Robbie Koenig - The best tennis commentator!

He knows his tennis. He is very instructive and doesn't worship the players like others do. He is not big headed like past champions can be (obviiously he can't with his poor record) but more importantly he is spot on when talking about the various parameters of the games and how it affects players.

If you want to get updated on tennis latest techniques, he is the guy to listen.

I like McEnroe, Henman (actually!), Becker, Cash (more recently), David Mercer, ...but none are as good as my Robbie.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbie_Koenig

I must say I have a soft spot for Boris, His unfunny German sense of humour cracks me up every time!
Robbie has had a lot of worship moments in the past, he is always safe on the bandwaggon, kicked Novak a lot in the past.

I really enjoy listening to Peter Flemming. Knows his stuff. Articulate, funny, not scared to say what he thinks and also has some interesting stories to tell about "the good old days".

I thought his commentary was bit amateurish. During Fed-Monaco match he was saying that lower ranked players lack bottle???? Is this how you do a commentary on TV?

1 comment doesn't make a commentator.

hawkeye wrote:1 comment doesn't make a commentator.

Then please enllighten me and recite some intelligent statements of Mr Koening.

Sorry I was defending Flemming...

hawkeye wrote:Sorry I was defending Flemming...

Sorry my fault too

hawkeye wrote:I really enjoy listening to Peter Flemming. Knows his stuff. Articulate, funny, not scared to say what he thinks and also has some interesting stories to tell about "the good old days".

I like Fleming too, partly I admit due to his accent, but I do think he knows his stuff. The US Open coverage always entertains me when he gets sent up in to the clouds on Arthur Ashe, for reasons I've not been able to fathom. He also seems to avoid the tendency to praise whoever is winning to the hilt and can maintain some perspective.

wow wrote:I thought his commentary was bit amateurish. During Fed-Monaco match he was saying that lower ranked players lack bottle???? Is this how you do a commentary on TV?

That wasn't Robbie saying that. Robbie commented at the beginning but left half way through that match. The other guy said that.....though the comment is still a valid one.

I don;t know Flemming much but when I listened to him once, he seemed stuck in the past and was saying wrong things such as Borg was faster than today's players!!!

All i can say is that Jan Siemerink is the best Dutch commentator

tenez - quite a few people actually say that borg was the fastest player ever to grace a tennis court. For one, mcenroe (i know he may say it as he played him) and i remember when wimby had a rain delay i think in 07 they talked about borg's speed after showing the '80 final montage and becker and lloyd said not even nadal was as fast as the swede. here are some clips you may or may not have seen but it shows he was lightning!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMfBpkUJeKE , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL__OcegrbY&feature=related

Also i think that the most complete commentators are koenig and goodall who are very knowledgable with very inciteful comments and then koenig also adding in great sayings such as 'someone call 911... federer has got out of jail'! I luv mcenroe, fleming says 'oh yes' over and over :P none of the other brits are that good imo

Yes Goodall seems pretty good too! from the little I heard.

Borg was the fastest of his time and had a great footwork. But you cannot compare him with today's players.

Even McEnroe said in 84, just 4 years after the famous Wimby 1980 final that when he wacthed it again it felt like "we were playing in slo-mo"!

The game moves on.

Every year at Wimbledon I hope they will put McEnroe and Flemming in the commentary box together. As far as I'm aware it has never happened. McEnroe gets centre court and Flemming gets put on the red button somewhere... I wouldn't even care what match they were covering.

Tenez - but why can you not compare him with todays players? Mcenroe said back in 80 that borg could run the 100yard dash in 9.8 seconds (although this cant be proven). And by saying 'we were playing in slo mo' doesnt prove anything apart from the fact that the game itself was slower due to the rackets.
Borg said he never got tired in a match and that may have been due to the game being much slower but that doesn't mean that everyone back then was much slower and the game has moved on.
As the rackets are so much more powerful now he probs would have had to sprint a lot more in matches but i think he was one of if not the fastest player to play tennis with the likes of monfils, nadal, chang etc

LuvSports! wrote:Tenez - but why can you not compare him with todays players? Mcenroe said back in 80 that borg could run the 100yard dash in 9.8 seconds (although this cant be proven). And by saying 'we were playing in slo mo' doesnt prove anything apart from the fact that the game itself was slower due to the rackets.
Borg said he never got tired in a match and that may have been due to the game being much slower but that doesn't mean that everyone back then was much slower and the game has moved on.
As the rackets are so much more powerful now he probs would have had to sprint a lot more in matches but i think he was one of if not the fastest player to play tennis with the likes of monfils, nadal, chang etc

It's obvious. Lendl with a wooden racquet at 20 could hit through Borg on clay. Can you imagine hit through Chang, Hewitt, let alone Djoko and Nadal with a wooden racquet on clay?

are you just ignoring what i am saying completely? I have said my views and i think it deffo isnt obvious as many tennis pundits would disagree with you im out

LuvSports! wrote:Tenez - but why can you not compare him with todays players? Mcenroe said back in 80 that borg could run the 100yard dash in 9.8 seconds (although this cant be proven).

I'm sure I remember reading somewhere that Borg won his "Superstars" heat agaisnt other sports stars by quite a margin, but because of tennis commitments he was unable to continue.

As commentators, I like Wilander, Mc Enroe and Stich, they seem to tell it like it is even if it means upsetting some players.

in 1980 (Borgs peak time) the fastest 100m ever run at non altitude was 10.02s.

THat is about the 700th fastest time officially recorded. Bolts finishes roughly 5m ahead of this racer! That's a lot over a 100m.

The idea that McEnroe's volleys with his wooden racquet could be good enough to get past today's faster players is non sense. I don't care what some so-called pundits might say. It's teh proof they can come with teh most absurd comments.

Koenig won't say absurd things like that.
At best one can say Borg was the relatively fastest of all time. Meaning he was proportinally faster to his peers than any other faster player was. But even that is difficult to measure and unproven.

Is that fast by today's standard? Some prefer to believe pundits than their own eyes. No wonder our politicians have it easy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Appqh9a9yI

ok well that is bull as in 1968 jim hines ran 9.95 in mexico city and that stood for 15 years when calvin smith shaved 0.02 off this.
did you watch those two videos i showed you? You cannot just ignore that but as you clearly are what is the point of me saying anything as you seem to be firmly set in you're views and reject what many pundits have said, those men who have been immersed with the sport for most of their lives and know more about it than either of us

You are considering altitude records. They have an * next to them.

LuvSports! wrote:ok well that is bull as in 1968 jim hines ran 9.95 in mexico city and that stood for 15 years when calvin smith shaved 0.02 off this.
did you watch those two videos i showed you? You cannot just ignore that but as you clearly are what is the point of me saying anything as you seem to be firmly set in you're views and reject what many pundits have said, those men who have been immersed with the sport for most of their lives and know more about it than either of us

All those "pundits" say different things. But besides Flemming you won't find anyone saying that today's guys are slower than Borg.

The idea that a pundit knows better is absurd.

Some for instance say Federer plays better than ever others say he is past his peak. Who do you listen to?

Tenez wrote:All those "pundits" say different things. But besides Flemming you won't find anyone saying that today's guys are slower than Borg.

I am pretty sure Fleming was talking relatively, as we all do, otherwise discussions about greatest player, great achievements would all be moot given that the sport advances over time. Given that he played against Borg, and Borg was a lot quicker than the rest in his time, it is an understandable comment.

Have you heard of Gould's hypothesis?