Your Call, 8.08

Pete Bodo is off until Aug.12th, but life at TennisWorld goes on.  It's been a while since I scratched the stats itch, so....

Morning, all.

Birthday greetings to TW commenter Jake and, hmmm, anyone else?

Roger Federer is 28 years old today, and he probably feels he's packed seven of those years into the last seven months or so.  AO F defeat in 5 sets to Rafael Nadal, coach experiment (#fail) with Darren Cahill, impending fatherhood announced (apparently no concubines involved), Miami meltdown, marriage, defeats Nadal on clay in Spain, wins RG, outlasts Andy Roddick at Wimbledon, becomes father of two identical twin girls.  And we've only just made it to August.

I thought I might take a look at the post-28th birthday career records of some of Federer's fellow members of the Open Era elite:

Sampras (14 GS, Aug 12 1971):  W 4 (Wimbledon, USO); F 7 (USO * 2)

Laver (11 GS, Aug 9 1938): W 40 (Wimbledon * 2, RG, USO, AO); F 18 (RG)

Borg (11 GS, Jun 6 1956: none (effectively retired in 1982)

Agassi (8 GS, Apr 29 1970): W 24 (RG, USO, AO * 3); F 16 (Wimbledon, USO * 2)

Lendl (8 GS, Mar 7 1960): W 24 (AO * 2); F 14 (USO * 2, AO)

Connors (8 GS, Sep 2 1952): W 22 (Wimbledon, USO); F 19 (Wimbledon)

McEnroe (7 GS, Feb 16 1959): W 7; F 7

Wilander (7 GS, Aug 22 1964):  F 1

Becker (6 GS, Nov 22 1967): W 6 (AO); F 3

Edberg (6 GS, Jan 19 1966): W 4; F 3

Nadal (6 GS, Jun 3 1986): let's wait until June 2014, shall we?

Laver's titles at the ATP website are all post 1968, the year he turned 30 (and was permitted to play as a pro at Roland Garros, the first of the majors to admit professional players).

What's interesting is how the Elite players naturally fall into two groups - one which we can call Prodigies (Borg, Wilander, Edberg, Becker, McEnroe and Sampras), the other Codgers (Connors, Lendl, Agassi and Laver).  Which of the two groups do you think Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal will eventually join?

This is today's Your Call post.  Please use this post for tennis related and other mildly OT discussion.

-- TW Contributing Editor Andrew Burton