When will Men's tennis go through another transitional stage?

[JRAJ1988]

2000-2003 was the last transitional era before Federer's reign of terror, followed by Nadal then Djokovic...With Murray and Del Potro picking up the scraps.

How can you determine a transitional era? when different players swap the number 1 ranking in one year? different slam winners? When is the next era going to come?

Regarding womens tennis I still think Serena is the dominant force until others step up.

 

[jg153040]

It started after January 2010. And Nole, Murray, old Rafa and Fed are picking up the pieces.

The field is not as deep. Rafa went away and still won everything after 7 months? And dominated his worst surface?
Old Ferrer who can't win a match vs Fed is making finals now and was in top 4? Old Fed nr.1 in 2012? Murray and Nole winning multiple majors? Haas anyone???

 

[Roddick85]

I thought we were already in a transition phase?....

 

[Nathaniel_Near]

Soonish...

 

[chicagodude]

It started after January 2010. And Nole, Murray, old Rafa and Fed are picking up the pieces.

The field is not as deep. Rafa went away and still won everything after 7 months? And dominated his worst surface?
Old Ferrer who can't win a match vs Fed is making finals now and was in top 4? Old Fed nr.1 in 2012? Murray and Nole winning multiple majors? Haas anyone???

Hmm, you make good points, but why Jan 2010 and not earlier? It was already Fed/Nadal winning before taht, they were simply joined by Djokovic and Murray recently?

And Haas doing well again is more a testament to how good he has always been (remember around 19999/2000?) and not to the weakness of this era. Ferrer has gotten better the older he got, tho I think he's going to decline soon now...

A transition period in my eyes is defined by a period when no real 'force' exists and a fairly large group could win majors and/or become #1. We had Fed for years, and right now it's a very small group that wins everything and is expected to win majors or be #1.
I expect in about 3-4 years that a new transition period will start, assuming Djoko, Nadal, Murray by then are slowly declining and no new star stood up by then. Could be that by then Delpo is winning everything, who knows...