By Raymond Lee | Wednesday, March 10, 2021
Tennis historian Raymond Lee digs deep into major stats and historical data to make a compelling case for world No. 1 Novak Djokovic as GOAT.
Photo credit: Mark Peterson/Corleve
Tennis history is being written right before our eyes and the authors are taking the sport to places previously unseen.
My last article for Tennis Now focused on Rafael Nadal’s greatness and place in history.
More: Djokovic Sets ATP Record for Most Weeks at No. 1
Well, Novak Djokovic just won his 18th Grand Slam championship and his ninth Australian Open title dismissing Daniil Medvedev 7-5, 6-2, 6-2.
On Monday, Djokovic celebrated his 311th week as world No. 1 breaking the record he previously shared with rival Roger Federer to stand alone as the all-time ATP leader for most weeks at the top spot.
So now Djokovic is within two majors of tying 20-time Grand Slam champions Nadal and Federer for the men’s major mark.
It’s funny in recent years whenever Djokovic, Nadal or Federer wins a major, that player is often proclaimed the clear GOAT and when any of the others win that player is now the clear GOAT. I call this the GOAT Merry Go Round.
Of course, all three iconic champions are worthy of holding the mythical Greatest of All Time title.
Before we answer that question, we must address this one: What is the GOAT? How do we define the GOAT?
As an extreme example, let’s say there are two great players, I’ll call one Mr. Invincible and the other Mr. Consistent.
Mr. Invincible plays for five years wins 20 tournaments a year and five calendar year Grand Slams. He wins 40 Masters 1000 and 5 World Tour Finals. He never loses a match. He then retires after playing only five years. Mr. Consistent plays at this time also, plays Mr. Invincible but NEVER beats him.
Mr. Consistent plays for 20 years wins 101 tournaments and 21 majors. He wins 41 Masters 1000 and 6 World Tour Finals. He surpasses Mr. Invincible in these categories.
My question here is who is the greater champion? There isn’t a true answer to this because it’s debatable.
In this article, I aim to highlight the career accomplishments of the champions, but also recognize the player’s peak time.
I believe simply counting Grand Slams to decipher the GOAT is not the end all in discussing greatness. We MUST consider other factors. I think we have to understand how dominant the player was in his time and what events were considered important during that player’s time.
For example the great Pancho Gonzalez won only two Grand Slams as an amateur, but once he turned pro he wasn’t allowed to even enter the classic majors. You can’t win majors if you’re not allowed to enter. This was the case for all pros up to 1968.
So how can you use classic majors to analyze who is the all time GOAT if a large amount of players are hurt by this or just plain eliminated because of this? I covered this issue in prior articles on Nadal’s remarkable record:
Where Does Rafael Nadal Rank in Tennis History Part 1
Where Does Rafael Nadal Rank in Tennis History Part 2
Clearly, Djokovic already has ample evidence for a case as GOAT.
The 33-year-old Serbian has attained the year-end world No. 1 ranking an amazing six times, equal to his childhood hero Pete Sampras, and ahead of five-time year-end No. 1 rivals Federer and Nadal. Remember, we’re discussing Open Era year-end No. 1.
Djokovic also has the distinction of holding all four majors at the same time, tying Rod Laver who did it once in the Open Era in 1969—seven years after he achieved the calendar-year Slam in 1962. Now I know it’s not technically a calendar-year Grand Slam but still, holding four majors at the same time shows Djokovic’s dominance. He is great on all surfaces. This phenomenal feat deserves in my mind extra credit in the GOAT debate. Only Laver can get that credit among the men besides Djokovic in the Open Era.
Among the women it would be Maureen Connolly, Margaret Court, Martina Navratilova and Steffi Graf. Navratilova won an amazing 6 majors in a row although she didn’t win the calendar year Grand Slam. Connolly won nine Grand Slam titles in a row that she entered. Connolly did skip a few majors during that streak.
Dig deeper and number show Novak Djokovic has won 82 tournaments in his career in only 258 tournaments entered for a winning percentage of 31.78. He has an 82.98 lifetime winning percentage which is only slightly behind Nadal at 83.1%. Djokovic has won 18 majors in 63 attempts for 28.57%.
