Jack of all trades or master of one (or a few)

The various discussions on Federer and Nadal have got me wondering - is it better to try to develop an all-round game where you are good enough at all the skills, or is it more successful to focus on specific areas and get those to an exceptionally high standard?

Obviously, Federer would be an example of someone in the first group, and Nadal more into the second (noting that over the last few years he has expanded the repetoire beyond the enormous top spin forehand that was his one key shot as a young player). Murray would be another who looks to do everything whereas Djokovic perhaps has a more 'play to his strengths' gameplan.

I guess there are advantages and disadvantages to both approaches. A more all round game increases the options so if plan A isn't working, then paln B, C and D are available. By comparison a player with fewer choices may be so much better at doing the things he's good at that plan A is more likely to work in the first place. Of course it is possible to take the specialisation to extremes and become Ivo Karlovic - a serving monster but with relatively little else in his game.

Also, it seems that the all-rounders tend to reach their peak in the game a bit later - partly because it takes longer to master the skills, but probably more because with more options to call on for each ball, the tactical side of the game is more difficult to work out.

Interested if anyone has any thoughts on this, and also on how they view past greats against this (admittedly slightly false) distinction.

Excellent post dummy half, I was about to go to bed as it is late out here, but I think in the modern game you have to pay a great all around player to succeed. The coaching the fitness, the level of competition is such that if you do have weakness even if it is a relative weakness players on tour today are going to find a way to exploit it. Still as in most things in life, there is a duality, if you don't have big weapons that set you apart from the rest of the guys on tour you are still not going to win. Look at Nadal, great forehand, great returns, and incredible speed. Murray and Djoko are two of the best returners and have two of the best backands in the game. So I hope it isn't a cop out, but to a certain extent in the modern game you need to be solid all around and still have weapons that set you apart. Even Federer, has a great all around game with variety. People talk about his backhand but he only has problems against heavy spin shots really on a clay court against guys like Nadal, and how many players can press his backhand till the point it breaks down?

Interesting question D_H.
I agree with socal, you have to be a rounded player to succeed on tour now. In the 80s and 90s you might get half-decent players who had relatively appalling forehands or backhands (e.g. Edberg FH wasnt great, Rusedski topspin BH) and they wouldnt get away with those now. Nadal's FH used to make the rest of his game look average but thats relative, he's always been able to compete at high levels, after all he beat Federer on a HC at 17yo so couldnt have had that many weaknesses.

Perhaps another question is whether players should adopt a multi-tactical approach or stick to more repeated patterns of play. People might point to the flowing all court game of Federer or the attack to the backhand side of Fed by Nadal. I'm not sure again....sometimes players can have too many shots and Murray was guilty of this during his early days (and Henman for much of his career) and not pick the right one at the right time. Conversely, Nadal tends to use that strategy more against Fed and will vary it up more against other players who are stronger on the BH side.

Perhaps it depends on the player - some seem to be able to make 'limited' approaches work well, others not. Maybe it actually comes down to the mental strength in applying either approach?

Andy Roddick is a perfect example of how you have to be relatively strong in all areas of the game to be successful. Yes Andy won a slam but the tour kind of figured out how to beat Andy and the game sort of passed him by in his early 20s. Andy was all serve and a good forehand. His backhand was subpar, a horrible volleyer, and not a particularly good mover. But to be the very very best you can't just be average or above average in everything. You got to have some weapons that set you apart from the middling talents on the ATP.

Thanks guys
After writing the initial post, I had a bit of a further thought about how the style of some players evolve over their careers, and how that fits (or not) with the above distinction.

Federer has probably regressed a bit over the years with regard to his volleying, and become a slightly more limited player (i.e. aggressive baseliner) compared with how he played against Sampras.

By contrast, Nadal has definitely improved, with now an effective serve (more about placement and spin than absolute power), his backhand has gone from good enough to being a very good shot and his volleying is effective (I don't think he's a great player of difficult volleys, but he is outstanding at choosing the time to go forward and put away a not too difficult chance).

Djokovic is another who started with a solid baseline game with a couple of weapons, but has worked towards improving other aspects (such as working on his volleying with Woodforde a couple of years ago).

Roddick is a good example of a limited player with a few weapons - his more recent successes have come from times when his form on the weak shots (backhand and volleying) have been at their most effective.

dummy half the guy who really exemplified the jack of all trades was hewitt. Outside of his speed and returning he really didn't have a weapon. Not an overwhelming serve, a good but not great volleyer, a good but not great forehand, a solid but not great backhand. I mean you can be a jack of all trades and not overwhelming in any particular area but I think overral the really great players who have staying power and who win most of the honors have to be good in all areas and great in some areas and have real weapons.

I think it was pretty difficult to be a JoaTrades up to the early 90's, those who did had a naturally diverse game that could adapt to most surfaces. But at that time it was also easy to concentrate on one surface and specialise in it.

Most slams had increasingly different surfaces, many changed from one kind to another and in the grass slams, Wimbledon and Australia had very dissimilar traits. But clay for many years was dominated by the S.Americans, until most clay surfaces became more uniform and events could vary the court conditions, using combinations on new ball design and granule size.

Today, to win a "Grand" slam, is much more difficult, although slam surfaces are becoming similar in speed, they are surprisingly different when it comes to the event opening. Much has been said about the homogenisation of surfaces, but on the day, weather, wind and air temps make a mockery of what the organisers plan on many occasions, and choice of ball design can add to that confusion.

This to me makes it very difficult for top players to adapt to what they expect conditions to be like and find many times that a court is "very" fast when they thought it was going to be a little faster than last year. Sometimes this suits certain players, most times it doesn't, but to be able to adapt your game quickly is a good sign of talent and skill.

