Alan Trengove on Rod Laver. New Article

[Dan Lobb]

Originally Posted by kiki

Peak Nastase can match anybody
While Nasty is much better than Pancho on clay Pancho is better indoors and maybe grass but by a less difference
Laver was mentaly stronger than Hoad

When Hoad was involved in his game, he could outlast anyone.
He had a great range of strokes, but usually dictated the game to his opponent, rather than respond to the other player's game.
If it was a minor event, his attention could be elsewhere.

[pc1]

Originally Posted by kiki

Peak Nastase can match anybody
While Nasty is much better than Pancho on clay Pancho is better indoors and maybe grass but by a less difference
Laver was mentaly stronger than Hoad

Nastase at his best would be a nightmare for any player in tennis history but you could also say the same for Pancho Gonzalez.

Gonzalez was no slouch on clay. He won many clay court tournaments in his career. He was a superb clay court player and he was able to defeat Laver and Rosewall at their peaks on clay. You can't do much better than that. Remember Nastase lost to Stan Smith on clay in the 1972 Davis Cup and Smith is not in the same league as Pancho Gonzalez on clay although Smith was a decent clay court player.

[kiki]

Originally Posted by pc1

Nastase at his best would be a nightmare for any player in tennis history but you could also say the same for Pancho Gonzalez.

Gonzalez was no slouch on clay. He won many clay court tournaments in his career. He was a superb clay court player and he was able to defeat Laver and Rosewall at their peaks on clay. You can't do much better than that. Remember Nastase lost to Stan Smith on clay in the 1972 Davis Cup and Smith is not in the same league as Pancho Gonzalez on clay although Smith was a decent clay court player.

True but it was DC and DC used to be so special and emotional...Smith was a true stelward and a fantastic player for DC, much more than Nasty
Their rivalry lasted only 3 years but it was one of the most exciting and intense ever

[jeffreyneave]

Just because a player wins the world tour does not automatically make you number one. Gonzales won every world tour played between 1954 and 1961, but that does not mean he was necessarily number one every year. Other play namely tournaments count as well. I rate sedgman as number 1 in 1958 and Rosewall as number one in 1961. The same is true in 1964. All active play counts towards world rankings not just the activity on the world tour. In 1964 19 tournaments made up the world tour but in all play there were 31 tournaments plus numerous one night stands. On the world tour Rosewall won 7 tournaments and Laver 6. But on overall play Laver won 11 tornaments and Rosewall 10. That's point why the world tour should be ignored because it does not cover all play. The world tour also failed to give extra points to the 3 pro majors. The world tour is not representative of overall play which showed that Laver had an edge in tournaments won, won 2 majors to one for rosewall and had huge 15-4 edge in their head to head results. Laver's win loss percentage was also superior at 74.8% to Rosewall's 69.5%.

I am very confident that the world tour consisted of 19 tournaments. I have added up Rosewall's 78 points, Laver's 70 points and Hoad's 29 points from these tournaments. These tournaments are all the events with 8 or more players except the Port Elizabeth tournament. That gives 18 events. The 19th event is the 4 man golden Racquet at Wembley where Gonzales and and hoad earned extra points.

jeffrey

[pc1]

Originally Posted by jeffreyneave

Just because a player wins the world tour does not automatically make you number one. Gonzales won every world tour played between 1954 and 1961, but that does not mean he was necessarily number one every year. Other play namely tournaments count as well. I rate sedgman as number 1 in 1958 and Rosewall as number one in 1961. The same is true in 1964. All active play counts towards world rankings not just the activity on the world tour. In 1964 19 tournaments made up the world tour but in all play there were 31 tournaments plus numerous one night stands. On the world tour Rosewall won 7 tournaments and Laver 6. But on overall play Laver won 11 tou
rnaments and Rosewall 10. That's point why the world tour should be ignored because it does not cover all play. The world tour also failed to give extra points to the 3 pro majors. The world tour is not representative of overall play which showed that Laver had an edge in tournaments won, won 2 majors to one for rosewall and had huge 15-4 edge in their head to head results. Laver's win loss percentage was also superior at 74.8% to Rosewall's 69.5%.

