Do you really like eighties/nineties tennis better than modern matches when you watch replays?

[NonP]

It's a figure of speech bud to portray how things looked
Enjoy the art of serve botting since that's as far as your tennis excellence can reach

Hopefully you're not a native English speaker, cuz your English seems even worse than your tennis.

Or, the advancements in racquet & string tech, combined with the surface slowdown of the major tournaments, produced players like Nadal and Djokovic, because the advantages of S&V were blunted.

As Octo just said I was talking more about fandom, and I know nothing I say here will convince anyone re: this received wisdom, but let me point out a couple things:

- S&V was already on the way out before the turn of the century. This point is crucial as it takes more than a year or two to groom a player for the pro leagues.
- Top players are increasingly holding serve more often than their predecessors in the '90s and even the '00s despite the tech "advancements" and surface "slowdown."
- Likewise the tournament stats show that Wimbledon is still by far the most serve-friendly of the four majors and RG the least, while the HC majors have more or less stayed the same.
- % of points won at the net similarly has yet to see a noticeable drop as would be expected on slower courts vs. better passing shots. If anything the opposite seems to be true, though a smaller sample size (I've been trying to collect net stats at least from the QF and on of all post-'90 Slams) and the differences in frequency of net forays make this comparison a lot trickier.

All of which is why I say all this talk about racquets and courts is a red herring. The real culprit is player development, and while I don't presume to know how to bring the variety back we know for a fact that the current system ain't working, that is if you care about tennis beyond the Big 3.

 

[dahcovixx]

Hopefully you're not a native English speaker, cuz your English seems even worse than your tennis.

You never came off as someone who actually plays

No offense, 90% of the this forum cant hit two balls in a row

 

[Steve0904]

I don't know if I enjoy them more, but I think there's something to be said for knowing the result of a match before you watch it. That is to say that if I grew up in the 80's or 90's I'd probably love that style of tennis simply because it's all I would know, but I grew up in the 2000's so I know modern tennis. Our likes and interests are usually shaped in our kid/early teen years so the people that like 80's/90's tennis the most were big tennis fans during that time, and probably in their kid or early teen years. 99% of people are this way. It's basically nostalgia bias.

That said, I find it hard to watch replays of Federer's matches over and over again even if he won the match simply because I know the result. The live excitement aspect of not knowing what's going to happen next is gone so it kills about 95% of my excitement.

 

[McLovin]

I, for one, miss ‘90s tennis. My favorite matches involved Edberg or Rafter. We don’t have anyone today that has net-attacking skills remotely close to what those guys could do. I liked watching Goran too.

As a teenager, I liked Agassi, but as I began to watch more tennis, I became a huge Edberg fan, then a Rafter fan. I remember sitting in a bar in 1990 asking the bartender to turn on ESPN so I could watch the Edberg/Lendl Aussie Open final. Everyone in the bar looked at me funny.

But, I especially enjoyed the Rafter/Edberg v Agassi/Chang/Courier matchups. Attacking tennis vs shotmaking/defending tennis at it’s best.

 

[Deleted member 770948]

Hingis vs. Williams was the best match-up, brain power vs. power.
Hingis was 11-10 vs. Venus.
Hingis was 6-7 vs. Serena.
And Serena was fat-free back then....

 

[Rosstour]

Brain power vs power. Lol

Serena didn't get where she is by being brainless.

 

[Dolgopolov85]

I saw Becker live in 2007 or so, he played exib vs Nestor at the opening day of Toronto masters.
Afterwards Ancic played vs Dancevic 1st rd match. Gap in hitting power was astounding.
I had a feeling as a club player i could outrally Becker how bad it looked.

Funny thing he looked old and slow at 40 and now we have Federer at that age competing for Slams

Well, Becker seemed to load up on the beer a lot after his playing days. But I saw Krajicek in 2015 in Champions Tennis League and he was still fit and still serving bombs. In fact, the crowd was so astonished by the power of his serves that they were cheering him on to hit aces.

Edit: And, oh, I have played with most of the best amateurs in my city of 2 million folks and the Krajicek I saw would have beaten each one of them, easily. Why, the Indian pro Ramkumar Ramanathan who too I saw over there, would have had a tough time against Krajicek. Would have only beaten him on stamina by dragging him to three sets. In a single set shootout, I would favour Krajicek. He was consistently slicing with the racquet nearly touching the floor. How many club players have you seen who can do that AND also serve 200 ks?

 

[Deleted member 770948]

Brain power vs power. Lol

Serena didn't get where she is by being brainless.

Hingis is known for being the most crafty or creative player ever, so I don't mean anyone's brainless, I just mean Hingis is known for brain power while Serena is known for power.

 

[Dolgopolov85]

Becker is bad example. He didn’t age well.

He intentionally chose it so he can project, project, project.

 

[Slowtwitcher]

Funny that Federer plays with a gut hybrid. Man, those poly crosses make a huge difference!

 

[FatHead250]

Why do people like topspin? It boggles my mind. There is nothing artistic or smart to it. Just swing as hard as you can and the ball goes in

 

[6august]

Obviously present is always better than the past. Sampras, one of the GOAT, my most favourite, possessed a very awkward and ugly forehand technique compared to modern players. There's no such definitions as ATP forehand, windshield wiper, pronation, open stance... at that time.

I watched it live so I don't need hightlights/replays. 00's tennis is better than 80-90's tennis: FACT!

 

[Dolgopolov85]

Obviously present is always better than the past. Sampras, one of the GOAT, my most favourite, possessed a very awkward and ugly forehand technique compared to modern players. There's no such definitions as ATP forehand, windshield wiper, pronation, open stance... at that time.

I watched it live so I don't need hightlights/replays. 00's tennis is better than 80-90's tennis: FACT!

But meanwhile, the only players today who serve better than Sampras are the ones much taller than him, only Fed might possibly have a better slice than Sampras and nobody playing today has better volleys or overheads than him. So, no, it's not about today being better, it's about believing that tennis is just a rally sport like ping pong or badminton.

 

[EdSWright]

Match play was more conducive to people taking a gamble. Now the top players are such good risk managers, with their scientific preparation, statisticians, and confidence that the house will win in the end. Matches are boring when you know who will win.

 

[skaj]

Of course.

 

[the green god]

Stopped reading at servebot.

 

[_GOATbis]

Imagine how Berretini would annihilate poor Laver.

 

[Oval_Solid]

90s and early 2000s tennis is unwatchable because of mary carillo