How do you define "greatness" in tennis?

Do you define greatness by the number of titles? If so, Federer is the greatest.

Longevity?

Ability to win on all surfaces?

Winning ruthlessly in straight sets?

Quality of opposition during that era?

Not having bogeymen (if only you didn't face them in the draw, you could win the title)?

Federer - 6 Wimbledon, 5 US Open, 1 French, 4 Australian (only one French and that was when he didn't have to play Nadal)
Sampras - 7 W, 5 US, 0 Fr, 2 Aus (never a serious contender at the French)
Laver - 4 W, 2 US, 3 Fr, 2 Aus (two real grandslams; no man managed even one since)
Emerson - 2 W, 2 US, 2 Fr, 6 Aus (half of the titles were at the least-recognised Aus Open)
Nadal - 2 W, 1 US, 6 Fr, 1 Aus (6/10 titles French)
Borg - 5 W, 4 US, 6 Fr, 0 Aus (best winning percentage in majors entered; tough competition with Connors, MacEnroe, Lendl, and Vilas)
Connors - 2 W, 5 US, 4 Fr, 1 Aus (tough competition with Borg, MacEnroe, Lendl, and Vilas)

Do you define greatness by the number of titles?

Longevity?

Ability to win on all surfaces?

Yes to all three.

Winning ruthlessly in straight sets?

No, not really important IMO. How many people remember that Kuerten had to battle through multiple five-setters for one of his FO titles (can't remember the one)? And yet Kuerten will be remembered as a clay court great I think.

Quality of opposition during that era?

Never bought into this argument: dominant is dominant. Is the opposition poor or is the player too good?

Not having bogeymen (if only you didn't face them in the draw, you could win the title)?

Yes and no. Whi H2H does indeed matter, it shouldn't affect the overall picture. I rate Agassi as a great, and he was dominated by Sampras quite badly if memory serves. Federer has been dominated by Nadal (mostly on clay) and is still great. So for me having a bogeyman affects the level of greatness, but not the greatness itself.

my list of greats:

Federer
Nadal
Sampras
Agassi
Laver
Emerton (still won six of the more "competitive" slams)
Connors
McEnroe
Bord
Lendl

Mad for Chelsea, You must really like Agassi to rate him higher than Laver, Borg, Mac, and Connors.

What did you so much like about Agassi?

MFC can't argue with the names on the list although if you're going back before the Open era to include Emerson the Budge, Gonzalez to name but two need also to be considered.

Even if Djokovic were never to win another slam he needs to join that list based on this extraordinary year alone. Hoad was another who (according to observers at the time) played unbelievable tennis in the mid 50s.

If longevity is important then there's one name you've left out - a player who straddled both era and made his last Wimbledon final at the staggering age of 39.

Ah, Ken Rosewall and that nightmare final vs Connors!

I included Emerson because he is third on the list of most majors. Budge, Pancho, Hoad, Tilden, and few others were outstanding players of their generation.

Borg is one guy who retired for an unusual reason that he was bored, not because he was fading or he was injured. Had he played for another 3-4 years... well, it remains a question mark.

1 - I simply look at the natural skills first. That to me is the most important factor.
2 - Then the mind. Can the player deliver his talent under high pressure moments.
3 - This of course comes with being fit and confidence in own abilities.
4 - When all this is clicking, the player should have a few good years of total domination and more importantly, being able to lift the game to new levels in the process. One may have an accident or injury (not picked up on the court) and that would affect unfairly the player ability to prove himself over time so to me longevity can be less important than bringing the game to higher spheres.

Here is my list of real greats in chronological order

Borg - Had most of the above though his natural skills were more in his footwork than his racquet swing.

McEnroe - Also had all of the above. Huge talent, total domination, game brought to levels where none reached in his time.

Lendl - Had all of the above too bar probably a lack of confidence in important moments. Woudl have won a few more slams had he not come froma communist country with the weight that carried at the time.

Sampras - Had all of the above but in my view never brought the game to new spheres. One felt that there were more talented players in his time but either past their best (Edberg) or mentally or physically frail (Goran Agassi, Kraji). Pete is probably one of the mentally strongest player out there.

Federer - Has all of the above too but in more abundance than any of the above players.

Leff wrote:Mad for Chelsea, You must really like Agassi to rate him higher than Laver, Borg, Mac, and Connors.

