re: The Official 2012 Wimbledon Daily Thread

quote:

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I'm betting that most of you are too young to have seen Martina in her prime. She revolutionized the game. Not only did she bring power to the women's game, she brought a bit of finesse as well. She could trade power backhands or passing shots with the best of them. She could dial up an ace pretty much at will. Also, there was no player in her era who could match her at the net.

I'll take Martina in her prime against anyone.

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I'll take Graf over Martina.

Fact: Women's tennis back in the day used to be really really bad. There was no depth. There was anti-depth. Until the early 90s women's tennis consisted of one or two players at any given time who could hit something other than a moonball. I'm not even exagerrating. Pull up an old youtube clip.

I'll give credit to Martina for changing the game. She brought power and aggressive play to the game when all the other girls on the tour except Evert were hitting goddamn moonballs. But that's also the reason she was so dominant. There was only one other player that was worth her weight in dogshit and that was Chris Evert. Once Martina established herself as better than Evert, every title was hers.

Steffi, who btw was beating Martina in Majors when Martina was still in her prime (but at the tail end) and Steffi was 17, dominated in an era where more than two players actually had the ability to hit the ball over 45 miles per hour.*

Also, Steffi was an all-around better athlete than Martina and a more versatile player.


*And this progression has continued. Every subsequent era in women's tennis has been better than the one before. This isnt' surprising. More girls are playing the game at a young age. For example, apparently every Russian and Eastern European girl and their goddamn cousins are given a standard issue government racquet at age 4 and told to hit the courts. I'm making a joke, but there is some truth to it as well. The game that Serena has been dominated has more depth than the game when Steffi dominated, and much much much more depth than when Martina dominated.