Most Years as World no. 1

[hoodjem]

Who holds the record as World no. 1 (or co-holder) for the most years?

Here’s my unofficial list—
Gonzales: 8 years (1952, 1954-1960)
Laver: 8 years (1964-1971)
Tilden: 7 years (1920-1925, 1931)
Kramer: 6 years (1947-1951, 1953)
Sampras: 6 years 1993-1998 )
Perry: 5 years (1934-1937, 1941)
Budge: 5 years (1937-1940, 1942)
Vines: 4 years (1932, 1935-1937)
Borg: 4 years (1977-1980)
Federer: 4 years (2004-2007)
Rosewall: 4 years (1960-1963)
Connors: 3 years (1974, 1976, 1982)
McEnroe: 3 years (1981, 1983, 1984)

Any glaring errors and omissions? (I have left off pre-1920 players, because I believe the all-comers system messes thing up.)


Do these numbers factor into your GOAT rankings?

 

[SgtJohn]

This is a good list, I don't have any strong disagreement with you. Counting co-holders obviously lets you be more flexible. You also seem to give much credit to tours as for the pro field (Vines '35/'36, Kramer '50, etc.)

For the statistical analysis I am carrying out I had to decide of only one champion for every year, which of course is very difficult for many of them (1931,1970, 1977,1998, and many many more). Anyway, here is the end result.
This is just the raw 'All-time leaders' list; I can send the source data if some of you are interested in the details, I just don't have the more detailed file with me right now...

Laver 7
Tilden 6
W Renshaw 6
Gonzales 5
Budge 5
Sampras 5
L Doherty 5
Federer 5
Rosewall 4
Perry 4
Cochet 4
R Doherty 4
Kramer 4
Lendl 3
Borg 3
Connors 3
Larned 3
McEnroe 3
Pim 3
E Renshaw 3
Wilding 3
Johnston 2
Riggs 2
Sedgman 2
Edberg 2
Lacoste 2
Hamilton 2
Hewitt 2
Smith 2
Hartley 2


Jonathan

EDIT: as for the all-comers system, I think it is indeed a challenge for us to rank players under this system, but it definitely can be done, as Karoly's excellent remarks about the years between 1877 and 1918 show.

On a more general note, the hardest challenge, I found, in assembling rankings for the past is that you obviously have to try and think like a contemporary of that time (adding up the players' points, 'ATP style', would have led to strange rankings in the 1890s probably...), but you cannot rely too much on this approach either, as past rankers often gave unreasonably high significance to reputation and supposed skills over performance (see: nonsense 1900s rankings where Brookes is judged one of the best though he did not play at all, etc.). So you just have to find a 'common ground', that is in essence very subjective.

 

[helloworld]

This is a good list, I don't have any strong disagreement with you. Counting co-holders obviously lets you be more flexible. You also seem to give much credit to tours as for the pro field (Vines '35/'36, Kramer '50, etc.)

For the statistical analysis I am carrying out I had to decide of only one champion for every year, which of course is very difficult for many of them (1931,1970, 1977,1998, and many many more). Anyway, here is the end result.
This is just the raw 'All-time leaders' list; I can send the source data if some of you are interested in the details, I just don't have the more detailed file with me right now...

Laver 7
Tilden 6
W Renshaw 6
Gonzales 5
Budge 5
Sampras 5
L Doherty 5
Federer 5
Rosewall 4
Perry 4
Cochet 4
R Doherty 4
Kramer 4
Lendl 3
Borg 3
Connors 3
Larned 3
McEnroe 3
Pim 3
E Renshaw 3
Wilding 3
Johnston 2
Riggs 2
Sedgman 2
Edberg 2
Lacoste 2
Hamilton 2
Hewitt 2
Smith 2
Hartley 2


Jonathan

??? What the hell is this??

 

[hoodjem]

Interesting.

I'd be curious to see how you arrived at numbers for Gonzales, Sampras, Federer, and Riggs, or the year-by-year list from 1950 on.

 

[pc1]

Who holds the record as World no. 1 (or co-holder) of this ranking?

Here’s my unofficial list—
Gonzales: 8 years (1952, 1954-1960)
Tilden: 7 years (1920-1925, 1931)
Laver: 7 years (1964-1970)
Kramer: 6 years (1947-1951, 1953)
Sampras: 6 years 1993-1998 )
Perry: 5 years (1934-1937, 1941)
Budge: 5 years (1937-1940, 1942)
Rosewall: 5 years (1957, 1960-1963)
Connors: 5 years (1974-1978 )
Vines: 4 years (1932, 1935-1937)
Borg: 4 years (1977-1980)
McEnroe: 4 years (1981-1984)
Federer: 4 years (2004-2007)

Any glaring errors and omissions? (I have left off pre-1920 players, because I believe the all-comers system messes thing up.)


Do these numbers factor into your GOAT rankings?

Was McEnroe number one in 1982? I guess he was on the ATP computer but how close was Connors considering he won Wimbledon and the US Open?

 

[hoodjem]

^^^ Yep, the ITF lists Connors as "world champion" that year.

Maybe co-leaders.? That would give Connors 6 years.

 

[Borgforever]

Hoodjem -- I think your GOAT-list is without doubt one of the finest lists of it's kind I read. I have a few opinions myself that differ from your's but all-in-all I think your list (if one places every guy after each other) could be absolutely correct. While I'm a tier or echelon thinker in these matters myself.

As regards to you No. 1 list I have a few nit-pickings:

I have Björn ranked as No. 1 five years in a row as follows:

1976 Borg & Connors

While I contend that Borg couldn't beat Jimbo at USO that year (even if Björn won the third set in that match) Borg had the better record -- winning the biggest tourney Wimby (without losing a set which has not happened since), won WCT and made it to the USO-final. Some people rank Jimbo as the best in 1976 just because Borg lost all of his H2H matches against Connors that year -- but I remain convinced that H2Hs are very deceptive as major indicators who's the best of the year.

Björn Hellberg is adamant that Borg was alone No. 1 in 1976 -- and he just always go by the results. Hellberg mentions Wimby being the No. 1 tourney and Borg won it in a fashion not seen since in a way and under such circumstances (the lightning fast courts) that no-one believed he could pull off. Borg was named by all sportswriters that year as one of the ten best athletes in sports. Connors was never mentioned there. Borg had the best GS-record that year biggest tourney win, second biggest tourney finalist and QF at RG and then the WCT -- a tourney that could be argued as the fourth major that year. Clearly better than Jimbo's 1976. And Jimbo's H2H dominance over Borg in their first 8-9 match-ups were (as many other rivalries) based not directly on playing quality but on psychology and other subtleties.

As regards to H2H's as a barometer would anyone contend that Nadal was the true No. 1 of 2006? Nadal won more than Fed in their H2H -- even one on HC cement.

What about 1974 when Newk lost twice to Rosewall, who in turn could hardly get to four games in a set against Jimbo in two meetings, but still beat a peak Jimbo in Dec/Jan 74-75 in a great four-setter? Jimbo 0-1 in H2H practically in 1974 with one of his closest contenders, actually his closest...

And Nastase was a demon to Connors -- four wins for Jimbo against twelve losses to Nasty up until that time (3-1 to Nasty in 1976 alone). Was Nastase way better than Jimbo in 1976? The H2H's says so. Falsely IMO. And while "Nasty" would usually eat Connors for lunch he himself had almost no chance at all against Ken Rosewall -- almost always losing to Kenny -- even their last meeting at WCT in NY in 1977 6-3, 6-3 -- Rosewall ultimately winning their rivalry with 6 wins to three losses .

Nastase even lost the 1976 Hong Kong final against Kenny (their only big-time meeting that year) 1-6, 6-4, 7-6, 6-0...

So Rosewall must be No. 1 in 1976 according to H2Hs...

Another prime example in your listing of Mac being No. 1 1981, 1982 and 1983.

In 1981 Mac had H2H's against the No. 3 Connors 0-1 (including YEC Masters played in January 1982 1-1) and the No. 4 Lendl 0-3. Mac only beat burnout-Borg (who played poorly in both the Wimby and USO-final) but couldn't score one single win against the third and fourth man. That's amazing for a No. 1. Mac didn't even take a set against Lendl in 1981 losing virtually in blow-outs every time.

In 1982 everything continues for Mac in the same vein, having a 0-4 H2H against Lendl -- only winning one set against the The Great Czech in 1982 -- and 2-2 against Connors (actually 3-2 to Mac if one includes the YEC Masters January 1982 match).

But in 1983 Mats Wilander won nine tourneys and performed the best in the GS-tourneys being finalist at RG and winning AO on grass against Mac and Lendl being up 3-1 against Mac in H2Hs that year -- including beating Mac comfortably on clay, HC cement and on grass the same year. Björn Hellberg is adamant that Wilander is lone No. 1 in 1983 -- I'm not sure myself -- I stress a lot of importance on the Wimby-winner always -- but I see the reasoning...

The examples of the unreliability of H2Hs is virtually endless.

However, I place Jimbo next to Borg in 1976 based on his many supreme wins that year -- among others: The world's second biggest tourney USO (against a slightly out-of-form -- compared to Wimby -- but otherwise great, healthy Borg in a great final) and his other tourney wins -- and to a slight extent his dominating H2H against Borg that year.

1977 Borg & Vilas

Well, I never believe Vilas was better than Borg for whole year ever I still place him as joint No. 1. Hellberg is adamant that Vilas was No. 1 and Borg second and Connors third. Vilas could hardly get any games against Borg (once every year he got a set -- only beating Borg early in his career -- never in any big matches -- in 1974, 75). He avoided Björn like the plague (smart by Guillermo) in 1977 and scored RG and USO while Borg was either not competing or was seriously injured. But I'll give him joint No. 1 with the Wimby winner and the also very successful Borg -- just based on his great results that year.

1978 Borg

I can't understand how Jimbo is co-No.1 with Björn this year when he isn't in 1976. For me Jimbo is "Nadal-2005/2006-No. 2" in 1978. Borg winning the biggest tourney (Wimby in blowout over a peak playing Jimbo who had a 25 (I guess) match winning streak coming into that final) and the third biggest tourney RG (losing fewer games than Nadal in 2008) and then having a final in the second biggest tourney USO (losing by being injured). I'm not overly reliant on H2H's as you know by now but Borg leads this department as well over Jimbo in 1978 (as he did in 1977).

For me placing Jimbo as co-No. 1 with Borg in 1978 with that context is just dead-wrong. There's no argument for Jimbo there at all...

The rest is nothing new...

1979 Borg - RG, Wimby and YEC Masters

1980 Borg - RG, Wimby and YEC Masters

There goes my two-cents...

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

...
On a more general note, the hardest challenge, I found, in assembling rankings for the past is that you obviously have to try and think like a contemporary of that time (adding up the players' points, 'ATP style', would have led to strange rankings in the 1890s probably...), but you cannot rely too much on this approach either, as past rankers often gave unreasonably high significance to reputation and supposed skills over performance (see: nonsense 1900s rankings where Brookes is judged one of the best though he did not play at all, etc.). So you just have to find a 'common ground', that is in essence very subjective.

Jonathan you're perfectly right. I defy anyone at the right moment to choose a clear #1 in each year since 1877.

Sorry hoodjem but I can't give my list without many explanations. Hope you won't be lost or annoyed by this long post (as many of mine). Once again I need in fact 2 posts to express my thoughts.

The most complex case is Gonzales's because in my mind he was at least #1 4 years in a row and at best 8 years (not consecutive) (and at about 10% : 9 years).
And once again I couldn't resist to argue Borgforever's points : for me Connors was the best in 1976 and I very longly detailed my arguments in these posts.

For the moment I can't myself do it (and perhaps I won't ever able) so here I will give some explanations chronologically because sometimes there are many players who could claim the #1 spot especially in Gonzales's era.

