Titles By Surface

[serve/and/volley]

I did some brief research on Wikipedia on titles by surface by some various players who won at least 3 Grand Slams since the 1980's:
(There is info on Borg, McEnroe, and Connors, but their respective articles didn't count the # of titles by surface, and I am too lazy to count by hand. Also the percentages indicate # of titles on the specific surface divided by the total # of titles.)

Ivan Lendl: 94 titles
- Grand Slams: 8 (9%)
- Hard: 31 (33%)
- Clay: 28 (30%)
- Grass: 2 (2%)
- Carpet: 33 (35%)

Boris Becker: 49 titles
- Grand Slams: 6 (12%)
- Hard: 16 (33%)
- Clay: 0 (0%)
- Grass: 7 (14%)
- Carpet: 26 (53%)

Stefan Edberg: 42 titles
- Grand Slams: 6 (14%)
- Hard: 23 (55%)
- Clay: 3 (7%)
- Grass: 5 (12%)
- Carpet: 11 (26%)

Mats Wilander: 35 titles
- Grand Slams: 7 (20%)
- Hard: 9 (26%)
- Clay: 22 (63%)
- Grass: 2 (6%)
- Carpet: 2 (6%)

Pete Sampras: 64 titles
- Grand Slams: 14 (22%)
- Hard: 37 (58%)
- Clay: 3 (5%)
- Grass: 10 (16%)
- Carpet: 14 (22%)

Andre Agassi: 60 titles
- Grand Slams: 8 (13%)
- Hard: 46 (77%)
- Clay: 7 (12%)
- Grass: 1 (2%)
- Carpet: 6 (10%)

Jim Courier: 23 titles
- Grand Slams: 4 (17%)
- Hard: 17 (74%)
- Clay: 5 (22%)
- Grass: 0 (0%)
- Carpet: 1 (4%)

Gustavo Kuerten: 22 titles
- Grand Slams: 3 (14%)
- Hard: 6 (27%)
- Clay: 16 (73%)
- Grass: 0 (0%)
- Carpet: 0 (0%)

Roger Federer: 53 titles
- Grand Slams: 12 (23%)
- Hard: 35 (66%)
- Clay: 6 (11%)
- Grass: 9 (17%)
- Carpet: 3 (6%)

Rafael Nadal: 23 titles
- Grand Slams: 3 (13%)
- Hard: 5 (22%)
- Clay: 18 (78%)
- Grass: 0 (0%)
- Carpet: 0 (0%)

 

[serve/and/volley]

Using just these basis stats, one can come up with one definition of "Grand Slam Dominance" as: the percentage of titles won that are Grand Slams (# of Grand Slam titles divided by the # of total titles). Thus we have the following ranking of the 10 players that we are looking at:

1. Federer: 22.6%
2. Sampras: 21.9%
3. Wilander: 20.0%
4. Courier: 17.4%
5. Edberg: 14.3%
6. Kuerten: 13.6%
7. Agassi: 13.3%
8. Nadal: 13.0%
9. Becker: 12.2%
10. Lendl: 8.5%

 

[pines2222]

I think it's pretty interesting that Lendl only won 2 grass titles. I think with today's racquets, he would have won a LOT more on grass, making his career look even better.

 

[edmondsm]

You can really tell how much they've fazed out carpet as a surface.

 

[serve/and/volley]

From these basic stats we can also make a definition of "Surface Specialist" to be: the percentage of titles won on a particular surface (# of titles on a particular surface divided by the total # of titles).

Hard:
1. Agassi: 76.7%
2. Courier: 73.9%
3. Federer: 66.0%
4. Sampras: 57.8%
5. Edberg: 54.8%
6. Lendl: 33.0%
7. Becker: 32.7%
8. Kuerten: 27.3%
9. Wilander: 25.7%
10. Nadal: 21.7%

Clay:
1. Nadal: 78.3%
2. Kuerten: 72.7%
3. Wilander: 62.9%
4. Lendl: 29.8%
5. Courier: 21.7%
6. Agassi: 11.7%
7. Federer: 11.3%
8. Edberg: 7.1%
9. Sampras: 4.7%
10. Becker: 0.0%

Grass:
1. Federer: 17.0%
2. Sampras: 15.6%
3. Becker: 14.3%
4. Edberg: 11.9%
5. Wilander: 5.7%
6. Lendl: 2.1%
7. Agassi: 1.7%
8. Courier: 0%
8. Kuerten: 0%
8. Nadal: 0%

Carpet:
1. Becker: 53.1%
2. Lendl: 35.1%
3. Edberg: 26.2%
4. Sampras: 21.9%
5. Agassi: 10.0%
6. Federer: 5.7%
7. Wilander: 5.7%
8. Courier: 4.3%
9. Kuerten: 0%
9. Nadal: 0%

 

[Moose Malloy]

I think these stats are a bit misleading, Lendl played in a very different time than Agassi & Sampras, in terms of the way the calendar was arranged. There weren't a lot of important outdoor hardcourt events until the mid to late 80s(when Key Biscayne/Indian Wells were created & the AO switched to hard)

Also carpet, was much, much more important in the 80s than the 90s. The top players in the 80s basically played on carpet for almost half the year(most of Jan to April, Oct to Dec)

So Sampras & Agassi weren't playing on it as much as Lendl was, & Lendl wasn't playing on hardcourt as much as they were. The fact that he has so many titles on all surfaces shows just how dominant he was & how long he was at the top of the game.

And Fed is playing at time when there are only 4 events on carpet, 3 of them quite minor, so its impossible to really compare him to even the 90s players in this respect.

Here is a graph which shows how much the schedule has changed since 1980

http://www.tennis28.com/charts/ATP_Surfaces_1980_2006.GIF

 

[coloskier]

I think these stats are a bit misleading, Lendl played in a very different time than Agassi & Sampras, in terms of the way the calendar was arranged. There weren't a lot of important outdoor hardcourt events until the mid to late 80s(when Key Biscayne/Indian Wells were created & the AO switched to hard)

Also carpet, was much, much more important in the 80s than the 90s. The top players in the 80s basically played on carpet for almost half the year(most of Jan to April, Oct to Dec)

So Sampras & Agassi weren't playing on it as much as Lendl was, & Lendl wasn't playing on hardcourt as much as they were. The fact that he has so many titles on all surfaces shows just how dominant he was & how long he was at the top of the game.

And Fed is playing at time when there are only 4 events on carpet, 3 of them quite minor, so its impossible to really compare him to even the 90s players in this respect.

Here is a graph which shows how much the schedule has changed since 1980

http://www.tennis28.com/charts/ATP_Surfaces_1980_2006.GIF

It is interesting that clay is still only about 35% of the season.