Talk:Pancho Gonzales/Archive 1

Archive 1

Changements

I've changed your "Semi-retirement" article and I have added some information about the Australian-New Zealander tours in 1950, 1951 and 1954.

Carlo Colussi 16:20, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

I do think Pancho Gonzales was among the great tennis players, but this article is not very NPOV.

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What does NPOV mean?

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Neutral point of view.

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Oh.

Well, why should it be neutral? I think Gonzales was one of the greatest tennis players who ever lived, and quite probably the greatest. I also have a lot of facts to back up my opinion. If anyone can demonstrate to me -- using facts -- that Roy Emerson was a better player than Pancho Gonzales, I will be happy to rewrite my article. Emerson was, for anyone who knows anything about the history of tennis, a distinctly secondary player when compared to the truly great ones.

If anyone in 1968 had ever expressed the opinion that Roy Emerson, 12-time Grand Slam winner, was a better player than Pancho Gonzales, he or she would have been laughed out of the room.

Time changes everything....

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It's OK to talk about Pancho's greatness but this article is for an encyclopedia. As it stands it sounds more like a forum comparing between Emerson and Gonzales.

A discussion on Emerson will do better to be at Emerson own entry, no? Mandel 11:56, 2 Jun 2004 (UTC)

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Emerson frequently shows up on lists of the greatest players of all time, based exclusively on the fact that he won 12 Grand Slams against secondary competition. Gonzales, on the other hand, has been almost totally forgotten, even though he was considered for perhaps a dozen years or so to have been quite possibly the greatest player of all time. I think it's certainly legitimate to compare Emerson to Gonzales in terms of their record against one another. Gonzales, a much older, semi-retired player, beat Emerson like a drum, never losing to him. This ought to make people reconsider the relative greatness of these two players. We say that one boxer is better than another because he beat the other man; the same ought to be true for tennis players.

Surname

I've stripped an LoPbN entry down from this:

• Gonzalez, Pancho (1928-1995), tennis player (actual surname was Gonzales, but often spelled Gonzalez)

but the article implies the opposite. Verification needed.
--Jerzy•t 04:14, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Gonzales Vs. González

Why is it spelled -throughout the article- "Gonzales", and then, in the section "Personal and Family life" "González", and then, for the rest of the article, again "Gonzales". This inconsistency is striking. 200.55.118.233 03:24, 5 September 2006 (UTC) Nahuel

Gonzales had decided for a certain time to change the last s to z because one says that Pancho considered Gonzalez more "noble" than Gonzales but the two spellings seem to be right :

Richard (or Ricardo) Alonso "Pancho" Gonzales (or Gonzalez)

Carlo Colussi 15:06, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Because different editors have worked on it, drawing from different sources, and they have different agendas, sad to say. One of these days I will try to standardize it. Also, some of the "z" spellings are direct quotes, I believe. If you have an article about "Aaron Burr", but you put in a quote from Thomas Jefferson about "Aaron Bure", you spell it "Bure" in that quote. But you could find a thousand Wiki articles with the same sort of minor inconsistencies.... Hayford Peirce 04:19, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

He is Richard Gonzalez in the Social Security Death Index, so why the hell is that a redlink? Gene Nygaard 04:12, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

You got me.... Hayford Peirce 04:59, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Here's the entry from one of several sources of the SSDI.[1]

RICHARD GONZALEZ 09 May 1928 03 Jul 1995 89119 (Las Vegas, Clark, NV) 89121 (Las Vegas, Clark, NV) 553-36-1684 California

