WORLD NO. 1 (by year)

[Mustard]

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

I really can't understand why you act like this. It's a bit annoying, to be honest.

That's the way it was.

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

It's just laughable to hear that Kriek's negligible AO victories were more important thant Lendl's first two Masters.

I said the Australian Open was a major and that the Masters wasn't a major. I didn't say either was more important.

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

Majors?
Give less credit to the ATP dude, or you'll go in short-circuit in the case of tournaments like the Grand Slam Cup: dismissed in 1999, official since 2000 (ahahah).

The Grand Slam Cup was the ITF's version of the World Championships. Neither were majors, but the Grand Slam Cup certainly paid a ton of money. $2,000,000 for the champion most years, I believe.

[Dan Lobb]

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

Here I agree with Mustard, Mal Anderson definitely deserves his Wembley victory.
Hoad lost to Segura early: well, it's just his fault. He could have won...
otherwise we can also dismiss Federer's 2009 RG: Nadal lost to Soderling early...
that's the rule of the game. If you lose to someone, you're out.

Anderson defeated Sedgman, Rosewall and Segura in that tournament: I can't ask him more.

The point is that the top two guys didn't consider it worth the effort to put out for this event.
This is when you get the supporting cast, and everyone regarded Anderson as supporting cast, winning a tournament.
At Forest Hills, the biggest event of the year, Anderson lost to Hoad in the first round, and Hoad and Gonzales contested the final. Get it? At the big one, the two top guys contested the final. Simple point.
As Hoad said; "If it was the final of a major event, I would try to win. But if it was the final of the Hamburger Open (and there really was a Burger King Pro Championship in Hollywood, Florida, no less) against a player I knew I could beat, well..", he shrugged his shoulders.

[Mustard]

Kramer claimed that Segura had the edge over Hoad. The Tournament of Champions was another tournament altogether, anyway, on grass-courts. The Wembley Pro was indoors. Gonzales was the only big name missing from the 1959 Wembley Pro, and Hoad lost to Segura.

[krosero]

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

You're correct, but the Australian Open in 1972-1982 in my opinion was much more depleted than the 1976 WCT. Moreover, even if partially depleted, the WCT had still a great media coverage that year, and a big money prize too (I think we have to consider the resonance of the event): we really can't say that about the 1972-82 Australian Open (less money, small resonance).

The AO fields ->
1972: Rosewall #3, Newcombe #4, no one else from the top-30
1973: Newcombe #2, Rosewall #6, no one else from the top-30
1974: Newcombe #2, Connors #3, Borg #18, no one else from the top-25
1975: Connors #1, Newcombe #2, no one else from the top-25
1976: Rosewall #6, Roche #12, Newcombe #20, no one else from the top-50
1977-A: only Vilas (#6) from the top-10 + Tanner, Ashe, Rosewall, Stockton (but no one of them was a top-10 at the time)
1977-B: only Gerulaitis from the top-10 (maybe Roscoe Tanner, I can't find his ranking at the end of 1977)
1978: only Vilas (#3) from the top-10
1979: only Vilas (#6) from the top-15
1980: Vilas (#4), Lendl (#6), Clerc (#8 ), Gerulaitis (#9) <- but despite the rankings, you have to agree that three of these players were not grass courters and we still have no one from the top-3.
1981: Vilas (#6), Tanner (#9), no one else from the top-10.
1982: Kriek (#10), no one else from the top-10.

As you can see, this were severely depleted fields (the only one which can be compared with the 1976 WCT Finals is the 1980 edition, but it was still worse)... on the contrary, when the field is only partially depleted, I still give to the prestige a higher credit.
For example, Wimbledon 1972 was a major in my opinion: five from the top-10, including the two stronger players of the year... add to that the Wimbledon prestige and you have a major (on the contrary, I don't consider the 1973 edition, with only one player from the top-10: I think that the difference is evident).
Anyway I also accept who propose Los Angeles for 1972: we don't have to be stiff.
We have some numbers, but there are a lot of ways to read them: some are unconvincing, some are good even with their differences. Your tennis history is definitely good. (Let me add that I'm honoured to write directly to the one who uploaded all these historical tennis videos on youtube!)

