Whats your top 10 of all time right now?
- Thread starter 90's Clay
- Start date
It is a mathematical fact that 0 2 5 7 is more evenly distributed than 1 2 2 9.
SamprasisGOAT
Hall of Fame
open era
1Sampras
2.Federer
3.Nadal
4.Borg
5.Lendl
6.Djokovic
7.Agassi
8.Connors
9.McEnroe
10.Becker
1Sampras
2.Federer
3.Nadal
4.Borg
5.Lendl
6.Djokovic
7.Agassi
8.Connors
9.McEnroe
10.Becker
monfed
Banned
Agassi is one of the most versatile and complete players of all time. AA did the career slam on vastly different surfaces in the 90s. He was balanced off both wings, probably the greatest returner of all time. His game would be successful in any era.
Last edited:
monfed
Banned
Say what you will but noone can convince me with Nadal's current playing style camping 10 feet behind the baseline that he would have a sniff of a Wimbledon/USO in the 90s or in the 80s with wooden racquets. Nadal was ousted on two consecutive occassions whilst in the middle of his prime from Wimbledon in the first week when the surface is low bouncing. That's a damning statistic of his 1D game. Nadal is a goner without excessive topspin. He even needs sunny conditions in clay to beat a challenge like Nole on clay. Enough said about his versatility. His FH is a highly overrated shot and on true low bouncing conditions, it's found wanting. His indoor record is pathetic for a guy who's won 14 slams, all the top greats have a good indoor record. Without excessive kick from the surface, he looks rather flat, Rome showed that and his imbalanced clay skewed resume is more proof of that. Fed has had no such issues, the only issue Fed ever had was BH abuse, noone of the former greats have had to withstand such a bizarre matchup challenge, it's just not the norm. Fed's just unlucky he had to face such a weird freakish matchup and a TOTAL roadblock at one slam. Other greats haven't won some specific slams due to their own incompetence of their game as opposed to some weird phenomenon preventing them. Sorry, this oddity has to be factored in.
Nadal's cross-era versatality which is a critical component of a GOAT is a massive hindrance. GOAT = Greatest of ALL TIME, not of 10 years. Nadal's playing style just isn't transferable to other eras, sorry but that's the truth.
Last edited:
forehand fan
Rookie
as i already said career slam.. or the measure of surface versatility is the only thing where agassi is ahead of lendl. lendl was much more dominant and consistent. that guy made 8 uso and 8 wtf finals consecutively and had 270 weeks at world no 1. np way is agassi ahead of lendl
Flash O'Groove
Hall of Fame
Can you explain how you rank Tilden and Budge? I often don't rank them, not because I'm certain they don't belong in the top 10 of all time, but because I don't know how to compare their achievements with the other top players: how to put them in a precise place.
NatF
Bionic Poster
His ranking for Tilden is as follows;
"He's an older player so I will get props from the posters in the Former Pro section. He also dominated his era therefore I can place him above Federer without raising too many eyebrows."
I guarantee his arguments for placing Tilden there will be superficial at best. He'll talk about Federer dominating a weak era while ignoring completely that the 20's were certainly 3 steps below the modern game in terms of competition.
Nadal being as low as 8th is ridiculous at this point too. There is no way he is any lower than say 5th. I think he is more likely top 3 at this point though.
He needs to do more on a surface other than clay.
It is obvious that NEITHER is evenly distributed.
Hey, Bobby, wherever you are, I guess you don't regard Gardner Mulloy as a tennis expert.
Brilliant logic, old boy.
Mathematically, the "most evenly" way of winning 14 GS would be:
3.5 3.5 3.5 3.5
Mathematically, 2 0 7 5 is closer to that distribution than 1 9 2 2.
hoodjem, I also have the same top eight. I think they should be common sense.
90's Clay, You are one of only very few who rank Rosewall among the top three. This honours you as Muscles really deserves such a rating.
I would rank Borg a bit higher.
NatF, Sorry, but some of your cynical statements have actual reason. Tilden was a giant. Remember that at 53 he almost beat the best player in the world.
Dan, I'm back again (don't know why I was banned, by the way).
Mulloy's first name is Gardnar. I'm sure he never called Hoad the GOAT.
Rosewall, Rosewall so low? Thought you are a Rosewall fan. I'm a Rosewall fan...
Bud Collins once wrote: "Rosewall is a Rosewall is a Rosewall...forever"...
I have Tilden top-4 as well. I think including level of competition is fine, but not including it is also fine.
