Will Novak pass Federer?

[Fiero425]

I wouldn't have added Borg to that obscure list since he retired well before 30 at 26 y.o.! He owned the French like Nadal does today! He would have won a lot more if the ATP had just given him a break back in early '82! He could have come back by French Open and still won with his usual pigeons still haunting the place like Vilas! I hardly think his countryman Wilander would have had the guts to beat Bjorn in all his glory! No doubt he would have been the one all were trying to surpass instead of Sampras 2 decades later! :angel: :dodgy:

Except that Borg had lost his drive by 25 and even if he hadn't retired and kept on playing, unless he miraculously found his mojo again, he wouldn't have won any Slams past 27 or 28.

Part of what keeps people winning Slams into their 30s is drive. Bjorn lost his at 25. He probably would have won another Slam or two, maybe three or four, but I don't think any in his 30s.

Borg's body and physiology was unlike anyone's at the time! Supposedly his heart rate was half of most which helped him in those grinding matches on clay and other surfaces! That was why he "owned" more players than even Rafa today; never losing to quite a few other top 10'rs including Gerulaitis, Dibbs, Solomon, Gottfried, and many others! The longer Rafa plays, the more his pigeons have come around to finally beat him including Lopez, Fabio, & Verdasco! :angel: :dodgy: :clap

 

[El Dude]

Part of the mystique of Borg is that he retired before he really declined! So we never got to see what a declining Borg would look like! It is also worth noting that Johnny Mac owned him at the end!! So even if Borg continued, who knows how many he would have won?! He was losing interest and Mac only compounded that because Bjorn knew he was no longer the best!

clap:laydownlaughinguzzled:cover

 

[Fiero425]

Part of the mystique of Borg is that he retired before he really declined! So we never got to see what a declining Borg would look like! It is also worth noting that Johnny Mac owned him at the end!! So even if Borg continued, who knows how many he would have won?! He was losing interest and Mac only compounded that because Bjorn knew he was no longer the best!

:cry :clap :laydownlaughing uzzled :cover

You know what they say about opinions and a part of the anatomy? :nono :ras:

 

[El Dude]

Well, the basic truth is that Mac won their last two meetings and three of four Slams overall. By the end of 1981, Mac was to Borg what Rafa was to Federer in 2008: he had taken his crown as best in the biz.

 

[Fiero425]

Well, the basic truth is that Mac won their last 2 meetings & 3 of 4 Majors overall. By the end of '81, Mac was to Borg what Rafa was to Federer in '08: had taken his crown as best in the biz.

See previous POST! :nono :cover :zzz: :deadhorse

 

[Kieran]

Well, the basic truth is that Mac won their last two meetings and three of four Slams overall. By the end of 1981, Mac was to Borg what Rafa was to Federer in 2008: he had taken his crown as best in the biz.

This is true, Mac had begun to relish his matches with Bjorn, and Borg hadn't figured out a way to stop him. I think the idea of all that hard work to the already tired Borg was a burden, then he wanted to cut back his schedule and fell into dispute with the ATP, and so the swede went Greta Garbo, which was likely the worst option for everybody, but it gave Borg an out.

The effect on Mac was immediate too: diminished appetite and a loss of momentum for a couple of years...

 

[Backhand_DTL]

Yeah, I think 17 is a stretch. I also think this summer puts some serious questions in Novak's stock. I would say the USO, he had so many passes, that it's hard to count making the final a huge success, but in general this year, he has looked vulnerable. Hopefully he can get back together by next season.

Yes, it's hard to treat reaching the final the way Novak did as a great achievement but it might be an important result in keeping the No. 1 ranking.

It's also true that this summer is the first time since after Roland Garros 2014 that their is some real uncertainity about Novak and although he pulled himself together for the French Open there was a vibe that his mind isn't fully on tennis at least since Rome and with the private and physical problems and achieving a lifetime goal by winning in Paris it's likely that his perspective on the sport right now is not the same it was during the years before and he needs a bit of time to find himself again.

