The era of weak number #1s

First topic message reminder :

I have been roundly and unfairly criticized by some for my contention that the late 90 and early 2000s was a weaker era in terms of depth at the very top of the game. Some interesting points were made, that it is difficult to really give it a solid cutoff date or that eras tend to at some point blend into other eras. But when one looks at the facts, the actual irrefuttable facts surrounding the players that held the #1 ranking between 1996-2003 one sees how utterly my original argument is backed up by the facts. Now again it is never easy to dominate the men's tour even for a short time, and none of these socalled weaker number #1s are bad players, they all are supertalented for even getting to that ranking even for a solitary week. However when comparing #1s to other #1s it becomes as clear as crystal that the late to mid 90s and early 2000s was a transitional and step back period in terms of talent at the top.

Statistical analysis:

1. Avg. Grandslams players who held #1 ranking before 1996 :(a sort of watershed year that can be placed in either of two eras):

Nastase, Newcombe, Connors, Bjorg, Mac, Lendl, Wilander, Edberg, Becker, Courier, Pete, Andre= Avergage grandslams of 7.25 per players

2. Players who held the #1 ranking from 1996-2003

Pete, Andre, Muster, Rios, Moya, Yevgeny, Rafter, Safin, Kuerten, Hewitt, Ferrero, Roddick=3.08 grandslam per player

3. Post 2003

Roger, Nadal, Novak=9.67 grandslams per player

To be fair I included players that straddled eras in both periods and treated them equally in both eras, pete and andre appear in two seperate lists. And for those of you who will balk that Roger didn't get included in the socalled weaker #1 era here is an alternative for group 2 with Roger included in the weaker #1 era.

Alternative 2A: pete, andre, muster, Rios, Moya, Yevgeny, Safin, Kuerten, Ferrero, Roddick, AND ROGER: 4.07 grandslams per player

In short, even adding Roger Federer and counting pete sampras twice although pete and Andre first rose to the top in the previous generation, and Federer in many ways was the last great player of the weaker era who really ushered tennis out of that transitional phase, even with these generous accounting principles the mid 90s to mid 2000s produced a host of weaker #1 players.

Laverfan, consistency is one measure. And as I have stated even if you take the weaker #1s at their very best and measure their best years against others, you would notice that the champions immediately before and immediately after them were more accomplished and more dominant. I keep hearing this short period argument which is only one factor in the analysis. The other factor is to compare the best single year these guys produced against their immediate predecessors and successors. Both measures are relevant, and taking both measures into consideration the weaker #1s lose on both counts.

socal1976 wrote:I never said that my metric was the only measure that people should take into consideration. It is however taken into consideration with many other factors that we have discussed one way of anlayzing the situation.

You have a fundamental error in your statistical analysis. The size of the sample is unequal.

First sample is a span from 1972 (Nastase - USO) to 1996 (Sampras's 8th slam - USO ) = 24 calendar years = 96 slams

Second sample is from 1996-2003 (Sampras's 9th slam - AO - Agassi's 8th slam AO) = 7 calendar years = 28 slams

Third sample is from 2003-2011 (Agassi's 8th slam - current) = 8 calendar years = 31 slams (not counting USO 2011). Lets make it 32 to make it divisible by 4 slams/year for the sake of argument.

Given the unequal sample size, if one calculates averages as follows...

Period 1 (96 slams) has 6 winners = Average 16 slams/player

Period 1 (96 slams) has 16 winners = Average 6 slams/player

Period 2 (28 slams) has 7 winners = Average is 4 slams/player

Period 2 (28 slams) has 4 winners = Average is 7 slams/player

Period 3 (32 slams) has 4 winners = Average is 8 slams/player

Period 3 (32 slams) has 8 winners = Average is 4 slams/player

The samples are skewed by your a priori knowledge of longevity of the players in each of the spans, hence the averages are skewed as well, giving you a 'false' proof of your hypothesis.

If you feel so inclined, do rolling annual averages and deviation analysis with equal-sized samples.

Fedex_the_best did already point out the fallacy earlier and suggested a method to give you a higher average.

socal1976 wrote:The modern era with Djokovic leading right now is in progress, so we have to see how it pans out in a couple of years, but early indications are good. Your hypothetical is just that a hypothetical not what actually happened and there are other factors that we have discussed in this analysis. (ie tournament wins, weeks at #1, masters wins)

Unlike BB's directness, I will follow P4ths's and Barrystar's mellower path and say the agenda is rather clear.

socal1976 wrote:

legendkillar wrote:This is what pi$$es me off about logic in a statement. Did you or did you not say you would never get into a GOAT debate because of such factors?? Yet you use 'evidence' to support your argument to determine strength of era's which in a sense is a similar compariable argument? I don't have a problem with how you are trying to portray your point, but to me if your not into a GOAT debate because of factors your arguing against because of the statistical nature of your point, seems strange why you can't acknowledge in your mind a GOAT.

I wouldn't determine any era 'weak' just that the players at the time not being consistent as some of the other era's with great players.