Well like you say, we don't have to be stiff about it, and that's really my main point about this. There's no need to be rigid about including the Masters and WCT Finals. I mean, what are we going to do, include the Masters as a major even in its first year (1970?), when it was just a set of round-robin matches? And include Dallas even as late as '88, when the tournament had long been in decline and the AO was back up to strength? Obviously we've got to be sensible and only pick those years when these tour-ending championships were genuinely strong.

But that's the whole problem right there. If we are going by strength of field, then why not pick a tournament like Philadelphia in those years when it clearly has a stronger field than Dallas?

Again your list is very close to what mine would be, so this is no great disagreement. But let me tell you how I think of it.

One, I would prefer to count the traditional Slams as majors, whenever it's sensible to do so. Even when they have moderately weak fields, they still carry a certain prestige and still present the unique challenge of 6 or 7 rounds to win. Arguably the only Slam events that don't make sense as majors are the AO's of the 70s and early 80s, in which often 80% or 90% of the top players were missing (in 1982 all top ten players were missing). And in fact during the weak AO years it was common to call Wimbledon, the USO and the French the "Big Three." So there's very much a precedent for dropping the AO and continuing to think of the remaining three as majors.

But if we take the step of dropping one of the Slams, placing strength of field over historical prestige, then I really don't want to pick a non-Slam tournament (Dallas) on the basis of prestige. If we're going outside of the Slams due to the problem of strength of field, then let's really go with the tournament that has the strongest field (Philadelphia). Going with the weaker field at Dallas, because of a prestige factor, just repeats the problem we have with the AO: we now have chosen yet another tournament that doesn't stack up as one of the best attended events of the year.

And in 1976 that's what I see, when Dallas is called a major and Philadelphia is not. I see Dallas getting that distinction merely because of its title; or because of great draws and matches that had taken place in Dallas in 1971-75.

Connors, arguably the greatest indoor player of the mid 70s, started playing Philadelphia in '76. That's when I think the tournament really hit top strength and was worthy of being called a major, with at least 6 rounds to play (7 for those who did not receive a bye). To me it is somewhat similar to the Lipton of the mid-80s which was a two-week event and was considered for a time as a kind of Slam.

[Xavier G]

Philadelphia (the US Pro Indoors) was a very big tournament back in the 70's and 80's and the depth of field was impressive with best of five sets semi finals some years and five set finals. The winner often had to win six matches. Borg tried to win it on quite a few occasions, but never did.

[FedericRoma83]

Originally Posted by krosero

Well like you say, we don't have to be stiff about it, and that's really my main point about this. There's no need to be rigid about including the Masters and WCT Finals. I mean, what are we going to do, include the Masters as a major even in its first year (1970?), when it was just a set of round-robin matches? And include Dallas even as late as '88, when the tournament had long been in decline and the AO was back up to strength?

About the WCT Finals: we surely don't need to do that, because I consider the Masters more important since 1977. About the 1970 Masters: that year only 2 slam were great, we surely can't understimate the Masters. I don't know if you want to consider it a major or not, I accept both options, but it was surely an important event. Stan Smith had to beat both Laver and Rosewall (the stronger players of the year) to win it, I think he deserves some credit for that.

One, I would prefer to count the traditional Slams as majors, whenever it's sensible to do so. Even when they have moderately weak fields, they still carry a certain prestige and still present the unique challenge of 6 or 7 rounds to win.

That's what I also do. If the field is only partially depleted (for example, Wimbledon & Roland Garros 1972), I would choose the slam anyway. I exclude slams only when they are totally depleted: that means only Roland Garros 1970 and Wimbledon 1973 (both with one player from the top-10) + the Australian Open 1972-82.

Going with the weaker field at Dallas, because of a prestige factor, just repeats the problem we have with the AO: we now have chosen yet another tournament that doesn't stack up as one of the best attended events of the year.

The fact is that we have a different method.
For what I can understand, your is:
- we take the majors, we exclude the Australian Open weak decade, we take the other events with the best fields.
Mine is more like:
- we take the majors, we exclude the Australian Open weak decade, we take the WCT or the Masters because they were the most prestigious after the slams (they also had the best fields in 90% of the seasons, tough not on every one I have to admit).

Obviously these are only two possibilities, there are a lot of others: for example, we can simply consider the 1972-82 a three-major-per-year era, even if this would give us two problems: 1. we'll got some troubles if we are going to compare different historical moments (but we don't necessarily need to compare them, because as Kiki rightly said, every era is a special case); 2. we know that journalists used to call the WCT finals a Major back in the days... that demonstrates how much the situation was messy at the time.

