The Djokovic Nadal slam h2h

[soldat]

@FlyingSaucer
I think it’s time to set the record straight once and for all on the slam h2h between Djokovic and Nadal.

Djokovic Nadal slam h2h breakdown 7-11
2-8 FO
2-0 at AO
2-1 at WC
1-2 at USO

Nadal has an 11-7 slam H2H and a winning H2H in slam finals v Djokovic, by the way.

These numbers show an important feature. We know there’s one clay slam and three non clay slams every season. You would expect in 18 slam meetings that Djokovic plays Nadal about 4-5 times on clay and about 14-15 times on non clay, if they were equally good at each surface with random draws, yet they played 10 times on clay, double the expected amount.

Does it mean that Nadal is that much worse than Djokovic on all the other surfaces? We look at the slam standings and you'll see that Nadal is worse at making deep runs at all the other slams, with fewer wins and fewer finals. Djokovic is an excellent clay player, and to no surprise, has made more French Open QFs than any of his other tournaments. Djokovic is also extremely good at going deep in tournaments and reaching SFs and Finals across all slams and all surfaces, meaning he is the most adaptable and complete player we've seen up to this point.

Djokovic
AO 16 QF 13 SF 11 F 10 Wins
FO 19 QF 13 SF 7 F 3 Wins
WC 17 QF 15 SF 10 F 7 wins
USO 14 QF 14 SF 10 F 4 wins

Nadal
AO 14 QF 7 SF 6 F 2 Wins
FO 16 QF 15 SF 14 F 14 Wins
WC 8 QF 8 SF 5 F 2 Wins
USO 9 QF 8 SF 5 F 4 Wins

The evaluation we can give is that Nadal underperformed at all the other slams while meeting Djokovic far more than the expected value at the French open. We can see that Nadal is 8-2 on FO, and 3-5 on all the other surfaces, and at FO, the main reason that they played so many times is that Djokovic is an excellent clay player and was able to challenge Nadal again and again by going deep in the FO. It's lamentable that Djokovic did not win more of their meetings on clay, and hats off to Nadal for being such a dominant clay player.

All this said, the evidence shows that Djokovic is the greatest tennis player ever, the greatest on hard court, the greatest on grass, and the second greatest on clay. Nadal is in 2nd place, being the greatest on clay, and Federer is in third place.

Anyone want who wants to bring up the slam h2h between Djokovic and Nadal in the future, reference this post.

 

[4UTRMoutet]

First ever reasonable opinion and analysis coming from this fella. But that being said, this is already well-known knowledge. Some choose to deny it, and there's not much to do about that.

 

[djokovic the conqueror]

Thank you for the necessary context of the Djokovic-Nadal h2h. Nadal fans love to cherry pick data and use it to make Nadal look better than he is. Djokovic is the most complete player. That's why he has a winning h2h against Fedal.

 

[soldat]

First ever reasonable opinion and analysis coming from this fella. But that being said, this is already well-known knowledge. Some choose to deny it, and there's not much to do about that.

Lol, I accept your attempt to compliment me. Pretty much everyone, including the most die hard Federer and Nadal fans secretly accept Djokovic is the GOAT, they just can't bring themselves to admit it publicly, even in an anonymous forum like this one

 

[Lleytonstation]

If your point is that rafa was better h2h in slams you proved it.

On clay rafa leads by 6. Off clay djoker leads by 2.

 

[Lleytonstation]

Oh and Federer is the greatest grass player of all time. More than double the grass titles and double the grass match wins and more wimbledon slam titles and 2 more final appearances too.

 

[soldat]

If your point is that rafa was better h2h in slams you proved it.

On clay rafa leads by 6. Off clay djoker leads by 2.

Because of the surface disparity you would have to weight the scores to get a better picture, the expected value of the clay slams would be .25 * 8 clay wins and .75 * 3 non clay wins for Nadal, vs .25 * 2 clays wins + .75 * 5 non clay wins for Djokovic, which ironically gives a score of 4.25 to each Djokovic and Nadal in slam h2h. But the tiebreaker still goes to Djokovic because of his far better performance at other slams while simultaneously reaching so deep at FO.

