Who displayed the 3rd Highest Clay Peak after Nadal and Borg ?

Who displayed the 3rd Highest clay peak after Nadal and Borg ?

  • Nastase in 1973 (9 Titles on Clay that year)

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Orantes in 1975 (8 Titles on Clay that year)

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Wilander in some year (mention in comments)

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    58

JasonZ

Hall of Fame
He played a really bad match but reaching the final alone tells us he was not overall in bad form. I seriously believe him losing in the semi would have been better for his legacy. Even worse is that this devastating loss eventually also ruined his confidence and carried over to the Wimbledon final.
i dont believe that he lost the wimby final because of loss of confidence after that french open loss. he was a little worse than in 2007 final and nadal was a little better (serve) than in 2007 final, and in 2007 it was already a very close 5 set win for fed, which he clutched out.
 

buscemi

Legend
I feel like I should give a shoutout to Adriano Panatta.

In 1976, he smoked Zeljko Franulovic & Nikola Pilic in Davis Cup on clay in straight set BO5 set matches on clay.

Days later, he entered the Italian Open and took the title, beating Vilas in a four set final.

Then, of course, he went straight into the French Open, beating two time defending champion Borg in the QF before taking out Dibbs and Solomon in the SF & F. The win over Borg was Borg's only loss at the French Open from 1974-1981 (with Borg winning every other year except 1977, when he didn't play).

That's 15 straight wins on clay, including a win over prime Borg at the French Open.
 

buscemi

Legend
It's either Muster 1995-1996 or Vilas 1977. Kuerten 1999-2001 is also up there.
Nastase from Barcelona 1 in April 1973-Barcelona 2 in October 1973 is tough to beat for me.

He was 59-1, winning the French Open without dropping a set, smoking Orantes in the Italian Open final, smoking Borg in the Monte Carlo final, and smoking Emerson in the Gstaad final, among many other great wins.

His only loss was to Panatta in the Bournemouth final, but Nastase was 3-1 against Panatta during this stretch, beating him in the Madrid final, the Barcelona 1 final, and the Florence final.
 

FlyingSaucer

Semi-Pro
In 2007, 19 year old Djokovic had a 7-6 2-6 7-6 win for his first victory over Federer. We don't claim a 19-year-old was better than #1 player in the world! Accidents DO HAPPEN!

Borg: 10-3 vs Vilas; 4-0 vs Lendl
Nadal: 11-2 vs Federer; 20-8 vs Djokovic

So it had to be Djokovic!
Djokovic was 20 years old.
 

mike danny

Bionic Poster
i dont believe that he lost the wimby final because of loss of confidence after that french open loss. he was a little worse than in 2007 final and nadal was a little better (serve) than in 2007 final, and in 2007 it was already a very close 5 set win for fed, which he clutched out.
But that FO defeat can explain why Fed fell down 2 sets to love.
 

NeutralFan

G.O.A.T.
Federer is seen as a pu$$y because he lost to Nadal at wimbledon 2008

Lets not pretend that losing in 4th round or QF or even in R2 would not have been better for Federer's Grass legacy

People talk highly of Pete because his best was kept for the finals and he was unbeatable in finals. That shows higher highs.
 

BauerAlmeida

Hall of Fame
I guess it's Lendl. His '86 and '87 runs in Roland Garros were great.

Kuerten had some scares in all his RG runs.

Vilas was pretty dominant in '77 but I would say Lendll is above by a hair.


PS: Honorable mention for Coria who had a crazy level in late 2003/early-2004. Montecarlo 2004 showed some insane level. If he was stronger above the neck he would have been a perfect claycourter. Rome 2005 showed some glimpses against Nadal as well.

The third highest level should be someone who at least was the best on clay in the respective year. Vilas would not have won the FO in 77 if Borg had played.


It is likely, but he was destroying everyone at RG in 1977. Just because Borg is a bad matchup it shouldn't disqualify him from the conversation. Especially because guys like Wilander, Lendl, Kuerten, etc would also struggle against Borg probably.

But winning 2 slams on clay in the same year and especially with the level he had at RG he should be in the conversation IMO.
 

Devin

Professional
Probably Kuerten for single matches although he was quite streaky even in his RG winning runs. Always found a way to get the job done though.
 

Neptune

Hall of Fame
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Rafa and Borg are clearly in another league.

Nole comes in at third, facing far greater competition than Lendl and Vilas.
 

Gizo

Legend
In terms of Lendl, while I think overall he has a stronger clay court record than the likes Wilander and Kuerten (I liked his achievement of winning 2 titles apiece at each of Rome, Monte-Carlo, Hamburg and Barcelona), and while he had the most dominant sequence at RG in the open era by a player other than Nadal and Borg from 1984-1987, I'm not sure if I'd rank his peak level at RG (from 1986-1987), at the same level of what I saw from the likes of Kuerten and Bruguera.

