The Finger Points Outwards - No. 112

TENNIS: Who is the greatest male tennis player ever? And which is the greatest rivalry?

BASKETBALL: How to fix pickup basketball using analytics.

SPORTS: The 100 worst blowouts in sports history.

AUSTRALIAN RULES FOOTBALL: Hipster Australian Football League logos.

ECONOMICS: The economics of commuting – why train strikes actually help passengers.

Williams Wins Wimbledon, Again … Which Tennis Grand Slam Tournament Has The Highest Concentration of Winners?

This year Serena Williams won the Wimbledon Championships for the sixth time. It seems that quite a few players have won Wimbledon a lot of times. Martina Navratilova won it nine times. Steffi Graf won it seven times. Serena’s sister Venus won it five times. On the men’s side, Pete Sampras and Roger Federer have won it seven times each.

But then it seems like you can win the French Open a lot of times too if you’re good on clay. Rafael Nadal has won that tournament nine times. Bjorn Borg won it six times. Chris Evert won the women’s singles seven times, and Graf got six titles.

Although maybe the Australian Open is the ‘easy’ Grand Slam tournament to win if it suits your game – after all, Novak Djokovic won it for the fifth time earlier this year, and Serena Williams won it for the sixth time. Or as Bill Simmons once noted, maybe tennis just lends itself to a player being completely dominant.

So which Grand Slam tournament has had the most dominant players, i.e. the highest concentration of winners? To measure this I calculated a concentration measure known as Herfindahl-Hirschman Index for each of the Grand Slam tournaments in the Open era (1968 onwards). The higher the index, the more concentrated the winners have been. The results were as follows:

Men’s singles: Wimbledon: 0.078, French Open: 0.075, US Open: 0.060, Australian Open: 0.052.
Women’s singles: Wimbledon: 0.101, US Open: 0.075, French Open: 0.069, Australian Open: 0.066.

So Wimbledon has the highest concentration of winners for both the men’s and women’s singles. I’ve noted above the main winners: in the men’s singles Sampras, Federer and Borg have won 19 of the 48 titles; in the women’s singles Navratilova, Graf, and the Williams sisters have won 27 titles between them. If you look at the combined totals of the top three or four winners for the other major tournaments they each lag behind those numbers.

Wimbledon – the most traditional, prestigious of Grand Slam tournaments. But also the most uncompetitive as well.

The Finger Points Outwards - No. 108

SPORTS: What are golfer Jordan Spieth’s chances of winning a Grand Slam of majors?

ECONOMICS/POLITICS:  Paul Krugman supports the Greek government having held a referendum on whether to accept the tough conditions of its creditors.

FOOTBALL: How did a kicker once win the National Football League’s Most Valuable Player award?

TENNIS: Pete Sampras’ letter to 16-year-old Pete.

ECONOMICS: How the mechanism for compensating drivers has changed in the era of Uber.

How Best-of-Five-Set Matches Benefit Dominant Male Tennis Players

This post was inspired by an article on The Economist, which went through some possible explanations for why, in recent years, the best male tennis players have dominated Grand Slams more than the best female tennis players. An addendum at the end of the article noted that part of the reason for this is that women’s matches in Grand Slams are three sets, while men’s matches are five sets, therefore making upsets more likely in the women’s game.

Not being able to calculate probabilities in my head, I was curious to see how the different match lengths affects the chances of the “better” player winning the match. Assume that a given male player and a given female player have the same probability of winning a particular set. The tables below show, for selected probabilities of winning a set that are greater than 0.5, the probability of those players winning a particular match, if their probabilities of winning a particular set remains constant. They also show the probability of those players winning a Grand slam tournament (although more caution should be taken with these probabilities, given that a player’s probability of winning a particular set is likely reduced as they progress through the tournament).

	Probability of winning match
Probability of winning set	Female	Male
0.5	0.500	0.500
0.6	0.648	0.683
0.7	0.784	0.837
0.8	0.896	0.942
0.9	0.972	0.991

	Probability of winning Grand Slam
Probability of winning set	Female	Male
0.5	0.004	0.004
0.6	0.031	0.047
0.7	0.143	0.241
0.8	0.415	0.620
0.9	0.797	0.933

So the fact that men play five sets does make a bit of difference to a dominant male player’s chances of winning a Grand Slam match (and the tournament) compared to a dominant female player’s. But it doesn’t look like it’s enough to primarily explain the greater recent dominance of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic compared to the top female players. Also, as noted in the article, there have been long periods when the top female players have been more dominant (Graf, Seles, Navratilova, Evert, etc), so the set structure just favours the top male players being more dominant, it by no means guarantees it.    

