he's 178 cm, which is taller than i thought he was... his listed weight of 70 kg, on the other hand, seems way too generous...

Borg played a full schedule until 1981, at which point he began to feel burnt out. He wanted to player a lighter schedule, but the ATP didn't want him to, so he ended up quitting altogether. It was only 1981 that he skipped large parts of the tour. By the ATP's count, he played 77 matches in 1980, 90 in 1979, 77 in 1978, etc. And that doesn't include exhibitions and other tournaments not counted by the ATP. In 1981, he played only 41 matches.

Also, fun fact about Don Budge: He's the only man in history to win six consecutive slams (37 Wimbledon - 38 U.S. Championships). He extended that streak into the pro tour and won the 39 French Pro and 39 Wembley Pro. He also won the next pro major he participated in, the 1940 U.S. Pro. Nine consecutive majors! It's too bad WWII interrupted his tennis career after his five consecutive years at number one. He came back to the tour with a shoulder injury and never quite reached his previous level.

I agree completely.

Probably hold at least two of three most wins at GS, open era. He's tied for most at Aus, U.S and one short at Wimbeldon. Another French would be nice, too

Shortening the lopsided head to head with Nadal would help, and gaining ascendancy over Andy Murray on the same thing.

gaining back the World #1, and building a lead for the most weeks ever at the spot.

19 slams would do it for me, i think.

Nadal, i don't think realistically has a chance of rising to GOAT.

thats an excellent list.

including pro slams then rosewall has 23, laver 20, pancho 17

the pro slams were, what - max 16 players and usually less?

VERY hard to compare. Personally, i'd weigh pro slams - smaller fields and all - higher than Amateurs only slams. This would dampen Laver's '62 slam a little (its still a great achievement, just not as great as the '69 one). I'd also weigh Fed's performances in 06 and 07 as high at least as Laver's 62 (though that's obviously debatable)

Neither Rosewall, nor Laver were the best player in the world as amateurs. Pancho thrashed Rosewall when Ken first turned pro, just as Rosewall thrashed Laver when the Rocket first turned pro.

In my opinion, quality of field counts for more than smaller field (and I'm not sure what the field for amateur slams were, either)

Fed has the edge in a few ways. To date,

-He has a better winning percentage at every grand slam.

-23 SF's in a row. Laver's best run was 12

-10 finals in a row and 18/19. Laver's is 8 and 12/13 and 16/18 (same run)

- I count it in Fed's favor that he changed the trend in tennis, from clay court greats being hopeless on grass and vice versa, to one where he's been rock solid on all surfaces. By comparison, in Laver/Rosewall's time, it was already pretty standard (?)

RV, what do you think? In one of your earlier posts you suggested another French for Fed, beating Nadal along the way, and a winning record against Nadal might push Fed up to #1? Could you say a bit more on this?

those are pretty meaningless claims to me. i would expect him to have a better percentage at this stage because those 3 guys had extremely long careers, pancho and ken were still competitive at 40. guys like borg have awesome percentages because they finished early. i dont really care about semi finals in a row. the third point is why he is great, and as mint has mentioned the surfaces are more homogenous than they have ever been, saying he has won on 3 different surfaces and pioneered this is a bit of a stretch. even as recently as 10 years ago nadal would have never come close to winning a wimbledon, now any old baselining mug can rock up without even knowing what a volley is and hes a real chance. guys like muster and kuerten would literally not turn up because the surface was so different. furthermore it could be argued that laver has an edge with 7 years at number 1 opposed to feds 5. good points but i will still stick with laver for now. one big thing for fed is he is probably the most elegant player in history and one of the most aggressive, which helps make him appear to be the greatest.

I agree. I was asking your opinion on what Fed would have to do to change that. If not 19 slams, what do you think would lift him to #1?



I believe Laver was the in the same mould. Heard some commentators discussing this point, and they thought Laver, McEnroe and Federer were the three best looking players. I'd add Stefan Edberg to that list

10 years ago, Lleyton Hewitt was winning Wimbledon!



Serve volleyer's have disappeared, true, but this is an exaggeration. post-Laver/Rosewall, and with wooden rackets still in play, Borg and Connors dominated Wimbledon. Both were capable, but far from great volleyers. Neither had a great serve. Both were great baseliners, particularly at returning serve.

Think they correspond pretty well (obviously not perfectly) to Nadal and Djokovic, who are both exceptional players by any standards - homogenous courts or otherwise.

Could somebody please explain the nuances of clay court tennis?

I understand its slower/ higher bouncing, thus discourages serve volleying, and base liners do well.

But not all baseliners. What are the nuances that make the top clay courters top clay courters?

Is it "not making mistakes" based baseline play, as opposed to "attacking" baseline play that makes the difference? I'd think Hewitt would have done better then.

What was it about Jim Courier's game that made him so much better than Andre Agassi on clay?

Initially Agassi seemed better suited to clay than grass, but that seemed to change over time. Why was this?

Any answers would be appreciated.

I

Answered on the other thread.

One thing that should be noted is it's very difficult to compare wooden racquet era tennis with modern racquet tennis. Even the early graphite racquets of the 80's were so much different to the racquets today.

With wooden racquets you couldn't put anywhere near the kind of top spin that players put on the ball today. Players used to hit it much, much flatter and so the margins were smaller. It was probably a more tactical but much less athletic and much less powerful game. It really is like two different sports. If you watch matches played on clay, even from Borg's era it looks so weak compared to the sort of play you get today.

19 probably is enough to be honest. but there will always be doubts while he has a losing record to nadal, which is probably unfair as rosewall and laver played each other so many more times so that the result is more genuine.
yeah for sure. edberg was pure class, my fave player as a kid

haha hewitt. well i suppose that was the beginining of the end of wimbledons integrity then though hewitt was a far more competent volleyer than most, and an excellent return of serve