Why Nadal Is The Greatest Tennis Player Ever.
The majority of mainstream media has projected Federer to be the best ever tennis player. However, we must NOT judge greatness based only on the number of Grand Slams won. The 3 most important criteria are: Head to head record, Level playing field & Quality vs Quantity.
H2H record: Unlike team sports, tennis is a one-on-one game. So if you are suppose to be the "Greatest of All Time" then you MUST necessarily win more than 50% of your matches against your greatest rival -- you need to win when it matters most. To date, Nadal has won aprox. 70% of his matches against Federer. Furthermore, Nadal has won 80% of his matches against Federer during the all important grand slam events -- it includes winning 3 of 3 matches on the grand slam hard courts. Isn't hard court suppose to be Federer's preferred court ? So why was the "Greatest Player of All Time" NOT able to beat Nadal during the 2009 Australian Open even though Fed had one extra day's rest and Nadal having just completed a semi final on a record 5 hour match against Verdasco ? Going into that 2009 GS, Federer was heavily favored to win the match -- but it wasn't to be because it was against the true Greatest Player of All Time :-)
Level Playing Field: There is only one slow court grand slam and three fast court grand slams on grass and hard court. Historically, players good in hard court are also good in grass but not good in clay in part because both hard courts and grass courts are fast courts. Imagine if we have a level playing field for grand slams: two grass and two clay Grand Slams. You would see Fed with around 16 Grand Slams and Nadal with around 22 Grand Slams.
Quality vs Quantity: A 'Greatest Ever' player must NOT be defined by numerous wins againt historically insignificant players like Mark Philippoussis, Andy Roddick, Marat Safin, Marcos Baghdatis, Fernando González and Lleyton Hewitt. 11 of Fed's 17 Grand Slams were during the weak Era from 2004-2007 against average players. At age 22, Nadal finally mastered the fast court game and thus the Golden Era began. During the Golden Era, Fed has only 6 GS titles and Nadal has 11.
Finally, the 2008 Wimbledon Grass Court Grand Slam is considered by most to be the Greatest Tennis Match Ever -- and who won this greatest tennis match ever ? Of course, none other than the Greatest Tennis Player Ever -- Rafa Nadal !! :-)
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You must be joking. Objective GOAT criteria by importance: 1. Overall Slam count 2. Overall weeks as a Nr. 1 player in the world 3. Year end Nr.1's. 4. Career Slam (all 4 Grand Slam) 5. WTF titles. Head to head might be (!) the 6th most important criteria. No sane tennis fan that knows anything about the history of the sort would rank H2H higher than that when it comes to GOAT criteria. Well, every sane fan that's not a blatant Nadal homer. :)
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I agree the overall GS count is the most important thing. However the numbers of weeks as number 1 is, to me , less important than the H2H. I lov Federer but he had the weakest competition out of the two so not surprise he was able to hold number 1 longer. To me there is no GOAT. I would say Federer but he wasn't the best of his generation so it's not possible. If Nadal was to win another 3 GS I would have no doubts.