In 1986-1987, he largely played at RG as a defensive grinder, engaging in a series of long, seemingly never-ending rallies (a rally of over 100 shots was clocked during his match against Nystrom in 1987). He was generally more passive at RG than he was at the lead-up tournaments. Fair play to him he won both of those titles and was particularly dominant in 1986, although that strategy proved to be very costly when he lost to Chang in 1989.

His most impressive performance from start to finish at RG, was probably his straight sets SF victory over Wilander in 1984 (the most decisive victory by either player during their 4 matches against each other at RG). He really bullied Wilander from the baseline and pinned him back there that day, his backhand which Wilander tried to relentlessly target was on song, and his ability to amp things up with his forehand was decisive. His fitness levels, while improving, weren't anywhere near as strong in 1984 as they were in 1986-1987 (he was dead on his feet after the final and nothing left in the tank for Queen's the following week while Mac won the title there). That, meaning that he had to play more proactively at RG in 1984 compared to in 1986 and 1987, meant that he was far more enjoyable to watch during his first title run there (and the 1984 final is an all-time classic).

I guess though because Lendl was so strong on all surfaces overall, his peak levels on each of them can be overlooked. For example his grass court peak at Queen's 1990 was incredibly high in general let alone considering that it was on his weakest surface, on carpet he won Masters / YEC tournaments crushing Connors and Mac both in their primes back to back (after Mac had won 44 consecutive sets in sanctioned tournament play), and blitzing the other 4 members of the top 5 (including an in-form Becker on an official 21 match winning streak) in succession without conceding more than 4 games per set or facing and without facing single break point etc.
 

buscemi

Legend
In 1986-1987, he largely played at RG as a defensive grinder, engaging in a series of long, seemingly never-ending rallies (a rally of over 100 shots was clocked during his match against Nystrom in 1987). He was generally more passive at RG than he was at the lead-up tournaments. Fair play to him he won both of those titles and was particularly dominant in 1986, although that strategy proved to be very costly when he lost to Chang in 1989.
This is why I might have Wilander's clay peak above Lendl's clay peak.

In their 1985 final, Wilander became increasingly aggressive coming to the net as the match progressed, taking the title going away, 3-6, 6-4, 6-2, 6-2. This is similar to how Wilander played in the 1988 U.S. Open final against Lendl, albeit with Ivan not being at 100%.

But Lendl was certainly at 100% in the 1985 final, and I don't necessarily see any version of Lendl taking out the aggressive version of Wilander from the 1985 final.
 

mavsman149

Hall of Fame
But Fed got destroyed in that RG final so he wasn't in great form anyway. So because it was a final, his form suddenly was great?

Or Djokovic at USO 2016 or Nadal AO 2014 (yeah, he hurt his back, but time don't remember that).

Making the final is ALWAYS better than losing earlier
 

timnz

Legend
He was the best, but was it really "clearly" if with Mats there was a guy playing alongside him who won the same amount of FO titles and beat Lendl twice at the FO?
Lendl and Wilander are close in the 1980s - same number of french opens and same number of French Open runner-ups. However, Lendl is significantly ahead in terms of other top quality clay titles in that period (Wilander 3 Super Series on Clay, Lendl 8 Super series on Clay).
 

nolefam_2024

Bionic Poster
Lendl is awesome. These 17 or so titles from vilas are just stat padding. The more we approach near 90s the more streamlined the competition becomes.
 

RS

Bionic Poster
I want that Djokovic is as good as Borg on clay crowd. That was actually a bit of a thing IIRC.
 

Pheasant

Legend
Extended peak, it has to be Lendl. He went to 4 straight RG finals while bagging 3 titles. Not bad. I think that a candidate should have at least defended his title to be considered for having the 3rd biggest peak. From RG of 1984 to RG of 1988, he went 84-7, .923 on clay. And that includes his loss when he pulled a pec muscle during that match vs Svensson. Lendl was icing his pec muscle during changeovers. He was interviewed and said that he knew right then and there that he needed a miracle to survive that match. He was also 11-2 vs the top-5 during that run. His 1984 FO run was perhaps the most impressive; a solid 4-set win over Gomez, then stomped Wilander in straights, then pulled off that @#!@#$ comeback vs McEnroe.
 

Mustard

Bionic Poster
Musters 95-96 clay numbers were absolutely insane. Gotta be him
In that period, Muster was 111-5 on clay and 18 clay titles won.

At one point in 1996, Muster played 19 matches in 26 days, including playing against Moya in 4 consecutive weeks. I'm not sure if that's ever happened elsewhere in tournament competitions beyond the pre-open era World Professional Tours, i.e. playing against the same player 4 weeks in a row, or even 4 tournaments in a row.
 
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