Has the tour just figured Nadal's game out?

[hipolymer]

Players are starting to attack Nadal's forehand and take away time from him, knowing that he requires time to set up his powerful spin. In the days of his "peak" Nadal relied on overpowering opponents' backhands, but these days players have much more powerful double-handed backhands. Then when they get the weak response from Nadal they go for a down the line backhand which is fatal to the Spaniard.

Djokovic was the very first player to use the double-handed backhand to overpower Nadal's weakness (there weren't many good backhand players from 2005 to 2010; these days we have Djokovic, Wawrinka, Murray, Dimitrov, Thiem, and even Troicki is dominating Nadal's backhand wing), and it seems more and more players have figured him out. This is why the tour is at its strongest ever. Players no longer are only strong off of one wing, like Federer and Nadal from 2004 to 2010. Nowadays even a top 20 player can dominate a top 5 player because these top 20 players are powerful off of both wings. And they have good serves to boot.

Of course, back then there were powerful backhand players like Safin/Nalbandian/Haas/Hewitt, but they had constant injuries and motivation issues which made it impossible to show their form on a day to day basis.

 

[VamosBamos987]

Players always knew what his gameplan was but it was almost impossible to stop him because his shots were so heavy and precise. Now he's garbagio and his shots land short, into the net, go way long on occasion, and some even frame outside the stadium. It's like taking away candy from a 5 yr old now. Even sureshs could grab a set from this Nadal lol.

 

[TheMusicLover]

It's more a matter of a natural decline happening to Nadal, than to any of the other players 'figuring him out'. If such, it happened quite a few years ago already.
Nadal lost foot speed, speed in general, precision, confidence, and his current serve is WTA-like.
No shame though - Father Time spares noone, and decline happens to ALL players, greats, GOATs and journeymen the same.

I'm actually happy he's still around, will probably make the WTF, and hope for him to make one final blast come 2017.

 

[tennis_pro]

Yes, when a great player declines suddenly the entire tour improves.

LOL

 

[Crionics]

Top players have coaches and/or scouts who analyze every single aspect of the opponent's game. Do you really think they needed 10 years to figure out Nadal?
Nadal simply declined.

 

[mistik]

I fancy my chances against Nadal nowadays. He is going to find a way to lose.