I am very confident that the world tour consisted of 19 tournaments. I have added up Rosewall's 78 points, Laver's 70 points and Hoad's 29 points from these tournaments. These tournaments are all the events with 8 or more players except the Port Elizabeth tournament. That gives 18 events. The 19th event is the 4 man golden Racquet at Wembley where Gonzales and and hoad earned extra points.

jeffrey

Jeffrey,

You have excellent points but we also must take into consideration the rules and how the players valued things during their time. To give an example, let us say that in 1979 player X won the Australian and player Y won Wimbledon. The rest of the year they had an equal record. Well by today's standards it is even but by the standards of 1979 it's not close, Wimbledon is by FAR a bigger tournament. I would venture to say that the Australian was below several other tournaments aside from majors in 1979.

If you look at 1960 for example Rosewall won the French Pro and Wembley. That's two of three majors and Olmedo won the US Pro. Pancho Gonzalez did not win a major that year but he very well had a great right to be called World Champion because he crushed Rosewall on a multi player tour along with Segura and Olmedo winning an incredible 49 of 57 matches!! Gonzalez's main focus were the tours and it is definitely true that these tours were MORE important than any major to the top pro at the time. Whoever wins it is considered the World Champion and it put money on Gonzalez's wallet. Lose the tour and he was no longer World Champion and a has been. There is no ifs ands or buts about it. The tours were BIGGER than a major.

So the same thing applies for 1964, by the standards of that time and that tour Rosewall was number one. Now in this case it's so close you can give an excellent argument for Laver as World Champion but I have no problems with calling Rosewall co-number one with Laver. You cannot just apply the standards of today to this.

By this logic Federer is the GOAT easily despite the fact guys like Tilden were more dominant in their respective times but didn't play the majors because of the travel problems among other things. Laver, Gonzalez, Kramer, Sedgman, Segura, Hoad, Budge, Nusslein and Trabert couldn't play the majors for a good portion of their careers. Do you penalize them for not winning as many majors as Roy Emerson because all in my opinion were superior to him? By applying the standards of today you can make an argument Emerson is the third best player ever and that would be wrong.

[BobbyOne]

Originally Posted by jeffreyneave

Just because a player wins the world tour does not automatically make you number one. Gonzales won every world tour played between 1954 and 1961, but that does not mean he was necessarily number one every year. Other play namely tournaments count as well. I rate sedgman as number 1 in 1958 and Rosewall as number one in 1961. The same is true in 1964. All active play counts towards world rankings not just the activity on the world tour. In 1964 19 tournaments made up the world tour but in all play there were 31 tournaments plus numerous one night stands. On the world tour Rosewall won 7 tournaments and Laver 6. But on overall play Laver won 11 tornaments and Rosewall 10. That's point why the world tour should be ignored because it does not cover all play. The world tour also failed to give extra points to the 3 pro majors. The world tour is not representative of overall play which showed that Laver had an edge in tournaments won, won 2 majors to one for rosewall and had huge 15-4 edge in their head to head results. Laver's win loss percentage was also superior at 74.8% to Rosewall's 69.5%.

I am very confident that the world tour consisted of 19 tournaments. I have added up Rosewall's 78 points, Laver's 70 points and Hoad's 29 points from these tournaments. These tournaments are all the events with 8 or more players except the Port Elizabeth tournament. That gives 18 events. The 19th event is the 4 man golden Racquet at Wembley where Gonzales and and hoad earned extra points.

jeffrey

jeffrey, Omitting the world tour is as wrong as considering it alone. Thus I give tied No.1 places. Also for 1959, 1960, 1961.

[pc1]

Originally Posted by BobbyOne

jeffrey, Omitting the world tour is as wrong as considering it alone. Thus I give tied No.1 places. Also for 1959, 1960, 1961.

BobbyOne,

Read my post just above yours.

