Is Federer the greatest sports-person in the world?

[krunchie]

Krunchies top 5 male tennis players of all time - in order

1- Federer
2- Sampras
3- Laver
4- Bjorg
5- Lendel

and on the bench

6- Mcenroe

a very inereststing argument but i agree we cant compare atheletes across sports, i find it hard to draw comparisons across the ages,
Rod Laver was the best of his generation thats all there is too it- could he hold a candle to Federer in todays tennis world- of course not.
but what if we were to plonk federer back in time without all the benifits of today (including sports science knowldege) as well as take all the money away so he had very little to train on ( because athelets of this age did not make a fortune) then there is no guarentee that Fed would beat rod laver back in 1964 either.

I mention 1964 because thats when laver won all 4 grand slams in 1 year as an amautre beforerepeating the feat as a pro in 69

[Bob B]

it is pretty impossible to compare sports people from different eras. i.e would rod laver beat roger federer? thats not a fair comparison. because of the training technicues etc, ANY pro tennis player would beat rod laver i think. his level of fitness and professionalism wouldn't compare to todays athletes. but back then, it was enough.


what you can do is measure a player against his peers. that means that the technical advances don't come into it, because everyone is on a level playing field in that regard

there are a few players that stand head and shoulders above everyone else that has played against them, and add to this, their records stand up against anyone from history. federer is definitely one of thise, woods and jordan are others.

How would you gauge Helmeth????????????

[AceLosesKing]

Hellmuth is an idiot. There are dozens of better players than him. The man knows how to do well in large fields against bad players. That's pretty much it.

[bennymacca]

How would you gauge Helmeth????????????

you have to give him some credit - you dont get 11 bracelets if you are a bad player

i would still say he is the best NLHE tournament player in the world - but there are many many more forms of poker than just NLHE tourneys

[Glyn Parsons]

Nathan and i had this discussion last night and my answer was no and that tiger woods was and still is far greater than federer. Nuff said

There are plenty of others tho in their respective fileds and not limited to Babe Ruth, Cassius, Doyle the list goes on

[maccatak11]

What were your reasons for choosing tiger woods over federer??

[Bacon]

I reckon it's because a golfer requires less fitness, and less thought processes.

[bennymacca]

i think tiger woods has stood consistently further above his peers than what federer did.

i mean he missed nearly a year of golf through injury and he still remained number one (different ranking system to tennis obviously, but still)

[Glyn Parsons]

He was and remains one of the highest earning professional athletes in the world whose achievements far outway those of federer in a game i find more challenging moreso mentally and emotionally draining than physically. He has been number one for far longer than federer in their respective fields and is still valued incredibly high amongst fellow pplayer and supporters..

[Bacon]

He was and remains one of the highest earning professional athletes in the world whose achievements far outway those of federer in a game i find more challenging moreso mentally and emotionally draining than physically. He has been number one for far longer than federer in their respective fields and is still valued incredibly high amongst fellow pplayer and supporters..

It's only 27 weeks difference in their longest streaks, which when this is 10% of the time, isn't FAR longer.