Who’s the greatest male tennis player of all time?

Narratives are a sport’s lifeblood. They form a fan’s connect with the sport, present a hook for his or her obsessions, maintain the deep emotional funding and create house to set out stakes effectively forward of time. If Lionel Messi can lead Argentina to World Cup glory in Qatar this December, he will likely be a larger footballer than the late Diego Maradona.

However narratives are additionally fickle, self-serving and sometimes pre-ordained. They’re neither goal nor absolutely quantifiable and don’t present room for luck, probability and danger. They’re extra a supporter’s flight of fancy to beat sporting uncertainty. If Gonzalo Higuain had buried the gilt-edged probability within the 2014 World Cup ultimate in opposition to Germany, Messi would already be a larger footballer than Maradona.

Federer, Nadal, Djokovic

In tennis, the pet narrative of this technology’s followers is to christen one amongst Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic as the best male singles participant of all-time. In spite of everything, that is an period not like another in males’s tennis historical past. Ranging from the 2005 French Open, the trio has dominated to nook 57 of the 67 Grand Slam tournaments, giving credence to the argument that the best needs to be one amongst them.

They occupy the highest three positions for many Grand Slam match-wins, with every of them recording over 300 victories, and they’re additionally within the top-five for many ATP tour titles gained. Therefore, the need is to construct a historic time machine, evaluate statistics among the many three and likewise with yesteryear champions like Rod Laver, Bjorn Borg and Pete Sampras and separate the best from the good.

It has simmered ever since Nadal equalled Federer’s then file of 20 Majors by profitable the 2020 French Open, practically bubbled over when Djokovic got here inside a match of profitable his twenty first Grand Slam title in New York final 12 months and exploded in Australia earlier this season when Nadal claimed his twenty first. With three extra Slams (together with the continuing French Open) nonetheless in play in 2022, and the trio nonetheless lively, the discuss is unlikely to die anytime quickly.

Comparisons throughout time

However comparisons throughout the modern and between the modern and the historic include their personal pitfalls. Information are for positive indicative, however shorn of context and perspective, they’re typically deceptive. For one, there isn’t a good subject for comparability. If Grand Slam titles gained is the lone measure of greatness, how does one sq. with the truth that the good Pancho Gonzales was denied the chance to even compete in them (from 1950 to 1967) as a result of he had turned skilled in what was an novice sport till the Open Period started  in 1968?

Jimmy Connors, an eight-time Slam winner and former World No.1, didn’t take part at Roland-Garros from 1974 to 1978 – his peak years – after he was banned from the 1974 version due to his affiliation with the World Group Tennis, knowledgeable league began by Billie Jean King. That 12 months, Connors gained the opposite three Slams. Fellow prime gamers additionally routinely skipped the Australian Open, which was held on the finish of the 12 months till 1985 than within the coveted start-of-the-season slot it occupies as we speak.

There may be then the depth of the sector and the non-overlapping nature of gamers’ peaks. Laver, thought of by many to be the best, gained six of his 11 Majors as an novice at the same time as equally nice gamers in Ken Rosewall and Gonzales have been plying their commerce on the skilled circuit. Federer gained 12 of his 20 Majors earlier than the tip of 2007, a interval when Djokovic was but to totally arrive and Nadal was nearly discovering his toes outdoors of the Parisian crimson clay.

It’s plain that developments in string and racquet know-how have benefitted gamers of the trendy period over their counterparts from the Nineteen Sixties and ’70s who performed with picket racquets that had a a lot smaller candy spot. Higher diet, coaching and restoration methods have allowed as we speak’s stars to play longer. Nonetheless, how can one quantify Federer’s and Nadal’s resilience, consistency, big-match nerve and infinite urge for food for the sport throughout twenty years?

Borg, who gained all 11 of his Majors in a wonderful seven-year window from 1974 to 1981, nonetheless radiates triumph partly as a result of he retired on the slightest trace of a decline. However ought to it rank increased than Federer’s late-career brilliance and problem-solving skills that allowed him so as to add three extra Majors in 2017 and 2018 after going practically 5 years with no victory?

