Wilander underrated ?

[suwanee4712]

I can't say that I was a great fan of Mats. I didn't like to watch him play very much. But he has the record to be included amongst the greats of his era. He was remarkably smart and consistent. And I don't care who you were, if Mats was in your side of the draw, you knew you were going to have to beat him to win that tournament. Mats almost never beat himself.

His 1982 French Open win over Vilas, to me, is still an astonishing feat. Even though it's not a match I would recommend anyone watching, Vilas was so good and so experienced. For Mats to outsteady and out tough him at age 17 at Vilas' best and important tournament says a lot.

7 grand slams is 7 grand slams anyway that you cut it. I give him a lot of credit for going down to Australia and winning on grass even when the draws weren't the best. Grass was not his best surface and he had no real reason to go down there and play those tournaments. But he did. And he beat some good grass court players for those titles.

So, yes, while not one of my favorites, I would say that Mats is very underated. And I agree with the person above who put him in the same category as Becker and Edberg. Though both of those players had the best style of play to beat Wilander, Wilander's results in the majors was just as good as their's.

[Jack the Hack]

Wilander is my favorite player of all time, and his record 6+ hour Davis Cup match with McEnroe in '82 was one of the events that inspired me to play tennis (even though Wilander lost).

Anyway, here's the previous thread about Wilander being underrated:

http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showt...light=Wilander

Wilander, Connors, and Agassi are the only three players to have won a Slam on all three major surfaces. I believe that Wilander is the only person to have done it twice.

His game style was not awe-inspiring as far as power or touch. His weapons were his mind, physical fitness, and speed. To me, he was the ultimate thinking man's player.

As far as his failures at Wimbledon, I will point out that Wilander had a 34-15 record there, made the quarterfinals in singles three times, and won the doubles championship with Joakim Nystrom in 1985. (In fact, Wilander has made comments in the past that winning the Wimbledon doubles title with Nystrom - a childhood friend - was as happy a moment as anything else he ever did on the tennis court.)

[Wuornos]

Originally Posted by Moose Malloy

1988 was the first year that the Australian Open was 128 draw. Wilander beat good players to win his 2 AOs prior to that year, but the fact that he had to play only 6 matches to win those majors in a way proves it was a lesser major. Isn't the 128 draw partly why we consider these events the 'majors?'

also consider the prize money differential with the australian open even today(& the difference in the 80s was even bigger, I'll try to find out how much Wilander won for winning the '83/'84 AOs, I recall it being considerably lower than a number of regular atp events that year, not just the majors)
It would be strange if, say, the Italian Open offered more prize money than a slam today, no?

total prize money offered at the majors in '06:

AO-$6,784,589

FO-$8,543,700

W-$8,847,338

US-$8,332,000

another reason Wilander is underrated is, despite winning 3 of 4 slams in '88, he only got the #1 ranking after winning the US Open, his 3rd major that year. That showed that he really wasn't that dominant in '88, like Mac, Connors, Lendl & other past greats were in their best years. He wasn't really winning that much more than other players in '88, despite the fact that he won 3 majors(& all 3 were major struggles, many 5 setters etc, he wasn't doing it the way Fed did) I think he own only 6 titles total in '88.

also Wilander had a very poor record at Wimbledon, he never even reached the semis. In the 80s Wimbledon was so far ahead of the other majors, I could see why Edberg & Becker may be regarded more highly.



You never explained your ranking system, but I think I figured it out. I noticed Connors was pretty low on your 'peak performance' list(lower than Becker & Courier) & now I know why. It seems unfair to penalize him for playing past his prime, being good enough to reach still slam semis, but not good enough to win them. his 15-16 record in semis is misleading. If he quit after '83, I imagine he would move up quite a bit under your system.

Thanks Moose. It was really interesting to see the discrepancy in prize money. I can't remember the exact words, but think there was line in 'The Hustler' where 'Minessota Fats' says the best pool player is the one who wins the most money forget everything else. On this basis alone it's possible to see why the AO would be held in less regard than the other slams.

I can see why you would think what you thought of my system but its not right. The system contains a spread adjuster which allows for long and short careers and adjusts for them accordingly. Connors is rated quite lowly for two reasons. First the system is based only on results in Majors and has an underrlying statistical significance basis to evaluate results. Connors tended to dominate for single years which is not enough to be considered hugely significant and then tended to follow up with a year where he was not dominant in the majors. E.g 1974 and 75. Had he been able to string two good years together the spread adjuster would have multiplied his total achievement by a higher value as he would have compressed a greater proportion of his major achievements into a smaller space and his dominance rating would have been higher.

No the reason Connors tend to appear low is that statistically a single year is not enough to prove outstanding greatness, only the lower echelons of the best. And Connors tended not to string his great results together.

Don't blame me I just harness the tools of statistical probability theory. What you could say in criticism of my system though is that it is a little short sighted in only looking at Majors and I suspect that Connors would be much higher if we included lessser tournaments. However, I'm not sure whether doing this might damage some other greats like Sampras.

Keep the posts coming Moose they're always a well thought out and a good read.

[grafrules]

Wilander should be ranked over Becker and Edberg. He has 1 more slam title then them. He won slam titles on all surfaces unlike them. He had a year winning 3 slams unlike them.

[Wuornos]

Thanks everyone. I have found all the points made most useful. Appreciated.