[BobbyOne]

Originally Posted by pc1

Jeffrey,

You have excellent points but we also must take into consideration the rules and how the players valued things during their time. To give an example, let us say that in 1979 player X won the Australian and player Y won Wimbledon. The rest of the year they had an equal record. Well by today's standards it is even but by the standards of 1979 it's not close, Wimbledon is by FAR a bigger tournament. I would venture to say that the Australian was below several other tournaments aside from majors in 1979.

If you look at 1960 for example Rosewall won the French Pro and Wembley. That's two of three majors and Olmedo won the US Pro. Pancho Gonzalez did not win a major that year but he very well had a great right to be called World Champion because he crushed Rosewall on a multi player tour along with Segura and Olmedo winning an incredible 49 of 57 matches!! Gonzalez's main focus were the tours and it is definitely true that these tours were MORE important than any major to the top pro at the time. Whoever wins it is considered the World Champion and it put money on Gonzalez's wallet. Lose the tour and he was no longer World Champion and a has been. There is no, ifs or but about it. The tours were BIGGER than a major.

So the same thing applies for 1964, by the standards of that time and that tour Rosewall was number one. Now in this case it's so close you can give an excellent argument for Laver as World Champion but I have no problems with calling Rosewall co-number one with Laver. You cannot just apply the standards of today to this.

By this logic Federer is the GOAT easily despite the fact guys like Tilden were more dominant in their respective times but didn't play the majors because of the travel problems among other things. Laver, Gonzalez, Kramer, Sedgman, Segura, Hoad, Budge, Nusslein and Trabert couldn't play the majors for a good portion of their careers. Do you penalize them for not winning as many majors as Roy Emerson because all in my opinion were superior to him? By applying the standards of today you can make an argument Emerson is the third best player ever and that would be wrong.

pc1, You have explained the matter better than I could do. Very convincing to me.

[BobbyOne]

Originally Posted by jeffreyneave

Just because a player wins the world tour does not automatically make you number one. Gonzales won every world tour played between 1954 and 1961, but that does not mean he was necessarily number one every year. Other play namely tournaments count as well. I rate sedgman as number 1 in 1958 and Rosewall as number one in 1961. The same is true in 1964. All active play counts towards world rankings not just the activity on the world tour. In 1964 19 tournaments made up the world tour but in all play there were 31 tournaments plus numerous one night stands. On the world tour Rosewall won 7 tournaments and Laver 6. But on overall play Laver won 11 tornaments and Rosewall 10. That's point why the world tour should be ignored because it does not cover all play. The world tour also failed to give extra points to the 3 pro majors. The world tour is not representative of overall play which showed that Laver had an edge in tournaments won, won 2 majors to one for rosewall and had huge 15-4 edge in their head to head results. Laver's win loss percentage was also superior at 74.8% to Rosewall's 69.5%.

I am very confident that the world tour consisted of 19 tournaments. I have added up Rosewall's 78 points, Laver's 70 points and Hoad's 29 points from these tournaments. These tournaments are all the events with 8 or more players except the Port Elizabeth tournament. That gives 18 events. The 19th event is the 4 man golden Racquet at Wembley where Gonzales and and hoad earned extra points.

jeffrey

jeffrey, 18 or 19 tournaments could be the right number. I agree. I'm just astonished that the Wembley Golden racquet event was part of the tour. But you seem right because without Wembley G.R. Gonzalez would have finished only fourth behind Gimeno. We do know that Pancho actually finished third.

[Dan Lobb]

Originally Posted by BobbyOne

jeffrey, 18 or 19 tournaments could be the right number. I agree. I'm just astonished that the Wembley Golden racquet event was part of the tour. But you seem right because without Wembley G.R. Gonzalez would have finished only fourth behind Gimeno. We do know that Pancho actually finished third.

Were Longwood, Stade Coubertin, Wembley Pro considered part of the World Tour?

