How can you even tell the difference between outplaying our opponent and him letting you win due to him being weak?
I use my eyeballs and common sense. It's plain obvious that a 35 year old cripple is not anywhere near as tough as a 26 year old player who dominates the tour and is in his prime.
I mean USO 2013 for example. Did Rafa win because he was so good? Or did he win because Nole was bellow average? Or is it combination or both, or none?
Or maybe it's 16% Nole declining and 84% Rafa outplaying him. Or maybe Nole declined only on some points.
How can you tell, when you only compare players against each other. I mean we don't have a time machine to put 2007 version of Gonzo and make him now 27 years old with modern training and evolution and his adaptation from youth to slower conditions and put him against Rafa 2012 at AO and see who wins.
Tell me, what science do you use? How do you know if you make Roddick 27 years old today and give him evolution and adaptation to today's conditions, that he wouldn't defeat Rafa and Nole.
You can't just assume if Rafa was 25 in 2006, that he would just own Hewitt, Safin and Fed. He would be a total different player without 5 years of evolution and seeing previous generations play.
How can't you see any problems when comparing eras? You can't just transport scientists today in the past and say they are better. Yes, they have accumulated knowledge, doesn't mean they are smarter.
That was just dumb. Gonzo would not beat Rafa at AO12 just like Kafelnikov would not beat Fed at WIM05. If you want to disagree that's your busniess, but obviously there's no way to prove it.
Where's your proof that 25 year old Nadal wouldn't dominate Hewitt, Safin and Fed in 2006? And why throw Safin in there? In 2006 he wasn't a threat in any major. In fact even Hewitt flew off the mark in 2006 dropping from #4 to #20.
Nadal's game owns Fed's, that is a FACT. If Nadal is making it to HC and WIM final in 2006 then that is BIG trouble for Federer. AO06 Fed wasn't playing great, I'd take Nadal at 25 years of age over that version of Fed any day. RG we know Nadal would win. WIM is not as clear cut, but most likely Fed would still win that and the USO is 50-50.
From 2004-2007 Fed didn't have to deal with another dominant tour player like Rafa and Novak have had to.
2008: Nadal -> Federer with Novak rising up there as well and Murray emerging.
2009: Federer -> Nadal, someone else beat him at RG doing Fed's dirty work. Then Nadal not playing Wimbledon made it easier for him.
2010: Nadal -> easy year the rest of the top 4 weren't at their best
2011: Nadal -> Novak
2012: Nadal -> Novak -> Federer -> Murray all playing their best in certain stages of the season made it a tough year
2013: Nadal -> Novak
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2004: Federer -> Who? Hewitt? LMAO. Roddick played very well in WIM final though he wasn't consistently facing Fed in majors that year.
2005: Federer -> Again Who? Teenage Nadal? LOL
2006: Federer -> Again teenage Nadal who turned 20. Not in his prime yet.
2007: Federer -> This is when it started getting tough, Nadal's grass game was a lot better and Novak began to emerge.
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