However Djokovic has been the most dominant of the Big 3 since 2011 winning 17 of his majors since then.
Federer is No. 1 among the big three with 103 tournament wins in 362 tournaments entered for a percentage of 28.45. Federer has a lifetime winning percentage of 82.09. He has won 20 majors in 79 attempts for 25.32%.
Nadal is at 86 tournament wins in 286 tournaments entered for a percentage of 30.06. Nadal has also won 20 majors but in 61 attempts for 32.79%.
So currently the hot topic of debate in tennis revolves around Federer, Nadal and Djokovic. They have been the Big 3 in tennis over the years with Nadal and Djokovic combining to capture 10 of the last 11 major championships.
Federer, who launches his comeback after a pair of knee surgeries in Doha today, is the elder statesman of the three and the dominant player in tennis for a number of years. Odds are if it was not for Nadal that Federer would have won the calendar year Grand Slam at least once. Of course that is all in hindsight and the reality is that Nadal was there.
It seems that every expert seems to only count majors to determine the GOAT in tennis even in other sports like golf. That makes absolutely no sense at all because it eliminates the majority of the tennis season with so many Masters 1000 tournaments and the World Tour Finals.
For example in 2015 Djokovic accumulated 7200 points from all four major because winning three majors that year gave him 6000 points and being in the final of the other gave him an additional 1200 points.
That same year 2015 Djokovic won six Masters 1000 tournaments and was in the finals of the other two. Obviously he gets 6000 points for winning the six tournaments and 1200 points for being in the finals of the other two tournaments. Guess what it also adds up to, 7200 points!
So do we eliminate all of the other tournaments Djokovic won that year aside from the majors? Of course not! By the way Djokovic also won the ATP Finals that year. So clearly Djokovic got most of his ATP points that year from non-majors so you can’t forget about these tournaments.
I figured I’d try something a little different in ranking these three greats. I decided to simply add up the ATP points they all accumulated at the end of each calendar year that they have played. Now I could have made some mistakes in the calculations and the freezing of the points due to the COVID-19 pandemic throws a bit of monkey wrench into the numbers but overall it seems like good way to proceed considering that is how the ATP calculates rankings.
I do think calculating ATP points is a logical way to judge how great a player has been over the years. I don’t necessarily think it is the end all but it is a way to help us in our judgments of great players. And why not since they rank players for one year that way, why not rank players for their career?
Now the ranking system has changed a bit over the years but currently it takes the best 18 tournaments and 19 if you qualify for the World Tour Finals. It has been that way since the year 2000. Prior to that it was the best 14 tournaments the player has played. The only player who played prior to the year 2000 on the ATP tour was Roger Federer and he only played 35 matches, five in 1998 and 30 in 1999 going 2-3 and 13-17 respectively. Federer accumulated 119 points in 1998 and 749 in 1999 for a total of 868 points.
So here are the current standings as of March 1, 2021 for ATP points for a career.
Total Accumulated ATP Points Career
1. Novak Djokovic with 126,617 points including his current win in the 2021 Australian Open.
2. Roger Federer with 126,058 points.
3. Rafael Nadal with 120,385 points including his quarterfinal showing in this year’s Australian Open.
It’s incredibly close as of now. Djokovic’s domination of the sport for the last decade (with minor exceptions due to injury) puts Djokovic up fractionally above the Great Federer with his win in the Australian. Nadal of course has the clay court season coming up. The French Open is where he has been almost a sure thing since 2005. So he figures to gain some ground there on Federer and Djokovic.
Right now the key is the age gap between Federer and the other two greats. Federer is born August 8, 1981. Nadal is born June 3, 1986 and Djokovic is born May 22, 1987. There is an age gap of about 4 years and 10 months between Federer and Nadal. The age gap between Djokovic and Federer is about 5 years and 9 months. Unless there is injury the older player tends not to do as well as the younger player but that is stating the obvious.
