Ferrer, victim of his era or less talented?

[pjonesy]

Ferrer gets tons of credit for being consistent, super quick, competitive and super fit. He leads the tour in wins, but can't beat the top 4 and reach a slam final. Is it a function of being unlucky and playing in the Fed, Djoker, Nadal, Murray era? Or is he just a smaller player, who does not possess the talent and/or variety of similarly sized players of the past like Chang, Rios or Hewitt?

[BrooklynNY]

David Ferrer would be world #1 if he played in the 2020's

[Djoker]

No real weapons with which to hurt the top guys.
The poor man's version of Rafa is still a terrific player, though. But tenacity and pure doggedness can only carry you so far.

[TMF]

You can't blame him because he's undersized for a tennis player. The big 4 are bigger, stronger, and have weapons. He's a workaholics, but nothing he can do when he gets overpowered. And he knows he's overmatched.

[NadalAgassi]

He is a victim of his era and being his size. Then again Hewitt and Chang were no bigger and are just better players than him, and would be better players than him prime vs prime in any era. To his credit he has lasted alot longer and had a much longer prime than Hewitt, but despite that achieved nowhere near as much in a much longer prime as he just isnt as good a player.

[matchmaker]

Originally Posted by NadalAgassi

He is a victim of his era and being his size. Then again Hewitt and Chang were no bigger and are just better players than him, and would be better players than him prime vs prime in any era. To his credit he has lasted alot longer and had a much longer prime than Hewitt, but despite that achieved nowhere near as much in a much longer prime as he just isnt as good a player.

I don't think Chang was better than Ferrer, he just got lucky with some draws. He could only win one major at the age of 16 and then nothing more. Most top players were fairly confident of being able to put him aside, much like they feel about Ferrer.

[pjonesy]

Originally Posted by BrooklynNY

David Ferrer would be world #1 if he played in the 2020's

Because he would be #1 in the sub 6ft class? Anticipating height divisions, you could be right.

[NadalAgassi]

Originally Posted by matchmaker

I don't think Chang was better than Ferrer, he just got lucky with some draws. He could only win one major at the age of 16 and then nothing more. Most top players were fairly confident of being able to put him aside, much like they feel about Ferrer.

Chang has made 4 slam finals. Ferrer one. Chang has won 7 Masters, Ferrer only 1. The two are not in the same league. You also cant prove Chang wouldnt have reached any slam finals or won any Masters in this era. Ferrer has lost slam semifinals to a very subpar Murray (2011 Australian), a very young Djokovic (2007 U.S Open), and lost in slams in his best surfaces numerous times to lower ranked opponents, and so on. Tsonga, Soderling, Robredo, Berdych, and others have all won their first Masters before he could. Chang has atleast beaten the likes of Agassi, Courier, Edberg, and Lendl in slams. Ferrers only ever big wins in a slam are over Nadal on hard courts, that is it, and no beating Murray at RG is definitely not a big win, sorry.

I do agree the very top players with a big games were confident vs Chang, just as they were with Ferrer, but Chang was still harder work and a more dangerous foe than Ferrer was.

[bluetrain4]

Originally Posted by NadalAgassi

Chang has made 4 slam finals. Ferrer one. Chang has won 7 Masters, Ferrer only 1. The two are not in the same league. You also cant prove Chang wouldnt have reached any slam finals or won any Masters in this era. Ferrer has lost slam semifinals to a very subpar Murray (2011 Australian), a very young Djokovic (2007 U.S Open), and lost in slams in his best surfaces numerous times to lower ranked opponents, and so on. Tsonga, Soderling, Robredo, Berdych, and others have all won their first Masters before he could. Chang has atleast beaten the likes of Agassi, Courier, Edberg, and Lendl in slams. Ferrers only ever big wins in a slam are over Nadal on hard courts, that is it, and no beating Murray at RG is definitely not a big win, sorry.

I do agree the very top players with a big games were confident vs Chang, just as they were with Ferrer, but Chang was still harder work and a more dangerous foe than Ferrer was.

Ferrer made a Slam final?

[Mustard]

Chang never beat Courier in a major. Their only major meeting was in the quarter finals of the 1995 US Open. Courier won 7-6, 7-6, 7-5.

[NadalAgassi]

Originally Posted by bluetrain4

Ferrer made a Slam final?

Sorry I meant to say none. Was a typo.

[zagor]

I like David but IMO Chang, Rios and Hewitt are much better players, the depth is very lacking below top 4 at the moment IMO which is why Ferrer is doing so well (relatively speaking).