Anyway I didn't say that the Philadelphia selection for 1976 is wrong, it's a definitely legitimate option, I accept every kind of vision, expecially when is so well explained (what I don't accept easily are statements like "the Australian Open was a Major because the ATP said that", but it's definitely not your case). Maybe tomorrow I'll wake up thinking "let's choose Philadelphia for 1976!", who knows... in Italy we use to say something like "only the idiots never change their minds".

[FedericRoma83]

Originally Posted by Dan Lobb

The point is that the top two guys didn't consider it worth the effort to put out for this event.
This is when you get the supporting cast, and everyone regarded Anderson as supporting cast, winning a tournament.
At Forest Hills, the biggest event of the year, Anderson lost to Hoad in the first round, and Hoad and Gonzales contested the final. Get it? At the big one, the two top guys contested the final. Simple point.

It's strange to hear that because, just for example, Ken Rosewall said that the Wembley tournament was his favourite one during the Pro era.
Your point sounds to me like: they went out before the finals = the didn't put out for it; they went to the finals = it was great tournament.
I don't agree: in my opinion we have to consider the option that even the greatest players ever can lose a match.

[FedericRoma83]

Krosero, can you post the Philadelphia 1976 draws?

[krosero]

The draws for the entire season can be pulled up here: http://www.atpworldtour.com/Scores/A...spx?t=2&y=1976

A convenient list of the computer year-end rankings is here: http://www.tennis28.com/rankings/yearend_topten.html

The ITF site also has archived draws, though I don't recall where to find them.

[krosero]

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

The fact is that we have a different method.
For what I can understand, your is:
- we take the majors, we exclude the Australian Open weak decade, we take the other events with the best fields.
Mine is more like:
- we take the majors, we exclude the Australian Open weak decade, we take the WCT or the Masters because they were the most prestigious after the slams (they also had the best fields in 90% of the seasons, tough not on every one I have to admit).

Obviously these are only two possibilities, there are a lot of others: for example, we can simply consider the 1972-82 a three-major-per-year era, even if this would give us two problems: 1. we'll got some troubles if we are going to compare different historical moments (but we don't necessarily need to compare them, because as Kiki rightly said, every era is a special case); 2. we know that journalists used to call the WCT finals a Major back in the days... that demonstrates how much the situation was messy at the time.

Anyway I didn't say that the Philadelphia selection for 1976 is wrong, it's a definitely legitimate option, I accept every kind of vision, expecially when is so well explained (what I don't accept easily are statements like "the Australian Open was a Major because the ATP said that", but it's definitely not your case). Maybe tomorrow I'll wake up thinking "let's choose Philadelphia for 1976!", who knows... in Italy we use to say something like "only the idiots never change their minds".

Love that last phrase, I don't recall hearing it.

I see entirely what you're saying, I don't have any big disagreements here.

But about Kiki's argument, I do have to say something. I agree with him, and you, and Timnz, that each era is best compared in its own context -- according to the standards of the time. No problem there. But to do that with the 70s and 80s, it is not necessary at all to give the era 5 or 6 majors per year. That will only invite bitter wars with fans of players from other eras, who will object -- rightfully IMO -- that the players of the 70s and 80s are being made to seem as larger figures in tennis history as a whole, than they really were. IMO the discussion will all get bogged down in useless fights, rather than what you all really want, which is to explain and highlight the features of the 70s and 80s.

To understand that era you have to take Dallas and the Masters into account, but there is no reason that cannot be done by simply considering them special tournaments -- and in certain cases, yes, one of them will be the fourth most important event of the year, maybe even rightfully called a major. There is no reason to call them all majors, every year they were held. All that needs to be done is to highlight the Dallas and Masters wins that a player may have.

In other words, you can highlight McEnroe's wins in Dallas and New York, in order to evaluate his career rightfully in the context of the era. On occasion you can even say that one of those titles was the fourth most important event of a particular year, and perhaps rightfully called a major. But calling all of Mac's wins in Dallas and New York majors just gives him an inflated place in tennis history as a whole, since champions of every other era only have 3 or 4 chances per year to win majors.

