weren't you the one who made a sweeping statement that "anyone with Fed in their names seems to only make schoolboy arguments"? how is that for generalization?
Sampras' rivals. Who beat him?
- Thread starter GS
- Start date
weren't you the one who made a sweeping statement that "anyone with Fed in their names seems to only make schoolboy arguments"? how is that for generalization?
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Laurie
Guest
Indeed, last week it was a valid point because I think you guys can get carried away and overdo it trying to make a point we've actually read over and over again for the past 3 years, especially phrases like ****s, fanboys, worshippers etc they are most irritating phrases to read over and over again on a daily basis.
It would be good to get beyond that now, don't you think? I'm sure you can put your point across in future without using those phrases.
abmk
Bionic Poster
well , sampras did break multiple times on occasions when he was playing really well ...
abmk
Bionic Poster
Come on now, those macthes are much more recent, its easier to remember things that took place not too long ago, plus more of those matches have been available on digital television as opposed to the 1990s where there was much less tennis on TV. Now this looks like a numbers game again (which you guys seem to loveDid you write this down before posting? Wasn't the Davydenko match in 1996 a nervy affair?
Indeed, Sampras' performance against Stich was excellent but that is 20 years ago so slipped my mind...
More matches I can recall?:
1996 US Open final
2000 US Open semi
2001 US Open 4th rd
2001 US Open semi
1990 US Open final
1991 Philadelphia semi
1997 Wimbledon quarterfinal
1997 Wimbledon final
1997 Grand slam cup final
1999 Cincinnati semi
1999 ATP round robin (v Kuerten)
1999 ATP semi
1993 US Open semi
1993 Wimbledon semi
1995 Davis cup (v Italy)
1995 Indian Wells final
1999 Wimbledon final
1997 Philadelphia final
I wasn't originally including matches with lots of tiebreaks in it but you seem to have done that. That's ok but it makes the list longer of course.
Then of course there are matches where it was tight all the way through but he played brilliant and should be mentioned like:
1994 Miami final
1994 ATP semi
1994 ATP final
1999 Los Angeles final
1996 ATP final
2000 US Open quarterfinal
2000 Miami final (thrashing Kuerten for almost two sets then it got tight)
1995 Davis cup final
1995 US Open final
2002 US Open final (thrashing Agassi for 2 and a half sets then it got tight)
2002 US Open semi
2000 Miami semi
Again, I'm sure there are many more but not sure if they have been documented because there was less tennis on television. For instance, I heard he played great matches in 2000 Miami against Rusedski and Moya but have never seen them so can't mention them.
only 4-5 matches that I stated had a TB ... and only one match where federer lost a set ....
wasn't the 2000 USO semi vs hewit a competitive one with all 3 sets being close ?
the davydenko match in 2006 @ the AO was a close one, not the one @ the USO ..
quite a few matches that I could add to the list fulfilling the same criteria (dominant performances ):
murray TMC 2010 RR
roddick bangkok 2004 F
henman USO 2004 SF
ferrero AO 2004 SF
moya RG 2005 4R
ljubicic IW 2006 Qf
blake IW 2006 F
gonzalez madrid 2006 F
soderling RG 2009 F
nalbandian TMC 2003 RR
ferrero TMC 2003 RR
berdych RG 2006 3R
ancic RG 2006 4R
ferrer MC 2006 3r
gonzalez MC 2006 4R
soderling shanghai 2010 Sf
tsonga USO 2011 QF
del potro IW 2012
gasquet madrid 2012
tipsarevic madrid 2012 SF
soderling USO 2010 QF
wawrinka AO 2011 QF
then tournaments like halle 2004, doha 2005, halle 2008 etc where he didn't lose a set, drop serve, didn't even go to TB etc ...
just way too many dominant performances ...
