Consistent Equivalents for Masters 1000

[timnz]

Federer recently broke the record on Season end finals - totalling 6. However, on close review that was 4 Masters Cups + 2 WTF's. Now everybody regards these are equivalents. Similarly the reasonable view is that Boris Becker got 3 Season end finals (not including his WCT Finals and Grand Slam Cup wins) - in 1988, 1992 and 1995. Now again, on close review the 1988 win was the Masters and the 1992/1995 wins were the ATP World Championships. But again - people rightly regard them as equivalents.

I'd like to discuss if we are in the same situation with the Championship series and Masters 1000.

There first was a Grand Prix Tour Championship Series from 1970 to 1989. Then from 1990 to 1992 inclusive they were called the "Championship Series, Single Week". From 1993 through 1999, the series was known as the Mercedes-Benz Super 9. In 2000, the name was changed to the Tennis Masters Series and then changed to ATP Masters Series in 2004. The present, World Tour Masters 1000 name took effect in 2009.

Now in most lists people see a continuity from at least 1990 onwards. Up until a few years ago, Agassi was the leader in these titles at 17 - even though his wins traversed a number of the various series title names (his wins were from 1990 to 2004).

The question I would like to ask is, why not seem them as a series from 1970? Like in the following place:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_Masters_Series_records_and_statistics

And if we do view them as a continuity - why is Nadal often quoted as leader at 19 titles, when it should be Lendl at 22 titles? And what do we do with people like Boris Becker whose career overlaps these periods of time (pre-1990 and post-1990) and has 8 pre-1990 Championship series titles and 5 post 1990 Masters series titles) - does becker have 5 Masters 1000 titles (in modern parlance) or does he have 13?

Yes, there have been changes over the years - but largely they have represented the deep field Tournaments only lower than the Slams and Season end championships. The fact that from 1990 (1990 supposedly was the beginning of these 'Masters 1000 events in some people's view) to 1992 they were called the "Championship Series, Single Week" really speaks strongly that we are really talking about the same thing and that like the Season End finals having Federer the title leader at 6, we should have Lendl the title leader of the Masters 1000 series at 22 (and Becker credited with 13 Masters 1000 wins).

 

[Nathaniel_Near]

Hi, we've been thinking about the same topics recently.

It seems clear to me that there has been a curious divide between 1000's equivalents. From 1990 onwards, the 1000's have been branded differently at various stages but are yet still credited in a tally of '1000's wins'. It's clear that the 1000's is a tier of quality that has been present for much of tennis' history or at the very least the Open Era, and yet the other slightly different branding and formats for some bizarre reason are probably incorrectly not properly credited to players, which leads to some misleading statistics and builds up misconceptions.

Like I think I mentioned in another thread, Lendl would indeed stand at 22 'tier 2' tournaments -- for arguments sake, tier 1 would be elite singles titles such as Slams and YEC and maybe other exceptions which would have to be fished out.


I agree that Becker should be credited with 13 Masters 1000 wins. Connors won 18 Grand Prix Championship Series, and should be credited with 18 Masters 1000 victories; Borg, 15; McEnroe, 19; Edberg, 8 (as opposed to 4).

Tier 2 Tournament Wins in Open Era (For now)


Lendl     - 22
Federer   - 20
Nadal     - 20

McEnroe   - 19
Connors   - 18
Agassi    - 17
Borg      - 15
 

Becker    - 13
Djokovic  - 11
Sampras   - 11



Laver     - 9
Edberg    - 8
Murray    - 8 
Muster    - 8
Wilander  - 8
Chang     - 7
Nastase   - 6   
Vilas     - 6      
Kuerten   - 5
Orantes   - 5
Rios      - 5
Roddick   - 5   
Safin     - 5



Courier   - 4  
Ferrero   - 4     
Kuerten   - 4  
Medvedev  - 4
Smith     - 4
Davydenko - 3
Gerulaitis- 3
Mecir     - 3
Moya      - 3
Ashe      - 2  
Newcombe  - 2
Noah      - 2   
Rosewall  - 2

***
Sorry for leaving out accents in names but I can't get them to work inside the PHP code and I am no expert.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_Masters_Series_records_and_statistics - A potentially amazing wikipedia source??