[Dan Lobb]

Originally Posted by Mustard

Kramer claimed that Segura had the edge over Hoad. The Tournament of Champions was another tournament altogether, anyway, on grass-courts. The Wembley Pro was indoors. Gonzales was the only big name missing from the 1959 Wembley Pro, and Hoad lost to Segura.

Again, the 1959 Wembley final was between Segura and Anderson, two guys who lost in the first round at the biggest tournament of the season, Forest Hills, where the final was between the number one and number two players.
The cream rises to the top in the big ones.
Wembley was perhaps the fourth most important event of the 1959-1960 season. Perhaps the sixth most important.
Kramer stated that Segura and himself had the edge on Hoad on the 1957 tour, because Hoad considered them over the hill, and concentrated on Rosewall.

[Dan Lobb]

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

It's strange to hear that because, just for example, Ken Rosewall said that the Wembley tournament was his favourite one during the Pro era.
Your point sounds to me like: they went out before the finals = the didn't put out for it; they went to the finals = it was great tournament.
I don't agree: in my opinion we have to consider the option that even the greatest players ever can lose a match.

Rosewall won six Wembleys, so he must have liked it.
I would like any event I won six times.
No, the biggest events for the pros were in the major venues, Wimbledon (1967), Forest Hills, Roland Garros, Kooyong. Do these locations sound familiar? They are the sites of the major Slam events.
Wembley was chosen by the pros as a poor substitute for Wimbledon, which wouldn't allow pro play until 1967.
It was like playing in a gas chamber, and the smoke affected the level of play, according to the London Times reviewers.
Gonzales didn't even show up for Wembley.
The top players usually show up in the major finals.

[FedericRoma83]

Originally Posted by krosero

Love that last phrase, I don't recall hearing it.
But to do that with the 70s and 80s, it is not necessary at all to give the era 5 or 6 majors per year.
To understand that era you have to take Dallas and the Masters into account, but there is no reason that cannot be done by simply considering them special tournaments -- and in certain cases, yes, one of them will be the fourth most important event of the year, maybe even rightfully called a major. There is no reason to call them all majors, every year they were held. All that needs to be done is to highlight the Dallas and Masters wins that a player may have.

In other words, you can highlight McEnroe's wins in Dallas and New York, in order to evaluate his career rightfully in the context of the era. On occasion you can even say that one of those titles was the fourth most important event of a particular year, and perhaps rightfully called a major. But calling all of Mac's wins in Dallas and New York majors just gives him an inflated place in tennis history as a whole, since champions of every other era only have 3 or 4 chances per year to win majors.

I definitely agree with you on that, expecially on bolded parts.
My personal view is to give no more than four "Majors-or-their-equivalent" per year. That means the Masters (1977-82) or the WCT Finals (1972-76), but surely not both in the same year, and no one of them since 1983 (only the Masters in 1986, but just because there was no AO).

Coming back to Philadelphia - I agree with you that the 1976 WCT Finals were not great as in 1975: nonetheless, I'm still not persuaded in pointing Philadelphia as the fourth tournament this year. For example, in 1976 Palm Springs was entered by the same players who entered Philadelphia. Add to that the cumulative money prize: in Philadelphia it was around 120,000 dollars, while at Palm Springs was 200,000. The only Philadelphia advantage is the best-of-five-set final & semifinals (not a little advantage, I admit), but with the same field and more money around, Palm Springs can also be a legitimate choice (it would not change anything, Connors won both, but now I'm talking about the methodology).
Still no one of those prizes can compete with the Dallas one (100,000 but they are distribuited to 8 players instead of 64), no one of those tournaments was called a Major back then (while the WCT Finals were) and I guess they had less resonance (tough I don't have official informations on this theme).
I'm totally confused now, it seems that we have a lot of candidates for the fourth Major placement in 1976.
Another messed up year was 1970. Wimbledon and US Open were ok, but is nearly impossible to pick up two other tournaments, there were a lot of great ones: the Masters (my personal third choice, but I can understand eventual disagreements on that), the Tennis Classic round robin, the Dunlop Internationals, an amazing Torneo Godò on clay, and so on...