3 years or more :

William Charles Renshaw : 1881, 1882, 1883, 1884, 1885, 1886 (6 years)
(not in 1889 though he won Wimby)

Joshua Pim 1893, 1894, 1895 (3 years)

Reginald Frank Doherty 1897, 1898, 1899, 1900 (4 years)

William Augustus Larned 1901, 1908, 1909, 1910 (4 years in "weak" periods)

Hugh Laurence Doherty 1902, 1903, 1904, 1905 and possibly 1906 (4 or 5 years)

(a long mention about Brookes possibly the most overrated player of his time, sometimes considered as the best from 1907 to 1911 or even 1914 but based on reputation as SgtJohn rightly told just before : he was almost undoubtedly the best in 1907 (only Larned could contradict but I have no argument for or against) and was possibly as good as HL Doherty in 1906 :I think that Brookes deserved the co-No1 place in 1906.
That year Doherty won Wimbledon but without Brookes and the best Americans while Brookes was undefeated in Australia (but without Doherty and the best Americans). For those feats I would say that both players were quite equal but with a slight edge to Doherty because he won the most prestigious title.
The only way to compare them is through the intermediary of Wilding because the New Zealander was the only player in the world who played both in Europe and in Australasia that year. In 1906, in a best-of-five set match, the only players who beat Wilding 3 sets to love were Brookes, 60 64 97 in the Victorian Chp, 11 games won by Anthony, and … H.L. Doherty, 63 86 62 in the South of France Chp, once again 11 games won by Anthony too, and Gore at Wimbledon (97 61 86). If I believe Wilding (the problem is : have I to trust Wilding in this case whereas I don’t trust him in his judgment of Larned’s play level ? Nevertheless as said before, Wilding was in 1906 the only first class player to have played both in Europe and in Australasia), no European (including Doherty) had played in 1906 as well as Brookes in the Victorian Chp. So once again Brookes and Doherty are, in my mind, equal in that other case but this time with a slight edge towards Brookes if Wilding has to be trusted.
In conclusion with the very fragile elements proposed here I would rank both players co-No1.)

Wilding 1911, 1912, 1913 (3 years)

Tilden 1920, 1921, 1923, 1924, 1925 and perhaps 1931 (most likely 6 years, perhaps 7 years if I give him 1922 or 5 years if I take away 1922 and 1931).

For the moment I consider that Johnston and not Tilden was the best in 1922 (see other posts of mine). In 1931 I give the edge to Tilden but Vines IMO was a real contender (neither Cochet nor Austin were better than Vines as Myers pretended at the time, Vines had clearly and undoubtedly the best amateur record in 1931)

Cochet 1928, 1929, 1930

Vines 1932, perhaps 1934, perhaps 1935 (perhaps 3 years or even 4 years because of 1931 so debatable)

In 1936 Vines was too long injured in the hot months that I prefer Perry as the number 1 (as I often say the first quality of a sportsman is to be strong and healthy)

Budge 1937 (very very slight edge over Vines and Perry), 1938 (still very slight edge over Vines), 1939, 1940, 1942 (probably 5 years)

Riggs 1941 (Riggs and Kovacs were probably very slightly superior to Perry (and Skeen) and Budge in 1941 as their first pro meetings in December suggested), 1945, 1946, 1947 (4 years)

Slight mention about 1943 : there were so few matches that it is almost impossible to select a #1 but Kovacs was apparently in the "greatest" form of all because, it has to be told, he had more opportunities to play than the others (he dominated in particular Quist and Crawford in their home country), Riggs would have beaten Sabin in a one set match while Budge "only" beat Edward Alloo, an ordinary player.

Other mention to 1944 :
Kovacs had the best record of all that year with no defeats if my memory is right

Kramer 1948, 1949, probably 1950, probably 1951 (probably 4 years)

I can be wrong but I don't think that Kramer deserved the first place in 1953 because not only he played only in the first half of the year but I also suspect very strongly that he avoided on purpose to face Gonzales in tour (for the moment I give Segura the #1 place but I'm not even convinced by my own arguments).

Gonzales THE BIG PROBLEM OF THAT THREAD.
1954, 1955, 1956, 1957 sure
but many questions about 1952, 1958, 1959, 1960, (and even 1961) so between 4 and 8 years (even 9 years if I include 1961 where I think at 90% that Rosewall was the king and so ... at 10% that Gorgo was the king)

I can't decide between Gonzales and Sedgman in 1952 and in 1958 (in the last year I wonder if Sedgman had not the edge), very probably 1959 (with Hoad not far behind or perhaps co-No1 or even No. 1 alone), very probably 1960 (though Rosewall had won most of the majors but with Gonzales absent (retired))

Rosewall 1961 (at 90%), 1962, 1963 (about 3 years)

Laver 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969, very probably 1970, very probably 1971 (so probably 8 years)
1964 sure though in 1964 everyone considered Rosewall the king.
1965-1969 no doubt (though some as British Lawn Tennis placed Kenny first (and Emerson 5th and first amateur in 1965)
1970-1971 : jeffrey has convinced me at 90% that Laver was the best these years. In his own rankings, even in my ranking point system, Laver finished first and Rosewall second both years.

TO BE CONTINUED

 

[hoodjem]

Laver 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969, very probably 1970, very probably 1971 (so probably 8 years)
1964 sure though in 1964 everyone considered Rosewall the king.
1965-1969 no doubt (though some as British Lawn Tennis placed Kenny first (and Emerson 5th and first amateur in 1965)
1970-1971 : jeffrey has convinced me at 90% that Laver was the best these years. In his own rankings, even in my ranking point system, Laver finished first and Rosewall second both years.

I agree 1964-1970, but I am surprised to see 1971.

I shall have to study results from 1971 more carefully.

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

End Of The Previous Post

Connors 1974, 1976, 1982 (3 years).

For 1976 I disagree with Borgforever. I think that Connors had the best record (I recognize by a little margin) and on top of that he also led Björn 4-0 in direct meetings (Borgforever is however 100%-completely-wholly right when he said that H2H stats aren't the most important factor to designate the better player. The H2H stats should only serve to decide between players who are very close (in 1976 or in 1977 it was the case) : if a player won the Grand Slam he is the undisputed #1 even though he lost 10 times in a row against another great player).
I get back to the 1976 records.
In my opinion the greatest events were as follows : 1. Wimbledon, 2. US Open, 3. far below French Open, 4. US Pro Indoor just ahead of 5. WCT Finals (the Davis Cup, the Masters were clearly below).
One word about the US Pro Indoor (called thus in reality since 1972) : the Philadelphia tournament has very often superb fields in the 1970s with players entering it though they didn't play the WCT circuit : it was the great start of the season (and not the Australian Open).
In 1969, 1970, (1974), 1976, 1978 there were very top fields with the worst only one very top player missing (for instance Vilas in 1976 and 1978 ).
So in 1976 all the very best except Vilas were absent (I don't count Orantes who on indoor fast court was bad) and even in 1976 Vilas wasn't by far the best player on that surface) (Vilas hugely improved in months to come as his performance in the Masters 77 (January 78 ) against Connors showed)..
In the WCT circuit and Finals missed Connors, a very great player, to say the least, absent (he wasn't under contract and played only 3 WCT events that winter) and moreover Nastase (who had great wins in the first half of 1976) didn't seem very motivated by the WCT circuit. Nasty played less tourneys than most of the others as Solomon or Stockton (who, they, qualified for the WCT Finals) : Nasty entered 8 events (and preferred to concentrate on rich events as Salisbury, La Costa, Palm Springs out of the WCT circuit) while Solomon or Stockton played 10 or 11 WCT traditional events. Knowing that in my opinion too many WCT points were given to 1st round losers, players like Solomon or Stockton earned thus invaluable points overrated and surpassed Nastase in the WCT ranking (Nastase made the same sort of "error" at the end of the year when he preferred to play lucrative invitational events instead of trying to qualify for the Masters (I know that he played some of his exhibitions during his 3-week suspension after the "Pohmann-Forest Hills" affair but after he didn't try to qualify and even gave up in the tie-breaker against Ken Rosewall at Hong-Kong).
So Connors won the 2nd event and the 4th whereas Borg won the 1st and the 5th.
So in great events they were quite equal (perhaps a very very slight edge to Björn because he played Garros and was a pretty good 2nd at Forest).
In other events in my mind Connors had clearly the edge : he won (besides the US Open and the US Pro indoor) Palm Springs, Las Vegas and Wembley which were one of the greatest events outside the majors. He also won Washington, North Conway, Indianapolis, and in lesser events Birmingham, Hampton, Denver WCT, Cologne (I don't count invitational events). Except his loss to Ramirez in the US Pro he was invincible in the US summer circuit.
Borg in 1976 won (besides Wimby and Dallas and invitational events) many less tournaments : Toronto Indoor WCT, Dusseldorf, and the US Pro.
Here is the great difference between both players.
Connors won 12 tourneys while Borg won only 6, twice less : enormous (that year Connors didn't win "beach tournaments", as in the USLTA "Riordan" winter circuit in 1973-1974 (not held on a beach but in cold indoor structures), to artificially enlarge his record).

If I use the ATP stats (a little incomplete because some invitational events aren't taken into account) Connors won 91 matches and lost 8 (I don't pick the WCT challenge cup in December 76 and April 77 in the ATP stats for 1976, besides the ATP didn't list the round robin matches of that tourney). If I include 1976 Davis Cup matches (played in October and December 1975), Connors win-loss record was 94-9 (including 3 defeats which were defaults or withdrawals) = 91,26% of matches won.
Borg win-loss record was 58-11 ( = 84,06%) so Borg not only lost more matches than Connors but also won less many matches (58/94=61,70% = 38,33% less).

So in 1976 Connors was much more consistent than Borg.

So even though Borg was slightly better in very great events,
in minor events Connors was clearly better (12-6 in tournaments won with more important events on Connors' side, 91,26%-84,06% in win-loss percentage record, etc ...) : I think that these arguments give an overall slight edge to Connors. Even if I state that after that both players are equal then H2H is the last criterion to decide and there Connors led 3-0 (4-0 including Caracas 4-man event) with only 1 set lost in all.

Conclusion : for me Connors was the world #1 in 1976 by a very slight margin

I won't be as long for 1977 though I should because it is a case as complex as 1976 and here again I don't agree with Borgforever :
This time I consider Borg as the best ... by a very slight margin (I can't give Vilas a co-No 1 ranking especially as Roland Garros was played without Borg (on the verge on becoming the #1), Connors (in his last weeks as #1), Gerulaitis (Italian Open winner with Vilas in the draw), Stockton (semifinalist of Roland next year), Tanner (the only one who never reached the semis in a major held on clay) all in the top10 or close to at the time and with Orantes injured).

So I come back to my list :

Borg 1977, 1978, 1979, 1980 (4 years)

McEnroe 1981, 1983, 1984 (3 years) (and certainly not in 1982, such a bad ATP ranking, McEnroe was only #3 behind Connors and Lendl)

Lendl 1985, 1986, 1987 (3 years)

For me in 1989 though he won many events he was so clearly outclassed by Becker in great events : Becker won Wimby, Flushing, the Davis Cup alone, and Paris-Bercy which was at the time the greatest event after the Slams, the Masters, Key Biscayne and the Davis Cup (the last 3 events in disorder). In 1990 all including me considered that Edberg was the best without any doubt though because of the Slam Cup affair (Edberg rightly despised the Slam Cup) the ITF wrongly designated Lendl as World Champion).

Sampras 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998 (6 years)

(some think Rafter was the best in 1998 but I don't)

Federer 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 (4 years)

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

see below (once again a "computer bug")

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

see below (once again a "computer bug")

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

I agree 1964-1970, but I am surprised to see 1971.

I shall have to study results from 1971 more carefully.

See jeffrey's ranking with his own methodology :http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showpost.php?p=3146905&postcount=292

and jeffrey's estimation with my approach : http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showpost.php?p=3160813&postcount=317

In both cases Laver = 1 and Rosewall = 2.
As said many times before Newk except Wimby did very little those years
and Smith played very well in the summer of 1971 but wasn't terrible at other periods and only won depleted events (as the Davis Cup).

