy Murray (2-8), and Nole. I would say Novak has consistently faced tougher opponents in the final. Four of feds slam wins were over people who never won a slam. Andy Roddick, who fed beat four times, has just as bad of a record as Andy. Three of Feds slams came over Andy Murray who you are putting as a prime example of why this is a weak era. That's 11 of 17 slam wins against weak opponent by your system.

I think the debate is dumb in general. The last couple of years have been weak, but 2011-2013 were year strong years. Some of the Federer's opponents weren't so great, but he also faced some really good players. 11 of federer's slams were won against players who ultimately had losing records in slam finals...

 

[Great Hands]

This Andy being 2-8 in slam finals as a stick with which to beat him is a bit much, for two reasons:

1. For most of his career Murray has not been one of the top two players in the world. Indeed, for large portions of it he was not even one of the top 3 players in the world. Thus in many cases, he was over-achieving just to reach the final!

Andy has never been the world no.1, never been the no.1 seed, never been the favorite for any slam, and never been the best player in the world on any of the four slam surfaces at any time. Given this, he should never have won any slams at all. The fact that he has won two is, again, an overachievement.

2. Every single one of Andy's 10 slam finals to date has been against Federer or Djokovic, the former arguably the greatest player of all-time and the latter a player who is realistically looking to challenge for that title. Even if you are a brilliant player, you're going to stuggle in slam finals against those two. I mean, how do you think, say, Becker or Edberg would have done in that situation? I mean, they're great players, but neither of them are anywhere near as great as Federer or Djokovic (6 slam titles compared to 17 and 12 and counting!). If they were in Andy's position, they might be 2-8 too, or worse!

 

[Front242]

Can you prove it?


I said 2011-2016 is a stronger era than 2004-2009 http://www.tennisfrontier.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=4699&pid=227082#pid227082
You are delusional if you believe otherwise.

Old Federer and banged up past his prime Nadal and incidentally one couldn't even play the last slam and the other quit after the 2nd round. You lost me with 2011-2016 being a stronger era and delusional sorry :nono Meanwhile the guy who Novak beat at RG is a mighty 2-8 in slam finals. Am I missing something or are there other guys out there challenging Novak? :cover Stan 2 matches every decade? Last 3 slam finals Federer and Djokovic played guess who had an overwhelming advantage. Could it be the guy nearly 34/35? I think not. Pull the other one with the nonsense that this is a strong era in tennis right now please 'cos no one at all is buying that.

Seems to me your problem is you see the names Nadal and Federer and because they were once great you make out this "era" is strong but that is not the case as they haven't been great for a long time now. To his credit, Djokovic is clearly playing fantastic a lot of the time (not all of the time mind you as he wasn't particularly impressive for long stretches even when winning tournament after tournament as the competition he faces are far from great) and it's not his fault players are old/well past their primes and near retirement (Federer and Nadal), poor (Berdych, Ferrer, Tsonga, etc) Murray in slam finals (horrendous 2-8 record as aforementioned) and you can only play who is in the final at the time but to say these old, banged up or inconsistent players make it a strong era is just fairy tale stuff I'm afraid.

To be fair, Fed's slam final opponents were Andy Roddick (1-4 in slam finals), Mark Philippoussis (0-2), Marat Safin (2-2), Leyton Hewitt (2-2), Old Agassi (8-7), Marcos Bagdhatis (0-1), Rafa, Fernando Gonzalez (0-1), Robin Soderling (0-2), Andy Murray (2-8), and Nole. I would say Novak has consistently faced tougher opponents in the final. Four of feds slam wins were over people who never won a slam. Andy Roddick, who fed beat four times, has just as bad of a record as Andy. Three of Feds slams came over Andy Murray who you are putting as a prime example of why this is a weak era. That's 11 of 17 slam wins against weak opponent by your system.

I think the debate is dumb in general. The last couple of years have been weak, but 2011-2013 were year strong years. Some of the Federer's opponents weren't so great, but he also faced some really good players. 11 of federer's slams were won against players who ultimately had losing records in slam finals...

