OT: Djoker Becomes Undisputed GOAT

[Hellcrooner]

Salty much ?

If you think Djokovic is about doping, you can say the same about Nadal, you know...

If nadal took the syringe now he wouldnt be dragging his ass on the court looking like a scrub.

So to put into basketball terms..

It's safe to assume Lebron is doping because otherwise he wouldn't be moving the way he does. You know like every other 40 year old that has ever played.. Right?

You can count on it.

But in this case you can count on MJ doing it too.

Or wilt/russell.


From the goat Basket players ever i would only confide in Bird and MAgic not doing it, hence why the lack of durability and their "dude tat chugs beer at home" body frame.

[ForeverTFC]

The truth is that you can't have like 6 or 7 GOAT's in one era no matter how superior you believe your era to be... doesn't make sense that we could evolve so much in even one decade.

Not here to argue Novak, but overall, isn’t it interesting? GOATs, GOATs everywhere!!!

Recency bias out there much?

If everything’s so much better and natural evolution and all, shouldn’t that athlete’s competition theoretically be just as difficult to overcome compared to predecessors and their own generation? Meaning each relative to their own era. It’s supposed to be the hardest it’s ever been now, yet athletes are breaking all-time records left and right?

Hmmm. What a time to be alive when there’s “coincidentally” GOATs all over the place.

The modern history of sports is what, 40-50 years old at this point? You're shocked that a large share of Sports have seen their GOATs emerge in the last decade or two? Why would that be surprising? That's 25%-50% of the sample.

The record breaking is also not a "gotcha". Totally reasonable to believe that the median skill level has increased but the tail has gotten both better and elongated.

[LightTheBeam]

If nadal took the syringe now he wouldnt be dragging his ass on the court looking like a scrub.

So to put into basketball terms..

It's safe to assume Lebron is doping because otherwise he wouldn't be moving the way he does. You know like every other 40 year old that has ever played.. Right?

You can count on it.

But in this case you can count on MJ doing it too.

Or wilt/russell.


From the goat Basket players ever i would only confide in Bird and MAgic not doing it, hence why the lack of durability and their "dude tat chugs beer at home" body frame.

As long as you keep the same standard I'm okay with it.

I'll disagree about Jordan. He essentially retired at age 34, when he returned in his late 30's he had clearly taken huge steps back physically, didn't look close to the same guy. Not a comparison to what we are seeing from Lebron with almost no physical drop off from early 30s to now.

[dhsilv2]

If nadal took the syringe now he wouldnt be dragging his ass on the court looking like a scrub.

So to put into basketball terms..

It's safe to assume Lebron is doping because otherwise he wouldn't be moving the way he does. You know like every other 40 year old that has ever played.. Right?

You can count on it.

But in this case you can count on MJ doing it too.

Or wilt/russell.


From the goat Basket players ever i would only confide in Bird and MAgic not doing it, hence why the lack of durability and their "dude tat chugs beer at home" body frame.

Steroids don't prevent or cure major back injuries or HIV. They may or may not have used something but their lack of longevity isn't an argument either way.

[dhsilv2]

The truth is that you can't have like 6 or 7 GOAT's in one era no matter how superior you believe your era to be... doesn't make sense that we could evolve so much in even one decade.

Not here to argue Novak, but overall, isn’t it interesting? GOATs, GOATs everywhere!!!

Recency bias out there much?

If everything’s so much better and natural evolution and all, shouldn’t that athlete’s competition theoretically be just as difficult to overcome compared to predecessors and their own generation? Meaning each relative to their own era. It’s supposed to be the hardest it’s ever been now, yet athletes are breaking all-time records left and right?

Hmmm. What a time to be alive when there’s “coincidentally” GOATs all over the place.

The modern history of sports is what, 40-50 years old at this point? You're shocked that a large share of Sports have seen their GOATs emerge in the last decade or two? Why would that be surprising? That's 25%-50% of the sample.

The record breaking is also not a "gotcha". Totally reasonable to believe that the median skill level has increased but the tail has gotten both better and elongated.

Forgetting just the tails stuff. More people and more teams in most sports. I do however sometimes wonder if despite tennis advancing with tools and technical skills...it feels like less people are competitive. And that does for sure give me pause and make me wonder. It's the only sport I follow to any degree that seems to have this issue.

[dhsilv2]

So to put into basketball terms..

It's safe to assume Lebron is doping because otherwise he wouldn't be moving the way he does. You know like every other 40 year old that has ever played.. Right?

You can count on it.

