Is Federer's Era Better Than Sampras's ?

Roger Federer- the Swiss maestro with 15 Grand Slams arguably the greatest man ever to have swung the tennis racket. Federer has done everything now hasn’t he? To be true he has! He has the most Grand slams, the no.1 title, the career slam, the total prize money—what ever you name it Federer has it.

Now Pete Sampras, the tall American whose record of 14 grand slams were broken two weeks ago—he was no less either. Sampras had the consistency, the cool, the lethal eye which dismantled his opponents even before they took guard.

Now Comparison in Tennis is Unfair but its unavoidable. How can you find out who is better if you don’t compare?

According to me the Cool American still is better than the classy Swiss. I don’t know why. Although I’m a very big Federer fan, I don’t see Federer better than Sampras.

When you just look back 12-13 years ago, to refresh the then top 10 ATP players were Sampras, Chang, Kafelnikov, Ivanisevic, Muster, Becker, Krajicek, Agassi, Enqvist and Ferreira. May be you wont agree on this but I see six to seven hall of famers in this very list.

When we look at this week’s top 10, it's Federer, Nadal, Murray, Djokovic, Del Porto, Roddick, Simon, Tsonga, Verdasco and Gonzalez. Only Federer, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray will go into the Hall of fame. May be Roddick if he continues to show what he did in Wimbledon.

If you say the competition is tougher now, then you are saying that Tsonga and Simon go into the hall of fame? Even if they won a Slam are they really worthy players?

Let me ask you this then, of the current Top 10, how many of them would have been in the 1996 year-end Top 10? In my mind it would be Federer probably at No. 1, Nadal at No. 3 and Murray at eight or nine.

But if you think Roger’s facing stiffer competition, then again you got more current guys in there than guys from 1996. So then explain how Del Potro  is better than Muster, how Tsonga is better than Kafelnikov,  Gonzalez better than Ivanisevic  or even Roddick better than Krajicek. Does Verdasco really kill Chang at the French? Or Gonzalez kill Becker at the US Open? I don’t see it, but apparently many of you guys do.

Meanwhile back in the day, Pete was dealing a lot more with guys who won Slams. Guys who knew how to win. The only guys Roger deals with that mentality are Rafa, Andy, Novak and the other Andy , with the last two mentally Unstable.

As for the argument players are strong and fitter now, well, they are. So what. I play tennis and if I worked out 8 hours a day two straight months It doesn’t automatically make me a better tennis player, or golfer or basketball player. Maybe I can run quicker and/or hit the ball harder, but that doesn’t mean I’ll be a better tennis player, does it? Sure it will help, it should, but it’s no guarantee. I’m not going to volley better, or hit my backhand crisper or return better. So I’m not totally buying that argument.

And I also don’t buy that players have more variety now. If they do, tell me how the current Top 10 has more variety than the Top 10 of 1996. In 1996 I see three guys who did the serve/volley pretty well in Sampras, Becker and Krajicek, and another in Kafelnikov who definitely knew a thing or two about volleying. But you Fed freaks claim the current crop is more skilled and has more variety? Well, show me, because I don’t see three guys let alone two that have the skills of the boys 10 years ago. But I must be wrong.

I’ve also heard the “Pete couldn’t play on clay” argument. I’m down with that, he was nothing special on the dirt. But the guy did have some nuts. Let me ask you Fed freaks this, how many former French champs has Roger beaten at Roland Garros. Answer: One, that being Carlos Moya. At the 1996 French Open, Pete beat Bruguera and Courier – both former French champs—in five sets. Bruguera by the way also reached the French final the following year. Not bad.

Never take any credit away from the Swiss master. He has done everything as I mentioned. He is a better player in Clay and Hard courts than Sampras. But the early part of his career was kind of a cake walk. He never had any competition before his nemesis Rafa Nadal came along. He won like eight to nine grand slams without any kind of upsets. His only competitions were the uncool Marat Safin and the big serving Andy Roddick, who knew only to serve then.

But Sampras had to fight for every single victory. Victory or defeat he stood there smiling and waiting.

Roger Federer will the Greatest of All Time one day but its not now. The guy still has four to five years to go. By the end he will have at least 20 Grand slams and hopefully a better Head to Head record against Nadal but its not time now!

The bottom line is “Victory came towards Federer but Sampras ran towards it”