 

[Nathaniel_Near]

In conclusion then, Lendl is the Tier 2 tournament leader of Open Era (probably).

 

[timnz]

Connors - 18

Connors won 19 not 18. So he is in a tie with Nadal.

See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_Masters_Series_records_and_statistics

Also it gets slightly more complicated with Rosewalls and Laver cases - depends if you add the equivalent tournaments for 1968 and 1969 on.... Laver may be up to around 15 or 16 if you do that. Not bad for a guy over 30 years old. You can bet that will never been beaten ie Masters 1000 wins for a player over 30.

 

[timnz]

Lendl Masters 1000 title leader

In conclusion then, Lendl is the Tier 2 tournament leader of Open Era (probably).

Lets call it Masters 1000 tournament leader. We call Federer the WTF leader with 6 (even though he has only won 2 WTF's) because we rightly include his Masters Cups wins aslo.

 

[urban]

As i wrote earlier, and timnz is arguing the same way, there is no reason not to include such top tier tournaments just behind the majors for 1968 (when the Australian certainly was no major)and 1969. I don't know, who in wikipedia made this list. Its reasonable, but to be true, there never was a Grand Prix Championship series. This is a fictional title. In 1970 the ILTF started a Grand Prix series, a concept of Jack Kramer. It was a counter move by the ILTF against the 20 tournament WCT series, which was planned by Lamar Hunt and Mike Davies for 1971. The WCT had expanded in 1970 and put together a string of pro tourneys with the best players available. Now the ILTF made their own series, with around 12 or 15 events mostly in Europe. The winner of this first Grand Prix series was Cliff Richey, who played all those ILTF tournaments and sampled the most points. Behind him were Ashe, Laver and Rosewall, who were actually placed better on the world ranking, but played only a handful of ILTF events. Philadelphia for example was a WCT event, not a Grand Prix event, and didn't count for the Grand Prix. To get the bonus money offered by the ILTF, some WCT men played the year end tournament, a simple round robin affair at Tokyo with 6 participants. Smith won this event, who had like Laver a 4-1 score, but had beaten Laver in the very first encounter of the event.
Since 1971 the Grand Prix and the WCT series formed two separate circuits. The early YEC were dominated by the ILTF men Nastase and Smith (non contract pros in terms of the time), while the WCT toppers played their own circuit. The ILTF Grand Prix, although it had good bonus money, was won by men like Eddie Dibbs, because often the top players like Borg or Connors, did play only parts of this circuit. For example in 1974, not the overall dominating Connors won the Grand Prix, but the more available Vilas.

 

[kiki]

Connors almost only competed at Riordan´s one man show.Best pros attended WCT,s till major Gran Prix events were almost as good

 

[timnz]

Connors

Connors almost only competed at Riordan´s one man show.

Really? He seemed to compete in the Phily indoor a lot of times - and that had a deep field reportedly.

 

[timnz]

Adjusting Connors again

Connors won 19 not 18. So he is in a tie with Nadal.

See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_Masters_Series_records_and_statistics

Also it gets slightly more complicated with Rosewalls and Laver cases - depends if you add the equivalent tournaments for 1968 and 1969 on.... Laver may be up to around 15 or 16 if you do that. Not bad for a guy over 30 years old. You can bet that will never been beaten ie Masters 1000 wins for a player over 30.

I guess I was wrong. Adjusting Connors back to 18 again (but not for previous reasons). It appears his 1981 Monte Carlo with Vilas was counted as a win when it should have been counted as a final only (the match was called off due to rain I believe at 5 all in the first set - too bad, it may have been Connors only chance to win an ATP title on European Clay).

 

[kiki]

Really? He seemed to compete in the Phily indoor a lot of times - and that had a deep field reportedly.

True, but in 72,73,74 he was a Riordan´s captive.Hopefully, he got rid of him and went onto winning big...

 

[kiki]

I guess I was wrong. Adjusting Connors back to 18 again (but not for previous reasons). It appears his 1981 Monte Carlo with Vilas was counted as a win when it should have been counted as a final only (the match was called off due to rain I believe at 5 all in the first set - too bad, it may have been Connors only chance to win an ATP title on European Clay).

Yeah.His only other final being a 4 set loss to Mc Namara at Hamburg.I don´t think he played Rome or Barcelona, at least, not when he was a top player.