First of all a greatest of all time argument is different than what we are discussing right now. The reason it is hard to have greatest of all time argument is the "all time" part of the argument. Because of human evolution, technological evolution, and changes to equipment, and the amateur/pro split, differing schedules; due to these changes over the entire 140 year history of the sport you can't measure a player for all time. But the distinction you fail to acknowledge is that we are not comparing Bill Tilden to Novak Djokovic. We are comparing players of the modern era against their immediate predecessors. Comparing a player or a generation of talent to another player and their accomplishments in the modern era is infinitely easier because of the factors i have just mentioned. And when you make a greatest of all time argument one essential part of the argument is what would happen if these players played against each other, something that is not possible due to the passage of time. But when measuring accomplishments, of one generation of stars against the immediate half decade before them you don't have the problems I have mentioned. (ie wood racquets v. modern racquets, amateur sport against pro sport, 19th century man v. 21st century man, big money sport v. no money sport) Many of the stars we are discussing are still playing! We watched them perform when they were at their peaks. How could I tell I predict Fred Perry in his prime against Roger Federer, with what technology would they play, in what temporal dimension would they play? But measuring the dominance and accomplishment of modern champions v. other modern champions who came directly before and after them is not as hard when these issues due not come into play and it can be done objectively.

Fred Perry v Roger Federer would hard to gauge. But if you took career statistics for example, Federer in one season played more matches than Perry in his career!

Saying that it is easier to condem an era as weak purely on the time frame between the 2 in this example is somewhat more difficult because the players of this era were competing in that era or beginning to. Makes it even more complicated.

Good points Laverfan, however I dispute your belief that the sample size is skewed. It depends on how you look at it. In category #1, I have 12 numbers. In category #2 although for just 7 years we also have 12 number ones. Of course category two is for a shorter period of time that isn't my fault that is the fault of the the tranistional number #1s. Back to my original thesis, the definition of a weak era is a bunch of guys coming up winning a slam and holding the number one ranking for short periods of time and then quickly dissappearing. The only category that you can make a skewed sample argument with is the current category, and that again isn't under my control we have only had 3 number #1s in the last 7 years. If anything with Djokovic probably going to win more slams the average might get better for the current era in the next year or two, but obviously with next new number one it will go down a bit. But still not enough to get to the weaker avg. slams of category #2. So actually the sample size of category #1 and #2 are exactly the same, we took an average of the first 12 number #1s and compared them to the average of the next 12 number #1s. (Counting pete and Andre twice because they appear in both time periods). I even did an alternate list including Roger in the weaker category 2, and still the transitional #1 era came up dreadfully short. If anything I gave category 2 the biggest possible benefit of the doubt and the most liberal accounting principles possible. In short, by including both Pete, Andre, and Roger/ players that don't really belong in category 2 to begin with, I inflated the slam numbers for category 2 and they still came up way short. Roger afterall, was the guy who ended the era of transitional number 1s, and Pete and Andre first rose to prominence and the #1 ranking before this period.


As for the claims that I have a Djokovic agenda, I have never made any bones that he is my favorite current player. But this really isn't about Novak, this is about the fact that I believe the current era and the Fedal era to be clearly stronger than the Hewitt/Roddick/Ferrero/ era and the late pete and Andre period. Novak will be judged by his own accomplishments and I am already ecstatic with what he has accomplished, so to me anything extra is just the icing on top. Do you think I just started to think the current era is better when novak reached number #1? Of course not, the mainstays of excellence over the last few years have been roger and rafa, they are the standard bearers of this improved modern era. Before novak got to #1 I thought the early 2000s and late 90s was poor and the current era stronger.

legendkillar wrote:Fred Perry v Roger Federer would hard to gauge. But if you took career statistics for example, Federer in one season played more matches than Perry in his career!

Saying that it is easier to condem an era as weak purely on the time frame between the 2 in this example is somewhat more difficult because the players of this era were competing in that era or beginning to. Makes it even more complicated.

I disagree, of course it is easier to analyze two eras that are close together in terms of time frame, then it is to analyze a player from 2011 against a player who played in 1898 or 1928. Ask yourself a question, why exactly is it that Hewitt, Ferrero, Safin, Roddick all these guys that were so dominant in the early part of the 2000s were mere afterthoughts on tour by their early to mid 20s when they should have been at their peak. And it wasn't as if they were all consistently ranked in the top 5 in that period and Roger just kept beating them in the semis and finals of slams. Everybody started beating them and beating them consistently. Roddick if anything was a better player in 09 than when he reached world #1. In 03, Roddick was a serve and forehand, he couldn't volley to save his life. He had no slice backhand and couldn't take the ball up the line with his topspin backhand to save his life. In 09, Roddick lost weight by his own accounts was lighter than he had ever been on tour, his backhand was better, and he spent much of the wimby final at the net and although not a great volleyer he was greatly improved. He still couldn't win another slam. In 2010 Roddick went one match short of pulling off the IW and Miami double, winning one and reaching the finals of the other. I think if Roddick 2009 played Roddick of 03 he beats him in straight sets. Yet, new and improved Roddick was unable ever to regain the number 1 or repeat as a grandslam champion. Why because he would have to beat Roger, Rafa, and the young guns now in the working stages of slams which he couldn't do consistently. It wasn't always Roger that was just knocking him out of slams, one year murray got him at wimbeldon, another year gasquet pulled off the upset in one of my favorite matches coming back from 2 sets down and hitting over 120 winners against the man about 70 percent of them with the up line backhand.

What you get socal with players like Hewitt, Roddick, Safin and Ferrero is that when a certain Federer and Nadal burst out onto the Grand Slam they took the game to a different level. When Hewitt, Roddick, Safin and Ferrero burst onto the scene as the likes of Sampras, Agassi and Rafter were coming to the end of their careers.

