1980 US Open Final McEnroe-Borg on TV Tonight

thor's hammer

thor's hammer

Semi-Pro
ESPN Classic, 9pm Eastern Time (US) Wednesday July 29, 2009

The McEnroe-Lendl 1985 final shown on Tennis Channel Monday night was pretty good. Looking forward to seeing this one tonight. 2 hour scheduled broadcast time, so I guess they'll be condensing the match.
 
rk_sports

rk_sports

Hall of Fame
haha.. .did you catch the moment where Borg dropped his raquet on serve and the ball was in play(?) and then as McEnroe returned it... Borg was without the raquet and guess what happened next?

--
 
R

rod99

Professional
borg's serve was terrible in that match. continually missed first serves and double faulted twice in the game he was broken in the 5th set.
 
B

Borgforever

Hall of Fame
I know many, many, many, many experts who think you are absolutely dead wrong in all these three statements that you just made.

And to really undermine your "statements" you don't add any arguments whatsoever.

Such statements demand at least 2000 words, at least, with strong arguments and references.

Needless to say, I couldn't disagree more with you on all three statements and I might add it's one of the more ignorant posts I've seen here. But don't take it personally. I am just speaking of the contents of that post.
 
drwood

drwood

Professional
Borgforever said:
I know many, many, many, many experts who think you are absolutely dead wrong in all these three statements that you just made.

And to really undermine your "statements" you don't add any arguments whatsoever.

Such statements demand at least 2000 words, at least, with strong arguments and references.

Needless to say, I couldn't disagree more with you on all three statements and I might add it's one of the more ignorant posts I've seen here. But don't take it personally. I am just speaking of the contents of that post.
Click to expand...

And I know many, many, many, many, many, many, many experts who would agree with the statements I just made. Show your proof, and I'll show mine.

We can start with 2009 Murray vs. 1980 Lendl -- who has reached more GS finals?

I many disagree with you, but that doesn't mean you're ignorant. Show some decency and respect.
 
B

Borgforever

Hall of Fame
Look it up yourself. It's out there, the relevant info. Laziness is not a virtue.

Give me one reason why I should do your homework?!

And don't count people under 30 as great tennis experts with proven expertise and decades of experience.

Have a nice life...
 
pc1

pc1

G.O.A.T.
drwood said:
1. Murray today was better than 1980 Lendl
2. Nadal has as many HC slams as 1980 Connors
3. Federer is much better than Borg, especially on HC
Click to expand...


To answer each point. I believe point one may be correct but Lendl did win at least 6 tournaments in 1980 that I counted. Murray may be better than Lendl in 1980 but it's not a slam dunk. It's easily argued the other way that Lendl was better in 1980 than Murray now. It's a very debatable issue.

Point two is really not viable since the US Open wasn't switched to Hard Court until 1978 and Connors won in 78, 82 and 83. He had no other hard court major tournaments to play. If the Australian was a top flight major on Hardcourt in the early 1970's then I believe Connors would have won his share. That is assuming he entered.

Point three is really debatable. That's an opinion, not a fact. I don't care if you think Federer is better than Borg, that's not the point but you really can't say Federer is MUCH better than Borg. In Borg you are talking about someone with perhaps the highest winning percentage in the history of tennis and has won 11 majors in 27 attempts. Borg won 100 tournaments by his mid twenties. Federer has won 60 at almost age 28. How is Federer MUCH better than Borg?

You're a chessplayer. Do you think Gary Kasparov would defeat Bobby Fischer 19 out of 20 games in chess? This is assuming Fischer is in his prime and is up to date with current theory. There is no way that would happen.

For that matter would Anand defeat the 1970's World Champion Karpov by a big margin. I don't think so. Yet Anand is the current champion and Karpov, like Borg was the 1970's World Champion. Given up to date theory I would favor a young Karpov over Anand.

Victor Korchnoi is very competitive, even at a very old age. Heck Kasparov wouldn't wouldn't defeat the present Korchnoi 19 out of 20 games.

Botvinnik once said that Jose Capablanca, given a few months to update himself on theory would be the best player in the world and as you know, Capablanca played in the 1900's to around 1940 but his peak was about the late 1910's or early 1920's. I think Botvinnik said that in the 1970's, with Karpov as the World Champion. I'm not sure if that's true because as you know, I respect Karpov but Botvinnik is clearly a voice to be respected in chess.