But in his post match interview he seemed clearly happier than after Wimbledon and said he expects to be able to play in Asia and the documentary series about his life on and off the court he plans to do with Amazon next year might also be a source of inspiration so there are reasons to be cautiously optimistic.

 

[Carol]

6 more GS? not even close unless the others player would become lame or one-armed :nono

I thought you belong to "no speculation" and "anything can happen" category or does it only selectively apply?

Of course everything that still has not happened is a speculation, if we don't know what is going to happen tomorrow what a heck we can know what is going to happen the next years but at least we think and having some ideas with some logic. IMO if the tour improves and not what we have seen for awhile (and not just Stan who probably is not going to win any more GS) then by logic Novak will can't win 6 GS not even in his dreams

 

[shawnbm]

I wouldn't have added Borg to that obscure list since he retired well before 30 at 26 y.o.! He owned the French like Nadal does today! He would have won a lot more if the ATP had just given him a break back in early '82! He could have come back by French Open and still won with his usual pigeons still haunting the place like Vilas! I hardly think his countryman Wilander would have had the guts to beat Bjorn in all his glory! No doubt he would have been the one all were trying to surpass instead of Sampras 2 decades later! :angel: :dodgy:

Except that Borg had lost his drive by 25 and even if he hadn't retired and kept on playing, unless he miraculously found his mojo again, he wouldn't have won any Slams past 27 or 28.

Part of what keeps people winning Slams into their 30s is drive. Bjorn lost his at 25. He probably would have won another Slam or two, maybe three or four, but I don't think any in his 30s.

I know you, El Dude, will recall what Mats said about his first French in 1982 after Borg stepped away--he practiced with him the week before Paris and was trying to hang with Bjorn and got whipped 6-0, 6-1!!!! The thought that Borg would NOT have won the 1982 French (and likely another at least) is one I will gladly speculate on and say that that thing we will never know was as about as sure a thing there ever was. Outside of that one Italian in the mid-Seventies when Borg was still a teenager, nobody was close to him. I would think his demolition of the field for years on end was pretty close to Nadal's. He was like a clay machine--I remember watching him very well. Nadal is the only guy that summons up such clay court prowess. I think Borg, even if losing to Mac on grass and hards, would have won two or three more of those easy. Noah against Borg on clay???? A massacre. Ivan the Terrible? He would have been ground into mincemeat by the Angelic Assassin. I have no doubts whatsoever.

 

[Kieran]

Ivan the Terrible took Borg to 5 sets in the 1981 final, buddy. I think Borg was tired of competition and although dispatched young Mats easily before the 1982 FO, it's different under the heat of pressure and expectation - both things which I believe was seriously stressed over, and wished to avoid. But even still, I think he'd have been prohibitive favourite to win the FO in 1982, because at that stage it still had to be proven he could be beaten there, again.

I held out hopes back then that he'd return in 1982, and Navratilova finally winning the US Open that year showed me that a player could beat "the jinx" and succeed through sheer stubborn perseverance, but Borg's whole career had been stubborn perseverance and I think his tank was empty once he knew how hard he'd have to work to get back to the top.

That's my feeling, anyway. Here's some YouTube vids of Borg v Mac in 1982, which are interesting shots into what might have been...

 

[Fiero425]

Ivan the Terrible took Borg to 5 sets in the 1981 final, buddy. I think Borg was tired of competition and although dispatched young Mats easily before the 1982 FO, it's different under the heat of pressure and expectation - both things which I believe was seriously stressed over, and wished to avoid. But even still, I think he'd have been prohibitive favourite to win the FO in 1982, because at that stage it still had to be proven he could be beaten there, again.