What did you so much like about Agassi?

wasn't actually in any particular order TBH. Just the names as they popped into my head. I've gone open era as I don't know enough about the other guys to include them. But if I did have to rank them, no way would Agassi be above Laver or Borg, probably not Emerton either. Tougher call on Mac and Connors, the all surface ability of Agassi is not to be ignored...

Tenez, I especially like you comment about delivering in high pressure moments.

come to mention it, Edberg should be on my list too (though in this case there's a bit of bias, just loved the guy's game).

I saw Lendl, Sampras, Wilander, and Roddick in exhibition event a few months ago. Wilander - not a drop of sweat after two sets
Sampras - borrowed Roddick's racquet and banged two dozen aces in two sets
Lendl - never smiled
Roddick - losing hair

It surpises me that everyone puts Laver amongst greatest but overlook Rosewal who had nearly impeccable record in terms of achievements.

What could be the reasons for that?
Ken Rosewal: 4 Aussie, 4 Wimby, 2 FO and 2 USO. Active career from 1957-1980. A winning percentage of nearly 80 in the slams. And not to forget about his Pro slams wins in FO and Wimby. A remarkable career but often forgotten.

Another intersting stat I found on here/: no of titles won excluding aussie open.

http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=189761&page=3

Ken Rosewall - 17
Pancho Gonzales - 12
Rod Laver - 12
Pete Sampras - 12
Bjorn Borg - 11
Bill Tilden - 11
Don Budge - 9
Roger Federer - 9
Henri Cochet - 8
Fred Perry - 8

Obviously this is an old page, hence fed'a tally will go upto 11.

IMO greatness could be what media keeps afloat.

Greatness is what Dolgopolov will use to blitz through next year at 1 of the biggies. Heard it here first f0alks.

Josiah Maiestas wrote:Greatness is what Dolgopolov will use to blitz through next year at 1 of the biggies. Heard it here first f0alks.

JM you know that he has serious fitness issues.

Really?

Well Tsonga didn't think so after this epic http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/tennis-news/2010/06/25/wimbledon-2010-jo-wilfried-tsonga-edges-past-dolgopolov-in-thriller-86908-22358832/

wow wrote:It surpises me that everyone puts Laver amongst greatest but overlook Rosewal who had nearly impeccable record in terms of achievements.

What could be the reasons for that?
Ken Rosewal: 4 Aussie, 4 Wimby, 2 FO and 2 USO. Active career from 1957-1980. A winning percentage of nearly 80 in the slams. And not to forget about his Pro slams wins in FO and Wimby. A remarkable career but often forgotten.

Hey, You are picking wrong information from somewhere or misreading. The biggest disappointment of Rosewall's career was never winning a Wimbledon trophy. He was in 4 finals and lost all of them, the last of which was an embarrassing straight-set loss to young Connors at the age of 39.

wow wrote:Another intersting stat I found on here/: no of titles won excluding aussie open.

Ken Rosewall - 17
Pancho Gonzales - 12
Rod Laver - 12
Pete Sampras - 12
Bjorn Borg - 11
Bill Tilden - 11
Don Budge - 9
Roger Federer - 9
Henri Cochet - 8
Fred Perry - 8

Obviously this is an old page, hence fed'a tally will go upto 11.

You were misreading that report you cited.

Rosewall won only 8 titles - 2 US, 2 Fr, 4 Aus. All the other numbers you are citing are also wrong because you misread.

wow wrote:Another intersting stat I found on here/: no of titles won excluding aussie open.

Ken Rosewall - 17
Pancho Gonzales - 12
Rod Laver - 12
Pete Sampras - 12
Bjorn Borg - 11
Bill Tilden - 11
Don Budge - 9
Roger Federer - 9
Henri Cochet - 8
Fred Perry - 8

Obviously this is an old page, hence fed'a tally will go upto 11.

Hey, These numbers included professional circuit tournaments like the Wembley Pro (not to mistaken for Wimbledon).

See, Rosewall did not play what we consider now as majors between 1957 and 1967 because he was contracted to play professional circuit. Thus, in the best years of his tennis career, he did not take part in the majors. By the time the Open Era started, he was rather old and couldn't deal with younger and fitter ones like Nuke. Rosewall was the best claycourt player of his generation. By the way, during the Laver Rosewall era, French was still clay, but the other three were on grass. So, we don't know how Laver would have done on hard courts. It's like saying we don't know how well Bradman would have done in ODI and T20 formats of cricket.

