Well, but don't you realize that's an answer that serves my argument rather than yours, lol? In your example match, he lost so you're serving it up to me on a platter to say he should have lost the match against Med too. In big matches Nadal wins, he usually doesn't play that badly. I do think he showed a lot of heart to fight through whatever was bothering him. And that's the last time I am going to say it. Not interested in further appeasing your insecurity.
I am not a fan of Nadal/Djokovic, but I do acknowledge when they've played well - nadal in RG 20 final, djoko in AO 21 SF/F, RG 21 SF (after 1st set), RG 21 F (last 3 sets) for instance to speak of recent stuff. nadal showed great fight in AO 22 final, but the level just wasn't there.
Rest of it is you projecting your emotions onto me, pal.
It's a pertinent question to ask when you have so much energy to get into a protracted discussion revolving around you making unprovoked personal attacks on me and then when I retaliate in kind, turning around and saying it reflects my state of mind? You have been doing this for I-lost-count-of-how-many-posts. In that much time, you could debate tennis if you are so inclined. Absent evidence, I conclude you aren't so inclined. That may be unfair but hey, it's a, as you say, public forum and I am entitled to so conclude. I am entitled to conclude your prime obsession when you participate in this forum is to inflict a holier-than-thou attitude on other participants and then protest feebly if they give you a piece of your mind.
You added that hurriedly upon realizing the flaw of your argument. You already knew where I was going with this which is why you could have taken your time and chosen not to offer RG21 as an example. That doesn't help at all. Nadal lost that match. Here we have a slam final where Nadal made horrible misses in the first couple of sets and still ended up winning the match. As much as it is a testament to his mental strength, it is also to Med's ineptitude. He never controlled the match anyway. It was all on Nadal's racquet. When he played badly, he lost. When he lifted his level, Med never changed anything probably under the illusion he was going to win. It was too late by the time he had cured himself of the illusion.
Nadal and Djokovic had never won slam finals from 2-0 up before until the Next Gen arrived.
Oh yes, Fed is weak minded especially against Djokovic. Why else would he lose not once but twice from 40-15 against the same player? The first since the 1940s to lose a Wimbledon final from 40-15. The Anderson match was pathetic too. You can try those tactics against abmk, but I am not going to argue Fed's follies.
Well, you could argue that something like that wasn't gonna happen against a Next Genner.
To lose from 2-0 sets up is pathetic. It doesn't matter who the player is. You really should be able to win when you have won the first two sets up. If nothing else, you can hold serve and take it to a tiebreak. And with the guys serving as fast as they do, not being able to do that reflects on the player's mental state in that third set which could vary from complacency or passivity or just nerves/choking.
Well, I am going to. Think of where he would be in the slam race if he got those done. And then Delpo 2009. You can't be the GOAT if you keep losing winnable matches. That's why Nadal's finished ahead of him. Maybe Nadal's lost a few he should have won but I am sure it's a lot less than Fed. Djokovic likewise shed fewer of these winnable ones. It boils down to that far more than the Nextgen lottery that went in Djokovic's favour. The reason they both will finish ahead of Fed is Fed looked a gift horse in the mouth once too often.
I agree in principle, but what if the opponent just starts zoning and there's not really much you can do even if you play like the first two sets? It doesn't happen often but it's not completely out of the question. I would probably label Fed's loss to Tsonga at Wimbledon 2011 one of these.
Med is different, for the nth time, because he was playing a much older player who did not have the ideal prep for this tournament by his own admission. So it was more doable for him than it was for many others in that position. It wasn't as bad as Coria but nearly there. And with a 200ks serve, he really should have taken at least one of the last three sets to a tiebreak. That's why I call it pathetic. I can understand someone like Simon still losing 3 sets because his serve is not a weapon. Med conceding the break in every one of those three sets was mostly on him.
Djokovic actually did lose many winnable matches, more so in his prime than Fed did.
Meh, I consider Fed's loss to Tsonga pathetic. 0 BPs in the final 4 sets and couldn't even bring a single one of the last 3 to a tiebreak, which means that Fed failed to keep his end of the deal which was to hold serve.
I don't remember much about the Tsonga match but I agree with the idea that you CAN get into a zone and make the first two sets irrelevant. But that too is rare. Wins from 2 sets to none are rare to begin with and wins where that didn't involve at least some level of implosion from an opponent who assumed he was going to win are rarer still. I believe a lapse of mental concentration is kind of a must for these amazing turnarounds to happen.
Again, who said he didn't win fair and square? Maybe somebody else did, wouldn't know, but I didn't. I can't help your insecurity about it. I know what I saw and I call Medvedev pathetic. It has nothing to do with the slam tally. You - and the squirrelly lurker who likes your posts - know that I accepted Nadal as the GOAT when he won no. 20 so it's absolutely foolish for you to pretend that that's the reason I am calling Med pathetic. No, I am calling him pathetic because I had to spend 5 hours watching a tennis match when I could have done something else that Sunday evening. I had to watch Med passively hitting the ball back for five hours and I happen to find that taxing. If you don't, fine. But I cannot be compelled to call Med great or even decent in that match. I won't.
He also made fun of mid 30's Agassi when Fed was beating him, as well as endless Hewitt/Roddick bashing, but suddenly Medvedev not being able to beat mid 30's Nadal makes him great and we shouldn't criticize him.
My forecast is he will ferret out something I said about AO 2017 final or Indian Wells that year and triumphantly show it around as if it proves his point. He has to completely ignore words like " I accepted Nadal as the GOAT when he won no. 20 " or that I argued with Fed fans who said Nadal's slam distribution makes his 20 worth less than Fed's and desperately play gotcha to salvage his severely bruised ego. He thinks he can fool me just because he made an account a long time ago.
Never denied that. I am just explaining where my irritation with his play comes from. When Nadal wasn't playing well, he adapted and came to the net a lot, sliced a lot. Med did zero adapting. He was a spectator in his own match and that's that. Honestly, I want either Alcaraz to start making slam finals or one Big Three guy to make up half of it. If it's a Tsitsi-Med/Zed-Med final, I won't even bother to watch. They all bore me to death.
Oh, fun, we're having a TTW group therapy session!