I held out hopes back then that he'd return in 1982, and Navratilova finally winning the US Open that year showed me that a player could beat "the jinx" and succeed through sheer stubborn perseverance, but Borg's whole career had been stubborn perseverance and I think his tank was empty once he knew how hard he'd have to work to get back to the top.

That's my feeling, anyway. Here's some YouTube vids of Borg v Mac in 1982, which are interesting shots into what might have been...

Oh, imperfection, delete, misinformation, alert, alert, alert - :dalek: - - Navratilova was upset my Shriver in '82; won 1st title in a rout and a romp over Evert the following season in '83! Tsk, tsk! :cover :deadhorse :spacecadet:

 

[Kieran]

Thank you brother! The old memory isn't what it used to be... :eyepop

 

[coban]

Novak's game - like many other great defenders is a game that will unravel quite fast if he is on the decline. A split second on the return of serve, or getting in position for the forehand/backhand can really hurt him.

Unless he changes up his game i don't think he will be able to reach Federer.

 

[El Dude]

Kieran said pretty much what I was going to say. Yes, Borg still had the game, but did he have the drive? Borg has the greatest "what could could have been" story, because it is easy to imagine what his record would have been like if he had continued on, maybe winning four, five, even six more Slams. But again, we cannot separate ability from psychology. In fact, much of greatness--and lasting greatness--is the will to work even harder to compete, and the desire to win.

If we say, "but if Borg had really wanted to he could have won more," then we should extend the same courtesy to others. We could even say, "If Federer still had the killer instinct, he would have won a few more Slams. If Rafa didn't lose his confidence..." and so on. In the end, a player accomplished what he accomplished, and the only real way we can assess greatness is by looking at the record, not what could have been.

So yeah, I agree with Kieran that Borg--already losing interest in the grind of the tour--saw the writing on the wall when he started losing to Mac more often than not. He didn't want to be #2 and didn't have it in him to do what needed to be done to return to #1. Could he have? Sure, why not? I agree that he would have been heavily favored at RG in 1982. But I could also see how, even if he had continued, he might have won only another Slam or two there, and maybe none at Wimbledon or the USO. We just can't know "what could have been" because it really would have depended upon his mentality, and his mentality was why he retired when he did.

 

[El Dude]

Novak's game - like many other great defenders is a game that will unravel quite fast if he is on the decline. A split second on the return of serve, or getting in position for the forehand/backhand can really hurt him.

Unless he changes up his game i don't think he will be able to reach Federer.

Here we see a possible mirror to Rafa. I think what happened to Rafa is that when injury and appendicitis hit him in 2014, he wasn't able to come back as quickly and easily as he had in the past. In fact, he never fully came back at all, and this marred his confidence and worsened his results. It took him almost two years to find a form vaguely resembling his best, and then he managed to win Monte Carlo, but then he got injured again and is back where he was.

When he was younger, Rafa was able to come back from his injuries rather quickly, playing himself right back into form. But this hasn't been the case for the last two years. Couple that with being older and dealing with confidence issues that he never had before, and it becomes an increasingly uphill battle.

One thing Novak has going for him that Rafa doesn't is an ability to remain relatively healthy. If Novak can continue to remain healthy, he could fight off Father Time for a few more years. He also seems better able to adjust and adapt his game, whereas Rafa doggedly does what he's always done (because he worked for him so well). But at some point, a hint of doubt sneaks in and the confidence is hurt, which in turn worsens results. It maybe that losing the last two Slams is that hint of doubt.

But I don't think we'll see a quick collapse from Novak. Rather, I think we'll see two or three years similar to 2012-14, when he was as good as anyone else, but not significantly better. I don't think he'll ever win more than two Slams in a year again, and I don't think he'll have more than one more multi-Slam year. If he doesn't win two in 2017, then he'll never win two in a year again. But if I had to guess, I'd say he wins two more next year, and two more sometime after that--perhaps one in 2018 and one in 2019, but isn't able to win another and retires after 2021 or 2022, finishing with 16.