In tennis Borg played with a wood racket and he was able to dominate tennis in the late 1970's to early 1980's. They play a different game now with the rackets of today. The rackets do a lot of the work. The game has greater shotmaking simply because the racket allow it. Some players may seem greater than some in the past because of the illusion the rackets give.

John McEnroe serves harder today than when he was in his prime. Is he really a better server today? I don't think so.

Roscoe Tanner, in the early 1990's served a ball at I believe 135 mph on the Senior Tour. It actually was higher than the record on the regular tour by 1 mph. What's the reason? He had a better racket.

To say Federer is much better than Borg is your opinion but facts show that there is no way the record of Federer is MUCH better than Borg.
 
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F

FiveO

Hall of Fame
drwood said:
And I know many, many, many, many, many, many, many experts who would agree with the statements I just made. Show your proof, and I'll show mine.

We can start with 2009 Murray vs. 1980 Lendl -- who has reached more GS finals?

I many disagree with you, but that doesn't mean you're ignorant. Show some decency and respect.
Click to expand...

Why would you want to compare a 22 year old Murray to a 20 year old Lendl?

At 20:

Lendl:

10 finals, 7 titles, best Major showing QF. overall match record 109-28, #6 ranking.

Murray:

4 finals, 2 titles, best Major showing R16. 43-14, #11 ranking.

At 21:

Lendl:

15 finals, 10 titles, best Major showing F (in 9 Majors played to date). overall match record 96-14, #2.

Murray:

6 finals, 5 titles, best Major showing F (in 12 Majors played), 56-15, #4.

At 22:

Lendl:

20 finals, 15 titles, 2nd Major Final (in 13 Majors played), 106-9, #3.

Murray* (to date):

5 finals, 4 titles, still one Major Final in now 15 attempts, 45-7, currently #3.

So, unless Murray reaches the US Open Final, which is entirely possible, and goes 61-2, not very likely in the remainder of this year, he merely falls further behind Lendl's torrid pace.




In short, Lendl is the wrong guy to compare Murray to.

5
 
CyBorg

CyBorg

Legend
drwood said:
1. Murray today was better than 1980 Lendl
2. Nadal has as many HC slams as 1980 Connors
3. Federer is much better than Borg, especially on HC
Click to expand...

I also think that Murray is underrated and will be until he achieves his moments of glory - to come, I think.

Until he wins a major, though, he's not necessarily better than the 1980 Lendl, but it's close.
 
jimbo333

jimbo333

Hall of Fame
drwood said:
1. Murray today was better than 1980 Lendl
2. Nadal has as many HC slams as 1980 Connors
3. Federer is much better than Borg, especially on HC
Click to expand...

1.It's not a fair comparison, as has been mentioned earlier, a 22 year old Lendl was better than a 22 year old Murray.

2.Again not a fair comparison, and while we're looking at 22 year olds. In 74 Connors won 3 Grand Slam Tournaments and wasn't allowed to play in 4th which he had an excellent chance of winning. In 2008 Nadal only won 2 GS and didn't even make the final in the other 2.

3. Federer is not much better than Borg on any surface.
 
Mick

Mick

Legend
Has federer ever won a tournament by beating djokovic, murray, nadal ?

______
1980 us open:

quarterfinal mcenroe d. lendl 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-5
semifinal - mcenroe d. connors 6-4, 5-7, 0-6, 6-3, 7-6
final - mcenroe d. borg 7–6, 6–1, 6–7, 5–7, 6–4
 
pc1

pc1

G.O.A.T.
Mick said:
Has federer ever won a tournament by beating djokovic, murray, nadal ?

______
1980 us open:

quarterfinal mcenroe d. lendl 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-5
semifinal - mcenroe d. connors 6-4, 5-7, 0-6, 6-3, 7-6
final - mcenroe d. borg 7–6, 6–1, 6–7, 5–7, 6–4
Click to expand...

Lendl was quite THE Lendl yet but he was super tough. I wonder what other players have won majors by defeating players of this level or around this level in the quarters, the semis and finals. I have to research that.

That's a great accomplishment by McEnroe.
 
P

pmerk34

Legend
jimbo333 said:
1.It's not a fair comparison, as has been mentioned earlier, a 22 year old Lendl was better than a 22 year old Murray.

