Rod Laver has the right to the all time crown
- Thread starter ProCoach
- Start date
abmk
Bionic Poster
have a highlight reel of that match. Shows the sun just setting at the time of edberg receiving the trophy . So, no, not a night match ..
Ultra2HolyGrail
Hall of Fame
Does this mean connors is better then mcenroe or borg? I think connors definately played at a higher level later in his career sort of like agassi did.
Possible. But if i was to bet money i don't think tilden would beat any great players from the 70's. From my perspective, 70's to mid to late 80's is when tennis took a big leap in play, then peaked in the late 90's, and early 2000's till now another leap.
There is just no telling. If the guy loved the game that much and was able to train with today's methods, he very well may. Sports Centuries' top 50 athletes of the 20th Century has these as the top 20 athletes pre-2000 and nearly all of them played sports at least 20+ years ago. I wouldn't say athletes are better now, because athletic ability is athletic ability and it has to be trained and nurtured. Here is the list:
1. Michael Jordan
2. Babe Ruth
3. Muhammad Ali
4. Jim Brown
5. Wayne Gretzky
6. Jesse Owens
7. Jim Thorpe
8. Willie Mays
9. Jack Nicklaus
10. Babe Zaharias
11. Joe Louis
12. Carl Lewis
13. Wilt Chamberlain
14. Hank Aaron
15. Jackie Robinson
16. Ted Williams
17. Magic Johnson
18. Bill Russell
19. Martina Navratilova
20. Ty Cobb
Many of these athletes are from pre-1960 where the training methods were very, very basic. Weight training was virtually unheard of pre-1965 and possibly even a little later.
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If that list is meant to be listing the top athletes rather than best sportsman (in terms of achievements) then I think it's a very poor list. I mean, Babe Ruth a better athlete than Jim Thorpe? Better sportsman based on a cross-sport achievement comparison, maybe, but a better athlete? Questionable decision to say the least.
But your main point in posting that list, if I'm not mistaken, was to demonstrate that past sportsman were not, in general, inferior athletes to modern ones. I don't think that list is capable of providing evidence for that contention. It certainly shows that past athletes were capable of equally great (and often better) achievements than modern athletes, but I think there are explanations for this that are just as plausible as the contention that past sportsman are athletically on the same plane as modern athletes.
Good food for thought here. It often seems to me that younger posters tend to have a distorted view of progress. They apply the spectacular technological advances of western societies during the 20th century to the human mind and body. They cannot conceive that the latter are by and large unchanged, or, if they conceive it, they attribute nearly magical powers to modern methods of fitness and training. But even if it was true that the methods are so spectacular, any comparison between old players and modern ones would have to assume equal conditions. How would Tilden play if he had grown up in today´s game, and how would a current player play if he had grown up in Tilden´s day.
In this regard, I always think it helps to take a look at the overlap matches between players of clearly different generations. I think it helps sober up the mind against such illusions. You know, old Gonzales v young Connors, Laver v Borg, Lendl v Agassi or Bruguera or Sampras, Sampras v Federer, Agassi v Federer or Nadal and so on. I just don´t have the reference works necessary to compile a list of such overlapping¨ encounters, but it is probably the most compelling way to dispel the illusions of magical progress in physical ability comparable to, say, the progress in telecommunications. A lot of folks take it for granted also that people are a lot smarter now than say 400 years ago. This is total bunkum. A guy like Newton, or even Euclid, or Erasthotenes, would run circles around 99.99999999 percent of the population today just like they did in their day. I will go further, if you could take newborns from the Cro Magnon days 50,000 years ago, raise them today and send them to college, a similar percentage would end up being brilliant scientists or thinkers as today. Anyway, I am getting off topic. I just wanted to say that these inter generational matches are very illustrative.
Exactly! It's not to argue who was the best, etc. Sports Century has some pretty knowledgeable guys there and this is what they came up with a few short years ago. It's just saying that these guys stood out in what they could do in terms of talent and athleticism. Babe Ruth is not nearly as athletic as Thorpe, but he was probably every bit as talented. Had he buckled down and not partied like he did, the Babe would probably have been quite an even bigger legend. Imagine him with today's training techniques. The training methods are what have upped the ante. Not that people are more talented or better athletes nowadays. Athletes get to train in more efficient and better ways nowadays, thus maximizing their talents.
