Nadal Sticks a Fork in Federer’s Legend

Rises to Number 2 All Time – All Surface

After 15 days and 2 rain delays, Rafael Nadal has cemented his position as the greatest player of his era.  A traditional tennis champion, he emerged as a 19 year old wunderkind, dominating the clay court circuit going on to win the French Open 5 out of 6 years and accomplishing the longest clay court winning streak in men’s history.  With victories over Roger Federer on all 3 slam surfaces the last time they played and a 2 slam win streak over players not named Federer, Nadal entered the US Open finals awaiting the winner of the Roger Federer – Novak Djokovic semi-final.

Federer was the talk of the tournament and of the sumer circuit.  He hired Pete Sampras’ coach, Paul Annacone, and played with new abandon approaching the net at every chance.   For 4 sets and 9 games Federer executed the style Annacone had burnished in the forges of Pete Sampras’ instinctive game.  But then in the last 3 games, Federer changed styles, coming to net only once, reverting to his all-court / baseline style, ultimately losing the match.

The tennis world gasped and in a moment messages went out to the tennis player and coaching twitter world that roughly paraphrasing read like this: “Federer is not 100% committed to Annacone’s strategy”, “Federer can’t win tight or long matches anymore”.   Djokovic baked Federer for 3 hours, stuck a fork in him and said “He’s done”.

The number one ranked Nadal who had measured Federer like no other in the sport (14-7 head to head record) took his 80% finals winning record into the last match of the tournament and clocked Djokovic with devastating serves rivaling Federer’s speed while laying waste to Djokovic’s serve with 26 break point chances.   The fork was in Nadal’s hands this time.  Victorious, Nadal is the first person to win The French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open consecutively since Rod Laver and he has completed a career grand slam.

In his own humble style Nadal has gone about becoming the second greatest player of all time based on our championship quality ranking, SATERICCON.  The myopic tennis media and sponsor world focused primarily on Federer, humiliating Nadal with tennis vans painted with #2 ranked Federer’s image carrying him to matches and the exaggerated coverage of the Federer William Tell commercial.  Luke Jensen claimed Nadal had peaked years ago.  Tennis hasn’t treated Nadal as the number 1 player he was in 2008, coming back from an injury, but instead went right back to Federer as number 1 as if Nadal’s on-court ferocity were a hiccup in tennis history or as if Federer would have won the French Open and Wimbledon in 2009 had he faced Nadal at either tournament.

A man of Spanish lineage hasn’t been so disrespected by the tennis world since Jack Kramer paid Tony Trabert  $80,000 and Pancho Gonzalez $15,000 on the fledgling pro tour, despite Gonzalez’ year in, year out domination of the circuit and his 74-27 record vs. Trabert.  We have already discussed how Federer is the Larry Holmes of the tennis era with Sampras as it’s Muhammed Ali, on our blog.

Nadal has emerged onto the tennis  world like the Mike Tyson of the sport leaving devastation and ruin to all those who challenged him.  While Federer was the Gentleman Jim of the sport winning in an oh-so Swiss manner, Nadal has been all fire facing off against Federer with a boxer’s gait and bounce.   He is a man supremely confident in his athleticism, skills and mental fortitude.

So where does Nadal rank on the all time – all surface list?  Nadal has moved ahead of John McEnroe and Bjorn Borg within a handful of points behind Pete Sampras.  One more grand slam victory over a talented pool in Australia or any Grand Slam to come and he will pull ahead in Sampras on an all-court basis in terms of greatness (primarily due to his dominance over Federer).

And what of Federer?  Our model re-calculates greatness based on how other players you beat perform at future Slams.  Federer is now riding Nadal’s coattails in our rankings.  Federer moves ahead of Becker to 9^th on an all court basis and is within a point of surpassing Wilander based on his record at slams against Nadal.  On a fast court basis he moves within one point of Borg at 5^th place.  Any combination of Nadal winning a slam or Federer beating another slam winner in winning a slam will put Federer ahead of Borg but nowhere close to Stefan Edberg in 4^th place.

