bjsnider
Hall of Fame
In the 'Courts of Babylon' days, big media used to sell tennis to the masses using personalities -- 'what's Nasty gonna do tonight'?, or 'come and watch Mac and Connors tear strips of flesh off each other'. Worked well in those years, but then, with the corporatization of tennis, the personalities didn't fit the profile anymore. I still remember the sadness, and even anger, from the TV talking heads regarding the lack of demonstrativeness from Pete Sampras. He was called 'boring' quite frequently. Who else from that generation wasn't boring? even Agassi didn't speak up very much. For those who weren't around in those days, McEnroe would often talk about how the personality had been purged from the game by big endorsement money. The pundits were actually complaining that they couldn't sell the game to the masses.
And then something happened. Pete Sampras approached Roy Emerson's 12 majors, a record no one paid attention to before that time. It seems impossible to imagine now, but in the 1970s, and 1980s, and through most of the 1990s, no one talked about major totals. For example, nobody said, 'McEnroe is now half way to Emerson's 12!'. That wasn't the gimmick in those days, and the players didn't give a damn about it. Many of them didn't even bother to play in all of the majors every year. It was common to skip Australia because of bad scheduling and worse facilities (Bjorn Borg played AO once in his career). According to McEnroe's book, the players cared a lot more about winning specific majors in that era of specialization, and about being world number one.
Apparently, Sampras' pursuit of both the Emerson record, and the most Wimbledons, worked as a substitute for the personalities. Now the talking heads have something they can yammer about. Never mind that previous generations couldn't have cared less, and therefore can't possibly be judged on those terms. What counts is ad revenue from viewership. ESPN is ultimately owned by Disney, and I doubt the Mouse cares much about accuracy and fairness in tennis history.
Pursuit of history doesn't work well if specialists are sometimes capturing majors. We just can't have them interrupting the narrative. For example, many RG tournaments have ended with one-time winners. It's a pretty long list, but just to name a few, Yannick Noah, Andres Gomez, Muster, Kafelnikov, Costa et al. Those guys are today's Kevin Anderson, Dominic Thiem, Kei Nishikori, Milos Raonic etc. Excellent players who, given special favours on one specific surface, might expect to win the big prize once in their careers. One big payday.
So, in order to prevent that from happening, as has been discussed so many times in the past, the surfaces were homogenized. Grass and hard courts significantly slowed, clay sped up. Too bad, no more Pat Cash types, who sneak in and take a Wimbledon. The effect of the homogenization is, almost all of the big tournaments, not just the majors, bubble up to the greatest players. That means the great players of the past, especially the pre-Open Era, are excluded from the argument, since they never had the opportunity to foresee that one day the major totals would matter. Good! the talking heads can't explain who these old guys are.
Let's use a thought experiment. Since Djokovic is currently number one, let's move forward in time five years, and give Djokovic 25 majors, 350 weeks at number one, more tournaments won than anybody, 3 or 4 wins for every loss against Nadal and Federer etc. in short, the numbers say he's greater than his contemporaries. Question: Does that make Djokovic the GOAT? If so, what's his argument against Rod Laver and Pancho Gonzales? What's his argument against Bjorn Borg? Suzanne Lenglen was unbeatable throughout the 1920s, so what is Serena's argument as GOAT against her? I mean, Lenglen truly crushed, annihilated, wiped out, destroyed, the field. Her stats are mind-boggling (she finished her career with a 97.99% win percentage). If God himself had played Lenglen at tennis, God would surely have taken a straight sets loss. In more modern times, Chris Evert's clay records are almost too astonishing for words. What is Williams's argument against her?
The answer to all of this is, there is no argument. It's all just hot air, designed to generate the kind of talk that frequently goes on around here. It's actually very easy to undermine any player's GOAT argument, no matter who that player happens to be. That means the entire 'debate' is meaningless, since there's no common frame of reference against which to measure all players in tennis history. I can make great arguments for Laver, Sampras, Gonzales, Borg, et al. and I can also undermine them easily. It all adds up to nothing. The only reason the TV pundits talk about it so much is that it generates views, which means ad revenue, which pays their salaries. If the GOAT nonsense didn't pay off, they'd stop talking about it.