[urban]

Good points and discussion here. Indeed we have the problem of applying todays standards. On the other hand, the standards of the pro tour were not always that clear for the pros themselves. Especially in transition years the pros leaned towards holding on the old king, in a way that a boxing champion had to be dethroned, even if he didn't defend his title. Dempsey for instance was the world champ in the 20s without even boxing for more than 3 years.
So Kramer was seen as the world pro champ until 1953 inclusive, although he played only sporadically 1951-1953, and was in my estimation overhauled by Gonzalez or Sedgman, if you consider the full seasons of tennis. Rosewall was imo the true pro Nr. 1 since 1961, but in that year most people still thought of Gonzalez as the real champ. In years like 1959 the pro ranking was a real mess, with all kinds of promoters and players giving ranking lists, which heavily differed from each other. Sometimes the pros didn't seem to know, what the reigning standard was. Since McCauley' book we have at least a solid statistical basis for reconsideration. We do this also in open years like 1975 or 1978, when the computer system was in its infancy. McCauley himself follows the old system of favoring the older champ as explained above - in his paragraph titles, but in the text he makes modifications.

[Dan Lobb]

Originally Posted by urban

Good points and discussion here. Indeed we have the problem of applying todays standards. On the other hand, the standards of the pro tour were not always that clear for the pros themselves. Especially in transition years the pros leaned towards holding on the old king, in a way that a boxing champion had to be dethroned, even if he didn't defend his title. Dempsey for instance was the world champ in the 20s without even boxing for more than 3 years.
So Kramer was seen as the world pro champ until 1953 inclusive, although he played only sporadically 1951-1953, and was in my estimation overhauled by Gonzalez or Sedgman, if you consider the full seasons of tennis. Rosewall was imo the true pro Nr. 1 since 1961, but in that year most people still thought of Gonzalez as the real champ. In years like 1959 the pro ranking was a real mess, with all kinds of promoters and players giving ranking lists, which heavily differed form each other. Sometimes the pros didn't seem to know, what the reigning standard was. Since McCauley' book we have at least a solid statistical basis for reconsideration. We do this also in open years like 1975 or 1978, when the computer system was in its infancy. McCauley himself follows the old system of favoring the older champ as explained above - in his paragraph titles, but in the text he makes modifications.

1959 was the transitional year, when there were TWO world championships, one the four-man tour, the other a 14 tournament series involving all the top 12 pros. Kramer's office promoted both series as the world championship. There were two different winners.

[BobbyOne]

Originally Posted by Dan Lobb

Were Longwood, Stade Coubertin, Wembley Pro considered part of the World Tour?

Dan, Yes, they were.

[jeffreyneave]

pc1,

I have to disagree. World rankings are always based on overall play not a proportion of it. Tha's true whatever year you do world rankings. The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus not the whole picture of total play. You look at the pro majors, tournaments as well as the world tour to do world rankings. Gonzales' 1960 world tour was important because he beat Rosewall but rosewall dominated the tournament circuit winning 2 pro majors and thus rosewall deserves a share of the world number one ranking. Gonzales world tour win of 1961 was not important because he only beat gimeno of the significant players; Rosewall with his 2 major pro wins where all the top players were present deserved the number one ranking on his own.

The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus never sufficient to be number one player on its own. Gonzales might at the time have been called world champion by the pro tour but that does not mean he was universllay reconised at the time or now as the real number one. L'eqiuppe ranked Rosewall as number one in 1960 and 1961.

jeffrey

[pc1]

Originally Posted by jeffreyneave

pc1,

I have to disagree. World rankings are always based on overall play not a proportion of it. Tha's true whatever year you do world rankings. The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus not the whole picture of total play. You look at the pro majors, tournaments as well as the world tour to do world rankings. Gonzales' 1960 world tour was important because he beat Rosewall but rosewall dominated the tournament circuit winning 2 pro majors and thus rosewall deserves a share of the world number one ranking. Gonzales world tour win of 1961 was not important because he only beat gimeno of the significant players; Rosewall with his 2 major pro wins where all the top players were present deserved the number one ranking on his own.

