Federer has not won every major title as everyone keeps saying...

K

Kirijax

Hall of Fame
ESPN and other sports sites keep saying that Federer has won his last remaining big title but he has not. He has not won an Olympic singles gold medal. It is clear which are the the top seven titles in tennis right now:

Australian Open
French Open
Wimbledon
U.S. Open
World Tour Finals
Olympic Singles Gold
Davis Cup

Federer does not have an Olympic Singles title. He has not completed the set. Andre Agassi remains the only player to do it. If everyone is going to keep saying that he has, then Mats Wilander also has a Wimbledon title in the list of his accomplishments.

But an Olympic Singles title and an Olympic Doubles title are clearly not the same thing.
 
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4bUV7Ls.gif
 
heninfan99 said:
4bUV7Ls.gif
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LOL Nice little effort on the gif. But the fast remains. Federer has not won every major title. He's without doubt the greatest of all time. No disputing that. But let's not get carried away. He has not won everything. He still lacks an Olympic Gold in the same way Nadal lacks a WTF.
 
Kirijax said:
LOL Nice little effort on the gif. But the fast remains. Federer has not won every major title. He's without doubt the greatest of all time. No disputing that. But let's not get carried away. He has not won everything. He still lacks an Olympic Gold in the same way Nadal lacks a WTF.
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He has an olympic Gold.
 
Kirijax said:
ESPN and other sports sites keep saying that Federer has won his last remaining big title but he has not. He has not won an Olympic singles gold medal. It is clear which are the the top seven titles in tennis right now:

Australian Open
French Open
Wimbledon
U.S. Open
World Tour Finals
Olympic Singles Gold
Davis Cup

Federer does not have an Olympic Singles title. He has not completed the set. Andre Agassi remains the only player to do it. If everyone is going to keep saying that he has, then Mats Wilander also has a Wimbledon title in the list of his accomplishments.

But an Olympic Singles title and an Olympic Doubles title are clearly not the same thing.
Click to expand...

Let me ask you one thing.

Is an Olympic Gold Medal in singles worth more than an Olympic Gold Medal in doubles? Or rowing? Or boxing, curling etc...?

No, it's not. Nobody cares how you win it, obviously Fed being a great singles player he was aiming for a singles Gold medal cause that's where his biggest chance is. But he still did it in doubles and his Gold Medal has the exact same worth as a Gold Medal in singles.
 
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tennis_pro said:
Let me ask you one thing.

Is an Olympic Gold Medal in singles worth more than an Olympic Gold Medal in doubles? Or rowing? Or boxing, curling etc...?

No, it's not. Nobody cares how you win it, obviously Fed being a great singles player he was aiming for a singles Gold medal cause that's where his biggest chance is. But he still did it in doubles and his Gold Medal has the exact same worth as a Gold Medal in singles.
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To play devil's advocate, not all olympic golds have the same status. For instance, the 100m in athletics arguably has a higher status than the 200m. In swimming, it's a greater achievement for an individual athlete to win an individual medal compared to a relay.
But yeah, I don't think the olympics is quite as central to tennis compared to a lot of other sports.
 
I don't know if it's the general sentiment, but my argument is that the importance of requiring an Olympics gold medal is diminished because the Olympics are such a rare event. Most players only get a couple chances at it in their career, and it seems unfair to fault them for not winning it.

This doesn't take anything away from those that HAVE won it, but to me, in some ways it's like winning the lottery. You have to play well in a single tournament that is held every four years.
 
Andy Murray tweeted this, got a lash

Amazing how long a couple of days is in sport...

Then followed with :

Andy Murray :

Federer struggled on Friday and was fantastic today hence a lot can change in a couple of days, please relax fedfans.
 
oh boy! Massu has Olympic singles and doubles gold, doesn't he? Wonder what other titles he's missing! AND he's almost front and centre in a GOAT conversation ---oh wait...
 
InvisibleSoul said:
I don't know if it's the general sentiment, but my argument is that the importance of requiring an Olympics gold medal is diminished because the Olympics are such a rare event. Most players only get a couple chances at it in their career, and it seems unfair to fault them for not winning it.

This doesn't take anything away from those that HAVE won it, but to me, in some ways it's like winning the lottery. You have to play well in a single tournament that is held every four years.
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Yes this is a very good point. Because of these factors it will depend a lot on luck. Tennis is also a bit more unpredictable than many sports – if you're the best runner in your event, than you can count on having a shot, whereas the best tennis players can go out in shock defeats.
 
heninfan99 said:
4bUV7Ls.gif
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This sums up the thread well. :-)

To address OP seriously, Olympics gold it for the country. So singles, doubles or team result all counted the same. It shouldn't even be in the list for a tennis player because people who played and watched tennis used to NOT CARE about it.