I created the redirect, for now, leaving the best spelling for the one slot for the name in accordance with Wikipedia:Naming conventions unresolved. Gene Nygaard 12:29, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

a) U.S. Pro or World Pro, b) BBC2-event at Wembley in spring

Jack March promoted a tournament in Cleveland (at different venues) from 1950 through 1964 that he called at the time the World Professional Championship. Many times it didn't deserve that label. In fact it seems that at the time this tournament was not labelled as United States Professional Championship (U.S. Pro) but later the majority considered the Cleveland tournament as also the U.S. Pro in 1950 and from 1952 through 1962. Therefore the Cleveland tournaments held in 1951, 1963 and 1964 were not at all the U.S. Pro (this one was held respectively at Forest Hills, Forest Hills again and Longwood Cricket Club outside Boston). So it would seem that Gonzales has never won the U.S. Pro but that he would have won 9 supposed "World Pro tournaments" at Cleveland. The 1953-1959 and 1961 editions won by Gonzales were (possibly at the time) later considered as U.S. Pro tournaments but his 1964 win was never considered as a U.S. Pro victory : this is why in the article there is a section

United States Professional Championship (also called World Professional Championship when held at Cleveland) Singles champion - 1953, 1954, 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1961 Singles runner-up - 1951, 1952, 1964

and another section

World Professional Championship (held at Cleveland) Singles champion - 1964

I recognize that this is very complicated and that the expression "World Professional Championship" has been too often misused.

Finally I think that the BBC2-event at Wembley held in spring has never been titled "World Professional Championship".

All that explains the minor corrections I've done in the article on May 30, 2007.

Carlo Colussi 14:25, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• • • • I know the BBC2 event never deserved the title World Professional Championship. However, The Tingay/Barrett World of tennis yearbook refers to the 1969 event in its results section as the "World Professional Championship". Betty Laver's biography of Laver refers to the 1968 event as the "World Professional Championship". I have also read the London Times' coverage of Gonzales' and Rosewall's wins. I am pretty certain that they called the event the BBC2 World Professional Championship. In 1964 the "Golden Racquet" was also used as a description (the trophy was a golden racket). In subsequent years this moniker was dropped.

As you point out the term world professional championship is one very loosely used in tennis by promoters. Its use should always be qualified by a an accurate description of the event's true status in that year's competition. The ATP use the term world Championship for the end of season play-offs throughout the 90's . Nobody regared it as such and usually called it the Masters; the title it has gone back to currently.

I have also seen some of the BBC's coverage of the 1967 Wimbledon event and they too called the event the "World Professional Champioship". This might be one of the few times the term was accurately used given how important the event was to pro tennis and the begining of open tennis the following year.

As to Cleveland the event never justified that description in the 1960s. In 1963 and 1964 the US pro was clearly the most important tournament in the USA for those years. McCauley is particularly scathing about the 1963 edition and Marsh's pretensions. In 1964 of the 8 events On the US summer tour it had the weakest field with Rosewall and Hoad not bothering to enter. In the 60's neither Rosewall or Hoad placed any significance on Cleveland and these two are the the most important pros of the early 60s given Gonxales' fickle participation in pro tennis at the time.

I don't regard Gonzales win in '64 as one of his major achievements. In the '63 to '67 pro era I would regard his defeat Of Rosewall and Laver in one evening in two very tight matches at the 1966 BBC2 event as his best. Rosewall said he liked playing at Wembley in the pro era. He said they use to put paint on the wood to slow it down a bit so that attackers and more defensive players had a fair chance. He said he did not like the fast Nygrass carpet used in the open era years of '69 to '71. He also stated that in Europe they usually played with a heavier ball than the light fast American one; just as Wimbledon today slows the play down on grass with a heavier ball. Given these circumstances winning at Wembley for Gonzales is a much better achievement than winning in the fast indoor conditions of the US, where nearly all his significant wins occurred after his comeback to the tour in '63.

jeffreyneave 2 june 2007

• • • • Hello jeffreyneave

Thank you for the informations about the surface of the Wembley tournaments.

Sure 1964 Cleveland win wasn't a very great one nevertheless Gonzales defeated Gimeno.

So if you are right there was therefore another World Championship with the BBC2 event. Unbelievable.