Every single sport has matured over the years. Golfers now are - on the whole - so much bigger than they were in Bobby Jones' time (Jones was 5'8"), but Jones is commonly in Top 10 all-time rankings. Baseball pitchers now are taller, stronger, and throw harder than the ones Babe Ruth faced, but it doesn't matter ... Ruth is on everyone's top 10 all-time list. Same goes with Bill Russell in basketball, Jim Brown in football, Gordie Howe in hockey.
All you can do is dominate your era, and Tilden did that as thoroughly as any player ever. Nobody in history has his combination of prolonged dominance and prolonged relevance. He also had celebrity status, and filled Madison Square Garden for matches, and helped popularize the pro tour.
The guy played competitively for 30 years, dominated for most of a decade, was still relevant into his mid-40s, and helped a growing sport gain worldwide attention. Not sure what else you want the poor guy to do.
Last edited:
I am very humble about my achievements. We all know deep down I am #1.
The_Mental_Giant
Hall of Fame
But rafa is the only player to play 2+ grand slam finals in 8 calendar years.. The closest in that department are fed/lendl with 6 and borg/sampras/connors with 5.
Rafa is the second player with more slam finals , with 20.
Sampras has 18 slam finals.
Just compare rafa.. 3,9,5,3
Sampras 3,0,7,8
Rafa is the second player to have 3+ finals on every slam. Fed has at least 5 in every slam with 5,5,8,6.
14-6> 14-4
Rafa has 64-28 with only 7 atp 250 titles. Sampras is 64-24 with 20 atp 250 titles included there.
To make an observation, both fed and nadal have the same amount of non-250 titles with 57.
The_Mental_Giant
Hall of Fame
Totally lack of amsingle slam is worse in my opinion, and we arent even tslking sbout slam finals.
3,9,5,3 destroys the final slam resume of sampras being 3,0,7,8.
Also when slam tally is tied the one with most finals goes up, slams are the golden medals and finals are the silver ones.
Rafa should be high concerning slams because 14-6 > 14-4
Also career slam/golden slam, 3+ finals on every slam, Its not even close when it comes to titles rafa is superior to sampras.... He also has singles gold medal and 16 m1000 more.. The 5 wtf are far from compensating those 17 extra titles... Plus you know wtf nowadays is far from being a slam.. Its just a little over an m1000, nobody cries when theybwin m1000 because its nowhere prestigious like a slam.. More like a higher paid exho with round robin format, scheduled in the end of the season... Maybe in lendl era it was more importsnt... But the likes of davydenko or nalbandian are well known fornbeing good players not for their master cup. On the other hand when you win a slam you turn into the 1 time slam winner, like wawrinka or delpo.
Also 20 of his 64 title are of atp 250 category. Rafa has only 7 atp 250. So regarding titles/finals and achievements its not even close, rafa edges sampras from every angle.
The only thing that remains as an advantage for sampras is ye#1 and weeks. But even if younconvert those points needed to keep the #1 you will be surprised how sampras didnt earn more points than rafa, and in some cases even less. Some years rafa held the #1 winning one slam and doing bad in the rest.. That doenst happen this days...
nadal being lower than 3 is a joke.
Last edited:
Kenshin
Semi-Pro
The_Mental_Giant
Hall of Fame
Also people are diminishing the fact of winning 9 times a GS is. Not even Fed or Laver could manage doing this. Being 66-1 in a slam ( the only slam of that surface) alone stands alone for the most impressive feat in tennis... And it gets double more impressive when you do that in a 10 years span. Yes fed won wimbledon , but only 7 times in the same span. How can you only lose 1 time in a whole decade playing the most physically and mentally taxing slam ever is just out of my understanding...
He rated Hoad as number one for 1961.
He did not mention Rosewall for consideration of this honour.
Do something before the age of 28.
How many Aussie opens did Emmo win?
Flash O'Groove
Hall of Fame
Hum no. Masters 1000 weren't mandatory tournaments in the 90's, and some other tournaments awarded more money and ranking point. That's why Sampras, Agassi and many more top players of the 90's missed so many Masters 1000. Nadal win a race that Sampras didn't run.
As for World Tour Finals, they are not equal to a slam but far superior to a Master 1000.
Davydenko went through Federer, Del Potro, Nadal, Djokovic when he won it 2009.
In which Master 1000 did Nadal went through such a field? In Madrid 2014 he played Batista Agut in the SF and Nishikori in the final...
