Will Nadal pass Federer?

[Carol]

Besides hundreds of tweets sent to Rafa after his win in the USO, here is what Roddick says

 

[DarthFed]

I don't think anyone is trying to crown Nadal the GOAT, but I do think there's loads of argument for both. Roddick laughed over the weekend about it and said: It's funny to try to guess the end of the book before it's been written. Good point, I thought.

There is no decent argument for Nadal yet but obviously his career is not over sad as that may be to some of us. But zero argument including that laughable metric above. The "typical" champion gets through 23%, sounds like some dude searching for anything. And the idea of awarding more or less than 1 slam for a given win is laughable. If that's the case we shouldn't count thenoast win for more than .10 slams for Rafa. He played nobody.

 

[Carol]

I'd like to know when he has played nobody.......

 

[Moxie]

There is no decent argument for Nadal yet but obviously his career is not over sad as that may be to some of us. But zero argument including that laughable metric above. The "typical" champion gets through 23%, sounds like some dude searching for anything. And the idea of awarding more or less than 1 slam for a given win is laughable. If that's the case we shouldn't count thenoast win for more than .10 slams for Rafa. He played nobody.

Is this a mistype, or did you mean the USOpen?

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Darth, Front and the rest of the Fed's fans this was forwarded to my inbox(actually from one of Darth's admirers)



Very interesting analysis at The Economist.

https://www.economist.com/blogs/gametheory/2017/09/draws-tennis?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/ed/

In fact, when we adjust those two numbers for difficulty, the King of Clay proves to be the king of tennis—period. 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. Running the numbers also forces us to recognise just how hard Mr Wawrinka has needed to work to break the stranglehold his most fearsome peers have held at the grand slams. His three majors all rank in the top ten most difficult.

.

There is a serious flaw in the analysis here. They are calculating the difficulty of the draw not based on an objective level of the opponents, but based on your chances of beating him. To make it clear, let me give you an example. If Roger was facing Brown, Roger is expected to win 99 percentage of time and so they would count the difficulty level for that match to be .01. If Rafa was facing Brown, Rafa is probably expected to
win 70 percent of the time and so they would count the difficulty level for that match be .30. In other words, the difficulty level is not objective and is based on how easily you are expected to defeat the opponent. If you are a GREAT player you would be expected to defeat a lot of players easily and so your difficulty level as computed by this algorithm would be small. On the other hand if you suck, you would not be expected to defeat a lot of players easily and so the difficulty level as computed by this algorithm would be large.

If you are trying to measure the difficulty level of a draw, it should be based on an objective measure. Not only that the measure used here is not objective, it severely penalizes players from whom a lot is expected.

 

[Moxie]

There is a serious flaw in the analysis here. They are calculating the difficulty of the draw not based on an objective level of the opponents, but based on your chances of beating him. To make it clear, let me give you an example. If Roger was facing Brown, Roger is expected to win 99 percentage of time and so they would count the difficulty level for that match to be .01. If Rafa was facing Brown, Rafa is probably expected to
win 70 percent of the time and so they would count the difficulty level for that match be .30. In other words, the difficulty level is not objective and is based on how easily you are expected to defeat the opponent. If you are a GREAT player you would be expected to defeat a lot of players easily and so your difficulty level as computed by this algorithm would be small. On the other hand if you suck, you would not be expected to defeat a lot of players easily and so the difficulty level as computed by this algorithm would be large.

If you are trying to measure the difficulty level of a draw, it should be based on an objective measure. Not only that the measure used here is not objective, it severely penalizes players from whom a lot is expected.

I get your point, I think, but haven't a lot of people here used rank and straightforward measures as a way of estimating the competition that a player has faced? By an objective algorithm, the Guardian one isn't wrong, then. And we here have used the same measure.

 

[Carol]

Is this a mistype, or did you mean the USOpen?

I hope he didn't mean the USO...then I would have something to say

 

[DarthFed]

Of course I meant this USO. He played .5 somebodies, as I'm giving washed up, post-wrist injury DP a ".5"

 

[Carol]

I see that some Roger's fans continue as usually
Nadal beat Delpo who had beaten Federer two days before and he won the final playing against a healthy and strong opponent and not like Federer playing the Wimbledon final against someone who couldn't even to walk because he was injured and finished crying because he felt completely impotent to play well, very dull and sad final

 

[DarthFed]

I see that some Roger's fans continue as usually
Nadal beat Delpo who had beaten Federer two days before and he won the final playing against a healthy and strong opponent and not like Federer playing the Wimbledon final against someone who couldn't even to walk because he was injured and finished crying because he felt completely impotent to play well, very dull and sad final

Anyone could've beaten Fed this past USO, he almost lost to a 19 year old rookie and then to ancient Youzhny who is no longer top 100. DP's level in this tourney seldom looked good, I knew he was zero threat to Nadal here barring him stepping up big.

And Anderson may have been healthy but strong? Credit to him, he took advantage of that debacle of a bottom half but let's not overstate things here. Or is your argument that Roger was lucky to not see Mr. Anderson in the Wimbledon finals

 

[Moxie]

Of course I meant this USO. He played .5 somebodies, as I'm giving washed up, post-wrist injury DP a ".5"

Got it. Was just waiting for you to make this USOpen into a big asterisk. Only took 4 days.

 

[DarthFed]

Where did I make an asterisk. I was just responding to the premise of the wacky criteria that the guy was using.

 

[Moxie]

Where did I make an asterisk. I was just responding to the premise of the wacky criteria that the guy was using.