About Gonzales's win at the 1966 BBC2 event, Kramer said in "World Tennis" that he couldn't believe that Gonzales was able to do such a performance, the American being still able, at 38, to beat the Australians on indoor wood in best-of-3-set matches (the Rosewall match being only a pro set match finished 18 minutes (the duration of the BBC2 news) before the final against Laver). Carlo Colussi 11:55, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

• • • • Hello jeffreyneave : I've re-read the Budge's article about Wembley 1953 in World Tennis : he wrote in particular that they played on a SLOW wood comparable to canvas and that Segura had "forgotten" his first serve when he faced Gonzales in the semis (I am not sure but I think that he wrote the same thing about the doubles opposing Sedgman-Budge and the Panchos). So that week Segura had great problems with his first service. Carlo Colussi 07:18, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

• • • • hello: I suppose this confirms that Wembley was rather slow for an indoor wood court, even in the period before Rosewall played. I suppose your Segura point is to argue that Segura had particularly bad day against Gonzales and that Gonzales did not have to perform to the standards he reached in 1952 when he beat Segura every time they met indoors. My argument would be that Segura beat Gonzales next timed they played on indoor clay. The change of surface is all important. Gonzales, probably feeling confidant after winning so easily at Wembley, won an easy first set but still lost the match. I would compare to the French final in 2006, where the attacking player Federer, feeling confident, won an easy first set. However, in the first set Nadal's backhand hit far too many balls short around the 'T', allowing Federer many easy opportunties for his big forehand ; Nadal also failed with his backand passing shot. After this tentative start, Nadal improved his background hitting it deep into Federer's backhand corner or somtimes hitting wide and deep to Federer's forehand which helps to stop Federer running round his backhand to play forehands; he also started to make some backhand passing shots. With this improvement Federer found that rallies became longer and there were fewer opportunties to get his big forehand into play off short balls. Not suprisingly Federer became less confident and started to make more errors. The better clay court player Nadal won the match when he started playing to his normal standards. I suppose that Segura realised after a tentative start that he was the better player on clay and played up to his normal standard in the 2nd and 3rd sets and duly won the match. Gonzales had a similar experience when he lost to Rosewall in the French pro in 1961. His attacking style won him an easy first set , but he was worn down by Rosewall's superior clay court game over the next 3 sets.

This all goes back to the standard Gonzales played in late '53 and whether he was playing at a lower level than in '52. My feeling is that Gonzales in the first set , which was competitive, confirmed his usual indoor level and superiority over segura. After that Segura became discouraged and mentally threw in the towel in the next 2 sets; hence the poor serving. In the interview Sedgeman gave in late '53 did he say that he was playing a lot better than he had at the start of the year when he played Kramer evenly ? Sedgeman seemed to have lost this tour because his shoulder went in the middle of the tour. This rather contradicts the argument that Kramer was the weak one physically despite all his assertions that he had chronic problems in the early 50's; when it really mattered Kramer proved fitter than the younger in his prime Sedgeman. I suspect as an amateur, Sedgeman just was not use to playing nearly 100 highly comptetitive matches in 4 to 5 months. I doubt sedgeman played 100 singles in a year as an amateur.

jeffreyneave 21 August 2007

ive —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jeffreyneave (talk • contribs) 16:29, August 21, 2007 (UTC). 

• • • Hello. I entirely agree with your first part (in particular Nadal played very bad (compared to his usual standard) in the 1st set of the RG final in 2006). About the last part I have two questions : a) I don't really find your answer to the comparison of Gonzales's levels between '52 and '53 (if I remember what you've written months ago these levels were comparable in your opinion), b) where have you read Sedgman's interview you are evoking ? World Tennis or elsewhere ? Thank you for the answers. Carlo Colussi 10:47, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

