On 7/17/2017 6:57 AM, Whisper wrote:
> On 17/07/2017 3:40 AM, stephenJ wrote:
>> On 7/16/2017 10:02 AM, Whisper wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> Federer 100
>>> Sampras 80
>>>
>>
>> Pretty Amazing. Think of everything Pete accomplished, and it was
>> incredible, and yet if he won two more W and another USO, he'd still
>> be behind Federer on 7/5/4/3.
> Sure, but Pete wasn't chasing anything at the time. You do wonder how
> he would have gone if he were chasing 19? Would he have retired at 31,
> or played on another 5+ yrs like Roger?
Good question, and there is no answer. On one hand, surely Pete wouldn't
have wanted to retire without the most slams, and without the most
Wimbledons. On the other, as of age 31, he had just won his 14th slam.
Five slams was a LONG way away in terms of the trajectory of his career.
Even before he broke all the existing records, when he was in 'chase'
mode, Pete hadn't won multiple slams in a year since 1997. From
1998-2000, he won one. At that rate, as of 2003 he would have been five
years and age 36 away from matching 19 slams, and that's assuming he
could win a slam a year. Nobody else has at that age - Federer went 4.5
years in his 30s between winning 2012 W and 2017 AO.
So tempering his desire to be slam king would be the reality of the
situation, which is how human motivation always seems to work.
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