Pretty dumb debate alright but Djokovic has won quite a few over Murray also who is 2-8 in slam finals and Tsonga and countless numbers against pensioner Federer Philippoussis was a beast on the fast grass btw and would've beaten 90% of the players on tour now if not more in a slam final if the grass was still as fast now as it was then. Soderling was also a total beast 2 years in a row at RG, much more so than Murray and Tsonga in slam finals. I'm certain Roddick would've beaten anyone not named Roger Federer on grass in his prime but the same cannot be said for Murray. But yeah, this debate is bs.

 

[Riotbeard]

Old Federer and banged up past his prime Nadal and incidentally one couldn't even play the last slam and the other quit after the 2nd round. You lost me with 2011-2016 being a stronger era and delusional sorry :nono Meanwhile the guy who Novak beat at RG is a mighty 2-8 in slam finals. Am I missing something or are there other guys out there challenging Novak? :cover Stan 2 matches every decade? Last 3 slam finals Federer and Djokovic played guess who had an overwhelming advantage. Could it be the guy nearly 34/35? I think not. Pull the other one with the nonsense that this is a strong era in tennis right now please 'cos no one at all is buying that.

Seems to me your problem is you see the names Nadal and Federer and because they were once great you make out this "era" is strong but that is not the case as they haven't been great for a long time now. To his credit, Djokovic is clearly playing fantastic a lot of the time (not all of the time mind you as he wasn't particularly impressive for long stretches even when winning tournament after tournament as the competition he faces are far from great) and it's not his fault players are old/well past their primes and near retirement (Federer and Nadal), poor (Berdych, Ferrer, Tsonga, etc) Murray in slam finals (horrendous 2-8 record as aforementioned) and you can only play who is in the final at the time but to say these old, banged up or inconsistent players make it a strong era is just fairy tale stuff I'm afraid.

To be fair, Fed's slam final opponents were Andy Roddick (1-4 in slam finals), Mark Philippoussis (0-2), Marat Safin (2-2), Leyton Hewitt (2-2), Old Agassi (8-7), Marcos Bagdhatis (0-1), Rafa, Fernando Gonzalez (0-1), Robin Soderling (0-2), Andy Murray (2-8), and Nole. I would say Novak has consistently faced tougher opponents in the final. Four of feds slam wins were over people who never won a slam. Andy Roddick, who fed beat four times, has just as bad of a record as Andy. Three of Feds slams came over Andy Murray who you are putting as a prime example of why this is a weak era. That's 11 of 17 slam wins against weak opponent by your system.

I think the debate is dumb in general. The last couple of years have been weak, but 2011-2013 were year strong years. Some of the Federer's opponents weren't so great, but he also faced some really good players. 11 of federer's slams were won against players who ultimately had losing records in slam finals...

As long as we can agree the debate is dumb, it's something :snicker

Pretty dumb debate alright but Djokovic has won quite a few over Murray also who is 2-8 in slam finals and Tsonga and countless numbers against pensioner Federer Philippoussis was a beast on the fast grass btw and would've beaten 90% of the players on tour now if not more in a slam final if the grass was still as fast now as it was then. Soderling was also a total beast 2 years in a row at RG, much more so than Murray and Tsonga in slam finals. I'm certain Roddick would've beaten anyone not named Roger Federer on grass in his prime but the same cannot be said for Murray. But yeah, this debate is bs.

 

[Front242]

Everything is so relative. Federer has won the most slams and yet people with sour grapes issues talk of "weak competition" when he won his early slams. Well, he may be the slam leader but he played like an amateur against Nadal in many slam finals so does that mean Nadal won a lot of his slams against "weak competition" ? Certainly when he plays Nadal, Federer HAS been a weak opponent a good 80% of the time so we could say the same thing there. Ah but he's Roger Federer Nadal fans will retort but he was far from the Roger Federer we all know in many of the bad losses against Nadal which made much of Nadal's competition weak. We could feasibly debate this about any combination of players.

