v2 G.O.A.T The Final

First topic message reminder :

After two months of competition, over 2500 votes, over 5500 comments, a voting scandal, a restarted format and the Gavin Hastings situation, the v2 GOAT has come to its climax with the final matchup of the tournament today to decide who the v2 posters will crown their greatest of all time.

Yesterday’s two semi-finals were two of the most closely contested matches of the tournament with football, tennis, cricket and boxing represented in the final four, in match 1 Mohammed Ali took on Don Bradman and with the voting neck and neck for the majority of the day it was eventually the self-proclaimed greatest of all time that took the initiative and became the first entrant to secure his spot in the final. In the second match grand slam champion Roger Federer took on two time world cup winner Pele, in another intriguing battle that was extremely close all day neither man could establish a lead of any note, eventually Federer sealed his spot in the final by just two votes finishing on 44 to Pele’s 42.

Bradman exits the competition defeating Zinedine Zidane, and Harry Greb in round 1, Daley Thompson, Brain Lara and Eddy Merckx in round 2, Sugar Ray Robinson and Usain Bolt in the last 16 , Michael Phelps, Tiger Woods and Michael Johnson in the last 8.

Pele’s scalps include Michael Schumacher, Stephen Hendry, Phil Taylor, Martina Navratilova and Wayne Gretzky.

Today’s final sees a clash of styles, generation and sports as boxing takes on tennis to decide the v2 G.O.A.T

Ali vs. Federer and emancipator vs 6oldenbhoy in the battle of the GOAT champions

Please vote for the v2 G.O.A.T

Please leave a comment as to why you voted

super_realist wrote:

Union Cane wrote:You can't just gloss over the fact that Federer loses 20% of his matches though, surely?

Ali's Olympic Gold must count in his favour as well.

You'd have to look at recent years of tennis stats to see what the win/loss ratio across the mens game.
I haven't done it, but I imagine that Fed is pretty close to having the best Win/Loss ratio.

The fact that Ali has a different one is irrelevant.

having done a (very quick so possibly not entirely accurate) piece of research into this: Borg has the best win-loss ration (open era), with a decent lead. Then comes the group of McEnroe, Lendl, Connors and Federer, not sure of the order of this one but they're all very close. Significantly they all played a lot more than Borg (at least 200 matches) who of course retired somewhat prematurely.

Mad for Chelsea wrote:having done a (very quick so possibly not entirely accurate) piece of research into this: Borg has the best win-loss ration (open era), with a decent lead. Then comes the group of McEnroe, Lendl, Connors and Federer, not sure of the order of this one but they're all very close. Significantly they all played a lot more than Borg (at least 200 matches) who of course retired somewhat prematurely.

I hope you didn't count the early years of their careers, and then discounted any years that didn't fit in with your agenda?

Ali by a country mile. Federer isn't even the tennis GOAT, as I've opined throughout this process. So congrats to Mr Ali, I hope he pulls off one last great victory

Federer is without a doubt the best tennis player of all time.

Azzy Mahmood wrote:Ali by a country mile. Federer isn't even the tennis GOAT, as I've opined throughout this process. So congrats to Mr Ali, I hope he pulls off one last great victory

Is he still alive?

What's Tim Henman's W-L record. Anyone got the stats on that. Must be Top 10?

VTR wrote:What's Tim Henman's W-L record. Anyone got the stats on that. Must be Top 10?

Not likely, he didn't win many tournaments.

super_realist wrote:

VTR wrote:What's Tim Henman's W-L record. Anyone got the stats on that. Must be Top 10?

Not likely, he didn't win many tournaments.

Come on he must be. With Greg Rusedski also near or in the Top 10!

He wouldn't even get into top 50 in Win-Loss ratio if you were to look into it, I would guess, ....He won 11 titles and One Masters Series event.

Union Cane wrote:

Mad for Chelsea wrote:having done a (very quick so possibly not entirely accurate) piece of research into this: Borg has the best win-loss ration (open era), with a decent lead. Then comes the group of McEnroe, Lendl, Connors and Federer, not sure of the order of this one but they're all very close. Significantly they all played a lot more than Borg (at least 200 matches) who of course retired somewhat prematurely.

I hope you didn't count the early years of their careers, and then discounted any years that didn't fit in with your agenda?

I hope that was tongue-in-cheek, I do serious research . Seriously, this is including their entire careers.

Mad for Chelsea wrote:having done a (very quick so possibly not entirely accurate) piece of research into this: Borg has the best win-loss ration (open era), with a decent lead. Then comes the group of McEnroe, Lendl, Connors and Federer, not sure of the order of this one but they're all very close.

I know of a player who has a better W/L record than ALL the players you have mentioned above.
He's Spanish.