2.Again not a fair comparison, and while we're looking at 22 year olds. In 74 Connors won 3 Grand Slam Tournaments and wasn't allowed to play in 4th which he had an excellent chance of winning. In 2008 Nadal only won 2 GS and didn't even make the final in the other 2.

3. Federer is not much better than Borg on any surface.
Click to expand...


Fed has 5 us opens Borg won zero.
 
P

pmerk34

Legend
FiveO said:
Why would you want to compare a 22 year old Murray to a 20 year old Lendl?

At 20:

Lendl:

10 finals, 7 titles, best Major showing QF. overall match record 109-28, #6 ranking.

Murray:

4 finals, 2 titles, best Major showing R16. 43-14, #11 ranking.

At 21:

Lendl:

15 finals, 10 titles, best Major showing F (in 9 Majors played to date). overall match record 96-14, #2.

Murray:

6 finals, 5 titles, best Major showing F (in 12 Majors played), 56-15, #4.

At 22:

Lendl:

20 finals, 15 titles, 2nd Major Final (in 13 Majors played), 106-9, #3.

Murray* (to date):

5 finals, 4 titles, still one Major Final in now 15 attempts, 45-7, currently #3.

So, unless Murray reaches the US Open Final, which is entirely possible, and goes 61-2, not very likely in the remainder of this year, he merely falls further behind Lendl's torrid pace.




In short, Lendl is the wrong guy to compare Murray to.

5
Click to expand...

In short it's a different era. No one plays a 120 matches a year anymore.
 
dsa202

dsa202

Banned
Borgforever said:
I know many, many, many, many experts who think you are absolutely dead wrong in all these three statements that you just made.

And to really undermine your "statements" you don't add any arguments whatsoever.

Such statements demand at least 2000 words, at least, with strong arguments and references.

Needless to say, I couldn't disagree more with you on all three statements and I might add it's one of the more ignorant posts I've seen here. But don't take it personally. I am just speaking of the contents of that post.
Click to expand...

Experts? What experts? Cliff Drysdale?

It's not like you have any references or anything to back up your statements.
 
F

FiveO

Hall of Fame
pmerk34 said:
In short it's a different era. No one plays a 120 matches a year anymore.
Click to expand...

Wouldn't change a thing. Then calculate win percentages. Lendl's perfomance at the same age as compared to Murray's thus far, is a level above, even prior to what would prove to be Lendl's prime (as history proves).

The post had to do with comparing a 22 year old Murray to Lendl at 20 and lays out what player had accomplished year to year at like ages but even earlier for Lendl in terms of experience, i.e. number of Majors played by those ages.

5
 
M

Moose Malloy

G.O.A.T.
1980 us open:

quarterfinal mcenroe d. lendl 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-5
semifinal - mcenroe d. connors 6-4, 5-7, 0-6, 6-3, 7-6
final - mcenroe d. borg 7–6, 6–1, 6–7, 5–7, 6–4
Click to expand...

Taking who he beat out of the equation, I think Mac maybe spent more time on court than anyone else in major history in the last 4 days of that event:

thursday night: beats Lendl in 4
friday afternoon: loses 5 set doubles final
saturday night(remember this was back when the 2nd mens semi was played after the womens final): beats Connors in 5. match ends after 10 pm I think.
sunday afternoon(4 pm start): beats Borg in 5. oh, & borg hadn't lost a 5 set match in 6 years prior to this day.
 
drwood

drwood

Professional
Borgforever said:
Look it up yourself. It's out there, the relevant info. Laziness is not a virtue.

Give me one reason why I should do your homework?!

And don't count people under 30 as great tennis experts with proven expertise and decades of experience.

Have a nice life...
Click to expand...

I just started with number of GS finals...do some of your own work instead of just spouting off at the mouth.
 
drwood

drwood

Professional
pc1 said:
To answer each point. I believe point one may be correct but Lendl did win at least 6 tournaments in 1980 that I counted. Murray may be better than Lendl in 1980 but it's not a slam dunk. It's easily argued the other way that Lendl was better in 1980 than Murray now. It's a very debatable issue.

Point two is really not viable since the US Open wasn't switched to Hard Court until 1978 and Connors won in 78, 82 and 83. He had no other hard court major tournaments to play. If the Australian was a top flight major on Hardcourt in the early 1970's then I believe Connors would have won his share. That is assuming he entered.