And Djokovic is the grass goat. 3-1 Wimbledon h2h outweighs the 1 extra slam.

 

[TheFifthSet]

The way I always put it is that even if Djokovic made 20 straight AO finals from 2005-2024 with everything else remaining the same, he would've faced Nadal a measly 6x. Nadal famously made and won "only" 14 RG Finals. Djokovic could've outdone that by a lot and there still wouldn't have been 10 real-world meetings.

Whoever you wanna blame, the AO-RG split ended up being the main determinant. The Slam H2H played out as it should have; Nadal was the (often enormous) pre-match favourite in 12, maybe 13 matches. If it were any worse than 11-7 it would've been underachivement. It neither deflates nor enhances either of their legacies.

In a sane place, above ends the discussion.

 

[soldat]

The way I always put it is that even if Djokovic made 20 straight AO finals from 2005-2024 with everything remaining the same, he only would've faced Nadal 6x. Nadal famously made and won "only" 14 RG's. Djokovic could've been an even at the AO than the greatest single-slam player ever on his domain and there still wouldn't have been 10 real-world meetings.

Whoever you wanna blame, the AO-RG split ended up being the main determinant. The Slam H2H played out as it should have; Nadal was the (often enormous) pre-match favourite in 12, maybe 13 matches. If it were any worse than 11-7 it would've been underachivement. It neither deflates nor enhances either of their legacies.

In a sane place, above ends the discussion.

Your first argument is already flawed. If Nadal had also played better and had gone deeper at AO, he would have met Djokovic a lot more. It's not that Djokovic by himself needs to make 20 finals, it's that Nadal needs to play better at AO as well.

If you weight the h2h by the ratios of what surface the matches occurred on you do, in fact, get 4.25 wins vs 4.25 wins exactly. I personally favor giving the tiebreaker to Djokovic due to his far better performance across all the slams.

 

[TheFifthSet]

Your first argument is already flawed. If Nadal had also played better and had gone deeper at AO, he would have met Djokovic a lot more. It's not that Djokovic by himself needs to make 20 finals, it's that Nadal needs to play better at AO as well.

My argument is that even in a hypothetical world where Djokovic at the AO is more prolific than Nadal at RG, you still could not have reasonably expected them to play 10x there (the amount they played at RG) given the surrounding circumstances.

I'm not saying Djokovic dropped the ball by not making 20 AO finals in a row. Rather that he was always going to lose the Slam H2H under the real-life circumstances, and one can hardly fault him for it.

If you weight the h2h by the ratios of what surface the matches occurred on you do, in fact, get 4.25 wins vs 4.25 wins exactly. I personally favor giving the tiebreaker to Djokovic due to his far better performance across all the slams.

Yeah, again the Slam H2H played out roughly as it should have considering the skew. It's not really a flex that Nadal went 11-7. It's likewise not that impressive that Djokovic won 7 of the 18 matches even with the unfavourable distribution. Pretty neutral.

We seem to agree.

 

[Lleytonstation]

Because of the surface disparity you would have to weight the scores to get a better picture, the expected value of the clay slams would be .25 * 8 clay wins and .75 * 3 non clay wins for Nadal, vs .25 * 2 clays wins + .75 * 5 non clay wins for Djokovic, which ironically gives a score of 4.25 to each Djokovic and Nadal in slam h2h. But the tiebreaker still goes to Djokovic because of his far better performance at other slams while simultaneously reaching so deep at FO.

And Djokovic is the grass goat. 3-1 Wimbledon h2h outweighs the 1 extra slam.

You can do all the math you want.

Its funny how you don't respect one h2h and then says its the be all end all against fed. That is some hypo talk right there.

I can admit djoker will go down as the greatest ever, but you djoker fans cant even admit fed is greater on grass. Its fact. The tennis world has agreed that djoker is greatest of all time and federer is greatest grass player of all time.

