Most talented player of all time

[JoshDragon]

I think Roger and Pete are the most talented that I've seen.

[kashgotmoney]

Originally Posted by pc1

Just curious about your opinions on who is the most talented player ever. It doesn't necessarily mean achievement but you can for example name a player like Safin if you think he's the most talented ever. It's all subjective and I'm curious about people's thoughts here. You can name the most talented male player and the most talented female player. No such thing as wrong answer here.

Everybody knows its me, im the most talented of all time. Just kidding. i think agassi is the most talented

[Shaolin]

Marcelo Rios

[pc1]

Originally Posted by NotSoSuper

Does anyone know of any good youtube clips of pancho?

Didn't think they had any but I checked out youtube and here it is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nd0gJzm_EQY

I haven't seen the whole clip yet but it's from a special on him a few years ago.

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

Originally Posted by pc1

A lot of people have said that Vines was the most talented and the best ever when on. And Tilden was considered to be virtually the perfect tennis player with the perfect build for the game.

If I believe the very old witnesses, Joshua Pim was the very talented one in those days . Here are some extracts that I listed in another post :

About Joshua Pim, Hillyard wrote in 1924-1925 : "Dr Pim then, at his best, was one of the greatest players (some think the greatest) ever seen. /.../ Complete master of every stroke on the court, there were two in particular I have never seen equalled. Indeed one of these I have never seen attempted by any other player. This was a drop volley made from any point between the service and base lines. / ... in a back of the court rally his opponent would drive a ball ... But the "Doctor", on occasion, did not let it bound. A rapid step or two forward, a snap of the wrist, and behold he had drop volleyd that ball short over the net, and left his antagonist stranded and staring, yards and yards away ! It was an amazing stroke, and one that only an absolute master fo the game could hope to bring off. Try it for yourself and see ! The other stroke I refer to was his lob ..."

Later probably Malcolm Douglass Whitman who had a very short career but seemed almost invincible.

Norman Brookes who was a very crafted serve and volley player (in 1924-25 still thought that Brookes' serve was better than Tilden's) but had no stamina at all.

Tilden naturally.

Cochet who made Tilden crazy for 3 consecutive years and in particular in the 1929 Davis Cup Challenge Round when Tilden said "Cochet plays a game I don't know".

Vines of course.

If some (Hopman, Kramer, ...) considered that Budge was the best day in day out and had a very complete game then he was probably very talented.

Frank Kovacs also was very talented. In particular in his opening match against Budge in the 41-42 pro North American tour the gallery expressed his Kovac's game admiration (the best backhand after Budge in those times). In 1952 he was still able to beat Gonzales (in one of their two matches played at Philadelphia) and in 1955 he had still match points against Gorgo.

Gonzales hadn't very efficient groundstrokes however he was such a competitor that he was talented.

Hoad of course (I don't think as you suggest that Rosewall considered Laver more talented but at the time of Rosewall's comment, around 1972 (or a few years before ?)? Laver was Ken's main opponent while Hoad was retired since many years).

Laver naturally

In late 1974 Robert "Bob" Anthony John Hewitt (not to confuse with Lleyton Hewitt) considered that the best two players he had faced were Laver and Hoad but in terms of talent he seemed to favour Nastase instead of Laver and considered that when Nastase was hot he could reached summits as high as Hoad.

Borg was probably much more talented than many thought (but it is true that he worked very hard : 5 hours a day and even 7 hours to prepare the Slam tournaments).

Mac of course (he was told as not training more than a hour a day).

Henri Leconte (not "LeConte" or even "Le Conte") though I don't think he was as talented as it was claimed. To give you an example, he never beat Becker except during one month in their whole careers : at Hambourg in May 1988 and a few weeks later at Roland Garros on clay each time, the worst surface of the German. Very often on fast surfaces Leconte could take a set from Boris but couldn't make better.

Becker naturally : once I watched him on TV stating that in terms of talent he was between Lendl (the less talented) and McEnroe (the more talented) but I think he was very close to Mac and perhaps even superior to John.

Mecir's performance at Key Biscayne against Lendl in 1987 seemed to have been great (I haven't watched the match)

Sampras not bad at all : his Asian and MSG exhibitions against Federer after an almost 5-year retirement speak for themselves. In the summer of 1999 between Wimbledon and Cincinatti he "walked on water" as stated Agassi.

Agassi also apparently didn't train hard in his early career (it seems that his 1997 decline has changed his train habits.