One other variable is the enjoying floor. Laver gained 9 of his 11 Majors on grass, whereas Federer, Nadal and Djokovic completed finalists or higher in any respect 4 Slams, throughout clay, grass and the acrylic, at the very least 5 instances every. Djokovic, in reality, is the one man to twice win all 4 Majors, all 9 ATP Masters 1000s and the year-ending ATP Finals. Nonetheless, a single floor dominating the tour like in Laver’s time results in larger variance and a carefully bunched subject.

It’s a truism that courts of as we speak are extra homogenous than ever earlier than, making them extra amenable to all-courters like Djokovic. The Wimbledon grass, for instance, was manner sooner within the Nineteen Sixties and ‘70s, thus imparting a halo to the back-to-back triumphs on the French Open (gradual clay) and Wimbledon of Laver (1962 and ’69) and Borg (1978, ’79, ’80) as in opposition to these of Nadal (2008 and 2010), Federer (2009) and Djokovic (2021).

Past the sector

Sporting champions are additionally of various hues, whose aura and significance lengthen far past the confines of the enjoying area. Arthur Ashe, a three-time Main champion and the one Black man to win the singles title at Australian Open, Wimbledon or the US Open, will simply trump the trio of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic for the eloquent activist he was for causes like civil rights, anti-apartheid actions and AIDS consciousness.

Going past tennis, the world might even see a larger sprinter than Usain Bolt however the Jamaican’s position in single-handedly rescuing a self-discipline ravaged by a number of doping scandals will stay undiminished. In soccer, the world could ceaselessly debate who amongst Pele, Maradona, Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo is the best, however it’s Dutch maestro Johan Cruyff’s concepts developed practically 5 many years in the past which might be nonetheless driving the game.

Identical sportsman, totally different instances?

The controversy to resolve the best sportsman can be self-limiting in that it not simply sees the previous via a blinkered lens however closes the door on potential greatness. Throughout a decade and a half, Federer, Nadal and Djokovic have advanced their techniques constantly to match up to one another and add layers of intrigue to their rivalry. Is it honest to imagine that no different set of gamers can replicate the identical?

“I really feel if I have been enjoying as we speak, I’d have tailored my type of play to as we speak’s wants,” badminton legend Prakash Padukone informed  Sportstar again in 2018. “The tendency for folks is to assume, ‘Would he have survived now?’ Usually, my view is that champions, in any sport in any period, succeeded as a result of they discovered what was good at the moment. It doesn’t imply that if I or anyone have been to play now, we’d play precisely the identical manner we performed within the Eighties or the Seventies.

“We’d have tailored to what was required and located a approach to win. It’s not simply me. It applies to any sport. I’d nonetheless have made use of my strengths. I’d in all probability have been a lot stronger bodily. I’d possibly have had a extra highly effective smash, moved sooner.

“I don’t understand how it could have advanced. However I’d have discovered a manner. In case you may do it at the moment, you are able to do it anytime.”

Why is it then that such a binary, slim and zero-sum train of discovering out who the best remains to be appeals? At its greatest, it permits us to revisit the previous and be taught from it. At its worst, within the intellectually flawed avatar, it affords an escape from the trimmings of the current. The ‘Best of All Time’ tag has an authoritative ring to it, however the parable and phantasm that blur actuality.

The courtroom is giant sufficient

However gamers’ legacies and their locations in pecking orders will not be at all times decided by the outcomes of huge moments. Nadal’s victory over Djokovic on Tuesday at Roland-Garros informed us nothing greater than what we already knew about his greatness. Nor would a record-extending 14th French Open and twenty second Grand Slam general. It is going to nonetheless match his followers’ narrative, of their want to see their hero endure for a bit greater than the remainder, militating in opposition to overwhelming proof that the world is vast sufficient to carry each sporting hero, of previous, current and the longer term.