8-7 at wimbledon with 2 more finals. And that is just wimbledon not grass. Djoker might not even be the second greatest.

Those are facts. Not opinions.

 

[gamelovergold]

Nadal faced joker 10 times in RG .
FEDERER the greatest rival of Nadal played only 6 times .
Novak was reaching QF SF F in french open but Nadal was never same consistency wise and that's why they meet less in AO WO USO
There are many intelligent people who types it is better to lose in SF then reaching finals and lose to your main rival.
Nadal opted for extremes and decided to lose in R1 R2 R3 R4 to be extra cautious.
( wim Rosol brown darcis kyrgios muller)

 

[soldat]

My argument is that even in a hypothetical world where Djokovic at the AO is more prolific than Nadal at RG, you still could not have reasonably expected them to play 10x (the amount they played at RG) given the surrounding circumstances.

I'm not saying Djokovic dropped the ball by not making 20 AO finals in a row. Rather that he was always going to lose the Slam H2H under these circumstances, and one can hardly fault him for it.



Yeah, again the Slam H2H played out roughly as it should have. It's not really a flex that Nadal went 11-7. It's likewise not that impressive that Djokovic won 7 of the 18 matches even with the unfavourable distribution. Pretty neutral.

We seem to agree.

I see what you mean, yes, 7-11 is probably the expected outcome given that they played so much on clay.

 

[Lleytonstation]

The whole "skewed" argument because of clay has always been a funny argument.

They played 18 times at slams. Rafa won 11 of those. it is what it is.

I wish fed didn't play djoker when he was older in a lot of slam matches, but it is what it is.

 

[TheFifthSet]

They played 18 times at slams. Rafa won 11 of those. it is what it is.

Agreed. Rafa earned his 11 wins. There was no funny business. In that sense yes, “it is what it is.”

However, if those 11 wins to argue for something that doesn’t follow from them, I think it’s only fair to point out that the skew was the single biggest thing shaping the Slam H2H.

 

[Lleytonstation]

Agreed. Rafa earned his 11 wins. There was no funny business. In that sense yes, “it is what it is.”

However, if Nadal fans use those 11 wins to argue for something that doesn’t follow from it, I think it’s only fair to point out that the skew was the single biggest thing shaping the Slam H2H.

Agree one hundred.

I am not saying it means Rafa is better, just saying he was better h2h at slams when they played each other.

And djoker fans can say the same about fed.

 

[Pheasant]

Nadal was 2 whiskers away from owning the HTH at 3 out of the 4 slams(2012 AO and 2018 Wimbledon) while leaving the AO a tie. But if, if, if doesn’t exist. So instead, the HTH has Nadal leading the HTH at 2 slams while Djoker leads the HTH at the other 2 slams. And Nadal leads the HTH vs both Djoker and Federer at slams. Nadal earned that.

At the end of the day, Nadal leads the HTH. Making adjustments for surface percentages doesn’t matter; just like making adjustments for injuries doesn’t matter either. And I won’t get into making adjustments for “peak” time frames either. If we get into making adjustments for several other factors, then Nadal is going to pull away from both Djoker and Federer even farther.

I don’t have Nadal as the winner of the Big 3 era overall. But I will give him credit where credit is due. He won the HTH among the 3 of them at slams and it’s not that close. The numbers are the numbers.

Nadal was 21-11 vs Fedovic
Djoker was 18-17 vs Fedal
Federer was 10-21 vs Djokodal

Nadal was a phenomenal big match player, despite having all of those injuries. He wins this category; even if I don’t pick him as the overall winner among the 3 of them.

Also, this need to prove that Djokovic crushes everybody in every single category is getting old. He doesn’t. In reality, the margins are razer-thin overall. He’s not going to dominate every single category like some of his diehard fans are trying to pitch. Just take the damn win. 24 slam titles, 400+ weeks at #1, and 8 YE#1 are also numbers that we don’t need to adjust. I won’t add if, if, if to those either.

Seriously, just take the damn win for the stuff that really matters, instead of nitpicking other smaller issues.

