[Jonathan Northrop] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

[Postpre]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Whether or not Sampras would have been able to adapt to today's style of play (baseline consistency) is uncertain. The Big 4 today, in their prime, would have a decisive advantage over Sampras once a rally ensued. I also think Djokovic would be able to return the Sampras serve with some regularity. Based upon my subjective eye test, Fed, Nadal, and Djokovic are the three best players I've ever seen.

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

I was not aware of the fact that he led Agassi and courier by such margins.

that is impressive indeed.

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Here's one for you, Clay Death. I created a spreadsheet with match-ups between the 15 greatest players of the Open Era, not counting older players like Laver, Rosewall, Newcombe and Ashe - but starting with Connors, Vilas, and Borg.

Anyhow, of those 15 players, Sampras is one of five that has a winning record against the others. His .635 winning percentage (66-38) is third after Borg (.676) and Nadal (.659).

Now one could say, but who did Sampras play? Its important to remember that Sampras was only five years younger than Edberg (8-6) and four years younger than Becker (12-7), both of whom as you can see he had winning records against. Of those 15 players he played a full 9 of them. He had winning records against all except Lendl (3-5) and Federer (0-1). Against his closest contemporaries, he fared quite well - he had a big advantage over Andre Agassi (20-14) and thoroughly dominated Jim Courier (16-4).

Of the current Big Four, Sampras only played Roger Federer once and lost. He was 30 years old and in serious decline and Federer 20 and on the rise.

I personally see no reason to believe that if Sampras was in his prime right now, he wouldn't be up there in the elite with the rest. There wasn't a comparable Big Four in his peak years, but early on there were many great players active and still in or close to their prime--Lendl, Becker, Edberg, Courier--and Andre Agassi was always good throughout his career.

I'm not saying Pete Sampras was he GOAT, but he is certainly among the greatest. I do think that Roger Federer has an overall greater record and ranks higher than him, and that Nadal is on the verge of surpassing him, but even then he's still likely the third greatest player of the last 40 years and one of the six or seven greatest of the last century.

impressive work.


now where does roger stand in terms of his greatest 5-10-15 rivals.


is it over 50%?

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

lendl once hired Sampras to help him improve his return of serve.


he invited Sampras to his home to blast serves at him. I don't have anymore details on this story but I either heard it or read it somewhere a few years back.


that might explain the 3-5 head-to-head against lendl.

lendl learned to return that serve a little better.

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

where do we rank borg?

 

[El Dude]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Clay Death, this is worth checking out:

http://www.atpworldtour.com/Reliability-Zone/Reliability-Versus-Top-10-Career-List.aspx

Its career players--Open Era (196 or ATP history (1973-), I'm not sure, but we're talking about five years difference, 40-45 years--vs. top 10 opponents. I'll reproduce the top 10 here:

1. Borg .705
2. Nadal .690
3. Becker .651
4. Federer .648
5. Lendl .643
6. Sampras .636
7. Djokovic .576
8. McEnroe .570
9. Murray .555
10. Agassi .548

Sampras is in pretty good company. Its also interesting to note how high Murray ranks, and ahead of players consider all-time top 20 players like Connors, Wilander, and Edberg.

As for Borg, I'm probably going to put together a GOAT blog entry at some point, and I do have a system, but for now I'll say he's not top five all-time, but he's in the top 10. If we look only at peak level, there's an argument you can make that he's worthy of GOAT consideration, but the fact that he stopped playing at 25 reduces his overall record, and all-time greatness--as I see it, at least--is a combination of peak level and career record.

In terms of Open Era, I'd probably rank him 4th after Federer, Nadal, and Sampras (and Lendl 5th).