For me Nadal has managed to "adapt" the best, to all surfaces and if he continues in this vein, then he will be as great as Federer and a multitude of slam winners from the past.

But for anyone trying emulate past heroes, they will have to be able to play on all surfaces with all the ambiguities that come with each slam event and they will have to train as JoaT's to realise their ambitions.

But maybe you have to start on one surface and then vary your game to suit the others, so which surface is best to begin on or does it really matter ?

Good post Jubba, Nadal has definetly been one of those players who you would think would be a specialist but who has managed to adapt his style to all different court surfaces. He still seems to have problems though on indoor surfaces. He did win one year in madrid when it was played on a real quick indoor court beating ljubi in the final whne ljubi was one of the best on tour. I don't know if I buy that the court conditions have been homogenized, wimbeldon is slower than it once was thank god because in the 90s it was a horribly dull tournament to watch. The US open has been very consistent since the late 70s and the Australian for about 15 years now has been played on a slower bouncier hardcourt. I think outside of wimby the grandslams have been pretty consistent. This year the french did seem quicker though because of the new balls.

I agree on the good post from Jubba.

Re: courts, clearly SW19 slowed down alot in the early 2000s which is well documented. AO has changed from Rebound Ace to Plexi which is quicker (Rebound was pretty slow and bouncy), at the French they are using less dressing than previous years and now they are using faster balls, and at the USO they are using more sand in the paint to grip the ball more...it feels like speed index homogenisation to me. I agree they are still different surfaces and weather can affect them differently (look at the dry weather on Queens which is usually lightening quick) but they are still nowhere near as diverse as they were in the 80s/90s when it was nigh on impossible to win all slams.

You might find this thread article interesting reading: http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=88100
This article also references this USA Today article: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/tennis/2006-07-16-surface-tension_x.htm?POE=SPOISVA

I think Pat Rafter is in with a good shout of being of being a jack of all trades.

Albeit he only won the US Open twice and appeared in the Wimbledon final twice. He was able to adjust his game to the situation and the player he was playing. Even though his game was prodominently serve and volley, he was able to exchange from the baseline if need be.

I dont really agree LK, Rafter was one of the best volleyers of the open era and a very aggressive player. I agree he could adapt his playing style (he beat Muster at the FO!) but I wouldnt reconcile that with being a jack of all trades (i,e, master of none).

Maybe Jack of all Trades will have to change to Master of All Surfaces.

But that would take some super human effort to achieve.

Agassi came close but only won once in France and in England, Nadal only winning once in Australia and the USA, but at least he has a few more years to go.
Federer as we all know has only won once in France, but at least four or more in all the other slams.

So at the moment, I think its Roger who is the Jack/Master of all Trades, but I still think the term GOAT (not that its being discussed here) is a fallacy and restricted to ones opinion, because records are always broken, era's have always been hampered by technology and players fitness levels mirror the need to dominate the sport at any given time based on sociological backgrounds throughout history.

And I think I can agree to a point about Rafter, he was a difficult player to beat on all surfaces. SF's at the AO and FO, finalist at SW19 twice and winner at the USO twice. Won two masters, finalist at 4 of them and Sf at 3, so he had a good pedigree across all four surfaces, but came up against Sampras too many times and an invigorated Ivanisevic (5 sets of pure great tennis too) at Wimbledon to deny him a possible two more slams. But he did admit to nerves a few times which might explain his bad record in his home country. Never could understand how he never got to a final there.

Yeah loved that final Jubba (notwithstanding Henman's bad luck in the semi). Pure theatre, and felt so happy for Goran...that win must have been one of the most popular ever because you knew it was his last roll of the dice and so wanted that title after all the savaging's at the hands of Sampras. Agree, Rafter should have done well at AO given his pedigree at USO, I guess back then it was Rebound Ace which was maybe a little too slow and bouncy for his fast court game.
The most impressive victory he had was S&V'ing Muster off the park at French Open when Muster was a favourite. It was an amazing match an Muster got thoroughly wound up the more he was losing. It was a needle match too - Muster kept aggressively marking Rafter's shots out with his racquet in the clay the more frustrated he was getting.

So Rafter served an ace, ran and jumped over the net and drew a big circle around the ace right in front of a bemused Muster who had stepped back a little thinking Rafter was coming over to lamp him...!!!

Oh, I wish I'd seen that, wonder if its on Utube ? :run2:

Cant find it Jubba...but found this newspaper report of the incident:

With Rafter serving at 2-3, Muster yelled at Loconto about a called ace. When Rafter finally won the game, he leaped over the net and used his racquet like a pen to mark the spot where the winning shot had landed.

As Rafter walked away, Muster appeared to spit at him. "I don't know if I was spitting," Muster said later.

Three games later he rubbed two tennis balls in the clay before throwing them to Rafter as the Australian was about to serve.

"I just made them slower," he said in defense of his actions.

Rafter, 21, who reached the third round of Wimbledon last year and the third round of the Australian Open last January, said he enjoyed the show.

But it was Rafter who was warned by Loconto after the Australian leaped over the net in the second set.

"He told me to settle down a little bit," Rafter said. "I told him I wasn't too over-impressed about (Muster's) little drawing of markings."

Despite all the niggling, Rafter and Muster played a hard-hitting match that turned on the Australian's tough serving.

Each time Muster tried to take control of the tempo, Rafter, who faces Bruguera next, came back with a big serve or a big volley.

Tennis had some characters in those days, God, can you imagine what 606 would have been like back then....

Still, Rafter good enough to upset the then "King of Clay".

Yep, Rafter was such a good S&V player than he bamboozled Muster....shows the talent a 21 yr old Rafter had...should have won more than his 2 slams.