Stich's win at Wimby has perhaps demotivated him afterwards.

Possibly Philippoussis : I watched the whole 2000 Paris-Bercy final he played against Safin and until Marat slightly injured himself (the match was stopped a few minutes), Philippoussis was overwhelming, dominating Safin from head to foot. But when play resumed, Mark had lost some of his impetus and Safin came back to eventually lift the trophy. And before at Wimby 1999 he led Sampras 6-4 1-2 before retiring but he proved that he could have seriously threatened the great Sampras that day. And the same year on indoor clay in the Davis Cup final many observers thought that no one could play better than Philippoussis did against Grosjean and Pioline.

Safin's performances at the 2000 US Open final and the 2005 Australian Open final rounds were superb.

Federer of course.

Nalbandian whose play in particular on medium fast indoor carpets can be absolutely amazing : remember his performances at Madrid and Paris in 2007 when he clearly dominated Federer and crushed Nadal both times.

Nadal impresses me more and more : he never ceases to improve technically so he must have a certain amount of talent. Perhaps he is underrated as Borg was in his time.

Wait and see for Tsonga.

[pc1]

Originally Posted by Carlo Giovanni Colussi

If I believe the very old witnesses, Joshua Pim was the very talented one in those days . Here are some extracts that I listed in another post :

About Joshua Pim, Hillyard wrote in 1924-1925 : "Dr Pim then, at his best, was one of the greatest players (some think the greatest) ever seen. /.../ Complete master of every stroke on the court, there were two in particular I have never seen equalled. Indeed one of these I have never seen attempted by any other player. This was a drop volley made from any point between the service and base lines. / ... in a back of the court rally his opponent would drive a ball ... But the "Doctor", on occasion, did not let it bound. A rapid step or two forward, a snap of the wrist, and behold he had drop volleyd that ball short over the net, and left his antagonist stranded and staring, yards and yards away ! It was an amazing stroke, and one that only an absolute master fo the game could hope to bring off. Try it for yourself and see ! The other stroke I refer to was his lob ..."

Later probably Malcolm Douglass Whitman who had a very short career but seemed almost invincible.

Norman Brookes who was a very crafted serve and volley player (in 1924-25 still thought that Brookes' serve was better than Tilden's) but had no stamina at all.

Tilden naturally.

Cochet who made Tilden crazy for 3 consecutive years and in particular in the 1929 Davis Cup Challenge Round when Tilden said "Cochet plays a game I don't know".

Vines of course.

If some (Hopman, Kramer, ...) considered that Budge was the best day in day out and had a very complete game then he was probably very talented.

Gonzales hadn't very efficient groundstrokes however he was such a competitor that he was talented.

Hoad of course (I don't think as you suggest that Rosewall considered Laver more talented but at the time of Rosewall's comment, around 1972 (or a few years before ?)? Laver was Ken's main opponent while Hoad was retired since many years).

Laver naturally

In late 1974 Robert "Bob" Anthony John Hewitt (not to confuse with Lleyton Hewitt) considered that the best two players he had faced were Laver and Hoad but in terms of talent he seemed to favour Nastase instead of Laver and considered that when Nastase was hot he could reached summits as high as Hoad.

Borg was probably much more talented than many thought (but it is true that he worked very hard : 5 hours a day and even 7 hours to prepare the Slam tournaments).

Mac of course (he was told as not training more than a hour a day).

Henri Leconte (not "LeConte" or even "Le Conte") though I don't think he was as talented as it was claimed. To give you an example, he never beat Becker except during one month in their whole careers : at Hambourg in May 1988 and a few weeks later at Roland Garros on clay each time, the worst surface of the German. Very often on fast surfaces Leconte could take a set from Boris but couldn't make better.

Becker naturally : once I watched him on TV stating that in terms of talent he was between Lendl (the less talented) and McEnroe (the more talented) but I think he was very close to Mac and perhaps even superior to John.

Mecir's performance at Key Biscayne against Lendl in 1987 seemed to have been great (I haven't watched the match)

Sampras not bad at all : his Asian and MSG exhibitions against Federer after an almost 5-year retirement speak for themselves. In the summer of 1999 between Wimbledon and Cincinatti he "walked on water" as stated Agassi.

Agassi also apparently didn't train hard in his early career (it seems that his 1997 decline has changed his train habits.

Stich's win at Wimby has perhaps demotivated him afterwards.

Safin's performances at the 2000 US Open final and the 2005 Australian Open final rounds were superb.