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Clay Death, this is worth checking out:

http://www.atpworldtour.com/Reliability-Zone/Reliability-Versus-Top-10-Career-List.aspx

Its career players--Open Era (196 or ATP history (1973-), I'm not sure, but we're talking about five years difference, 40-45 years--vs. top 10 opponents. I'll reproduce the top 10 here:

1. Borg .705
2. Nadal .690
3. Becker .651
4. Federer .648
5. Lendl .643
6. Sampras .636
7. Djokovic .576
8. McEnroe .570
9. Murray .555
10. Agassi .548

Sampras is in pretty good company. Its also interesting to note how high Murray ranks, and ahead of players consider all-time top 20 players like Connors, Wilander, and Edberg.

As for Borg, I'm probably going to put together a GOAT blog entry at some point, and I do have a system, but for now I'll say he's not top five all-time, but he's in the top 10. If we look only at peak level, there's an argument you can make that he's worthy of GOAT consideration, but the fact that he stopped playing at 25 reduces his overall record, and all-time greatness--as I see it, at least--is a combination of peak level and career record.

In terms of Open Era, I'd probably rank him 4th after Federer, Nadal, and Sampras (and Lendl 5th).

fantastic post general el dude. no arguments from this side of the atlantic mate.


I will do some research on Sampras tonight before I hit the sack.

I will give him another look.



you know one thing that surprises me:

why did becker achieve so little in terms of slams compared to these other giants of the game? boom boom had it all.

he had the size (6 foot 4). he had the serve, the net game, and he had the movement. he was thoughtful and composed on the court. I mean he was a bright chap who was fairly good at problem solving on the court as his winning percentage would suggest.

and what about the ostravaghost? lendl lost 11 slam finals. certainly he could have done more in terms of slams.

he started out by losing his first 4.

 

[britbox]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

I think a lot of the previous generations get a bad rap when these cross-era comparisons are made. First of all, we tend to put them in this era and make a judgement based on what they were doing in a bygone era.

We could do the reverse and it wouldn't be so pretty - stick a smaller wooden racquet in the hand of a lot of present day players and see if they get the power, insane topsin and have the ability to deal with low bouncing unpredictable cut up grass courts.

Players adapt to the conditions of the day... Sampras likely wouldn't have changed to a single backhand in the current era. His whole outlook was geared towards winning there and then... not some hypothetical match in the future in different conditions.

I wasn't a big fan of the Pistol, but his record speaks for itself. The guy is a legend and a lock in Top 5 of all time IMO.

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

quality post there.

that said, as our friend general el dude has so carefully articulated, "talent is talent".


nadal and roger have an insane level of talent never before seen in the sport.

and it has to do with all that they can do on the court. nobody has ever generated that kind of racquet head speed for instance. nobody has ever moved as well as these cats do.

they are bigger, stronger, quicker, faster, and more agile on the court.

nadal has been slowed down by his injuries but he once had the speed of the fastest cornerbacks in the NFL.

nole engulfs and the entire court with his sick athletic ability. there is just no place to hit the ball.

roger used to float around the court producing unimaginable winners from anywhere on the court.

 

[brokenshoelace]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

by that crazy sales pitch I guess roger doesn't count at all.

just go back to worshipping Sampras who could not bag the RG crown.

good job broken one.


it is getting really amusing now. I may have to grab some popcorn.


sampy the single dimensional pony is old news mate.

roger happen to come along to steal all his thunder.

This is why having an argument with you is akin to having an argument with a child.

A) I am not, and never was, a Sampras fan, as everybody here would tell you. Simply assuming that I "worship" him just because I'm raising arguments that support him really shows how limited your thinking is, and reveals what drives your "argumentation," blind, irrational love for the player you root for.

B) Federer is a better, more complete player than Sampras. He's also the greater player IN MY OPINION, because I value accomplishments. However, your argument (if I can call it that) essentially says "Sampras is not as good as Federer so he doesn't matter." Well genius, if a player's relevance/brilliance is only measured up to Roger Federer, no one else would matter. You're negating Sampras' skill and accomplishments because of a player who dominated the tour AFTER SAMPRAS RETIRED? How can you hold that against him? Oh right, because of one Wimbledon match they played.

