From Just Hero to GOAT?

Yesterday, Roger Federer at last captured the most elusive title of his career: the French Open. His 6-1, 7-6, 6-4 victory over Robin Soderling came with deceptive ease (picture from the official site of Roland Garros), for the dominant performance stood in contrast to the difficult path Federer traveled just to reach his fourth consecutive French final. The previous three trips, of course, yielded bitter disappointment as he lost to Rafael Nadal by increasingly decisive margins. Thus, the obvious storyline in this long-awaited victory was Federer's completion of the so-called career Grand Slam--i.e., titles at the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon, and the U.S. Open.

Yet the larger story was also about Federer's place in tennis history. With this latest championship, he now has won 14 career Grand Slam titles, equalling Pete Sampras' mark for the most ever in men's tennis. This prompted, of course, immediate conversation in the sports media about whether or not Roger Federer should now be considered the GOAT: Greatest of All Time. I don't dispute the general premise of the debate. It is, after all, the kind of thing sports encourage. Moreover, I happen to think that Federer is the greatest singles player in men's history, even if I don't have the personal experience of having seen a player like Rod Laver play.

What is interesting to me here is that Federer's all-time greatness is presumed to pivot around yesterday's result. In other words, the mere accumulation of titles is viewed as the baseline (pun intended) by which we can compare players. This neglects several factors, of course, not least of which is that it fails to account for the depth of talent in the game at a given time and it does not include the consistency displayed by a player across tournaments, surfaces, and quality of competition. Let me illustrate by focusing on the most common comparison now made: Federer vs. Sampras.

They each have won 14 Grand Slam titles, and both are commonly associated with their dominance at Wimbledon. Sampras won 7 times at the All-England Club; thus far, Federer has won 5 times. An interesting footnote, of course, is that the only time the two played each other, Federer dethroned Sampras at Wimbledon in 2001, winning in a 5-set classic. Overall, Sampras won 64 career titles; thus far, Federer has 59. It is a very safe bet that he will surpass that mark.

Perhaps Sampras' greatest achievement in terms of consistency was that he finished every year from 1993 to 1998 as the number one ranked player in the world. Even Federer has not done that (he finished number one for four straight years, from 2004 to 2007). Yet Federer might counter with the astonishing feat of having reached 20 consecutive Grand Slam semifinals. That is a level of consistency, especially in this era of incredible depth, that is likely never to be duplicated.

All this said so far, one would be hard-pressed to make a claim that one player was better than the other. Thus, the tennis experts agreed, the difference is the French Open. The French was the nemesis of both men, they insisted, an unreachable goal that left each of their careers slightly incomplete. And here's where I (finally) get to the point of my analysis: that our relentless focus on victories and championships blinds us from more nuanced understandings of athletic achievement. For if you truly wish to use the French to compare Federer and Sampras, then it ends up being no contest at all.

Federer has now played in 11 French Open tournaments. Although he lost his debut to Patrick Rafter in 1999, he has since had considerable success at Roland Garros. After a 4-set loss to Nadal in the 2005 semifinal, Federer reached the final from 2006 to 2008 (again, each time losing to Nadal). All in all, prior to his 2009 title, Federer advanced to one quarterfinal, one semifinal, and three finals. Meanwhile, he has won multiple clay-court tournaments, including Masters Series events (the next level down from Grand Slams) at Hamburg, Madrid, Monte Carlo, and Rome. By any measure, this is a hugely successful history.

Sampras' clay-court history is decidedly less impressive. At his peak, he won a handful of clay-court tournaments, including Masters Series titles. Yet at the French, he never advanced beyond the semifinal. In 13 appearances, he reached three quarterfinals and just the one semifinal. Moreover, he lost in the first or second round eight times. In short, his accomplishments at Roland Garros are dwarfed by Federer's.

The point isn't to diminish Sampras' achievements. Rather, it is to spotlight how foolish it is to use Federer's victory yesterday as the determining factor in evaluating the difference between the two players. An athlete's career should be about more than simply counting the number of trophies (consider the current discussion about Kobe Bryant's place in NBA history based on whether or not he wins a title without Shaquille O' Neal as a similar conversation). Especially when evaluating a player of Federer's considerable stature, we should be able to appreciate the depth of his accomplishments.

So, is Roger Federer the GOAT? I think he is. I just don't think we needed yesterday's victory to prove it. Of course, before we reach any definitive conclusions, we may want to wait until we know more about Rafael Nadal's career...