One remark about 1947 :
I don't exactly know what was the exact win-loss record between Riggs and Kramer in 1947 only but they met something like 4 times in December 1947 and Riggs led 3-1, each time on indoor fast courts. So in 1947, strictly speaking, Riggs dominated Kramer on a surface supposed help Jack's powerful game. If Riggs had played on slow surfaces he probably would have won all the (at least first) matches.
So for me there is no doubt that Riggs was the best in 1947.
Riggs was the best always in weak years that is whenever Budge or Kramer were not at their very top.

In his book Kramer very clearly explained that because of Rigg's play he had to drastically change his game to improve. In January 1948 Kramer decided to play his "big game" that is to go to the net almost all of the time (until 1947 Kramer's game was closer to the game of his idols, Vines and Budge).
So only in 1948 Kramer hugely improved and became better than Riggs (on fast courts because on clay Riggs had still the edge but clay wasn't important in pro tennis at the time). Kramer wrote that he began to master his new game around mid-January 1948.

In conclusion : Riggs world #1 in 1947 and Kramer world #1 in 1948 far ahead anyone, Riggs included.

 

[hoodjem]

Why is the US Open reduced to 150 points in 1971?

It looks like a full draw of 128 (with seven matches).?

 

[SgtJohn]

'evening everyone!

Some remarks on this matter...Thank you Carlo for your posts because for some of these years I had 'fixed' my mind on some ranking for some time, but looking at the data again maked me realize they still deserve more thinking!

1897: very hard year. I see 3 contenders: Reggie, who won Wimbledon in an impressive fashion, beating all the best players of the time. Then there is Eaves, winner of the Irish and the British Covered (both Majors-level events), and was the finalist at Wimbledon, plus played the US Champs, losing only in the challenge round to Wrenn. The third one is then Wrenn, who beat a top 2 British player in his Challenge Round, but lost to Larned at Longwood (2nd most prestigious US event).
Personally I give this year to Eaves as he performed well in every major tournament he entered, and did this on 2 continents, a rare feat at the time. Doherty's defeats everywhere outside Wimbledon build a strong case against him, and his negative head-to-head against Eaves tips the balance in the latter's favour for me... Naturally, a win is a win, but it is interesting to note that Eaves only loss against Reggie at Wimbledon came after he retired...

1901: again a very hard year involving Reggie Doherty. I think that Karoly saw him as the top player and I often followed his opinion, but on second thought it seems a bit shaky. Doherty won the Irish only because Laurie retired after the match's interruption (there was one set all at this point), and lost his Wimbledon title. Wimbledon champion Gore had weak results elsewhere. Laurie was excellent throughout the year but lost early at Wimbledon. Finally I agree with Carlo that Larned, who didn't play against any British, deserves to be number 1, seeing that he swept the US circuit...

1931: a nightmare to rank. 3 contenders but I want to rank none of them number 1.
-Cochet did very poorly in tournament play, the highlight being a Monte-Carlo win, due to injury. Still he won both his singles in the Davis Cup challenge round, the most significant feat at this time.
-Tilden dominated the pro circuit, but bear in mind that his opponents were far inferior to the best amateurs.
-Vines won everything on the US circuit but did absolutely no international play ( no trip to Europe and no Davis Cup). In an era when the top players were almost all from Europe, it is a big issue. Contrary to 1901, there was a tradition that it was hard to be considered the best if you did not prove it in Davis Cup play...

I personally choose Cochet whenever I really have to make a choice, but for me it's a tie.

1934-1938: Perry, then Budge.
I choose the best amateur for these years.
1. I feel that the amateur field was slightly better. I realize this statement needs more proof, I will talk longer about that when I have time.
2. The 'adaptation' factor. Whenever an amateur had turned pro, I consider he was almost bound to lose due to the tremendous change : different surface, different 'mood', different format with the long tours, etc. So when Perry is roughly equal to Vines in 1937 in spite of these changes (although Vines was obviously perfectly accustomed to the pro game), I consider Perry was probably better in the years before. When Budge crushes the others in his first pro year, it shows that he had been better long ago already in my opinion.

1941: I would probably give this year to Perry, for the sake of quality of opposition, but it was probably close, and we don't have a lot of data.

I'll have to write the rest later, especially considering that I'm getting near the early 50s, that is a nightmare, rankings-wise ...

Jonathan

 

[SgtJohn]

1950: I'm curious as to why you give Kramer the edge, Carlo. Kramer did not win any tournament, while Segura won the very significant US Pro. Kramer won the main tour, which made him 'professional world champion', but he beat Gonzales, a brand new arrival from the amateur tour, so that says nothing on his relative level compared to Segura. Segura would probably have crushed Gonzales too in a tour...
Sure, Kramer was superior to Segura in 1949, and he was again in 1951, but raw results in 1950 are not enough in my opinion to put him above.
So all in all I give 1950 to 'old Pancho'.

1952: Another difficult year. Both Sedgman and Gonzales were the best among their peers, each winning major events (Wimbledon and Forest Hills, Wembley and Philadelphia), and coming short at others (Roland Garros for Sedgman, US Pro for Gonzales).
The amateur field wasn't extraordinary (Drobny, McGregor, Seixas), but the pro field was also a bit depleted: with Kramer injured most of the year, Segura was Gonzales's only rival.
In the end it's tempting to compare them using the 1953 record. Sedgman crushed Gonzales in Wembley then, but apparently Gonzales won a small Australian tour. Anyway, Gonzales's long absence from the tour in 1953 makes all his results a bit irrelevant that year.
So it's basically a tie. In the list at the beginning of this thread, I counted 1952 for Gonzales, but honestly I cannot decide.

1953:
3 contenders for this year, plus Gonzales, whom I, as many, feel has been unfairly robbed of this year by Kramer.
Kramer dominated the others (except for a single defeat at Segura in Caracas) when he played, but he only played the first half of the year.
Segura was the most consistent by far, and he dominated his head-to-head against Sedgman.
Sedgman was average most of the year but won the most significant event at Wembley and also in Paris (even if it was not a true French Pro, I guess a clay event in Paris is always important), beating Gonzales, the man who had dominated the pros just a year before.

In recent times I have named Kramer the top player, but for no other year have I been so much back-and-forth....so it is another tie!

 

[pc1]

'evening everyone!

Some remarks on this matter...Thank you Carlo for your posts because for some of these years I had 'fixed' my mind on some ranking for some time, but looking at the data again maked me realize they still deserve more thinking!

1897: very hard year. I see 3 contenders: Reggie, who won Wimbledon in an impressive fashion, beating all the best players of the time. Then there is Eaves, winner of the Irish and the British Covered (both Majors-level events), and was the finalist at Wimbledon, plus played the US Champs, losing only in the challenge round to Wrenn. The third one is then Wrenn, who beat a top 2 British player in his Challenge Round, but lost to Larned at Longwood (2nd most prestigious US event).
Personally I give this year to Eaves as he performed well in every major tournament he entered, and did this on 2 continents, a rare feat at the time. Doherty's defeats everywhere outside Wimbledon build a strong case against him, and his negative head-to-head against Eaves tips the balance in the latter's favour for me... Naturally, a win is a win, but it is interesting to note that Eaves only loss against Reggie at Wimbledon came after he retired...

1901: again a very hard year involving Reggie Doherty. I think that Karoly saw him as the top player and I often followed his opinion, but on second thought it seems a bit shaky. Doherty won the Irish only because Laurie retired after the match's interruption (there was one set all at this point), and lost his Wimbledon title. Wimbledon champion Gore had weak results elsewhere. Laurie was excellent throughout the year but lost early at Wimbledon. Finally I agree with Carlo that Larned, who didn't play against any British, deserves to be number 1, seeing that he swept the US circuit...

1931: a nightmare to rank. 3 contenders but I want to rank none of them number 1.
-Cochet did very poorly in tournament play, the highlight being a Monte-Carlo win, due to injury. Still he won both his singles in the Davis Cup challenge round, the most significant feat at this time.
-Tilden dominated the pro circuit, but bear in mind that his opponents were far inferior to the best amateurs.
-Vines won everything on the US circuit but did absolutely no international play ( no trip to Europe and no Davis Cup). In an era when the top players were almost all from Europe, it is a big issue. Contrary to 1901, there was a tradition that it was hard to be considered the best if you did not prove it in Davis Cup play...

I personally choose Cochet whenever I really have to make a choice, but for me it's a tie.

1934-1938: Perry, then Budge.
I choose the best amateur for these years.
1. I feel that the amateur field was slightly better. I realize this statement needs more proof, I will talk longer about that when I have time.
2. The 'adaptation' factor. Whenever an amateur had turned pro, I consider he was almost bound to lose due to the tremendous change : different surface, different 'mood', different format with the long tours, etc. So when Perry is roughly equal to Vines in 1937 in spite of these changes (although Vines was obviously perfectly accustomed to the pro game), I consider Perry was probably better in the years before. When Budge crushes the others in his first pro year, it shows that he had been better long ago already in my opinion.

1941: I would probably give this year to Perry, for the sake of quality of opposition, but it was probably close, and we don't have a lot of data.

I'll have to write the rest later, especially considering that I'm getting near the early 50s, that is a nightmare, rankings-wise ...

Jonathan

Just out of curiousity, where do you rank Hans Nusslein in the 1930's? It's possible in some years he was number one.

 

[SgtJohn]

Just out of curiousity, where do you rank Hans Nusslein in the 1930's? It's possible in some years he was number one.

Nusslein was a very consistent player throughout the 30s, and overall I would place him 4th just after the 'Big 3' in a decade ranking.

For many individual years, he's hard to rank simply for the reason that from 1936 to 1938 there was not one but 2 pro tours: the American one, dominated by Vines and, after 1937, Perry, and the European one where Nusslein was the king, crushing everybody.

Before that, Hans was the top pro in 1933, but there is little doubt that Perry and Crawford were better. In 1934 and 1935 Vines had a clearly better record in tournaments and a positive H2H against Nusslein. I guess that's why the American is usually ranked higher in the years later, even if there was never any encounter between them for 3 years.

I seem to remember also references by Bowers to German test matches where Von Cramm beat Nusslein, which would lead to a kind of equation: Nusslein < Von Cramm < Perry=Vines, but I admit this is very approximate, especially if it is all based on some casual 'friendly' play...

Jonathan

 

[pc1]

Jonathan,

I admit it's hard to rate Nusslein but I am fascinated by what they have said about him. From what I understand Nusslein's widow mentioned that Nusslein won the majority of the matches against Vines when they played on clay while Vines won the majority indoors. The impression one gets is that they played virtually even but of course I could be greatly mistaken.

Around 1934, 1935 I would think Vines would clearly be better than Nusslein but I think in the late 1930's it may have become very close.

I know Tilden was impressed by him and according to Joe McCauley's book Cochet never won a set from Nusslein. Against Cochet was past his best but I would think still pretty good. Nusslein won a number of Pro Majors including the French Pro and Wembley in 37 and 38 and the U.S. Pro in 1934.

 

[BTURNER]

Just out of curiousity, where do you rank Hans Nusslein in the 1930's? It's possible in some years he was number one.

First time since I've been on this site, I had to google a name! Bud Collins doesn't mention him and niether do most histories of the game that I have read. I guess I am the ignorant uneducated one on this site.

 

[pc1]

First time since I've been on this site, I had to google a name! Bud Collins doesn't mention him and niether do most histories of the game that I have read. I guess I am the ignorant uneducated one on this site.

Trust me he fascinates me because he was so unknown and yet apparently so great. It's an amazing story to me. Tilden thought he was great. Budge said (Budge said this about a few people so you have to take this with a grain of salt) "Nusslein is the finest player I ever saw" according to Joe McCauley's The History of Professional Tennis.

It is possible that he had some years in the late 1930's that he had single digits in losses despite playing many tournaments.

The problem with Nusslein is that he never was really an amateur so he never attained the fame of a Perry or a Vines for example but he was amazing. And if you're ignorant and uneducated, what does that say about me if I'm learning from your posts? lol.

