Ajla Tomljanović vs America

[LP]

Did you know Court won only 4 matches to win the 1964 Australian Championships? There were only 27 entrants and she received a bye in the 1st round. Serena and Steffi both had to win 7 matches to win each Open and they never received a scheduled bye. Interesting, no?

But that says nothing about the opposition, with seeding many early rounds are almost practice games for top seeds. So I think it is meaningless discussing match numbers.
 

[Mav]

In the Open era, the common saying is that you can’t win it in the 1st week but you can lose it in the 1st week. In other words, you have to finish off your 1st 3 or 4 opponents quickly or you end up banged up in the 2nd week. There’s an attritional aspect to having to play 7 games in 2 weeks. The top seeds might be expected to prevail in their first matches (but Haley fell in round 1) but the consequences show up in the 2nd week. If you told the top seeds they’d have byes in the 1st 3 rounds, almost all would be overjoyed.

[LP]

If you told the top seeds they’d have byes in the 1st 3 rounds, almost all would be overjoyed.

Only if they had a monopoly, if it's the same for everybody it's no advantage.

Whether a tournament starts with 200 or 20, the last few opponents are likely to be the same quality.

Back in the 50s, 60s and 70s, they use to play challenge matches, one off head to head games of the best going around at the time against the best. Not joke matches for charity like they play now, but serious events exposing the best to the best outside of an open framework. Some clubs still run formats like this to establish who's the better player, a long running format design to rank the best players. Many old world individual sports ran the same way, golf, billiards, snooker, wherever a head to head competition was found. You couldn't avoid the better opponents, you never got the luck of them being a shock omission. One of the reasons this diminished was that as the money grew players started refusing challenges, making excuses for not playing an opponent, because ranking means income. It's a pity this has subsided, because if not gamed it really does filter the best of the best.

[Thryleon]

Do you seriously contend that other clubs’ supporters agree we’re the GOAT? I’d be surprised if you could find any. You’d be on much firmer ground if you asked them whether Carlton had the most premierships alongside Essendon in the history of the VFL/AFL.

We've been rubbish for 25 years and can STILL point to the scoreboard, and they cannot say a thing about it aside from hearing the qualifications that you are telling us.

Essendon have the same number of flags, and declare themselves the greatest, even though they have won 2 fewer finals than us to get to their 16.  Thing is, no one cares about that.  Scoreboard says we stand on 16 premierships a piece and thats all that really matters.

[Mav]

Exactly. You say we can fall back on the indisputable fact we have 16 premierships but others will concede that but say we aren’t the GOAT. Likewise, Margaret Court can boast of having 24 Grand Slam titles but that doesn’t mean others aren’t the GOAT rather than her. The specific boast does not carry with it the more general boast.

[DJC]

Back to the tennis, I took one of my grandsons to basketball tryouts yesterday and sat next to Poo.  His son was trying out too.

Poo looks fit enough to play a five setter against quality opposition but he remains another tennis player who, for whatever reason, was not able make the most of his enormous talent, athleticism and physical attributes.

[Mav]

But I bet he enjoyed himself immensely off the court when he was a player (in both senses). Current sport stars have far more pull than former ones. Asking a young bloke to give up the advantages of stardom and commit to a perpetual cycle of training and playing while living out of a suitcase is a big ask.

[townsendcalling]

Ask Roger Federer if he thinks Rod Laver's incredible record should be downgraded because he played in a certain era. Never. You compete against whoever is put in front of you at the time. You can do no ore than that.  If you enter a Grand Slam tournment with Djokovic banned, Roger injured, Rafa defeated in the second round and Tsisapas sooking it up in the corner.....and you win, Happy Days!!  You're a Grand Slam champion and that's all there is to it!!

[Mav]

But you’re making my point for me. Laver won a paltry 11 Grand Slam titles, far fewer than Joker, Rafa & Federer. So that means he couldn’t possibly be the GOAT on Thryleon’s criterion. But he was excluded from 21 Grand Slam tournaments in his peak years because he was a professional. Credit him with even half of those titles and he’s neck and neck with them. Give him most of them, which isn’t fanciful by any means, and he would have been well ahead - Bradman compared to everyone else.

[madbluboy]

We are probably the worst club in the AFL era.