I agree Hewitt, Roddick, Safin and Ferrero at their peak ages didn't progress further in championship success, but the window and timeframe they had to do it in between latter success for Sampras and Agassi and the emergence of Federer and Nadal. Look at Agassi and Sampras when McEnroe, Becker, Edberg, Lendl and Wilander all came to the end of their careers, who came up and challenged Agassi and Sampras in their prime? I can't say I would imagine Roddick or Safin or Hewitt could sustain success down to the dynamics of their game and the emergence of better players.

Hi socal,

It was Federer who was across the net in Roddick's other 4 finals. Hewitt also ran in to him a lot, from the start of 2004 it was 5 out of 7 slams. You agreed earlier that your 'strong' era should probably start circa 2007 rather than 2003 (NB. Federer then definitely belongs in this category) but are now backtrackign in some other posts. Federer distorts things for these two guys, and I refer to my above comment that one amazing talent can not turn an era from 'weak' in to 'strong'. Ferrero was undoubtedly afflicted by injuries, starting in spring 2004. From 2007 we have had domination from 2 guys until 2010 and then a third has emerged this year. I'm happy to see how it pans out.

socal1976 wrote:It depends on how you look at it. In category #1, I have 12 numbers. In category #2 although for just 7 years we also have 12 number ones. Of course category two is for a shorter period of time that isn't my fault that is the fault of the the tranistional number #1s.

The highlighted statement is where the subjectivity comes in. They participated in different number of slams and fewer opportunities. For example, let us take two different periods. 1973-1996 (23 years) and 1996-2011(15 years). Another suggestion is to plot a graph between average number of ATP #1's per year for the Open Era annually.

socal1976 wrote: Back to my original thesis, the definition of a weak era is a bunch of guys coming up winning a slam and holding the number one ranking for short periods of time and then quickly dissappearing.

Quickly? Hewitt @ November 19, 2001 to April 27, 2003 for 75 weeks. What time span is your yardstick? 237 weeks?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ATP_number_1_ranked_singles_players

socal1976 wrote:The only category that you can make a skewed sample argument with is the current category, and that again isn't under my control we have only had 3 number #1s in the last 7 years.

The 'rolling' average method avoids the skew. You, being the statistician, do have it under your control.

Apologies for this example, but Black Plague, WW I and WW II killed a lot of people. Hence such catastrophic events skew the 'mortality' ratio and rate compared to Iraq/Afghanistan wars now. Should I consider them together for mortality statistics?

socal1976 wrote:So actually the sample size of category #1 and #2 are exactly the same, we took an average of the first 12 number #1s and compared them to the average of the next 12 number #1s. (Counting pete and Andre twice because they appear in both time periods).

Out of the current list of 25 #1s, splitting it in half seems reasonable at first, but the first 12 #1s from my link are 50+ weeks at #1, which again skews the data by longevity of a player.

socal1976 wrote:I even did an alternate list including Roger in the weaker category 2, and still the transitional #1 era came up dreadfully short. If anything I gave category 2 the biggest possible benefit of the doubt and the most liberal accounting principles possible. In short, by including both Pete, Andre, and Roger/ players that don't really belong in category 2 to begin with, I inflated the slam numbers for category 2 and they still came up way short. Roger afterall, was the guy who ended the era of transitional number 1s, and Pete and Andre first rose to prominence and the #1 ranking before this period.

An alternate list to avoid accusations of bias, which is already there.

socal1976 wrote:Of course not, the mainstays of excellence over the last few years have been roger and rafa, they are the standard bearers of this improved modern era. Before novak got to #1 I thought the early 2000s and late 90s was poor and the current era stronger.

That again smacks of subjectivity. I think 1962-1969 was the strongest era in terms of Tennis, therefore I am. QED

Legend, your last post is entirely consistent with the argument that I am making. Why was Nadal able to carve out niche for himself in the Federer era when none of these other players were able to? Even to a lesser extent Novak was able to carve out a niche for himself during Fed's best years. The weak era number ones were completely blown out and contrary to a very popular misconception it wasn't simply Fed that was knocking them out of every slam. These guys started to get beat up consistently by the Nadal/Djoko generation of players. (Murray, Nadal, Djoko, berdy, Tsonga, Gasquet, Monfils) And at an age that they should have been the ones drop beat downs on those kids. Injuries while a factor does not explain the whole scenario, not nearly. All these players had lengthy healthy periods in their career in their physical primes. Hewitt and Safin suffered a few more injuries, but Roddick and Ferrero have been generally healthy especially roddick.

An interesting statistical analysis that our friend Laverfan could do to shed light on this would be to look at the winning percentage of Hewitt, Ferrero, Roddick, and Safin vs. the Nadal generation that came up. And to look at it not all time but lets say from 05-08 to make it both fairer to the older guys and to the younger players.

Out of the current list of 25 #1s, splitting it in half seems reasonable at first, but the first 12 #1s from my link are 50+ weeks at #1, which again skews the data by longevity of a player.

-Laverfan's quote

Sorry, so what, it seems fair because it is fair laver fan. The players that had longer runs of success are not unfairly skewing the results. They are skewing their own numbers up fairly, of course consistency at the top is one of the biggest factors in distinguishing among greats. How else could you do it?

An alternate list to avoid accusations of bias, which is already there. Laverfan

What bias, if anything I bent over backwards to inflate the numbers of the weaker category. If I wanted to manipulate the results to show category 2 as being much weaker than what it was, I could have. I accounted their slam average like Enron accountants counted their profits in the years before their bankruptcy. I gave the weaker category every possible benefit of the doubt. If you did this list and only looked at FIRST TIME NUMBER #1S (ie not including Pete, and Andre as they reached the number one ranking first before the cutoff date) the numbers would be horrifyingly worse for the weak era #1s.

