It's fairly easy to calculate which players are more successful at slams and which are more successful at being #1s. After all, in a year we have 52 weeks and 4 slams. The natural thing is to have 52/4 = 13 weeks pr slam. Which means both Federer and Sampras, the most prolific slam-winners, actually were better at being #1 than winning slams. Djokovic is about even for now. Nadal obviously better at slams.
Yes, Sir Markus, that is a very simple calendar division, and when you separate the two figures, it is easy to make the resulting comparison to each player's weeks at #1/slam to that. But that 13 weeks has nothing to do with weeks at #1. It is simply how many
calendar weeks per slam. Also, it's worth noting that the current calendar/slam weeks is nowhere near evenly divided (13):
AO to RG ~= 19 weeks
RG to WC ~= 4 weeks
WC to USO ~= 9 weeks
USO to AO ~= 20 weeks
The combination of winning the US Open and the Australian Open are worth 3 times as many calendar weeks as the combo of Roland Garros and Wimbledon!
It is an interesting comparison, but I don't believe that was Sir Swish's question. He was trying to equate the two stats. How many slam wins = weeks at #1?
Mostly I believe that domination over time gives you more weeks at number 1. When someone is not the dominator, or when there is no domination among the players, then it is much more difficult to get many weeks at #1, and many times one gets none, even if one wins 2 majors.
Secondly, being #1 in a 52 week period is not solely dependent on amount of majors won. Just last year, Roger Federer held #1 for 17 weeks while only holding 1 major in the period (Wimbledon 2012). Novak Djokovic held 2 majors up to the 2012 US Open, and was not #1. In the period between Wimbledon 2012 and the US Open 2012, Federer's one slam was worth 7 or 8 weeks, and Djokovic's 2 slams were worth 0 weeks. But by the end of the year, Djokovic got back to #1, while holding only 1 major and still holds it.
I don't think you can equate the two stats, it's like trying to equate oranges and tangerines.
1. Slam wins are the top result of an individual tournament.
2. Weeks at #1 is based on cumulative results of all tournaments played during a rolling 52 week time period and obviously include slam results during that time. Since slam results are worth twice as many points as any one tournament (exc. WTF), they influence the cumulative results the most compared to the other tournaments, but not to the exclusion of the totality of other results.
Even if slams were the only tournaments of the year, you couldn't equate slam
wins to weeks at #1.
Player A could lose in the final in all majors and have 4800 points for the year.
Player B could have 2 QF at the AO and RG, and then win Wimbledon and the US Open and have 4720 for the year.
Player A would be #1 at the end of the year with 0 majors and Player B would have 2 wins in the majors and 0 weeks at #1.
Now this isn't Sir Swish's question, but which player, A or B, would you say is the best player at the end of the year?
Respectfully,
masterclass
