Re: Federer serve speed question...

"Steve Jaros" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> "VinB" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >
> > > No I don't.  Let's look at the 2 FO finals she lost :
> > >
> >
> > Look at 89 FO semi, Seles's *first* slam and Graf undeniably in the best
> > form of her career. This was just few weeks prior to Graf thrashing
Seles
> on
> > grass but look what happens on clay. A tight 3 set win for Graf.
> > This was peak Graf against new comes Seles.
>
> Good point.
>
> It's pretty obvious - Graf's rep as 'best ever' over MN largely rests on
> their respective FO records: Graf has 6 while MN has 2.

MN only has an advantage in Wimbledon titles - Graf leads in every other
category; more FO, USO & AO, more yrs No.1, calendar slam, & retired many
yrs younger than MN.....  Graf probably woulda won > Wimbledons too if she
kept playing & didn't miss 2 yrs due to injury...



But Graf only had 2
> FO titles as of the spring of 1993, and since she hadn't won the French in
> *5* years at that point, it sure looked like she'd never win another. It's
> obvious that Seles - who had won the FO three straight times before
getting
> stabbed, owned that event and that Graf's chances of ever winning it again
> were somewhere between 'slim' and 'none'.

Look at her final losses in '89, '90 & '92 & you'll realise you're sadly
mistaken.... ; )



>
> Yet from the Seles stabbing onwards, she won 4 more French titles even
> though she wasn't as good a player as she had been before then.  That
> allowed her to pass MN as 'best ever' as well.

It's not Graf's fault MN lost more slam finals than she shoulda...


>
> The stabbing accomplished exactly what the GraFan nutcase hoped it would -
> it returned Steffi to #1 on the computer, and eventually led to Steffi
> having the best career singles record ever - #1 all time...
>


I think the stabbing cost Graf at least 1 slam, but like your opinion it's
all speculation...