 

[gamelovergold]

In the grand scheme of things
Novak 31 Nadal 29.
Those 2 WINS in FO were worthy enough.
Novak 27 federer 23
Those 3 Wins in Wim were worthy enough.

 

[soldat]

Agree one hundred.

I am not saying it means Rafa is better, just saying he was better h2h at slams when they played each other.

And djoker fans can say the same about fed.

That's two completely different reasons though. Nadal and Djokovic are a similar age and the overall h2h 7-11 doesn't show a lot because of the disparity in the surfaces played. But the 2-8 clay h2h does show that Nadal is extremely good on clay, he beats Djokovic 80% of the time they meet at French Open.


If you want we can do the breakdown for slam h2h for Federer and Djokovic as well.

Djokovic Federer slam h2h breakdown 11-6
1-1 FO
4-1 at AO
3-1 at WC
3-3 at USO

We will focus on just the 3-1 on grass slams, because we want to know who is better on grass between Federer and Djokovic. We count their respective slams, which Federer leads by 1 slam which means it's very close. Normally I'd give the win to Federer if the h2h was just 2-1 but 3-1 and 3-0 in Wimbledon finals? I think just based on their h2h it's quite clear that Djokovic is ahead on grass.

Now, I think if you want to make the argument that the Djokovic Federer h2h on grass doesn't mean anything you'll have to make the argument that:
"Federer Djokovic grass h2h doesn't mean anything because they have a 6 year age gap"

This is a completely different argument.

 

[junkieballer]

At hard and grass Slams they met only when Nadal was ranked top2:

2007 Wimbledon - Nadal was #2
2011 Wimbledon - Nadal was #1
2018 Wimbledon - Nadal was #1
2010 US Open - Nadal was #1
2011 US Open - Nadal was #2
2013 US Open - Nadal was #2
2012 Australian Open - Nadal was #2
2019 Australian Open - Nadal was #2

On the other hand at Roland Garros they met 3 times when Novak was outside top2, including one time when he was a baby at #63:

2006 Roland Garros - Djokovic was #63
2007 Roland Garros - Djokovic was #6
2008 Roland Garros - Djokovic was #3

This means Nadal could reach Nole off clay only when being peak, while Nole could reach Rafa on clay even when not being peak.

 

[gamelovergold]

Nadal was 2 whiskers away from owning the HTH at 3 out of the 4 slams(2012 AO and 2018 Wimbledon) while leaving the AO a tie. But if, if, if doesn’t exist. So instead, the HTH has Nadal leading the HTH at 2 slams while Djoker leads the HTH at the other 2 slams. And Nadal leads the HTH vs both Djoker and Federer at slams. Nadal earned that.

At the end of the day, Nadal leads the HTH. Making adjustments for surface percentages doesn’t matter; just like making adjustments for injuries doesn’t matter either. And I won’t get into making adjustments for “peak” time frames either. If we get into making adjustments for several other factors, then Nadal is going to pull away from both Djoker and Federer even farther.

I don’t have Nadal as the winner of the Big 3 era overall. But I will give him credit where credit is due. He won the HTH among the 3 of them at slams and it’s not that close. The numbers are the numbers.

Nadal was 21-11 vs Fedovic
Djoker was 18-17 vs Fedal
Federer was 10-21 vs Djokodal

Nadal was a phenomenal big match player, despite having all of those injuries. He wins this category; even if I don’t pick him as the overall winner among the 3 of them.

Also, this need to prove that Djokovic crushes everybody in every single category is getting old. He doesn’t. In reality, the margins are razer-thin overall. He’s not going to dominate every single category like some of his diehard fans are trying to pitch. Just take the damn win. 24 slam titles, 400+ weeks at #1, and 8 YE#1 are also numbers that we don’t need to adjust. I won’t add if, if, if to those either.

Seriously, just take the damn win for the stuff that really matters, instead of nitpicking other smaller issues.