Positively 4th Street wrote:Hi socal,

It was Federer who was across the net in Roddick's other 4 finals. Hewitt also ran in to him a lot, from the start of 2004 it was 5 out of 7 slams. You agreed earlier that your 'strong' era should probably start circa 2007 rather than 2003 (NB. Federer then definitely belongs in this category) but are now backtrackign in some other posts. Federer distorts things for these two guys, and I refer to my above comment that one amazing talent can not turn an era from 'weak' in to 'strong'. Ferrero was undoubtedly afflicted by injuries, starting in spring 2004. From 2007 we have had domination from 2 guys until 2010 and then a third has emerged this year. I'm happy to see how it pans out.

Positively, good to hear from you. I am not backtracking at all. If you read my first post and read the timeline I provided recently you will see that my position is entirely consistent. I made it a point to argue that exact dates are not possible in this type of analysis; its very difficult if not impossible to come up with a hard and fast cut off date.

Roddick also got beaten in a lot of slams in the earlier rounds before he ever got to Federer in the last few years. I pointed out quite a few, my favorite being when Gazza came back from 2 sets down in wimby on the man. I don't think I have ever seen any backhand so completely dominate a matchup. But we digress, there is this HUGE MISNOMER THAT THESE WEAKER ERA STARS SIMPLY DIDN'T SUCCEED BECAUSE OF HOW GREAT ROGER WAS, this is incorrect. Every time I bring up ljubicic or blake, or nalbandian, or safin, or hewitt, or ferrero and their lack of consistent success all we hear about is Roger was just to good. This only tells a small part of the story. Roger was not beating these guys in every slam, he wasn't winning every single masters event, he wasn't preventing them from reaching the semis and finals consistently. The tour was doing that to them. Roger would just make sure to clean them up if they happened to be unfortunate enough to get him in their draw. Why is it that Agassi was able to carve a niche in the Sampras era? Why was it possible that wilander, edberg, and becker carved out their niches in the lendl era? And then consequently, why did these weak era number #1s completely fail to carve out even the smallest niche for themselves in the fedal era? Also why was Nadal and to lesser extent Djoko able to carve out a niche in the Federer dominance years? At an age, and in good enough health to compete these weaker era stars should have done much better than they did. I'll answer my own question as to why they didn't do better, they just weren't good enough.

socal1976 wrote:of course consistency at the top is one of the biggest factors in distinguishing among greats. How else could you do it?

Looking at Borg/McEnroe from 9 Apr 1979 - 2 Aug 1981 (a span of two+ years),

Borg was #1 4 times(34 + 46 + 20 + 2 = 102 wks), while McEnroe was #1 3 times (3+1+2 = 6 wks). Strong era of weak era? Borg domination!

Looking at Federer/Nadal from 2 Feb 2004 - 5 Jul 2009 (a span of four+ years), Federer was #1 one time (237 weeks) while Nadal was #1 (46 wks). Strong era of weak era? Federer domination!

I can selectively choose my data points and spans, and prove that Federer is better than Borg, McEnroe and Nadal. Now, do you see how I can skew the data. Your choice of periods does the same thing.

laverfan wrote:

socal1976 wrote:of course consistency at the top is one of the biggest factors in distinguishing among greats. How else could you do it?

Looking at Borg/McEnroe from 9 Apr 1979 - 2 Aug 1981 (a span of two+ years),

Borg was #1 4 times(34 + 46 + 20 + 2 = 102 wks), while McEnroe was #1 3 times (3+1+2 = 6 wks). Strong era of weak era? Borg domination!

Looking at Federer/Nadal from 2 Feb 2004 - 5 Jul 2009 (a span of four+ years), Federer was #1 one time (237 weeks) while Nadal was #1 (46 wks). Strong era of weak era? Federer domination!

I can selectively choose my data points and spans, and prove that Federer is better than Borg, McEnroe and Nadal. Now, do you see how I can skew the data. Your choice of periods does the same thing.

No if anything I gave the weaker era #1s the huge benefit of the doubt. Like I said there were ways to analyze their numbers that I still feel would be accurate that would actually show them to be weaker on average. If anything, including Pete and Andre twice, and even giving an alternate scenario of giving them Roger Federer as well they still come up way short. Other than throwing in the #1 and #2 all time slam winners when I could have easily made the list in a manner that would reflect much more poorly on the weak era #1s.

For example, lets say that I made the list putting each champion only in the era that they first reached the #1 ranking. Then Pete and Andre would be in the pre-1996 era. Then the list would look something like this: Muster, Rios, Moya, Kafelnikov, Rafter, Safin, Kuerten, hewitt, ferrero, and Roddick) Then their average #1 ranked player would average 1.5 slams as opposed to the plus 3 average that they ended up with. This is also one way to look at, and if anything I bent over backwards to inflate the Weaker era #1s in comparison to the other 2 eras. If I had done this analysis without counting players twice and simply putting the players in the era in which they first reached #1 than the weak era crowd would look much much worse. I gave them the enron accounting principle for inflating their numbers and they still fall way short of the champions that preceded them or came after them.

Boris Becker and wilander only held the #1 ranking for a few short weeks, but that doesn't make them a weaker #1 they won 13 slams between them. Again looking at the totality of circumstances. In the weak #1 era 2 slams would get you the #1 ranking for 70 plus weeks, In the 80s 6 and 7 slam winners struggled their whole career to even get a cup of coffee at the #1 ranking. That again is another piece of evidence of how weak at the top that transitional period was.