[BeHappy]

Originally Posted by Mustard

Chang never beat Courier in a major. Their only major meeting was in the quarter finals of the 1995 US Open. Courier won 7-6, 7-6, 7-5.

Still running around correcting everyone over trivial points Mustard eh? Copied and pasted? At least it wasn't me this time.

[Mustard]

Originally Posted by BeHappy

Still running around correcting everyone over trivial points Mustard eh? Copied and pasted? At least it wasn't me this time.

Copy and pasted what, exactly?

[Relinquis]

It's not his size. Is he smaller than Rios or Hewit? He's faster and has more stamina than players 5-6 years younger than he is. You can see this in the way he runs balls down.

It's his style of play. He doesn't junkball like Murray, he doesn't build up pressure from the baseline like Djokovic, he doesn't have Nadals assortment of insane spins, he doesn't have federer's touch or aggressive tennis (shot-making, movement and temperament).

His match against Almagro during this current Australian Open showed this. Even when Almagro was limping around in the last set, it took ages for Ferrer to take him down because his game is so defensive.

Another good match to see his weakness is Ferrer Vs. Davydenko at Doha earlier this year. He doesn't play aggressive tennis in terms of shot making and coming into the court like Davydenko does, although he is far superior to him in defense. Ferrer Vs. Nishikori at this years AO also showed that he doesn't have the ability to counter attack in the way other top 10 players do, although he did beat Kei by wearing him down and being in better shape.

He also had no net game (in comparison to other top 10 folks that is).

Mentally, he's one of the toughest competitors on tour. He just hasn't added any attacking strategies. I wonder what would happen if he had another coach that focused on this.

[pc1]

I don't think the guy is talented enough. He is a terrific player but he doesn't have anything to hurt the top players in my opinion. Excellent groundies and a terrific return but no real weapon like Nadal's forehand to use an example.

[President]

I don't think he would have won majors in any era (barring a fluke, worse players than him have won slams) but I do think he could have won some more Masters 1000 or Super 9 titles if he played in another time period, he has a good game that is reliable on all types of surface speeds and is very consistent with his level. It just happens that the top 4 in this era are even very consistent in this level of tournament these days.

[dominikk1985]

hewitt is much bigger than ferrer. he is about 2 inches taller and 10 pounds heavier.

I think ferrer would have reached a slam final and with a lot of luck maybe even won one in a weaker era but he never would have been a dominant force.

I don't think roddick is a lot better than him. in fact ferrer leads roddick h2h 7-4 and a lot of those matches were in roddicks prime before his prime.

[matchmaker]

Originally Posted by NadalAgassi

Chang has made 4 slam finals. Ferrer one. Chang has won 7 Masters, Ferrer only 1. The two are not in the same league. You also cant prove Chang wouldnt have reached any slam finals or won any Masters in this era. Ferrer has lost slam semifinals to a very subpar Murray (2011 Australian), a very young Djokovic (2007 U.S Open), and lost in slams in his best surfaces numerous times to lower ranked opponents, and so on. Tsonga, Soderling, Robredo, Berdych, and others have all won their first Masters before he could. Chang has atleast beaten the likes of Agassi, Courier, Edberg, and Lendl in slams. Ferrers only ever big wins in a slam are over Nadal on hard courts, that is it, and no beating Murray at RG is definitely not a big win, sorry.

I do agree the very top players with a big games were confident vs Chang, just as they were with Ferrer, but Chang was still harder work and a more dangerous foe than Ferrer was.

Point taken. But again I think that history plays a big role in the development of a player. At 16 years of age, Chang got about the biggest boost in self-confidence you could ever have. Whereas Ferrer rose to top ranks at a later stage in his tennis carreer and although he has gotten some good results too (I do think beating a multiple HC champion on the surface is noteworthy), he could never win against some players.

I can indeed not prove it, but I really think Chang would not have played a big role in this era.

But let's say that in absence of that proof Chang is still better than Ferrer.

I think that what makes them more alike is how the real top players think about them and what they think is that they can easily beat these guys when it matters.

None of the two has/had had a lot of authority at that point.

[hoodjem]

Originally Posted by BeHappy

Still running around correcting everyone over trivial points Mustard eh? Copied and pasted? At least it wasn't me this time.

Hey, somebody has to keep the standards up around here.

If we don't point out people's goofs, then the next thing you know someone will be claiming the Federer is the greatest of all time. Go figure.