In 100m races margin are almost 1/1000th of second .
Fotball world cup are won by just 1 goal. .
Margins are always very thin when two great players play .
One ace for Federer in 2019 and it would have been 21 22 23 ( other things remain same) and Federer by that single victory would have been immortalized by his fans.
One shot
One Ace
One double fault
One lucky shot.
It is always like that

 

[Lleytonstation]

That's two completely different reasons though. Nadal and Djokovic are a similar age and the overall h2h 7-11 doesn't show a lot because of the disparity in the surfaces played. But the 2-8 clay h2h does show that Nadal is extremely good on clay, he beats Djokovic 80% of the time they meet at French Open.


If you want we can do the breakdown for slam h2h for Federer and Djokovic as well.

Djokovic Federer slam h2h breakdown 11-6
1-1 FO
4-1 at AO
3-1 at WC
3-3 at USO

We will focus on just the 3-1 on grass slams, because we want to know who is better on grass between Federer and Djokovic. We count their respective slams, which Federer leads by 1 slam which means it's very close. Normally I'd give the win to Federer if the h2h was just 2-1 but 3-1 and 3-0 in Wimbledon finals? I think just based on their h2h it's quite clear that Djokovic is ahead on grass.

Now, I think if you want to make the argument that the Djokovic Federer h2h on grass doesn't mean anything you'll have to make the argument that:
"Federer Djokovic grass h2h doesn't mean anything because they have a 6 year age gap"

This is a completely different argument.

The argument for fed being better on grass, and why it is universally accepted, is for many reasons.

To address the h2h: fed was almost 33 the first time djoker beat fed at wimbledon. Clearly he was past his prime. The one match they played when they were both in their relative primes fed won. Also does this mean roddick was better than djoker because of h2h? No. Fed did also have 2 match points and basically tied djoker when he was 38 years old...

Then you have the main point which is fed played two more Wimbledon finals and has one more championship.

That doesn't even include the fact that fed beat 5 WC winners compared to djokers 3.

Then you have the fact fed had 10 more grass titles outside wimbledon.

Oh and he also beat the guy with 7 Wimbledon titles at wimbledon name pete sampras who also has an argument of being ahead of djoker on grass.

 

[junkieballer]

Djokovic and Nadal are the same age and Nole has more than Nadal

2 Slams
7 YEC
4 Masters
219 weeks at #1
3 year end #1
1 career Slam
2 career Masters
1 NCYGS

 

[Tenez01]

Nadal was 5-0 against Glutenovic

And then when Nole become the player that he is, the h2h is 7-6 in favor of Nole despite 7 of those being on clay. It was 5-1 off clay compared to 2-5 on clay.

 

[junkieballer]

Djokovic is in a separate tier from Nadal and Federer:

More than Nadal:

2 Slams
7 YEC
4 Masters
219 weeks at #1
3 year end #1
1 career Slam
2 career Masters
1 NCYGS

More than Federer:

4 Slams
1 YEC
12 Masters
1 Olympic gold
118 weeks at #1
3 year end #1
2 career Slams
2 career Masters
1 NCYGS

 

[Lleytonstation]

Nadal was 5-0 against Glutenovic

And then when Nole become the player that he is, the h2h is 7-6 in favor of Nole despite 7 of those being on clay. It was 5-1 off clay compared to 2-5 on clay.

It does make me wonder if I stopped eating gluten if I would become a superhero too. Ill never know though cause I like pizza.

As the saying goes, "20 slams with pizza is greater than 24 slams without pizza"

 

[Lleytonstation]

Olympic gold

Not so fast bud.

 

[Clay lover]

Nadal was 5-0 against Glutenovic

And then when Nole become the player that he is, the h2h is 7-6 in favor of Nole despite 7 of those being on clay. It was 5-1 off clay compared to 2-5 on clay.

Someone else could easily have said Nadal was not the same after 2013. And when Nadal became a shadow of himself, the Novak wins came in blah blah blah.