• • • • hello. I made an error in the 2nd paragraph. I assumed Gonzales beat Segura 7-5, 6-0, 6-1 in '53 Wembley SF. In fact that's the score Sedgman beat Budge in the other SF. Gonzales actually beat Segura 6-1 ,9-7, 7-5 which refutes my argument that Segura threw in the towel after the 1st set. Segura played poorly in the singles and doubles (the 2 Panchos were thrashed in the doubles final) and just had a bad week at Wembley. My basic point is that Gonzales always had an edge over Segura indoors (In '51 he beat Segura at Philadelphia and Wembley: the two biggest indoor events of the period: and in'52 he repeated those wins at the same events). I don't think Segura had a mental hang-up about Gonzales; he just knew it was always going to be very tough against a server like Gonzales; just as he found it difficult against Kramer And Sedgman indoors (in'53 I think he won every outdoor match and the clay indoor aginst Sedgman but lost the majority of the normal indoor matches.) On clay he knew his chances were much better and justified it by beating both Gonzales and Sedgman at the indoor clay event.

My question about the Sedgman interview concerns the one he gave to Chatrier where he gave comments on playing in Paris and gave a contribution to new magazine Tennis de France. You quoted from this interview in which Sedgman said that Kramer was still the best indoor player but his lack of stamina would hurt Kramer outdoors. I have not read the interview and was just asking for information about Sedgman's standard of play over the year.

jeffreyneave 22 August 2007 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jeffreyneave (talk • contribs) 15:42, August 22, 2007 (UTC).

• • Hello. I've completely forgortten the good results but now yes you are indeed right. About Sedgman I thought that you've recently read an interview during/or just after Wembley. What he said to Chatrier and Haedens (the latter having asked the questionS to Sedgman about his progress and Kramer's level) was that effectively he was a much better tennis player after one year of touring with the pros : Sedgman thought that the pros were really tougher than the amateurs. He then thought having improved his shots except perhaps his forehand. Nevertheless the global question is still the same : has Gonzales declined or not between '52 and '53 ? Carlo Colussi 08:53, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Gonzales's victories

I have just begun to list in the article all Gonzales's singles titles that I've found in Sutter's and McCauley's books. I will continue when I have the complete list at hand.

Carlo Colussi 11:35, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you Carlo!!!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.1.116.14 (talk) 18:58, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

1952 Philadelphia Inquirer Masters tournament (new results)

I've looked at the Google Archives and at first sight I didn't understand because those archives aren't easy to "translate" because very often characters are erased and columns are mixed so many times the phrases don't mean anything. Moreover in the introduction you've got comments that aren't written in the shown document.

About the Philadelphia Masters tournament held in 1952 the World Pro Top4 of 1951 competed : Kramer, Segura, Gonzales and Kovacs together in only one group playing in a round-robin event. But the different sources seemed at first sight very odd for me. I don't remember each word of the comments but they look like that : "Segura won his third of four matches" "Kramer has lost 3 of 4" and "Kovacs has lost 4 straight matches" : Why had they played four matches in the course of the tournament when in principle only three matches by player are needed in a 4-man round robin event ? Other strange comments : "Segura beats Kramer again" (but in another source though it isn't clear apparently Kramer beat Segura) or "Gonzales again whips Kramer" or more disturbing "Gonzales downed Kovacs" and in another source "Gonzales upset by Kovacs". Finally I've seen that this tournament was a DOUBLE round robin competition and the four players had met each other twice. So here is the conclusion of my researches :

March 21, 1952 : Kramer d. Kovacs 75 60; Gonzales d. Segura 62 64

March 22 : Segura d. Kramer 60 1513; Gonzales d. Kovacs 62 63 (score not sure)

March 24 : Gonzales d. Kramer 63 64; Segura d. Kovacs 62 62

this was supposed to be the third round of the event : in fact it was the 3rd day of the competition and the conclusion of the first round robin affair when all the players had met each other once.

