Connors was the most determined competitor in the history of tennis. Yes Borg had won several matches in a row, but increasingly their matches were becoming closer. The tide was turning. And it's very very important to remember that Connors improved his serve in 82. With Connors improving and Borg declining, Borg was heading for the no.3 or even no.4 position.
Sometimes rivalries abruptly change. Look at Lendl Mac, multiple consecutive wins for 1 player were followed by multiple consecutive wins for another.
You can't simply say Borg owned Connors and that was going to heppen forever. Connors beat Borg in all exos in 82. He'd overtaken him. In Senior tennis Connors dominated Borg. It simply doesn't follow that because Borg beat Connors 8 times in a row he was going to do it forever.
When Borg was always beating Connors it wasn't like Federer Hewitt, a foregone conclusion. In 79 Connors couldn't compete with Borg, but in 80-81 Connors was a very tough opponent for him with lots of close matches. That wasn't going to go on forever, especially with Connors' improved serve.
Good points. I agree with you that we can't make ssumptions that if Borg continued to play he would still have dominated Connors just because he WAS dominating him before. But, hear me out, here's my logical on it. It seems like everyone here on the forum would say Borg is a superior Wilander, right? Now look at Wilander's head to head with Connors. He never lost to him. So, logically we could make a pretty good assumption that Borg would still dominate Connors if he continued to play and wasn't Burnt out. If you don't agree then you would have to admit that Wilander would beat Borg cause he was beating Connors. Almost no one believes this notion. I know different match ups may favour different players but Wilander's style is very similars to Borg's minus Borg's ground stroke power and serve so you can draw you own conclusions.
I can use the same example above to logically deduce that Borg would still have done well against Mac if he continued to play.
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