The Finger Points Outwards - No. 27: Age and Ranking of Men's Tennis Players

Read an article in 'The Age' on the weekend about how the top male tennis players are becoming older - this article shows this is indeed right, at least when you look at the top 100.

Tennis Australia Unveils Plan to Turn its Women Tennis Players Into Russians

Faced with mediocre results and budget cuts, Tennis Australia has unveiled its radical new plan to return to world supremacy by turning its top female players into Russians.

The scheme went into action during the week when the newly-rechristined Samantha Stosurova was seen warming up on the practice courts and sipping from a hip flask of vodka. There have also been reports of Casey Dellacquaova sporting shoes made by up-and-coming Russian manufacturers as she wanders Melbourne's streets.

One player that may be exempt from the makeover is Jelena Dokic, who has made it through to the quarter-finals of the women's draw. However, a loss tonight may result in her being housed in a babushka doll for the remainder of the week.

Tennis Australia hopes to have at least five blond-haired blue-eyed women in the top 20 by the end of next year. Rumours are also afoot that, if the plan is successful, the tennis authority may have similar plans to turn its professional male players into Frenchmen.

Rod Laver Arena Devastated By Djokovic ‘Whoopee Cushion’ Prank

Half of Rod Laver Arena was today destroyed by a massive explosion, which was later revealed to have emanated from a giant ‘whoopee cushion’ left in the stadium by world no.3 Novak Djokovic.

Authorities were initially confused by the source of the blast, but the cause soon became apparent when Djokovic broke into guffaws at his press conference.

“No, I’m sorry, I don’t know anything about…,” he began, before he could contain his snickering no longer, “ha ha ha I’m sorry… hee hee… I got you a good one, didn’t I? Did you see it? Kaboom!!!”

A reporter asked if he was concerned at all about the human casualties of his prank. Djokovic shrugged, ‘Well, I think that a lot of those people were barracking for that little French kid during last year’s final so I don’t feel too bad about it.’

The rest of the conference proceeded as normal until another huge explosion was heard outside the press room. All eyes turned to Djokovic, who was again engulfed in hysterics, “Ha ha ha I’m sorry,” he said, waving his hands in apology, “I think my little brother has just taken out Hisense.”

Ivanovic: Smashing Live Kittens the Key to Success

In a candid press conference, Serbian uber-babe Ana Ivanovic has revealed that she sometimes uses live kittens as tennis balls in her practice sessions.

‘Of course, I prefer using real tennis balls, but you can’t always find them and they’re quite expensive,’ said the world No.5, ‘In cases like those, you need another small bit of fluff to smash about.’

Ivanovic was sketchy about how long ago she adopted the unorthodox routine, but sources say that she would often whack small turtles around the disused swimming pool she used to train in as a junior.

Flashing her gorgeous smile, Ivanovic was all too happy to expand upon the aerodynamics of various felines. ‘I find the tabby cats are good for groundstrokes, but for developing sheer power nothing really beats an overhead smash with a siamese.’

Fellow Serb and current No.1 Jelena Jankovic was unsurprised when she was told of her rival’s technique, ‘How else do you win the French Open if you’re not willing to spill some kitten brains along the way? She had all of you fooled. Nobody can be that nice.’

Roddick Stunned by First Round Exit in Wii Tennis Open

In a shock reversal of their Australian Open result, US tennis star Andy Roddick was bundled out of this year’s Australian Wii Tennis Open by Sweden’s Bjorn Rehnquist in a tough-fought five-gamer.

Rehnquist’s Mii character, Rehny, teamed up with a computer-chosen player to topple A-Rod and A-Rod: 0-Game, Game-30, 40-Game, Game-15, Game-40.

‘I’d been practising with a twin A-Rod attack throughout the break, but it just didn’t work for me today,’ said an understandably dismayed Roddick, ‘I’d like to blame the Wii sensor or the fact that there was a lamp standing waaaay too close to my remote, but the truth is, I didn’t bring my A-button game and I paid the price.’

Rehnquist gave a sly chuckle when quizzed about his victory. ‘I saw that the A-Rod at the net had a tendency to jump up and swing at fresh air, which didn’t give the A-Rod on the baseline enough time to get into position,’ he explained, ‘All Rehny needed to do was not try anything fancy and let the A-Rods beat themselves.’

Roddick was not consoled by his thrashing of Rehnquist in the first round of the Australian Open. ‘In the non-virtual Open, I have to run up against Federer or Nadal at some point,’ he sighed, ‘I feel like that this was my best chance to win a title. At least I always have Pong to return to.’