I don't think the numbers being lesser for sampras has that much to do with TV as much as federer putting in quite a few more dominant performances ...
abmk
Bionic Poster
well, yes and no ... at their best, they are similar in some ways ...they do try to blast their opponent away with serve/FH and or serve/volley combos and try to dictate with their FHs ...
but the difference comes in returning , defense, passing and mixing up the play ..... federer simply gets quite a few more returns back ....while he can play quick strike tennis like sampras ( though doesn't do it as much and not nearly as well given his serve isn't as good & surfaces have been slowed down), he constructs points better when required and can defend on and on for quite some time ......
not the case with sampras, he could do some incredible gets and turn defense into offense with one shot, but not for a sustained amount of time in a rally , which would be required against elite defenders ...
as far as sampras' speed/movement is concerned, it was very good, his speed was among the very best, but movement by itself was a notch below the very best ... in this generation alone, there are plenty who match/surpass him in that regard : federer, nadal, djoker, murray, hewitt, davydenko, ferrer,simon
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helloworld
Hall of Fame
While Federer may be the better defender, Sampras' serve is a much bigger weapon, and thus negates all advantages that Federer may have. A lot of guys in the 90s could defend better than Sampras, but all their strengths were taken away because of Sampras' serve. Just look at the difference between their serves at Wimbledon or even the exhibitions a couple years back. The difference is huge.
Feather
Legend
Sampras was already losing to a bunch of nobodies by the time he faced Federer in Wimbledon 2001, but ****s like to bring this up because their man barely won the match against the old guard, who would have thrashed Fed cleanly had he not been old.
If you mean peak to peak, Sampras is NOT gonna thrash Federer. Stop living in fantassy world
L
Laurie
Guest
Come on, you’re playing a numbers game here. We are grown ups, not teenagers trying to out do each other
You must have prepared a list this time In more seriousness, believe it, there is a lot more tennis on television today than in the 1990s. It is entirely logical, digital television allowed providers and broadcasters to provide a lot more channels in a bouquet using the same bandwith as one analogue channel, that is a fact as we know. Consequently, more sports channels popped up and we had the possibility to see a lot more tournaments, the sort of tournaments we wouldn’t have seen before and especially earlier round matches. There was no "Tennis Channel" in the 1990s, no Supertennis channel (Italian channel, shows lots of live tournaments like Dubai, Doha, Basel etc and archive footage in HD).
Sampras won tournaments in Japan and Hong Kong on multiple occasions, I have never seen a single match on television or archived. Those are the sorts of tournaments that will be shown today. Consequently, he could have played some dominant matches there which are simply not documented.
And I won’t list matches I actually haven’t seen. By all accounts he thrashed Agassi in the 1996 ATP championships 6-3 6-1 or something where he played great but I won’t list it because I haven’t seen it. And then I heard in the 1993 ATP semi, he thrashed Medvedev with incredible tennis, again I wont list it, I’ve always wanted to see it, I believe he did one point where he served, return came low and he hit a through the legs winner volley, the sort of play which would guarantee lots of youtube hits if anyone has a video of it.
Then there is the match I got by chance a few years ago from an Italian archivist where Sampras thrashed Henman 6-0 6-3 in less than an hour in Vienna in the quarterfinal in 1998. Luckily that match was on Italian television, I put it on youtube two years ago. There are plenty more matches like that I’m sure, don’t forget he played just under 1000 matches.
On the 2000 semifinal, its true the scoreline was close, he should have won much more emphatically, he had loads of breakpoint opportunities throughout the match he didn’t take but was always in control of the match, even when he got broke in the 3rd set, he broke back two games later.
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Laurie
Guest
Regarding movement, players like Simon and Davydenko have great movement obviously but it is not enough to win loads of tournaments, its one of the facets needed. And of course slower surfaces does help those with better movement to retrieve more and more often.
And looking at other things, Murray doesn’t have the game to dominate yet either. He has great defence, but his forehand is not versatile enough. For instance, Murray’s mentor, Lendl had a forehand which was passed through to Sampras, Courier, Agassi, then through to Federer and Nadal, which was to camp on the backhand side looking to hit inside out and inside in forehands (down the line). Murray simply has not developed this facility.
Oh yes, the other thing I wanted to mention is the Sampras return and passing shots showed his great movement. Movement is not just about running down 20 shots, and remember there are many different factors that determine good movement.