Oh ok. Didn't realise that that was your point. Fair enough.
One thing to note in regard to that point, though, is that a larger population in general, and a larger talent base for a sport in particular, will tend to produce better athletes and more talented sportsman for that sport purely because it's more likely that such people will be born and be exposed to said sport.
So, if the relevant populations increase with time it is reasonable to suppose (all things being equal) that a later top level player will be, in general, more talented/athletic than an earlier player. However, this supposition should, of course, be supplemented with actual observations of the sportspeople in question to determine whether the general rule of thumb warrants application in a particular instance.
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1970CRBase
Guest
But a larger pop doesn't produce more talent. eg China has a billion people but isn't in the World Cup.
The transitive property makes yet another appearance in this thread. Why don't we trace it back to Renshaw and then deduce that Renshaw would be winning slams over Federer?
Tennis is played at a higher level than ever before in the history of the world. The old guys just wouldn't be as good in the modern game. Laver would be lucky to be to 30. Borg's slam count would be cut by at least a third. The modern game is supreme in almost every way. Connors is far less of a tennis player, pound for pound than Hewitt. If serve and volley tactics still worked, someone would be doing it on a regular basis. The game has changed.
Tennis is played at a higher level than ever before in the history of the world. The old guys just wouldn't be as good in the modern game. Laver would be lucky to be to 30. Borg's slam count would be cut by at least a third. The modern game is supreme in almost every way. Connors is far less of a tennis player, pound for pound than Hewitt. If serve and volley tactics still worked, someone would be doing it on a regular basis. The game has changed.
Yes. I am like Captain Kirk around here, getting things done.
Surely you jest??
Program development, infrastructure, money, interest, all have a huge impact. My post was in the context of "other things being equal" (as I explicitly stated).
By the way, what do you make of China's performance at the last Summer Olympics where they blew everyone away?
Limpinhitter
G.O.A.T.
Did you stop taking your thorzine and zyprexa again?
pc1
G.O.A.T.
Superb post Benhur.
Even in the game of chess, they did a computer analysis of the World Champions and they concluded the most error free player was Jose Raul Capablanca, World Champion in 1921. I haven't checked to see if the study had flaws but still Capablanca was ranked the best. He truly was a chess genius.
I just wanted to point out that so many on the threads seem to think old timers like Tilden would be barely able to hit the ball 60 mph today and that is so absurd to me when a smallish female player like Justine Henin had served over 120 mph and regularly serves over 110. Sharapova, the same height as Tilden and taller than Federer has hit serves over 120 mph and a service fault that I saw last year at 128 mph. So if you put it into context you have to realize that to think Tilden couldn't serve 130 mph if he wanted too today would be an illogical thought. Of course a talented player like Tilden who lived and breathe tennis would probably do well. No one can prove it for sure but you have possibly the greatest genius and student of tennis ever, with obviously great talent who is obsessed with the game and he now knows the modern techniques and training methods. He also has the best equipment and strings. There's a great chance he would be a terrific player now.
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Limpinhitter
G.O.A.T.
Well, I'll say this, if Federer was a great net player, Nadal wouldn't have a Wimbledon title.
Limpinhitter
G.O.A.T.
Nothing? Not a single comment? Hmmm!
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1970CRBase
Guest
Ok. It's just that that sounded like what you were saying.
pc1
G.O.A.T.
I've seen the video. It's very interesting.
I think alot of China's reason for doing well is because, as a communist state, they force their athletes to train non-stop. I knew a guy from China that was a high-level badminton player and he was sent to their sports school as a little boy and forced to train nonstop. We don't do that here. That's still falls under training. Since Russia no longer forcefully makes their athletes train, they have fallen apart in the Olympics compared to what they used to be. If you compare Russian athletes under communist rule vs. today's Russian athletes, the athletes from old Russia are ten times better than the ones they have today. Only because of training techniques and the amount of training they do versus the forced training they used to do. When they ate and slept sports back in the day, the Russians were some of the best. China still does the forced training and they are good, but certainly not great. Especially in sports other than your traditional Olympic sports.....