Cumulative All Surface Rank
via SATERICCON Analysis
1		Sampras
2		Nadal
3		Borg
4		McEnroe
5		Connors
9		Federer

What is the career trajectory of Nadal at this point?  As we mentioned before, Borg retired at 25 after winning his 6^th French Open and becoming convinced he could not beat McEnroe after 3 successive fast surface defeats at Slams.  Wilander didn’t win another slam after his tour de force over Lendl at the 1988 US Open.  We think Nadal will win one or two more slams but his period of dominance is likely to be over within the next two years.

The only two handers to consistently challenge for and win slams after 25 years of age were Connors and Agassi.  Neither were counter punchers or defensive players like Nadal has been for much of his career but instead they were aggressive baseliners, hugging the lines, looking to end points quickly.  To become more Agassi than Borg, Nadal needs to modify his game significantly (as he has done already) continuing to add punch to the serve, shortening points, being more opportunistic, and more importantly, shortening his strokes.  It is doubtful even with his weight training assisted body that he will continue to be able to defend,  get around his two handed backhand or have the massive rotation on his forehand as younger and more agile players come onto the court.

Slams at Age	23	24	25	post 25	Total Slams
Borg	2	2	0	0	11
Nadal	1	2	???	???	9
Connors	0	1	0	3	8
Agassi	0	1	1	5	8
Wilander	0	3	0	0	7

And what of Men’s tennis with it’s two major brands, Federer and Nadal sunsetting and not one teenager in the ATP top 100 ?  Will tennis wise up to its ways and go back to diversified surfaces as golf has different courses?  Will it correct the error it made by slowing down 100% of the tennis court when only 12.5% (the service box) may (or may not) have been in need of change?  What about the inflated record consequences of the 32 seed era which guarantees the higher your seed, the easier your path to a title?  No  one seems concerned about the convergence in results.  Records which occurred once every twenty years have now happened 3 times in 11 years with Agassi, Federer and Nadal recording career Grand Slams.  By sheer chance Agassi won the 2^nd least compelling career surface slam in the professional error.  Rule changes instituted by the ATP and other tennis authorities allowed Federer to win the weakest career slam . This is like 3 players hitting more than 65 home runs in 11 years, it just doesn’t happen without assistance (in this case administrative).  But in tennis, records are being broken with abandon, and there are 50 men over 25 years old in the top 100 who have no chance of ever winning a grand slam.  So what next new talent in the sport is a young fan to cheer?

Next, the economics of the US Open.

If Federer Isn’t the Best of His Era, How Can He Be the Best of All Time?

Simulation Metrics for All Time Greats

Tennis Grand Slam winners have played more than 3,000 matches between each other.  Pantheonists, the 16 greatest tennis players of all time, have played more than 1,400 matches against each other while winning 70% of the available grand slam titles of the Open era.  We crunched the numbers and created two metrics to measure the overall greatness during a career for Pantheonists.  In reviewing the data, we normalized it by considering only matches where players were younger than 31 (there are only a few slam winners over this age) or if there was less than 5 years of age between the players, such as with Sampras and Agassi, we included that data into their later years.

Results are below which show that on a winning percentage vs. other all time greats, Roger Federer ranks #14 on the SITDON scale.  Rafael Nadal’s #1 ranking is built entirely on his dominance over Federer and we consider there to be insufficient data to rank him #1.  We believe that we will need to see Nadal’s performance over the next few years vs. other rising players to clearly see where he ranks among the all time greats, but he has a fantastic start and it is clear that we are now in the midst of the “Nadal” era overshadowing Federer’s era with his defeat of Federer at Grand Slam finals on every surface the last time they played.

On a cumulative quality of slams all surface ranking, Federer ranks #10 all time.  Federer’s all surface slam does little to influence his overall ranking as there was only one other single slam winner in the quarterfinals of his French Open victory.  Assuming Federer does not change stylistically i.e. adapt a kamikaze net rush style at all costs approach like McEnroe, Rafter, Edberg and Sampras in their later years, we don’t anticipate he will win another slam without injuries or upsets to his central competitors.  Nadal is on course to surpass both Borg and McEnroe from a cumulative quality point of view on his next slam victory and may surpass Sampras with 2 or 3 more slams.  We consider this a difficult task since Nadal is the same age as Wilander at the time he won his last slam and one year younger than Borg when he retired.

