OT: Twenty Slams For Roger Federer!

[i'm_still_beta]

Let's be honest here, Clay ain't real tennis. It's basically a track meet. So yeah, no question about it. Rafa is the GOAT track & field player in Men's Tennis, by a lot.


But srsly, it's safe to say the Fed is done winning slams and Rafa has one more FO in him b4 he's done. This means that Novak has a couple years of farming les allowing him to build a safe lead before finally hanging it up. I just don't see how he stays below ~23 les.

Let's be honest here, it's bad take. One can argue that clay is, in fact, real tennis because of longer rallies that require point construction. Nadal abuses top spin and defense? Good. Because Sampras like many others, for example, abused serve and volley on grass and fast court in general and played significantly worse on clay and slow hard. He couldn't servebot his way to win on clay.

[i'm_still_beta]

13 are on clay (French Open), which is the surface that deviates the most from the norm IMO. So, I can't give him that.

RN definitely the best clay player of all-time.

To be fair it's not true. Hard courts have different type of speed (Cincinnati vs Miami masters for example). Grass unlike other surfaces (clay, hard) has unpredictable bounce and because of that you can make the argument that it's surface that deviates from others the most.

But I think clay and grass differ from hard equally. Sliding, movement, high bounce and slow speed on clay vs unpredictable slow bounce, fast speed on grass. And movement plays role on grass too. Watch how well prime Federer moved on grass and how some other players move much worse on grass than on hard.

[DAF86]

"Grass is for cows". That's the saying among many ATP players. But the "odd ball" surface is clay.

[i'm_still_beta]

"Clay is not real tennis narrative created by Nadal haters because of his dominance on that surface. He has always beaten fan and media darling Fed and then another goat candidate Novak Djokovic. Fans of latter 2 created this narrative.

Overall, all 3 surfaces (clay, hard and grass) are real tennis.

[DAF86]

"Clay is not real tennis narrative created by Nadal haters because of his dominance on that surface. He has always beaten fan and media darling Fed and then another goat candidate Novak Djokovic. Fans of latter 2 created this narrative.

Overall, all 3 surfaces (clay, hard and grass) are real tennis.

The worst part is I'm a huge Federer fan and, as consequence, a big Nadal hater. I'm realizing Fed might not win another slam so I'm at the point of starting to root for Djokovic just so that Nadal doesn't end up as the winningest slam player. But when the argument gets so ing dumb, one has to stand for objectivity and facts.

[Spurtacular]

"Clay is not real tennis narrative created by Nadal haters because of his dominance on that surface. He has always beaten fan and media darling Fed and then another goat candidate Novak Djokovic. Fans of latter 2 created this narrative.

Overall, all 3 surfaces (clay, hard and grass) are real tennis.

I don't say it's not real tennis. But I do say that it does drastically alter play and results. That has to be taken into account one way or another. Sliding all over the place on one surface and not the others is a very fundamental difference.

[lefty20]

Let's be honest here, it's bad take. One can argue that clay is, in fact, real tennis because of longer rallies that require point construction. Nadal abuses top spin and defense? Good. Because Sampras like many others, for example, abused serve and volley on grass and fast court in general and played significantly worse on clay and slow hard. He couldn't servebot his way to win on clay.

This is why neither is considered the GOAT. Fed has the le for now and Djoker will likely snatch it from him at some point.

[i'm_still_beta]

This is why neither is considered the GOAT. Fed has the le for now and Djoker will likely snatch it from him at some point.

I have the same opinion. Fed and Djoker 1a and 1b. Nadal and Sampras are 3 and 4 (2nd tier because of the their limitations on different types of courts)

Slight edge to Federer because of his versatility. Djoker's net game (Djokosmash) is much weaker than Fed's and today's tennis lacks fast courts. Fed plays noticeably better on fast courts than Novak

But tennis pundits have Fed and Nadal as 1a and 1b because of slam race. And Big Three themselves agree that it's all about slam race

[i'm_still_beta]

I don't say it's not real tennis. But I do say that it does drastically alter play and results. That has to be taken into account one way or another. Sliding all over the place on one surface and not the others is a very fundamental difference.

Agree to disagree on that one. All three surfaces are equally different imo

[Spurtacular]

Still standing is Djokovic, who has gone 38-5 in 2021 on his way to three straight Grand Slam les, and is knocking on the door of the first Calendar Year Slam since Rod Laver in 1969.

https://sports.yahoo.com/tennis-us-o...204322873.html