Henman won 65%
Rusedski won 61%

The trophy biting, cheating, miserable capybara has roughly 82%.

Red wrote:

Mad for Chelsea wrote:having done a (very quick so possibly not entirely accurate) piece of research into this: Borg has the best win-loss ration (open era), with a decent lead. Then comes the group of McEnroe, Lendl, Connors and Federer, not sure of the order of this one but they're all very close.

I know of a player who has a better W/L record than ALL the players you have mentioned above.
He's Spanish.

you're right, actually. Didn't look at Nadal (for some reason, more fool me), and his W-L record is right up there with Borg's. So in W-L terms:

Borg, Nadal
Federer, Lendl, Connors, McEnroe
the rest

In 98, his first year on tour, Federer played Agassi in his 6th match. Agassi was 8 in the world. In Jan 99 he played Moya who was 5 in the world in about his 12th match...and beat him. All this in 6 months.
Making your way up the tennis rankings is the polar opposite of boxing where you get spoon fed the early opponents, getting established on tour might be almost the hardest thing any pro has to do.

Mad for Chelsea wrote:

Red wrote:

Mad for Chelsea wrote:having done a (very quick so possibly not entirely accurate) piece of research into this: Borg has the best win-loss ration (open era), with a decent lead. Then comes the group of McEnroe, Lendl, Connors and Federer, not sure of the order of this one but they're all very close.

I know of a player who has a better W/L record than ALL the players you have mentioned above.
He's Spanish.

you're right, actually. Didn't look at Nadal (for some reason, more fool me), and his W-L record is right up there with Borg's. So in W-L terms:

Borg, Nadal
Federer, Lendl, Connors, McEnroe
the rest

Nadal is above Borg

super_realist wrote:Henman won 65%
Rusedski won 61%

The trophy biting, cheating, miserable capybara has roughly 82%.

This can't be right! Have you excluded anything not played on grass, Timmy was only really at his best on them to be honest so can only fairly be judged on that. Playing anyone on any other surface was a bad match up my view so needs to be ignored.

sirbenson wrote:He wouldn't even get into top 50 in Win-Loss ratio if you were to look into it, I would guess, ....He won 11 titles and One Masters Series event.

He must be top 10 in some measure. Top 10 in his own family? Or top 10 at Wimbledon up to but excluding semi-finals. Come on Tim!

VTR wrote:

super_realist wrote:Henman won 65%
Rusedski won 61%

The trophy biting, cheating, miserable capybara has roughly 82%.

This can't be right! Have you excluded anything not played on grass, Timmy was only really at his best on them to be honest so can only fairly be judged on that. Playing anyone on any other surface was a bad match up my view so needs to be ignored.

Henman never won a grass court tournament, 10 wins on hard courts and one on carpet.

Federer all the way. I don't equate any of Ali's fame from outside the ring with any importance here and I can't see how anyone else can either. Brilliant though he undoubtedly was, I don't have him outpointing the Fed or even being that close to doing so.

I think VTR is trying very badly to be funny.

Hence the with every attempt.

legendkillarV2 wrote: Hence the with every attempt.

Not really. I've had a wind-up specialist on here researching Tim Henman's Win-Loss ratio. Amazing how those who spend all their days on here winding people up took about 5 obviously tongue in cheek posts to realise I wasn't being serious.

Diggers wrote:In 98, his first year on tour, Federer played Agassi in his 6th match. Agassi was 8 in the world. In Jan 99 he played Moya who was 5 in the world in about his 12th match...and beat him. All this in 6 months.
Making your way up the tennis rankings is the polar opposite of boxing where you get spoon fed the early opponents, getting established on tour might be almost the hardest thing any pro has to do.

And then when you get good enough you get seeded, and you play the no-hopers in the first few rounds every week. Swings and roundabouts.

Lots of stats today diggers, a quiet day of desk research or is all that time on the tennis board paying dividends?

VTR wrote:

legendkillarV2 wrote: Hence the with every attempt.

Not really. I've had a wind-up specialist on here researching Tim Henman's Win-Loss ratio. Amazing how those who spend all their days on here winding people up took about 5 obviously tongue in cheek posts to realise I wasn't being serious.

I was actually interested in how Tim ranked.

Voted for Federer. Funny how Ali's going to win it and he's not even the best at his sport!

Where's Hans when you need him!!!

milkyboy wrote:

Diggers wrote:In 98, his first year on tour, Federer played Agassi in his 6th match. Agassi was 8 in the world. In Jan 99 he played Moya who was 5 in the world in about his 12th match...and beat him. All this in 6 months.
Making your way up the tennis rankings is the polar opposite of boxing where you get spoon fed the early opponents, getting established on tour might be almost the hardest thing any pro has to do.

