Who is a better server, prime Pete Sampras or Hubert Hurkacz?

Who is a better server, prime Pete Sampras or Hubert Hurkacz in 2023?

  • Hurkacz is a signifcantly better server

    Votes: 9 9.8%
  • Hurkacz is a slightly better server

    Votes: 6 6.5%
  • Both equal

    Votes: 2 2.2%
  • Pete Sampras is a slightly better server

    Votes: 13 14.1%
  • Pete Sampras is a significantly better server

    Votes: 62 67.4%

  • Total voters
    92

Megafanoftennis100

Professional
Seriously, Hurkacz has been serving insanely well this year. His matches at Wimbledon 4R and ATP Finals RR against Djokovic are perhaps one of the best serving performances I have ever seen.

But did he serve better than Pete Sampras in his prime?
 

Kralingen

Bionic Poster
59326.jpg
 

ChrisRF

Legend
Only the serve I would say Hurkacz. Sampras had the best combination of serve, volley and return, but that doesn't mean he must be the outright best for any single of those shots. Like in decathlon where you don't need to win any single discipline to win the title.

Sampras was never a classic servebot. He had the best serve of any ATG players in history though, and maybe the outright best ever serve adjusted to heigth. But he never was even close to the pure service numbers that Hurkacz had at Wimbledon against Djokovic for example. Especially in combination of quantity (1st serve percentage over 80%) and quality.
 

Holmes

Hall of Fame
Only the serve I would say Hurkacz. Sampras had the best combination of serve, volley and return, but that doesn't mean he must be the outright best for any single of those shots. Like in decathlon where you don't need to win any single discipline to win the title.

Sampras was never a classic servebot. He had the best serve of any ATG players in history though, and maybe the outright best ever serve adjusted to heigth. But he never was even close to the pure service numbers that Hurkacz had at Wimbledon against Djokovic for example. Especially in combination of quantity (1st serve percentage over 80%) and quality.
He also was never close to the pure poly that Hurkacz had at Wimbledon. Notwithstanding, he was broken four times in seven finals.
 

RS

Bionic Poster
I was going to say this is closer than it looks but Sampras had a equipment disadvantage and he is a fair bit shorter so his is obviously more impressive.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: NAS

tudwell

G.O.A.T.
In absolute terms Hurkacz may very well have the superior first serve, but even with a full bed of gut and that tiny ancient frame, PETE's second is still clearly better. And adjusted for era and occasion (bringing your best serves at the biggest moments)...
 

Pheasant

Legend
Let's start with comparing Quentin Halys over the past 52 weeks. Halys has a horrendous ground game, but a very good serve.

I'll compare percent of 1st serves won, 2nd serves won, and games hold% .

Hurkacz: 79.6/50.7/88.0
Halys: 79.9/51.7/88.1


Halys beats Hurkacz in all 3 categories, despite having a horrendous ground game with nothing to back up his serves.

Sampras with a garbage 85 inch racket was able to serve 136 mph. I've seen it. He also served 120-125 on 2nd serves and he hit his spots as well as anybody ever.

However, we cannot underrate evolution. Evolution is MASSIVE!!

Ergo, Hurkacz>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Sampras as players; especially serving. I think that a more fair comparison regarding serves would be Schwartzman vs Sampras. I honestly don't know about that one. But even there, I'd lean Schwartzman. Schwartzman plays in a much more evolved era.
 

DSH

Talk Tennis Guru
Seriously, Hurkacz has been serving insanely well this year. His matches at Wimbledon 4R and ATP Finals RR against Djokovic are perhaps one of the best serving performances I have ever seen.

But did he serve better than Pete Sampras in his prime?
Silly, silly question, buddy.
(n)
 

paolo2143

Hall of Fame
If we are talking first serves only then HH I think although Pete's first serve was also awesome.

However if we are looking at both first and second serves together then i would still say Pete as he had probably the best 2nd serve I have ever seen in his prime.
 
D

Deleted member 629564

Guest
[content deleted by user]
 
Last edited by a moderator:

WYK

Hall of Fame
Not only is Pete a better server, but he is still one of the best servers in the history of the game.
People lose their minds when they saw Kyrgios hitting 120mph second serves out of nowhere.
Pete hit 120mph second serves as a matter of course. You did not get a second serve when you played Pete Sampras.
 

mental midget

Hall of Fame
In absolute terms Hurkacz may very well have the superior first serve, but even with a full bed of gut and that tiny ancient frame, PETE's second is still clearly better. And adjusted for era and occasion (bringing your best serves at the biggest moments)...
agree. it's kind of tough to rank because if either of them hits their spot...it's an ace. and while sampras is the vastly better player, as you said, just isolating the first serve...man i have to say HH has been raining down some bombs this year, almost goran-like when he's on.
 