Here’s three good examples of Sampras’ movement – enjoy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rF_cL1NbIKs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnUZtuOGKUA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFiOslvMvXY
pc1
G.O.A.T.
Neither one were exactly at their peaks. I felt for evaluation purposes the match was worthless. Both were inconsistent in those days.
I checked Sampras' record the next year in 2002 and before he won the US Open he was 20-17. Obviously he finished up with a record for the year of 27-17. Still not great by Pete Sampras standards.
abmk
Bionic Poster
Come on, you’re playing a numbers game here. We are grown ups, not teenagers trying to out do each other
yeah, I only recalled some of them on top of my head for this 2nd list ... others I did go through the list of matches played ...
except only 4-5 matches amongst those I listed were from smaller tournaments like doha,basel, dubai etc..... rest 45-50 of them were all from grand slams , TMCs and master series tournaments ......
regarding the medvedev match @ TMC 93, you mean this ?
not between the legs, but from behind them ....... good one, but I've seen plenty of shots better , including from sampras himself ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvMdBJccWLo
yeah, but still not a dominant performance, is it ?
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abmk
Bionic Poster
that 2001 wimbledon match b/w fed and sampras was a pretty good one ..... more than decent quality one ....granted sampras was off his peak in 2001, but he did play well here, and federer played well above his age as well ...
of course it wasn't the passing of the torch or some nonsense like that, but still a pretty good match ( though they both made some silly mistakes they probably wouldn't at their peaks )
of course it wasn't the passing of the torch or some nonsense like that, but still a pretty good match ( though they both made some silly mistakes they probably wouldn't at their peaks )
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L
Laurie
Guest
Thanks for that ABMK, interesting shot!
I am sure he did a tweener serve and volley point indoors once, maybe not that match then.
I am sure he did a tweener serve and volley point indoors once, maybe not that match then.
zagor
Bionic Poster
Yes, but you only mentioned Sampras not being at his peak.
More or less agree, it was an entertaining match but as Abmk said not passing of the torch or anything and one match is too small of a sample size anyway.
That said, their 2007 (I think, not sure the exact year) exos are even more worthless (by a good margin) yet people love using them as proof of Pete's supposed superiority.
Right, and finishing the year outside of the top 10 (in 2001) or failing to get past the 4th round in slams (in 2002) is not great for the standards of a player who holds a record (let's say an Open Era record) for the # of weeks spent at #1 and who holds a record slam SF streak (along with holding the Open Era record for the # of slam titles).
abmk
Bionic Poster
yeah, obviously, their overall games are not as good as sampras' , but I was only talking about movement ......
yeah, movement is not just about running down 20 shots, that's why I said sampras was an excellent mover .....just that he was a notch below the guys I mentioned, they could also run down balls again and again .....
regarding passing and returning , sampras was good @ returning and passing .... but federer is simply quite a bit better at those ...
many of those passing shots are just "very good" ones .....the kind that federer used to pull off routinely at his peak, on the rise BH DTL and CC passes, on the rise FH CC and DTL passes ...
now these are the type that are really "amazing"
federer vs djokovic passing shot french open 2011
federer vs agassi dubai 2005 amazing point
vs hewitt @ USO 2004
point starting @ 3:14
now this is one amazing passing shot from sampras
vs agassi @ AO 2000
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not disputing that. just stating that federer is likely to break the opponent more often (and deliver a bagel
) take the list of matches that you and laurie have listed, and just compare the scores. I'm confident that Federer would be the one that has more emphatic wins (differential in games, sets, points etc).
L
Laurie
Guest
not disputing that. just stating that federer is likely to break the opponent more often (and deliver a bagel
take the list of matches that you and laurie have listed, and just compare the scores. I'm confident that Federer would be the one that has more emphatic wins (differential in games, sets, points etc).
There you guys go again turning everything into a contest
Let's just enjoy the tennis now. Happy Holidays
There you guys go again turning everything into a contest
Let's just enjoy the tennis now. Happy Holidays
guilty as charged
happy holidays!
pc1
G.O.A.T.
guilty as charged
happy holidays!
Same to you fed ruiz. Just keep beating up on me to keep me on my toes.
Happy Holidays.
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