The H2H between Nadal and Fed

PeterHo

PeterHo

Hall of Fame
Gary Duane said:
One great player does not make an era stronger. He just makes everyone else look weaker. ;)

I will never understand why there is an assumption that 00-03 was "weak" just because there was no totally dominant player. That does not prove that everyone else was weak...
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But the one great player Will make the era stronger in a sense that its hard for anyone else to win.

The definition of a great player is one who can dominate the competition in his time. Not only that, great players, when out of prime, can still compete with in prime greats.

Nobody in 00~03 was able to dominate. There was no great player in his prime during this period. There were a few out of prime greats.


If you look at the age gap, after sampras and Agassi, there's a huge lull in talent. You have to wait for one whole decade for the next player to win more than 5 slams.

Then suddenly you have 3 players who win 10~17 slams, within 6 years age difference.

If Nole has declined this yr, it would be very similar to 00~03. A few out of prime greats competing with some good, but not great players.
 
Gary Duane

Gary Duane

G.O.A.T.
PeterHo said:
If you look at the age gap, after sampras and Agassi, there's a huge lull in talent. You have to wait for one whole decade for the next player to win more than 5 slams.

Then suddenly you have 3 players who win 10~17 slams, within 6 years age difference.

If Nole has declined this yr, it would be very similar to 00~03. A few out of prime greats competing with some good, but not great players.
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My point is that there is no absolute way to evaluate the level of any top group of players against the others.

It's not like race, where several people may be fighting for a win, but none of the possible winners is going to set a record. In this case we have an absolute - a time - to measure them all against. We have nothing like this in tennis. It's all opinion, based on what we see.
 
Druss

Druss

Hall of Fame
PeterHo said:
But the one great player Will make the era stronger in a sense that its hard for anyone else to win.

The definition of a great player is one who can dominate the competition in his time. Not only that, great players, when out of prime, can still compete with in prime greats.

Nobody in 00~03 was able to dominate. There was no great player in his prime during this period. There were a few out of prime greats.


If you look at the age gap, after sampras and Agassi, there's a huge lull in talent. You have to wait for one whole decade for the next player to win more than 5 slams.

Then suddenly you have 3 players who win 10~17 slams, within 6 years age difference.

If Nole has declined this yr, it would be very similar to 00~03. A few out of prime greats competing with some good, but not great players.
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In that period you mentioned of 00-03 there was one great player, his name was Marat Safin. He should have won multiple slams and dominate that period, however tennis was not his No1 priority, hence he goes down as one of the biggest under-achievers in Open Era.
 
Druss

Druss

Hall of Fame
PeterHo said:
But fed is different to Connors.

He never led the h2h vs nadal.

Its unprecedented.
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So here Nadal is mature enough because he's beating Federer.

PeterHo said:
Djokovic has made this era stronger than 00~03. This era is more comparable to 04~07.

Ie. There is one outlier vs the rest.
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04-07 There is only one outlier! Really? Oh, that's right, now it's: Nadal doesn't count because it's baby Nadal.
 
PeterHo

PeterHo

Hall of Fame
Gary Duane said:
My point is that there is no absolute way to evaluate the level of any top group of players against the others.

It's not like race, where several people may be fighting for a win, but none of the possible winners is going to set a record. In this case we have an absolute - a time - to measure them all against. We have nothing like this in tennis. It's all opinion, based on what we see.
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Yes there is no absolute term, so that's why the whole goat debate is generally just based on records and achievements, how dominant a player has been against his era's competition. Its the best effort.
 
PeterHo

PeterHo

Hall of Fame
Druss said:
In that period you mentioned of 00-03 there was one great player, his name was Marat Safin. He should have won multiple slams and dominate that period, however tennis was not his No1 priority, hence he goes down as one of the biggest under-achievers in Open Era.
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Well safin wasn't a great player during that period... he didn't have the results to show for it. He is a could have been player.
 
PeterHo

PeterHo

Hall of Fame
Druss said:
So here Nadal is mature enough because he's beating Federer.


04-07 There is only one outlier! Really? Oh, that's right, now it's: Nadal doesn't count because it's baby Nadal.
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Nadal was the leader of the chasing pack, but NOT an outlier during that period.

An outlier is somebody who dominates the rest of the competition, by that I mean those players ranked from anywhere in the top 5 to 100. Nadal only dominated on clay, while he lost many times to non top players on other surfaces.
 
Druss

Druss

Hall of Fame
PeterHo said:
Nadal was the leader of the chasing pack, but NOT an outlier during that period.