Then the dates, the results and the scores are less sure :

March 26 : Gonzales d. Kramer 64 64 ("Gonzales again whips Kramer"); Segura d. Kovacs 62 63

March (27 ??) : Kramer d. Kovacs 86 63

March 28 : Kovacs d. Gonzales 06 64 64 (score not sure ??); Kramer d. Segura 46 86 63 (result uncertain given that in another source "Segura b. Kramer again")

March 29 : Gonzales d. Segura 63 62 ("Gonzales takes title")

Conclusion : Gonzales ended 1st with 5 wins and 1 loss, Segura 2nd (3-3) tied with Kramer, Kovacs last with 1-5.

So if I have rightly understood the archives (given that they are difficult to decipher) then Gonzales had beaten Segura and Kramer both twice in the Philadelphia Inquirer Masters tournament (and he was even with Kovacs 1-1) and that his overall 1952 record was 5-2 against Segura and 3-0 against Kramer.

Carlo Colussi (talk) 09:17, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Melbourne 1967

Melbourne, ended on February 19, 1967 wasn't a tournament as stated by Joe McCauley but a two-day meeting between the USA and Australia (as were all the Australian tour events in early 1967). Here are the full results of the Melbourne matches where you can note that Joe McCauley made an error because he wrote that Laver defeated Ralston but this is indeed the reverse and moreover Gonzales didn't win a tournament but "only" his matches against Stolle and Laver :

February 18-19 1967

Professional Tour Matches, Melbourne

1st Day

MS D Ralston (USA) d. R Laver 86 26 64

MS R Gonzales (USA) d. F Stolle 86 64

MD Laver/ Stolle d. Gonzales/ Ralston 16-14

2nd Day

MS Ralston d. Stolle 97 63

MS Gonzales d. Laver 62 64

MD Stolle d. Gonzales/ Ralston 46 1210 62

Carlo Colussi (talk) 11:51, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Where have you got the information that McCauley made two errors in his presentation of the results ?

Jeffreyneave 8 feb 2008

• • • Hello Jeffrey.

I've got it from Andrew Tasiopoulos who has collected innumerable results in Australia (he is an Australian citizen and he is living there). For instance he sent me all Rosewall's matches in Australia from 1949 (and even before if we include his boy and junior results) to early 1966. He examines every Australian paper and naturally he is very interested by his country players. This is the person who help me to list the 1963 matches between Rosewall and Laver in the 1963 US tour. Here is the mail he sent me about the 1967 Australian tour where he even added some doubles results absent from McCauley's book :

Andrew Tasiopoulos Envoyé : mardi 5 février 2008 07:35 À : COLUSSI Carlo Objet : couple of results

Hello Carlo

Just a couple of new items.

I am going through 1967 at the moment in the newspapers and I spotted that the Melbourne Pro tournament in McCauley's book played in Melbourne on 18-19 February 1967 was not a tournament. The event, like all pro events in Australia that year, was a round-robin between Australian and US professionals with no "winner". Also Ralston defeated Laver 86 26 64 on the first day. Here is all the results with new doubles matches.

Fred Stolle and Dennis Ralston (USA) both became professionals at the start of the year and were to make their debuts in Brisbane on January 28 1967 but rain cancelled matches. The two with Richard Gonzales (USA), Rod Laver and Ken Rosewall travelled through Australia playing a professional Australia vs. USA series. USA won the series winning 19 of the 32 matches. There is a doubles match missing within the results documented. January 31 1967 Professional Tour Matches, Toowoomba MS F Stolle d. D Ralston (USA) 63 108 MS R Laver d. R Gonzales (USA) 46 63 64

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February 4-5 1967 Professional Tour Matches, Sydney 1st Day MS D Ralston (USA) d. F Stolle 79 63 62 MS R Gonzales (USA) d. K Rosewall 36 64 64 MD D Ralston/ R Gonzales d. K Rosewall/ F Stolle 62 1513 2nd Day MS Ralston d. Rosewall 63 86 MS Gonzales d. Stolle 63 86 MD Rosewall/ Stolle d. Ralston/ Gonzales 63 64

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February 6 1967 Professional Tour Matches, Rockhampton MS D Ralston (USA) d. Stolle 63 57 97 MS R Laver d. R Gonzales (USA) 63 810 75 Results not confirmed

