Greatest female clay courter ever

[BTURNER]

those were the years she was unable to play the french because of WTT. Evert never played two clay slams in the same year. Might as well pretend the RG tournament was not played 76,77,78. US OPenm was the de facto clay court slam those three years.

 

[grafselesfan]

Why on this thread about clay court majors do so many forget Evert won those 3 us opens on clay barely losing a set, against high caliber fields during the years she did not play the French. She has 10 majors on clay and the highest career win/loss ratio recorded in open tennis. There is no debate left.

That actually is a good way to look at it. Replace the 76-78 French Open results with the 75-77 U.S Open. Only years U.S Open was on clay and had it the best possible fields available at the time, and French Open on the womens side was a farce those years anyway. Even Sue Barker laughed at it after she won the French in 76. Then the new hypothetical becomes the U.S Open those 3 years on fast hard courts which would have been interesting between Evert, Goolagong, King, and to a lesser extent pre-prime Martina, aging Court, and Wade.

 

[pmerk34]

That actually is a good way to look at it. Replace the 76-78 French Open results with the 75-77 U.S Open. Only years U.S Open was on clay and had it the best possible fields available at the time, and French Open on the womens side was a farce those years anyway. Even Sue Barker laughed at it after she won the French in 76. Then the new hypothetical becomes the U.S Open those 3 years on fast hard courts which would have been interesting between Evert, Goolagong, King, and to a lesser extent pre-prime Martina, aging Court, and Wade.

No one doubts that evert would have won 10 French opens

 

[ilove.juju]

My vote went to Monica Seles. Without the stabbing she would win more French Opens than anyone else and that makes her the greatest clay courter ever IMO. I disagree with gj011 that Graf would not have won more however. I think Graf would have won atleast 2 of her 93, 95, 96, 99 titles since Monica could not win the French every year that decade and there was nobody else that decade who would have stopped her so someone else had to win a couple, and looking at the candidates it has to be Graf.

I agree.

Many people forget that in 1993, Seles had won 3 of the 4 French opens she had played. Graf on the other hand, had only two, the later dating back to 1988. She had lost to either ASV of Monica in the past 4 years and I feel Seles could have won at least another 2 or 3 FO.

 

[drwood]

I agree.

Many people forget that in 1993, Seles had won 3 of the 4 French opens she had played. Graf on the other hand, had only two, the later dating back to 1988. She had lost to either ASV of Monica in the past 4 years and I feel Seles could have won at least another 2 or 3 FO.

Definitely not better than Evert. Past-prime Evert beat prime Navratilova in 85 and 86 finals, while past-prime Seles choked in the 98 F against Vicario.

But no question Seles would have been #2 all-time behind Evert w/o the stabbing IMO.

 

[pc1]

Helen Wills Moody with four French Championships would have to be considered also. In fact a lot of people compared Evert to her. She was a lot taller than Evert at 5'9" and a bigger serve.

She won four French Championships in five attempts and the loss at the French was a default due to the fact she had emergency appendix surgery in her first French in 1926.