Our two metrics are SITDON, the Secada Index of Tennis Dominance with Overt Normalization, and SATERICCON, the Secada Absolute Tennis Era Relative Influence and Championship Competitiveness Over Normalization.  SITDON looks at career winning percentage before the player turns 31 to determine how they did vs. other all time greats.  We consider this to be an excellent substitute for weeks at number 1 ranking and number of slams won.  From our point of view, SITDON is the equivalent of baseball ERA which tells you week in, week out, what was the consistency of that player.  However, SITDON is far more granular as it only looks at the statistics in matches between all time greats, like pitching against Reggie Jackson or Barry Bonds and does not include the equivalent of baseball’s bum of the month.

SATERICCON, measures individual greatness at any point in time.  Though SITDON measures overall career performance, SATERICCON answers the question, in a tournament of the greatest players, who would win those tournaments?   Historically, who was the greatest at the instant when it mattered.   It is a complementary statistic to our Slam Triple metric yet it considers the cumulative value of winning a number of slams which may be less competitive vs. winning a few ultra-competitive slams.  So it answers the question, if you won a slam in the ultra competitive 1987-1993 period, how would that translate into playing in slams in the far less competitive, A32 era and vice versa.

Normalization is the process of looking at data, in this case, 1,400 plus match results and selecting the good data while throwing out the bad.  Though not a perfect process we erred on the side of conservatism in determining when a player was at or near their peak.   In this case we included all data for players from the time they began playing pro tournaments to their 31^st birthday.  Long-playing champions such as Connors, Lendl, Sampras and Agassi are rewarded by both metrics for their longevity.  They are more than just champions for tennis, they are part of the fabric of the sport, tennis DNA.

SITDON has 4 advantages over other measures.   (1) it eliminates factors that others say make era comparison indeterminate such as equipment,  fitness or seedings.  All that matters is the results between top players, (2) it makes it easier to evaluate how age, mileage and style impact the outcome of a match and (3) it refines overall win record and overall match record to only those matches between the greatest players of eras at their peak.   (4) It eliminates computer ranking which is frequently subverted for business to incentify players to play more with higher risk of injury.

SITDON is an absolute measure of competitiveness between Pantheonists in the same era.  Federer’s total match record vs. Pantheonists ranks him 15^th all time in number of matches and with normalization, he ranks 14^th out of 16 in winning percentage vs. Pantheonists  as well.  John Newcombe  takes the last spot as all of his wins over Laver and Rosewall are eliminated via normalization i.e. they were all over 30 when he played them.  Even without normalization i.e. elimination of matches vs. Pantheonists far from their peak, Federer finishes near last in the Pantheon.

Note:  though cumulative career statistics matter on an absolute basis, there is a danger in quoting mid-career statistics average or percentile statistics for tennis players as they are surely to decline in the second half of a career.  Nadal and Federer’s percentages and averages are surely to decline as has every Pantheonist before them as they play longer and deeper into the latter half of their careers.

SITDON measures what would happen if Pantheonists were to play one singles match against each other, SATERICCON measures what would happen if Pantheonists were to play a succession of matches against each other.   SATERICCON’s basis is to determine who was greatest when the greatest all played each other assuming a winner of an all time great tourney would be indicated by past performance.

To create this measure, we use analytic methodology and then we consider ancient and present competitive folklore.  Larry Holmes was undefeated in his first 44 bouts beating an old Muhammad Ali in 15 rounds.  Ali defeated 6 heavyweight champs in or near their prime.  Experts consider Ali a greater champion.  Michael Jordan’s Bulls became champs after beating Isiah Thomas’ Detroit Pistons (at their prime) who had beaten the Celtics and Lakers before them.    Olajuwon’s Rockets won the championship when Jordan semi-retired and the Bulls and Pistons were long past their glory.  They disappeared when Jordan returned.  Jordan’s Bulls are considered greater than the Rockets.

