Laver and Sampras are most widely accepted as the greatest tennis player of all-time. Who gets your vote?

POINT: "Sampras' stake as century's best is secure"
by Dan Jenkins

Pete Sampras is quoted as saying, on his official website at www. Sampras.com, "A nice guy playing good tennis. That's how I'd like to be remembered." It seems too modest of a statement for a winner of twelve Grand Slam singles titles (going for a record 13th as of press time.) It would be nice to see instead, "A nice guy playing the best tennis ever. That's how I'd like to be remembered." Well Pete, even though you didn't say it, I'll say it for you - Pete Sampras is undoubtably the century's best player, with rights to a truly un-matched resume.

Before going any further, let's pay respect where respect is due. Rod Laver, Grand Slam winner in 1962 and 1969 and Sampras' role model growing up, certainly has an argument in laying claim as player of the century, and was recently voted as such by a six-member panel of experts assembled by The AP. It also seems safe to say that had Laver not missed dozens of Grand Slam tournaments in the sixties, due to turning professional ahead of the open era, Sampras would still have a long trail ahead in setting a new Grand Slam titles record.

With this information, it seems going with Laver as player of the century is a comforting choice. However, once the eras the respective champions played in are considered, an entirely different picture develops. In Laver's time, there were maybe 10 players with any chance to win a tour stop event. Guys like Rosewall, Newcombe, Ashe and Emerson (all Grand Slam singles winners in the sixties) battled for supremecy along side the "Rocket." But let's face facts, true depth outside the top 10 didn't exist and early rounds were a cakewalk for the elite.

Conversely, Sampras has played in an era where any player in the top 100 has a chance on any given day. The talent pool has reached a depth not even fathomable to players back in the sixties, or dare I say even the seventies and early eighties. Even the recent era of McEnroe, Borg and Connors saw early round romps more often than not.

Let's not forget technology either. Wooden racquets, quite simply, didn't give a true glimpse of a players full talent. Play in the sixties was at a snails pace when compared to the quickness and agility required of modern day tour players.

This makes Sampras' achievements in the current era that much more exceptional. He has spent more weeks at No. 1 than any other player in the history of the ATP Tour. He is the only player to appear in all the ATP World Championships in the nineties, holds a 12-2 lifetime record in Grand Slam finals, is the only player in the open era to have won at least one Grand Slam title in seven consecutive years and finished the year at No. 1 a record six times in a row after the 1998 campaign. The resume goes on and on, record after record, all accomplished against the toughest competition the game has yet witnessed.

Being the winningest player between 1990 and 1999, with 61 career titles, won't sell Sampras as the century's best. But the era he accomplished it in should. Pete Sampras, without a doubt, is the best the game has ever seen.


COUNTERPOINT: UPDATE 2010: Federer is the best ever.

"It's a simple choice, Rod Laver is the greatest to ever play"
by Granville Swope

I could recite his many accomplishments including eleven Grand Slam titles, 20-4 Davis Cup record while never playing on a losing Davis Cup team, but to be called the greatest, no matter what it is, has to be special, something no one has ever done before, will ever do again, unheard of, singularly unique. And that is why Rodney George Laver is the best ever to play this wonderful game.

Tennis today is relatively simple. As a pro you can take your pick of any 45 or so tournaments and prioritize by event, whether it be a Grand Slam, or big prize money, fits your travel schedule, Davis Cup schedule, whatever. It wasn’t always this way. The game has evolved, the athlete has evolved. Not only is the “content” of the tennis different today, but the “context” of tennis is different today and Rocket Rod dominated in both eras.

Remember, until 1969 tennis was an “amateur” sport. Players were limited to only eight events plus the U.S. Championships. Players were not given prize-money for playing, rather they were given expense money ranging anywhere from $20-$100 per day. Tournament victories meant a big trophy and a photo-op, but no prize money. Yet, while the amateurs weren’t making the big bucks, they were the privileged few who got to play the “majors” of the time, the US Clay Court Championships and Forest Hills (now the US Open) to name a few. The pros on the other hand, led by legends like Jack Kramer and later Donald Dell, were struggling to get their “new” tournament schedule up and running which included significant prize money. Until that time tennis was a gentlemen’s sport and players who were paid for their efforts were banned from the amateur title events and Davis Cup.

Rod Laver won the Grand Slam as an amateur in 1962 and shortly thereafter turned pro. As a pro, he was banned from the amateur events until 1967. Then in 1969, after the shakedown between amateur and pro was complete, merging into what is now the ATP, he won his second Grand Slam. Two Grand Slams in two distinct tennis eras. Frankly, I don’t know who’s loss is greater; Rod Laver losing five years of Grand Slam tournaments, or our loss as spectators for being robbed of watching the singularly most graceful and fearsome tennis player to have ever picked up a racquet. No tennis player’s overall game was quite as complete as Laver’s. He had no weaknesses to attack; making him virtually impenetrable. A slippery left handed serve with a follow-up touch volley with reflexes matched only by McEnroe. He could drive the ball deep, angle it short, lob to any point on the court, with nerves of steel.

Like a cat playing with a mouse, it doesn’t matter how big the mouse is, it doesn’t stand a chance. Truly a man out of time. Rod has transcended the sport in a way few, if any athletes ever will. He is singularly the greatest tennis player ever.

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