 

[hoodjem]

Nusslein's name does pop up a lot in the 30s. Seems that he was always very close, dogging the heels of Vines or Perry or Budge.

 

[pc1]

Nusslein's name does pop up a lot in the 30s. Seems that he was always very close, dogging the heels of Vines or Perry or Budge.

In McCauley's book in 1937 Nusslein won six tournaments defeating Tilden, Cochet, Stoefen, Ramillon among others.

In 1938 I see he won at least five tournaments.

In 1939 I see he won at least two tournaments defeating Vines, Tilden.

He was clearly much better than Cochet when they played and in the late 1930's Nusslein was much better than Tilden. I would think that Nusslein in the late 1930's was near or on the level of Budge, Vines and Perry. I would suppose von Cramm also. I can't think of anyone else who could compare so at worse I would think Nusslein is fifth but I can see him higher than that.

 

[GameSampras]

Too bad Pete got hurt in 99. Because he definitely had a lock on the Number 1 that year giving him 7 years. And maybe even 8 but he got married in 00 and missed tournaments there at then of 00

 

[Cesc Fabregas]

Too bad Pete got hurt in 99. Because he definitely had a lock on the Number 1 that year giving him 7 years. And maybe even 8 but he got married in 00 and missed tournaments there at then of 00

Yeah if Pete wasn't injured during that USO he would have ended the year number 1 he totally destroyed Agassi at Wimbledon and at The Masters.

 

[timnz]

Borg only number 1 for 3 years - 1978 to 1980. Vilas number 1 in 1977

I dispute the thought that Borg was number 1 in 1977. It has to be Vilas that year. Vilas won 18 Tournaments that year (24 finals in all he made!) including 2 Grand Slams and was also in the final of a third Grand Slam tournament. Borg won 12 Tournaments including one Grand Slam (but no other Grand Slam finals).

I DO think that Borg was a better player than Vilas that year. Their head to head proves it. However, being a better player is a different thing than being ranked higher. Ranking is based on achievement, and on the basis of that Vilas outstrips Borg. I do know that Borg wasn't allowed to play Roland Garros that year, but is that Vilas' fault?

I know Connors was ranked officially number 1 at the end of 1977, but no-one seriously agrees with that ranking. In discussions he is regarded as third behind Borg and Vilas (in whatever order).

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

Why is the US Open reduced to 150 points in 1971?

It looks like a full draw of 128 (with seven matches).?

jeffrey rightly granted less points to the US Open than to Wimby because many great WCT players didn't come : Laver, Rosewall, Gimeno, Emerson, (Drysdale ?) apparently because of the feud between the ILTF and the WCT organization (but the reasons aren't very clear : Rosewall for instance wouldn't have come at all because his children were apparently ill, to be confirmed). So when you see that at least Rod & Ken, the best two players in the world in jeffrey's ranking, were absent from the US Open you can deduce that the draw wasn't as perfect as Wimby's. So jeffrey's attribution isn't bad.

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

Answers to SgtJohn

1897 : you're absolutely right about the 3 contenders, Reggie, Eaves and Wrenn. As you I would be tempted to choose Eaves but I'm not sure because he lost "many" times in the US : to Harold Nisbet at Longwood Bowl, to WA Larned at Hoboken in round-robin and to Wrenn at Newport. Eaves was ranked only #3 in the US ranking behind R.D. Wrenn and W.A. Larned. This is what makes me prevent to rank Eaves #1 without any doubt but I can't really choose either Reggie or Wrenn. I suppose I've chosen Reggie because I absolutely want to choose one but I haven't a clear opinion at all. So I keep your arguments in mind (in particular the fact that Eaves was the only one to play on both continents).

1931 : as I've written everywhere Cochet's year was really poor and here I strongly disagree with you.Vines was clearly the best amateur that year. As ever in those times, players couldn't easily travel abroad. In spring 1931 Vines wasn't yet considered as the best US amateur so he wasn't invited to play Wimbledon and the Davis Cup : Wood and Shields then crossed the Atlantic to play both events but when they came back to the US they didn't confirm they were at the top of the US amateur tennis and Vines completely dominated the US circuit, beating Perry 4 times in 4 meetings (or according to other sources 4 out of 5 confrontations). So Vines couldn't play in Europe that year. On the other side Cochet didn't play in the US (because he hadn't appreciated the Forest Hills organization in 1928 he didn't come back to the US before 1932) so comparisons between both players are hard. Nevertheless Cochet's season was relatively poor. He won Monte Carlo over Lyttelton Rogers, then the Danish Covered Court (Copenhagen) over Einer Ulrich, father of Torben and Jürgen and grandfather of Lars, drummer of metal band Metallica. Cochet then won his third and last tournament of the year, the Austrian Chps in early May (over Menzel). Next week he lost easily to Pat Hughes in the Italian Chps at Milan because of his illness. Then he couldn't play at all the French at Roland. He made his comeback at Wimbledon, still ill, and lost in the first round. When he played the Davis Cup Challenge Round in late July he hasn't fully recovered his health nevertheless he defeated both Austin and Perry. Then he virtually retired until next year. In those years the the Davis Cup Challenge Round was the climax of the amateur year. This partly explains why Myers and Francis Gordon Lowe ranked Cochet as the best amateur but the British journalist also ranked Cochet on reputation. The problem is that he forgot Vines because the latter wasn't selected in the US Davis Cup team. Therefore the American player couldn't cross the Atlantic to show how strong he was. Vines won 9 tournaments and next year always beat Cochet.
Therefore I think that Cochet wasn't a contender a 1930. According to the witnesses he was less good than in 1930 (because of his illness and his professional constraints) and above all as I described it above he played very little. Ray Bowers claimed that an evaluator (probably E.C. Potter) deemed that in 1931 Cochet would have no chance against Tilden (who was close to Cochet in 1930). Vines' record was much more impressive. Sure he didn't play the Davis Cup but he was perhaps wrongly not selected by the US Officials.
So for me it's a tie between Tilden and Vines but not Cochet who was ranked so high by Myers on reputation.

1934-1935 : I am eager to see your explanations about the superiority of the amateur field. However you're right about the adaptation factor. But I'm not convinced about Perry's superiority. Bowers pointed out that once Vines led the tour (in April) whenever Vines was 2 or 3 matches ahead of Perry in their North American tour, then Vines lost most of his next matches suggesting that perhaps Vines purposely lost some of them to keep the score close and therefore to attract the public (here is what Bowers wrote :"In matches played when Vines was ahead in the running tally by two matches or more, then Elly's W-L record was 8-17. In all other matches his W-L record was 24-12 (or 24-9 excluding the first three matches when Elly was ill). Vines lost all seven times when he was three matches ahead. Why did Elly perform so poorly whenever he was comfortably ahead? Was he purposely allowing the tally to stay close?"). But Bowers said there was no prove by writing "All tennis competitors know that a player who is behind improves in determination and concentration, while a player who is ahead tends to let up. Our suspicions therefore remain unproven, but they remain". Kramer is convinced that Vines let Perry come back in that tour though Vines never confessed it to Kramer or someone else. And in 1938 Vines clearly beat Perry.
And in their amateur years only in 1933 Perry had better results than Vines who superior to Perry from 1930 to 1932. And had Vines not play Down Under in summer 1932-1933 he would have been much less tired and probably would have played better in summer 1933 than he actually did and in that case I'm not sure that Perry would have had better results.
So I'm not sure at all that Perry was better than Vines in 1934-1935 but I admit I have to take into account your good arguments.

About 1936 we agree : Perry first

About 1937-1938 we also agree. Budge very slightly ahead of Vines.

In 1939 Budge didn't crush Vines in their first tour but beat his elder 22 matches to 17 and Vines was told to be overweight and ill so Budge's domination wasn't outrageous at all but both players were very close and Budge later said that it was against Vines during their two-month tour that he improved the most in his whole career.

1941 : there are two small reasons why I give Riggs the edge : Riggs led 5-4 (and 30-15 ?) while serving for the match when Perry retired because he had injured his arm after dropping. So slight advantage to Riggs. The other reason is what Bowers wrote about writer J.P. Allen and another watcher who deemed "that leading amateur Bobby Riggs should defeat the top pro, Perry".

1950 : I agree with you. Segura was clearly the best player in tournaments but what makes me choose Kramer, is Kramer's results in 1950. If I consider the calendar year, Kramer clearly dominated Gonzales from January to May (but I haven't the precise result of their head-to-head meetings over that period) and he also clearly dominated Segura in the 1950 part of their 1950-1951 tour which began on October 26, 1950 and finished next March (Segura led in the first days but by mid-November Kramer was already leading). I know this tour counted for 1951 but nearly half of it was played in 1950 so this is what I use (with the Paris and Cleveland tournaments) to compare Kramer and Segura in 1950. So in my mind it's very tough to rank Segura #1 in 1950 but I concede it was very close between both players. 1950 is undoubtedly one of the most complex years.

1952 : we are tempted to compare Gonzales and Sedgman with their 1953 records (because they couldn't meet in 1952) when Segdman indeed crushed Gonzales but when Gonzales easily beat Segura at Wembley who globally dominated Sedgman in direct meetings (7-3 in 1953) so it's as usual hard to compare. And we both agree to tie Gorgo and Sedge for 1952 (for the moment).

1953 itself : Paris (in November) wasn't a French Pro and was exactly the same event as the 1950 edition (January). Not played on outdoor clay but on indoor fast court (probably fast cement) at the Palais des Sports in Paris (and besides I own Tennis de France Janvier 1954 with photos of the event and though they are black and white you clearly see that the ground wasn't made of clay). I have no 100% proof that the 1950 event was a four-man singles competition but Kramer, Parker, Gonzales and Segura (the four man who played the world tour) played in doubles (I watched them on a video at the Tenniseum at Roland Garros) so I greatly suspect that Gonzales and Parker played the singles and lost in the 1st round (because Segura beat Kramer in the final) and in 1953 it was still a 4-man event (Segdman beating Segura then Gonzales, Gonzales defeating Budge and Segura overcoming Budge for 3rd place).

Thanks for your arguments (that I copy-paste in my word document) Jonathan.

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

In McCauley's book in 1937 Nusslein won six tournaments defeating Tilden, Cochet, Stoefen, Ramillon among others.
In 1938 I see he won at least five tournaments.
In 1939 I see he won at least two tournaments defeating Vines, Tilden.
He was clearly much better than Cochet when they played and in the late 1930's Nusslein was much better than Tilden. I would think that Nusslein in the late 1930's was near or on the level of Budge, Vines and Perry. I would suppose von Cramm also. I can't think of anyone else who could compare so at worse I would think Nusslein is fifth but I can see him higher than that.

Nüsslein was clearly one of the very best in the second half of the 30's. Sure he lost to Von Cramm at the Rot-Weiss Club in 1934 but according to Geist, Nüsslein's wife told him that Hanne was ill that day.
Tilden asserted that in 1936 Nüsslein beat von Cramm consistently in Davis Cup training.
With Vines and Perry almost always touring in 1937-1938 (Perry just entered the 1938 US Pro in those years) Nüsslein captured almost all the tournaments.
And in 1939 Nüsslein won one tournament with Budge in the draw (Southport) and played superbly against Budge in their only meeting of the year (at Wembley) that Don won 13-11 2-6 6-4 (Hamilton Price deemed the match among tennis history's most magnificent). And with Vines, Nüsslein shared the wins (1 all) in direct meetings that year. Apparently Vines was globally given a very slight edge over Nüsslein in 1939 because of their results at Roland Garros which was the tournament with the best field of the year : Nüsslein surprisingly lost on clay in straight sets to Stoefen who in his turn was defeated by Vines in 5 sets.
I almost don't understand German but I couldn't resist to buy the book about Nüsslein written by Robert Geist (who is Austrian) and I was surprised to read that even Nüsslein considered himself behind Vines, Perry and Budge (suddenly I have a doubt and I will look at the book later and eventually edit that last claim if I'm wrong).

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

I dispute the thought that Borg was number 1 in 1977. It has to be Vilas that year...

Yeah this is an incredibly difficult year to handle.