Tennis Stars Ask For Next Australian Open To Be Pushed Back to 2013

Recent reports that tennis' top players wanted the start date of the Australian Open pushed back a month have been proved false, when it was revealed that many of them were actually favouring changing the start date to 2013 to help them recover from their heavy workload.

'It's a long flight to Australia', said reigning men's champion Novak Djokovic, 'Delaying the start date for four years would give players a better chance of making the journey over'.

Three-time women's champion Serena Williams agreed. 'My schedule is pretty full up for the next three Januarys,' she explained, 'I expect the clothes sales will continue on until at least 2010, in 2011 I plan on take some minor roles in Broadway musicals, and then in 2012 Venus and I thought we might take our Dad back to visit his family on Mars'.

Russian player Marat Safin favoured that the Open be played every second year, to coincide with how often he brings his game to Melbourne Park.

Even players that would be expected to favour an earlier start date were surprisingly reluctant. Roger Federer, for whom winning the Australian Open would help in his quest to pass Pete Sampras' record for the most Grand Slam wins, said that, after gifting Nadal a Wimbledon title last year, he now expects to win there 'until at least the year 2018'. Meanwhile, local hero Lleyton Hewitt said that, given his current ranking, he thought the summer months may be better used to play kick-to-kick with the football.

'Injured' women's star Maria Sharapova, last seen in an Hawaiian beach resort, was not available for comment.

Tour organisers are considering the alternative of 40 matches of strip tennis between glamour couple Fernando Verdasco and Ana Ivanovic. Ivanovic, a great fan of tennis in Australia, is reported to be supportive of the idea, but only if the telecast is exclusive to her website.

And The Women?

Below are the adjusted Grand Slam victories for the top women players. As I suspected, since several women have won three or more of the Grand Slam tournaments, there’s not much difference to the unadjusted figures:

Adjusted Grand Slam victories (Unadjusted in parentheses): 1968-onwards

Steffi Graf - 25.50 (22)
Chris Evert – 19.58 (18)
Martina Navratilova – 18.34 (18)
Margaret Smith Court – 12.34 (11)
Billie Jean King – 9.37 (9)
Monica Seles – 9.37 (9)
Serena Williams – 8.94 (8)
Justine Henin – 6.62 (7)
Evonne Goolagong Cawley – 6.62 (7)
Venus Williams – 5.14 (6)

Roger Federer - The Greatest Grand Slam Performer?

Swiss tennis superstar Roger Federer is only two Grand Slam victories away from equalling the record of 14 wins by American Pete Sampras. On the face of it then, it would seem that, for the moment, Sampras has been more successful than Federer when it comes to Grand Slam wins. However, there is an argument to be made that it is not only the number of Grand Slam wins that matter but also the variety of wins. For example, Gustavo Kuerten won three French Opens, but he was pretty average at the other Grand Slams, and only racked up three Grand Slam trophies by being very good on clay. To show how hard it is to win on more than one Grand Slam surface, consider the following table:

Percentage of Grand Slams Won At Player’s Most Successful Venue: 1968-onwards

1st most successful venue – 59.4 per cent.
2nd – 28.1 per cent
3rd and 4th – 12.5 per cent.

So, in the Open era, it has been about twice as hard for a player to win at a second Grand Slam venue as it has been at their most successful venue, and about five times as hard to win at a third or fourth venue. Taking these probabilities into account, we come up with the following list of top Grand Slam performers:

Adjusted Grand Slam victories (Unadjusted in parentheses): 1968-onwards

Roger Federer 15.54 (12)
Pete Sampras 15.18 (14)
Ivan Lendl 10.57 (8)
Andre Agassi 9.95 (8)
Bjorn Borg 9.29 (11)
Stefan Edberg 8.82 (6)
Mats Wilander 7.91 (7)
Jimmy Connors 7.84 (8)
Rod Laver 7.64 (5)
Boris Becker 6.72 (6)

*Adjusted Grand Slam victories = Grand Slams at most successful venue*0.561 + Grand Slams at 2nd most successful venues*1.185 + Grand Slams at 3rd and 4th most successful venues*2.667

Roger Federer now pushes slightly ahead of Pete Sampras, who won half his Grand Slams at Wimbledon and another five at the US Open. Ivan Lendl takes Bjorn Borg’s place at No.3, with the Swede not managing to capture either the Australian Open or the US Open crowns. Other big winners are Edberg and Laver (who would do even better if we counted victories before the Open era), while John McEnroe falls out of the top 10 altogether.

On this basis, it looks as if Federer is already the greatest of them all. If he wins another Australian Open, he will move well clear of Sampras on the adjusted score, having won at least 4 trophies at three separate Grand Slam venues. However, one suspects that, should he capture that elusive French crown in 2008, these debates will stop altogether.