I do think that to look at ATP points accumulated over the years for an ATP player helps to let people realize that it’s still quite an accomplishment to do well in a major or any top tournament even if you don’t win it. For example Ivan Lendl is arguably one of the top players of all time but he only won 8 majors. That’s excellent of course but if we also look at the fact that he was the finalist in a major 11 other times you realize that Lendl was quite a great player. It’s harder to evaluate players because the rules and what was prestigious were different then. The Masters 1000 series the way we know it has only been around since 1990 and the point ranking system has had several incarnations until we have rankings the way they have it today.
Certain sources have Lendl as winning 22 Master’s Level 1000 type tournaments but I’m sure he could have won far more if they had the system in place that they have now because entering these tournaments would have been mandatory.
Lendl did win a lot of tournaments which arguably in their day were just as important as the Classic Majors. For example, he won a number of WCT Championships and was in the final of another. John McEnroe won an amazing five WCT Championship and was in the finals of three. Both Lendl and McEnroe were end of year number one numerous times. Isn’t that the final goal for any player, to be the best in that tennis season?
Currently the ATP website does not have point totals prior to 1995. It would be nice to be able to see them and also the ways they used to rank players in the past.
The ATP tour has only been around since 1973 and Open Tennis has only been around since 1968. It’s tough to logically rank past players and look at point totals since there were no point totals in the pasts and record keeping hasn’t been that great.
The parameters of how to be number one has changed also over the years. For example during the great Pancho Gonzalez’s time the foremost event in tennis was considered to be the World Championship Tours. If you win this tour you are the World Champion. If you lose it sometimes you may never get another chance. In this way tennis in those days was very similar to Professional Boxing.
As I mentioned earlier the WCT Championships were considered to be essentially a major and it was clearly more important in prestige than tournaments like the Australian Open which is a classic major. John Newcombe said in his goal for 1974 was to win Wimbledon and the WCT Championship. When Newcombe won the WCT Championship finals over Bjorn Borg he was acclaimed the number one player in the world despite Jimmy Connors winning the Australian Open earlier that year.
Arthur Ashe was No. 1 in 1975 due to his winning Wimbledon and the WCT Championship.
Many players skipped the Australian Open in 1970s. It simply wasn’t that important. Jimmy Connors played it twice, winning it in 1974 and losing the final to John Newcombe in 1975. Bjorn Borg played it once in 1973 and lost in the third round. If Borg or Connors played the Australian a few more times during their peaks it’s reasonable to assume they would have won a number of Australian Opens. They were clearly the best players or among the best on grass for many years during the 1970s and 1980s.
I do think it’s reasonable to think the at worst the three best players of the last 25 years and arguably of all time are Djokovic, Federer and Nadal. They have been virtually unbeatable in some years and in majors their dominance is astounding!
The accumulation points system may have some flaws of course. For example, Federer in his best years of 2004 to 2006 had a maximum point total in one year of 8370 at the end of 2006. It may not seem like a lot but the number two player was Nadal at 4470 points. This means that Federer was 87.2% ahead of number two Rafael Nadal! No one was close to Federer in those days. The point system has changed since then. Since all three players have played during this period and were young, (therefore at their peaks at some point) so at least the ranking system rates them all on equal footing.
The current end of calendar year record seems to be Novak Djokovic at the end of 2015 when amassed a total of 16,585 points, far ahead of Andy Murray at number two.
The ATP record for points was on June 6, 2016 by Djokovic with 16,950 ahead of Andy Murray at 8,915. He was 90.13% ahead of Murray! However that wasn’t at the end of the calendar year but the middle of the year!
Let’s look at the numbers again for the Big 3.
Tournaments Won
1. Federer-103
2. Nadal-86
3. Djokovic-82
Federer is clearly ahead here over Nadal and Djokovic. However Nadal and Djokovic are about 5 and 6 years younger respectively. I think Nadal and Djokovic would probably have been even closer if not for COVID-19 affecting the tennis schedule in 2020 (and the world) so badly.