I think there will be dispute for a long time about Borg and Vilas in 1977. Some as me will consider that Roland Garros field was too weak (not only Borg but also Connors, Gerulaitis, Stockton and Tanner missing (Orantes was injured)) to give Vilas the edge (in the Australian Open there was only 4 players of the Top20 so it isn't in my mind a Slam tournament but a very ordinary one) and others as you who consider that it was a true Slam and that Vilas was the best.

As Borgforever wisely said once, we have to agree to disagree on that point.

 

[pc1]

Yeah this is an incredibly difficult year to handle.

I think there will be dispute for a long time about Borg and Vilas in 1977. Some as me will consider that Roland Garros field was too weak (not only Borg but also Connors, Gerulaitis, Stockton and Tanner missing (Orantes was injured)) to give Vilas the edge (in the Australian Open there was only 4 players of the Top20 so it isn't in my mind a Slam tournament but a very ordinary one) and others as you who consider that it was a true Slam and that Vilas was the best.

As Borgforever wisely said once, we have to agree to disagree on that point.

It was tough. I think the average standard of play by Borg was the highest of any player that year but Vilas may very well have accomplished the most winning the French, the U.S. Open and so many other tournaments plus a long winning streak.

I think number one that year came down to Vilas and Borg. Borg was clearly the better player but Vilas did so much that year.

 

[SgtJohn]

1931:

OK Carlo, you convinced me, Cochet really had terrible results apart from the Davis Cup in 1931, I give up supporting him as a possible number 1. I found a London Times article after his Wimbledon defeat describing his 'sickly' state from the beginning of the year. France was really fortunate he was up and running again for the DC...

Then it has to be Vines at the top in my opinion... I know the Bowers article about 1931 states that Tilden had tremendously increased his level of play, but I have always been a little doubtful...I feel that 2 factors contributed to make Tilden look impressive to the observers of that time:
-the surface, usually quick wood in the pro tour, suited Tilden's game much more. (The US pro was on grass though, I admit).
-the rest of the pro field was nothing compared to the amateurs. I don't suggest that Kozeluh or Richards were not great players, but they could not be compared to 1930 Cochet and Borotra. I think Tilden might have looked good in the pro tour just as Federer would look like a sure GOAT if he played a 100-dates tour against Roddick and Davydenko: because their game suit his.
These are just suggestions, but to me the lack of recent data letting us compare Kozeluh and Richards with the amateurs is a bit disturbing when trying to assess Tilden's level of play...

1934-6:
The element of 'showmanship' existed in early pro tennis, I admit, but I'm reluctant taking into account such an 'incertain' factor. (we could also argue for instance that Tilden lost sets on purpose, to set up a good show, in meaningless DC matches, such as the last one of the 1922 ties, a performance that we use as a basis to claim Johnston was the best player!).

The difficulty with 1934 and 1935 is that both men had very strong runs, dominating and winning most of the major events in their tour...

So ultimately I'm relying on the strength of the field. Here is a top 10 for 1934 as I see it:
Perry,Vines,Crawford,Von Cramm,Nusslein,Tilden ,Austin,Allison,Kozeluh,Shields
We have 6 amateurs vs 4 pros, and 3 vs 2 in the top 5. It's a slim margin for sure, but that leads me to give a very slight edge to Perry.


Jonathan

 

[urban]

In German tennis circles, the elegant von Cramm always was the prince, while the small, stocky and bald Hanne Nüsslein was more the Cinderella man. Otto Froitzheim, the amateur, and Roman Najuch, the pro, were very good older players from 1900 to 1920. Roderich Menzel the 1938 RG finalist, who played DC for Czechia and Germany, was the leading tennis writer in German language. He wrote some novels and history books on tennis and rated von Cramm higher than Nüsslein. Nüsslein must have been an excellent coach. He coached the US DC squad in the 30s, and later trained the very talented lefthander Dr. Christian Kuhncke, who lead Germany to the DC Cup final in 1970.

 

[Benhur]

I dispute the thought that Borg was number 1 in 1977. It has to be Vilas that year. Vilas won 18 Tournaments that year (24 finals in all he made!) including 2 Grand Slams and was also in the final of a third Grand Slam tournament. Borg won 12 Tournaments including one Grand Slam (but no other Grand Slam finals).

Of course. 1977 clearly belongs to Vilas. He won the French, the USO, and was finalist at the Australian. He won 18 tournaments and 145 matches. I don't even begin to understand why this is open to discussion. It’s just one of those things. Invoking the old canard of “weakness of field” might conceivably have a small decorative place in a case where there is a very difficult tie in accomplishment in majors and elsewhere. No such case exists here by any stretch of the imagination.

According to both the ATP and the ITF, Lendl has 4 years as number 1. The ATP gives him 85, 86, 87 and 89. The ITF gives him 85, 86, 87 and 90. For starters, it is strange that to give Lendl only 3 years one has to carefully handpick that both organizations were wrong, but in different directions, on different years.

Careful analysis has convinced me that the ATP is right on this, and the ITF is wrong. Not that they are both right and wrong depending on the year of one’s convenience. There is no question that 1990 belongs to Edberg, not to Lendl.

I went through his and Becker’s 1989 record in detail at some point, and Lendl has a significantly better record and is far ahead according to the criteria used at the time, and to most other criteria used since then and to the present. But most importantly, the ranking is clearly consistent with the criteria used, it wasn’t produced by voting by a few cats in a closed room. And the same exact thing could happen today with today's system. Becker wasn’t year end number one for the simple reason that he never even came close to catching Lendl on the rankings. To give Becker the number one spot, the ATP would have had to retroactively invalidate its own system and improvise one that would give Becker the spot, which would have been unprecedented. The ITF of course did not seem to have any system in place at all, other than voting by a few "experts" and going with the "feel of the moment," as evidenced by their astonishing decision to give 1990 to Lendl over Edberg. I acknowledge that the case for Lendl in 89 is not so overwhelmingly clear-cut as the case for Vilas in 77 (where it's being even open to discussion boggles the mind) but it is very strong all the same.

One interesting point of comparison for the studious scholar in the methods of biased and selective judgment is this: in the Vilas-Borg case, the fact that Vilas had a much better performance in slams (2 slams + 1 final vs only 1 slam and 0 finals) is discreetly passed over in silence, with some vague invocations of "weakness of field." Vilas record elsewhere is also clearly better, and that's also covered in torpid smoke. On the other hand, in the Lendl-Borg case, the fact that the difference in slam performance is significantly less marked than in the previous case (2 slams and 0 finals for Becker, vs 1 slam + 1 final for Lendl, with the exact same performance in the remaining 2 slams) is presented as overwhelming proof that it overrides Lendl's much better performance elsewhere. Interesting.

I won't go through it all again, but here is the thread on Lendl-Becker 1989

http://tinyurl.com/djw2tu

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

Thanks SgtJohn and urban for your posts.

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

Of course. 1977 clearly belongs to Vilas.
...To give Becker the number one spot, the ATP would have had to retroactively invalidate its own system and improvise one that would give Becker the spot, which would have been unprecedented....
in the Vilas-Borg case, the fact that Vilas had a much better performance in slams (2 slams + 1 final vs only 1 slam and 0 finals) is discreetly passed over in silence, with some vague invocations of "weakness of field."
http://tinyurl.com/djw2tu

1) Yes there were clearly weak fields in the Australian Open from 1972 to 1982 : never more than 4 players among the Top20 every year (and even only 2 Top20 players some years as in 1972 or 1973) so I completely disagree with you about the fact that we call the Australian a Slam event in those years. Except the Australians nobody cared about that tournament (and I was so disappointed at the time that almost no great player made the trip to play there), it was just a very ordinary tournament and the real start in the mid-70's wasn't that depleted tournament but the US Pro indoor at Philadelphia were almost all the best entered every year (from 1969 when it was already labelled "US Pro Indoor" to around 1982). All the Vilas' fans always use that argument of better performance in slams than Borg in 1977 so this isn't discreetly passed over as you state.
So we never agree on the #1 spot in 1977 : I'm not completely sure that Borg was the #1 but I wholly disagree that "of course 1977 belongs to Vilas". This is very debatable.

2) Yes the ATP ranking weren't good in 1989 as they have never been since their creation on August 23, 1973 until even now, though there have been huge improvements since its start. It isn't still perfect nowadays. In 1973 a Slam was worth only 1/3 more than the other greater events, the WCT Finals and the Masters had no ATP points at all and of course Davis Cup wasn't granted anything at all. It was ridiculous and what happened : Orantes was #2 at the start which was completely unfair to Smith for instance who was the true #1 or 2 in August 1973. Connors was ranked #1 from mid-1974 to mid-1979 (except a week) though in 1975, 1977 and 1978 he wasn't the true best. Even now a Slam only counts twice a "Masters 1000". Do you really think that 2 Masters 1000 should be equal to a Slam event ? Do you really think that future players dream to win the Cincinatti event or the Monte Carlo tourney ? No they dream about Wimby, Flushing or Roland but certainly not about any Masters 1000 (except perhaps in the case he is a local player : I suppose that if you are born and live in Indian Wells you eventually dream about that tourney). But do you think that Safin is famous because he won Madrid and Paris-Bercy in a row in the autumn 2004 ? Certainly not but because he won two months later the Australian Slam. So even now the ATP ranking isn't fair because it doesn't grant enough points for the true majors that is the Slam tournaments. Nowdays the ratios are 2 (for a Slam) - 1.5 (for the Masters Cup now called something like the ATP World Tour Finals) - 1 for a Masters 1000. For me the ratios should be like 4 - 2 - 1. A Masters Cup should be equal to 2 Masters 1000 and a Slam to 2 Masters Cup. I know many disagree but when you see how many rate Federer on his number of Slam tournament wins when they compare him with other greats in tennis history but they don't use (or so little) his Masters Cup wins or Masters 1000 wins as an argument. They will consider (wrongly but I don't want to detail it here) that Federer is undoubtedly superior to Sampras if the Swiss won 15 Slams because those tourneys are so much important than the others, much more than the ATP ranking grants them.
So in 1989 Becker should have more points with his Slam feats. And besides Becker was overwhelming in Davis Cup that year, thrashing Edberg and Wilander. But did the ATP give him points for that ? Absolutely not. Completely unfair.
Becker that year won most of the great events. Even Paris-Bercy was more than the equivalent of a "simple Masters 1000 of today" (but I recognize that the Key Biscayne event that Lendl won then was also superior to a "simple ...").
So in conclusion I'm not certain at all that Lendl deserved the #1 spot that year.

One last thing about Becker. He always beat Lendl in Slams (be it in finals or semifinals) except in their last meeting when both were past their primes but it wasn't in last rounds which count much : it was only a round of 16 (in the US Open 1992).

 

[Benhur]

1) Yes there were clearly weak fields in the Australian Open from 1972 to 1982 : never more than 4 players among the Top20 every year (and even only 2 Top20 players some years as in 1972 or 1973) so I completely disagree with you about the fact that we call the Australian a Slam

Ah, we must rearrange the entire history of tennis to fit Borg as number one in 77. Eliminate all slams won by players in Australia prior to the 80s or something. Call them something else. Take away Laver's grand slams. etc. Excellent.

And I suppose the French was depleted also or otherwise anemic in 77 and does not really count as a slam. In addition, Borg was not there so it cannot count, just like the Australian. Borg must be the only player whose sainthood is sho shiny that its fans declare that when he didn't deign attend a slam, the slam does not really count as such. And of course the USO does not count because there were too many rowdy Argentineans who distracted Connors, and when Borg lost in the fourth round, well then of course the tournament lost its status until next year... So yeah, in general, Vilas FO + Vilas USO + Vilas AO final are at best equal, and probably worse, than Borg's Wimbledon. And of course Vilas 18 tournaments and 145 matches won are just a triviality.

So we never agree on the #1 spot in 1977 : I'm not completely sure that Borg was the #1 but I wholly disagree that "of course 1977 belongs to Vilas". This is very debatable.