I'm not disagreeing with you or even supporting Nadal here, I'm just saying assigning self-defined "periods" to players' careers to boost his credentials is first of all prone to subjectivity (you can draw the lines to fit your agenda as you like) and secondly applicable to all players - people could just as well have said what you said for anyone they're a fan of to prove "their real self" is superior.

I'd just look holistically and say Djokovic has had a better career overall.

 

[junkieballer]

Nadal and Federer admitting Djokovic is the GOAT:

https://twitter.com/x/status/2092733321943904314

 

[gamelovergold]

It does make me wonder if I stopped eating gluten if I would become a superhero too. Ill never know though cause I like pizza.

As the saying goes, "20 slams with pizza is greater than 24 slams without pizza"

I will never believe that gluten free diet was the magical formula .
As per 20 slam with pizza vs 24 slam without pizza theory Novak sacrificed a lot to reach pinnacle of his sports.
There will be time for pizzas and burgers after retirement and he is only 40 years so still can enjoy a little

 

[Lleytonstation]

Nadal and Federer admitting Djokovic is the GOAT:

https://twitter.com/x/status/2092733321943904314

Lol I agree they both kind of admit it but they both really struggled to just come out and say it. Pretty funny seeing them squirm a bit trying to get the words out

 

[gamelovergold]

Lol I agree they both kind of admit it but they both really struggled to just come out and say it. Pretty funny seeing them squirm a bit trying to get the words out

Real character shown by Roger and Rafa to concede that Novak is better than them.
It will not diminish anything Roger Rafa acheived but their humbleness in accepting will increase their status .
All 3 were in same race and only 1 could be winner

 

[Lleytonstation]

Real character shown by Roger and Rafa to concede that Novak is better than them.
It will not diminish anything Roger Rafa acheived but their humbleness in accepting will increase their status .
All 3 were in same race and only 1 could be winner

They all got to enjoy the lead too.

 

[junkieballer]

Lol I agree they both kind of admit it but they both really struggled to just come out and say it. Pretty funny seeing them squirm a bit trying to get the words out

Fedal played Nole 110 times and could not stop him from getting all the records

 

[Lleytonstation]

Fedal played Nole 110 times and could not stop him from getting all the records

Well not all the records, but yes the overall big ones.

 

[soldat]

The argument for fed being better on grass, and why it is universally accepted, is for many reasons.

To address the h2h: fed was almost 33 the first time djoker beat fed at wimbledon. Clearly he was past his prime. The one match they played when they were both in their relative primes fed won. Also does this mean roddick was better than djoker because of h2h? No. Fed did also have 2 match points and basically tied djoker when he was 38 years old...

Then you have the main point which is fed played two more Wimbledon finals and has one more championship.

That doesn't even include the fact that fed beat 5 WC winners compared to djokers 3.

Then you have the fact fed had 10 more grass titles outside wimbledon.

Oh and he also beat the guy with 7 Wimbledon titles at wimbledon name pete sampras who also has an argument of being ahead of djoker on grass.

7-11 slam h2h doesn't mean much (because of clay skew), but 2-8 vs Nadal on clay does mean something. After playing 10 times, Nadal won 80%. It means Nadal is better than Djokovic on clay. They are the same age, they played in the same tournaments and met each other often.

By the same principle, the main argument for why Djokovic is better than Federer on grass is because he played Federer many times on grass. The fact that Federer has more grass titles and that Federer beat Sampras only adds to the glory of beating Federer again and again on grass. So if you're a Federer fan and you want to convince me that Federer is better than Djokovic on grass, you have to convince me why the 3-1 h2h doesn't mean anything, or is not as valuable as the 1 extra slam between 7 vs 8 Wimbledons, and your only argument becomes the 6 year age gap


I don't necessarily buy age gap arguments aka "I lost due to age", even if it's a 16 year age gap (2023 Wimbledon finals comes to mind) because

1. It disregards the level of play of the older player (who reaches the final defeating everyone else in their draw)
2. It disregards the level of play of the younger winner
3. It doesn't account well for the fact that the older, established player normally has an advantage in first encounters

It also creates a bunch of questions for which you need to make principled answers: at what exact age does decline begin, how much was the decline each year, does the player recover and improve again later? is the onset of age decline the same for everyone? e.g. why is it that a player is still relative prime at 31 but not at 33? Why does a player continue to top the rankings and achieve amazing results at older ages? Does it make sense for you to get worse every year and still continue to top the rankings?