An outlier is somebody who dominates the rest of the competition, by that I mean those players ranked from anywhere in the top 5 to 100. Nadal only dominated on clay, while he lost many times to non top players on other surfaces.
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But Federer wasn't dominating Nadal! Even on HC Nadal was beating Fed. You yourself said that. So you have 2 outliers in 2006-07.
 
PeterHo

PeterHo

Hall of Fame
Druss said:
But Federer wasn't dominating Nadal! Even on HC Nadal was beating Fed. You yourself said that. So you have 2 outliers in 2006-07.
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You are confusing outlier and h2h. Its not the same thing.

Main reason why nadal beat fed, is matchup. H2h. Doesn't mean nadal is great on hardcourt overall. He still needs to beat safin roddick etc etc to win. He didn't Make a single hard Crt slam final during that 4 year period... his ability on hard CRTs, which makes up over half of the tour, was not great at all.

Outlier is concerned with overall competition. Nadal needs to have great results across most torunaments and surfaces to be an outlier.

You can only argue that nadal was 1/4th of an outlier, given he only dominated clay.
 
Druss

Druss

Hall of Fame
PeterHo said:
You are confusing outlier and h2h. Its not the same thing.

Main reason why nadal beat fed, is matchup. H2h. Doesn't mean nadal is great on hardcourt overall. He still needs to beat safin roddick etc etc to win. He didn't Make a single hard Crt slam final during that 4 year period... his ability on hard CRTs, which makes up over half of the tour, was not great at all.

Outlier is concerned with overall competition. Nadal needs to have great results across most torunaments and surfaces to be an outlier.

You can only argue that nadal was 1/4th of an outlier, given he only dominated clay.
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In 2006-07 he was second on grass, had he not been in same era as grass court King, he would have won a couple more majors outside of clay. Plus he won 3 Masters in HC during that period, that's second to Fed., so no slouch either on HC. Nadal had 5 great years on grass: 2006-11.
 
PeterHo

PeterHo

Hall of Fame
Druss said:
In 2006-07 he was second on grass, had he not been in same era as grass court King, he would have won a couple more majors outside of clay. Plus he won 3 Masters in HC during that period, that's second to Fed., so no slouch either on HC. Nadal had 5 great years on grass: 2006-11.
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Again, its about hard court.
He didn't even make the semi finals in hard crt slams. Kept losing plenty of matches at WTF. In terms of 3 major tournaments in the year, there was only Federer as the single outlier.

On grass, his first final was in 07. Still, out of 5 major tourneys in a year, he only "beat the rest of the competition" in 2. While if you look at Murray of 11~13, considered an outlier in the period, he beat the rest in 3 slams. While some may say Murray is not really an outlier, his results showed he is overall more consistently Better than the rest of the competition, compared to 04~07 nadal.
 
Druss

Druss

Hall of Fame
PeterHo said:
Again, its about hard court.
He didn't even make the semi finals in hard crt slams. Kept losing plenty of matches at WTF. In terms of 3 major tournaments in the year, there was only Federer as the single outlier.

On grass, his first final was in 07. Still, out of 5 major tourneys in a year, he only "beat the rest of the competition" in 2. While if you look at Murray of 11~13, considered an outlier in the period, he beat the rest in 3 slams. While some may say Murray is not really an outlier, his results showed he is overall more consistently Better than the rest of the competition, compared to 04~07 nadal.
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Nadal made his first Wimby final in 2006 not '07! Fedal both shared 4 slam finals on 2 surfaces in 2006-07, each winning on their favoured surface.
 
PeterHo

PeterHo

Hall of Fame
Druss said:
Nadal made his first Wimby final in 2006 not '07! Fedal both shared 4 slam finals on 2 surfaces in 2006-07, each winning on their favoured surface.
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Ok great, and that still doesn't really change the fact he's only great in 2 out of 4 slams.
He's nearly half an outlier.

Elsewhere (about 60% of the tour), he loses to non top 5 player quite often.

While Murray 11~13 is clearly better than rank 5~100 in 70% (minus clay) of the season.

Consider Murray the bar in defining outliers. The guy is better than the rest but only has 2 slams.
 
Gary Duane

Gary Duane

G.O.A.T.
Druss said:
Nadal denied Federer 4 times at RG and that's excluding the 2005 SF. Djokovic he denied twice at RG, that's a total of six.
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I was right about finals, which was what I was thinking about.

As for all RG matches, Nadal got him in 2005 in the SF, F in 2006, F in 2007, F in 2008. I think that's right.

So Nadal directly stopped in in the RGs, since we can't be 100% that Fed would have won otherwise in 2005 - but it is likely.

Then F in 2011.