Well then, Nadal doesn't matter. Steve Darcis showed that in Wimbledon.

 

[brokenshoelace]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

I was not aware of the fact that he led Agassi and courier by such margins.

that is impressive indeed.

Look at that, Clay Death being misinformed? I couldn't tell...

 

[El Dude]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Regarding Becker "only" winning 6 Slams and Lendl's 8-11 record in Slam finals, one thing to remember with these two is that they played during a time when multiple generations of great players were playing. Lendl started in the peak of Borg, Connors and McEnroe. Once those three were gone or fading, you had Wilander, Becker, and Edberg rising, then after that Agassi, Courier and Sampras.

I think you can even argue that the 80s were the hardest, most competitive era because there is no gap in top talent, no period in which there weren't a handful of great players playing in their prime. Its also why Mats Wilander's 1988 in which he won three Slams was so impressive - he did that at a time when Lendl, Agassi, Becker and Edberg rounded out the top 5, and Connors and McEnroe were just a bit behind at #7 and #11, respectively. That year must have the most all-time greats and total Slam wins in a top 11 ever.

I just happened to write a blog relevant to this here - in particular, look at both charts.

http://www.tennisfrontier.com/blogs/el-dude/talent-richness-of-the-atp-era/

In the first chart you can see how the mid-80s to early-90s is particularly "talent dense" - and that is the prime of Becker.

The point being, it was probably harder to win a Slam in the '80s than it was in the 1995-2004 period. This isn't to deny the greatness of Sampras and Federer, but that there Slam counts may be a bit padded (or Becker's and Lendl's penalized) by playing in the competition context that they did.

 

[Mog]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

I think a lot of the previous generations get a bad rap when these cross-era comparisons are made. First of all, we tend to put them in this era and make a judgement based on what they were doing in a bygone era.

We could do the reverse and it wouldn't be so pretty - stick a smaller wooden racquet in the hand of a lot of present day players and see if they get the power, insane topsin and have the ability to deal with low bouncing unpredictable cut up grass courts.

Players adapt to the conditions of the day... Sampras likely wouldn't have changed to a single backhand in the current era. His whole outlook was geared towards winning there and then... not some hypothetical match in the future in different conditions.

I wasn't a big fan of the Pistol, but his record speaks for itself. The guy is a legend and a lock in Top 5 of all time IMO.

Thanks britbox for this post.
I was thinking the same.
The wood racquets, smaller heads, not having heavy top spin producing strings, excessive power producing equipments are the factors. The Champions adjust to what they have. So the reverse is very interesting.
Again comparing the top ones of different eras does not do fair justice.

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

that is impressive work general el dude. I just read that blog.


80s is general regarded as quite competitive.


I was looking at the top 10 rankings in the 80s from 1980-1988. the competition was relatively fierce at the top.


lets just take a look at 1981. here are the top 10 players for 1981:


1. johnny mac
2. borg
3. Connors
4. lendl
5. clerc
6. vilas
7. mayer
8. teltscher
9. McNamara
10. tanner



or 1982:


1. Connors
2. lendl
3. johnny mac
4. wilander
5. vilas
6. gerulaitis
7. clerc
8. noah
9. kriek
10. tanner


1987:

1. lendl
2. wilander
3. Edberg
4. cash
5. mecir
6. becker
7. Connors
8. Mayotte
9. johnny mac
10. gilbert

 

[El Dude]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Whether or not Sampras would have been able to adapt to today's style of play (baseline consistency) is uncertain. The Big 4 today, in their prime, would have a decisive advantage over Sampras once a rally ensued. I also think Djokovic would be able to return the Sampras serve with some regularity. Based upon my subjective eye test, Fed, Nadal, and Djokovic are the three best players I've ever seen.