Point three is really debatable. That's an opinion, not a fact. I don't care if you think Federer is better than Borg, that's not the point but you really can't say Federer is MUCH better than Borg. In Borg you are talking about someone with perhaps the highest winning percentage in the history of tennis and has won 11 majors in 27 attempts. Borg won 100 tournaments by his mid twenties. Federer has won 60 at almost age 28. How is Federer MUCH better than Borg?

You're a chessplayer. Do you think Gary Kasparov would defeat Bobby Fischer 19 out of 20 games in chess? This is assuming Fischer is in his prime and is up to date with current theory. There is no way that would happen.

For that matter would Anand defeat the 1970's World Champion Karpov by a big margin. I don't think so. Yet Anand is the current champion and Karpov, like Borg was the 1970's World Champion. Given up to date theory I would favor a young Karpov over Anand.

Victor Korchnoi is very competitive, even at a very old age. Heck Kasparov wouldn't wouldn't defeat the present Korchnoi 19 out of 20 games.

Botvinnik once said that Jose Capablanca, given a few months to update himself on theory would be the best player in the world and as you know, Capablanca played in the 1900's to around 1940 but his peak was about the late 1910's or early 1920's. I think Botvinnik said that in the 1970's, with Karpov as the World Champion. I'm not sure if that's true because as you know, I respect Karpov but Botvinnik is clearly a voice to be respected in chess.

In tennis Borg played with a wood racket and he was able to dominate tennis in the late 1970's to early 1980's. They play a different game now with the rackets of today. The rackets do a lot of the work. The game has greater shotmaking simply because the racket allow it. Some players may seem greater than some in the past because of the illusion the rackets give.

John McEnroe serves harder today than when he was in his prime. Is he really a better server today? I don't think so.

Roscoe Tanner, in the early 1990's served a ball at I believe 135 mph on the Senior Tour. It actually was higher than the record on the regular tour by 1 mph. What's the reason? He had a better racket.

To say Federer is much better than Borg is your opinion but facts show that there is no way the record of Federer is MUCH better than Borg.
Click to expand...

Federer is better than Borg overall, b/c he has won on all surfaces while being much more consistent at the Slams....whats the most number of GS semis Borg made in a row (even if you exclude the Aus Opens he failed to play in)? And Federer is much better on HC than Borg...that was the original point I was making. Borg lost to Tanner at the 79 US Open...that would be like prime Federer losing to someone worse than Roddick (b/c Tanner isn't in Roddick's league when you look at their career accomplishments).

When I say much better, I don't mean that Federer would beat Borg 19 out of 20, but I do think he'd be anywhere from 12-8 ahead to 14-6 ahead on hardcourts...he moves as well as Borg, has more power, and has a better serve (anyone who saw the 1980 US Open final last night can't argue that last point...Borg's serve cost him that match).

My saying Federer is much better than Borg is like saying that Kasparov is much better than Anand....H2H prime Kasparov would comfortably beat prime Anand, but it wouldn't be a massacre.

Bottom line, McEnroe's 80 US Open defense was phenomenal, beating Lendl, Connors and Borg in succession. That being said, no one should try to devalue the current era.
 
jimbo333

jimbo333

Hall of Fame
pmerk34 said:
carpet? Clay? What do you think?
Click to expand...

I have no idea what you are on about, you seem to think that the USOpen was played on HC in the 70's and it wasn't apart from 79 I think. So what you said was meaningless.

Incidently I think Federer was slightly better than Borg on hardcourts, but I still think Federer wasn't much better than Borg on any surface!
 
P

pmerk34

Legend
jimbo333 said:
I have no idea what you are on about, you seem to think that the USOpen was played on HC in the 70's and it wasn't apart from 79 I think. So what you said was meaningless.

Incidently I think Federer was slightly better than Borg on hardcourts, but I still think Federer wasn't much better than Borg on any surface!
Click to expand...

The US Open started being played on Hard in 1978. Borg never won it from 1978-1981. Federer has won it 5 straight times. Meaningless I know when saying Federer is clearly a better hard court player than Borg.

Borg won 6 French Opens. 6 of 8. Federer has one 1. Meaningless according to your logic. Borg must only be sliiiightly better on clay then Fed?
 