That's worse than I remembered. Isn't that 5 times at RG?

Nadal got Novak in , 2014 F, 2013 SF, 2012 F, 2008 SF

I can't keep this stuff in my head without looking it up. It all blurs in my head.

Again, in the two SFs we don't know that Novak would have won otherwise. Fed probably would have won in 2008.

But the wins in 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2012, 2013 and 2014 certainly gave the other two considerable pain. It's pretty likely that there would be one or two grand slams there if a certain clay GOAT had not been around to stop that from happening. ;)
 
Druss

Druss

Hall of Fame
Gary Duane said:
I was right about finals, which was what I was thinking about.

As for all RG matches, Nadal got him in 2005 in the SF, F in 2006, F in 2007, F in 2008. I think that's right.

So Nadal directly stopped in in the RGs, since we can't be 100% that Fed would have won otherwise in 2005 - but it is likely.

Then F in 2011.

That's worse than I remembered. Isn't that 5 times at RG?

Nadal got Novak in , 2014 F, 2013 SF, 2012 F, 2008 SF

I can't keep this stuff in my head without looking it up. It all blurs in my head.

Again, in the two SFs we don't know that Novak would have won otherwise. Fed probably would have won in 2008.

But the wins in 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2012, 2013 and 2014 certainly gave the other two considerable pain. It's pretty likely that there would be one or two grand slams there if a certain clay GOAT had not been around to stop that from happening. ;)
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I guess you're right in that we can't say for certain that Fedovic's losses at the SFs would have translated into wins, though wins against Puerta/Ferrer would have been likely.

What's certain is that Nadal denied them a combined 6 finals; 4 to Fed & 2 to Djoko.
 
Gary Duane

Gary Duane

G.O.A.T.
Druss said:
I guess you're right in that we can't say for certain that Fedovic's losses at the SFs would have translated into wins, though wins against Puerta/Ferrer would have been likely.

What's certain is that Nadal denied them a combined 6 finals; 4 to Fed & 2 to Djoko.
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It's actually scary, isn't it? I know everyone argues about just about everything else, but there is no arguing about Nadal on clay, and that's why I think it is very foolish to count him out on clay in 2016.
 
Gary Duane

Gary Duane

G.O.A.T.
Druss said:
Agree!
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In 2008, when Nadal won between 67 and 68% of all his games on clay he was at a level that no player has come close to on any surface since stats were collected around 25 years ago, and I suspect that would stand up against any year on any one surface from the beginning of the open era. ;)
 
Mustard

Mustard

Bionic Poster
Steve0904 said:
That's been proven time and time again over their careers. Who won the title when Nadal lost at USO 05, 06, 07, and 08? Federer. Who won the title when Nadal lost at AO 07 and 10? Federer. Who won the title at RG 09 and Wimbledon 2012? You get the point. Who won the title when Nadal beat Federer at AO 12 and 14. Not Nadal.
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Who won the French Open, Wimbledon and US Open in 2010, when Federer lost? Nadal, beating the person who beat Federer all 3 times. Who won the 2012 French Open when Federer lost? Nadal, beating Djokovic.

PeterHo said:
You are confusing outlier and h2h. Its not the same thing.

Main reason why nadal beat fed, is matchup. H2h. Doesn't mean nadal is great on hardcourt overall. He still needs to beat safin roddick etc etc to win.
Click to expand...

Safin and Roddick? Have I missed something?

There aren't many players, anywhere, with winning head-to-heads against Nadal. Federer is just one of many that Nadal has a winning head-to-head against. Nadal's best runs of form came in spurts (especially in the spring, but sometimes going longer), rather than year long (or longer) domination like Federer or Djokovic. Nadal's record in the biggest matches against his biggest rivals is the best of this era by several miles. Along with a 9-2 head-to-head in majors against Federer, he's 9-4 in majors against Djokovic. When Nadal is ready, and is playing great tennis to the extent of being in big finals on big stages, he delivers more than any other player in this era.

PeterHo said:
He didn't Make a single hard Crt slam final during that 4 year period... his ability on hard CRTs, which makes up over half of the tour, was not great at all.

Outlier is concerned with overall competition. Nadal needs to have great results across most torunaments and surfaces to be an outlier.

You can only argue that nadal was 1/4th of an outlier, given he only dominated clay.
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I find it amusing that some people expect Nadal to have been reaching hardcourt major finals (age 18-21), when Federer didn't win his first major anywhere until he was 21. Watch the 2006 Dubai final to see how even a teenage Nadal was capable of beating a redlining Federer on hardcourt. Nadal sucked up the punishment and then struck the knockout blow.
 