Interesting that you should bring up Russia, as their population has dropped significantly since the fall of the Soviet Union...
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1970CRBase
Guest
Then what's your take on the fact that China with it's enormous soccer mad population was never a soccer power whereas Denmark is a World Cup force? Or that China, after 30 years of trying hard, still can't catch up to South Korea's soccer standard? (China is 1-26 vs South Korea) heh, I wish I knew why. Actually, 1 billion people who want that answer.
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Don't forget also that Africa has 680,000,000+ in population and their sports teams are pretty awful. It really is about nurturing that special talent that a person has. Too bad Michael Jordan didn't fall in love with tennis and give it a go. Talk about the potential to be a serve and volley king.......
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1970CRBase
Guest
But they also produce great individual talent. Except that it's their infrastructure which is bad.
Well, in a way. When they were great at athletics, they had around 138 million in Russia proper. They now aren't so good and they have a population very close to that of 141 million. (I just checked the population of 1970's Russia and current Russia.)
Umm yes I know. I did actually mention the importance of infrastructure, program development and money etc. in the very post you quoted. I merely said that all things being equal, you can expect a bigger talent pool to produce great talents with a higher frequency, and, at the very top, talents so great that they would be unlikely to appear in a smaller pool.
And to preempt any other posts, I did say you should actually observe the sportsmen before making rash assumptions based on the general rule I posit above.
Yes...but they competed as the soviet union...which had a peak population of 291 million..
Yeah, that's a fact. Watching Cameroon play was sad. Those guys look like they could just be phenomenal, but they just don't have the organization and ball control skills in the World Cup. As for speed and leg strength, they are awesome. Passing.......(as Borat would say) Not so nice........
Maybe, but I prefer Morphy. He seemed like more of a raw genius and certainly was head and shoulders above his contemporaries in a way no subsequent champion has been.
That's definitely true. They also had a steroid issue as does China. I've heard wild stories of blood doping and have heard quite a few in tennis as well. Funny, I played a satellite tournament back in 1993 and had to have a steroid shot for sinus issues and for 3 days, I played like never before. I seriously felt like a bull out there and took out the top seed in the main draw 1 and 1. A few days later, I felt like a 100 year old grandpa. Once I was coming down off of that crap, I felt TERRIBLE. Being that prednisone isn't a major performance enhancer, I can only imagine what a serious performance enhancing drug could do. Talking World Cup earlier, I wonder how North Korea will treat it's players when they get back.......
Tina
Banned
That sounds terrible, ProCoach. Did you go for the treatment center?
Tina
Banned
I know you are pretty good at Chess (compared to me
). Would you mind sharing with us about the differences? I love to hear your point of view. Thanks. -Tina
Tina
Banned
Similarities: Chess and Tennis
I believe there are some similarities between chess and tennis. In tennis it is good to come to the front and center at the net to play volleys and cut down your opponent's options and angles (Please correct me if I am wrong). This is similar to the way that it is good to control the center in chess. Also passing shots bear a resemblance to passed pawns in my eyes. In chess, white and black take on different roles with respect to the opening behavior. In tennis the server is like the white player and the returner of serve is like the black player.
For example: Sampras was a great server-whiter player and Agassi was a great returner-black player
I believe there are some similarities between chess and tennis. In tennis it is good to come to the front and center at the net to play volleys and cut down your opponent's options and angles (Please correct me if I am wrong). This is similar to the way that it is good to control the center in chess. Also passing shots bear a resemblance to passed pawns in my eyes. In chess, white and black take on different roles with respect to the opening behavior. In tennis the server is like the white player and the returner of serve is like the black player.
For example: Sampras was a great server-whiter player and Agassi was a great returner-black player
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Limpinhitter
G.O.A.T.
slice bh compliment
G.O.A.T.
Even closer parallels to squash. Controlling the T and all.
Good point, though. It's been said that tennis combines elements of chess and boxing. I grew up playing chess, I used to box, and I've always played a lot of tennis, so this fits neatly for me.