The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus never sufficient to be number one player on its own. Gonzales might at the time have been called world champion by the pro tour but that does not mean he was universllay reconised at the time or now as the real number one. L'eqiuppe ranked Rosewall as number one in 1960 and 1961.

jeffrey

Jeffrey,

Gonzalez won the 1960 Pro Tour easily by a crushing score of 49 to 8 and Rosewall was among the opponents. The values of the time was that the Tour was to determine the World Champion and remember Gonzalez did play 57 matches on tour alone. That's a lot of matches. Remember that Rosewall lost a high percentage of matches to Gonzalez on that tour.

I believe that if Gonzalez thought that in order to retain his World Title that he had to win many big tournaments he would have done so. But that wasn't the prerequisites of the time to be World Champion. Frankly to play a long tour is far tougher than playing a few majors.
And what Gonzalez did in 1960 in winning that tour was awesome.
Again you cannot use current evaluations of players in the past. You have to evaluate by the times. Gonzalez would have played far more tournaments and probably would have won a good percentage of them if it was necessary for him to stay World Champion.

[Mustard]

Originally Posted by jeffreyneave

pc1,

I have to disagree. World rankings are always based on overall play not a proportion of it. Tha's true whatever year you do world rankings. The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus not the whole picture of total play. You look at the pro majors, tournaments as well as the world tour to do world rankings. Gonzales' 1960 world tour was important because he beat Rosewall but rosewall dominated the tournament circuit winning 2 pro majors and thus rosewall deserves a share of the world number one ranking. Gonzales world tour win of 1961 was not important because he only beat gimeno of the significant players; Rosewall with his 2 major pro wins where all the top players were present deserved the number one ranking on his own.

The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus never sufficient to be number one player on its own. Gonzales might at the time have been called world champion by the pro tour but that does not mean he was universllay reconised at the time or now as the real number one. L'eqiuppe ranked Rosewall as number one in 1960 and 1961.

jeffrey

The world pro tours were the most important things on the pro tour until the last few years before the open era, and Gonzales regularly backed up his dominant tour wins with big wins in tournaments, with 1960 being the only exception. Gonzales barely played a tournament in 1960, due to the end of his long contract with Kramer, but dominated the world pro tour (including against Rosewall). And in 1961, Gonzales beat just about every good professional on the pro tour except the absent Rosewall, and also won the US Pro for the eighth time (albeit weakened in Cleveland by this point due to Jack March's finances going belly up).

Gonzales certainly wasn't toppled by Rosewall or anybody else before his initial retirement at the end of 1961, and that was the standard used back then. Rosewall has a case for co-number 1, but I think it's clear that Gonzales has to be number 1 if you can only choose one player.

Regarding 1958, yes Sedgman had an excellent year in winning both the Wembley Pro and the big tournament in Australia (beating Gonzales in both tournaments), but Gonzales not only beat Hoad in the world pro tour, but backed this up by winning his sixth consecutive US Pro and his third consecutive Tournament of Champions.

[BobbyOne]

Originally Posted by jeffreyneave

pc1,

I have to disagree. World rankings are always based on overall play not a proportion of it. Tha's true whatever year you do world rankings. The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus not the whole picture of total play. You look at the pro majors, tournaments as well as the world tour to do world rankings. Gonzales' 1960 world tour was important because he beat Rosewall but rosewall dominated the tournament circuit winning 2 pro majors and thus rosewall deserves a share of the world number one ranking. Gonzales world tour win of 1961 was not important because he only beat gimeno of the significant players; Rosewall with his 2 major pro wins where all the top players were present deserved the number one ranking on his own.

The world tour was always only a proportion of play and thus never sufficient to be number one player on its own. Gonzales might at the time have been called world champion by the pro tour but that does not mean he was universllay reconised at the time or now as the real number one. L'eqiuppe ranked Rosewall as number one in 1960 and 1961.

jeffrey

jeffrey, A main problem of this case is the fact that most experts erroneously

hesitate to give tied places for two or even three players. I regret this. It's a fact that in several (or many) years there was not a clear-cut No.1 (No.2 and so on) player. It often happened that two or even three players had about the same amount of successes. Best example might be 1959 when Gonzalez won the world tour but Hoad won the Ampol tournament series and both players were equal in matches won (23:23) over the whole year.

