2022 Tennis Season

[jon]

Well, it's been an absolute snooze fest of a season thus far. But it's finally heating up. It's Djokovic against Nadal at 2:45 surprisingly in the Quarterfinals. I'm not sure why Nadal is the 5 seed considering he won the Australian Open. Nonetheless this probably is a de facto final anyways. Djoker has been absolutely annihilating people this tournament. Again hoping he pulls through. But not confident in the least. Paying absolutely no attention to the women's side.

[VideoGameCritic]

I was avoiding this thread last night because I wanted to watch Nadal/Djokovic. I was up till 12:45 in the morning and they still had a LONG way to go!

I hear Nadal won and I'm glad. News of his demise are greatly exaggerated. He was looking like a man in his prime, and it wasn't like Djokovic wasn't trying!

The next match against Zverev should be a gem.

[jon]

Well, Zverev just had a gruesome foot injury. It might be an ankle. It was so bad that for a while TV didn't want to show it. I personally wasn't watching the match. After I saw Nadal was up a set I was waiting for Zverev to hopefully win the 2nd set and then I was going to watch the rest. The 2nd set was I believe in a tiebreaker. I've never been the biggest Zverev fan but was definitely hoping he beat Nadal as I want Djokovic to catch up major wise. Zverev had a real chance in my opinion if he pulled out the 2nd set, although he's been known to be as big if not bigger choker than Federer. He almost had to try to lose the U.S. Open a couple years ago against Thiem. And what in the world happened to Thiem not to be too of topic. No one knows how serious this injury is but there's a photo of it and it doesn't look good. I'm sure the injury will be on youtube soon. Apparently he got helped off on a wheelchair. Although he was on crutches and came back on the court even though he retired. Now it's Nadal as a huge favorite to win again.

[VideoGameCritic]

Kind of hard to watch the French Open. I have the Tennis channel which rebroadcasts all the best matches, but I have to remember to avoid the news all day!

Huge news about Zverev. I guess he'll be gone for the year, giving the big three a better chance to add to their grand slam victory totals. I will be rooting for Nadal.

[goldenband]

Hey, does this mean we'll be getting *coughArcadiaGrandSlamTenniscough* more tennis game reviews soon?

As a longtime Federer fan, I've come to the conclusion that Nadal is probably the GOAT, and do so with no regrets. The guy isn't just a physical beast, but is ridiculously smart about his tactics -- his intelligence is so underestimated. I hope he wins #22 (though Ruud is not to be underestimated) and would love to see him win more beyond that.

[jon]

This whole discussion about the Goat, and I have my thoughts on other sports as well, and they differ too. But some players peak at certain times I believe Federer around mid 2006 to very early 2007 was better than Djokovic and Nadal ever were (with the obvious exception of clay). Federer was not some superhuman freak, and like most players in the past peaked around 24 years old, which is what you'd expect.

The only time Federer was truly in his prime and played Nadal in a non clay major was the 2006 Wimbledon. And let me tell you, he destroyed Nadal. Nadal was lucky to win 1 set, the 3rd set, in a tiebreak. Federer had won every set that 2006 Wimbledon tournament and was up 2 sets to 0 on Nadal. He bageled Nadal in the first set.

Federer's decline from his absolute prime came shortly after he won the 2007 Australian Open without losing a set. He had a 50+ match winning streak. But then he started losing to guys like Guillermo Canas twice. By 2007 Wimbledon Federer wasn't nearly as dominant and I was shocked when Nadal took him to 5 sets.

Djokovic in the 2007 U.S. Open final had like a million set points in each of the first 2 sets but choked and Federer won in straights. But still, that was another sign he was past his peak.

You can make and argument that Djokovic was too young in their 3 previous meetings. But in the 2006 Davis Cup and 2007 Australian Open Federer absolutely demolished Djoker. You can't really say he was too young in the 2007 Australian Open because he made the U.S. Open final later that year and was ranked 3rd by that point.