On one hand I agree with you. The match the other night was as good as it gets (if rather sloppy on Novak's part, but we all know Rafa is great at inducing shanks with that spin!).

On the other, you use the word "adapt." I've probably used it as well, but I don't think that word is the right one and is a bit misdirecting. If Sampras were 15 years younger (around the same age as Novak and Andy), he wouldn't have to "adapt" to the current style of play, he would have grown up within it. That's a bit difference. Pete was born in 1971 so the first players he saw were probably Borg, McEnroe, and Connors, then growing up saw Lendl, Wilander, Becker, and Edberg as he matured into a professional. Those were his role-models.

Now the tricky part about this imagination is that every player born in the 80s grew up idolizing none other than Pete Sampras. We could speculate that Roger Federer's game is based upon his, with of course his own unique - and more diverse - style. So its hard to say what sort of game Sampras would have developed if he were born 15 years later, or what sort of player anyone would have been without Pistol Pete ushering in 21st century tennis.

But I think the key part here is that if Pete was 15 years younger, his style of play would be developing alongside Rafa's, Novak's, and Andy's, and under the shadow of Roger Federer's. He wouldn't need to "adapt" - he'd be right in the mix, and his game would evolve to suit the times.

One can only imagine what sort of player a Bjorn Borg would have been with modern rackets and baseline hitting being the default. I imagine he would have been great.

Ultimately its all speculative. In the end, all I think we can do is look at how great a player was relative to his contemporaries, and define his historical greatness in that light.

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Clay Death, this is worth checking out:

http://www.atpworldtour.com/Reliability-Zone/Reliability-Versus-Top-10-Career-List.aspx

Its career players--Open Era (196 or ATP history (1973-), I'm not sure, but we're talking about five years difference, 40-45 years--vs. top 10 opponents. I'll reproduce the top 10 here:

1. Borg .705
2. Nadal .690
3. Becker .651
4. Federer .648
5. Lendl .643
6. Sampras .636
7. Djokovic .576
8. McEnroe .570
9. Murray .555
10. Agassi .548

Sampras is in pretty good company. Its also interesting to note how high Murray ranks, and ahead of players consider all-time top 20 players like Connors, Wilander, and Edberg.

As for Borg, I'm probably going to put together a GOAT blog entry at some point, and I do have a system, but for now I'll say he's not top five all-time, but he's in the top 10. If we look only at peak level, there's an argument you can make that he's worthy of GOAT consideration, but the fact that he stopped playing at 25 reduces his overall record, and all-time greatness--as I see it, at least--is a combination of peak level and career record.

In terms of Open Era, I'd probably rank him 4th after Federer, Nadal, and Sampras (and Lendl 5th).

I am looking at these numbers again. this is fascinating stuff.

 

[ClayDeath]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

I hear uncle tony is starting to talk a little bit about this now.

he said very specifically that there are other factors other than slams that need to be taken into account. so you know everybody is going to build their own case.

tony says roger still occupies the top spot but that nadal is catching up.


I don't think we realize sometimes how lucky we have been to watch players like roger, nadal, nole, and murray evolve into true greatness.

this has never happened before and will never happen again. the sport grows more and more demanding with each passing year. the kind of numbers these cats have posted are beyond superhuman and beyond all imaginings.

 

[fedfan]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

excellent read.

Fed and his fans are starting to sweat bullets

 

[Moxie]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

excellent read.

Fed and his fans are starting to sweat bullets

Fedfan! You were invoked during the live chat over the weekend...the game v. the Bulldogs came up. (Oh, sorry...) Good to see you. Don't be a stranger the whole football season.

 

[calitennis127]

RE: [Blog] Nadal the Great, Part 1: Rafa's Window of Opportunity

Nadal likely would have had a winning H2H against Sampras - not because of tennis, but because of his personality, mindset, and stamina.

Many players in Nadal's era have higher peak levels and superior offensive shotmaking. That doesn't prevent him from actually defeating them in matches.