 

[shawnbm]

Hewitt and Roddick and Safin were accomplished slam winners and number one players (well, maybe not Marat). Roger beat back those who were there and Agassi was tough as nails right through 2005. He beat some top players and nobody knew then how many more finals they would reach, but they thought Fed would be an all time great even after his first major--they don't say that about everybody. Everybody was talking about Nadal as he came up. Folks talked about Nole when he was 19 having the talent to be a great player--not just good, but great. Roger, Rafa and Nole are greats because they are simply better, particularly when it counts. Period--end of discussion.

 

[Fiero425]

Hewitt and Roddick and Safin were accomplished slam winners and number one players (well, maybe not Marat). Roger beat back those who were there and Agassi was tough as nails right through 2005. He beat some top players and nobody knew then how many more finals they would reach, but they thought Fed would be an all time great even after his first major--they don't say that about everybody. Everybody was talking about Nadal as he came up. Folks talked about Nole when he was 19 having the talent to be a great player--not just good, but great. Roger, Rafa and Nole are greats because they are simply better, particularly when it counts. Period--end of discussion.

It has been a strange merry-go-round with these 3 players! You had Roger dominating initially starting in '03, winning everything in sight; 3 major finals 3 times! The tide turned a little with the ascension of Rafa; esp. at the FO! He started to impose his will on Roger, finally beating him on all surfaces; even Wimbledon grass! Then along came Nole defeating them both and taking 3 majors of his own in 2011! They played a little volleyball with the top ranking for a few years, now Nole has taken over for good it seems! He's really exerting dominance on the tour; majors, Masters, and now 4 straight WTF wins in London! They all are CGS winners, but unlike Roger and Rafa, Nole owns all 4 Slams at the moment with a chance at a CYGS this season after taking his 1st FO title over a relative pigeon and perennial "also-ran," Andy Murray! Right now, it doesn't look like anyone can stop him from overtaking all the Open records, but it can change with this new generation of players like Theim, Kei, and Raonic; we'll see! :angel: :dodgy:

 

[Front242]

Actually things can change in a heartbeat. They said the same thing about Nadal and before that they said no one would beat Sampras for quite some time. Everyone was 100% wrong on both counts.

 

[nehmeth]

Philippoussis was a beast on the fast grass btw and would've beaten 90% of the players on tour now if not more in a slam final if the grass was still as fast now as it was then. Soderling was also a total beast 2 years in a row at RG, much more so than Murray and Tsonga in slam finals. I'm certain Roddick would've beaten anyone not named Roger Federer on grass in his prime but the same cannot be said for Murray. But yeah, this debate is bs.

Definitely BS. You can say Mark would have beaten anyone on the fast grass and that Roddick would have beaten anyone on grass in his prime. I watched these guys play and I simply disagree.

Soderling? I am 110% in agreement with you. He was unbelievable.

 

[El Dude]

The real question is, what happened to all the Rafa fans? They're vapor.

 

[El Dude]

As for the question, it is important to note that this thread was started after Novak won 2014 Wimbledon, his first and only of that year and his 7th overall. It was the third year in a row that Novak won a single Slam, and his 2011 dominance seemed far in the rear-view mirror. No one could have predicted that he would just be starting the most dominant run in Open Era history.

Someone should probably do another poll, but with options ranging from 12 to 20+. I'd probably vote 17 or 18.

 

[Obsi]

...

What happened with your claim that I started first to talk about weak competition? I asked you to prove it but you failed to do so. Do you admit now you were lying?

Old Federer and banged up past his prime Nadal and incidentally one couldn't even play the last slam and the other quit after the 2nd round. You lost me with 2011-2016 being a stronger era and delusional sorry :nono Meanwhile the guy who Novak beat at RG is a mighty 2-8 in slam finals. Am I missing something or are there other guys out there challenging Novak? :cover Stan 2 matches every decade? Last 3 slam finals Federer and Djokovic played guess who had an overwhelming advantage. Could it be the guy nearly 34/35? I think not. Pull the other one with the nonsense that this is a strong era in tennis right now please 'cos no one at all is buying that.