See Pete Sampras' career: zero Olympics.

See 2004 Athens Olympics, Fed won three grand slams that year. Who won the olympics singles gold? Nicolas Massu. (edit: see his career http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolás_Massú)

People who followed tennis long enough can tell you the so called "Golden Slam" is a relatively recent term. Nadal fans made it up after Federer's prime ended in 2008-2010. I know that is when some of you guys started watching tennis. But I assure you, that before you started to follow tennis, there was a guy who basically won everything except the clay slam. It it really your loss for not able to see that dominance as sports fan. If you are open minded (i know some of you are), you can try to relive it, but it is not the same as you already know the ending.
 
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Also it was by no means easy to win the doubles gold. They did beat the Bryan's in the semi-finals for instance.
 
tennisaddict said:
Andy Murray tweeted this, got a lash

Amazing how long a couple of days is in sport...

Then followed with :

Andy Murray :

Federer struggled on Friday and was fantastic today hence a lot can change in a couple of days, please relax fedfans.
Click to expand...

Yeah I saw that – wonder if it was ill-willed?:confused:
 
Kirijax said:
ESPN and other sports sites keep saying that Federer has won his last remaining big title but he has not. He has not won an Olympic singles gold medal. It is clear which are the the top seven titles in tennis right now:

Australian Open
French Open
Wimbledon
U.S. Open
World Tour Finals
Olympic Singles Gold
Davis Cup

Federer does not have an Olympic Singles title. He has not completed the set. Andre Agassi remains the only player to do it. If everyone is going to keep saying that he has, then Mats Wilander also has a Wimbledon title in the list of his accomplishments.

But an Olympic Singles title and an Olympic Doubles title are clearly not the same thing.
Click to expand...

You're right, Federer is missing from his singles resume, in order of importance:

Olympic Singles Gold
Rome Masters
Monte Carlo Masters

Despite this, his resume is the most complete in the Open Era save perhaps Agassi, and undoubtedly the most impressive in the Open Era.

Let's just hope he can fill in those three (relatively small) gaps.
 
ark_28 said:
Olympic Gold is not a major in Tennis! Pete hardly even rocked up for it
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Never said it was. But the Olympic Singles gold medal has become of the biggest accomplishments in tennis in the last couple of decades and Federer has not won it. Agassi remains the only player to do that. If you want to downgrade the Olympics to an exhibition tournament that the pros go out of their way to win, then that's your prerogative. Go right ahead.

Olympics vs. Davis Cup

There's a bunch of other threads about the importance of the Olympics. I'll let the Fed fans look it up for themselves. But make sure you remember, in the tennis world, singles is more important than doubles.
 
Starfury said:
Really don't think so. He was comparing him to Friday (couple of days), and that was really one hell of a difference.
Click to expand...

Yeah, you're likely right. I just wondered if he was casting suspicion about the legitimateness of the injury.
 
moonballs said:
This sums up the thread well. :-)

To address OP seriously, Olympics gold it for the country. So singles, doubles or team result all counted the same. It shouldn't even be in the list for a tennis player because people who played and watched tennis used to NOT CARE about it.

See Pete Sampras' career: zero Olympics.

See 2004 Athens Olympics, Fed won three grand slams that year. Who won the olympics singles gold? Nicolas Massu. (edit: see his career http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolás_Massú)

People who followed tennis long enough can tell you the so called "Golden Slam" is a relatively recent term. Nadal fans made it up after Federer's prime ended in 2008-2010. I know that is when some of you guys started watching tennis. But I assure you, that before you started to follow tennis, there was a guy who basically won everything except the clay slam. It it really your loss for not able to see that dominance as sports fan. If you are open minded (i know some of you are), you can try to relive it, but it is not the same as you already know the ending.
Click to expand...

Says the guy with Federer as his avatar. lol

Next!
 
Logic said:
You're right, Federer is missing from his singles resume, in order of importance:

Olympic Singles Gold 750
Rome Masters 1000
Monte Carlo Masters 1000

Despite this, his resume is the most complete in the Open Era save perhaps Agassi, and undoubtedly the most impressive in the Open Era.

Let's just hope he can fill in those three (relatively small) gaps.
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The ATP and ITF don't rank the importance same as you do.
 
Kirijax said:
LOL Nice little effort on the gif. But the fast remains. Federer has not won every major title. He's without doubt the greatest of all time. No disputing that. But let's not get carried away. He has not won everything. He still lacks an Olympic Golf in the same way Nadal lacks a WTF.
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Bartelby said:
I don't think Federer will ever win an Olympic golf medal!
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Hood_Man said:
Federer doesn't play golf.
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... hilarious fail ! :)

1242991040_mountaintopgolf.gif
 
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tennis_pro said:
Let me ask you one thing.