[FedericRoma83]

Originally Posted by Dan Lobb

Rosewall won six Wembleys, so he must have liked it.
I would like any event I won six times.
No, the biggest events for the pros were in the major venues, Wimbledon (1967), Forest Hills, Roland Garros, Kooyong. Do these locations sound familiar? They are the sites of the major Slam events.
Wembley was chosen by the pros as a poor substitute for Wimbledon, which wouldn't allow pro play until 1967.
It was like playing in a gas chamber, and the smoke affected the level of play, according to the London Times reviewers.
Gonzales didn't even show up for Wembley.
The top players usually show up in the major finals.

Gonzales didn't show up for Wembley? He won four times there! Come on!
It was definitely one of the best tournaments, if I'm not wrong Rod Laver said that his favourite match against Ken Rosewall was the 1964 Wembley final.
A lot of journalists of the time also pointed at the 1956 final between Gonzales and Sedgman as the greatest Pro match of the era...
I really can't see your arguments, this sounds to me like if you have a personal idiosyncrasy to that tournament, with no real reasons.

[kiki]

Originally Posted by krosero

Love that last phrase, I don't recall hearing it.

I see entirely what you're saying, I don't have any big disagreements here.

But about Kiki's argument, I do have to say something. I agree with him, and you, and Timnz, that each era is best compared in its own context -- according to the standards of the time. No problem there. But to do that with the 70s and 80s, it is not necessary at all to give the era 5 or 6 majors per year. That will only invite bitter wars with fans of players from other eras, who will object -- rightfully IMO -- that the players of the 70s and 80s are being made to seem as larger figures in tennis history as a whole, than they really were. IMO the discussion will all get bogged down in useless fights, rather than what you all really want, which is to explain and highlight the features of the 70s and 80s.

To understand that era you have to take Dallas and the Masters into account, but there is no reason that cannot be done by simply considering them special tournaments -- and in certain cases, yes, one of them will be the fourth most important event of the year, maybe even rightfully called a major. There is no reason to call them all majors, every year they were held. All that needs to be done is to highlight the Dallas and Masters wins that a player may have.

In other words, you can highlight McEnroe's wins in Dallas and New York, in order to evaluate his career rightfully in the context of the era. On occasion you can even say that one of those titles was the fourth most important event of a particular year, and perhaps rightfully called a major. But calling all of Mac's wins in Dallas and New York majors just gives him an inflated place in tennis history as a whole, since champions of every other era only have 3 or 4 chances per year to win majors.

If you want to be fair to those fans that didn´t enjoy the Golden Era, why notn weighten the Ao.Masters and WCT by , lets say, give the winner of those events a 335 of the value...that way, you can give the 4 th biggest event its weighten value.

It could look like this. Let´s take 1979

Borg wins W and RG and 33% of the 4 th major (Masters)
Mac wins USO and 33% of the 4 th major (WCT)
Vilas wins a 3% of the 4 th major (AO)

Now, I am too lazy to weighten all those titles from 1970 to 1989, but a Ken Rosewall resumee may look like this ( only open era, we should also value Por slams as 66% and amateur slams as 33%, thus Emerson won substantially 4 majors)...

2 WCT titles: 66% of a major
1 FO, 1 USO= 2 majors
2 AO= 66% of a major

so, he won, 3 majors and 1/3 of another one...

[kiki]

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

I definitely agree with you on that, expecially on bolded parts.
My personal view is to give no more than four "Majors-or-their-equivalent" per year. That means the Masters (1977-82) or the WCT Finals (1972-76), but surely not both in the same year, and no one of them since 1983 (only the Masters in 1986, but just because there was no AO).

Coming back to Philadelphia - I agree with you that the 1976 WCT Finals were not great as in 1975: nonetheless, I'm still not persuaded in pointing Philadelphia as the fourth tournament this year. For example, in 1976 Palm Springs was entered by the same players who entered Philadelphia. Add to that the cumulative money prize: in Philadelphia it was around 120,000 dollars, while at Palm Springs was 200,000. The only Philadelphia advantage is the best-of-five-set final & semifinals (not a little advantage, I admit), but with the same field and more money around, Palm Springs can also be a legitimate choice (it would not change anything, Connors won both, but now I'm talking about the methodology).
Still no one of those prizes can compete with the Dallas one (100,000 but they are distribuited to 8 players instead of 64), no one of those tournaments was called a Major back then (while the WCT Finals were) and I guess they had less resonance (tough I don't have official informations on this theme).
I'm totally confused now, it seems that we have a lot of candidates for the fourth Major placement in 1976.
Another messed up year was 1970. Wimbledon and US Open were ok, but is nearly impossible to pick up two other tournaments, there were a lot of great ones: the Masters (my personal third choice, but I can understand eventual disagreements on that), the Tennis Classic round robin, the Dunlop Internationals, an amazing Torneo Godò on clay, and so on...

