The Tennis Thread

[Ryne Ween]

Per Isner he will just never be able to make a deep run of he can't figure out a way to win a few return points. Federer basically held his serve to love for the third set. This is a guy that couldn't break Mahut in 70 tries. I just don't think he has the talent to improve. he will have to be content winning a couple 250 events here in the states that nobody cares about.

[Guest]

Serena will have to settle for a second Serena Slam and not the Grand Slam. She won the first set also but couldn't close it out. Thought she was going to get it back at 4-3 (I think) down a break but 15-40.

 

I didn't watch it but judging by the scoreline and stats, Djokovic absolutely rolled Cilic. Djokovic had an 83-39 advantage in points won and only lost 13 of 56 service points. Cilic had only 11 winners but 37 errors.

[Ryne Ween]

Fed and Novak are clearly at the top of the sport. Novak is putting in a great season. Hopefully fed can roll him in the final.

[SpongeWorthy]

amazing 2nd set.

[Wilson A2000]

Fed just can't be Novak in a major at this point in his career. Novak is just better. To the fourth set...

[SpongeWorthy]

bummer. would've been amazing to see federer force a 5th set coming back from 2 breaks down.

 

it will be tough but novak has a pretty clear path to pass nadal and federer for majors

[Wilson A2000]

I already consider Novak better than Nadal career vs. career

[Ryne Ween]

Djokavichs ability to win the big points is amazing.

[SpongeWorthy]

I already consider Novak better than Nadal career vs. career

 

naw, not yet. nadal has more majors, career slam, better H2H record in slams (including slam finals) against djok. but what really keeps nadal ahead of him for me is nadal's quasi-dominance of federer when federer was still basically at his apex.

 

but it may just be a matter of time before djok passes them both.

[Ryne Ween]

I already consider Novak better than Nadal career vs. career

 

I don't agree. nadal has 4 more slams. A dozen or so more atp titles. He's got a big edge in the major head to head as well. Also a gold medal.

[Ryne Ween]

I already consider Novak better than Nadal career vs. career

 

naw, not yet. nadal has more majors, career slam, better H2H record in slams (including slam finals) against djok. but what really keeps nadal ahead of him for me is nadal's quasi-dominance of federer when federer was still basically at his apex.

 

but it may just be a matter of time before djok passes them both.

 

I have no idea who is going to step up and challenge him. The best bet is Nadal regaining form because there is nobody else. Wawrinka has shown that his style of play can bully Novak but you can't trust him to consistently factor into the slams. Del Potro is no more. Murray is like a worse version of Djoker and can't beat him.

 

There is nobody younger than Djokavich that seems like a great player. Dmitrov turned out to be a mirage. Nishikori can consistently win matches against inferior players. Roanic sucks.

 

Sadly our great hope is Nick Kyrios and there is no way he will mature mentally to the point where he could beat Novak over 5 sets.

[Wilson A2000]

I just think that Nadal is way too French Open heavy even though he has the career slam

[Ryne Ween]

Nadal has 5 non FO slams and Djoker has 5 outside of the AO. Can punish a guy for dominating The French.

 

Unless Nadal gets it together this won't be an argument for long as Djokavich will pass him within 3 years probably.

[Guest]

Way too many unforced errors from Roger, but he has to be aggressive against Novak to beat him. He can't just sit back and rally because Novak will out-hit him. So when he gets a few more of those to go in, he's able to win a set. And sometimes those will go in more often over two sets. But over 3/4/5 sets, they're not going to go in as often and that's why Novak comes out on top.

 

The fact that Roger is No. 2 in the world and making two major finals at 34 is amazing. Novak's better, but he's not that much better. Novak needed five sets to beat him at Wimbledon last year, and four sets in the last two majors. A few points go the other way and Roger could have won. It's not like he's getting through and Novak's rolling him 3-2-2 or something. Roger had 23! break points today. In the previous 6 matches, Djokovic's opponents had 22 break points combined. If he goes 7-23 instead of 4-23, he probably wins the match.

 

As for who is better, it still goes Federer-Nadal-Djokovic to me, and the gap between the first two is bigger than the gap between the second two. I don't fault Roger for his H2H against Nadal because it's not his fault he was sitting in the final of every major from 04-08 and Rafa couldn't make a hard court final until 09. Novak's got to get a French Open though unless he does something insane and wins 20 majors without winning a French. Nadal only won 3 majors in a year once and 2+ three times. Novak's now won 3 in a year twice but those are the only two times he's won 2+. Federer was 3 majors in a year 3 times and 2+ five times. Federer's still got the insane streaks that Novak won't catch - 10 straight finals and a second with 8 straight for 18 out of 19 (Novak's best is 4, twice, including currently) and 23 straight semis (Novak got to 14 and is at 7 now).

 

With the way he's playing now, I certainly wouldn't bet against Novak winning 16-18 majors. He's the same age as Federer was in 2009 when he won #14 and 15. The difference is Roger was going against Nadal in his prime plus an up and coming Djokovic (and Murray to a lesser extent). It will still be tough to get there. I'd be surprised if he doesn't equal Nadal. Federer will be a tougher order but he's good enough to do it and the rest of tennis doesn't appear to be good enough to consistently beat him.

[chuckywang]

Funny that Djokovic came closer to the GS than Serena. He got 3 majors and 1 final.

[Guest]

Saw the other day that Belgium is in the Davis Cup final, which I found odd because I couldn't name a single tennis player from Belgium. Their best guy is ranked No. 15, though he's never made a major QF and only made the 4th round twice, and the next best is No. 64.

[Ryne Ween]

Saw the other day that Belgium is in the Davis Cup final, which I found odd because I couldn't name a single tennis player from Belgium. Their best guy is ranked No. 15, though he's never made a major QF and only made the 4th round twice, and the next best is No. 64.

 

Been a very weak Davis cup year with the top players not participating. Belgium went to the fifth rubber vs an Argentina without del Porto or Juan Monaco.

 

GB is in the final on the strength of Murray winning 3 points in every tie.

 

They are playing the final in Belgium on clay. Maybe Belgium can steal the doubles and win the Davis cup.

[Guest]

So Great Britain won the Davis Cup for the first time in 79 years. Great Britain won 12 matches over the four rounds and Murray was involved in 11 of those wins. The only one he wasn't was the first round doubles match against the US, a match he didn't play. In his eight singles wins, he only dropped 2 of 26 sets. He's only the third player to go 8-0 in singles and only the fourth to go a combined 11-0 in singles and doubles.

[wvcbxl]

Congrats to Andy Murray on winning the Davis Cup :wink:

[Ryne Ween]

Pretty sure Murray didn't have to match up against a top 10 player for the whole DC year.

 

It was a terrible year for that event. Especially considering the semi was a terrible Argentina team, Brazil (obviously terrible) and Belgium. Out of that whole group only David Goffin is a consistent top 50 players (other than Murray).

 

Murray singlehandedly beating France was impressive because they have a good team, but other than that this years Davis cup was trash.