Serena's Longevity Stands Tallest.... Big 3 still have some catching up to do.

Razer

Razer

G.O.A.T.
Longest Span between 1st grand slam singles final and last grand slam singles final in the open era

01. Serena Williams - 20 years [1999 US open to 2019 US Open]
02. Venus Williams - 19 years 11 months [1997 US open to 2017W]
03. Martina Navratilova - 19.5 years [1975AO to 1994W]
04. Rafael Nadal - 17 years [2005 RG to 2022 RG]
05. Roger Federer - 16 years [ 2003W to 2019W ]
06. Novak Djokovic - 15 years 5months [2007USO to 2023AO]
07. Andre Agassi - 15 years 3 months [1990RG to 2005USO]
08. Chris Evert - <15 years [73RG to 88AO]
09. Steffi Graf - 12 years 2 months [1987RG to 1999W]
10. Peter Sampras - 12 years [1990 USO to 2002 USO]
11. Maria Sugarpova - 10.5 years [2004W to 2015AO]
12. Boris Becker - 10.5 years [1985W to 1996AO]
13. Jimmy Connors - 10.5 years [1973AO to 1984W]


With the numbers of Teenager dwindling in the top 100 every year this record will probably stand the test of time

www.tennisforum.com

Average age & number of teenagers in top 100 (1987-2022)

The average age of players in the top 100 is constantly increasing, especially since 2009. The number of teenagers has decreased significantly, this year there are the fewest of them. Probably nothing surprising for most. Similar for top 20 and top 250 (which shows a more gradual decline in the...
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Yeah, not happening...

I have Djokovic having five seasons at the top, at best I think he stretches it to 19.
 
Hitman said:
Yeah, not happening...

I have Djokovic having five seasons at the top, at best I think he stretches it to 19.
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Yup, 18-19 years seems tops for Novak.
If he can reach a slam final 5 years from now then we are looking at 28-30 slams.... unlikely

For the ladies as well it is getting tougher and tougher as now teens are not beating people in 20s, and 35+ is always taxing for everyone in every era, so these sort of records will stand for sometime...
 
rick kerr said:
Yup, 18-19 years seems tops for Novak.
If he can reach a slam final 5 years from now then we are looking at 28-30 slams.... unlikely

For the ladies as well it is getting tougher and tougher as now teens are not beating people in 20s, and 35+ is always taxing for everyone in every era, so these sort of records will stand for sometime...
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Novak is the closest to achieving this IMO, and even he will fall short. No lady is achieving this, unless she is the GOAT of GOATs.
 
Hitman said:
He does, but I don't think he will. Not sure he will be playing beyond 2024.
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True, his last 12 months been very worrisome. Another 12 months like this and he will be 38... very hard....

I think he will be aiming for 20th anniversary of his first RG title, so he will maybe try to play..... not sure what his result will be...
 
mahesh69a said:
If talking about slams in general (not just singles) Serena (bless the mother) has a long way to go ...

Navratilova won her 1st slam in 1974 and last slam in 2006 when she was nearly 50.

Lets see someone win 59 slams total in the OE.
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I think Serena is not focused about doubles or else she could get into shape and win some slams in doubles even now..... it is singles where her time ran out after 20 years ... maybe if not for pregancy she could have stretched this record to 21 or 22 as well....

Serena's physical superiority over her peers is probably even more than Nadal's over his field....
 
rick kerr said:
True, his last 12 months been very worrisome. Another 12 months like this and he will be 38... very hard....

I think he will be aiming for 20th anniversary of his first RG title, so he will maybe try to play..... not sure what his result will be...
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Lets see, we can speculate for now.
 
Not going to happen. The only ones who can theoretically still break it are Rafa and Nole and neither will Rafa reach a final three years from now, nor will Novak in 5 years (I mean never rule him out especially not in light of generation useless, but still not happening for me). That’s being said, the longest span between first and last slam title would be more relevant imho.
Btw: it says AO 2008 for Novak as the first final which should be USO 2007. The span of 15 years and 5 months is correct though.
 
BorgTheGOAT said:
Not going to happen. The only ones who can theoretically still break it are Rafa and Nole and neither will Rafa reach a final three years from now, nor will Novak in 5 years (I mean never rule him out especially not in light of generation useless, but still not happening for me). That’s being said, the longest span between first and last slam title would be more relevant imho.
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Even in 1st slam title to last slam title Serena is leading at 17.5 years for now
Rafa is closest at 17 years and has a chance to beat it this year with an 18 years gap.

However we should still see GS Final IMO, a lot of times players are not able to win title due to a stronger player existing, so we should give Final appearance as the cutoff.... If you are in the final then it means you are in a position to take the title, whether you take or not depends on the day.
 
rick kerr said:
Even in 1st slam title to last slam title Serena is leading at 17.5 years for now
Rafa is closest at 17 years and has a chance to beat it this year with an 18 years gap.