But in this case you can count on MJ doing it too.

Or wilt/russell.


From the goat Basket players ever i would only confide in Bird and MAgic not doing it, hence why the lack of durability and their "dude tat chugs beer at home" body frame.

As long as you keep the same standard I'm okay with it.

I'll disagree about Jordan. He essentially retired at age 34, when he returned in his late 30's he had clearly taken huge steps back physically, didn't look close to the same guy. Not a comparison to what we are seeing from Lebron with almost no physical drop off from early 30s to now.

Jordan is a pretty easy and fairly obvious PED user. Given when he played and his body mass increases at the end of the 80's to early 90's. Not sure why people care though.

[Doctor MJ]

I do however sometimes wonder if despite tennis advancing with tools and technical skills...it feels like less people are competitive. And that does for sure give me pause and make me wonder. It's the only sport I follow to any degree that seems to have this issue.

So I think of young tennis pros as essentially start-up companies. It takes a lot of money to compete on a world tour, and this leads to teenagers having a certain amount of time to start going deep into pro tournaments before sponsors abandon them.

Some will make it of course, but there's "making it" and then there's competing with the ultra-rich pros who pay for every type of support that money can buy and have people who have been working with them for years cultivating what's working for them. It's not a fair fight.

This stands in contrast to team sports where the team is paying for player development, and tends to devote more resources to their young prospects than to veterans. What the LeBrons of the world spend on themselves of course dwarfs that still - so there's an advantage in basketball just as there is in tennis - but if you're a top basketball prospect you don't really have to worry about self-funding the same way as a young tennis pro.

So yeah I'd say: I expect there will be an increasing long-term oligarchical rule of top veterans in all sports where training allows such healthy maintenance, but that we'll generally see it more extreme in individual sports.

And note that in this case "individual sports" are any sport where a player performs individually even if they are grouped into a team.

[Impuniti]

undisputed my ass.

He is behind Nadal and federer.

he has only taken advantage of the other two being older and with poor health that made them miss a lot gs.

I wouldn't say poor health. Djoker is moreso the exception for being able to play at such a high level despite the age. What happened to Federer and Nadal is completely normal and the standard.

[Doctor MJ]

So to put into basketball terms..

It's safe to assume Lebron is doping because otherwise he wouldn't be moving the way he does. You know like every other 40 year old that has ever played.. Right?

You can count on it.

But in this case you can count on MJ doing it too.

Or wilt/russell.


From the goat Basket players ever i would only confide in Bird and MAgic not doing it, hence why the lack of durability and their "dude tat chugs beer at home" body frame.

Steroids don't prevent or cure major back injuries or HIV. They may or may not have used something but their lack of longevity isn't an argument either way.

Thank you for pointing this out.

Back before the Balco scandal, the theory was always that the reason why steroids needed to be illegal is that they'd help you in the short-term but hurt you in the long-term, where long-term meant both a) shorten the tail end of your career, and b) cause health problems that would likely shorten your life.

So when we now have people talking about steroids as if they give you longevity, I think people need to question steroids as a magic-bullet explanation for what's happening.

Now of course people are using terms like "doping" and "juicing" and might say they mean this to be a broader category than just steroids, but I think the important question here is:

Are they using anything that's illegal in their sport?

It goes without saying that there a bunch of things going on that are helping players to have better longevity nowadays, and that's something we should consider when doing cross-era analysis. But that doesn't mean the players are in any way "cheating". They might be sure, but they ain't breaking a specific rule, then it ain't cheating.

And what about the possibility of cheating done sneakily enough that it isn't detected?

I'd say by and large such techniques put a ceiling on how hard you can cheat. So yeah, it's possible that steroid use never stopped in sports, but to the extent we have specific chemicals we're testing for, athletes are limiting their cheating to within boundaries in order to keep from getting caught.

And y'know what? That's good enough for me. Make the best tests you can, work to prevent athletes from doing things that are extremely harmful to their body, but beyond a certain point, if there's nothing more you can realistically do, I'm not worried about it.

Also incidentally for those who feel like people are likely cheating just as well as they always did, I think it eye-opening to look at women's track & field records in the Olympics. Basically, if you didn't know anything about steroid-based cheating, you'd assume that the human female peaked in the '80s, which is ridiculous. Clearly if sprinters are continuing to cheat today, they are doing so less effectively than they did 40 years ago despite vastly superior technology.