Is an Olympic Gold Medal in singles worth more than an Olympic Gold Medal in doubles? Or rowing? Or boxing, curling etc...?

No, it's not. Nobody cares how you win it, obviously Fed being a great singles player he was aiming for a singles Gold medal cause that's where his biggest chance is. But he still did it in doubles and his Gold Medal has the exact same worth as a Gold Medal in singles.
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Well, if Djokovic one day gets an Olympic Gold in rowing, curling, badminton, etc. it does absolutely nothing for his tennis singles legacy
 
moonballs said:
The ATP and ITF don't rank the importance same as you do.
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The number of points assigned to an event determine its importance to the rankings.

The type of importance I was talking about is in terms of prestige (which is, to some extent, a matter of opinion).

For example, all four majors are equally important in terms of rankings (2000 points), but most people would agree that Wimbledon is the most prestigious.
 
What the Olympics is, is an event that has "Olympic value" attached to it, exactly because it is the Olympics. It only gives 750 ranking points, but it is technically more important than that because of the sentimental value the Olympics themselves have. But it has very little tennis history, so personally I don't see it as a big hole. Or put another way. I prefer Federer's CV like it is, as opposed to having an OSG and missing a WTF.

That said, Federer missed his best chance in 2012, when it was directly after Wimbledon and not directly before the USO as it was in 2004 and 2008. As such in 2004 and 2008, I have a feeling he was a little more focused on the USO which he ended up winning both times, probably because he didn't put out as much energy to get the Olympics, like say Nadal, who had won the Olympics and Toronto in 2008, but was visibly tired in the SF against Murray along with Murray being the form player and playing brilliantly.

So in essence, I think Federer put more effort into the Olympics in 2012 (and still lost obviously) probably because he had just won a major and the scheduling helped, plus he wasn't really in his prime so he wasn't just lapping up majors, whereas in 2004 and 2008 he still was, and wanted to strike while the iron was hot so to speak.

And then look at the circumstances of 2004 and 2008 respectively. In one of the years he's going after his first USO title in his breakout year and a chance for 3 slams, and in 2008 he needed the USO to save his year.

Slams on the other hand, don't need a justification
 
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I just don't see how not having Olympic gold in tennis is a resume hole. It's not harder to win than a masters 1000, which are "only" the 3rd tier events. You have to win 4 BO3 matches and 1 BO5 in the final, just like in masters 1000 (up until 2007). Slams are worth 2000 points because of their history and 7 BO5 matches. WTF is worth 1500 points because you only play top 8 players. Olympics is much easier to win compared to those tournaments.

If you wanna talk about winning the Olympics in terms of representing your country and prestige or whatever, than a gold medal is a gold medal and each and every one is worth the same, whether its won in singles or doubles















or golf :lol:
 
TommyA8X said:
I just don't see how not having Olympic gold in tennis is a resume hole. It's not harder to win than a masters 1000, which are "only" the 3rd tier events. You have to win 4 BO3 matches and 1 BO5 in the final, just like in masters 1000 (up until 2007). Slams are worth 2000 points because of their history and 7 BO5 matches. WTF is worth 1500 points because you only play top 8 players. Olympics is much easier to win compared to those tournaments.

If you wanna talk about winning the Olympics in terms of representing your country and prestige or whatever, than a gold medal is a gold medal and each and every one is worth the same, whether its won in singles or doubles















or golf :lol:
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It's a small hole because it's the Olympics. People attach value to it because it's the Olympics. The difference is it's more "Olympic value" than "tennis value."
 
Kirijax said:
Never said it was. But the Olympic Singles gold medal has become of the biggest accomplishments in tennis in the last couple of decades and Federer has not won it. Agassi remains the only player to do that. If you want to downgrade the Olympics to an exhibition tournament that the pros go out of their way to win, then that's your prerogative. Go right ahead.

Olympics vs. Davis Cup

There's a bunch of other threads about the importance of the Olympics. I'll let the Fed fans look it up for themselves. But make sure you remember, in the tennis world, singles is more important than doubles.
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It only became of importance once Fed started talking it up. Not a couple of decades ago.

The 1992 final was Rosset-Arrese; 1996 had doubles specialist Paes (highest singles career rank #73) winning the bronze and Brugera (never made a QF at AO or USO) winning the silver on hard; 2000 had still-not-very-good Fed making the SFs; 2004 had Massu winning.