Then again, in the early 80s a player could get to number 1 without winning any slams at all. Perhaps there was weak year or two in there leading up to that.

JuliusHMarx wrote:Then again, in the early 80s a player could get to number 1 without winning any slams at all. Perhaps there was weak year or two in there leading up to that.

Actually all the players that attained the number #1 ranking in the 80s had multiple slams. Not a single one of the 80s #s was even a 2 or 3 slam wonder.

ATP #1 Players (25), Average Weeks/Slam

Pete Sampras 286 - 14 slams = 286/14 = 20
Roger Federer 285 - 16 slams = 285/16 = 18
Ivan Lendl 270 - 8 slams = 270/8 = 34
Jimmy Connors 268 - 8 slams = 268/8 = 33.5
John McEnroe 170 - 7 slams = 170/7 = 24
Björn Borg 109 - 11 slams = 9
Rafael Nadal 102 - 10 slams = 10
Andre Agassi 101 - 8 slams = 13
Lleyton Hewitt 80 - 2 slams = 40
Stefan Edberg 72 - 6 slams = 12
Jim Courier 58 - 4 slams = 14
Gustavo Kuerten 43 - 3 slams = 14
Ilie Năstase 40 - 2 slams = 20
Mats Wilander 20 - 7 slams = 3
Andy Roddick 13 - 1 slam = 13
Boris Becker 12 - 6 slams = 2
Marat Safin 9 - 2 slams = 4.5
John Newcombe 8 - 7 slams = 1.1 (2 slams in 1967)
Juan Carlos Ferrero 8 - 1 slams = 8
Thomas Muster 6 - 1 slam = 6
Marcelo Ríos 6 = NaN
Yevgeny Kafelnikov 6 - 2 slams = 3
Novak Djokovic 6 - 3 slams = 2
Carlos Moyá 2 - 1 slam = 2
Patrick Rafter 1 - 2 slams = 1/2


The point of this exercise is that there is no relationship between being #1 and winning slams.

Korda, Johansson, Edmondson, Kriek, Krajicek, Costa, Ivanisevic, Gaudio, Gomez, Chang, Noah, Vilas (4 slams), Cash, Stich, Kodes, Gimeno, Rosewall, Orantes, Tanner, Bruguera and Del Potro (he may become #1) were never ATP #1s. (I probably missed a few).

Your premise that ATP #1 and slams are related is false.

When suych a sport is limited to those with a comfortable financial background... then there will always be some not so great players making an era look rather weak!

socal1976 wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Then again, in the early 80s a player could get to number 1 without winning any slams at all. Perhaps there was weak year or two in there leading up to that.

Actually all the players that attained the number #1 ranking in the 80s had multiple slams. Not a single one of the 80s #s was even a 2 or 3 slam wonder.

Kriek, Noah, Chang won slams without being #1.

Your premise that ATP #1 and slams are related is false. .
laverfan

Come on laverfan, with all due respect that is a silly statement. Even under the analysis you just did dividing weeks at #1 per their slams don't you see how low the weak era #1s score. You are telling me that being #1 and winning slams is unrelated, I disagree completely and who heartedly. Yes you can pull a wozniacki or Rios and not win slams and be #1, but it doesn't happen very often and I would posit that as a world #1 you will never be seen as quite legitimate if you don't win a slam at some point in your career. The slams are the pinnacle of the sport and the #1 player is supposed to be the best player in the world, how are those two things not related. In fact of 25 world #1s in the men's game, 24 of them have been slam winners. I don't need to have a degree in mathematics to figure out that some relationship and correlation exists.

If you can't rate a player by slams, weeks at #1, tournament victories, or match record then how exactly should we rate a player Laverfan?

socal1976 wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Then again, in the early 80s a player could get to number 1 without winning any slams at all. Perhaps there was weak year or two in there leading up to that.

Actually all the players that attained the number #1 ranking in the 80s had multiple slams. Not a single one of the 80s #s was even a 2 or 3 slam wonder.

You've mis-read what I wrote. Lendl reached No .1 without winning a slam. The fact that he went on to win slams after that doesn't change the fact that he got to No. 1 without winning a slam. Were the 12 months preceding that point 'weak'?

socal1976 wrote:You are telling me that being #1 and winning slams is unrelated, I disagree completely and who heartedly.

Djokovic won 2 slams before he got to #1. Kriek (highest rank ATP #7) won two slams and was never #1.

socal1976 wrote:Yes you can pull a wozniacki or Rios and not win slams and be #1, but it doesn't happen very often and I would posit that as a world #1 you will never be seen as quite legitimate if you don't win a slam at some point in your career.

Del Potro lost to Cilic yesterday and won USO 2009. Winning a slam has nothing to do with ATP #1. A player attains #1 by winning slams, not the other way around.

socal1976 wrote:The slams are the pinnacle of the sport and the #1 player is supposed to be the best player in the world, how are those two things not related.

There are plenty of examples, Vilas won four slams, had a 50 match winning streak (4 matches are not recognised by ATP though), and his highest rank was #2.

socal1976 wrote:In fact of 25 world #1s in the men's game, 24 of them have been slam winners. I don't need to have a degree in mathematics to figure out that some relationship and correlation exists.

The correlation is that a player gets to #1 by winning slams. There are other methods, like winning tournaments at Tour level to accumulate enough points to be #1 - aka the Rios-Wozniacki 'effect'. Look at Serena's ranking woes (even though she is back to her winning ways and lost points due to injuries).

socal1976 wrote:If you can't rate a player by slams, weeks at #1, tournament victories, or match record then how exactly should we rate a player Laverfan?