Great point.I still would go with Dallas as the 4 th biggest event from 1971 to 1976, then Masters replaces Dallas as the biggest 4 th from 77 to 82.From 83 onwards, I´d pick again Melbourne, even if 1983 and 1984 Masters/Dallas were, as good if not better than Melbourne.

For 1970, yes, Godo Cup was exceptional, but I´d go with RG,W,FH and Masters ( instead of AO, sorry Arthur)

[krosero]

Originally Posted by FedericRoma83

Coming back to Philadelphia - I agree with you that the 1976 WCT Finals were not great as in 1975: nonetheless, I'm still not persuaded in pointing Philadelphia as the fourth tournament this year. For example, in 1976 Palm Springs was entered by the same players who entered Philadelphia. Add to that the cumulative money prize: in Philadelphia it was around 120,000 dollars, while at Palm Springs was 200,000. The only Philadelphia advantage is the best-of-five-set final & semifinals (not a little advantage, I admit), but with the same field and more money around, Palm Springs can also be a legitimate choice (it would not change anything, Connors won both, but now I'm talking about the methodology).
Still no one of those prizes can compete with the Dallas one (100,000 but they are distribuited to 8 players instead of 64), no one of those tournaments was called a Major back then (while the WCT Finals were) and I guess they had less resonance (tough I don't have official informations on this theme).
I'm totally confused now, it seems that we have a lot of candidates for the fourth Major placement in 1976.

The main problem I have with calling Dallas the fourth major of '76 is that there were other tournaments with greater numbers of Top Ten players -- including Connors. Connors was of course #1 at this time; and he was probably the strongest player indoors; which makes his absence or presence from an indoor tournament paramount.

When, for the sake of argument, I consider Dallas a major in that year, I get the same feeling as when I try to consider the AO a full-fledged major: I feel that there are other tournaments where the winner can truly be considered to have faced the best players. Borg's win in Dallas was a fine win, but without the world's best player in the draw. Philadelphia had both Connors and Borg and so did Palm Springs (an event played on hard court, arguably Connors' best surface).

Of course Connors had been absent from Dallas in previous years, too. But in those years he wasn't at Philadelphia or Palm Springs, either, since he was playing on the Riordan tour.

That's why I feel Dallas is inadequate as a fourth major in '76: because there were two other tournaments that had Connors, and had better top ten attendance overall.

The word "major" carries so much weight that, if it's applied to Dallas in '76, people will tend to think of Borg's victory there as greater than Connors' victories over better fields -- and that doesn't make sense to me.

I feel the same way about the Masters in January 1979, where both Borg and Vilas were absent. That's why Philadelphia seems like a good choice for the '78 season, too, with 9 of the world's top ten playing. Today you get that sort of attendance all the time, but back then that was rare.

I know the argument is that Dallas carried greater prestige, but when I see a tournament where all the top players show up -- in an era when tournaments rarely drew them all -- then I can't believe that there's anything second-tier about that tournament.

But other than going with Philadelphia in '76 and '78, I'm with everyone else in choosing Dallas in the first half of the 70s, then the New York Masters up to the January 1983 edition.

[timnz]

Originally Posted by krosero

The main problem I have with calling Dallas the fourth major of '76 is that there were other tournaments with greater numbers of Top Ten players -- including Connors. Connors was of course #1 at this time; and he was probably the strongest player indoors; which makes his absence or presence from an indoor tournament paramount.

When, for the sake of argument, I consider Dallas a major in that year, I get the same feeling as when I try to consider the AO a full-fledged major: I feel that there are other tournaments where the winner can truly be considered to have faced the best players. Borg's win in Dallas was a fine win, but without the world's best player in the draw. Philadelphia had both Connors and Borg and so did Palm Springs (an event played on hard court, arguably Connors' best surface).

Of course Connors had been absent from Dallas in previous years, too. But in those years he wasn't at Philadelphia or Palm Springs, either, since he was playing on the Riordan tour.

That's why I feel Dallas is inadequate as a fourth major in '76: because there were two other tournaments that had Connors, and had better top ten attendance overall.