Percentage of Tournaments Won
1. Djokovic-31.8
2. Nadal-30.1
3. Federer-28.5
Djokovic is ahead here but all numbers are close. Djokovic, when healthy (don’t know how age will affect that) in recent years wins a higher percentage of his tournaments played than 31.8% but you can say the same about Nadal. I’m talking about the next few years and how it projects for these three greats. Not sure about Federer yet until we see his return from injury.
Grand Slam Titles Won
1. Federer and Nadal-20
2. Djokovic-18
Federer and Nadal are tied with Djokovic a mere two majors away. Because of youth and injury it looks like Nadal and Djokovic may both finish ahead of Federer when all is said and done but you never know.
Percentage of Grand Slams Won
1. Nadal-32.8%
2. Djokovic-28.6%
3. Federer-25.3%
Nadal is ahead here mainly because of his superhuman ownership of the French Open. He has won the French 13 times in 16 attempts. Nadal was injured in 2016 and had to withdraw before the third round.
People have held as a negative against Nadal that many of his majors came in one tournament but that to me seems unfair because he’s won all four majors and has been in the finals of the Australian four times, losing to Djokovic each time. You could also say a good percentage of Djokovic’s majors are in the Australian Open. It is same thing with Federer with Wimbledon. The main thing to realize is these greats are unbelievable on all surfaces or else they would not have accomplished everything they have done in tennis.
Years at World No. 1
1. Djokovic-6
2. Federer and Nadal-5
Djokovic is tops in this important category among the Big 3 and tied with Pete Sampras overall in the Open Era. Federer and Nadal are both close behind at five.
Big 3 Rivalry Records
Djokovic is 27-23 vs Federer and 29-27 vs Nadal
Nadal is 27-29 against Djokovic and 24-16 against Federer
Federer is 23-27 against Djokovic and 16-24 against Nadal
It seems if we look at just ATP total points, Novak Djokovic may very well be the GOAT of the Open Era.
Djokovic’s consistency over the years to go deep into any top tournament even if he doesn’t win it is just inhuman.
Perhaps Djokovic’s greatest feat is holding all four majors at the same time in 2015-2016! Just a stunning achievement. He even had the nerve to beat Nadal at the French in 2015 although he lost to Warwinka in the final. Beating Nadal at the French and not winning the French Open doesn’t seem fair, but that’s tennis.
I think do if they had the same ranking system in the past that some great players Tilden, Kramer, Gonzalez, Laver, Borg, Lendl, Connors, McEnroe and Vines among others could have challenged some of these point records but nevertheless it would be tough for even a super player.
In the old traditional categories Djokovic is very close or ahead of Federer and Nadal so it seems probable he will surpass both rivals.
As far as total ATP points are concerned Djokovic has been great as far as tournament performance is concerned in recent years so it seems like he may pull even further ahead.
Nadal still may very well end up with the most majors because he has always a threat in any major and about a sure a bet as can be in the French Open every year.
Federer had years that it seemed like he would never lose and even when he lost it took a player in the zone like Marat Safin in the 2005 Australian Open to beat Federer in the fifth set 9-7 in one of the finest matches I have ever seen.
You can make a sound argument that besides being the GOAT that Federer at his peak was the highest level ever but you can also say that about Djokovic, Nadal and a few others.
Has any period in tennis history ever had three players of this magnitude playing at the same time at top level? I really cannot think of any period in tennis history where this has happened besides in recent years.
I can see two potential GOATs at their peak during the early 1950s with Jack Kramer and Pancho Gonzalez but that’s just two players. In the mid-1930s to late 1930s they had Vines, Budge and Perry playing but Vines was often hurt and getting tired of tennis. Perry was hurt and Budge dominated. If they all were healthy and willing to play that’s a possibility. Still that never happened.
We’re very lucky to live in the Big 3 era. So many of their clashes are legendary matches. I’m not sure if we will ever see an era like this again—let’s enjoy it while we can.
Raymond Lee is a Tennis Now contributing writer and tennis historian who lives in New York. He has written about tennis for decades serving as a contributing writer for Tennis Week Magazine and TennisWeek.com.