Steve0904

Steve0904

Talk Tennis Guru
Mustard said:
Who won the French Open, Wimbledon and US Open in 2010, when Federer lost? Nadal, beating the person who beat Federer all 3 times. Who won the 2012 French Open when Federer lost? Nadal, beating Djokovic.
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Except that Nadal is supposed to beat Federer according to many Nadal fans. And he's definitely "supposed" to win RG, so the only 2 losses that even mean anything at all are the Wimbledon and US Open losses in this context.

Are you disputing that Federer is better against the field than Nadal is over the course of their careers? I hope not.
 
S

scotus

G.O.A.T.
Boom-Boom said:
Probably right, but more obvious for three out of 4 ;-)
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I don't quite agree.

I have seen Nadal, Djoko, and Murray all out of breath and bent over. I have never seen Fed do that, even when he was playing the other top 3 and running nearly as much.
 
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Levi_Ackerman

Levi_Ackerman

Legend
OP should have added a warning in his op: "This thread is for biased Fed fans in denial. Objective tennis fans beware!"

Lol. Sometimes, the arguments Fed fans come up with to "rationalise" his h2h with Nadal reminds me of climate change deniers and young earth creationists. That's how absurd they can be.
 
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Candide

Candide

Hall of Fame
mike danny said:
Grass equal? Really?
Click to expand...

In Spanish Math: 7 = 2.
ddc4cdd58244ca4b40dd266f1d96937f.jpg
 
K

KINGROGER

G.O.A.T.
H2H would look different if 1. They were the same age and 2. Nadal had met Federer more between 04-07 on HC, or anytime between 2014-2016.
 
J

Jonas78

Legend
sureshs said:
Do you think Nadal will reverse the trend by defeating him in the upcoming Slams?
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They havent met on grass sinse 2008, and never at USO. And they will never meet again at FO. What makes you so sure they will even meet in the upcoming slams?

Looks as parts of the Brigade are doing the same as the Ultronians did back in 2015/2016; Djoker was going to surpass both 17 slams and 302 weeks, who could stop him? Thats already forgotten...

One slam at a time...
 
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Get A Grip

Get A Grip

Hall of Fame
Gary Duane said:
2004 - 2007:

Off clay, 5/2 to Fed.
(On clay, 6/1 to Nadal)

They played as many times on clay as on HCs and grass.

I'm interested in the rivalry off clay. Nadal leads by a huge margin on clay against both Novak and Fed, and he is responsible for denying FIVE grand slams to these guys, three times to Fed, two times to Novak. It should be obvious to anyone with a working brain that Nadal clearly leads any argument about GOAT player on clay.

But I'm interested in the competition off clay.

2008:

Only one meeting off clay the entire year, at Wimbledon

5/3 in favor of Fed.

2009:

One meeting at the AO

5/4, Fed still leads.

2010

Fed wins the WTF:

6/4 to Fed.

2011

Fed wins the WTF again, Nadal wins Miami

7/5 to Fed.

2012:

Fed wins Indian Wells, Nadal wins the AO.

8/6 to Fed.

2013:

Nadal wins all three meetings off clay.

8/9 to Nadal

2014:

Nadal wins at the AO.

8/10 to Nadal

2015:

Fed wins Basel

9/10 to Nadal

Off clay Fed was always ahead until 2013, having a pretty clear advantage against a 5 year younger player until the end of 2007, and Nadal has edged ahead as is usual for a younger player as the older player extends his career.

Overall I find these guys to be exceptionally close off clay, and that could be why we so much enjoy their matches.

(On clay it will most likely remain a beat-down, and unlike many I expect that to continue against Novak if Nadal gets his mojo back.)

If I have screwed up my figure, please correct me.

Thoughts?
Click to expand...


Well, yes they'e split pretty evenly off clay, BUT 4 Fed wins on HC are indoors--ATP finals, Basel, and 2 Tennis Masters cups. I consider indoors different from HC due to the bounce (lower) it's Nada's worst surface statistically and Fed's best.

Also please consider this re. their H2H: Nadal beat Fed in Fed's house, Wimb; Fed never beat Rafa in Rafa's house, RG.

Even if pretty even off clay, then clay gives Rafa the obvious edge--it's still 23-14, then add the two factors I cited.
 
The Green Mile

The Green Mile

Bionic Poster
Huge difference between 23-10 and 23-14 right? The former looks pretty bad, though the latter looks somewhat respectable lol. Almost similar numbers to Pete vs Andre H2H.
 