[QPR]

He already was the greatest male player but he'll never be loved like Fed and Nadal were and you know it kills him

The funny thing is, he was a goof ball early on, constantly clowning around, was a way more interesting personality than Federer or Nadal. I'm sure the passion to win was always there, but he was a genuinely fun dude at the same time.

Then I think he got a little cynical and overly serious, probably with some of the controversies he's had. So now he's boring and seen as kind of a douche, and he never got that admiration that Federer or Nadal did.

He also had a reputation for quitting/retiring when matches got tough when he was younger.

[NBA4Lyfe]

djokovic> lebron

sorry its the truth

[rzzzzz]

I can’t believe Federer lost to djokovic in 2019 Wimbledon finals with 2 match points on serve. If he won that, it would’ve been like Jordan’s game 6 1998 legendary farewell moment. Djokovic would still have more slams but the argument would’ve been there for Fed but with that L, it’s hard to go against djokovic as the goat with his accolades.

He actually had match points on his serve at two different times that day. He also had two match points on his serve against Joker at a US Open. The first, Joker made an incredible return off a killer serve. The 2nd, he served and volleyed and had an easy put away at net that he pushed out of bounds. In truth, Federer had a habit of sometimes getting a little careless at the end of matches, but was so superior it hardly ever cost him. Whereas Djokovic has a habit of hanging in really tough down the stretch.

[dhsilv2]

You can count on it.

But in this case you can count on MJ doing it too.

Or wilt/russell.


From the goat Basket players ever i would only confide in Bird and MAgic not doing it, hence why the lack of durability and their "dude tat chugs beer at home" body frame.

Steroids don't prevent or cure major back injuries or HIV. They may or may not have used something but their lack of longevity isn't an argument either way.

Thank you for pointing this out.

Back before the Balco scandal, the theory was always that the reason why steroids needed to be illegal is that they'd help you in the short-term but hurt you in the long-term, where long-term meant both a) shorten the tail end of your career, and b) cause health problems that would likely shorten your life.

So when we now have people talking about steroids as if they give you longevity, I think people need to question steroids as a magic-bullet explanation for what's happening.

Now of course people are using terms like "doping" and "juicing" and might say they mean this to be a broader category than just steroids, but I think the important question here is:

Are they using anything that's illegal in their sport?

It goes without saying that there a bunch of things going on that are helping players to have better longevity nowadays, and that's something we should consider when doing cross-era analysis. But that doesn't mean the players are in any way "cheating". They might be sure, but they ain't breaking a specific rule, then it ain't cheating.

And what about the possibility of cheating done sneakily enough that it isn't detected?

I'd say by and large such techniques put a ceiling on how hard you can cheat. So yeah, it's possible that steroid use never stopped in sports, but to the extent we have specific chemicals we're testing for, athletes are limiting their cheating to within boundaries in order to keep from getting caught.

And y'know what? That's good enough for me. Make the best tests you can, work to prevent athletes from doing things that are extremely harmful to their body, but beyond a certain point, if there's nothing more you can realistically do, I'm not worried about it.

Also incidentally for those who feel like people are likely cheating just as well as they always did, I think it eye-opening to look at women's track & field records in the Olympics. Basically, if you didn't know anything about steroid-based cheating, you'd assume that the human female peaked in the '80s, which is ridiculous. Clearly if sprinters are continuing to cheat today, they are doing so less effectively than they did 40 years ago despite vastly superior technology.

We should note a few things.

Steroids or other drugs like that will keep your test levels high. This absolutely has some "anti aging" effects in terms of athletic performance.

Steroids also can make you strong enough to actually rip your muscles and tendons off your own bones doing explosive actions...something we do seem to see more of these days.

But I for example have a good friend in his mid to late 40's who is also around his all time strongest. He's using a fairly healthy dose of gear. But he's been able to stay in the gym not because of that but because back injuries he had were resolved by cutting into him and removing bone fragments from his spinal disks and freeing up nerves that were being pinched....the surgery left a mark the size of a quarter DAYS after. 15-25 years ago that's someone cutting him open so they can get a chisel in there. The gear has allowed him to get stronger when most men are losing their test levels. But medical science is why he can walk without pain pills and even get through the day in the first place. Let alone go to the gym.

But to your point, the advances in medical science DWARF our advances in drugs. Almost any real advancements today on drugs are to hide them from testers. The world of performance enhancing drugs just isn't being advanced that fast. There isn't money in it with it being illegal in most contexts. Training, diet, and medical assistance is where we're advancing. Drugs are still around and I think most athletes use, will use, or have used them. But while they work...they aren't making you unbreakable. They might make you more breakable.

