"Novak Djokovic is the greatest tennis player in history" by Simon Barnes (ESPN)

On more serious note, it's ridiculous to call someone with 10 Slams the GOAT when someone else in the same era has 17 Grand Slam titles.
 
Backspin1183 said:
On more serious note, it's ridiculous to call someone with 10 Slams the GOAT when someone else in the same era has 17 Grand Slam titles.
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Simon Barnes was Chief Sports Writer at The Times and UK Sports Columnist of the Year in 2001 and 2007. He writes about a wide variety of sports for ESPN.co.uk, as well as ESPNFC.com and ESPNcricinfo. He has written more than 20 books including The Meaning of Sport and three novels. On Twitter he is @simonbarneswild
 
ABCD said:
Simon Barnes was Chief Sports Writer at The Times and UK Sports Columnist of the Year in 2001 and 2007. He writes about a wide variety of sports for ESPN.co.uk, as well as ESPNFC.com and ESPNcricinfo. He has written more than 20 books including The Meaning of Sport and three novels. On Twitter he is @simonbarneswild
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Doesn't matter who the author of the article is. 17>>>>>>>>>10. You have no case until Djokovic gets to 17 himself. Numbers don't lie.
 
Backspin1183 said:
On more serious note, it's ridiculous to call someone with 10 Slams the GOAT when someone else in the same era has 17 Grand Slam titles.
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No it's not if you compare rivals and players who were in those finals.
It's like Novak running with hurdles
images


while Roger was running without it
Bolt,%20Usain,%20Beijing%20200m-thumb.jpg
 
Lord Anomander said:
Even as a Nole fan I have to say: Do we really need another topic like that? It's getting boring and Barnes is clearly affected by recency bias (http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/inde...ommentators-players-say-at-face-value.549714/).

Let's talk again after both Nole and Roger finished their careers. For now Nole is still far behind Federer.
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It is widespread practice on TTW to post tennis articles from competent and less competent tennis experts. I just posted an interesting article written by someone who seems to be an accomplished tennis writer. Why would you have anything against an interesting article about a pro tennis player? This fits the purpose of this section of the forum. You can always choose not to read and not to comment.
 
ABCD said:
It is widespread practice on TTW to post tennis articles from competent and less competent tennis experts. I just posted an interesting article written by someone who seems to be an accomplished tennis writer. Why would you have anything against an interesting article about a pro tennis player? This fits the purpose of this section of the forum. You can always choose not to read and not to comment.
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We just need 1 Novak is the GOAT thread. It's basically snowing ultron balls in this place.
 
Author maybe used a bit wrong title “greatest” instead of “BEST” of all time but is absolute right. No1e is the best player ever (or greatest with his play). It is simple. If you look at current athletes in athletic who maybe run further or jump higher than athletes from 50 years in past they all have better results (are faster and can jump higher = are better) but are not greater of some champions in the past who accomplished greater results if you look at medals on world championships and Olympics.

Like author said in article: “Djokovic is probably the finest player who has ever played. That is to say, if the players from former eras were to take him on with the weapons they possessed at their peak, they would all lose”.


And that’s absolutely true! No1e is the BEST player ever in form of his tennis power and the way he play but he is not the most successful player, that are 2 different things.
 
talicnitom said:
Author maybe used a bit wrong title “greatest” instead of “BEST” of all time but is absolute right. No1e is the best player ever (or greatest with his play). It is simple. If you look at current athletes in athletic who maybe run further or jump higher than athletes from 50 years in past they all have better results (are faster and can jump higher = are better) but are not greater of some champions in the past who accomplished greater results if you look at medals on world championships and Olympics.

Like author said in article: “Djokovic is probably the finest player who has ever played. That is to say, if the players from former eras were to take him on with the weapons they possessed at their peak, they would all lose”.