Things look better now having SFs like:

2008
#2 Nadal vs. #3 Djokovic
#8 Blake vs. #12 Gonzalez

2012
#1 Federer vs. #8 del Potro
#2 Djokovic vs. #3 Murray

Or look at number of quarterfinalists seeded:

2012: 8 (including top 3)
2008: 5 (including top 3)
2004: 4 (highest #3)
2000: 3 (highest #2)
1996: 4 (including #1, but also 2 WCs and 1 alternate)
1992: 4 (highest #4)

The top players did not really care until Fed started bigging it up. Sampras didn't even choose play it in 1996 or 2000.

Unfortunately for Fed, it seems to mean too much to him. Whether that's because he met Mirka at the Olympics, I don't know.

But he has the near-inexplicable losses to Berdych in 2004 (whom he would beat the next 8 times) and Blake in 2008 (whom he was 8-0 against and this would remain his only defeat), both in straights, where he came an UE machine.

Even in 2012, he was a set and a break up against Falla before he got crazy nervous out of nowhere and it went to three. Nothing seems to affect him personally like the Olympics.

So let's not rewrite history and say it has become important over the last two decades. The last two Olympics are clearly the only two that most of the top players have cared about, as clearly shown by their attendance and performances there.
 
ark_28 said:
Olympic Gold is not a major in Tennis! Pete hardly even rocked up for it
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Lots of players never show up for DC either! I think this is the first time Federer has played it in a long time. So what, that hasn't devalued DC as a major tennis event, has it?

And why does Pete's absence weigh more than Agassi, Nadal, Djokovic and Federer's presence?
 
Mustard said:
Winning the Davis Cup at least once is a big thing.
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If you can call it "big."

In that sense, OSG > DC because it is entirely a singles tournament. If Federer never had Wawrinka playing as well as he did in the final, the Swiss would've lost like every other year they played.
 
Steve0904 said:
It's a small hole because it's the Olympics. People attach value to it because it's the Olympics. The difference is it's more "Olympic value" than "tennis value."
Click to expand...

If we're only going to look at the "Olympic value", Federer already has two medals, so there's no hole there. From tennis perspective, Olympics are no bigger than Monte Carlo.
 
Steve0904 said:
If you can call it "big."

In that sense, OSG > DC because it is entirely a singles tournament. If Federer never had Wawrinka playing as well as he did in the final, the Swiss would've lost like every other year they played.
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Excellent point.

Winning the OSG is entirely an individual achievement whereas Davis Cup is a team event from start to finish and no one player can win it all by himself!

Federer fans always seek to downplay OSG simply because their man has never won it! But their man disagrees with them and that's an uncomfortable fact they can never quite manage to get around!
 
TommyA8X said:
If we're only going to look at the "Olympic value", Federer already has two medals, so there's no hole there. From tennis perspective, Olympics are no bigger than Monte Carlo.
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Well, try telling that to Federer who tries every 4 years to win the Olympics singles title but frequently skips Monte Carlo, even though he's never won that either!
 
If a tournament is only once every 4 years it can miss a player's entire prime.

Also said tournament is not even worth the same points as a bloody masters 1000.

Now, should Federer have an olympic Singles gold.. sure.. in 2004 and 2008 and even in 2012 he was still in good enough form that he probably should have won ONE of those three tournaments... of those probably 2004.

But let's get real.... tennis wasn't even an olympic sport for a LONG time... There is no player that would trade a grand slam for it..

It's a nice tournament, and gives you some country pride and all.
 
Mainad said:
Well, try telling that to Federer who tries every 4 years to win the Olympics singles title but frequently skips Monte Carlo, even though he's never won that either!
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Well, he knows he'll most likely never win MC for as long as Nadal plays there, so why risk constant humiliation?
 
tennisaddict said:
Federer: I've won enough in my career, I didn't need to tick any empty boxes. This was for the boys.
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BS.

Big Federer fan, but the Davis cup for whatever reason is considered significant and he wanted to get it done.

But "for the boys" is stupid... the whole stupid team was two guys, did the other dudes ever play?

France actually used a legit team.

But basically if you had two studs in a single country you could win a davis cup, which is what the swiss did.

The other guys must feel the same way someone who is like a 12th man on a basketball team is that wins a title... sure he gets a ring, but he never contributed on the court so who gives a crap.
 
jm1980 said:
Well, he knows he'll most likely never win MC for as long as Nadal plays there, so why risk constant humiliation?
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Nadal usually turns up for the Olympics as well but that doesn't stop Federer wanting to compete!

Plus, he had an excellent chance to win MC this year as Nadal went out early but he still couldn't manage to get past Stan! :wink:
 
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