I can't rate really the old guys, but I feel that if in the open era you managed to garner at least 3 slams you are a great. In the open era spanning over 4 years that would include:

Fed, pete, borg, connors, mac, lendl, edberg, becker, wilander, laver, newcombe, vilas, kuerten, djokovic, ashe, rosewal, agassi, courier.

About 20 guys yes, more inclusive than other people here on this site. But I think it mainly comes down to grandslams won. And while anyone can get lucky and win a lone slam, maybe be very good and win two, but as the saying goes 3 times is a trend. Tennis afterall is not a pretty shot contest, they keeps score and it is about winning.

There is no question that the parameter to measure greatness in tennis has to be linked to the performance in Slams.

In my view there is a distinction, I know is rather subtle, between:

- Champion: this is a player who has accomplished an extraordinary career by normal standards and by the standards of his country. E.g. Murray

- Great champion; a player who has won at least 1 slam, and has backed it up with an exceptional career in terms of ranking, wins outside the slams, and level of tennis achieved . E.g. Gomez, Safin, Rafter

- Tennis great; multi-slam winner (3+), who has reached the pinnacle of the game on a specific surface or period of time. E.g: Kuerten, Courier, Edberg, Agassi etc.

Big fan of Edberg, Becker, but I woudl not call them tennis great. To be a tennis great you woudl need to dominate all your peers for a decent period of time. This is why Nadal doesn;t make my list either. For too long he was essentially dominant on clay and was only abe to dominate on other surface when 1 - The number one was off form (2008) and 2 - 2010 when the the whole top was off form and 3 they slowed down all surfaces to give him a chance.

Nadal doesn;t have enough raw talent to be a tennis great. It is clear now, though always was to me, that he plays the same game everywhere and can't come up with alternative tactics.

For me, since the Open Era started:

(1) the Standout greats for excelling in two or more of longevity, skill, no. of slam titles, breadth of success across surfaces and peers, effect on the way the game developed, entertainment as well as not having too many glaring gaps in that list

Laver
Borg
McEnroe
Lendl
Sampras
Agassi
Federer
Nadal

(2) A lot of slams, but quite not for the top echelon of greats

Connors
Wilander
Edberg
Becker

(3) Bubbling Under - excellent but not 'greats' (in Djoko's case "yet")

Vilas
Nastase
Kuerten
Courier
Djokovic

It also helps if the player has been involved in a particularly special series of matches or one side of a particularly significant rivalry (even Trivalry) that has helped drive the game on.

Connors got more slams than Mac over a longer period, but for me he was always 'there' as a challenge rather than the more imposing presence (as I saw it) of the likes of Mac or Borg - similar to Wilander in that respect.

Tenez wrote:Big fan of Edberg, Becker, but I woudl not call them tennis great. To be a tennis great you woudl need to dominate all your peers for a decent period of time. This is why Nadal doesn;t make my list either. For too long he was essentially dominant on clay and was only abe to dominate on other surface when 1 - The number one was off form (2008) and 2 - 2010 when the the whole top was off form and 3 they slowed down all surfaces to give him a chance.

Nadal doesn;t have enough raw talent to be a tennis great. It is clear now, though always was to me, that he plays the same game everywhere and can't come up with alternative tactics.

Tenez: I have to disagree with this view.

I know the argument has been debated ad nauseam but it is worth mentioning here:

Edberg has played during one of the toughest era in modern tennis. Just look at the kind of people he's had to deal with: Courier, Becker, Sampras, Agassi, Wilander, Lendl just to mention a few. This must be taken into account.

Other important factors are:

- the technical excellence: Edberg has reached the pinnacle of the serve-and-volley technique and, together with Mac, he was its unequalled master.
- the wow factor: few champions have reached such a worldwide celebrity status and were consensually admired, as Edberg
- the personality: a tennis great has always a special charisma and a stand-out personality, qualities that are all part of his profile.

I certainly appreciated Edberg's immense talent and was one of my all favourite of all time. But he was not that strong mentally, was he? He was better than Becker but kept losing against him in many important matches. He never dominated for long enough in my view. Look at his ATP number 1 run (NOt as bad as Becker though).

Sure the opposition was tough but it has always been tough. Lendl was teh one who had the toughest in my view though I disagree of opponents slam counts to make a case.

Edberg was what Barry defines as lots of slams but not really great yet.

Weren't Vilas and Kuerten only winning on clay???

Josiah Maiestas wrote:Weren't Vilas and Kuerten only winning on clay???