Seems to me your problem is you see the names Nadal and Federer and because they were once great you make out this "era" is strong but that is not the case as they haven't been great for a long time now. To his credit, Djokovic is clearly playing fantastic a lot of the time (not all of the time mind you as he wasn't particularly impressive for long stretches even when winning tournament after tournament as the competition he faces are far from great) and it's not his fault players are old/well past their primes and near retirement (Federer and Nadal), poor (Berdych, Ferrer, Tsonga, etc) Murray in slam finals (horrendous 2-8 record as aforementioned) and you can only play who is in the final at the time but to say these old, banged up or inconsistent players make it a strong era is just fairy tale stuff I'm afraid.

I said 2011-2016 is a stronger era than 2004-2009 was but you keep talking only about 2014-2016 and completely ignoring 2011-2013.

Federer has won the most slams and yet people with sour grapes issues talk of "weak competition" when he won his early slams.

Federer never dominated like Djokovic since late 2014 and yet people with sour grapes issues talk of "weak competition".

 

[BIG3]

In Agassi’s case, he won 6 after 29th birthday. The baseline player didn’t necessarily age worse than S&V type. Nole’s style is closer to Agassi’s than to Pete and I didn’t see it disadvantage.

1. Agassi did not win 6 after 29th birthday. He won only five after 29th birthday. More importantly, he won only 2 after 30th birthday.

2. One of the important reasons for the longevity of Agassi's career is that he was goofing when he was young with extracurricular activities and became serious only when he was getting older. As a result he had less mileage and less burnout which helped him in the later part. However, Novak was always serious about tennis from the beginning and so the mileage and burnout will come into effect.

How all-time-greats age?
1. Body/Injury history
2. weak or strong field
I didn't see high correlation to play style. Pistol should have fresher legs than Fed as he didn't advance deeply in every tournaments as Fed, he aged much worse.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

In Agassi’s case, he won 6 after 29th birthday. The baseline player didn’t necessarily age worse than S&V type. Nole’s style is closer to Agassi’s than to Pete and I didn’t see it disadvantage.

1. Agassi did not win 6 after 29th birthday. He won only five after 29th birthday. More importantly, he won only 2 after 30th birthday.

2. One of the important reasons for the longevity of Agassi's career is that he was goofing when he was young with extracurricular activities and became serious only when he was getting older. As a result he had less mileage and less burnout which helped him in the later part. However, Novak was always serious about tennis from the beginning and so the mileage and burnout will come into effect.

How all-time-greats age?
1. Body/Injury history
2. weak or strong field
I didn't see high correlation to play style. Pistol should have fresher legs than Fed as he didn't advance deeply in every tournaments as Fed, he aged much worse.

There is also the issue of losing mental focus. That depends on how long you were playing tennis seriously. Pete was extremely serious about tennis and aged fast. Agassi was not that serious and lasted long. Serena is lasting this long, as she used to take extended breaks and play very less in non GS tourneys right from the beginning and she used to indulge in lots of extra curricular activities which helps in avoiding burnout.

Novak had been serious about tennis from the beginning. He was not taking extended time off unnecessarily or indulging in extracurricular activities.

 

[BIG3]

1. Agassi did not win 6 after 29th birthday. He won only five after 29th birthday. More importantly, he won only 2 after 30th birthday.

2. One of the important reasons for the longevity of Agassi's career is that he was goofing when he was young with extracurricular activities and became serious only when he was getting older. As a result he had less mileage and less burnout which helped him in the later part. However, Novak was always serious about tennis from the beginning and so the mileage and burnout will come into effect.

How all-time-greats age?
1. Body/Injury history
2. weak or strong field
I didn't see high correlation to play style. Pistol should have fresher legs than Fed as he didn't advance deeply in every tournaments as Fed, he aged much worse.

There is also the issue of losing mental focus. That depends on how long you were playing tennis seriously. Pete was extremely serious about tennis and aged fast. Agassi was not that serious and lasted long. Serena is lasting this long, as she used to take extended breaks and play very less in non GS tourneys right from the beginning and she used to indulge in lots of extra curricular activities which helps in avoiding burnout.