[MVP1992]

I'm not a fan of the GOAT thing.
I'd prefer to look at their generation or era.

I have Federa and Djoker sharing the honour.

But, take out the covid jab nonsense bans, and Djoker likely has 1 or 2 extra slams to his name.

[12footrim]

undisputed my ass.

He is behind Nadal and federer.

he has only taken advantage of the other two being older and with poor health that made them miss a lot gs.

This debate has been over for a while. At this point it's not even really close, he has the higher peak elo, he has the head to heads, he won all his in the era when Nadal and Federer were already established as hall of famers and he eventually outshined them even as Nadal is basically the same age and falling apart now. His game easily translates to the most surfaces and he's still beating the 21 year old up and comer that already has 4 major's himself at the age of 37 and still owns the 4-3 head to head with a future all time great. He's got it all.

https://theresourcenexus.com/best-tennis-players-all-time/

[Wingy]

The truth is that you can't have like 6 or 7 GOAT's in one era no matter how superior you believe your era to be... doesn't make sense that we could evolve so much in even one decade.

Not here to argue Novak, but overall, isn’t it interesting? GOATs, GOATs everywhere!!!

Recency bias out there much?

If everything’s so much better and natural evolution and all, shouldn’t that athlete’s competition theoretically be just as difficult to overcome compared to predecessors and their own generation? Meaning each relative to their own era. It’s supposed to be the hardest it’s ever been now, yet athletes are breaking all-time records left and right?

Hmmm. What a time to be alive when there’s “coincidentally” GOATs all over the place.

The modern history of sports is what, 40-50 years old at this point? You're shocked that a large share of Sports have seen their GOATs emerge in the last decade or two? Why would that be surprising? That's 25%-50% of the sample.

The record breaking is also not a "gotcha". Totally reasonable to believe that the median skill level has increased but the tail has gotten both better and elongated.

That’s not shock, it’s just sarcasm.

Why is it totally reasonable re: the tail? Seems like complete conjecture.

Some simply are the greatest, but I’ve heard frequently -

Biles (active)
Bolt (r. 2017)
Brady (r. 2023) [and we know damn well people are ready to crown Mahomes, esp if Chiefs win this year]
Kohei* (r. 2022)
Lebron (active)
Ledecky (active)
Marta (active - women’s soccer)
Messi (active)
Novak (active)
Phelps (r. 2016)
Serena (r. 2022)
Tiger (active)
Taurasi (active)

*apparently there’s a men’s gymnast I’ve never heard of that some say is their GOAT. I only searched because I figured you’d say I conveniently cherry picked Biles and left out men’s gymnastics, but look…another GOAT!!

So what’s that leave from athletes that didn’t just finish their career, and people actually give a damn about the sport??

- Gretzky
- Whoever baseball is? (yet the GOAT topic’s already coming up about Ohtani!)
- Whoever the best women’s golfer is?

So even drawing your “modern era,” 25-50% line [that doesn’t even consider the likes of Bill Russell, Willie Mays, Babe Ruth], that’s what? Some 80+% of the GOATs are active, or retired within the last 8 years?

Most of them are active, with the retired having done so mostly within the last 2 years, and the remaining 2 retiring within the last 7-8 years.

Seems a little too coincidental, and that humanity’s recency bias weighs heavily into these greatest proclamations.

[LuckyAC]

Not here to argue Novak, but overall, isn’t it interesting? GOATs, GOATs everywhere!!!

Recency bias out there much?

If everything’s so much better and natural evolution and all, shouldn’t that athlete’s competition theoretically be just as difficult to overcome compared to predecessors and their own generation? Meaning each relative to their own era. It’s supposed to be the hardest it’s ever been now, yet athletes are breaking all-time records left and right?

Hmmm. What a time to be alive when there’s “coincidentally” GOATs all over the place.

The modern history of sports is what, 40-50 years old at this point? You're shocked that a large share of Sports have seen their GOATs emerge in the last decade or two? Why would that be surprising? That's 25%-50% of the sample.

The record breaking is also not a "gotcha". Totally reasonable to believe that the median skill level has increased but the tail has gotten both better and elongated.

That’s not shock, it’s just sarcasm.

Why is it totally reasonable re: the tail? Seems like complete conjecture.