"He played .5 somebodies, as I'm giving washed up, post-wrist injury DP a ".5" Let me just ask you straight out: Do you hold this USO against Nadal for winning it, or not? I believe you have said that if Roger had won it, it would have been a gimme, too. Is it of lesser value, as a Major win, in your opinion?

 

[GameSetAndMath]

I get your point, I think, but haven't a lot of people here used rank and straightforward measures as a way of estimating the competition that a player has faced? By an objective algorithm, the Guardian one isn't wrong, then. And we here have used the same measure.

The rank is objective measure. If someone is computing the average ranking of the opponent, they would use the same ranking of a particular player (independent of whether that player is facing Rafa or Roger or Novak). However, the difficulty measure that is being used by this article is based on whether or not you are expected to defeat the opponent and if so, how easily. This measure is calculated relatively with respect to you.

 

[Moxie]

The rank is objective measure. If someone is computing the average ranking of the opponent, they would use the same ranking of a particular player (independent of whether that player is facing Rafa or Roger or Novak). However, the difficulty measure that is being used by this article is based on whether or not you are expected to defeat the opponent and if so, how easily. This measure is calculated relatively with respect to you.

I'm pretty sure it wasn't calculated respect to me. LOL. I do think it was calculated respect to rank and not H2Hs...am I wrong?

 

[GameSetAndMath]

I'm pretty sure it wasn't calculated respect to me. LOL. I do think it was calculated respect to rank and not H2Hs...am I wrong?

The article says clearly that it uses Elo rating system. The Elo rating system is a method for calculating the relative skill levels of players in competitor-versus-competitor games.

 

[DarthFed]

"He played .5 somebodies, as I'm giving washed up, post-wrist injury DP a ".5" Let me just ask you straight out: Do you hold this USO against Nadal for winning it, or not? I believe you have said that if Roger had won it, it would have been a gimme, too. Is it of lesser value, as a Major win, in your opinion?

Not at all. It counts as a full slam just like the others do and that's my point. I don't believe in .98 or 1.18 slams. It's a laughable criteria

 

[Federberg]

Sampras gets in on this very topic...

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...-record-interview-kids-on-block-a7947981.html

 

[Federberg]

Darth, Front and the rest of the Fed's fans this was forwarded to my inbox(actually from one of Darth's admirers)

Here is some gospel for what is left of your tennis souls....

El Dude.. you may enjoy reading this while having your evening bottle of spirits


Very interesting analysis at The Economist.

https://www.economist.com/blogs/gametheory/2017/09/draws-tennis?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/ed/

———

THE RACE is on. Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer, the two men who dominated men’s tennis from 2005-10, have enjoyed a startling resurgence in 2017, splitting the year’s four grand-slam titles. Mr Federer picked up his wins at the Australian Open (where he defeated Mr Nadal in a five-set final) and Wimbledon, while his long-time rival paired his tenth French Open crown with this year’s US Open title. Mr Nadal cruised to the championship in New York, dropping only one set in his last four matches and polishing it off on September 10th with a routine win over South Africa’s Kevin Anderson, 6-3 6-3 6-4.

The latest trophy represents Mr Nadal’s 16th major title, second only to Mr Federer’s 19. Even as pundits have predicted for years that one or the other is finished as an elite player—especially Mr Federer, who turned 36 last month—there is no end in sight for this two-man race. The only other active player in range—Novak Djokovic, with 12—hasn’t claimed a victory since last year’s French Open, and is sitting out the second half of this season with an elbow injury. Andy Murray, the fourth member of the “Big Four” of men’s tennis, holds only three majors, and thanks to a hip injury, he too is missing much of the 2017 season.

....

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 proves to be the king of tennis—period. 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. Running the numbers also forces us to recognise just how hard Mr Wawrinka has needed to work to break the stranglehold his most fearsome peers have held at the grand slams. His three majors all rank in the top ten most difficult.

Even more than weeks atop the world rankings and Masters-level titles, difficulty-adjusted majors are unlikely to figure in the typical weekend argument about the greatest tennis player of all time. Yet for a single metric, it carries a heavy load, going to the heart of the case for Mr Nadal and cutting through much of the anecdotal carping that leads fans to discount one title or grant another extra credit. Each of the all-time greats has had their share of good and bad luck—little of it as good as Mr Nadal’s fortunes this past fortnight. 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.

Just read this. It's interesting, but has the usual flaw in this type of metric which seems very Elo like. Federer gets penalised for his age (starting earlier and therefore not having to face them). It always amuses me when I see the lengths some commentators go to try to contextualise Federer's achievements. At least this guy doesn't go on about Laver which would then utterly refute any of his points about relative difficulty he uses to boost Rafa. My main issue with this type of analysis is that it always fails the common sense test. A simple example is the AO 07 (I think) where Roger tuned Fernando Gonzalez. Taken from the view point of Gonzalez' historical achievements it looks routine. But for those of us who watched him crush Rafa and others, it's patently obvious that not paying attention to the actual level some of these guys played at diminishes the value of this type of analysis. In my humble opinion, at the end of the day a win is a win... the rest is just.... fluff

 

[Front242]

Exactly. Gonzalez had 3 (!) unforced errors I believe in the whole match against Haas at the 2007 AO which shows how well Gonzalez was playing. Haas was also playing well! Just got mangled by an on fire Gonzo as did Nadal. So this analysis is utter bs. It shows how good prime Federer was the way he beat Gonzo who was on fire that tournament.