Also, there's some world championship biathlon of sorts -- combining chess and boxing in the same week. So cool, even though it's probably a mediocre talent pool, I respect it.
It'd be like distance running and tractor pull. Or hammer throw and darts. Shot put and tiddlywinks, anyone?
pc1
G.O.A.T.
Morphy certainly was brilliant. It's really hard to access who is the greatest chessplayer. The FIDE system is changed so that they can limit ratings loss. The ratings are now inflated as opposed to past years.
My favorites have been Capablanca and Fischer. Capablanca has a pure style of chess and is possibly the most gifted player ever, along with Morphy and a few others. Botvinnik, in the 1980's I believe when Kasparov was World Champion mentioned that of all the World Champions he had met it was Capablanca who impressed him the most.
Since you enjoy Morphy, how do you like Alekhine?
Some of the great Russian players are often hard to access. They have an entire team to back them as opposed to one man.
But I enjoy Karpov and Kasparov also. Petrosian is also a great favorite of mine.
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pc1
G.O.A.T.
The thing with chessplayers today is that the rating system has changed and theRe is ratings inflation. So unfortunately you cannot compare ratings today and in the past.
It's fairly clear however that chessplayers in the past can compete easily today. Victor Korchnoi has been competing at a top level for over a half century.
To stay on topic, whatever people say about Laver's relative strength in comparison to player's today, Laver's accomplishments as a player in many areas are virtually impossible to equal. His 199 tournament victories are just incredible. His three Grand Slams are amazing. One amateur, one pro and one Open Grand Slam! The man won everything.
It's fairly clear however that chessplayers in the past can compete easily today. Victor Korchnoi has been competing at a top level for over a half century.
To stay on topic, whatever people say about Laver's relative strength in comparison to player's today, Laver's accomplishments as a player in many areas are virtually impossible to equal. His 199 tournament victories are just incredible. His three Grand Slams are amazing. One amateur, one pro and one Open Grand Slam! The man won everything.
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Ultra2HolyGrail
Hall of Fame
The american champ.
pc1
G.O.A.T.
The american champ.
Nice post Ultra2HolyGrail.
Tina
Banned
Like I said many times, everyone is so unique according to Howard Gardner's multiple intelligences. Please Let Him Go
.
Tina
Banned
pc1
G.O.A.T.
lol. Well I like the Fischer photo. It's a very well known Life magazine photo.
CyBorg
Legend
jimbo333
Hall of Fame
Of course, in the end, it is impossible that "we will all agree". No surprise there. This is inherently both a objective and subjective exercise. When you have a objective and subjective discussion, there will never be universal agreement. Comparing players who are about 30 years apart in terms of "prime Tennis years" necessitates that we engage in subjective assessments. That cannot be eliminated. We can't have absolute certainty. That's fine. That's the way it's supposed to be.
Yet, let's start by agreeing that we can't think of Federer playing with his 2010 BLX Wilson frame, while Connors played with the T-2000 that he used through ~1983. So, if they played, we would have to have Federer playing with most likely a wood frame. The changes in his Game in some ways is predictable, but it's impossible to say how he would have fared. He could not have played the Game he does today. Now, otherwise, you have to give Connors a modern frame and make a hypothetical, educated assessment as to how he would play against Federer today.
You have to consider various surfaces and in this case, concentrate on hard courts. One final thought, people forget that Connors could hit his groundstrokes as hard or harder than Roger Federer. More pace and extremely flat, with some use of the slice/sidespin. Meanwhile, of course Federer hits with considerably more spin. Let me also add that Connors was extremely fit and tough, with anticipation that made up for the lack of blazing speed. Mentally, he was as tough as they come.
Good stuff
But Connors actually used his T2000 through until 1986, apart from a few months in 1984, amazingly!
Tall Bama Guy
New User
ProCoach - you mentioned Austin Powell as a student in one of your posts. I grew up with his dad and watched Austin grow up until he moved off. He is a terriffic young man. How is his wrist doing? I talked to him last summer and he was telling me about the problems he had. Thanks.