By what they achieve in their entire career, not just slams/masters. Look at Pancho Gonzalez, just two USOs but an amazing player even at 41 years of age.

No actually socal the post was all about you.

Let it go, your guy is a great player in the tradition of Lleyton Hewitt, another fantastic player. This "era" nonsense is just chaff.

Winning a slam and being '#1 are not related. #1 is about consistency across the year...winning a slam is different a player could have a freak run, etc. The top players are those who win slams WHILST being #1...thats handling pressure, maintaining peak form across short and long periods. Clearly if a player is #1 for less than say 8 weeks, that doesnt make the era weak. You cannot also compare era's, I dont care how close they are to each other, things still change on tour rapidly. As do surfaces, and you tend to get a few years between the peaks of great players. Howeever...there is no such thing as an era anyway - what is an era? Is it defined by a great player coming along? ie. the borg era, the Fed era? Shouldnt it be a timeframe, if so - how long, when does it start? If not, what is the "era" between Sampras and Federer called, e.g. between 2000-2004 say when no player was really clearly dominant, I dont buy Hewitt was. I think the era argument is moot because there are no era's just passages of time when a certain player may dominate followed by (or not) other passages when no-one stands out as much. Doesnt make that a weak "era", just a time when there wasnt a true legend of the game in peak.

Lydian... Fantastic summation.

JuliusHMarx wrote:

socal1976 wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Then again, in the early 80s a player could get to number 1 without winning any slams at all. Perhaps there was weak year or two in there leading up to that.

Actually all the players that attained the number #1 ranking in the 80s had multiple slams. Not a single one of the 80s #s was even a 2 or 3 slam wonder.

You've mis-read what I wrote. Lendl reached No .1 without winning a slam. The fact that he went on to win slams after that doesn't change the fact that he got to No. 1 without winning a slam. Were the 12 months preceding that point 'weak'?

No because obviously Lendl showed his grandslam mettle. Lendl did go on to win 8 slams and play in 19 finals, therefore he couldn't be that week of a number one. Of course we are looking at these accomplishments in retrospect, there is no other way to look at it. Also remembering that lendl got to 4 finals before finally winning, and at the time many people didn't consider Lendl legitimate till he won the french open in 1984.

lydian wrote: You cannot also compare era's, I dont care how close they are to each other, things still change on tour rapidly. As do surfaces, and you tend to get a few years between the peaks of great players. Howeever...there is no such thing as an era anyway - what is an era? Is it defined by a great player coming along? ie. the borg era, the Fed era? Shouldnt it be a timeframe, if so - how long, when does it start? If not, what is the "era" between Sampras and Federer called, e.g. between 2000-2004 say when no player was really clearly dominant, I dont buy Hewitt was. I think the era argument is moot because there are no era's just passages of time when a certain player may dominate followed by (or not) other passages when no-one stands out as much. Doesnt make that a weak "era", just a time when there wasnt a true legend of the game in peak.

Actually, that is precisely were we differ. I think you can measure the dominance and accomplishment of champions of different periods within the modern era. I can't produce a time machine and drag Pete Sampras in his prime into our time to play Roger in his prime on grass. What I can do is look at the level of accomplishment and dominance in their age and measure that against players of other eras and how dominant they were in their time. Especially, when we are talking about players that played with generally the same conditions, and on the same tour. When comparing the weak era guys against the current champions or those that came right before them we see clearly as you pointed out that they were neither as accomplished or as dominant. Not in the short term, ie their best years weren't nearly as good as other #1s, and not in the long term when measuring their accomplishments over the course of their career.

And if you look at the timeline I provided a few posts ago you will see that while no exact cutoff date can be provided that I do a pretty detailed job of documenting both the beginning and the end of the weaker era. But yes it is always tough to time these things exactly.

Furthermore, I would disagree with you in that you state that an era that no great emerges in is not weak by definition, I disagree an era that lacks any great players would be exactly how I would define a weak era. Maybe others wouldn't but by definition you don't have a great player out their setting the bar, you have a bunch of lesser mortals winning a slam here and there and reach world #1 for a short time and then completely fading away. If that era wasn't weak why did the ferrero, hewitt, roddick, and safin generation completely fail to be relevant in what should have been their physical peak in the new era? Maybe because they just weren't as good.

"What I can do is look at the level of accomplishment and dominance in their age and measure that against players of other eras and how dominant they were in their time"

Yes you could do that but it still doesnt allow comparison of era's. Whatever Sampras and Federer achieved in their own primes is not comparable other than to say Federer won 16 majors and Sampras 14. Or they both were #1 for around 285/6 weeks.

Just because Fed won 16 and Sampras 14 doesnt make one "era" stronger or weaker than the other. How can you compare era's from the results of each dominant player? It cannot work that way. Your agument is undone by itself because you cannot know the relative strength of players between era's. Each era creates different results due to the nuance of player strengths within each era. Its circular logic.

You say generally same conditions but this isnt true. Court speeds have got slower and slower through the 2000s (or faster re: the French) due to surface and ball changes. Racquet technology also continues to make a difference as times change. And then you have the tour itself and differences in scoring/ranking systems between 90's and 00's, and more pressure on todays guys to play more events. There's too much variation.

