[The Federest]

In 2001, the seeds at grand slams were extended in number from 16 to 32, offering better protection for top players. Arguably this helped Federer set his astonishing records for consecutive SF and QF appearances. It also seems likely that it helped Rafa to win an utterly unprecedented number of titles at Roland-Garros.

Generally, it must be a contributing factor to the consistency of the Big 3 at slam level, especially in latter years when conserving energy in early rounds is so vital for veterans. My question is: How much of a factor has it been?

 

[Johnny Groove]

Of course it is a huge factor. So much protection in the early rounds nowadays. Poor Sampras had to play maybe top 20 guys in first round

That's why I did not want to go back to 16 seeds. You cannot just have the protection and then right at end of career switch it back so no one reaches your records

 

[TheLastJedi]

In 2001, the seeds at grand slams were extended in number from 16 to 32, offering better protection for top players. Arguably this helped Federer set his astonishing records for consecutive SF and QF appearances. It also seems likely that it helped Rafa to win an utterly unprecedented number of titles at Roland-Garros.

Generally, it must be a contributing factor to the consistency of the Big 3 at slam level, especially in latter years when conserving energy in early rounds is so vital for veterans. My question is: How much of a factor has it been?

The question is, how strong the #17-#32 are, in 1st and 2nd rounds.
Any statistics on upsets by #17-#32 in the first 2 rounds?

 

[Budadiii]

The question is, how strong the #17-#32 are, in 1st and 2nd rounds.
Any statistics on upsets by #17-#32 in the first 2 rounds?

All I know is, 17-32 ranked players right now are extremely strong, and would wear out many of the top 10 and beat many of the 8-16.

 

[Kowchi]

All I know is, 17-32 ranked players right now are extremely strong, and would wear out many of the top 10 and beat many of the 8-16.

All I know is, 17-32 ranked players right now are extremely strong, and would wear out many of the top 10 and beat many of the 8-16.

17			Karen Khachanov	23	1,840	26	0	0
18			Alex de Minaur	20	1,775	23	0	0
19			John Isner	34	1,770	20	0	0
20			Grigor Dimitrov	28	1,747	22	0	0
21			Felix Auger-Aliassime	19	1,636	25	0	0
22			Lucas Pouille	25	1,600	23	0	0
23			Andrey Rublev	22	1,584	25	0	0
24			Benoit Paire	30	1,538	33	0	0
25			Guido Pella	29	1,530	27	0	0
26			Nikoloz Basilashvili	27	1,450	25	0	0
27			Pablo Carreno Busta	28	1,422	23	0	0
28			Borna Coric	23	1,415	23	0	0
29			Jo-Wilfried Tsonga	34	1,410	25	0	0
30			Nick Kyrgios	24	1,395	19	0	0
31			Milos Raonic	28	1,350	19	0	0
32			Taylor Fritz	22	1,315	30	0	0

 

[TheLastJedi]

17			Karen Khachanov	23	1,840	26	0	0
18			Alex de Minaur	20	1,775	23	0	0
19			John Isner	34	1,770	20	0	0
20			Grigor Dimitrov	28	1,747	22	0	0
21			Felix Auger-Aliassime	19	1,636	25	0	0
22			Lucas Pouille	25	1,600	23	0	0
23			Andrey Rublev	22	1,584	25	0	0
24			Benoit Paire	30	1,538	33	0	0
25			Guido Pella	29	1,530	27	0	0
26			Nikoloz Basilashvili	27	1,450	25	0	0
27			Pablo Carreno Busta	28	1,422	23	0	0
28			Borna Coric	23	1,415	23	0	0
29			Jo-Wilfried Tsonga	34	1,410	25	0	0
30			Nick Kyrgios	24	1,395	19	0	0
31			Milos Raonic	28	1,350	19	0	0
32			Taylor Fritz	22	1,315	30	0	0

Very colorful selection, some of those are fully capable of pulling a hot botting performance, especially on green grass or fast hard court, for an upset.

So I guess at the end of the day Rogie is the biggest beneficiary of the 32 seed format.

 

[SetPointDown]

Very colorful selection, some of those are fully capable of pulling a hot botting performance, especially on green grass or fast hard court, for an upset.