The word "major" carries so much weight that, if it's applied to Dallas in '76, people will tend to think of Borg's victory there as greater than Connors' victories over better fields -- and that doesn't make sense to me.

I feel the same way about the Masters in January 1979, where both Borg and Vilas were absent. That's why Philadelphia seems like a good choice for the '78 season, too, with 9 of the world's top ten playing. Today you get that sort of attendance all the time, but back then that was rare.

I know the argument is that Dallas carried greater prestige, but when I see a tournament where all the top players show up -- in an era when tournaments rarely drew them all -- then I can't believe that there's anything second-tier about that tournament.

But other than going with Philadelphia in '76 and '78, I'm with everyone else in choosing Dallas in the first half of the 70s, then the New York Masters up to the January 1983 edition.

So your list for 4th event of the 1970's through to the 1982 season is:

1970 ?
1971 - Australian Open or WCT Finals (The Australian Open had a deep field that year)
1972 - WCT Finals
1973 - WCT Finals
1974 - WCT Finals
1975 - WCT Finals
1976 - Philadelphia or Masters?
1977 - Masters
1978 - Philadelphia or Masters?
1979 - Masters
1980 - Masters
1981 - Masters
1982 - Masters

If you could please elaborate on your choice for 1970, 1971, 1976, 1978 Thanks

Also be interesting on your view of the 4th event from 1983 through 1987. My belief is that from 1988 the Australian Open was definitely up to full slam status again being in the new stadium and 128 draw and very deep field. I know top players started coming back in 1983 but did it still have the depth from 1983 through 1987? (I know it was much better than 1972 to 1982 - but was it up to full slam speed from 1983 through 1987?).

The only WCT finals that seemed particularly week was 1976 and 1978. It seemed to be have strong fields the rest of the time even right until the end in 1989.

Regarding the 1976 WCT Finals. I know the Pepsi Grand Slam organizers for their tournament in early 1977 regarded the WCT finals as one of the majors they used to select participants for their event. It was rated by them before the Masters. The Philadelphia event doesn't get a mention.

[elegos7]

I think there is a fairly objective way to quantify the importance of tournaments, even choosing the 4 most important event in a year.

Tournaments should be given „prestige points” (from 0 to 4) and “draw quality points” (from 0 to 4). So the maximum number of points is 8.

Here is my proposition for the „prestige points”:
4: GS
3: year-ending championships (and the WCT finals)
2: 9 premium events (called ATP 1000 today), DC Final
1: other important events (called ATP 500 today)
,0: smaller events
The only difficulty is to assign the premium events before 1990, but in this way we only have to take into account prestige and tradition, without looking at the entry field

Here is my proposition for the „draw quality points”:
It is based on the top 8 participants (current weekly ATP rankings, before 1984 interpolated monthly rankings)
The participation of the No 1 player is worth 4 p, No 2: 3 p, No 3-4: 2 p, No 5-8: 1 p (max 15 points)
So the „draw quality points” for tournaments:
4: 11-15 p
3: 7-10 p
2: 3-6 p
1: 1-2 p
0: 0 p

Here are some points for tournaments (I consider the first 4 the most important):
1968: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 7, PSW 6, AUS 4,
1969: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, AUS 7, PSW 6,
1970: WIM 8, USA 8, Sydney Dunlop 6, PSW 6, FRA 5, AUS 7, Masters 5,
1971: WIM 8, USA 7, FRA 6, AUS 8, Masters 5, WCT 7,
1972: WIM 6, USA 8, FRA 6, WCT 6, AUS 6, Masters 6, PSW 6,
1973: WIM 6, USA 8, FRA 8, WCT 6, AUS 6, Masters 7,
1974: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 6, WCT 7, AUS 6, Masters 5,
1975: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 6, WCT 5, AUS 7, Masters 6,
1976: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 7, WCT 6, AUS 5, Masters 5, Philadelphia 5,
1977: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 6, Masters 7, AUS 5 (both), WCT 5, Philadelphia 6,
1978: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 7, Masters 6, AUS 5, WCT 6, Philadelphia 6,
1979: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, AUS 5, WCT 7,
1980: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, AUS 6, WCT 5,
1981: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, AUS 5, WCT 5,
1982: WIM 7, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, AUS 4, WCT 6,
1983: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, AUS 7, WCT 6,
1984: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, AUS 6, WCT 6,
1985: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, AUS 8, WCT 7,
1986: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, Masters 7, no AUS, WCT 6,
1987: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, AUS 8, Masters 7, WCT 6,
1988: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, AUS 8, Masters 7, WCT 5,
1989: WIM 8, USA 8, FRA 8, AUS 8, Masters 7, WCT 7,