Federer of course.

Nadal impresses more and more : he never ceases to improve technically so he must have a certain amount of talent. Perhaps he is underrated as Borg was in his time.

Wait and see for Tsonga.

Fantastic post Carlo. I am also getting more and more impressed with Nadal. He doesn't seem to have any majors weaknesses players can attack and as you wrote, he works very hard to improve technically.

Since you mentioned Mecir, you mentioned the Key Biscayne match against Lendl and like you, I understand it must have been great but I didn't see it. However I did see the 1987 WCT final in which he defeated McEnroe 6-0 3-6 6-2 6-2. Mecir was brilliant. Such flowing movement, incredible angles and passing shots. McEnroe did not play that badly but lost. Of course it was not the McEnroe of 1984 but he was still very good.

You're probably seen this but here's youtube clip of Mecir against Wilander at the U.S. Open.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2bzlj4ypvw

Leconte was one of my favorites to watch but I may agree with you that his talent may have been overrated. He was a wild player of course but his speed as a bit suspect to me. I think he was perhaps slower than many players and you cannot have super talent if you aren't that fast. He was fun to watch. His hand/eye coordination was amazing and he had wonderful angle volleys. This is not important but Leconte was my wife's favorite player. She says the players now are boring compared to Leconte.

One player that some have talked about that had great talent is Frank Kovacs. He unfortunately was also known as "The Clown Prince of Tennis." Bobby Riggs once describe a match around 1950 in which Kovacs defeated Frank Parker with the loss of only one game in three sets. Riggs thought no one in the history of tennis could do that to Parker but Kovacs. Kovacs was 6'3" tall and he had such a great backhand that even a Jack Kramer couldn't serve and volley against and Kramer had one of the great serves of all time. It's a shame Kovacs didn't take tennis seriously.

[Azzurri]

Originally Posted by NotSoSuper

Does anyone know of any good youtube clips of pancho?

I could care less about this thread.................

[gabritox]

Fabrice Santoro

[pc1]

Originally Posted by Azzurri

LOL...yea, lets rate player talent from YT video clips. Just likem the kiddies on the boards today will argue with people that actually watched many of the greats play, yet YT videos is their education..joke.

not jumping on you and I know what you meant, but YT clips should not be a way to "judge" someone's talent vs. another player of different generations. It is impossible. Don Budge was supposed to be a great talent, yet someone like Nadal would smoke him. Silly.

The guy that won Wimbledon ike 7 straight times in the 1800's should also be mentioned..right?

Of course you really can't judge talent from clips but people at least want to get an idea of what the player all about.

You can see stroke technique and the way the players move so while you may not judge unless you see more of the player, you can form an initial impression.

You can't say a guy like Don Budge would be smoked by Nadal and you can't say that Nadal wouldn't smoke him.

A lot of people have argued about the merits of Ken Rosewall but Ken Rosewall was competitive up to the late 1970's and for example defeated Vitas Gerulaitis in the semi-finals of the Sidney Indoor in 1977 at age 43. Would Nadal have smoked Rosewall? Would Rosewall have smoked Nadal? Who knows? My opinion is neither would smoked either one if they played in their primes.

Josh has nice opinions and I respect them but to say his opinions are clearly better than the others, well I disagree. It's all subjective and that's the fun of it.

[pc1]

Originally Posted by JoshDragon

Thanks but actually I've only seen Sampras through You Tube videos. Although there is enough footage of him to get a feel for what kind of player he was.

I agree about Tilden it's almost impossible to get any footage of him at all. Although from what I've seen of the players (via you tube) from around that time period, they are still great athletes but lack the power of the guys today. The game seems significantly different back then also.

It's has a lot to do with the equipment Josh. Remember tiny wood rackets with small heads and heavier than our racket today. The players didn't have the head surface to put a lot of spin on the ball. If the players played with our rackets they would hit a lot harder.

If you watch the women players you would think they hit the ball very hard today, wouldn't you? Well, if the guys from the 1920's played today, wouldn't you think they would hit the ball harder than the female players of today? I would think so. Don't confuse racket technology advancement with tennis skills. In fact the wood rackets forced a lot of the players to learn more tennis skills than today's players. They had to because no one with a few minor exceptions like Ellsworth Vines and Lew Hoad could hit a lot of winners from the baseline.

Tilden was 6'2 I believe, so he was taller than Nadal and Federer. He was a tennis addict and was obsessed with improving himself and studying the game. Don't you think he might have learned how to play with our racket today? I can't prove it but I would tend to think so.