D

Deleted member 743561

Guest
Get A Grip said:
Well, yes they'e split pretty evenly off clay, BUT 4 Fed wins on HC are indoors--ATP finals, Basel, and 2 Tennis Masters cups. I consider indoors different from HC due to the bounce (lower) it's Nada's worst surface statistically and Fed's best.

Also please consider this re. their H2H: Nadal beat Fed in Fed's house, Wimb; Fed never beat Rafa in Rafa's house, RG.

Even if pretty even off clay, then clay gives Rafa the obvious edge--it's still 23-14, then add the two factors I cited.
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lol, classically trained.

Should probably eliminate those four indoor matches straight away, as they skew this thing in an irreparable way. Just for fun, we should probably place the 15 clay matches directly in the waste receptacle, as well. Agreed?
 
mike danny

mike danny

Bionic Poster
The Green Mile said:
Huge difference between 23-10 and 23-14 right? The former looks pretty bad, though the latter looks somewhat respectable lol. Almost similar numbers to Pete vs Andre H2H.
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The current Fed-Rafa H2H is similar to the Djoko-Rafa one at the end of USO 2013. It was 22-15. And no one was even calling that one lopsided.
 
mike danny

mike danny

Bionic Poster
Get A Grip said:
Well, yes they'e split pretty evenly off clay, BUT 4 Fed wins on HC are indoors--ATP finals, Basel, and 2 Tennis Masters cups. I consider indoors different from HC due to the bounce (lower) it's Nada's worst surface statistically and Fed's best.

Also please consider this re. their H2H: Nadal beat Fed in Fed's house, Wimb; Fed never beat Rafa in Rafa's house, RG.

Even if pretty even off clay, then clay gives Rafa the obvious edge--it's still 23-14, then add the two factors I cited.
Click to expand...
Should we eliminate clay as well since it's Fed's worst and statistically Rafa's best? I mean 13 of Rafa's wins have come on his best surface, while just 4 of Fed's wins have come on his.
 
K

KINGROGER

G.O.A.T.
Get A Grip said:
Well, yes they'e split pretty evenly off clay, BUT 4 Fed wins on HC are indoors--ATP finals, Basel, and 2 Tennis Masters cups. I consider indoors different from HC due to the bounce (lower) it's Nada's worst surface statistically and Fed's best.

Also please consider this re. their H2H: Nadal beat Fed in Fed's house, Wimb; Fed never beat Rafa in Rafa's house, RG.

Even if pretty even off clay, then clay gives Rafa the obvious edge--it's still 23-14, then add the two factors I cited.
Click to expand...
So in other words, Fed wins when conditions are most neutral and his superior tennis skills thrive?

Also Nadal only started winning a lot on outdoor HC when Fed was 30-33 years old and past his prime.
And that point about Fed not beating Nadal at RG... no one cares.
 
mike danny

mike danny

Bionic Poster
Get A Grip said:
Well, yes they'e split pretty evenly off clay, BUT 4 Fed wins on HC are indoors--ATP finals, Basel, and 2 Tennis Masters cups. I consider indoors different from HC due to the bounce (lower) it's Nada's worst surface statistically and Fed's best.

Also please consider this re. their H2H: Nadal beat Fed in Fed's house, Wimb; Fed never beat Rafa in Rafa's house, RG.

Even if pretty even off clay, then clay gives Rafa the obvious edge--it's still 23-14, then add the two factors I cited.
Click to expand...
Regarding the bolded, what about the 2013-early 2014 factor? Roger was at his worst in that period and Nadal at his best. That's why the H2H looks the way it does. Rafa feasting on the weak 2013-early 2014 Roger, but unable to return the favor. Roger played 2015 Rafa just once.
 
K

KINGROGER

G.O.A.T.
The Green Mile said:
Huge difference between 23-10 and 23-14 right? The former looks pretty bad, though the latter looks somewhat respectable lol. Almost similar numbers to Pete vs Andre H2H.
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And you have to factor in that Nadal vultured 5 wins over 32 year old bad back 2013 Fed... but wasn't good enough to reach resurgent 2014-2015 Fed more than once. Or at any HC slam between 04-08. Or at Wimbledon between 2012-2016. Or at any post RG masters between 04-12, 14-16 (the one year he did was 2013 LMAO)

Just for fun. Say Fed was only good enough to reach Nadal once in 2013. H2H is now 19-14. But then let's say crappy playing 2015 Rafa somehow made SFs/finals playing badly (LOL). I'll choose 2015 IW, Wimbledon, Cincy, Basel WTF. That's 4 extra wins for Roger so H2H including the 2017 matches is now 19-18.

So the balance of the H2H really does hinge on Fed being so good he can reach Rafa playing badly/averagely, but the reverse isn't true.
 
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