So in 1968 I choose PSW (Pacific Southwest) as the 4th important event. In 1970 the Sydney Dunlop and the PSW are 3rd and 4th. The problem here is comparing the Dunlop (2+4=6) and the AUS (4+3=7) events in Sydney. The former had better field, but the latter had more prestige. From 1972-76 the WCT, from 1977-1986 the Masters, for the sake of consistency. But looking at the points, in some years other events could also be the 4th event (like Masters 1973, AUS 75, AUS 1985).

What do you think?
This system is crude, but it gives an opportunity to evaluate events during the whole course of tennis history, using the same criteria. I am ready for the years 1977-2012, and slowly working my way backwards, but I can give you the obtained points for any tournaments you are particularly interested.
Perhaps giving the same weight to prestige as the draw quality is not fair. In this way the AUS Open (and many amateur slams) already gets 4 points, even without a Top8 participant.

[FedericRoma83]

1970 ?
1971 - Australian Open or WCT Finals (The Australian Open had a deep field that year)
1972 - WCT Finals
1973 - WCT Finals
1974 - WCT Finals
1975 - WCT Finals
1976 - Philadelphia or Masters?
1977 - Masters
1978 - Philadelphia or Masters?
1979 - Masters
1980 - Masters
1981 - Masters
1982 - Masters

If you could please elaborate on your choice for 1970, 1971, 1976, 1978 Thanks

My choices would be:
1971 - Australian Open (no way: a Slam with a great field will always overcome other events from my point of view)
1972 - WCT Finals
1973 - WCT Finals & the Masters (we need two tournaments that year: Wimbledon was just insignificant, only one top-10 player in its field)
1974 - WCT Finals
1975 - WCT Finals
1976 - WCT Finals (if you prefer the prestige & a partially depleted but still nice field), Philadelphia (if your prefer strong fields & 3-out-of-5 finals) or Palm Springs (if you prefer strong fields & great money prizes) [No way for the Masters Finals that year, they were weaker than the WCT Finals]
1977 - Masters
1978 - Masters (without any kind of doubt, at least from my point of view. The Masters was not strong as in 1977 that year, but it was still having Connors, McEnroe and five other top-10 players, the only difference was Borg, who lose in the Philadelphia quarterfinals to Tanner and didn't enter the Masters: it's definitely not fair in my opinion to put Philadelphia over a prestigious Masters).
1979 - Masters
1980 - Masters
1981 - Masters
1982 - Masters

1970 is more complicated, we need two substitutes because that year the Roland Garros had only one top-10 player, but there are a lot of strong tournaments. My four favourite are Torneo Godò, the Dunlop Internationals, the Tennis Classic round robin and the Masters.
If I have to pick two, I'll say the Masters (for two reasons: 1. it was the first edition of a great historical tournament; 2. Stan Smith defeated Rosewall and Laver to win it: he deserves some consideration for such a feat) and Torneo Godò (to pick up a great clay tournament as a Roland Garros substitute).
But if you prefer the Tennis Classic or the Dunlop tournament, I accept it without problems: they were definitely big ones!
I think there's really no way to estabilish a "real truth" about 1970.

I know top players started coming back in 1983 but did it still have the depth from 1983 through 1987? (I know it was much better than 1972 to 1982 - but was it up to full slam speed from 1983 through 1987?).

Yes I think it was: the only top player who keeps his Australian Open boycott was Jimmy Connors, all the other players regularly entered it, except McEnroe in 1984 because he was defaulted after the Stockholm accident. Surely the Masters was still really important during the 1983-87 years, but I think that we really can't understimate the AO Slam status after it was rehabilitated.

The only WCT finals that seemed particularly week was 1976 and 1978. It seemed to be have strong fields the rest of the time even right until the end in 1989.

Yes, but even with strong WCT fields, the Masters was slightly superior to the WCT Finals after 1977.
In 1986, when there was no Australian Open, all journalists considered the Masters as a fourth tournament.