I didn't bother to watch the AO final. I wasn't interested. It would not, and does not, settle anything. The first week was far more interesting. The Tsitsipas/Federer match was more interesting. I guess that illustrates the problem for big media organizations. If viewers stop believing the GOAT b.s., they might actually lose interest in the biggest matches, and then we'd have to look around for some other, even more brainless narrative. Maybe sex appeal, right? Maybe they could just aim the camera at the players' asses and show that for a few hours, while debating who's the ass GOAT?
And then something happened. Pete Sampras approached Roy Emerson's 12 majors, a record no one paid attention to before that time. It seems impossible to imagine now, but in the 1970s, and 1980s, and through most of the 1990s, no one talked about major totals. For example, nobody said, 'McEnroe is now half way to Emerson's 12!'. That wasn't the gimmick in those days, and the players didn't give a damn about it. Many of them didn't even bother to play in all of the majors every year. It was common to skip Australia because of bad scheduling and worse facilities (Bjorn Borg played AO once in his career). According to McEnroe's book, the players cared a lot more about winning specific majors in that era of specialization, and about being world number one.
Apparently, Sampras' pursuit of both the Emerson record, and the most Wimbledons, worked as a substitute for the personalities. Now the talking heads have something they can yammer about. Never mind that previous generations couldn't have cared less, and therefore can't possibly be judged on those terms. What counts is ad revenue from viewership. ESPN is ultimately owned by Disney, and I doubt the Mouse cares much about accuracy and fairness in tennis history.
Pursuit of history doesn't work well if specialists are sometimes capturing majors. We just can't have them interrupting the narrative. For example, many RG tournaments have ended with one-time winners. It's a pretty long list, but just to name a few, Yannick Noah, Andres Gomez, Muster, Kafelnikov, Costa et al. Those guys are today's Kevin Anderson, Dominic Thiem, Kei Nishikori, Milos Raonic etc. Excellent players who, given special favours on one specific surface, might expect to win the big prize once in their careers. One big payday.
So, in order to prevent that from happening, as has been discussed so many times in the past, the surfaces were homogenized. Grass and hard courts significantly slowed, clay sped up. Too bad, no more Pat Cash types, who sneak in and take a Wimbledon. The effect of the homogenization is, almost all of the big tournaments, not just the majors, bubble up to the greatest players. That means the great players of the past, especially the pre-Open Era, are excluded from the argument, since they never had the opportunity to foresee that one day the major totals would matter. Good! the talking heads can't explain who these old guys are.
Let's use a thought experiment. Since Djokovic is currently number one, let's move forward in time five years, and give Djokovic 25 majors, 350 weeks at number one, more tournaments won than anybody, 3 or 4 wins for every loss against Nadal and Federer etc. in short, the numbers say he's greater than his contemporaries. Question: Does that make Djokovic the GOAT? If so, what's his argument against Rod Laver and Pancho Gonzales? What's his argument against Bjorn Borg? Suzanne Lenglen was unbeatable throughout the 1920s, so what is Serena's argument as GOAT against her? I mean, Lenglen truly crushed, annihilated, wiped out, destroyed, the field. Her stats are mind-boggling (she finished her career with a 97.99% win percentage). If God himself had played Lenglen at tennis, God would surely have taken a straight sets loss. In more modern times, Chris Evert's clay records are almost too astonishing for words. What is Williams's argument against her?
The answer to all of this is, there is no argument. It's all just hot air, designed to generate the kind of talk that frequently goes on around here. It's actually very easy to undermine any player's GOAT argument, no matter who that player happens to be. That means the entire 'debate' is meaningless, since there's no common frame of reference against which to measure all players in tennis history. I can make great arguments for Laver, Sampras, Gonzales, Borg, et al. and I can also undermine them easily. It all adds up to nothing. The only reason the TV pundits talk about it so much is that it generates views, which means ad revenue, which pays their salaries. If the GOAT nonsense didn't pay off, they'd stop talking about it.
I didn't bother to watch the AO final. I wasn't interested. It would not, and does not, settle anything. The first week was far more interesting. The Tsitsipas/Federer match was more interesting. I guess that illustrates the problem for big media organizations. If viewers stop believing the GOAT b.s., they might actually lose interest in the biggest matches, and then we'd have to look around for some other, even more brainless narrative. Maybe sex appeal, right? Maybe they could just aim the camera at the players' asses and show that for a few hours, while debating who's the ass GOAT?