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jimbo333

jimbo333

Hall of Fame
pmerk34 said:
The US Open started being played on Hard in 1978. Borg never won it from 1978-1981. Federer has won it 5 straight times. Meaningless I know when saying Federer is clearly a better hard court player than Borg.

Borg won 6 French Opens. 6 of 8. Federer has one 1. Meaningless according to your logic. Borg must only be sliiiightly better on clay then Fed?
Click to expand...

Yep meaningless!

Borg reached the final of USOpen in 78, 80 and 81, and was outplayed by the superb Connors and McEnroe. At that time they didn't play that much tennis on HC. I would say Federer was slightly better than Borg on HC.

Federer was beaten 3 times in final by the superb Nadal. I would say Borg was slightly better than Federer on Clay.

Federer is not much better than Borg on any surface in my opinion:)
 
pc1

pc1

G.O.A.T.
drwood said:
t was the original point I was making. Borg lost to Tanner at the 79 US Open...that would be like prime Federer losing to someone worse than Roddick (b/c Tanner isn't in Roddick's league when you look at their career accomplishments).


Bottom line, McEnroe's 80 US Open defense was phenomenal, beating Lendl, Connors and Borg in succession. That being said, no one should try to devalue the current era.
Click to expand...

Two points here. I won't argue with you about Federer and Borg anymore because I don't think we can convince each other but one point is that I believe Tanner, when he was on his game was superior to Roddick. Serves were about equal but Tanner was able to upset top players at majors like Nastase, Smith, Connors, and Borg among others.

Tanner had a far superior volley to Roddick and while he wasn't a real speed demon, he was faster than Roddick.

Here's an interesting video on the ground force of Tanner's serve.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42STJgl2K4E
 
CyBorg

CyBorg

Legend
A player at a particular moment is never as good as his entire career would attest. A player is never the same at one stage as he is in another.

Roger Federer of 2009 is not the same player as Roger Federer in 2008.

This is a major pet peeve for me. An argument begins over how good a player is at a particular moment and inevitably someone begins citing career accomplishments, which are - logically - irrelevant to the discussion. All that matters is how good a player is in that particular time span - not how many Wimbledons he won or what he did many years ago.

If somebody is interested in my opinion, then I would say that Borg of 1980 was a better player than the Federer of 2009, on any surface. Borg was right around his peak condition. Federer is on the downswing of his career.

As for Tanner-Roddick - the difference between these two isn't that Roddick was, at one point, necessarily a better player than Tanner. Rather Roddick seems to have put together a more consistent career. How good was Tanner in 1979? Probably close to Roddick's level - definitely as good as Roddick is now, probably not as good as Roddick was in 03/04.
 
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U

urban

Legend
What surprised me the most about Mac's win, was, that he survived that long struggle with Connors the night before, to win a marathon match over Borg, who was was seen as unbeatable in five set matches then. What a physical performance! At Wimbledon 1980, Mac seemed to tire in the fifth, a thing Don Budge noticed then. I always thought, that the player, who had to play the second semi at Flushing in the semis on Saturday, had a big disadvantage in the final on Sunday. Mostly the player, who wins the first semi, wins the final,too.
 
S

Skywalker91

Rookie
drwood said:
And I know many, many, many, many, many, many, many experts who would agree with the statements I just made. Show your proof, and I'll show mine.

We can start with 2009 Murray vs. 1980 Lendl -- who has reached more GS finals?

I many disagree with you, but that doesn't mean you're ignorant. Show some decency and respect.
Click to expand...

It's impossible to compare players based on statistics. Especially based on who reached more grand slam finals? Okay so Federer's the best there's ever been, just because he has the most gs titles? It's a really touchy subject to compare a wood racquet player with our modern day players. I've never hit with a wooden racquet and I've only seen a few matches with wood racquets so I can't really argue if Murray is better or if Lendl is better.
 
Ironwood

Ironwood

Professional
Speaking of Johnny Mac, in he past 18 months, I have had the opportunity to see McEnroe play exhibition matces against Mats Wilander and Jim Courier, both straight set victories. I also saw him 3 or 4 times in his prime in both singles and doubles. At 50 I think he would beat the McEnroe of the '80's. He is still superb in all facets of the game......except maybe 5 hrs on clay at Roland Garos.
 
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