And then when you get good enough you get seeded, and you play the no-hopers in the first few rounds every week. Swings and roundabouts.

Lots of stats today diggers, a quiet day of desk research or is all that time on the tennis board paying dividends?

Well as a boxing champion you do get to cherry pick who you fight most of the time usually with home advantage, so as you say about them swings and roundabouts.
To be honest I dont think Id have either in my top 5 for very different reasons.

Duty281 wrote:Voted for Federer. Funny how Ali's going to win it and he's not even the best at his sport!

That's subjective though. I think he is a valid choice as the greatest ever boxer. A lot of people would put him top and can make a fair argument as to why.

Equally, Federer is not definitely the best Tennis player ever. He can validly be chosen as the greatest by someone, but there are several other players that are valid choices.

Most boxing expert rate Ali in the top 10, but not top three, from what I have seen. Of course being a heavyweight brings a little more glamour, like a 100 metre runner compared to a middle distance one.

All this rubbish about Federer being some sort of faint-heart who can only win against inferior opponents - he's got a big streak of yard-dog running through him which was totally demonstrated at Indian Wells yesterday when playing hampered by a back strain. Of course, those of you who actually follow the game of kings would then say that he was playing Swiss No. 2 Stan Wawrinka who has a deplorable record against him and is not famed for mental or physical tenacity. Roger had to dig very deep to beat Stan, struggling not only with his opponent but his own body, certainly a case of 'winning ugly'. There are numerous other instances of this, but I have neither the time nor the inclination (and I'm sure you don't) to wade through them here. Even Andy Roddick paid tribute to the way Roger dug deep in their renowned 2009 Wimby final... No it's Federer for me and hope he wins ...and he's got nicer hair than Ali..... (couldn't resist that, sorry my debating skills need a lot of work).

Did somebody call for hans?

Diggers wrote:

milkyboy wrote:

Diggers wrote:In 98, his first year on tour, Federer played Agassi in his 6th match. Agassi was 8 in the world. In Jan 99 he played Moya who was 5 in the world in about his 12th match...and beat him. All this in 6 months.
Making your way up the tennis rankings is the polar opposite of boxing where you get spoon fed the early opponents, getting established on tour might be almost the hardest thing any pro has to do.

And then when you get good enough you get seeded, and you play the no-hopers in the first few rounds every week. Swings and roundabouts.

Lots of stats today diggers, a quiet day of desk research or is all that time on the tennis board paying dividends?

Well as a boxing champion you do get to cherry pick who you fight most of the time usually with home advantage, so as you say about them swings and roundabouts.
To be honest I dont think Id have either in my top 5 for very different reasons.

It's an impossible task really, don't think the winner's important, its the process and the debate. Some of which has been good. going round in circles now though. Same old soundbites from round 1. Think I'll draw a line under this one.

Think after all the debate Im down to a draw for Bolt and Phelps. Gavin Hastings a close third.

Stella wrote:Did somebody call for hans?

Indeed. He's a slippery one, I'll grant him that

Would be interesting to know at the end of this how many of us actually consider Ali the greatest sportsman of all time.

Not a criticism as the draw has been random and despite our earlier issues carried out fairly I believe, but would still be interesting.

I'd say that most people profess to dislike the cult of personality that pervades society in the UK, and yet its personality that's going to triumph most likely here.
I think an interesting poll would be one on the boxing board to see how many thought Ali should be put forward if only two candidates from their sport were allowed.

As a boxing regular Diggers my position on that is going to sound a little odd in that I do not have Ali in my top two but I would have put him forward in this process if we were only having two. Do think such a poll should be decided predominantly on sporting achievements and merit but there are some people who have just a force of personality and impact outside their sport that these things cannot be disregarded and Ali is perhaps the biggest such person.

Should perhaps clarify though that when I say Ali is not in my top two that is not to say he is a mile outside. He is absolutely definitely third or fourth.

See I don't need people with boxing knowledge to tell me who's the best, I can make my own mind up. For me, Ali is the greatest boxer of all time, not only for his actual performances in the ring, but for what he did for the sport of boxing as well. When you talk about the great matches of all-time, he's in most of them.

Diggers wrote:I think an interesting poll would be one on the boxing board to see how many thought Ali should be put forward if only two candidates from their sport were allowed.

If the idea was to put forward two candidates with the most chance of winning a GOAT competition, Ali would surely top the list.