Not Vilas. He has a USO...but you are right it may have been in Forest Hill....which was clay.

But you could say that Laver never won a slam on HC either.

I think what I would agree with is that Lendl is by all means a greater player than Edberg, that's for sure.

To take this into account I would find it reasonabe to draw a further distinction between tennis greats and greatest of all time - Eg GOATS; e.g Borg,Mac, Lendl, Sampras , Fed.

As regards to the mental attribute: I think this is very much a consequence of the game style of a player: an attacking player will never be as consistent as a defensive one: eg Borg v Mac., unless armed with a devastating serve, like the case of Sampras and Federer.

Josiah Maiestas wrote:Weren't Vilas and Kuerten only winning on clay???

Vilas won 2 slams on grass.

Guga won Cinci on hard court.

Guga won Cinci

So did Murray who cares though?

I don't about anyone else, but the last sentence of paragraph 3 is how I define tennis greatness -

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

Edberg is a slightly tricky one - but ultimately I have him as a fast-surface specialist who did not do enough to be considered as a standout great.

He won both his Aus Opens on grass when the draws were still <128 so he only had to win 6 rounds each time. I'd say that the Aus Open's arrival in the really big time started in 1988.

His trip to the RG final in 1989 was an oddity with a good draw for a fast-court player - he faced both Goran and Becker (SF) on the way.

Maybe not a great, but a great player to watch, a true artist on the court and a gentleman to boot. Stefan Edberg, I salute you:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvO5Wh33icc&feature=grec_index

barrystar wrote:His trip to the RG final in 1989 was an oddity with a good draw for a fast-court player - he faced both Goran and Becker (SF) on the way.

He really should have won that FO final versus Chang! 2 points for a 5/2 lead, double break in the fourth...easiest volley for me (imagine for Edberg) ..and sails it long.

Edberg was great no doubt but his game and personality left me completely cold. Great player though. Really the only S and V guy that i loved was Boris. Boris had that star quality that the swedes Edberg and Wilander lacked because of their quiet and emotionless demeanor. And the fact that he rose up as teenager and just exploded on the scene by destroying everyone on rout to two straigh wimbys really engraved him in my mind.

Following on from my Art Larsen link above I also found this story

"Tony Trabert told a story that Larsen and he were playing doubles in the Italian Open. Match point came and the last ball, Larsen flipped his racket around and volleyed it over for a winner, holding the head of the racket and hitting the ball with the grip."

Tenez you do injustice to Sampras.
First of all  he brought  a lethal first and second serve not seen before or after his era.Secondly he played in an indisputably stronger era than Federer.He competed against Connors  McEnroe  Becker Edberg
Wilander Agassi Lendl.That is 7 all time greats with winning record against all of them! Fed has a losing record against Murray and Nadal.By the end of next year he might have a losing record to Djokovic also .Sampras played against Stich Courier Rafter  Bruguera Ivanisevic Muster Chang  Noah all of them 
GS  winners with better  record than anybody in Fed's era with  the exception of Djoko and Nadal.Despite that he remained No 1  286 weeks a record Fed will not brake unless you believe in him leapfrogging Nadal and Djokovic.
He also the only GOAT canditate that won a GS as a teenager in his twenties and in his thirties.Another
record Fed will never break. As for the age thing look Sampras record against same age Agassi
in the US Open 4-0 12 sets won 3 lost. Federer against an eleven years older Agassi  is 2-1  6 sets won 6 lost.Of course you mentioned last week that in France they were not showing much Tennis twenty years ago.
As I said before there is no universaly accepted method
to determine GOAT. Best players of his era is somewhat easier. Sampras was in his and Federer is in his. So far...

Sorry Faust but you need atleast 1 RG victory to be in this discussion, even losing in a 5 set marathon holding match point(s) wouldn't make him in discussion for GOAT as he never clinched a title, nevermind reach ONE final.. he will always be a 2 surface fish

Sampras did not compete with Connors - he played Connors twice when Connors was 39, 40 years old.
And he only played Wilander 3 times.

I don't do injustice to Pete. I picked him in my short list. I just say that he hasn't raised the bar in tennis...as much as the other greats. His second serve was the best but as a second serve is not as good as a first serve winner, I cannot say that the consistency of his first and second serve raise the level of the game.

It's his serve and more importantly the quality of his second serve that allowed him to make the most of what was then a very fast game dominated by servers.

I for instance believe that Goran had a better first serve but was mentally weaker than Pete.