You mention weaker era guys like Ferrero, Hewitt, Safin, etc. You could argue that those players peaked early and conditions after 2003 slowed dramatically which affected the base of their early successes. Safin was a fast court player and USO slowed down. Ferrero was mainly a clay courter really, not any great particular player. Hewitt was also more suited to fast surfaces when you look at his best results (Wimbledon, Queens, USO). He continued to do well at Queens/Halle where the speed kept up but not at the others where they kept slowing down.

However, you forget Agassi - an important factor to compare here. He was an unusal player in that he was also dominant in the early 00s - with similar rates of success in his play vs the 90s (similar ranking achievements, titles, slams, Masters, etc). The success he got in the early 00s doesnt support 00-03 being particularly weaker than say 96-99. If 00-03 had been so weak why didnt Agassi achieve more than he did earlier on given his playing plateau was very long - he was an "Indian summer" player if ever I saw one. Plus we saw Agassi be extremely competitive vs Nadal and Federer across say 03-05. Yet he wasnt mopping up USO titles from 00-03 (2R, QF, F, SF).

I think Hewitt & Co probably werent as good as Nadal/Federer across the later years of 04-10 but that STILL does not make their own era weak. It arguably makes their own peak era just more competitive. You could for example argue that Fed winning slams 04-07 was a weak era because no-one could stand up to him. Or that Nadal winning all those French Opens is the same case. And as I say surfaces/balls/racquets are changing all the time even in this decade.

Players only tend to have peak plateau periods for 2-3 years generally. Hewitt/Safin were good 00-03, Fed 04-07, Nadal 07-10...the "eras" are short. Just because their post-peak period isnt strong in the next era it doesnt mean their own era of peak play was weak.
Personally I dont think there's much between the late 90s/early00s/late00s other than you didnt have a legend playing 00-03 besides Agassi - I just do not buy an era is weaker than another, or buy into eras period, they're just different.

socal1976 wrote:...at the time many people didn't consider Lendl legitimate till he won the french open in 1984.

My point exactly - people thought the No. 1 wasn't 'legitimate' - they must have been shouting 'weak era' when Lendl first got to No. 1. What he did after that has no bearing on what happened in the 12 months leading up to it, because his No 1 ranking was based on his slamless preceding 12 months.

Wee Kieria has risen from the grave



What a load of arguments about a load of *nothing*

Well Lydian I have to disagree with your analysis. First of if what you are stating is true then it is impossible to ever distinguish between any players who played even a few years apart from each other. For example, one could not say that Bjorn Bjorg was more dominant than Marcelo Rios eventhough everyone on god's green earth knows it true because bjorg played with a wooden racquet and in a different era? I am not talking about a hypothetical match between the two and who would win. What I am saying is that one can look at how dominant and accomplished bjorg was in his time and state that in these areas he surpasses Rios for example. Now if you accept this assumption, which is quite frankly common sense, then you can easily take the next step.


If one can distinguish between one player's level of domiance and accomplishment vs. another then you can objectively measure the strength of two eras especially when these eras are seperate by just a few short years. The conditions are not identical but they are similar even some of the cast of players are similar. So if there is one group of champions who played in an era and are not nearly as consistent, not nearly as accomplised, nor dominant in their time than the players that came immediately before and after them, then that era is clearly weaker. Why because it is the top players in any era that determine who wins the slams and the major honors. Therefore, if the top players are more consistently great and dominant it becomes harder to win, much harder than a case were you have more parity. Top heavy eras when you have a few superlative players become the most challenging periods to win slams. It becomes impossible to pull a thomas johansson and win a grandslam by not beating a single top ten player.

This isn't that unusual or controversial of concept. We see it in other areas in sports. Sports progress forward with time but this isn't always lineal. For example, in the 1970s we had a golden generation of heavy weight boxers. Ken Norton, Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, Holmes, Spinks, and George Forman. Then afterwards we had lengthy dry spell in heavy weight talent as boxing lost some popularity and some prestige as new stars did not come up to replace the old. The same thing to a large extent happened in tennis. Tennis boomed in popularity in the 70s and 80s with ever increasing financial gain came in more talented competion. This lengthy boom fizzled for a few years during the end of the Pete/Andre era and through the early Fed era until new more accomplished champions arose.

socal1976 wrote:Positively, good to hear from you. I am not backtracking at all. If you read my first post and read the timeline I provided recently you will see that my position is entirely consistent. I made it a point to argue that exact dates are not possible in this type of analysis; its very difficult if not impossible to come up with a hard and fast cut off date.

Roddick also got beaten in a lot of slams in the earlier rounds before he ever got to Federer in the last few years. I pointed out quite a few, my favorite being when Gazza came back from 2 sets down in wimby on the man. I don't think I have ever seen any backhand so completely dominate a matchup. But we digress, there is this HUGE MISNOMER THAT THESE WEAKER ERA STARS SIMPLY DIDN'T SUCCEED BECAUSE OF HOW GREAT ROGER WAS, this is incorrect. Every time I bring up ljubicic or blake, or nalbandian, or safin, or hewitt, or ferrero and their lack of consistent success all we hear about is Roger was just to good. This only tells a small part of the story. Roger was not beating these guys in every slam, he wasn't winning every single masters event, he wasn't preventing them from reaching the semis and finals consistently. The tour was doing that to them. Roger would just make sure to clean them up if they happened to be unfortunate enough to get him in their draw. Why is it that Agassi was able to carve a niche in the Sampras era? Why was it possible that wilander, edberg, and becker carved out their niches in the lendl era? And then consequently, why did these weak era number #1s completely fail to carve out even the smallest niche for themselves in the fedal era? Also why was Nadal and to lesser extent Djoko able to carve out a niche in the Federer dominance years? At an age, and in good enough health to compete these weaker era stars should have done much better than they did. I'll answer my own question as to why they didn't do better, they just weren't good enough.