The more you use age as an argument the more you have to come up with additional claims, like every other player in the top 100 ATP gets worse every year, because my favorite player gets worse every year due to age and the only way it would make sense for him to keep winning or reaching finals is if everyone else also got worse...

(You also bring up Roddick and their matchup is 5-4 with many meetings when Djokovic was a developing player, they didn't play 4 times on grass with 3 of them being big final matches)

 

[FlyingSaucer]

You can do all the math you want.

Its funny how you don't respect one h2h and then says its the be all end all against fed. That is some hypo talk right there.

I can admit djoker will go down as the greatest ever, but you djoker fans cant even admit fed is greater on grass. Its fact. The tennis world has agreed that djoker is greatest of all time and federer is greatest grass player of all time.

8-7 at wimbledon with 2 more finals. And that is just wimbledon not grass. Djoker might not even be the second greatest.

Those are facts. Not opinions.

I wanna know the H2H between Djokovic and Borg that makes Djokovic the second-best clay courter.

 

[GoatNo1]

If your point is that rafa was better h2h in slams you proved it.

On clay rafa leads by 6. Off clay djoker leads by 2.

they played 10 times at rafas clearly best and noles clearly worst slam and 2 times at noles clearly best and rafas worst slam.

after USO13 rafa won amazing 0 sets out of 19 vs nole on HC and in that period of 10 years they met astonishing 1 time on HC in slams!

rafa played outside of clay in late stages of slams just when he was in his best form. nole was always in final stages of slams not matter form.

 

[soldat]

I wanna know the H2H between Djokovic and Borg that makes Djokovic the second-best clay courter.

Tell you right now. Djokovic beat Nadal the greatest clay courter of all time. Twice.

If Nadal is 1 on clay then Djokovic must be 2... Borg comes 3 at the very most

 

[FlyingSaucer]

Tell you right now. Djokovic beat Nadal the greatest clay courter of all time. Twice.

If Nadal is 1 on clay then Djokovic must be 2... Borg comes 3 at the very most

You're somewhat of a unique troll, I'll give you that.

 

[soldat]

You're somewhat of a unique troll, I'll give you that.

It's okay if you can't think of anything useful to add to the conversation

 

[FlyingSaucer]

It's okay if you can't think of anything useful to add to the conversation.

I'd have to take your argument seriously, first.

 

[MeatTornado]

(You also bring up Roddick and their matchup is 5-4 with many meetings when Djokovic was a developing player, they didn't play 4 times on grass with 3 of them being big final matches)

As usual, pre-prime matches don't count, but post-prime does.

That developing Djokovic was already world #3 the first time he played Roddick. If Federer's old age can be ignored because he was still at the top of the sport, then the same goes for young Djokovic.

 

[soldat]

I checked their h2h and you're right, Djokovic was about 22 in their later matches, with most of his losses coming in ATP masters matches and one at Australian open when he was in his 4th year on tour.

Poor performances happen, there's certain matchups that aren't good for whatever reason, I think 5-4 is quite normal variance for such a small sample size. All the big 3 have negative h2h against somebody.

One thing is I think the trajectory of a tennis pro is: get on tour, suck for a while but get better, breakthrough, and then maintain a high level up until the very end when there's a sudden decline. In this respect, the pre-breakthrough period is the period that's not as important. The "post-prime" period, if it exists, is where most of the epic matches occur, and it's why its usually the older player who has an advantage.

As usual, pre-prime matches don't count, but post-prime does.

That developing Djokovic was already world #3 the first time he played Roddick. If Federer's old age can be ignored because he was still at the top of the sport, then the same goes for young Djokovic.

 

[Hitman]

Not this again...

