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Who is the true goat in Tennis ?
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LukeParkerno1
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Best players box imo
Vdubs
Hall of Famer
LukeParkerno1
Post-Human
Don't see how Nadal is lower than Fed, Raf has more and a better head to head. Question is where do you put Bjorg and Laver and those two are subjective. Personally have Bjorg at 2, and Laver at 5.
Vdubs
Hall of Famer
Possibly true.
I thought Fed at his peerless best was both great to watch, and near unbeatable.
Nadal has a great record, and ahead on Slams, so great argument for him to be #2, but I do not enjoy watching him.
McEnroe was not far behind Borg
LukeParkerno1
Post-Human
The HTD is so far in favour of Nadal that's the issue, and he got more Slams in the end. Bjorg for me and I trust my father here who followed him at his prime, he was better than both, it's why I have him at 2, Nadal 3, Fed 4th, and Laver 5th. From 2 to 5 it's subjective though, clear who is 1, and he won't be beaten in our lifetime.
Vdubs
Hall of Famer
Agree about hth.
Nadal was too strong for Fed overall, but I'm in your dad's vintage (mid 60's), and Borg was machine like, but did not have the resilience or durability to be in the top 3. Hard to know how we would have been against the top 3, but we'll never know. There was a time that we thought noone would surpass Fed and Nadal.
That's why I find his achievement pretty extraordinary. Ad he was coming up and developing his game, he had two all time greats in their prime to contend with. So his game had to be at 95% his peak before he could even think of challenging them on a consistent basis. caveat: 95% was a somewhat arbitrary figure, but he certainly had to get his game to a certain level before he was able to match it.
LukeParkerno1
Post-Human
I was saying from the start it was Novaks to break if he didn't flop slams to Murray he'd have broken it long before and then he basically had a year to 18mths from competing due to COVID. Would have 30+ already. Each to their own on Bjorn he was a machine and I have read heaps about him but it was a bit before my time, defer to my father on that one. I have Nadal comfortably ahead of Fed on any list.
Correct me if i'm wrong, but the majority of their head to heads were on clay, hence Nadal is a long way in front as at full fitness he is practicably unbeatable on clay. All other surfaces the head to head is nearly even.
LukeParkerno1
Post-Human
Doesn't matter where they are, and Nadal has squared it on other surfaces. He's ahead and it's comfortably too. Fed won quite a few grass events too. On every indicator Nadal is ahead, he may not have had the prettier game, but as a player he beats Fed.
They aren't square on other surfaces though.
Federer won 8 Wimbledons. His favourite surface is grass, without a doubt.
12 on hard court. Only 1 At French.
Nadal is better head to head in the fact that he won both French and Wimbledon in the same year v Federer. Adjusting his game from clay to grass whilst having to contend with Federer on his surface is a feat in itself.
Federer has never won v Nadal in French, and only won twice on clay all time.
Nadal leads 6-0 French Open. 3-1 Australian Open.
Federer only leads in Wimbledon 3-1.
It’s even more impressive that Djokovic is the only player to beat Nadal twice in French Open.
Nadal and Djokovic have won every grand slam at least twice. Federer hasn’t done that.
In fact Djokovic is the only player in history to win each 3 times- doing so at French Open this year.
LukeParkerno1
Post-Human
Yes they are basically, and Nadal has a significant advantage on clay, Fed never beat Nadal on clay to win a slam, he beat Soderling in that final. It's not even close, Nadal has more Slams, take out their best Slam and it's equal anyway. Then you defer to the Slam number, Nadal is ahead.
Crazy they never played at the US open.
LukeParkerno1
Post-Human
Furthermore the one French Fed got he didn't even have to beat Nadal, if you vaguely remember Soderling beat Nadal (Nadal was out for months after this but that isn't the point)
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Tennis legend John McEnroe has described Novak Djokovic as “one in a billion” after the Serb claimed his 24th Grand Slam title with victory at the 2023 US Open.
The seven-time major singles champion also labelled Djokovic as “one of the most remarkable athletes you will see in any sport in every way possible.”
“He is one of the most remarkable athletes you will see in any sport in every way possible. The drive, the hunger, the will he still has after all his achievements is crazy. He is one in a billion,” the American told ESPN.
www.tennis365.com
The seven-time major singles champion also labelled Djokovic as “one of the most remarkable athletes you will see in any sport in every way possible.”