Everything is debatable, including the excentricity of the orbit of the Moon and the existence of witches.

2) Yes the ATP ranking weren't good in 1989 as they have never been since their creation on August 23, 1973 until even now, though there have been huge improvements since its start. It isn't still perfect nowadays.

Of course not. Perfection is always in the hands of future rearrangers, who will one day perhaps decree a few surprise number ones in the last few decades. Lack of perfection is a far cry from anyone having the liberty to recreate the system as they will and rewrite history. I suppose you could change many more year-end number ones with these techniques.

Some years are of course extremely incomprehensible, like 77 (Connors??) or screwed up because they had two competing systems, one not considering the other, as happened in 82 (McEnroe???).

But by 1983 the system seemed to have come to make sense and resemble today's, though it kept changing in different ways. The result in 1989 contained the unprecedented oddity of a number two with a slightly better record in slams than the number one (about half a slam better if you consider a runner-up appearance to be worth 1/2 a slam). But this oddity is not at all inconceivable in any of the systems that existed since then until the very present, and it could perfectly well arise in the current system, as I've said many times. It is not difficult at all to imagine it. Not only could it arise, but it could do so with an even larger difference in the number of points accumulated than was the case in 1989. Would you then declare the system invalid?

In order to have a system where such a small difference in slam performance as Becker had over Lendl in 89 absolutely guarantees a better year-end ranking, you would have to render everything outside slams nearly meaningless for rankings, not a particularly appealing system. You need a ranking system that relies on something more than 4 tournaments, if you want to have some meaningful tennis year round.

There is no question that Lendl vastly outperformed Becker outside of slams in 1989, both in tournaments won, in how deep he went in those he didn't win, and in winning percentage. I've gone through this in detail in the "Lendl-Becker 1989" thread mentioned in my previous post. What you or any other thinks would be fairer in any given year is not very relevant. Not to the point that it should be changed because you think so. You cannot change retroactively every system that does not conform exactly to your preferences in order to have the results you want. A performance like Lendl's 89 in the current system would also be more than enough to surpass the small difference in points in their slam performance, which was exactly the difference between a win and a runner-up appearance. That was 300 points in last year's system, less than one Master's series. Perfectly surpassable by good appearances elsewhere, and of course Lendl surpassed it in spades. What would you do if the case arose in the current system, with a difference in points even higher than what happened in 89? It CAN, you know.

Do you really think that 2 Masters 1000 should be equal to a Slam event ?

Yes. Sounds pretty fair to me. Of course if would be nicer get those points by winning the slam than the 2 Master's, as it would mean more prestige and less work. But it is fair that the ranking points are the same. If you devalue all tournaments to increasingly smaller fractions of a slam, player's won't give a damn about them except for money, they will become increasingly similar to exhibitions.

Do you really think that future players dream to win the Cincinatti event or the Monte Carlo tourney ? No they dream about Wimby, Flushing or Roland

Of course, the bigger the dream the better. I agree. I wonder how you rationalize this when you find it "unclear" that Vilas FO, USO and runner-up AO are not better than Borg's W. I wonder through what tortuous contortions of the imagination one can arrive at any other conclusion than that Vilas has by far the best record that year.

But did the ATP give him points for that ? Absolutely not. Completely unfair.

Why unfair, if that was the accepted normal practice for all the decades, decade after decade in the history of tennis until now? NOBODY got ranking points for playing Davis Cup, either in 89 or in previous years or later years, until now. Why is it unfair to Becker, and not to everybody else?

One last thing about Becker. He always beat Lendl in Slams (be it in finals or semifinals) except in their last meeting when both were past their primes but it wasn't in last rounds which count much : it was only a round of 16 (in the US Open 1992).

That's totally irrelevant to the 1989 ranking discussion. For the record, Lendl edges Becker in total career h2h. Should that be a factor in determining who had a better record in 1989? I don't think so.
Also, in 1992 Lendl was 32 and Becker was 24. So if you consider Becker to be past his prime in the same sense as Lendl, then I guess Lendl has a winning h2h record against a player who, unlike him, must have been on his prime during all their encounters except the last one, or something like that.

 

[Benhur]

One oddity:

In the open era, Lendl is second only to Sampras in total number of weeks ranked as number 1: 270 weeks. (Sampras was number 1 for 286 weeks).

Connors was number one for a total of 268 weeks.

268 weeks is 5 years.

Yet Connors is given 6 years as year-end number one, while Lendl, with 270 weeks is given 3 years.

I guess Connors used a different measurer for the length of his weeks, or something. So Connors converted 5 years into 6. While Lendl saw 5 years shrink into 3.

Odd.

 

[SgtJohn]

One oddity:

In the open era, Lendl is second only to Sampras in total number of weeks ranked as number 1: 270 weeks. (Sampras was number 1 for 286 weeks).

Connors was number one for a total of 268 weeks.

268 weeks is 5 years.

Yet Connors is given 6 years as year-end number one, while Lendl, with 270 weeks is given 3 years.

I guess Connors used a different measurer for the length of his weeks, or something. So Connors converted 5 years into 6. While Lendl saw 5 years shrink into 3.

Odd.

These figures are not for consecutive weeks. To be the year-end champion you just need the week including the 31st of december. You could have hundreds of weeks and not one single year at the top, then...

 

[hoodjem]

jeffrey rightly granted less points to the 1971 US Open than to Wimby because many great WCT players didn't come : Laver, Rosewall, Gimeno, Emerson, (Drysdale ?) apparently because of the feud between the ILTF and the WCT organization (but the reasons aren't very clear : Rosewall for instance wouldn't have come at all because his children were apparently ill, to be confirmed). So when you see that at least Rod & Ken, the best two players in the world in jeffrey's ranking, were absent from the US Open you can deduce that the draw wasn't as perfect as Wimby's. So jeffrey's attribution isn't bad.

Aha. Thanks.

1970—Laver
1971—Laver/Rosewall/Newcombe
1972—Newcombe/Smith
1973—Nastase
1974—Connors
1975—Connors
1976—Connors/Borg
1977—Borg/Vilas/Connors
1978—Connors/Borg
1979—Borg
1980—Borg
1981—McEnroe
1982—Connors/McEnroe
1983—McEnroe
1984—McEnroe
1985—Lendl
1986—Lendl
1987—Lendl
1988—Wilander
1989—Becker/Lendl
1990—Edberg
1991—Edberg
1992—Courier

 

[krosero]

1) Yes there were clearly weak fields in the Australian Open from 1972 to 1982 : never more than 4 players among the Top20 every year (and even only 2 Top20 players some years as in 1972 or 1973) so I completely disagree with you about the fact that we call the Australian a Slam event in those years. Except the Australians nobody cared about that tournament (and I was so disappointed at the time that almost no great player made the trip to play there), it was just a very ordinary tournament and the real start in the mid-70's wasn't that depleted tournament but the US Pro indoor at Philadelphia were almost all the best entered every year (from 1969 when it was already labelled "US Pro Indoor" to around 1982).

Hi Carlo. I think that what you're doing here is the same thing I see tennis historians always doing. They're always asking, what were the four greatest tournaments of the year? Maybe the 4 Slams, but maybe not -- maybe some other tournaments had greater fields (your example, the U.S. Pro Indoor in '77).

Ben-Hur -- your response to Carlo's perfectly reasonable post was some lampoon (a strawman, actually) about rearranging all of tennis history for the sake of Borg, for the sake of his sainthood (your term). But I've debated Carlo and read a lot of his posts; I've always seen him being skeptical of Borg-worship; it's the last thing I would ever attribute to him. Your response to him was about rearranging tennis history for Borg, but all I see him doing is trying to fit 1977 into tennis history with the methods used for any other year.

There's a current thread that gives Laver the #1 position for 1970 (and 1971?), despite his not winning any of the traditional Slams (because his Dunlop victory can be regarded as the "true" Aussie Open of the year). On the face of it, that's even stranger than giving 1977 to Borg for only 1 Slam victory, but I see the logic in giving Laver that year, and a lot of people seem to agree with the arguments.

I'm not saying 1977 is the same, and you can re-open that evidence if you wish, but that's not what I'm talking about. My point is that the 1977 debate is not all about Borg. It's not all about Borg vs. Vilas. When people talk about quality of fields in the particular 1977 events, that's no different than what is done for any year in tennis history. And respectable arguments have been made for both Vilas and Borg, in my opinion.

And besides Becker was overwhelming in Davis Cup that year, thrashing Edberg and Wilander. But did the ATP give him points for that ? Absolutely not. Completely unfair.

Here's another one, Carlo. Correct me if I'm wrong but when you guys debate the #1 player for each year in the past, you always take Davis Cup into consideration, because of its weight. Its weight in 1989 was no longer as great as, say, in 1953, but it still was an event featuring singles competition and great pressure. Taking it into account is another method as old as tennis (well, almost as old), and the fact that the ATP computer does not take it into account does not mean we shouldn't; Davis Cup has been weighed far longer than there have been computerized rankings.

So we never agree on the #1 spot in 1977 : I'm not completely sure that Borg was the #1 but I wholly disagree that "of course 1977 belongs to Vilas". This is very debatable.

Agreed -- no one can say that the debate is over.

 

[Benhur]

These figures are not for consecutive weeks. To be the year-end champion you just need the week including the 31st of december. You could have hundreds of weeks and not one single year at the top, then...

Very well. Consider the following.

Lendl was ranked number 1 from the end of the US Open 1985 until the end of the USO 1988 (Sept 12). That’s three years.

4 months later (Jan 16 1989) he regained the number one ranking and kept it through all of 1989 and all the way into August 1990. That’s nearly 14 more months.

So, yes, he was ranked number 1 on December 31 1989, and in fact he was ranked number one the entire year except for the first two weeks of the year. And he ended the year with a pretty significant margin over Becker. It wasn’t close. And that’s why they (the ATP) had to give him the year. What else should they have done? The ITF gave it to Becker, and this is offered as authoritative proof that he was the rightful recipient. But the ITF kept no ranking system, did they? They couldn't have had a ranking system. Why? Well, because of what they did the following year.

Edberg ended 1990 as a clear number one, and so the ATP rightly gave him the year. But again the ITF disagreed, and the reason they did was that they didn't like something Edberg said. Wow!! What a nice ranking system that must have been! A system based on the amount of pleasure or the amount of displeasure induced by a player's words! And we are supposed take their judgment as authoritative when it suits our fancy (1989) but not when it doesn’t (1990). Ha!

The other weeks that Lendl spent as number 1 come from the years prior to 1985. Here one could suggest that, if the ranking system in 1982 didn't involve a complete schism between two organizations (one not recognizing the other at all) he may well have gotten the number one ranking in 1982 as well, based on the amazing number of tournaments he won that year. But since Lendl had no slams, I agree that Connors is the rightful number one in 1982 (but by a hair), Lendl is second. And Mac a distant third.

At any rate, to sum this up, creating a non-existing special system retroactively to have Becker emerge as year-end number one in 1989, by invoking a desire to achieve one's own idea of "perfection" in said system, is not very serious. If any system could be changed according to each person's idea of its "perfection," there would be as many systems as people on the planet, all of them "perfect" to someone.

 

[Benhur]

Very well. Consider the following.

Lendl was ranked number 1 from the end of the US Open 1985 until the end of the USO 1988 (Sept 12). That’s three years.

4 months later (Jan 16 1989) he regained the number one ranking and kept it through all of 1989 and all the way into August 1990. That’s nearly 14 more months.

Correction: nearly 19 more months

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

Benhur's quote : Ah, we must rearrange the entire history of tennis to fit Borg as number one in 77. Eliminate all slams won by players in Australia prior to the 80s or something. Call them something else. Take away Laver's grand slams. etc. Excellent.

