bjsnider
Hall of Fame
From Courts of Babylon, in the Lendl chapter:
"Ultimately, Lendl would win eight Grand Slam titles, one more than his lifelong tormentor, John McEnroe, and the same number as his other major rival, Jimmy Connors. He would contest nineteen Grand Slam finals, appearing in the championship match in at least one of the Big Four tournaments for a solid decade beginning in 1981. Lendl led Czechoslovakia to a Davis Cup victory in 1980, but the lack of a supporting cast and his expatriation to the United States in 1984 prevented him from becoming a great performer in that competition.
Lendl was ranked in the top ten for 13 consecutive years, a streak surpassed only by Connors (16 successive years). He won 94 sanctioned titles in his career, 17 more than McEnroe but 15 fewer than Connors. Between 1985 and 1988, Lendl held the world’s number one ranking for 157 consecutive weeks, second only to Connors’s 160-week run. But Lendl has spent the most total weeks in the number one position (270 weeks—2 weeks longer than Connors). Thus, he has a legitimate claim to being the top player of the Open era."
In sum, this is the criteria Bodo uses to judge Lendl and the other players in the Open Era:
Total GS titles
Total GS finals
Davis Cup wins
Time spent ranked in the top 10
Total number of titles won
Time spent as the world number one
Consecutive time spent as the world number one
He missed a couple of things that I think should be added to the criteria, in retrospect:
Total number of years finishing as the year-end world number one
Success in the Olympics
Try evaluating Murray on this basis, because it looks to me like he's one of the dozen or so greatest players of the Open Era.
"Ultimately, Lendl would win eight Grand Slam titles, one more than his lifelong tormentor, John McEnroe, and the same number as his other major rival, Jimmy Connors. He would contest nineteen Grand Slam finals, appearing in the championship match in at least one of the Big Four tournaments for a solid decade beginning in 1981. Lendl led Czechoslovakia to a Davis Cup victory in 1980, but the lack of a supporting cast and his expatriation to the United States in 1984 prevented him from becoming a great performer in that competition.
Lendl was ranked in the top ten for 13 consecutive years, a streak surpassed only by Connors (16 successive years). He won 94 sanctioned titles in his career, 17 more than McEnroe but 15 fewer than Connors. Between 1985 and 1988, Lendl held the world’s number one ranking for 157 consecutive weeks, second only to Connors’s 160-week run. But Lendl has spent the most total weeks in the number one position (270 weeks—2 weeks longer than Connors). Thus, he has a legitimate claim to being the top player of the Open era."
In sum, this is the criteria Bodo uses to judge Lendl and the other players in the Open Era:
Total GS titles
Total GS finals
Davis Cup wins
Time spent ranked in the top 10
Total number of titles won
Time spent as the world number one
Consecutive time spent as the world number one
He missed a couple of things that I think should be added to the criteria, in retrospect:
Total number of years finishing as the year-end world number one
Success in the Olympics
Try evaluating Murray on this basis, because it looks to me like he's one of the dozen or so greatest players of the Open Era.
