Federer / Nadal / Djokovic - who is the best?

hellpowna

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Nadal, Djokovic or Federer: who do you think is the best tennis player?

Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer have dominated tennis over the last 10 years. Each of them has a different play style and their preferred surface. These players have longstanding rivalry and have encountered each other in many occassions, often in Grand Slam finals.

  • Nadal is often nicknamed the King of Clay. The Spanish player has won an outstanding number of titles on this surface, including 9 French Open, and reached an incredible streak of 81 consecutive wins on clay. But he has also won major titles on all the surfaces and even an Olympic Gold in Bejing 2008.
  • Djokovic is the current leader of the ATP World Tour. The Serbian has won many titles in the last few years, clinching his 8th Grand Slam last january in Australia. He can win on all surfaces, and even beat Nadal on clay, but he is still chasing his first French Open.
  • Federer has been called the Greatest Of All Times by many observers, and compared to other sport legends such as Jordan, Rossi or Woods, maybe a bit too soon now that Nadal and Djokovic are getting closer to his records. Not only is he praised for his 17 Grand Slam titles, or his 302 weeks as number one, but also for his style of play. He keeps many records, among which 65 straight victories on grass.
Head to Head
Nadal vs Djokovic 23 vs 21
Djokovic vs Federer 19 vs 20
Nadal
vs Federer 23 vs 10
 

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I started being aware of tennis shortly before Nadal first came to the scene so that might colour my perception a bit but imo Nadal was the best of the three. At his peak his dominance was something virtually untouchable for the longest time and his record against Federer (who reigned for a long time without a clear challenger and then while Nadal was ascending to his peak) reflects that. Djokovic gets docked by me for being unable to have much success against Federer and Nadal when they were still at their peaks despite already nearing his own peak and raising him game (or perhaps it only appeared that way) after Fed/Nadal declined. Djokovic is obviously the best in the game today and Roger had the greatest period of sustained success but for the highest level of dominance and play my vote goes to Nadal.
 
Federer for me, even if he's no longer #1 in rankings, as far as a career goes he's had more success. Then Djokovic (who will get his career slam one day) and Nadal. Nadal is only super effective on clay (hence the superior head to head against the other 2 since most courts on the circuit are clay iirc).
 

UncleSam

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Federer dominated the game like no one else and I suspect that if Nadal weren't a few years younger than him he would have won more of their head to head matches.

Additionally, I would like to point out that the Federer-Nadal head to head is deceiving - it reflects that Federer consistently got to the finals in the French/other clay court tournaments where Nadal was the heavy favorite, but Nadal frequently lost prior to the finals to lesser opponents prior to playing Federer. If you looked at who won the largest percentage of tournaments that both of them took part in Federer would probably have an edge, though I'm not going to look it up (and don't even know if that statistic is available).

Djokovic is clearly a distant third, at least until he wins a lot more majors. He is the best player in the world today but he is not nearly as dominating as Federer was ten years ago or Nadal was seven years ago. If he manages to consistently defeat the likes of Wawrinka/Berdych/Murray then maybe he will move into contention, but as of now I feel he has only won majors as a result of Federer/Nadal declining (though Djokovic today vs Federer ten years ago would be a tremendous match most likely).

Nadal is the greatest clay court player of all time. On grass, Federer has a slight edge, though both are among the best of all time on that surface. Federer, however, is definitely the stronger hard court player, and may well be the greatest hard court player ever. It really comes down to how you define 'best' relative to the different surfaces; there are clear distinctions between each on each major surface in terms of their results, it just depends which one you value more. Personally (and as an American I am biased in this regard) I feel that the hard court is the best marker to go by, and so feel that Federer is the best player of the three (and the best of all time). It would have been nice if Nadal had managed to make more Aussie and US Open finals so that they could have played more head to head while both were at their peaks, but they played plenty of great matches at their peaks as it is.

I want to see Federer win one more major (US Open hype) and retire, as he definitely deserves it and the fact he is still one of the best players in the world speaks to his greatness. It would be nice to see Nadal recover and get back into form as well, but frankly I don't expect it - his style of play is a lot more conducive to injury, and even if he recovers I doubt he will be able to play the way he used to, as it is a lot more physically demanding than most other players' styles (particularly Federer, which is a major reason for the latter's longevity).

Edit: Nadal is 13-2 against Federer on clay, and is 10-8 against him on other surfaces, though Federer held an edge on other surfaces until recent years. I feel that if Nadal had made more US Open finals/hard court masters event finals during their peak rivalry years, then the number of Federer wins would likely be much higher on hard courts. Meanwhile, if Federer had been less effective on clay against non-Nadal competition, then those 15 clay court matches would likely be reduced significantly. Frankly, if it weren't for Nadal, it is likely that Federer would've won 4-5 French Opens, at least. While the 6-2 record in grand slam finals in favor of Nadal is definitely a point in his favor, it also speaks to Federer's dominance that in spite of this he still has an edge of 17-14 in total grand slams.
 
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Soul Fly

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Federer because class is priceless.

No offence to the other two, they're great players and will probably statistically outdo him at their respective peaks (Nadal not so sure given his legs are pretty much gone and he's not even thirty, even if he has more titles).

He also probably the only one in the modern open era who doesn't rely on a surface specialization (eg: Nadal's baselining really shines on clay, which is one of the reasons for his superior h2h record against Fedex)

I guess it's a matter of personal preference and this moment in Wimbledon made me fall in love with him all over again.


Goddamn sonofabitch. :sniff:
 
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Coronis

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Federer is in my mind the greatest player of the open era, and possibly of all time (looking at you Rod Laver). Nadal is of course, the best clay court player ever but has pretty much already burnt himself out. As Djokovic continues to play and win he will surpass Nadal, but he has not been as dominant as Federer at his peak. Despite the recent dominance of these players we shouldn't forget about older greats when ranking them all time. (like Bjorn Borg, retired at 26 with 11 Grand Slams holy shit)
 
Well for me Federer is the best player ever. He always seems to have more time than every other player for one thing. Today's performance does strengthen the claim, and imo if he beats Djokovic on Sunday, there will be no question. For me Federer will always be the best but hopefully a few people can be swayed with a Sunday win. The word legend is really thrown around willy nilly today but Federer is just the definition of it.
 
Nadal definitely have the edge, then Federer and last Djokovic. he's the GOAT.

the only male which finished the golden slam career (OG in singles + OG in doubles). Most well-rounded player ever imo
 
Call me a bit bias considering that Roger Federer is my favorite player of all time, but I also believe that he is the best player of all time. I think the stats flat out speak for themselves, he may not be as well rounded as Nadal, but he has set so many records in his own right that he makes up for it.

Djokovic is doing quite well for himself at the moment, he is already the top earner in tennis and is only 3 titles away from surpassing my #3....

Nadal is a great player, no doubt about it, but I'm putting him at #3 because it seems like at the rate he is going compared to the rate Djokovic is going it won't be much longer until Djokovic statistically overtakes him in quite a few aspects

So there's my opinion
 

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