 

[Backhand_DTL]

Novak's game - like many other great defenders is a game that will unravel quite fast if he is on the decline. A split second on the return of serve, or getting in position for the forehand/backhand can really hurt him.

Unless he changes up his game i don't think he will be able to reach Federer.

Here we see a possible mirror to Rafa. I think what happened to Rafa is that when injury and appendicitis hit him in 2014, he wasn't able to come back as quickly and easily as he had in the past. In fact, he never fully came back at all, and this marred his confidence and worsened his results. It took him almost two years to find a form vaguely resembling his best, and then he managed to win Monte Carlo, but then he got injured again and is back where he was.

I really wouldn't classify Novak as a defender but much more as a measured offensive baseliner with great defensive and counterpunching skills. His prefered game style is to control rallies off the first strike (which he is able to do on most of his serves and his opponent's second serves) and win the point rather sooner than later via good shot selection and point construction.

Only Stan and Del Potro playing well have the kind of power that is needed to continously push him far behind the baseline. Against other players (even big hitters like Berdych, Tsonga and Cilic) he mostly stays close to the baseline and tries to take the ball quite early. I haven't looked at statistics but my impression is that especially since Becker joined his team Novak worked on shortening the points while staying within himself and wins the majority of his matches in about 90 minutes which is rather efficient.

Compared to Rafa he also moves and strikes the ball with clearly less effort so their styles are fairly different. As older players who play(ed) somewhat similar to Novak I would think of David Ferrer (although at least Novak's serve and backhand are a lot better; forehand, return, movement and net game are on a similar level in my opinion) and Andre Agassi, who both didn't noticeably decline in their early 30s but had played significantly less matches at Novak's current age. So it remains to be seen if Novak's recent physical problems are kind of an exception or the start of his body breaking down more frequently.

The other thing he has going for him are that the younger generations don't seem too threatening for the near future. I think only Nishikori beat Novak in a big match yet and has lost all their matches (most of them rather easily) since then so even if Novak declines a bit and Kei, Milos or Grigor improve slightly Novak should be able to handle them more often than not and the players as old or older than him are as likely to decline as he is. Apart from that Delpo could be a Wild Card, Thiem might be dangerous on clay and Kyrgios on grass but a true changing of the guard seems unlikely within the next two years right now.

 

[El Dude]

Good stuff, FG. Where I see them as similar is that they both rely upon incredible movement and athleticism. If and when they lose a step, it has a larger impact on their game than someone, like Federer for instance, who is more offense-minded.

But I do think Novak will age better than Rafa, maybe much better. But his level of 2015-early 2016 is unsustainable, especially as the field continues to improve over the next year or two.

I do agree, though, that we won't see a "true changing of the guard" next year, but I do think we'll see the current guard start looking mortal: more upsets for both Andy and Novak, possibly a new Slam champion even, or at least a new Master's titlist or two. But I don't think it will be until 2018 at the earliest, if not 2019, that the Novak-Andy-Stan generation wins a minority of Slams. I could see Novak and Andy winning 2-3 between them again next year, with one new Slam winner, and then in 2019 two between them, with two Slams going to younger players. By 2020, the guard will likely have shifted.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Apart from that Delpo could be a Wild Card, Thiem might be dangerous on clay and Kyrgios on grass but a true changing of the guard seems unlikely within the next two years right now.

There may not be and probably will not be a change of guard soon. But, a change of guard is not needed to stop Novak from passing Fed. He can lose to a variety of different players, no one looks really great.

However, I would give Novak YE #1 at least couple more years as he is likely to be more consistent and go deep in many tourneys, even if he gets upset 2 or 3 times in slams each year.

 

[Backhand_DTL]

Good stuff, FG. Where I see them as similar is that they both rely upon incredible movement and athleticism. If and when they lose a step, it has a larger impact on their game than someone, like Federer for instance, who is more offense-minded.

