Yeah I did follow tennis then and well before. The pre Fed reign was a time of transition from the Sampras + era, allowing less talented players like the ones you mentioned to burgle some titles. Once Fed, and later Nadal, Novak came along, they won squat. I am beginning to worry re the semiotic linguistic capacity of some posters outside NZ. I did not bring up ANYONE but Fed in my initial reference. My point was, nah, I'm no bothering. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it think.
The more you wrote, the more you exposed yourself.
You said once Fed came along, the rest of New Balls generation won squat.
Federer won Wimbledon in 2003. And since then, Andy Roddick and Marat Safin won slams (as well as Gaudio, who was not exactly a New Ball generation).
About not bringing up anyone else in your initial post, you did compare Thiem to Federer.
Read this slowly, everyone:
Rohemomona literally compared Thiem to Federer.
And by the way, new balls generation had already won slams when Sampras and Agassi were actually younger than Nadal is now. And Sampras was even younger than Djokovic/Murray now. If 2000-2003 were transition era, what kind of era 2015-2017 would you call?
Should Thiem win a GS this year he will be a year and a smidgen older than Fed was. Should he win a Masters this year ditto. The age of maturation of tennis players has been stretching out since the seventies. It is perfectly reasonable to suggest the new breakthrough age may now be closer to mid rather than pre or early twenties. Players like Kyrgios-age wise-are rarer nowadays than they were ion Borg-Jimbo-Mac et al days. Rest assured I will gloat when Theim does break through...
Thiem was just destroyed by Djokovic.
In September, Thiem will turn 24, the age at which Federer had won 5 slams, ranked #1 for a year, a handful of masters, and two WTF.
Well, of course Thiem will breakthrough. Even Wawrinka and Cilic broke through.
The problem is - read slowly - you were comparing Thiem to Federer.
In 2000-2001 (when Federer was 19-20 yo), a number of people who actually knew a thing or two about tennis had already predicted Federer for greatness. Even people who were not really expert in tennis could already see that Federer had real talent and je ne sais quoi necessary for greatness when he defeated the defending Champion and greatest grass player in Wimbledon when he was only 19 yo. Many experts had already seen his talent even before he destroyed Sampras.
The magnitude of Federer beating Sampras would be like had Thiem defeated Nadal in RG in 2013.
As for age of maturation of tennis players that has been stretching out since the 70s, that is not accurate to say the least. It's not linear. Chang was the youngest ever to win a slam, younger than any other player before him, Hewitt became the youngest ever #1, and Nadal's breakthrough was younger still. Even within the same generation, the age of breakthrough are not similar at all
Fact is, people see that Generation Useless are not that talented nor have they
je ne sais quoi for greatness.
Thiem is likely to win slam one day, but this is like saying that Zverev and Kyrgios will win a slam one day.
Thiem will win slam when the immediate previous generation have all entered 30 yo, which will happen in a few weeks.
Actually, comparing Zverev and Kyrgios to Federer is more apt than comparing Thiem to Federer.
One more thing, you claimed that Thiem will be only one year older and a smidgen than Federer was if he win his first master.
Wrong.
Federer won his first master in 2002, Hamburg, when he was still 20 yo.
The earliest Thiem can win a master is in Cincy and Rogers Cup when he will still be 23 yo, and if he fail that, by the time Shanghai rolls, he will be 24 yo.
23 or 24 yo is definitely NOT a year and smidgen older than 20 yo.
Federer won his first slam at 21 yo. Thiem is already 23. Even if Thiem win RG this year, it would make him two years older than Federer when winning first slam.
Math education seems to be clearly lacking in New Zealand.