Why is Djokovic so dominant?

First topic message reminder :

The difference between the Federer run and the Djokovic run (both mightily impressive) is that Federer did it with a style, panache and level of play that brought new fans into the sport in truckloads and got old heads talking all over again. Of course Federer kept it up for 4 years - Djokovic may yet do that - the opportunity is certainly there.

Federer, to quote Agassi, 'was the guy that came and took the game light years ahead'. Federer fans, and indeed tennis fans, will remember watching him play in those days simply to see what outrageous play he would produce next. It was magical.

Djokovic in contrast, aside from a good spell in the latter half of 2015, hasn't been all that special. If anyone has watched him this year, you'd note that he's looked far from magical. Most of his wins have been dull affairs. And that's not knocking him or his style. For me, he certainly has not been as brilliant as he was in the first half of 2011, yet, the form right now, which in terms of absolute level of play is similar to 2012 in my estimation, has won him numerous titles - easily. Ditto for the first half of last year - form wasn't anything special yet wracked up the titles.

Did anyone watch the Miami final ?- god awful tennis.
The IW tournament wasn't too hot either. He's laboured through the last three big tournaments in terms of form but has still won the titles and never looked in danger of losing. Clearly shows a huge gap at the top. The Raonic, Dimitrov generation is the worst since the late nineties (and much worse than that generation too). The next generation after that are too young to make an impact (or perhaps not good enough - since history shows that great players almost always make an early impact - we shall see) leaving the way clear for Djokovic to sweep up. The fact that Djokovic's main competition for the last 2 years has been an old Federer - who himself is still beating everyone else handily - is testament to the sad state of competition.

In essence he has become supremely dominant by just maintaining. Another aspect to this unprecedented dominance is the propensity of slow and medium paced courts which allow him to play the same game everywhere - the game that he's number one at. There's no need to adapt or change style. Even now, on a fast paced court (Dubai, Cincinatti) some players would have a decent chance against him but on the majority uniformly slowish courts, where defence and consistency determines the victor, the best defender in the game, invariably comes out on top.

So for me, impressive, as this run is in terms of results, the actual tennis has for large stretches been pretty uninspiring - and I guess that's reflected in the general uptake. Djokovic is not transcending his sport the way Federer (and he did even before the rivalry with Nadal had started) did. No one's talking about his accomplishments the way people did about Federer despite a 20 month spell that has been as dominant as any equally lengthy Federer span.



emancipator

It Must Be Love wrote:I would stop, but this debate is actually too amusing.  

Bogbrush wrote:Yes, it to reflects poorly on them to be losing out to such a senior player. It goes to show there's so little capacity amongst them to cope with him, but he does play a game they are not exposed to.

Emancipator wrote a long OP and some others, talking about various things as well as how Djokovic's competition for the past 2 years has been weaker (infact he said worst competition he'd ever seen).
You wrote a post saying you agreed with Emancipator and that it reflects very poorly on the rest of the tour that the biggest threat to the world number 1 is a guy who's 'nearly old enough to be on the seniors tour'.

Right there is this whole almost 300 post thread in a nutshell and what is important here. It is blatant hypocrisy and a 180 of a long argued position when Fed was dominating. Now that Djokovic is dominating we can look and discuss and critique competition levels as relevant. So we have gone from "there are no weak eras" to "you can't talk about competition level or your crazy" to "now that Djokovic is dominating well its down to weaker competition of course." In fact, what Emanci posits is more extreme than my position. He says that the last two years the competition Novak has faced has been the worst he has ever seen in his entire viewing life. And that is somehow functionally better than me having a few cracks at Empanada Dave or saying Roddick huffed about around the court like a pregnant and sweaty sow? How is that, you are saying the last two years it is the weakest competition ever, exactly the same thing that made me crazy for saying it about the early to mid 2000s.

Another flimsy argument is to use Federer being competitive now into his 30s as some sort of evidence. Early 2000's you had Agassi (even older) still competitive and Jimmy Connors was even older and still competitive reaching a slam semi in the early 90's so it is not wholly unusual to get a 30+ player remaining competitive especially ones regarded as legends. Players such as that remaining competitive until their 30's is evidence of nothing but as I say I am sure EVERYONE here knows there are fluctuations it is just that some cannot be man enough to admit it. socal believes the early 2000's was a spell of fluctuations (shall we say), others such as emancipator and BB are saying the same of the here and now and I'd say yes we are in a fluctuation downwards right now. So in essence we are in agreement here.

And before anyone flies off the handle what I am saying by no means denigrates any player's achievements. All any player can do is beat the opponents before them and to do that consistently even in times of less fervent opposition is still an achievement. Every players plays through fluctuation periods in tennis so everything evens out in the end.

Caledonian Craig wrote:Players such as that remaining competitive until their 30's is evidence of nothing but as I say I am sure EVERYONE here knows there are fluctuations it is just that some cannot be man enough to admit it. socal believes the early 2000's was a spell of fluctuations (shall we say), others such as emancipator and BB are saying the same of the here and now and I'd say yes we are in a fluctuation downwards right now. So in essence we are in agreement here.

Yes, I think that's a sensible stance to take, and I'm glad we agree.

Caledonian Craig wrote:Every players plays through fluctuation periods in tennis so everything evens out in the end.

Well it can even out, but it's not necessary that's the case. Sport is quite unpredictable, I don't think it follows neat patterns; for example it may be a long while before we can a new all time great playing at their peak, unless there's a huge shock from someone like Raonic.

If I could put it another way then I'd say it doesn't change how many slams players win. If a given player is in the cream of form then he'll beat whoever is put in front of him beit one of the very best players or a lesser rated players or shall we say less-in-form players. Winning is the ultimate mark of greatness.

Everything is subjective of course. I happen to think that even if the current crop were better than they already are, Djoko would simply up his game and stay dominant. He seems to play with something in reserve most of the time.

JuliusHMarx wrote:Everything is subjective of course. I happen to think that even if the current crop were better than they already are, Djoko would simply up his game and stay dominant. He seems to play with something in reserve most of the time.

Precisely. Winners will always find a way to get the job done more often than not. Even now, in a fluctuation period, it still takes some doing to churn out the wins avoiding off days and coming through sticky situations to win. Likewise the other greats of the game who could churn out wins like a conveyor belt.