In the Trojan war, Achilles retired briefly over compensation issues, in the interim period Hector laid waste the Greeks slaying far more than Achilles that year and nearly destroying their navy, almost altering history.  But when Achilles came out of retirement, everyone well knew who would win, it was destiny.  Our methodology borrows heavily from this philosophy and the Highlander series.  When the Highlander defeats another Highlander he gains the power of that Highlander and all their previous victims.   Likewise in the Volsunga Saga of Nordic and Germanic literature, if you defeat a dragon and eat it’s heart you gain it’s power.  When measuring greatness, history has always looked at the quality of your victories over the quantity. In SATERICCON, when you defeat another slam champ or the person who defeated them in the slam, you gain their power rating as a cumulative score.

We measure the overall difficulty of winning a grand slam championship by the quality of the field at the quarterfinal stage of the tournament.  We consider the number of grand slams won by the other quarterfinalists, excluding the winner and score the slam as having the value of difficulty assigned by all quarterfinalists.   So for example, Pete Sampras’ first Wimbledon championship had Jim Courier, Boris Becker, Mats Wilander, Stefan Edberg, Goran Ivanisevic and Andre Agassi in the quarterfinals.  The cumulative score of that win is a 28 which is the number of career slams by those players.  In Federer’s first US Open victory, Andy Roddick, Lleyton Hewitt and Andre Agassi were quarterfinalists .  Those players won 11 grand slams between them and Federer’s score is an 11.  However, to come up with a true “normalized” measure of greatness, we only measure players who were at or near their peak in skills and athleticism, so Federer’s score was reduced to 3 by eliminating Agassi who was already 33 at the time of this tournament.  Every player was impacted by this measure as almost each player had an all time great long past their prime in the quarterfinals of one or more of their championships.

The impact of normalization on Federer’s record is far greater since he has played  so few Pantheonists and is dominated by Nadal, the only other Pantheon player in his era.  Without normalization, based on his wins over a 33 year old Agassi, Federer would move past Becker and Wilander on the all time list but that would only get him to #8 all time on an all surface basis.  It was important to use the cumulative score of grandslam wins vs the average score as it balances out the dearth of grand slam champs Federer defeated per tournament but gives him extra points for his cumulative slam wins.  (On an average Slam victory Q-Rating score basis, Federer would rank near last.)  This study does not address what would have happened if Lendl had given up his Quixotic quest for a Wimbledon title and won 2 more French Opens, what would have happened if McEnroe had not taken a break during his career or what would have happened should Jimmy Connors have been allowed to play the French Open in 1974.  All these players ranked ahead of Federer in SITDON and SATERICCON rating.

To create the metric for competitiveness of grand slam victory, we used Federer as the baseline for all other players since so many journalists and talking heads rank Federer as #1 we gave Federer’s cumulative score a 1 and then graded the other players on a scale relative to Federer.  Though several other players have won a Slam Triple, Federer has never been able to do it which questions his ability to win a tournament of all time greats.  Though our SATERICCON rating does not say Pete Sampras is 2.37 more likely to win an average slam than Federer (though we think it is positively indicative), it does say he is far more likely to win a slam 2.37 times more difficult than Federer.

We also eliminated the Australian Open from consideration because it had little relevance in tennis until it became the first slam on the calendar in 1987.  Players like Orantes never played the Australian Open and Borg and Nastase played in it once.  Next, The toughest tournaments of all time on each surface and the winners.

Comparing Tennis Eras, Why Federer’s Second Half Matters

Wimbedon’s first week is midway and tennis pundits will discuss how much more Roger Federer will extend his lead on the other all-time great tennis players in the great players’ Pantheon.  Disbelievers will be silenced looking for arguments like, ”Could Federer have beaten Becker, Edberg or McEnroe on fast courts?” or “If Federer couldn’t beat an aging Rafter or Agassi before they turned 31 how could he beat them at their best?”.   If you have heard the reply, “can’t compare eras tennis”, you are not alone as Googling for that statement comes up more than 2 million times in results.  But you can compare eras.