Novak had been serious about tennis from the beginning. He was not taking extended time off unnecessarily or indulging in extracurricular activities.

Agree with what you said but still didn't see high correlation between playing style and aging. I'd put it way behind injury history and field competitiveness.

Brad Gilbert recently tweeted that S&V player is more injury prone b/c sprint to the net. Interesting?

 

[GameSetAndMath]

If you are a baseline player whose average rally length is 9 or more, surely it would add more mileage. For an S&V player, most of the points would end in a 4 shots.

Not all baseline play is the same. Some are aggressive baseline players, Some are counterpunchers.
I would say Novak falls in between those extremes.

 

[Front242]

...

What happened with your claim that I started first to talk about weak competition? I asked you to prove it but you failed to do so. Do you admit now you were lying?

Old Federer and banged up past his prime Nadal and incidentally one couldn't even play the last slam and the other quit after the 2nd round. You lost me with 2011-2016 being a stronger era and delusional sorry :nono Meanwhile the guy who Novak beat at RG is a mighty 2-8 in slam finals. Am I missing something or are there other guys out there challenging Novak? :cover Stan 2 matches every decade? Last 3 slam finals Federer and Djokovic played guess who had an overwhelming advantage. Could it be the guy nearly 34/35? I think not. Pull the other one with the nonsense that this is a strong era in tennis right now please 'cos no one at all is buying that.

Seems to me your problem is you see the names Nadal and Federer and because they were once great you make out this "era" is strong but that is not the case as they haven't been great for a long time now. To his credit, Djokovic is clearly playing fantastic a lot of the time (not all of the time mind you as he wasn't particularly impressive for long stretches even when winning tournament after tournament as the competition he faces are far from great) and it's not his fault players are old/well past their primes and near retirement (Federer and Nadal), poor (Berdych, Ferrer, Tsonga, etc) Murray in slam finals (horrendous 2-8 record as aforementioned) and you can only play who is in the final at the time but to say these old, banged up or inconsistent players make it a strong era is just fairy tale stuff I'm afraid.

I said 2011-2016 is a stronger era than 2004-2009 was but you keep talking only about 2014-2016 and completely ignoring 2011-2013.

Federer has won the most slams and yet people with sour grapes issues talk of "weak competition" when he won his early slams.

Federer never dominated like Djokovic since late 2014 and yet people with sour grapes issues talk of "weak competition".

Jesus Christ, enough of this bull$h1t. I'm only gonna reply to your last line. Federer dominated like no one before for 4 whole years. Djokovic has been beating old men and Murray and a bunch of nobodies and no kids on the block who pose little to no threat to him or the top guys on the big stage from 2014-preseent and Nadal has been an absolute shell of himself the last 2 years.

It's so unfortunate that you still haven't grasped that 2014-present has been a very weak era in tennis. 2011-2013 was much stronger so if you want to "big up" Djokovic then at least boast about 2011 and quite rightly so 'cos Federer and Nadal were much better back then than they are now. Djokovic deserves much more praise for 2011 than 2014-present as the competition was much stronger.

 

[Front242]

PS: you questioned Federer's era first here at the link below (different thread) and asked was it "weak" which started off this whole boring "debate" and we took it from there.

http://www.tennisfrontier.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=4699&pid=226978#pid226978

 

[Rational National]

I know that history and stats tell us that the average slam winning age is 25/26, but Novak at 29 is still the fittest player on the tour (with Murray born a week earlier the 2nd fittest), he clearly has the motivation for what his legacy will be and the younger players coming through at this stage don't have anything close to the arsenal to beat him let alone usurp his position at the top.

If he stays injury free I would say that conservatively he wins 1.5 slams per year for the next 4 years or perhaps more realistically he is 2.5., hence he is 18-22.

Then by 33 not only will he have passed Roger and the discussion be about GOAT in a historical tennis and sporting contest, but he will thought of as the modern day Alexander of Macedonia