It's the cult of celebrity that is disliked, specifically celebrities with little or no personality or talent. Personality is liked.

one thing i've learned from this process is that none of these sportsmen and women are perfect for the role of goat!

i'm disappointed ali has made it this far, let alone looking like scraping a win. federer is a modern great, competing in one of the most competitive environments and he deserves to be high up the pecking order, certainly a lot higher than ali [...nothing written here so far has justified his place in todays final] in my opinion.

but i can't resolve who i would have as my goat.

having read a lot of the comments over the last few weeks, i'm veering slightly toward gretzky if anyone, even though i think i've only seen him perform once or twice...

certainly have learnt a lot about a lot of terrific sportsmen and a few women...

cheers to MttC for making this happen

JuliusHMarx wrote:It's the cult of celebrity that is disliked, specifically celebrities with little or no personality or talent. Personality is liked.

Which is what differentiates Ali from someone like Beckham - that and a huge amount of talent.

I've seen plenty of people argue for Ali as the greatest fighter of all time. Whilst I personally disagree - he comfortably makes my top 5. But for outside influences preventing him fighting in his peak years - he may well have been the greatest!

Aye would like to echo that comment Barragan, would also add big thanks and congratulations to the people who have taken the trouble to do write ups for contenders which have on the whole been excellent, particularly those brave enough to do either multiple ones or for guys outside their favoured sports, a herculean effort all round.

We can quibble over some of the results or placings but I for one have found the process informative and interesting and as far as I am concerned you can’t ask for more than that.

Hang on now, the Fed express has made a comeback!

Ali competed in the most competitive era for heavyweights. Comparisons can be drawn with Federer as both were arguably past their best when facing their toughest competition. Difference was that Ali was last man standing against his toughest opponents.

I read a lot of comments saying Ali wasn’t the best at his sport, and its true he isn’t considered the most talented fighter ever nor the one who achieved the most in the ring. However boxing is strange like that because the fact is he would beat the guys ranked above him generally and he would probably start as favourite against any other fighter to ever lace on a pair of gloves. I cant think of a single fighter that I think the bookies would favour of him when he was at his best although that’s not to say there weren’t fighters capable of beating him.

One of the rather uncomfortable realities in boxing is that a bigger but much less skill practitioner can beat a smaller far more skilled practitioner for reasons of almost pure size alone. As a result weight classes were introduced which made the sport better but tended, in my opinion, to result in the heavyweights getting a kind of raw compensation deal in comparison to the smaller fighters who were protected from them.

In its original and purest concept the champion –i.e the best – was the man who could beat everyone else and the only way to topple him was to beat him.

When people say Srgar Ray Robinson was the best of all time it comes with the unspoken caveat that he was the best in relation to his size. He wouldn’t beat Ali though and Ali is hamstrung by this fact. What more can he do really? He beat all the top heavyweights in the toughest era of heavyweights by a stretch. The reason why the heavyweight title has held that bit more glamour historically is because the heavyweight champion is the actual best in terms of who can beat who and disregarding weight classes.

I don’t have any issue with Robinson being rated the best of all time in boxing – he is well worth the tag. But I think it puts someone in Ali’s position in a kind of impossible position. The flip side then is you have some very average heavyweights capable of beating some outstanding smaller boxers but it would be almost unthinkable to consider them better.

Duty281 wrote:Hang on now, the Fed express has made a comeback!

... Well he had to do it once in his career

Remind me, spaghetti was from the tennis board?

ShahenshahG wrote:

milkyboy wrote:You know enough about boxing, to know that that judgement call is fairly universally held by people who know their boxing digs. But have it your own way,we'll shelve the concept of federer being past his best too, and look at those records against his peers a bit more closely. Looks like a flat track bully to me, who cleaned up in a weak era.

Harsh but some truth to that Federer doesn't like being made to work hence his record against Nadal, whereas Ali's best work has been when his back was against the wall.

So from 1998-2013 (so far), Federer achievements are considered from Wee Keira, yet Nadal from 2001-2013 is considered a 'strong' era player. There are daily era debates in the Tennis section. I am certain posters who feel similarly can add their voices to such a debate.

Era comparisons are fraught with issues, because there is no universal yardstick, and there will never be. Can Pele be compared to Messi purely based on goal counts, or Bradman to Tendulkar, purely based on averages, or Borg to Federer purely based on slam count, or h2h.

Every sport is a constantly evolving, living, breathing organism, and does not stand still long enough to be part of a static cameo, like a Monet or a Degas, or a Bach or Mozart. Because of such dynamic nature of sport, the definition of an era itself is ambiguous. Is an era defined by a player's dominance, or the other way around?

Voted for Federer and now a tie at 35/35.

Duty281 wrote:Hang on now, the Fed express has made a comeback!

Very suspicious. Looking at the voting throughout the day, Ali keeps pulling ahead by 5-10 votes then is pegged back each time. And then we have new posters like FiveSetsAll or whatever he's called commenting on the competition on the final day.

Wow.

35 a piece!!!