However we should still see GS Final IMO, a lot of times players are not able to win title due to a stronger player existing, so we should give Final appearance as the cutoff.... If you are in the final then it means you are in a position to take the title, whether you take or not depends on the day.
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This is debatable but ok. Interesting stat nevertheless.
 
aldeayeah said:
You're missing Djokovic '07 USO, o historian of the game
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I counted 07USO.... starting from that is his 15 years 5 months ... that 08AO I wrote is a typo



BorgTheGOAT said:
This is debatable but ok. Interesting stat nevertheless.
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I mean Navratilova did beat Graf in 90s twice, even Fed did reach W final and come close to winning, so it be wrong to not count this in longevity.... thats why I put GSFinal.
 
Why would anyone even care about this? :-D
Just more useless garbage "records" that tennis fanatics like to dream up and make silly threads on.
 
Mike Sams said:
Why would anyone even care about this? :-D
Just more useless garbage "records" that tennis fanatics like to dream up and make silly threads on.
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But we cared about these records years ago when Federer reached slam finals in 30s, people said it is something never done before, people said Djokovic and Nadal will be finished in their 20s ...... What happened now ???

Reaching a grand slam final 20 years apart is the ultimate feat of longevity -> Serena's 2019 US open final opponent Andreescu was not even born in 1999 when Serena played the 1999US open final....... So these are the type of records which we should be talking about instead of weak era records of 04-07.
 
It's ridiculous to compare men to women, and it's not a very relevant record (slam win would be more important than slam final, and it's still a nice statistic more than something truly relevant), but yeah, none of them are touching that record. Federer is obviously retired, Nadal looks semi-finished and even with a last hurray he wouldn't come close. Djokovic looks great but has a lot of time left to reach that so still extremely unlikely.
 
TheNachoMan said:
BO5 takes a bigger toll on the body
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Federer is a man and despite that his 1st bo3 final (marseille 2000) to last bo3 final (basel 2019) is 19 years 8 months apart.

You think that helped him ?

BO3 over 7 rounds is very taxing on a woman's body and pregnancy especially is slam career ending experience, also athletically women decline quicker than men, so you should not blame them for not playing best of 5 sets

Longevity is Longevity, they play their fields and what you get is the result.
 
Hitman said:
He does, but I don't think he will. Not sure he will be playing beyond 2024.
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Everything about Rafa is exceptionally rare. I wouldn't put it past him to retire after this season and come back in 2025 or even 26 for clay season and end up winning at RG.
 
Why reaching final over winning it is suddenly a huge factor?! LOL What about winning said final?...isn't it more telling about someone's longevity, than simply reaching it and losing??...
 
BeatlesFan said:
And Fed played longer than any of them except Rosewall and Connors. Fed turned pro in 1998 and was active til 2022, that's 24 years. All these other parameters are meaningless, it's just total years playing.
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Active till 2022 only on paper, he was done and dusted at ao 2020

He turned pro in 1998, so what ? Nadal turned pro in 2001 despite being 5 years younger, Novak turned pro in 2003 (5 years after fed) despite being 6 years younger
Novak and Rafa were in slam finals at an earlier age than Fed
Rafa has won slams farther apart than Fed has
Rafa has year end 1 12 years apart - (2008 vs 2019)
Novak has year end 1 11 years apart - (2011- vs 2021 )
Fed's year end 1s are just 6 years apart - (2004-2009)
Longevity in career span is not what matters, it is winning at the highest level
Serena (a woman who had a kid) reached a slam final before fed reached his and reached a slam final after he reached his last slam final .... fed's entire career is stuffed inside SERENA's ....

Fed's longevity is not exceptional
 
Bookmark my reply: Emma Raducanu will break this at the 2042 AO.
After an amazing 18-year run as a world-famous actress and model, she will rediscover her passion for tennis, find the perfect coach for her (Naomi Osaka?), experience good health and win her long-awaited second slam.

(Obviously facetious, and I am a fan of Emma.)
 
BeatlesFan said:
And Fed played longer than any of them except Rosewall and Connors. Fed turned pro in 1998 and was active til 2022, that's 24 years. All these other parameters are meaningless, it's just total years playing.
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According to your logic,

Aisam Ul Haq Qureshi, Aqeel Khan, Gasquet, Masoor Bahrami all have greater longevity than Nadal ?

Fabrice Santoro and Amritraj more than Djokovic ?

We should be talking about these men ?

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It's crazy she couldn't get #24, just one more slam to tie Court once and for all

Serena had an incredible 23-6 slam ratio from 1999-2017 and before you know it she lost 4 slam finals in a row in a 2 year window

sports eh?
 
Sephiroth said:
It's crazy she couldn't get #24, just one more slam to tie Court once and for all

Serena had an incredible 23-6 slam ratio from 1999-2017 and before you know it she lost 4 slam finals in a row in a 2 year window

sports eh?
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Her pregnancy broke down her body and she could never return to her pre 2017 levels, I am sure she doesn't regret it in any way, but that is a factor for sure.
She losing so many slam finals in a row and then going down in 1st week in 2020s is a result of that, her decline could have been slower otherwise and she would have more slams too.
 
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