And that’s absolutely true! No1e is the BEST player ever in form of his tennis power and the way he play but he is not the most successful player, that are 2 different things.
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Have several seats.
 
talicnitom said:
Author maybe used a bit wrong title “greatest” instead of “BEST” of all time but is absolute right. No1e is the best player ever (or greatest with his play). It is simple. If you look at current athletes in athletic who maybe run further or jump higher than athletes from 50 years in past they all have better results (are faster and can jump higher = are better) but are not greater of some champions in the past who accomplished greater results if you look at medals on world championships and Olympics.

Like author said in article: “Djokovic is probably the finest player who has ever played. That is to say, if the players from former eras were to take him on with the weapons they possessed at their peak, they would all lose”.


And that’s absolutely true! No1e is the BEST player ever in form of his tennis power and the way he play but he is not the most successful player, that are 2 different things.
Click to expand...

Getting a bit excited there, aren't we?:eek:
 
If you read the article, author never supposed that No1e is the most successful player in history. Just the best one! In form of ability to play tennis in better way that anybody was before.

PS.
Do you really think that the former champions would have a chance against No1e? McEnroe said himself that in his peak he would not take a (more than a few) game against a peak No1e and Sampras said back in 2011 that that’s the best tennis he ever seen. Some of others who said that No1e is playing the best tennis in history are Wilander, Pilic and Bollettieri…
 
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ABCD said:
Simon Barnes was Chief Sports Writer at The Times and UK Sports Columnist of the Year in 2001 and 2007. He writes about a wide variety of sports for ESPN.co.uk, as well as ESPNFC.com and ESPNcricinfo. He has written more than 20 books including The Meaning of Sport and three novels. On Twitter he is @simonbarneswild
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Yeah, it's amazing who can get fame and authority these days.
 
talicnitom said:
If you read the article, author never supposed that No1e is the most successful player in history. Just the best one! In form of ability to play tennis in better way that anybody was before.

PS.
Do you really think that the former champions would have a chance against No1e? McEnroe said himself that he would not take a game against a peak No1e and Sampras said back in 2011 that that’s the best tennis he ever seen.
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Sandow-Hart-Jericho-HBK-gifs-001_002.gif
 
I don't think the author is comparing results or say ingen 10 is beter than 17. He looks at it in a different way so Read the whole artikel and not just the title.
 
My English is not good and I always check and change a little what I write. And I changed to a few games, before you gays react and that you can see, when your post alert and when I made a last edit. Thad not change the fact that a many from tennis elite (players, coaches, analytics) think that No1e plays a better tennis than anyone did before.
 
Yeah a weaponless pusher who needs fake multiple MTOs in Wimbledon 2014 final against grandfather Fed is the GOAT...sure.

I am a Fed fan first and foremost but I really hope Nadal comes back to even 80% of his best. All this bollocks Djokovic is GOAT talk will end in no time. 80% Nadal wipes the floor with any version of Djokovic...anywhere....except at AO where it goes 6 hours and Nadal takes it if not for a missed sitter :D

Djokovic just has insane flexibility and incredible stamina. He is neither the pure artistic genius that Roger is nor the insane back-to-the-wall warrior spartan Nadal is. Even in the USO 2011 Federer match, DJokovic had GIVEN UP only for Federer to pathetically choke. Nadal pre-2015 would fight his backside off whether he was MP down or 6-0 up.
 
talicnitom said:
My English is not good and I always check and change a little what I write. And I changed to a few games, before you gays react and that you can see, when your post alert and when I made a last edit. Thad not change the fact that a many from tennis elite (players, coaches, analytics) think that No1e plays a better tennis than anyone did before.
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You are doing just fine. Enjoy. My gut feeling is that for some people here it is not a problem what McEnroe can do against Djokovic, but what the author (indirectly)says about "peak" Nadal, Federer and Djokovic. On the other hand, there are some Djokovic fans disagreeing with Simon (#5), which is nice to see.
 
ABCD said:
You are doing just fine. Enjoy. My gut feeling is that for some people here it is not a problem what McEnroe can do against Djokovic, but what the author (indirectly)says about "peak" Nadal, Federer and Djokovic. On the other hand, there are some Djokovic fans disagreeing with Simon (#5), which is nice to see.
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I'm 19yo and I'd consider myself a McEnroe fan.
Not everyone thinks tennis started in 2011, even young people.
 