I didn't see Tilden, very few have but from second hand accounts he was very talented.

The most talented players I have seen were not necessarily in this order Laver, Nastase, Borg, McEnroe, Mecir, Sampras. Don't want to rate Nadal and Federer yet but I'm sure they are up there. Korda and Rios also. These are players I have seen in person and often on television.

[Satch]

Roger and Safin

[Golden Retriever]

Most talented is the one who wins the most matches in the pro tour. Otherwise it is just a lot of speculation and heresay.

[Tshooter]

"Most talented is the one who wins the most matches in the pro tour."

No that would be the player with the most wins. The most talented, however, was Nastase.

[jaggy]

Bahrami for me

[Azzurri]

Originally Posted by pc1

Of course you really can't judge talent from clips but people at least want to get an idea of what the player all about.

You can see stroke technique and the way the players move so while you may not judge unless you see more of the player, you can form an initial impression.

You can't say a guy like Don Budge would be smoked by Nadal and you can't say that Nadal wouldn't smoke him.

A lot of people have argued about the merits of Ken Rosewall but Ken Rosewall was competitive up to the late 1970's and for example defeated Vitas Gerulaitis in the semi-finals of the Sidney Indoor in 1977 at age 43. Would Nadal have smoked Rosewall? Would Rosewall have smoked Nadal? Who knows? My opinion is neither would smoked either one if they played in their primes.

Josh has nice opinions and I respect them but to say his opinions are clearly better than the others, well I disagree. It's all subjective and that's the fun of it.

I could care less about this thread.................

[Azzurri]

Originally Posted by JoshDragon

Thanks but actually I've only seen Sampras through You Tube videos. Although there is enough footage of him to get a feel for what kind of player he was.

I agree about Tilden it's almost impossible to get any footage of him at all. Although from what I've seen of the players (via you tube) from around that time period, they are still great athletes but lack the power of the guys today. The game seems significantly different back then also.

...............................

[Morpheus]

Ilie Natase. Greatest natural talent ever to play the game.

[JoshDragon]

Originally Posted by pc1

It's has a lot to do with the equipment Josh. Remember tiny wood rackets with small heads and heavier than our racket today. The players didn't have the head surface to put a lot of spin on the ball. If the players played with our rackets they would hit a lot harder.

If you watch the women players you would think they hit the ball very hard today, wouldn't you? Well, if the guys from the 1920's played today, wouldn't you think they would hit the ball harder than the female players of today? I would think so. Don't confuse racket technology advancement with tennis skills. In fact the wood rackets forced a lot of the players to learn more tennis skills than today's players. They had to because no one with a few minor exceptions like Ellsworth Vines and Lew Hoad could hit a lot of winners from the baseline.

Tilden was 6'2 I believe, so he was taller than Nadal and Federer. He was a tennis addict and was obsessed with improving himself and studying the game. Don't you think he might have learned how to play with our racket today? I can't prove it but I would tend to think so.

I didn't see Tilden, very few have but from second hand accounts he was very talented.

The most talented players I have seen were not necessarily in this order Laver, Nastase, Borg, McEnroe, Mecir, Sampras. Don't want to rate Nadal and Federer yet but I'm sure they are up there. Korda and Rios also. These are players I have seen in person and often on television.

I'm not sure about Tilden being obsessed with improving himself. From what I've read he didn't eat healthy meals and he smoked. Hard to believe someone with habits like that could be more committed to the game than the players today.

[pc1]

Originally Posted by JoshDragon

I'm not sure about Tilden being obsessed with improving himself. From what I've read he didn't eat healthy meals and he smoked. Hard to believe someone with habits like that could be more committed to the game than the players today.

Good point but I think people weren't as health conscious in those days. Pancho Gonzalez was known for being a heavy smoker also and he (from what I've read) didn't have the best diet either. I don't think cigarettes were known to be bad for you then. It's hard to believe that people didn't know that in those days but it's true.

I read in Fred Perry's book a story in which an old Tilden wanted to show Perry something he just mastered on the tennis court. He told Perry to hit a ball wide to him and Tilden used Perry's forehand style to return the ball to him. He told Perry that after watching Perry play that he felt Perry's forehand grip was the best way to return that shot and he didn't feel he would be a complete player unless he mastered that shot.

That's why I thought he was obsessed with bettering himself in tennis.

[TheMagicianOfPrecision]

Yeah probably Johhny Mac!