Baggio10

New User
Hurkacz at his best days is better than Sampras, for example his serving performance against Djokovic in Wimbledon. I don't think Sampras could have ever served a returner like Novak off the court that way. But Sampras serve was more consistent and repeatable weapon than Hubert. Whatever advantage Hubert have on Sampras comes from height. Pete technique on serve is unrivaled.
 

TheFifthSet

Legend
Only the serve I would say Hurkacz. Sampras had the best combination of serve, volley and return, but that doesn't mean he must be the outright best for any single of those shots. Like in decathlon where you don't need to win any single discipline to win the title.

Sampras was never a classic servebot. He had the best serve of any ATG players in history though, and maybe the outright best ever serve adjusted to heigth. But he never was even close to the pure service numbers that Hurkacz had at Wimbledon against Djokovic for example. Especially in combination of quantity (1st serve percentage over 80%) and quality.


Sampras averaged close to 50% unreturned serves over his 7 Wimbledon finals (and, contrary to popular belief, overall unreturned serve %’s were a little lower then). 8 of the top 10 all-time in unreturned serve % are from this era.

Hurkacz, on the other hand, had a 42% unreturned serve in his one Wimbledon match against Djokovic.

Don’t let ace counts fool you. They undersell the potency of Pete’s serve.


Edit: also, Hurkacz’s landed 73% of his first serves in that match. Certainly some outstanding treeing!…but still not better than Pete’s serve.
 
Last edited:

TheFifthSet

Legend
Sampras has the greatest motion ever, but people need to wake up to the fact that height is major helper on serve and there is a pretty strong correlation there.

Taking the shot in isolation, there are several players who have had a better serve than pete in my opinion purely because they are tall.

Isner, Karlovic, Opelka, maybe even Milos from the current gen.

When we talk about the fastest players ever, we don't make these unconscious concessions for guys like Medvedev and Zverev, who are incredible movers for their height. I don't know why people do the same for servers.

But Sampras is a better server than Hurkacz even when paying mind to the obvious link between height and service efficiency.
 

robow7

Professional
One thing that doesn't show up on stat sheets for serving is the fact that Sampras more than anyone that I can think of, could come up with a big one when he really needed it, say down break point in the final set to stay in the match or to serve it out. That ace or service winner will look like every other 1st service point won on the stat sheet but we all know they are tougher to come by when the pressure is really on. I doubt Pete ever lost a title while serving and up 40-15 with match points (not that any of the greats would do that : )
 

Username_

Hall of Fame
Sampras was obviously a crap server since his era was so weak. Djokovic is still yet to peak so what does that tell you
 
people laugh but their ace percentage is incredibly close. Sampras is at 13.08, and Hurkacz is at 13.07. Hurkacz is at 18.05 this year, so it is going up. Let's not forget the gap is the +1 shot. Hurkacz is not a serve and volleyer and his first ball forehand is the worst in the top 30
 

Kralingen

Bionic Poster
I will say that Hurkacz would’ve won Wimbledon three times by now if he was anything close to the athlete and total package tennis player Sampras was.
 

Mivic

Hall of Fame
I will say that Hurkacz would’ve won Wimbledon three times by now if he was anything close to the athlete and total package tennis player Sampras was.
If Hurkacz could pair the serve he showed against Djokovic at Wimbledon with even a slightly below average baseline game he’d be a serious problem on grass. His forehand was inexplicably bad in that match, probably the worst I’ve ever seen him hit it and way below the tour average standard and he still made Djokovic sweat just because of how absurd his botting was for long periods of that contest.
 
Last edited:

Kralingen

Bionic Poster
If Hurkacz could pair the serve he showed against Djokovic at Wimbledon with even a slightly below average baseline game he’d be a serious problem on grass. His forehand was inexplicably bad in that match, probably the worst I’ve ever seen him hit it and way below the tour average and he still made Djokovic sweat just because of how absurd his botting was.
I seriously think he’d be top 3 contenders for all Slams if he had even prime Kevin Anderson’s ground game or a Raonic level FH. He leaves so much meat on the bone with his awful returning and FH.