Basically, the Federer that annihilated Nadal at the 2006 Wimbledon and Djokovic at the 2006 Davis Cup and 2007 Australian Open would've probably beaten Nadal or Djokovic in their absolute prime, whenever it was.

But Goldenband, I remember you mentioning a bunch of tennis games a while back. There was one Japanese only PS1 game that looked really cool

[jon]

Something told me today’s match wasn’t must see tv .

One thing I find fascinating and I know I’ve mentioned before is just when the courts slowed down and who it benefitted. Everyone knows that at some point around 2003-2008 the courts got a lot slower. And there’s a big debate about who it benefitted. Probably the most people think that it helped especially Nadal win Wimbledon and Djokovic too. It’s probably a general consensus that Federer is the better fast court player by far.

I personally think around early 2004 perhaps very late 2003 they changed the ball too a heavier bigger one that made the game a lot slower. This coincided exactly with the rise of Federer. By then people were wondering when Federer would win and he was having rather disappointing results compared to his expectations even though he was young in his defense.

What I wonder is what would’ve happened if they didn’t change the ball. Also Wimbledon and the U.S open changed their surface to a slower surface. The Australian Open made it slower in 2008 which is right when Djokovic starting dominating. If you watch the 2007 Australian Open matchup between Federer and Djokovic it played much faster than 2008.

No one knows exactly when Wimbledon slowed down but it started affecting play a lot by around 2001-2003. I do think if they didn’t slow the game down Federer would’ve still won a lot of majors.

But it would’ve been really interesting to see how Nadal and Djokovic would’ve fared if they hadn’t slowed the game down. I do think Nadal would’ve still won a million French Opens. I think it was fine to slow it down but they slowed it down too much.

[DrLitch]

I see Nadal/Djokovic adapting to faster courts. For example Agassi was a baseliner that coexisted in both eras and competed for titles with the likes of Sampras and Becker on the fast courts. He won a few titles although fair to say when the courts slowed down, coupled with a lifestyle change, he had a late surge and picked up a couple of slams. He gave Nadal and Federer some decent matches although it was obvious both were superior players. One may argue Agassi was past his prime by then.

I cannot see Nadal or Djokovic not being able to adapt. They would still pick up slams on all surfaces although whether they would dominate as much over Federer is debatable. I do suspect faster courts heavily favor Federer's attacking game and I do not always enjoy Nadal's or Djokovic's typical slugfest with playing percentages and not taking many risks (although I am a fan of Nadal). People say Sampras and Becker were boring but I would take their brand of tennis any day - check this out, absolutely unbelievable play on fast carpet, even Federer would struggle out there with those guys hitting those shots.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7x7q4PSflU

[jon]

It’s extremely hard to gauge how great Federer would’ve been if the courts didn’t get slowed down in 2004 (there’s the possibility that Wimbledon was slowed down prior to 2004). That’s because it’s hard to make assumptions based on some mixed results and in my opinion bad coaching.

The first thing I noticed is that whoever Federer’s coach was had been making terrible errors of judgment because he had Federer playing S&V predominantly before the 2004 slowing down of the courts. Even in 2001-2003 between the racquet technology and the possibility of slightly slower court conditions compared to the 90’s you had to be one of the best S&V players of all time to have been successful by 2001-2003. We’re talking Rafter, Sampras, guys like that, the best of all time with that. And Federer was trying to S&V on already slightly tougher conditions. If you look at a lot of his losses during the disappointing 2002 and pre Wimbledon 2003, he’s trying to S&V and is just getting crushed because it was nearly impossible to employ that tactic even in the early 2000’s before 2004. He was trying to S&V even at the Australian open in 2002-2003 which was suicide and even the 2003 U.S. Open. Federer was a good S&V player but he didn’t have the best follow up volley and again on these already slightly slowed down courts literally only the best S&V players ever were succeeding. Sampras was having trouble at the U.S. Open against Safin and Hewitt until finally finishing with a win against Agassi.