If there is someone (as Krosero put it in a post) who doesn’t rate Borg as high as many others, this is me. I don’t want to rearrange history to the benefit of Borg at all. See all my posts in the "Björn Borg great at AKAI nov 1982" thread and you will understand that I am not at all a Borg's fan.
It is that I deeply wonder if Vilas deserved the 1st place in 1977. I'm very doubtful to say the least.
Secondly I didn’t say to eliminate all the Australian tourneys but I perfectly given the years when the Australian tourney was very depleted : from 1972 to 1982 and certainly not 1969 (quite depleted in 1970 and always depleted in the amateur era). Quite a good tourney in 1969, 1971 and since 1983 (and became a true Slam in the late 1980's-early 1990's).

Benhur's quote :And I suppose the French was depleted also or otherwise anemic in 77 and does not really count as a slam. In addition, Borg was not there so it cannot count, just like the Australian. Borg must be the only player whose sainthood is sho shiny that its fans declare that when he didn't deign attend a slam, the slam does not really count as such. And of course the USO does not count because there were too many rowdy Argentineans who distracted Connors, and when Borg lost in the fourth round, well then of course the tournament lost its status until next year... So yeah, in general, Vilas FO + Vilas USO + Vilas AO final are at best equal, and probably worse, than Borg's Wimbledon. And of course Vilas 18 tournaments and 145 matches won are just a triviality.

At Roland Garros not only Borg was absent but Connors, Gerulaitis, Tanner and Stockton (Orantes too but he was injured) all in the Top10 or very close. While at the Masters that year every good player tried to qualify and to win it. The Masters (held in January 1978 ) was worth at least the 1977 depleted Roland Garros and the Australian Open was merely an ordinary national tournament with some foreign players lost “Down Under”. Once again the Australian Open was nothing in those times. Even great Australians sometimes didn’t enter their own championship (as Laver since 1972, Rosewall in 1974-1975 and in 1975 Newcombe said to the tournament director that he didn’t want to play except if the director gave Newk a guarantee that Connors would play. Do you imagine nowadays a Tsonga telling to the French Federation that he would play Garros only if Nadal comes ?). The Australian Open was nothing at the time. Edmondson won it when he was beyond the 200th place in the ATP ranking (though I never liked that ranking it isn’t an absolute stupid ranking and even in the 70’s it gave a rough idea of a player’s level).
Such a surprise would be (almost) impossible in a "true" Slam (for the moment the lowest ranked winner in a true Slam is Kuerten, 66th) : it gives an indication of the Australian field at the time : quite weak.

So after these arguments we don’t compare a US win + a French win + an Australian final (on Vilas's side) against a Wimby win (Borg's)
but a US win (with a Borg injured) + a French win (with half of the Top10 absent which is much important) against a Wimby win (with all the best present and at their best (Connors slightly injured in his "non-playing" hand) + a Masters final (with all the players wanting to qualify for it) with Borg beating Vilas

(the Masters that year was probably the 3rd event possibly tied with the depleted French Open, see eventually http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showpost.php?p=2840980&postcount=46 and http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showpost.php?p=2840980&postcount=47 for a list of the 4 greatest events of each year since 1950).

So in major events Borg was close to Vilas (because Vilas’s feats in 1977 are overrated by you and others).

Other thing : why Vilas that year won so many tournaments and matches ? Because some great players (as Borg, Gerulaitis and Nastase) played WTT and so missed many tournaments in particular the US summer season (I recognize that Gerulaitis “broke” his WTT contract by playing the Italian Open that he wasn’t allowed to enter because he had WTT matches to play at the same time but defaulted them).
So once again Vilas’s record in “ordinary” (by opposition to major) tournaments is less impressive than it seems at first sight. Most of Vilas’s victories were obtained without Borg (and Gerulaitis) present. But most of the time when Borg and Vilas were in the same draw, Vilas didn’t win while Borg did win or at least beat Vilas. In particular at Nice, Monte Carlo and New York (Masters). The reason why Borg defeated Vilas wasn't because his strongest shots could exploit Vilas’ weakest shots (as was the case with Laver who played his backhand return to the weak Ashe’s forehand volley) or because Borg mentally owned Vilas
but simply because every Borg’s strokes were better than Vilas’s, from the service to the forehand and from the backhand to the volley.

If Borg and Gerulaitis preferred to play the WTT circuit in 1977 (as Newcombe did in 1974, Connors in 1974, Rosewall in 1974, Nastase from 1976 to 1978 and some other greats) it just indicates that the traditional tournaments weren’t so important at the time. The WTT organizers never held their event during Wimbledon and the US Open because those events were then the truly great events but they held their circuit during the French and Italian Opens because those tourneys weren’t that important (nowadays in the 2000’s no one dares to directly attack the French Open but in the early and mid-70’s it wasn’t a great event for many). So if Borg’s record (and Gerulaitis’ and others’) in “ordinary” tournaments seemed much less impressive than Vilas, the "much" is a wrong view.
Vilas won so much in 1977 in part because Borg, Gerulaitis and others were absent in many events.

So in majors Borg was close to Vilas.
In ordinary events Borg was pretty closer to Vilas than pure stats seem to state.
And in head-to-head meetings Borg was clearly superior to Vilas.

These 3 points make me think that Borg and Vilas were very very close that year.

Perhaps I didn’t express it very clearly in previous quotes :
I don’t claim that Borg was certainly the #1 in 1977
but I strongly contradict the reverse claim that is that Vilas was certainly the #1 as you state in your “Of course. 1977 clearly belongs to Vilas.”

So in my opinion both records were very close (Vilas perhaps slightly ahead) but head-to-head records being clearly in Borg's favour I suppose that perhaps Borg was #1 but I can't be sure. But I repeat I'm not sure at all that Vilas was undoubtedly the #1.

However I recognize that Vilas was clearly better in 1977 than in surrouding years (1976, 1978 ) because he had hugely improved between 1976 and 1977 and because in 1978 he didn’t recover from his great tiredness due to his very very long 1977 season.

to be continued

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

continuation of the previous post (more than 10,000 characters)

Benhur's quote : What you or any other thinks would be fairer in any given year is not very relevant. Not to the point that it should be changed because you think so. You cannot change retroactively every system that does not conform exactly to your preferences in order to have the results you want.

No no no I strongly disagree. I don't want to put a system in favour of supposed results I would want.

The great problem in all the point system rankings used until now (ILTF Grand Prix rankings, WCT rankings, ATP rankings) is that they are very far from translating the truth.

For instance since the Monte Carlo tournament began a week ago, all the players and all the media are talking about one and only thing : Roland Garros and nothing else.
Actually all the best French players have injuries and no one worries about their absence at Monte Carlo (Gasquet, Tsonga) or Barcelona (Monfils, Tsonga) or Rome or Madrid but everyone fears that some (or all) of them won’t be fit or even present at Roland Garros in about 30 days.
That just gives an indication about the importance of the true majors which are since the mid-1980’s-early 1990’s the four Slam tournaments (but it wasn’t at all the case in previous years) : Monte Carlo, Rome or Madrid are almost nothing compared to Roland Garros but in the ATP ranking system that difference in importance has (wrongly) never been taken into account. Great players (and others) trained hard for the majors and not for the “ordinary” events even what were called in the past “Super 9” or now “Masters 1000”.
Of course Federer is sad to have lost Indian Wells or Miami but what really causes him great distress is his Australian loss and not his recent American (or Monte Carlo) loss. If eventually he wins Roland in six weeks all his previous losses since the US campaign will be instantly forgotten whereas even if he wins Rome and Madrid in a row but loses at Roland, it will be a great failure for him.
So it’s not what I want and it’s not about a particular year :
every year the major tournaments really stand out and the other events though they count (because every match counts) aren’t as important as the point system ranking wrongly suggests (suggested).
Why do you think Agassi collapsed in 1995 ? He had won all the US summer tournaments including the “Super9” beating Sampras in the process and so accumulating more ATP points than those won in a US Open victory but at the climax of that US summer he lost the US Open final to Sampras and that defeat devastated Andre so much that he truly sank to the point of playing challenger events two years later and to be ranked beyond the 100th place.
That lone match lost, changed Agassi's next three years.
But was Sampras ravaged because Agassi had overcome him in the Canadian Open final that summer 1995 ? Certainly not. He probably thought that he had to work more to win the US Open whereas Agassi was seriously depressed (and physically injured just afterwards) by his US failure.

Benhur's quote : Yes. Sounds pretty fair to me. Of course if would be nicer get those points by winning the slam than the 2 Master's, as it would mean more prestige and less work. But it is fair that the ranking points are the same. If you devalue all tournaments to increasingly smaller fractions of a slam, player's won't give a damn about them except for money, they will become increasingly similar to exhibitions.

I don’t think that the very best players work and concentrate so much for those events. Listen to Federer for instance (but perhaps he lied, I can’t see through his mind) but he didn’t seem too affected by his loss to Wawrinka at Monte Carlo. For him it was an integral part of his preparation for Roland Garros. Monte Carlo was first for him a way to improve his clay court game, after having played for weeks on hard courts, in order to reach his best level at Garros. I don’t say that those tournaments are merely exhibitions but I say that my 4-2-1 ratios would be fair enough. Many know that Federer had won 5 consecutive Wimby tourneys. Some know that Federer had won 4 Masters Cup. But who knows that he had won the Canadian Open (a Masters 1000) and how many times ? Very few except tennis aficionados or enthusiasts as us.
So once again I repeat : in reality there is a huge difference between the Masters 1000 and the true majors but unfortunately it isn’t transcribed in the point rankings as it should.

Benhur's quote : I wonder how you rationalize this when you find it "unclear" that Vilas FO, USO and runner-up AO are not better than Borg's W. I wonder through what tortuous contortions of the imagination one can arrive at any other conclusion than that Vilas has by far the best record that year.

Not tortuous contortions at all : see my explanations above. Add Borg’s Master final, suppress Vilas’ final at the Australian which isn’t worth much and clearly devaluate Vilas’s victory at the depleted Roland Garros and suddenly you will note that Borg isn’t so far away from Vilas in major events.

Benhur's quote : Why unfair, if that was the accepted normal practice for all the decades, decade after decade in the history of tennis until now? NOBODY got ranking points for playing Davis Cup, either in 89 or in previous years or later years, until now. Why is it unfair to Becker, and not to everybody else?

Completely wrong.
In the first open Davis Cup in 1973 the event gave points in the Grand Prix ranking and for instance Newcombe had less Grand Prix points than Okker in tournaments but because Newcombe received about 107.5 points (if my memory is right) from Davis Cup matches he ended second ahead of Okker and therefore earned a greater bonus than the Dutchman.
Gorman ended 8th in the Grand Prix circuit (and thus was the last qualified for the Masters Cup which was called at the time "Masters". Why modern ATP leaders have used that term "Masters" for tourneys less important than the "original" Masters (I won't detail here but in reality there were Masters before the Grand Prix Masters in 1970 which I entitle "original")
just ahead of Borg and so prevented the Swede to enter the Masters Cup because Gorman had played in the Davis Cup final.
But where you are deadly wrong is that before open tennis, the Davis Cup was the most important amateur event and so from 1920 to 1967 it very often decided who was the #1 amateur in the world. At the time there was no point allowed to anyone in whatever event held (Davis Cup, Slam tourney, national tournament, …) but in particular when players were close the Davis Cup was the final judge. Before even Fraser won his first Slam amateur event in September 1959 he was considered the best amateur because he had beaten Olmedo in the Davis Cup though Olmedo had already two Slams under his belt that year (Fraser still considers that his two singles wins in the 1959 Davis Cup Challenge round are his greatest tennis feats, ahead his 3 Slam wins). In 1953 too Rosewall had 2 Slams while Trabert had only one but Trabert beat Rosewall in the Cup. In 1930 Tilden had won Wimby but Cochet defeated him in the Cup and the French was ranked by everyone as the best amateur, etc …
Even in the open era Davis Cup was an important event and most of the observers ranked Newcombe ahead of Smith in 1973 because of Newk's win from Smith in the Cup. Some ranked Borg ahead of Orantes in 1975 because Borg crushed Manolo in that competition, ...