So I guess at the end of the day Rogie is the biggest beneficiary of the 32 seed format.

Nope, it's easydrawdal

Win/Loss % v/s Top-20 -

HC-
Djokovic - 77.05 (47-14)
Federer - 73.07 (57-21)
Nadal - 61.36 (27/17)

Grass -
Federer - 76.74 (33-10)
Djokovic - 76 (19-6)
Nadal - 75 (15-5)

 

[TheLastJedi]

Nope, it's easydrawdal

Win/Loss % v/s Top-20 -

HC-
Djokovic - 77.05 (47-14)
Federer - 73.07 (57-21)
Nadal - 61.36 (27/17)

Grass -
Federer - 76.74 (33-10)
Djokovic - 76 (19-6)
Nadal - 75 (15-5)

Top20? We are talking about #17-32.

 

[Supercell]

Unfortunately we'll never know how much it affected slam counts of Big3 but one can always speculate.

1) Avoiding 17-32 guys in round1 and round2 definitely helped Big3 in some slams, especially those when they had shaky starts against lower ranked opponents. This probably let them avoid some upsets at slams. However, there is only 37% chance that a seeded player (16 seeds) will draw 17-32 floater in his mini-section of the draw (R1 or R2). So this situation on average would affect draws of about one third of slams any member of Big3 played. What's more, there is a chance that 17-32 floater losses in R1 (projected R2 meeting with Big3 doesn't take place), so the percentage is even lower. Obviously only a fraction of these situations would cause problems for the Big3 in a given tournament (upset or significant energy loss). Overall Big3 could've been seriously affected in 10-15% of slams IMO.

2) OTOH 32 seeds system increases the chance that a Big3 player meets a very strong high-seeded rival later in the tournament. This effect can't be completely neglected as well.

IMO 16 seeds would cause few early upsets for Big3 (after all they rarely loss in Masters1000 first matches, against strong players) but one can't neglect the effect (esp. energy loss). I think their GS tallies could have been reduced by one, maybe two slams.

 

[SetPointDown]

Top20? We are talking about #17-32.

Win/Loss % v/s Top-30-50-

HC-
Djokovic - 94.28
Federer - 92.86
Nadal - 85.71

Grass -
Federer - 100
Djokovic - 90
Nadal - 84.62

 

[TheLastJedi]

Win/Loss % v/s Top-30-50-

HC-
Djokovic - 94.28
Federer - 92.86
Nadal - 85.71

Grass -
Federer - 100
Djokovic - 90
Nadal - 84.62

First of all, this is still not #17-#32.
Second of all, we are talking about the chance #17-#32 causing an upset in first two rounds.
It appears you just want to rush some data, regardless how relevant they are.

 

[TheLastJedi]

Unfortunately we'll never know how much it affected slam counts of Big3 but one can always speculate.

1) Avoiding 17-32 guys in round1 and round2 definitely helped Big3 in some slams, especially those when they had shaky starts against lower ranked opponents. This probably let them avoid a few more upsets at slams. However, there is only 37% chance that a seeded player (16 seeds) will draw 17-32 floater in his mini-section of the draw (R1 or R2). So this situation on average would affect draws of about one third of slams any member of Big3 played. What's more, there is a chance that 17-32 floater losses in R1 (projected R2 meeting with Big3 doesn't take place), so the percentage is even lower. Obviously only a fraction of these situations would cause problems for the Big3 in a given tournament (upset or significant energy loss). Overall Big3 could've been seriously affected in 10-15% of slams IMO.

2) OTOH 32 seeds system increases the chance that a Big3 player meets a very strong high-seeded rival later in the tournament. This effect can't be completely neglected as well.

IMO 16 seeds would cause few early upsets for Big3 (after all they rarely loss in Masters1000 first matches, against strong players) but one can't neglect the effect (esp. energy loss). I think their GS tallies could have been reduced by one, maybe two slams.

Good points.
I also want to raise a question, without seed protection, would #17-#32 be stronger or weaker?

 

[SetPointDown]

First of all, this is still not #17-#32.
Second of all, we are talking about the chance #17-#32 causing an upset in first two rounds.
It appears you just want to rush some data, regardless how relevant they are.