But like you alluded to Dr. Litch, there’s a real question about Federer’s ability on the fastest carpet. Even as late as 2003 he was getting demolished by the likes of Henman. One loss that really makes me question how great Federer could’ve been on fast courts was him losing in straight sets in the 4th round of the 2002 U.S. Open to Max Myrni, who was a serve and volleyer as well. There’s no tv footage but I’m assuming the court was too fast for him.

But it’s as I alluded to really hard to tell. Because he also in my opinion choked in a lot of early matches. Everyone talks about blowing the Championship points on his serve to Djokovic at Wimbledon, and there was also the 2010-2011 U.S. Open where he blew 2 match points each against Djokovic in the semis.

But it goes even further back. After Federer’s huge win against Sampras at the 2001 Wimbledon he faced Henman in the QF’s. He lost in 4 but a couple sets it looked like he choked on some crucial points. People were expecting Federer to win a major or two in 2002. It ended up being a big disappointment but if you look at what happened, there’s signs that he choked even before Djokovic. In the 2002 Australian Open (Agassi didn’t play) it was a really weak QF’s except Safin, who somehow blew the final against Tomas Johansson. Rumor was Safin partied too hard the night before. But in the 4th round Federer played Haas, and by then it should’ve been a victory. But Federer netted a ground stroke on a neutral rally on match point and eventually lost to Haas. If he hadn’t choked he would’ve had a really easy draw and a chance to maybe face Safin in the semis.

Then a couple months later Federer made his first big final in Miami. He beat world #1 Hewitt in straights in the semis which was probably his biggest win besides Sampras at that point. And even though Federer lost the final in 4 sets to Agassi it really looked like he was choking a lot in that 4th set and had a real chance to maybe have a crack at the 4th set and maybe push Agassi to a 5th set. Then in Miami in 2003 he blew a match point in the QF’s in another easy draw. So it’s really hard to tell how Federer would’ve fared had the courts not been slowed down. That’s because he shouldn’t have been serve and volleying in 2000-2003 besides literally Wimbledon and carpet. I mean he was serve and volleying in hard court majors in 2002 and 2003 which was suicide.

[DrLitch]

In terms of talent Safin could have been in the mix with Nadal/Fed/Djoko/Murray. Remember the SF AO 05 against Federer? If that is not an all time great tennis match I do not know what is. He had an injury hit career, like Hewitt, another underrated player that also played a classic against Nadal in the AO 05. Safin really was temperamental. AO 05 was really a damn good tournament. I wanted Hewitt to win but Safin was a man possessed.

One of Federer's idols was Sampras although starting out as serve volley is bizarre because there were far better players at it - even Henman could beat Fed at that game. Sampras is a serve volley player but he started out as an attacking baseliner and as he got older he adapted his game somewhat to shorten points. Lots of matches Sampras had against Agassi and Courier featured stunning rallies and shot making from the back. Federer chipping and charging like Sampras in his early career is odd. Sampras could get away with it later in his career because his serve was probably the greatest of all time.

Federer is best on fast hard courts and grass. Federer's winning percentages against his closest rivals show he leads H2H on faster indoor hard courts and loses H2H gibs on slower courts. Djokovic has a winning H2H against Fed on grass which is a stat that could be well down to Fed's mental toughness. It sounds odd to question the mental toughness of a player that won 20 slams, one that somehow toughed it out against a Roddick that played his 1 in 100 match in that one Wimbledon final. But I do believe he suffered to some degree, a mental block against Nadal and Djokovic later in his career. Around 08/09 he was starting to lose to these guys in close matches even when ahead. I personally believe it is down to fitness/stamina/physicality. Nadal and Djokovic always seem to win those 5 hour plus slug fests. At his best on an indoor hard court or a more classic grass court, Federer and Sampras are probably the GOATs. Clay, obviously Nadal. Outdoor hard courts, perhaps Djokovic is the GOAT. Overall best tennis player.... no such thing.... if I had to choose I would give it to Rod Laver. He won 4 slams in a row same year twice.

The modern baseline slugfest is starting to get boring. I want 90's attacking tennis back.