The French Open and Roger Federer: Greatest Player Ever...?

The US tennis media has always referred to Pete Sampras as the greatest tennis player due to his 14 major singles titles with little discussion of the fact that he never won the French Open.  

The US tennis media dismisses this all important fact with the rationale that somehow red clay is a "gimmick" surface or an anomaly of a surface when in fact it is a common surface found in Europe and South America.

One of the reasons for this bias is that Americans grow up with the game that is primarily played on fast surfaces with limited exposure to clay courts (and that any exposure is to green clay, not red).

There is no doubt the style of play is different on the red clay thus it takes a truly great, all around player to win on grass at Wimbledon, hard courts at the US Open and Australian Open, and the red clay at the French Open.

Pete Sampras is not and never was the greatest player ever because he could not win on the red clay at Roland Garros.  I always admired Andre Agassi more than Sampras because Agassi did win all four major titles in his career putting him in an exclusive group of players that includes Rod Laver and Roy Emerson.  

Laver won 11 major singles titles in his career which included winning each major at least twice.  Laver won six of those major titles before the Open era but overcame any doubts as to his place in history by winning each major at least once during the Open era.

Emerson won 12 major singles titles and also won each major at least twice but all occurred before the Open era.

Laver's and Emerson's great accomplishments occurred during the golden era of Australian tennis which included their fellow countrymen Ken Rosewall, Tony Roache, John Newcombe, Neale Fraser, and Fred Stolle who themselves combined won 26 major singles titles.

Given these facts, Pete Sampras should never have been anointed the greatest player ever which brings me to Roger Federer.  The US tennis media measures Roger Federer by what Pete Sampras did.  

If Federer ultimately wins the French Open this weekend, he does not become the greatest player ever because he will have tied Pete Sampras' record of 14 major singles titles.  

Rather, he could be called the greatest player ever because he will have won more major singles titles than any other player in the group of players that has won all four majors in their careers.

Nonetheless, the fact that Rod Laver won the Grand Slam twice—in 1962 and in 1969—makes Federer vs. Laver a most interesting debate of the greatest men's tennis player ever if Federer wins in Paris this weekend.