Quote:
Originally Posted by ut2010
How old was Roger when he first started getting pwned by Nadal? 25 or 26?
Fed probably most talented player of all time but a bit weak mentally compared to Djoker/Nadal causing him to choke when those guys played close to his level.
TBF, Nadal has really only dominated Roger on clay. They've played 27 times in their life. 14 of those matches have been on clay and Rafa is 12-2 in those matches. On hard courts they're 5-5 and on grass Fed leads 2-1.
Given Rafa's freakish heightened abilities on clay, I think it's not unreasonable to sort by surfaces and not just declare one true GOAT. It might be fair to say that Rafa is closer to Federer on hard/grass than Fed is to Rafa on clay, but I'm still not sure that makes him better.
The problem with Fed vs Djokovic is that their career peaks will have come too far apart. Right now Federer has the lifetime edge 14-10. They only met in a GS final once and that was in 2007 and Roger won quite handily. Of course, Djokovic is sooo much better now than he was in 07 and Federer is probably a fair amt. worse, though the diff. between Fed's diminshed skill from then till now is not nearly as great as the diff. between Djok's increased skill over the same period.
Agree with iggy that Federer's fatal flaw for now has been that he could never beat Rafa at the French. The fact that he has actually played him 5 times there (4 in Finals the other in a semi) and lost every single time is pretty tough to swallow for Fed fans such as myself. He's actually never even forced 5 sets vs. Rafa at the French. Every win has been 4 sets or less, including the most one-sided best of 5 match the two have ever played in the 08 final, when Nadal won 6-1, 6-3, 6-0 in straight sets.
There's no way Djokovic can be called definitively better than either one RIGHT NOW, but he has at least forced himself into the discussion. Seeing how dominant he has been recently and the fact that his winning ways are far from over, it seems at least plausible that he puts himself aside both Rog and Rafa at some point if not passes them.