We at Secada Labs have analyzed more than 3,000 tennis matches played between all time greats, “The Pantheon” and other slam winners across the Open era(s) and more than 1,400 matches between the 16 players who comprise “The Pantheon”, winners of 4 or more Grand Slams during the open era.  Using our patent pending SITDON and SATERICCON methodology and based on our copyright pending SHOTS framework, we have come up with an absolute measure of tennis greatness.  The framework and metrics answer 3 questions.   (1)  How do you measure all time greatness?  (2) What was the level of greatness of any player in the tennis pantheon at the time they were playing?  (3) What was the level of greatness of the field of any tournament won by an all time great?

The Pantheon of All Time Great Players
4 Slam Victors or More (top 16)
Roger Federer		Mats Wilander
Pete Sampras		Stefan Edberg
Bjorn Borg		Boris Becker
Jimmy Connors		Rod Laver
Ivan Lendl		Jim Courier
Andre Agassi		Guillermo Vilas
Rafael Nadal		Ken Rosewall
John McEnroe		John Newcombe

Federer’s Rank Among All Time Greats

We ran the analysis and Federer ranked no greater than 6^th on all time basis on any surface even when weighted in favor of his “volume” of slam victories rather than the average competitiveness of those wins.   Indeed, 5 players, Boris Becker, Stefan Edberg and 3 Americans, Pete Sampras, John McEnroe and Jimmy Connors ranked ahead of Federer on a weighted average basis on his two best surfaces and Federer ranked 7 overall on a blended basis.  Sampras, Edberg and McEnroe ranked ahead of Federer on both surfaces.  We think back to the old Reebok commercial where Shaq is faced with the Pantheon of great centers, he shows his prowess and they reply, “That isn’t enough” .   Federer’s record of beating tennis also-rans with a rapidly diminishing tournament record has not been enough.  The last part of Federer’s career will determine his place in the Pantheon.

Before drilling down into the numbers there are 3 philosophical arguments that are the basis of the study and need to be asked in any comparison.

Comparing All Time Greats

(1) How do you compare all time greats?  Does the level of competition matter.  Does Muhammad Ali’s triumphs over 6 heavyweight champs in or near their prime make his fights more meaningful than Larry Holmes victories over an aged Ali and Ken Norton and a succession of unknowns?   Does the Quality (Q rating)  of who you beat or the Q rating of the overall tournament matter as much as what you win?

(2)  Though all time slam records matter, any determination of greatness would be determined by a tournament of champions or long term competition.  So though people may say that Federer’s defeat of an aging Sampras long past his Wimbledon peak is exemplary of his likely outcome with Sampras (we disagree), the question remains how many times would Federer beat Sampras out of 10 matches, 5 out of 10, 6 out of 10?  Could Federer win in a tournament of 16 people where he could face an Agassi or Connors in their prime in the first round, then Lendl or Vilas then Edberg or Becker before he ever faced Sampras?  We know the answer to that for Sampras as he is one of the few who has won such a tournament as have Edberg and Becker.   The answer is unknown for Federer.

(3)  If grand slams or “Majors” are the gold standard of measuring tennis success and championships are the coin of the realm, what happens when the gold in the coinage is diluted?  In the book “eight centuries of financial folly” The authors stated “Many of the earliest financial crises occurred when monarchs of a country reduced the gold or silver content of their coinage to finance budget shortfalls”  Did rule changes occur in tennis that diluted the value of slam championships by increasing the likelihood that top players would reach later rounds as seeded?  Did rule changes occur, (like slowing down the court and balls at Wimbledon) that favored one style of play over another. Although our study eliminates equipment changes  as a factor in greatness, 2001 tennis rule changes have had many unintended consequences that unequally favor a champion over challengers and certain styles of play over others.

More to come in our next part – The 2002 Slow Court era – Saving the Tennis Brand

Note:  Credit goes to Phil Secada, who is loosely associated with Secada Labs for serving as a backboard and devil’s advocate about these concepts with respect to Federer all time.