It's curious that Lance Tingay only gave tied places regarding the tenth place.

He mostly gave the first place to the Wimbledon winner neglecting the success of others. F. i. for 1970 he gave Newcombe the top banana even though Rosewall was at least as good as Newk (hth and so on) and Laver also was great in winning the most tournaments and having the best hth.

[Blocker]

Originally Posted by abmk

poorly written and researched IMO .....first off the fact that he speaks so highly of the 62 slam, even though it was only against amateurs and Rod was probably only the 3rd best player in the world at that time ( behind rosewall and hoad ) .....then ....

But how can you be proclaimed the best player that’s ever lived when you’ve lost a series of matches to another player – in this case, Nadal?

err, what ? so the best player ever has to have a winning record vs everyone ? really ?

Not so, Federer, who often looked decidedly uncomfortable at Roland Garros until he won the French title in 2009. It has been his only triumph there in 14 appearances – a stark difference from Laver’s two triumphs from eight visits.

federer played pretty well at RG in 2005,2006 and 2007 .....just because he won there the first time in 2009 , doesn't mean that was the first time he played well there ......

No. No-one would begrudge Federer if he had a couple of 0-1 or 1-2 H2H scorelines against journeymen. Upsets can and do happen. But for crying out loud, at least be in front of your greatest rival in the H2H count if you want to stake a claim to the undisputed GOAT instead of getting caned by him most times. Remember, in slams it's 2-8.

[jeffreyneave]

The fundamental rule is that all play counts towards world rankings not just the world tour. The pro majors and tournaments are just as important as the world tour. A pro major, like a modern slam, requires a player to win on the big, important occasion when it really matters against all the best players. Its an important skill different from the consistency skill required to win a tour. The pro majors allow all pros to compete for the world number one spot not just the restricted number on the world tour (somtimes as low as 2). L'equipe Ranked rosewall number one in 1960 and 1961 so winning the world tour was not only thing that mattered. The sunday times considered Rosewall the dominant pro from 1959-64. I do not agree with this but it again shows that winning the world tour was not sufficient on its own to get the number one spot.

The 1964 tour was a different tour than the earlier head to head tours because it was a series of 8 man tournaments linked together. Its more like the Grand prix of the 1970s. Winning the Grand prix did not make Richey (1970), Vilas (1974-5) or Ramirez(1976) a contender for the number one spot. The majors and other play like the WCT tour counted as well. The 1964 tour win for Rosewall is not that significant either. That tour did not give extra weight to the pro majors nor did it cover all play (it only covered 19 events not the full 31 events actuall played). The fundamental rule is that all play count for world rankings. On overall play Laver won more tournaments (11 to 10) ,won more majors (2to 1), crushed Rosewall 15-4 in the head to head and Had a superior win percentage (74.8% to 69.5%). On all the standard world ranking measures was ahead so I have no doubt that he should be regarded as the undisputed number one of 1964.

jeffrey

[abmk]

Originally Posted by Blocker

No. No-one would begrudge Federer if he had a couple of 0-1 or 1-2 H2H scorelines against journeymen. Upsets can and do happen. But for crying out loud, at least be in front of your greatest rival in the H2H count if you want to stake a claim to the undisputed GOAT instead of getting caned by him most times. Remember, in slams it's 2-8.

there is no 'undisputed' GOAT ......

just that federer has ticked most of the boxes and his record is the closest to being the greatest, more so than the others ...

out of those 10 grand slam matches, 5 have been on clay @ RG, where rafa is arguably the greatest .....

also since most of the matches were in the semis/finals and federer would've won most of them if not for rafa, the effect of those losses is already seen in federer having lesser no of slams than he would have if not for rafa ....

switch place to an indoor setting and you have rafa winning a grand total of 1 set in 4 matches vs federer with a bagel and two breadsticks being thrown in ....