I agree with you that Nadal's record is more evenly spread than Sampras (Nadal is now a favorite for every slams he enter!), but Sampras still have the weeks and the Master cups.
Bukmeikara
Legend
Davydenko wiki page - His biggest achievement to date was winning the 2009 ATP World Tour Finals, and he has also won three ATP Masters Series.
Nalbandian wiki page - He was runner-up at the 2002 Wimbledon Championships and the winner of the Tennis Masters Cup in 2005.
The Master Cup is the most important tournament after the slams. The solo fact that in the past 10 years - Federer 5 titles, Djokovic 3.
The_Mental_Giant
Hall of Fame
But their weeks and ye#1 are result of points earner.. And if rafa earned more points in shorter span of time and even in that situation he managed to do 3ye#1 and circa 140 wk at the moemtns , speaks for itself. Youonly can compare titles,because like in this case you can earn more points and tournaments and still fall short to add weeks as number 1#.
Also we should weight properly tournaments. Ao wasnt that important during borg era, the same way that YEC was on its prime during lendl and sampras era, but lost relevance since last 10-12 years, on the other hand ;1000 and olympic gold gained more importance.
Anyways we should stick to ranking points, because all the rest is subjetive, except with the facr that slam # is the dealbresker, but in this case we are comparing both men who are tied.
The_Mental_Giant
Hall of Fame
You could also say for this era... The m1000 are the most importsnt.. The solo fact that nadal 27, federer 21, djokovic 19 and murray with 9. The closest active players to the big 4 are davydenko with 3 (semiretired) and ferrer with 1, which is plain ridiculous... So m1000 are one of the most important tournaments by far. And like tennis as turned far more physical in the last 10-12 years, you have many people not thinking highly on masters cup, because you can gather the top 8 players of the world but when they are already burned-out.
Well you keep trumpeting Hoad as #1 all time (ROTFL) and Nadal has more slams even off clay than Hoad has in his entire career.
Well you keep trumpeting Hoad as #1 all time (ROTFL) and Nadal has more slams even off clay than Hoad has in his entire career.
Interesting objection.
But Hoad has more great match victories than Raf ever dreamed of.
And more great showings on clay than Raf.
Last edited:
Phoenix1983
G.O.A.T.
The bit in bold is one of the most ridiculous assertions ever made on this forum.
NatF
Bionic Poster
Hell no does Hoad have more great showings on clay than Nadal.
Ah, I was hoping someone would bite.
Yes, Hoad had a great clay record, exceeding Raf in quality of opposition.
His record against Roswall on clay between 1952 and 1960 was 15 to 7 by my count (Bobby insists on adding the indeterminate surfaces of the 1959 Grand Prix d' Europe stops to make it 16 to 11).
These include some of the greatest red clay matches ever, including the 1957 The Hague final, won by Hoad at 8-6 in the fifth set, if memory serves.
And the Japanes Pro final in 1960, a legendary match won by Hoad at 6-2, 0-6, 3-6, 6-1, 11-9.
A Kramer Cup win in 1962 against Gimeno on the red clay of Turin 2-6, 6-1, 6-4, 6-4.
Also, wins over Trabert, another clay giant, at Roland Garros in 1958 and 1960.
And a series of wins on clay against Davidson in 1956 (Davidson defeated Rosewall at RG in 1954, and was runner-up at RG in 1955 and 1956 (the latter to Hoad), and RG champion in 1957, before injury stopped his career.
And last, but not least, wins at RG over Pasarell at 6-4, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 and the Italian Open against Orantes at 6-2 in the fifth set, both in 1970, when Hoad was a 35-year old retired legend.
Last edited:
YaoPau, I agree. But Tilden played competively for 40 years: 1912 till 1952.
Thanks, Muscles ;-)
Welcome back!! Great to have you back on TT.
Kenshin, Thanks. Have not seen you posting recently. Therefore: Welcome back also to you! ;-)
The Mental Giant, I agree. Maybe only Rosewall and/or Borg could also have won nine French Open if Björn would have retired later and Muscles would have been allowed to enter it every year of his career.
He must be an expert like Hopman who ranked Emerson ahead of Rosewall generally.....
Phoenix, I'm glad I finally can agree with you.
Dan, I insist regarding the 1958 Perrier Cup (Rosewall beat Hoad 4.1 on clay) plus the 1959 GP Vienna meeting (Rosewall beat Hoad on clay)
Similar threads