But I do think Novak will age better than Rafa, maybe much better. But his level of 2015-early 2016 is unsustainable, especially as the field continues to improve over the next year or two.

I do agree, though, that we won't see a "true changing of the guard" next year, but I do think we'll see the current guard start looking mortal: more upsets for both Andy and Novak, possibly a new Slam champion even, or at least a new Master's titlist or two. But I don't think it will be until 2018 at the earliest, if not 2019, that the Novak-Andy-Stan generation wins a minority of Slams. I could see Novak and Andy winning 2-3 between them again next year, with one new Slam winner, and then in 2019 two between them, with two Slams going to younger players. By 2020, the guard will likely have shifted.

Yes for Roger as an all out attacking player it's easier to commit to a style that's less physical and aims to keep points as short as possible. Regarding the dependence on movement and athleticism Novak certainly is between Rafa and Roger so expecting Novak to be able to play at a high level until the age of something like 32 or 33 (which would be the 2020 season) seems reasonable to me. But Novak has a quite unique style of moving which is more of the fluid kind but relies a lot on sliding, flexibility and taking rather big steps, so there isn't much evidence to base a prediction how fast that declines with age on.

The level of play itself from Novak from fall 2014 to Roland Garros 2016 above all compared to 2011 where he successfully redlined for eight months is actually kind of sustainable in my opinion, although I think there was a slight drop already after the Australian Open (especially Novak's serve seemed a bit worse than 2015 to me, before it really took a nosedive after RG) and rumours about minor health issues were already there some months before Wimbledon.

But in both years there were multiple tournaments where Novak looked nothing special in the early rounds and definitely beatable for other Top players but in most cases seemed to be able to raise his level at will once he faced another Top 10 player or when he felt threatened within a match. And even this year apart from the freak losses in Dubai and Monte Carlo and the tournament in Rome where something seemed to be completely off in general other than maybe the 4th round against Simon in Australia and the Davis Cup match against Kukushkin there weren't any matches where he was close to losing until after the French Open. But for that to work there's a calm and supreme confidence in his body and abilities required which doesn't seem to be there right now and can't be acquired on command. Nevertheless after reaching finals in I think all but four events he played from October 2014 to May 2016 and achieving his biggest goal for the season by winning in Paris some kind of drop off was probably inevitable and at his for a dominating player already advanced age would likely have happened even without any personal and physical problems.

As an improving serve can mask a slight decline in other areas quite well I wouldn't be surprised if Novak can come at least close to the level of the first half of the year again if he gets his serve back to the 2015-level and is able to build up some confidence during the rest of the year but even then an all around dominance for a whole year like 2015 probably won't happen again with Andy and someone of the younger generation seeming due for a breakthrough against Novak at a major and Delpo, Cilic and Stan recently reminding us how dangerous they can be in the weeks they catch fire. Young players like Zverev, Fritz, Thiem or Kyrgios somewhat consistently contending for Slams or the No. 1 ranking in my opinion is unlikely to happen before the second half of 2018 though.

There may not be and probably will not be a change of guard soon. But, a change of guard is not needed to stop Novak from passing Fed. He can lose to a variety of different players, no one looks really great.

However, I would give Novak YE #1 at least couple more years as he is likely to be more consistent and go deep in many tourneys, even if he gets upset 2 or 3 times in slams each year.

Yes, Novak not passing Roger's slam count seems more likely than not regardless when the change of guard will happen at the moment. But accomplishing the greater hard court resume than Roger which he would arguably have with one further and definitely have with two further HC slams (assuming Roger doesn't add any himself) should definitely be a goal for Novak. If he is at at least 15 Grand Slam titles after the Australian Open 2018 it will get interesting regarding the slam total if not Novak reaching or passing Roger most probably won't happen.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Novak says that grand slam trophies and no. 1 ranking are no longer his priorities . I wonder what are his priorities; Bollywood? uzzled