“He is one of the most remarkable athletes you will see in any sport in every way possible. The drive, the hunger, the will he still has after all his achievements is crazy. He is one in a billion,” the American told ESPN.
John McEnroe lauds 'one in a billion' Novak Djokovic after US Open triumph
Tennis legend John McEnroe has described Novak Djokovic as "one in a billion" after the Serb claimed his 24th Grand Slam title with victory at the 2023 US Open.
www.tennis365.com
BrissyLions101
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40th Masters 1000 title now and almost guaranteed an 8th Year end No1.
97 tour level titles with Jimmy Connors 109 in sight.
Crazy Stuff!
97 tour level titles with Jimmy Connors 109 in sight.
Crazy Stuff!
Now 98 titles for Djokovic and it's by his record breaking 7th YEC.
Has enough of a lead on Alcaraz in points that he could end up going quite a few months in 2024 as no. 1, so the magical 418 weeks at no. 1 is now looking achievable.
He will almost certainly push deep into the 90 wins at each Grand Slam next year and overtake Federer's number of total wins at Grand Slams.
Basically the only meaningful record that Djokovic has not (or will not) gobble up is the consecutive weeks at no. 1 which Federer will continue to hold. Every other meaningful record Djokovic extended his lead on in 2023, and will hopefully do again in 2024.
Convincingly crushed Alcaraz then Sinner. At 36.
He ll skate through to the Aus Open, knowing number 1 seed is safe, then perhaps have a break from French and go for Wimbledon.
He ll skate through to the Aus Open, knowing number 1 seed is safe, then perhaps have a break from French and go for Wimbledon.
LukeParkerno1
Post-Human
He's already talking going for the Golden Slam. He's playing the French be dumb if he doesn't would be the clear favourite right now,
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I am an unashamed Nadal fan and he had a legit claim at the title for a while but it’s passed him by.
I just can’t find a way to put the likes of Laver and Borg that high into the equation when the gap in total slams is THAT high to the three at the top.
It’s like there needs to be two lots of discussion.
As far as the main three go, we’ll Novak clearly is number one but there is a bit more nuance worth discussing than just how many titles each of them have won etc etc.
All players have styles and all players have their favourite surfaces.
To me that gives Nadal a handicap straight away.
Ok, Federer’s favourite surface only has one slam as well, AND it only offers a few tournaments a year, and they’re only warm up tournaments. At least Nadal’s favourite surface offers a ‘season’ and includes a handful of prestigious tour events.
Djokovic is the most favoured here. Hard courts suit him the most, there are two slams held on hard courts and I’m fairly sure I’m right in saying they dominate the biggest percentage of other tournaments on the circuit as well.
There are a lot of good hard court players, too, for Novak to contend with.
Though I doubt to the level of the fabled ‘European and South American clay court specialists’ that Nadal has basically made obsolete for nearly 20 years. That these guys have just stopped bobbing up and nabbing the odd title speaks volumes for how dominant he has been.
Anyway that’s a long winded preface for what I was intending to say:
The games of Federer and Djokovic and how they were coached and developed were suited to fast tennis. Yes grass doesn’t bounce as much as hard court but generally if you’re good on one, you’re good on the other. Each year they front up and have 3 slams that suit their own games. Nadal has 1.
And yes it needs to be acknowledged that for a good chunk of their careers Novak and Federer were BOTH competing for those 3 slams so 1.5 each, to Nadal’s 1, to bring some perspective back a little.
Imagine if there was a slam say the US or the Aus played on a surface that wasn’t the same as clay but suited clay courters a fair bit. What sort of impact would that have on numbers with a second ‘slow court’ surface in the slams? It’s a scary thought because his numbers not only probably go up by 4-5, the numbers of the others would come down.
He gets dismissed a lot for the sheer volume of his slams that came in Paris, but if you have won the same amount of grand slams AWAY from there as Andre Agassi won for his career, then it doesn’t matter one bit.
Winning two at all of them PROVES you can play everywhere, once you do that you can win 20 at Paris and it really doesn’t matter.
So yes while I can accept the pretty indisputable claim Djokovic has, I think Nadal hasn’t really had a lot ‘in his favour’ in general and just to be in a position to be considered is a freak achievement.