 

[chimpish]

Nadal was 5-0 against Glutenovic

And then when Nole become the player that he is, the h2h is 7-6 in favor of Nole despite 7 of those being on clay. It was 5-1 off clay compared to 2-5 on clay.

Djokovic fans should never use Glutenovic as an excuse.

All it does is open the door to the Rafaelites to further push the ridiculous myth that healthy Rafa never loses, even though he lost to a player IN A MAJOR outside the big three and Murray every single year in his career except 2019.

If Djokovic hadn’t sorted his problems out before then, that’s on him. If Rafa was too injured to be a Tennis player (which he clearly wasn’t) then he should have taken up another sport. Neither are valid excuses when debating records or H-H.

And as a Fed fan, it’s on him that he needed to change his racket earlier even though it was obvious to many of us he needed to take his backhand on more aggressively for years in certain match ups. That’s also on him.

 

[Tenez01]

It does make me wonder if I stopped eating gluten if I would become a superhero too. Ill never know though cause I like pizza.

As the saying goes, "20 slams with pizza is greater than 24 slams without pizza"

How many pizzas equal a slam? I'm prolly a slam winner already

Someone else could easily have said Nadal was not the same after 2013. And when Nadal became a shadow of himself, the Novak wins came in blah blah blah.

I'm not disagreeing with you or even supporting Nadal here, I'm just saying assigning self-defined "periods" to players' careers to boost his credentials is first of all prone to subjectivity (you can draw the lines to fit your agenda as you like) and secondly applicable to all players - people could just as well have said what you said for anyone they're a fan of to prove "their real self" is superior.

I'd just look holistically and say Djokovic has had a better career overall.

Just saying. Although it's pretty well known that H2H with Nadal is a result of the survivorship bias. He lost to mugs a lot outside RG hence not even reaching Nole in the draw but Nole was consistent enough to meet him at RG. Everyone knows Djokovic had the better career overall.

Djokovic fans should never use Glutenovic as an excuse.

All it does is open the door to the Rafaelites to further push the ridiculous myth that healthy Rafa never loses, even though he lost to a player IN A MAJOR outside the big three and Murray every single year in his career except 2019.

If Djokovic hadn’t sorted his problems out before then, that’s on him. If Rafa was too injured to be a Tennis player (which he clearly wasn’t) then he should have taken up another sport. Neither are valid excuses when debating records or H-H.

And as a Fed fan, it’s on him that he needed to change his racket earlier even though it was obvious to many of us he needed to take his backhand on more aggressively for years in certain match ups. That’s also on him.

Sure, Nadal can have the clay H2H but outside the 2013 US Summer swing, he's MIA vs Nole once Nole started his domination of tennis for more than a decade. It's pretty common knowledge.

 

[Mustard]

Novak was reaching QF SF F in french open but Nadal was never same consistency wise

Nadal is the one who has won majors in 15 different calendar years, Djokovic in 13. Nadal was in the top 10 for 900+ consecutive weeks also.

 

[ALCARAZWON]

All this said, the evidence shows that Djokovic is the greatest tennis player ever,

and never good enough to beat the most athletic version of Federer at any of the slams except AO if we assume Federer was fully recovered from mono in early 2008.
And Djokovic never beat Nadal at a slam until 2011, which was a result of the murderous 2009 AO ending Nadal's peak athleticism forever...
So its very hard to take Djokovic seriously, as he was a spectator during the FEDAL era which nobody can ever match.

 

[Tenez01]

Nadal is the one who has won majors in 15 different calendar years, Djokovic in 13. Nadal was in the top 10 for 900+ consecutive weeks also.

Most of them were at RG, did great in the clay season to secure top 10. Djokovic on the other hand was dominating the calendar for years going deep in almost all events on all surfaces. Only a major elbow injury stopped him in 2017-mid 2018 and covid cancellations and restrictions between 2020-22. Djokovic was No. 1 in 13 different years and 428 weeks. Djokovic already surpassed Nadal in weeks at top 10 as well.