Fedalforever said:
Yeah a weaponless pusher who needs fake multiple MTOs in Wimbledon 2014 final against grandfather Fed is the GOAT...sure.

I am a Fed fan first and foremost but I really hope Nadal comes back to even 80% of his best. All this bollocks Djokovic is GOAT talk will end in no time. 80% Nadal wipes the floor with any version of Djokovic...anywhere....except at AO where it goes 6 hours and Nadal takes it if not for a missed sitter :D

Djokovic just has insane flexibility and incredible stamina. He is neither the pure artistic genius that Roger is nor the insane back-to-the-wall warrior spartan Nadal is. Even in the USO 2011 Federer match, DJokovic had GIVEN UP only for Federer to pathetically choke. Nadal pre-2015 would fight his backside off whether he was MP down or 6-0 up.
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Well, define "weapon".

Why is defense not considered a weapon? Why does something have to be aesthetically pleasing to be a weapon? A LOT of people find Nadals forehand ugly, yet nobody would deny that it's a weapon. It's a feature of his game that wins him matches in abundance. And if you retort by saying that a weapon has to be offensive in nature, well, what the hell? Semantics much? If it's an incredible obstacle for the opposition to overcome, that leads to match victories and titles (sort of the point of tennis, winning and all), what does it matter what it's called?

Moreover, seen his backhand? Forehand? Return? Serve? Drop shot (underrated part of his game) ? Djokovic isn't a pusher, particularly when he plays Nadal fwiw, where he basically tries to blast him off the court (although you may also get stretches of passivity like in the US Open 2013). In that specific match up its insane to come away with the conclusion that Djokovic plays the role of the counterpuncher.

Djokovic clearly isn't the GOAT and it's unlikely that he will ever achieve that title consensus wise, but to call him a weaponless pusher is......actually, I don't have a word for it. Enjoy making troll threads that contribute to the deterioration of this forum.
 
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simple, he is talking about actual tennis level, which in most cases the younger generations are better than the previous, historic ones, even if the previous ones had more achievements and/or have more talent. This is simple due to the advance of the human race, speed, power, taller, bigger, emotional intelligence, sports science, medicine, etc, etc.

Nole has been the best player since 2011. The easiest way to see this is Peak Nadal knocked Peak Fed over in 2008, and then Peak Nole knocked over Peak Nadal.

his definition of greatest, is different to what the term generally means, ie. the player who has achieved the most in history.
 
ABCD said:
Simon Barnes was Chief Sports Writer at The Times and UK Sports Columnist of the Year in 2001 and 2007. He writes about a wide variety of sports for ESPN.co.uk, as well as ESPNFC.com and ESPNcricinfo. He has written more than 20 books including The Meaning of Sport and three novels. On Twitter he is @simonbarneswild
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Hahahahaha.. Oh man..
 
In a single article the author lost all credibility.

A player losing 3 times to a 34 year old in a single year is ample proof that he cannot be anywhere close to the greatest.
 
Djokovic is the reigning, defending, undisputed, heavyweight ATP mens singles number one player of the world, and the heavyweight champion...but he is not the GOAT, when there are two other icons still active, and still more accomplished than him. He still has a lot of work to do to even catch Nadal, never mind Federer who is even further ahead.

One step at a time. For the heavyweight champion of the world to be considered an ATG is good enough for now. Lets not get carried away and forget what kind of trail blazing Roger and Rafa did only a short time ago.
 
This is the correct part of the article :


Djokovic has neither brilliance nor weakness. He has no perfect stroke, like the Federer forehand or the Nadal topspin. He hasn't got any 10 out of 10s in his armoury, but he hasn't got any 3s or 4s either.
 
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz

In 5 years, there will be another player who will be hyped up as the greatest thing since sliced bread.