I also think he suffers a little because he doesn’t have the ‘grace’ of Federer: it’s like when people try and compare a cricket batsman to Mark Waugh, ok no one is going to make it look that easy, but easy doesn’t always equal exciting so I enjoyed watching Nadal bully the ball with freak amounts of spin and the run down a forehand and will it across the court to win a point.
Anyway just my (lengthy) two cents
I just can’t find a way to put the likes of Laver and Borg that high into the equation when the gap in total slams is THAT high to the three at the top.
It’s like there needs to be two lots of discussion.
As far as the main three go, we’ll Novak clearly is number one but there is a bit more nuance worth discussing than just how many titles each of them have won etc etc.
All players have styles and all players have their favourite surfaces.
To me that gives Nadal a handicap straight away.
Ok, Federer’s favourite surface only has one slam as well, AND it only offers a few tournaments a year, and they’re only warm up tournaments. At least Nadal’s favourite surface offers a ‘season’ and includes a handful of prestigious tour events.
Djokovic is the most favoured here. Hard courts suit him the most, there are two slams held on hard courts and I’m fairly sure I’m right in saying they dominate the biggest percentage of other tournaments on the circuit as well.
There are a lot of good hard court players, too, for Novak to contend with.
Though I doubt to the level of the fabled ‘European and South American clay court specialists’ that Nadal has basically made obsolete for nearly 20 years. That these guys have just stopped bobbing up and nabbing the odd title speaks volumes for how dominant he has been.
Anyway that’s a long winded preface for what I was intending to say:
The games of Federer and Djokovic and how they were coached and developed were suited to fast tennis. Yes grass doesn’t bounce as much as hard court but generally if you’re good on one, you’re good on the other. Each year they front up and have 3 slams that suit their own games. Nadal has 1.
And yes it needs to be acknowledged that for a good chunk of their careers Novak and Federer were BOTH competing for those 3 slams so 1.5 each, to Nadal’s 1, to bring some perspective back a little.
Imagine if there was a slam say the US or the Aus played on a surface that wasn’t the same as clay but suited clay courters a fair bit. What sort of impact would that have on numbers with a second ‘slow court’ surface in the slams? It’s a scary thought because his numbers not only probably go up by 4-5, the numbers of the others would come down.
He gets dismissed a lot for the sheer volume of his slams that came in Paris, but if you have won the same amount of grand slams AWAY from there as Andre Agassi won for his career, then it doesn’t matter one bit.
Winning two at all of them PROVES you can play everywhere, once you do that you can win 20 at Paris and it really doesn’t matter.
So yes while I can accept the pretty indisputable claim Djokovic has, I think Nadal hasn’t really had a lot ‘in his favour’ in general and just to be in a position to be considered is a freak achievement.
I also think he suffers a little because he doesn’t have the ‘grace’ of Federer: it’s like when people try and compare a cricket batsman to Mark Waugh, ok no one is going to make it look that easy, but easy doesn’t always equal exciting so I enjoyed watching Nadal bully the ball with freak amounts of spin and the run down a forehand and will it across the court to win a point.
Anyway just my (lengthy) two cents
How's this for nuance, it's been over ten years since Nadal has taken a set off Djokovic on a hard court, as well as ten years since Nadal has beaten Djokovic on any surface that is not clay.
In this time Nadal has played Djokovic 12 times on clay with a record of 5 wins to Djokovic, so hardly one sided.
Federer also won his last seven matches against Nadal on non-Clay surfaces.
Now you can cry poor and say that there should be more clay surface events to suit Nadal, however, clay is fortunate that it actually has the amount of ATP titles allocated to it that it has. If you were say, a grass specialist, you have very limited events to pick from.
You could just as well look at the equation from the opposite direction. It is impressive that Djokovic has been able to frequently (at least relatively speaking) beat Nadal who is clearly the greatest clay-court player. This is not something that Nadal can claim.
Extrapolating further since Djokovic became the no. 1 ranked player in the world on 4 July 2011 he has been beaten by Nadal on non-clay surfaces a total of 2 times, from 16 attempts.
You can twist it anyway you want, but it's still a massive indictment on Nadal's GOAT credentials (outside of all the other statistical arguments in Djokovic's favour).
And I say this as someone who has a great deal of appreciation for Nadal, his playstyle and his achievements.
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I’m not really sure what your argument is supposed to signify because I’m not arguing that Nadal is the best.
I’m saying that he has the hardest job in the first place of matching the other two numerically.