Benhur's quote : That's totally irrelevant to the 1989 ranking discussion. For the record, Lendl edges Becker in total career h2h. Should that be a factor in determining who had a better record in 1989? I don't think so.
Also, in 1992 Lendl was 32 and Becker was 24. So if you consider Becker to be past his prime in the same sense as Lendl, then I guess Lendl has a winning h2h record against a player who, unlike him, must have been on his prime during all their encounters except the last one, or something like that.

Not it isn’t irrelevant at all. It just shows that when it really mattered Becker won from Lendl and it was true in particular in 1989. The two most important events were Wimby and Flushing, and Becker won both, beating each time Lendl (in a semi and in a final).
So here too (in 1989) the debate isn't over.
And at the time the opinions were clearly divided. Some considered that Lendl was the #1 because they respected the ATP computer but many others considered that Becker was the boss.

Eventually if you estimate points won by Lendl and Becker :
- by using the "4-2-1" ratios,
- by granting as many (or perhaps a little less) points to the Davis Cup 1989 as the Masters Cup
- by giving more points to a final win (or less points to losses) as used at the time in the ATP ranking,
and if the final result still gives Lendl the first place then I will consider Lendl as the best in 1989.

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

Quick answer to Krosero

We have disagreed on some points in the past but I completely concur with your last post. And no you aren't wrong about the Davis Cup.

It weighed much between 1900 and 1919 (but it varied from year to year : in 1900 for instance the British Isles sent a second class team in the US).

From 1920 to 1930 it was simply the greatest event by far and the world #1 was always the player who did the best in the Davis Cup.

From 1931 to 1959 it was the greatest amateur event.

From 1960 to 1967 it was the greatest amateur event for the majority (others preferred Wimby).

Because the ILTF (and national federations) didn't want to open the Davis Cup to the professionals in 1968 and to the contract professionals in 1969, the Davis Cup lost much of its importance and when it was open in 1973 it was a bit too late. The Cup became less and less important to the point that many preferred missing the event in order to prepare an important event or to train hard or to even play exhibitions.
Now for the first time the Cup gives ATP points (in 1973 it was Grand Prix points) but as you can note less than a simple "Masters 1000" so no explanation is needed to situate the Cup's level.

In 1989 the most important events were the Slam events.
Next were the Masters (Cup) and the Davis Cup.
Next Key Biscayne
Next Paris-Bercy
Next the other "Super 9".

In 2009 the Davis Cup is below all the events cited just before (and Miami or Paris-Bercy are at the same level as the other "Masters 1000")

 

[Carlo Giovanni Colussi]

ITF world champion

Benhur,
I have never considered the ITF world champion nominations as respectable. Since 1978 when they began to name their world champion I have never waited their nomination to have my own opinion.

Just a precision about Edberg's case.
Here is what I wrote in Wikipedia some years ago :
The International Tennis Federation's (ITF) choices for men's singles have been generally approved by tennis fans and the tennis media except in 1990 when the designation of Ivan Lendl was strongly criticized by those who claimed that the ITF was punishing Stefan Edberg for not playing the Grand Slam Cup. ''Tennis Magazine'' (France), February 1991, issue no. 179. The magazine said, "'On (la FIT) a choisi de sanctionner un champion qui n'avait pas craint d'avouer publiquement le peu d'importance qu'il accordait à la Coupe du Grand Chelem, la fameuse invention de la FIT pour 'casser' l'ATP Tour." Translated into English, "'One (the ITF) has chosen to sanction a champion who hadn't feared to publicly confess the little importance he granted to the Grand Slam Cup, the famous ITF invention to 'break' the ATP Tour." That year, the Association of Tennis Professionals named Edberg its "Player of The Year," in accordance with its computer ranking system, and ''Tennis Magazine'' (France) ranked Edberg first, Andre Agassi second, and Lendl third.

Slight precision : others specialists (than Tennis Magazine) considered Lendl as #2 and Agassi #3 but always chose Edberg as #1 (and Becker usually #4) though Becker was ATP #2 and Agassi ATP #4.

 

[krosero]

It weighed much between 1900 and 1919 (but it varied from year to year : in 1900 for instance the British Isles sent a second class team in the US).

From 1920 to 1930 it was simply the greatest event by far and the world #1 was always the player who did the best in the Davis Cup.

From 1931 to 1959 it was the greatest amateur event.

From 1960 to 1967 it was the greatest amateur event for the majority (others preferred Wimby).

Because the ILTF (and national federations) didn't want to open the Davis Cup to the professionals in 1968 and to the contract professionals in 1969, the Davis Cup lost much of its importance and when it was open in 1973 it was a bit too late. The Cup became less and less important to the point that many preferred missing the event in order to prepare an important event or to train hard or to even play exhibitions.
Now for the first time the Cup gives ATP points (in 1973 it was Grand Prix points) but as you can note less than a simple "Masters 1000" so no explanation is needed to situate the Cup's level.

In 1989 the most important events were the Slam events.
Next were the Masters (Cup) and the Davis Cup.
Next Key Biscayne
Next Paris-Bercy
Next the other "Super 9".

In 2009 the Davis Cup is below all the events cited just before (and Miami or Paris-Bercy are at the same level as the other "Masters 1000")

Thanks for that summary.

 

[Tomaz Bellucci]

Carlo, wonder post.
I just want to make some points (bold)

Benhur's quote : Ah, we must rearrange the entire history of tennis to fit Borg as number one in 77. Eliminate all slams won by players in Australia prior to the 80s or something. Call them something else. Take away Laver's grand slams. etc. Excellent.

If there is someone (as Krosero put it in a post) who doesn’t rate Borg as high as many others, this is me. I don’t want to rearrange history to the benefit of Borg at all. See all my posts in the "Björn Borg great at AKAI nov 1982" thread and you will understand that I am not at all a Borg's fan.
It is that I deeply wonder if Vilas deserved the 1st place in 1977. I'm very doubtful to say the least.
Secondly I didn’t say to eliminate all the Australian tourneys but I perfectly given the years when the Australian tourney was very depleted : from 1972 to 1982 and certainly not 1969 (quite depleted in 1970 and always depleted in the amateur era). Quite a good tourney in 1969, 1971 and since 1983 (and became a true Slam in the late 1980's-early 1990's).

Benhur's quote :And I suppose the French was depleted also or otherwise anemic in 77 and does not really count as a slam. In addition, Borg was not there so it cannot count, just like the Australian. Borg must be the only player whose sainthood is sho shiny that its fans declare that when he didn't deign attend a slam, the slam does not really count as such. And of course the USO does not count because there were too many rowdy Argentineans who distracted Connors, and when Borg lost in the fourth round, well then of course the tournament lost its status until next year... So yeah, in general, Vilas FO + Vilas USO + Vilas AO final are at best equal, and probably worse, than Borg's Wimbledon. And of course Vilas 18 tournaments and 145 matches won are just a triviality.

At Roland Garros not only Borg was absent but Connors, Gerulaitis, Tanner and Stockton (Orantes too but he was injured) all in the Top10 or very close. (Connors were absent in many RG won by Borg and Panatta, besides taht, I don't think Stockton was a problem to Vilas on clay, maybe Orantes and Gerulaitis) While at the Masters that year every good player tried to qualify and to win it. The Masters (held in January 1978 ) was worth at least the 1977 depleted Roland Garros and the Australian Open was merely an ordinary national tournament with some foreign players lost “Down Under”. Once again the Australian Open was nothing in those times. Even great Australians sometimes didn’t enter their own championship (as Laver since 1972, Rosewall in 1974-1975 and in 1975 Newcombe said to the tournament director that he didn’t want to play except if the director gave Newk a guarantee that Connors would play. Do you imagine nowadays a Tsonga telling to the French Federation that he would play Garros only if Nadal comes ?). The Australian Open was nothing at the time (Disagree with "nothing"). Edmondson won it when he was beyond the 200th place in the ATP ranking (though I never liked that ranking it isn’t an absolute stupid ranking and even in the 70’s it gave a rough idea of a player’s level).
Such a surprise would be (almost) impossible in a "true" Slam (for the moment the lowest ranked winner in a true Slam is Kuerten, 66th) : it gives an indication of the Australian field at the time : quite weak (this time agree, but nothing is too much).

So after these arguments we don’t compare a US win + a French win + an Australian final (on Vilas's side) against a Wimby win (Borg's)
but a US win (with a Borg injured - not Vilas fault) + a French win (with half of the Top10 absent which is much important - like I said before, Connors never went until late 70, Orantes injured, Borg and Geurlaitis banned cause it's choices of WTT) against a Wimby win (with all the best present -like USO- and at their best (Connors slightly injured in his "non-playing" hand) + a Masters final (with all the players wanting to qualify for it) with Borg beating Vilas (and Vilas beating the champion Connors)

(the Masters that year was probably the 3rd event possibly tied with the depleted French Open, see eventually http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showpost.php?p=2840980&postcount=46 and http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showpost.php?p=2840980&postcount=47 for a list of the 4 greatest events of each year since 1950).

So in major events Borg was close to Vilas (because Vilas’s feats in 1977 are overrated by you and others)

Other thing : why Vilas that year won so many tournaments and matches ? Because some great players (as Borg, Gerulaitis and Nastase) played WTT and so missed many tournaments in particular the US summer season (I recognize that Gerulaitis “broke” his WTT contract by playing the Italian Open that he wasn’t allowed to enter because he had WTT matches to play at the same time but defaulted them).
So once again Vilas’s record in “ordinary” (by opposition to major) tournaments is less impressive than it seems at first sight. Most of Vilas’s victories were obtained without Borg (and Gerulaitis) present. But most of the time when Borg and Vilas were in the same draw, Vilas didn’t win while Borg did win or at least beat Vilas. In particular at Nice, Monte Carlo and New York (Masters). The reason why Borg defeated Vilas wasn't because his strongest shots could exploit Vilas’ weakest shots (as was the case with Laver who played his backhand return to the weak Ashe’s forehand volley) or because Borg mentally owned Vilas
but simply because every Borg’s strokes were better than Vilas’s, from the service to the forehand and from the backhand to the volley (agree but the topic is not about greatest player)

If Borg and Gerulaitis preferred to play the WTT circuit in 1977 (as Newcombe did in 1974, Connors in 1974, Rosewall in 1974, Nastase from 1976 to 1978 and some other greats) it just indicates that the traditional tournaments weren’t so important at the time. The WTT organizers never held their event during Wimbledon and the US Open because those events were then the truly great events but they held their circuit during the French and Italian Opens because those tourneys weren’t that important (nowadays in the 2000’s no one dares to directly attack the French Open but in the early and mid-70’s it wasn’t a great event for many). So if Borg’s record (and Gerulaitis’ and others’) in “ordinary” tournaments seemed much less impressive than Vilas, the "much" is a wrong view.
Vilas won so much in 1977 in part because Borg, Gerulaitis and others were absent in many events. (cause Borg and Vitas own choices, the tennis "system" in that times "allows" that - everybody forgets that if Vilas would not went to the 2 previous Wimby grass tournies, and play on clay (don't remember the event in that part of the season) he would catch the computer number one cause the ELO points, so not all in Vilas 77 is mere clever selection of events)
So in majors Borg was close to Vilas.
In ordinary events Borg was pretty closer to Vilas than pure stats seem to state.
And in head-to-head meetings Borg was clearly superior to Vilas. (agree)

These 3 points make me think that Borg and Vilas were very very close that year.

Perhaps I didn’t express it very clearly in previous quotes :
I don’t claim that Borg was certainly the #1 in 1977
but I strongly contradict the reverse claim that is that Vilas was certainly the #1 as you state in your “Of course. 1977 clearly belongs to Vilas.”

So in my opinion both records were very close (Vilas perhaps slightly ahead) but head-to-head records being clearly in Borg's favour I suppose that perhaps Borg was #1 but I can't be sure. But I repeat I'm not sure at all that Vilas was undoubtedly the #1.

However I recognize that Vilas was clearly better in 1977 than in surrouding years (1976, 1978 ) because he had hugely improved between 1976 and 1977 and because in 1978 he didn’t recover from his great tiredness due to his very very long 1977 season.

 

[CyBorg]

Some great posts by Carlo in this thread.