I guess these sport journalists need somehow to justify their pay by creating rubbish articles and hyping up whatever is "hot" at the moment. Maybe they should just shut up and get a real job.
 
The item is amusing for the reason he talks about Djokovic's WTF group, adding the comment "...Djokovic has already brushed aside Nishikori and, on Tuesday, is due to take on Federer. The competition he faces in his group looks soft; but then all groups look like that for Djokovic right now..."

The very next day Federer beat him.
 
He won the fight but No1e won the war in the end anyway!

If it is a tennis matches with no importance in a bigger tournaments that's the RR matches on WTF.

Like over whole season, Fed won a few less important matches and No1e wan all the important ones.

GS-F 2-0 (2x800p)
WTF-F 1-0 (500p)
M-F 2-1 (3x400p)
atp500-F 0-1 (200p)
WTF-RR 0-1 (200p)

They played for 3700 points in this matches and No1e got 2900 (almost 80%) of them.
 
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Bobby Jr said:
The item is amusing for the reason he talks about Djokovic's WTF group, adding the comment "...Djokovic has already brushed aside Nishikori and, on Tuesday, is due to take on Federer. The competition he faces in his group looks soft; but then all groups look like that for Djokovic right now..."

The very next day Federer beat him.
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Are people not forgetting that Fed got to two of the slam finals this year against the Djoker? 34 years old? That is 6 years older than Djokovic in a sport where someones peak play is usually 22-27 (approx). He is almost been outside of it as long as it lasted.
Get real people. Djokovic is a machine and an all time great. He isn't hitting the kinds of shots that Federer hits in his sleep or Nadal's power (don't kid yourself, that is what gives him the ability to unleash 4000rpm's for 5 hours). He has made the game a test of will and fitness.
If that is what you consider the best, I respect your opinion but I disagree.
 
Bobby Jr said:
That's all besides the point. The point is the writer was way off the mark in the first instance.
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I know a similar example "15 reasons why Roger beats Novak this afternoon" by Craig O'Shannessy. My favourite prediction by a commentator is "Someday the twins will grow up to hear about matches like this".
 
Fedalforever said:
Yeah a weaponless pusher who needs fake multiple MTOs in Wimbledon 2014 final against grandfather Fed is the GOAT...sure.

I am a Fed fan first and foremost but I really hope Nadal comes back to even 80% of his best. All this bollocks Djokovic is GOAT talk will end in no time. 80% Nadal wipes the floor with any version of Djokovic...anywhere....except at AO where it goes 6 hours and Nadal takes it if not for a missed sitter :D

Djokovic just has insane flexibility and incredible stamina. He is neither the pure artistic genius that Roger is nor the insane back-to-the-wall warrior spartan Nadal is. Even in the USO 2011 Federer match, DJokovic had GIVEN UP only for Federer to pathetically choke. Nadal pre-2015 would fight his backside off whether he was MP down or 6-0 up.
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seems legit
 
talicnitom said:
Author maybe used a bit wrong title “greatest” instead of “BEST” of all time but is absolute right. No1e is the best player ever (or greatest with his play). It is simple. If you look at current athletes in athletic who maybe run further or jump higher than athletes from 50 years in past they all have better results (are faster and can jump higher = are better) but are not greater of some champions in the past who accomplished greater results if you look at medals on world championships and Olympics.

Like author said in article: “Djokovic is probably the finest player who has ever played. That is to say, if the players from former eras were to take him on with the weapons they possessed at their peak, they would all lose”.


And that’s absolutely true! No1e is the BEST player ever in form of his tennis power and the way he play but he is not the most successful player, that are 2 different things.
Click to expand...

That's a shame for Djokovic fans though, isn't it? Because in 50 years he'll be the 200th or 300th best and in 100 years he probably won't even be in the top 500. It's quite obvious that players want to chase immortality the other way: by being the closest they can possibly be to "the most successful" player (even if it's always debatable). It's not much of an accomplishment to be better than Vilas because even Nicolas Kiefer is better than Vilas.
 
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