Goran had no where near the forehand, movement, or second serve pete had. I'd take pete's volleys over goran as well. Not to mention his flying overheads.

Mad for Chelsea wrote:Maybe not the greatest, but a tennis great , a true artist on the court and a gentleman to boot. Stefan Edberg, I salute you:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvO5Wh33icc&feature=grec_index

MFC:

This is just the way tennis should be played!

Josiah Maiestas wrote:

Guga won Cinci

So did Murray who cares though?

Did Murray win 3 RG?

So what, who said that to be a tennis great you have to play at same level on all surfaces? Simon Reed?

When the concept of Grand Slam was invented all the 4 Slams were played on grass.

Wonder who would be GOAT on an ice surface?

Faust wrote:
Tenez you do injustice to Sampras.
First of all  he brought  a lethal first and second serve not seen before or after his era.Secondly he played in an indisputably stronger era than Federer.He competed against Connors  McEnroe  Becker Edberg
Wilander Agassi Lendl.

MacEnroe, Lendl, Connors and Wilander retired when Sampras came on the scene. His career might have overlapped with Connors and Lendl for maybe one year when Connors was approaching forty years.

The opponents Sampras faced (not listing the clay specialists like Bruguera who mostly dominated the French) were:
Edberg, Courier, Becker (a few years only), Ivanesevic, Stich, Agassi, Krajicek, Medvedev, Chang, Pioline, Kafelnikov, Moya, Kuerten, Muster, and Henman (couldn't help including him!).

Not a weak opposition, but IMO, the rivalries were stronger during the Borg era (Borg, Becker, Connors, Mac).

I can see it now:

GSM, and the new champion of South Pole Open.... Davydenko 7-6 7-6 6-7 6-7 27-25

Jeremy_Kyle wrote:
When the concept of Grand Slam was invented all the 4 Slams were played on grass.

Are you sure about this statement?

I thought that Roland Garros was always on clay. US open switched from grass to hard in the mid-seventies, and Australian from grass to hard in the eighties, and what I read, the French was always the odd one.

Faust wrote:
Tenez you do injustice to Sampras.
First of all  he brought  a lethal first and second serve not seen before or after his era.Secondly he played in an indisputably stronger era than Federer.He competed against Connors  McEnroe  Becker Edberg
Wilander Agassi Lendl.That is 7 all time greats with winning record against all of them! Fed has a losing record against Murray and Nadal.By the end of next year he might have a losing record to Djokovic also .Sampras played against Stich Courier Rafter  Bruguera Ivanisevic Muster Chang  Noah all of them 
GS  winners with better  record than anybody in Fed's era with  the exception of Djoko and Nadal.Despite that he remained No 1  286 weeks a record Fed will not brake unless you believe in him leapfrogging Nadal and Djokovic.
He also the only GOAT canditate that won a GS as a teenager in his twenties and in his thirties.Another
record Fed will never break. As for the age thing look Sampras record against same age Agassi
in the US Open 4-0 12 sets won 3 lost. Federer against an eleven years older Agassi  is 2-1  6 sets won 6 lost.Of course you mentioned last week that in France they were not showing much Tennis twenty years ago.
As I said before there is no universaly accepted method
to determine GOAT. Best players of his era is somewhat easier. Sampras was in his and Federer is in his. So far...

Faust,

Pete fans like to point out that he played against a whole array of greats but as already alluded to many of them were pretty much finished by the time Pete started to dominate. Connors was an old man, Lendl and Wilander were done by the early nineties, Becker was finished by 96, Edberg even earlier.

Noah played Sampras once and beat him.

Pete had a losing record against Bruguera; He and Muster were essentially clay court specialists.

Chang, Muster, Ivanisevic, Stich, Noah all won one slam each.

Rafter won two.

Agassi was MIA for much of the nineties.

As for stating that Fed is the best in his era..so far, don't you think that's a little bit unfair? The Fed era is over. To compare him to rivals 5-6 yrs younger, at the tail end of his career, and then determining whether or not he was the best of his era, would be akin to comparing an old Sampras with Hewitt and Safin (both of whom he had losing records to), and then deciding (incorrectly) that sampras wasn't the best of his era.

Leff wrote:
Are you sure about this statement?

I thought that Roland Garros was always on clay. US open switched from grass to hard in the mid-seventies, and Australian from grass to hard in the eighties, and what I read, the French was always the odd one.

Yes, my friend. The four of them.