The percentages establishes the fact that Nadal needs to avoid higher ranked players much more than the other two,so he's the biggest beneficiary of the 32 seed rule

 

[Supercell]

Good points.
I also want to raise a question, without seed protection, would #17-#32 be stronger or weaker?

17-32 ranked players would still be in similar positions in another seeding system (in the long term this change affects all players the same) but with 16seed system there would probably be a larger ranking variance at these positions.

 

[TheLastJedi]

The percentages establishes the fact that Nadal needs to avoid higher ranked players much more than the other two,so he's the biggest beneficiary of the 32 seed rule

Win/Loss % v/s Top-20 -

HC-
Djokovic - 77.05 (47-14)
Federer - 73.07 (57-21)
Nadal - 61.36 (27/17)

Grass -
Federer - 76.74 (33-10)
Djokovic - 76 (19-6)
Nadal - 75 (15-5)

Since you data don't provide any information of early round performance, I will divert the topic from the seeding format for now.

Nadal won his fair share, based on the percentage. However, Rogie won more slams undeservingly, especially on hard court, that's very clear from your data.

 

[SetPointDown]

Since you data don't provide any information of early round performance, I will divert the topic from the seeding format for now.

Nadal won his fair share, based on the percentage. However, Rogie won more slams undeservingly, especially on hard court, that's very clear from your data.

Federer and Djokovic routinely beat 2-3 top-10 players for their HC slams.
Unlike Nadal who barely beat any top players for his off-clay(vultured) slams

Nadal truly is biggest Vulture of all time tbh.

 

[TheLastJedi]

Federer and Djokovic routinely beat 2-3 top-10 players for their HC slams.
Unlike Nadal who barely beat any top players for his off-clay(vultured) slams

Nadal truly is biggest Vulture of all time tbh.

Hello, weak-era fanboy, US-Open record firmly exposed the Vulturer nature in Rogie.

 

[SetPointDown]

Hello, weak-era fanboy, US-Open record firmly established the Vulturer nature in Rogie.

USO actually showed some of the greatest vulturing tendencies of easydrawdal
Capitalized on the cupcake to the final in both 2010 and 2013 while Djokovic had much tougher opponents and then leaving no stone unturned in vulturing 2017 and 2019 when both Djokovic and Federer got injured.

Both Djokovic and Federer have much better records against top players(I can post the stats but as seen in this thread you won't be able to comprehend it),but vulturedal just too damn lucky

 

[TheLastJedi]

USO actually showed some of the greatest vulturing tendencies of easydrawdal
Capitalized on the cupcake to the final in both 2010 and 2013 while Djokovic had much tougher opponents and then leaving no stone unturned in vulturing 2017 and 2019 when both Djokovic and Federer got injured.

Both Djokovic and Federer have much better records against top players(I can post the stats but as seen in this thread you won't be able to comprehend it),but vulturedal just too damn lucky

Face some reality. Backed in 2017 there already serious discussion about how Rogie vultured his slams on easy opponents, some are high ranked players in weak era.

Sorry, Roger: Rafael Nadal is not just the king of clay

The Spaniard has overcome unusually strong opposition to rack up 16 grand-slam wins

www.economist.com

It's too obvious you want to muddling the water by dragging Djokovic into this. He won some hard slams.

 

[SetPointDown]

Face some reality. Backed in 2017 there already serious discussion about how Rogie vultured his slams on easy opponents, some are high ranked players in weak era.

Sorry, Roger: Rafael Nadal is not just the king of clay

The Spaniard has overcome unusually strong opposition to rack up 16 grand-slam wins

www.economist.com

It's too obvious you want to muddling the water by dragging Djokovic into this. He won some hard slams.

LOL that old ELO inspired(demonstrably flawed method in tennis) article that was totally not written from a vulturedal fanboy bias and it totally doesn't miss the headline point of their own article by overrating Nadals clay slams.

Reality-
At USO,
Federer has a 72.8 win % and Djokovic has 63.15 WIN % against top-10

easydrawdal's is just 58.33 %
Easy to figure who vultured more.