Hi socal,

At the onset of this whole discussion my aim was to show that your metric was flawed, which even you have acknowledged. A secondary goal was to show that there are mitigating circumstances so explain some of what you refer to as a 'weak' era. Muster and Kuerten were wonderful clay-courters, and with the disparity in surfaces back then, a great clay season meant a shot at #1. There is no disputing that Federer is the main reason why Andy Roddick is stuck on one slam, bringing up some defeats to other players does not take away from this (apart from the 4 finals, Federer beat him in 3 semis and a quarter-final). Ditto Hewitt, who, as mentioned earlier, ran in to Fed in 5 out of 7 slams when at, or certainly still near, his best. Ljubicic and Blake are not part of this discussion as I remember it, don't know what you are trying to achieve there.

Your point about players being able to carve out niches is also moot. What you are overlooking is the fact that Federer was picking up slams at an unprecedented rate between 2004 and 2007. 11 out of 16, 11 out of 12 off clay, a surface that Roddick and Hewitt would undoubtedly consider their worst so not giving them much scope there to add to their respective tallies.

All the top players quickly started beating Roddick and hewitt, with Roddick at least he got to the finals of events at grandslams for Roger to beat him. Hewitt wasn't even consistently making the second week of slams, which was a result of others knocking him out.

I do not agree that my metric is flawed, I think it is a very telling analysis. But with all mathematical analysis you have to look at all the facts and a variety of measures analyzed properly to get a good answer. What I said was my metric is one way to look at it and that it is an accurate picture. Nothing has been posted that makes me change this belief.


And my point about other player's being able to carve niches is not mute. Roddick and Hewitt, failed to carve out even the smallest niche in the Fed era. Fed didn't win every masters event, why weren't they racking up Master's wins or consistently even getting to the finals and semis of events? If Roddick and Hewitt were truely great players they would have found a way to get Roger at least a few times, but they weren't. Why was Nadal able to carve out his niche and even beat Fed at age 17 in a hardcourt Master's tournament? Nadal was able to do because he is great and Hewitt and Roddick weren't able to because they aren't.

Socal, you talk too much

gallery play wrote:Socal, you talk too much

That's only half of the poblem!

Tenez wrote:

gallery play wrote:Socal, you talk too much

That's only half of the poblem!

The other half is that I am right most of the time, and you can't stand it.

socal1976 wrote:And my point about other player's being able to carve niches is not mute. Roddick and Hewitt, failed to carve out even the smallest niche in the Fed era. Fed didn't win every masters event, why weren't they racking up Master's wins or consistently even getting to the finals and semis of events? If Roddick and Hewitt were truely great players they would have found a way to get Roger at least a few times, but they weren't. Why was Nadal able to carve out his niche and even beat Fed at age 17 in a hardcourt Master's tournament? Nadal was able to do because he is great and Hewitt and Roddick weren't able to because they aren't.

Sorry to be a pedant socal, but by saying it's a moot point I mean it is debatable. Surely you'll concede at least that? Federer was a special talent, if he'd been a 'regular' slam winner like the guys before him then Roddick and Hewitt would most likely have had 3 or 4 slams each and we wouldn't be having this debate. These guys were probably a bit demoralised and daunted by the wonder of Federer. Nadal had no such baggage, and was able to get a lot of wins on clay. I know he beat him on hard first, but he really established his supremacy on clay.

Positevily, if Roddick and hewitt were really great players they would be able to find away to do better than they did. It wasn't Roger alone beating them. Hewitt and Roddick started losing regularly to the younger generation that came up with Nadal but a bit after Nadal. Your argument might hold more water, if for example the players in question (roddick, hewitt, ferrero, safin etc) when consistently high ranked and just losing to Fed at the tail end of slams. But that wasn't the case except for Roddick the other three at times struggled to just remain in the top 20. This is one of the biggest misnomers that it was simply the greatness of Roger that prevented these players from doing better in their physical primes. Lots of players passed these guys up and real quick, when they were healthy enough and young enough that with their experience they should have been beating up the Nadal, Djoko, Murray, Gasquet, Berdy generation. In fact the opposite was true the young guns got the better of those guys more and more often.

socal1976 wrote:

Tenez wrote:

gallery play wrote:Socal, you talk too much

That's only half of the poblem!

The other half is that I am right most of the time, and you can't stand it.

I think they meant half the problem is that you talk too much, and the other half is that it's rubbish. I have to agree with them.

Isn't it time for another thread about Fognini? Or maybe we need another "proof" that this is now the strongest era ever (ooh and the implications of that for Djokovic would be what...?)?

bogbrush wrote:

socal1976 wrote:

Tenez wrote:

gallery play wrote:Socal, you talk too much

That's only half of the poblem!

The other half is that I am right most of the time, and you can't stand it.

I think they meant half the problem is that you talk too much, and the other half is that it's rubbish. I have to agree with them.

Isn't it time for another thread about Fognini? Or maybe we need another "proof" that this is now the strongest era ever (ooh and the implications of that for Djokovic would be what...?)?

Oh wow, you mean you agree with Tenez and GP, your fellow extreme Nadal haters what a surprise. Don't worry, since you enjoy my Fogi posts I will make show to find away to work in more posts about the one and only player to beat Novak in his historic run Fabio Fognini.