Some simply are the greatest, but I’ve heard frequently -

Biles (active)
Bolt (r. 2017)
Brady (r. 2023) [and we know damn well people are ready to crown Mahomes, esp if Chiefs win this year]
Kohei* (r. 2022)
Lebron (active)
Ledecky (active)
Marta (active - women’s soccer)
Messi (active)
Novak (active)
Phelps (r. 2016)
Serena (r. 2022)
Tiger (active)
Taurasi (active)

*apparently there’s a men’s gymnast I’ve never heard of that some say is their GOAT. I only searched because I figured you’d say I conveniently cherry picked Biles and left out men’s gymnastics, but look…another GOAT!!

So what’s that leave from athletes that didn’t just finish their career, and people actually give a damn about the sport??

- Gretzky
- Whoever baseball is? (yet the GOAT topic’s already coming up about Ohtani!)
- Whoever the best women’s golfer is?

So even drawing your “modern era,” 25-50% line [that doesn’t even consider the likes of Bill Russell, Willie Mays, Babe Ruth], that’s what? Some 80+% of the GOATs are active, or retired within the last 8 years?

Most of them are active, with the retired having done so mostly within the last 2 years, and the remaining 2 retiring within the last 7-8 years.

Seems a little too coincidental, and that humanity’s recency bias weighs heavily into these greatest proclamations.

Tennis became a professional sport in 1968, Djokovic started his career in 2004, 36 years later (and has played for 20 years). So actually the GOAT arrived only 64% through pro tennis history. Federer started in 1998, only 53.5% through pro tennis history.

[Hellcrooner]

GS FINALS ( the ones that matter)

GOLD : Nadal 30 finals 22 won = 73,33%
SILVER: Djokovic 37 finals 24 wom = 64,86 %
BRONZE: Federer 31 finals 20 won = 64,51 %


How did they win their finals.

GOLD : Nadal vs a big three member 11 of them, against "scrubs" 11 of them he won 50% of his titles vs big three
Silver : Djokovic vs a big three member 8 of them, against "scrubs 16 of them he won 33% vs big three members
Bronze: Federer vs a big three member won 4 against " scrubs" 16 of them so he only won 16% vs big three members


finals lost vs scrubs=

GOLD: nadal NEVER LOST A GS FINAL VS A " SCRUB"
SIlVER: Federer he only lost ONCE vs a " scrub"
Bronce: Djokovic he lost EIGHT F TIMES vs " scrubs"



So, keep repeating stupid mantras

Goat, my ass

undisputed? My Ass


He is the WORST of the three all thigns considered.

[Rust_Cohle]

GS FINALS ( the ones that matter)

GOLD : Nadal 30 finals 22 won = 73,33%
SILVER: Djokovic 37 finals 24 wom = 64,86 %
BRONZE: Federer 31 finals 20 won = 64,51 %


How did they win their finals.

GOLD : Nadal vs a big three member 11 of them, against "scrubs" 11 of them he won 50% of his titles vs big three
Silver : Djokovic vs a big three member 8 of them, against "scrubs 16 of them he won 33% vs big three members
Bronze: Federer vs a big three member won 4 against " scrubs" 16 of them so he only won 16% vs big three members


finals lost vs scrubs=

GOLD: nadal NEVER LOST A GS FINAL VS A " SCRUB"
SIlVER: Federer he only lost ONCE vs a " scrub"
Bronce: Djokovic he lost EIGHT F TIMES vs " scrubs"



So, keep repeating stupid mantras

Goat, my ass

undisputed? My Ass


He is the WORST of the three all thigns considered.

What a dumbass take. He has a superior head to head vs nadal and Federer. Hell, nadal hasn’t beaten Djokovic on a non clay surface since 2013. Oof

Novak was the GOAT long before his gold medal. You’d have to be a casual at this point to think otherwise.

[Rust_Cohle]

:wink:

Upon defeating Carlos Alcaraz in a thrilling 2-set Olympic Final, Novak Djoković secured both the gold and his status as the objective GOAT of tennis.

Record 24 Gland Slams
Only player to complete triple Career Grand Slam
Record 40 ATP Tour Masters
Only player to complete Career Golden Masters, which he has done twice
Superior Head-to-head record against every other contender
Olympic gold medal in Men’s Singles



May the doubt rest in peace.

Maybe but honestly the thing that will always hold him back is the “it” factor and he trails them by a wide, wide margin.

His play style is also very boring. No style points. Not as many signature matches. Reputation early in his career as a quitter.

Nah, that’s a ridiculous take. Some of the most epic matches ever had Djokovic. He was beyond brilliant to watch tactically, he was marching Alacaraz at 37 with just as many insane jaw dropping shots