A lot of the top 3 contender thing is the era but yeah that serving in Wimbledon was ridiculous. And he craters his own first serve win % with stupid volleys and horrendous 3rd ball errors like you said.

If there was some statistical proof to actually isolate the power of the serve in court positioning I’d bet he looks even better. I feel like the average returned first serve of his that does get over the net is a very makeable FH that most players on Tour put away 90% of the time, he creates so many advantages for himself, just doesn’t take them.
 

tex123

Hall of Fame
Seriously, Hurkacz has been serving insanely well this year. His matches at Wimbledon 4R and ATP Finals RR against Djokovic are perhaps one of the best serving performances I have ever seen.

But did he serve better than Pete Sampras in his prime?
Is this a joke? Have you seen Sampras' serve?
 

spottishwood

Hall of Fame
This is some quality thread. Tennis (along with TTW) are both evolving which tells us that Hurkacz is the evolved form of Sampras.
 

TheFifthSet

Legend
better how?

From a purely statistical POV: much higher unreturnables, an advantage compounded by playing in an era with lower avg unreturnables (part of this is due to the “giant” skew, but this holds even when adjusting for height; a quick perusal of TA charting stats evinces that).

If stuff like Sampras maintaining or even ramping up his unreturnables against better competition (i.e “being clutch” — really, the lack of drop-off when facing Top 10 opponents is nearly unprecedented) sounds too airy fairy, the first paragraph should at least be enough to not dismiss the comparison out of hand.

As for the myriad of variables you’ve gone over: I believe their collective impact is overblown relative to the effects of poly. See below, snipped from our last exchange:

You would expect there to be at least some kind of statistical footprint left by all of these factors, perhaps even just gradually. Instead the year-by-year service statistics of the last 10-15 years are virtually identical. With all of these moving parts, you would think one or the other will lead to real changes in this-or-that service statistic, if not at once then at least over time. It isn’t happening. Unless they’re all cancelling each other out in near-perfect harmony, I have a difficult time believing that all of these changes amount to such a negligible impact on the bottom-line.

Tour-wide first serve % jumped about 3-4% in a four year span coinciding with the mass-adoption of poly. It’s increased by about a percentage point since then, 15-20 years later. What would that indicate?


I do admire the rigour with which you analyze things (and agree with the analysis most of the time) but you could perhaps go without assuming that others are missing something when many of your contentions are disputable and, from the statistical side of things, occasionally quite hard to justify. It’s very possible that many folks on here have actually spent quite a lot of time poring over the things you discuss in this thread and yet still, on eminently reasonable and dispassionate grounds, disagree.

Also, fwiw, I don’t consider Sampras to be a better server than Karlo, Isner or Opelka. Hurkacz, different story.
 
Last edited:

a10best

Legend
Pete served his way to winning 14 GS in a strong era. This is quite possibly the most ridiculous comparison in a century.
If Hurkacz' serve was so great in one of weakest era's ever in terms of depth, he would at the very least have made a slam final. '
 

President

Legend
Pete served his way to winning 14 GS in a strong era. This is quite possibly the most ridiculous comparison in a century.
If Hurkacz' serve was so great in one of weakest era's ever in terms of depth, he would at the very least have made a slam final. '

So you are saying PETE's game was weak outside his serve, similar to Hubie?
 

a10best

Legend
So you are saying PETE's game was weak outside his serve, similar to Hubie?
Not even a hint of that. Pete's running cross-fh was lethal and his bh was a construct the point shot. His overall game was great enough to make a FO semi where serves are nullified.
Hurkacz is not knocking on any doors. He's more comparable to Berdych or Anderson but without any threat of making a slam final. Put him in the Pete's era with the same racket & string technology and he's never mirroring his results so far.
 
Last edited:
Pete served his way to winning 14 GS in a strong era. This is quite possibly the most ridiculous comparison in a century.
If Hurkacz' serve was so great in one of weakest era's ever in terms of depth, he would at the very least have made a slam final. '
look at the numbers lol
 

JasonZ

Hall of Fame
Not only is Pete a better server, but he is still one of the best servers in the history of the game.
People lose their minds when they saw Kyrgios hitting 120mph second serves out of nowhere.
Pete hit 120mph second serves as a matter of course. You did not get a second serve when you played Pete Sampras.
he very rarely served 120mph on second serves, thats a myth
 
Top