More like.
Rod Laver*
1962 - 21 titles
1964 - 10 titles
1965 - 17 titles
1966 - 16 titles
1967 - 19 titles
1969 - 18 titles
1970 - 15 titles
* = including mickey mouse tournaments won in a 4-men draw, also counting useless exhos and tournaments not bigger than a challenger title in Szczecin
I wouldn't be quite as hard on this claim as you are, although I will admit that on more than one occasion I have used the term "mickey mouse" to describe some of the tournaments that some fans of former players want to credit to their heroes. For tennis historians it is essential to compile a complete record of all players' achievements, so we definitely need to include exhibitions and small tournaments in their list of titles. The problem comes when fans want to compare that augmented list with Federer's 75 or Sampras's 64 or Nadal's 50. In this scenario, Connors, for example, has 148 titles credited to him instead of the official ATP total of 109, Borg has 101 instead of the ATP total of 63, and Laver with 200 and Rosewall with 132 are also far ahead of any contemporary player. (These numbers are approximate).
This is misleading, to say the least. Today's players will never reach those totals. partly because exhibitions are not counted, and small invitational events no longer exist. More importantly, however, in today's ATP the leading players take part in the SAME events. Participation in the 4 majors, the WTF and the 9 Masters events is mandatory, and generally speaking every player in the top 50 who is not injured (top 8 for the WTF) takes part in all of these. The only significant occasional exceptions are the two Masters events after the US Open. Top players structure their calendar around the majors, the Masters series and the WTF, and they play in only a handful of ATP 500 and 250 events. Even the 500 events sometimes have very strong fields. Dubai is a good example. Every year it draws 8 or so of the 10 leading players.
The result is that for contemporary players "big" tournaments take up a significant proportion of their titles. Federer's 75 includes 17 majors, 6 WTF's and 20 Masters. Nadal's 50 includes 11 majors, one Olympic gold medal and 21 Masters. All of these are events in which virtually all the leading players participated. There are no divisions between amateur and pro ranks, no rival pro tours and no boycotts. In the past the leading players often did not play in the same events. That is also one reason why second-tier players such as del Potro, Ferrer, Soderling and Tsonga amass fewer titles than their predecessors did. Ferrer is a partial exception, because he plays in some small clay court events. Otherwise, however, you would normally have to beat two of Federer, Nadal or Djokovic in order to win a tournament. Not many players are capable of doing so. That is something to keep in mind when you hear the claim that there are not many champions around today. Today's leading players never boycott the Australian Open or Roland Garros and rarely miss even Masters events.
All of this has been pointed out before. Nevertheless, we still see the comparisons between the number of titles won by players in the 50's, 60's and 70's with those won by today's generation. That comparison is badly flawed.