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February 7-8 1967 Professional Tour Matches, Brisbane 1st Day MS R Laver d. D Ralston (USA) 1210 06 62 MS R Gonzales (USA) d. F Stolle 64 68 63 MD Laver/ Stolle d. Gonzales/ Ralston 11-9 2nd Day MS Stolle d. Ralston 63 68 86 MS Laver d. Gonzales 62 57 97 MD Gonzales/ Ralston d. Laver/ Stolle 8-5

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February 10-11 1967 Professional Tour Matches, Adelaide 1st Day MS D Ralston (USA) d. K Rosewall 1311 61 MS R Gonzales (USA) d. F Stolle 108 64 MD D Ralston/ R Gonzales d. K Rosewall/ F Stolle 119 64 2nd Day MS Ralston d. Stolle 64 62 MS Rosewall d. Gonzales 64 86 MD Rosewall/ Stolle d. Ralston/ Gonzales 97 97

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February 14 1967 Professional Tour Matches, Shepparton MS F Stolle d. D Ralston (USA) 75 16 61 MS R Gonzales (USA) d. K Rosewall 64 46 64 MD Ralston/ Gonzales d. Rosewall/ Stolle 106 Results not confirmed

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February 18-19 1967 Professional Tour Matches, Melbourne 1st Day MS D Ralston (USA) d. R Laver 86 26 64 MS R Gonzales (USA) d. F Stolle 86 64 MD Laver/ Stolle d. Gonzales/ Ralston 16-14 2nd Day MS Ralston d. Stolle 97 63 MS Gonzales d. Laver 62 64 MD Laver/ Stolle d. Gonzales/ Ralston 46 1210 62 I think that a couple of weeks ago you sent me an email about the 1948 Australian Hardcourt played in Tasmania. I had the venue as Launceston but I rechecked it and it was played in Hobart that year.

Andrew

Sorry Jeffrey for not having answered earlier but I have almost no time left for Wikipedia. Carlo Colussi (talk) 14:22, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

• • • • • HELLO CARLO.

Thanks for your answer. This might also suggest that the event in New Zealand, which stolle won, might not be a tournement because again matches were restricted to Aussies playing americans.

jeffreyneave 25 feb 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.159.208.23 (talk) 20:25, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

• • • • Hello Jeffreyneave

Your remark about Stolle is judicious. I will ask Andrew for it. In the future weeks I will have almost no time for Wikipedia (for instance today I'm on it just for about 5 min) but I've seen some of your questions about Gonzales-Laver head-to-head matches in 1969-1970 and I will see it later : one thing I've discovered is that Gonzales probably led 3-2 in 1970 because in a South African magazine, that I own, it is written that Gonzales defeated Laver in Cape Town or Johannesbourg (it probably wasn't a tournament match but possibly a sort of challenge match) during spring (I will look at it carefully and give you the right town) and in 1969 I will look at the Laver's autobiography but I think that Laver's lead in 1969 was superior to 4-0. But please don't be hurry because I don't know when I answer you. That's all !!! I quit Wikipedia for today. Carlo Colussi (talk) 11:36, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

• • • Hello Jeffreyneave

I've quickly looked at Laver's book as well as World of Tennis '70 so I've perhaps missed some meetings in 1969 between Laver and Gonzales. I only have 4 results which seems little :

- Portland (Oregon), February 1969, one-night stand, Laver d. Gonzales 75 68 86

- Seattle, March 1969, one-night stand, Laver d. Gonzales 108 63

- Binghampton, pro tournament, final, August 1969, Laver d. Gonzales 61 62

- Baltimore, pro tournament, final, August 1969, Laver d. Gonzales 63 36 75 46 86.

About the 5th meeting in 1970 between the two players :

Cape Town, probably one-night stand, probably April 1970 (when both players toured in South Africa, with the South African Chp (Johannesburg) and Natal Chp (Durban) tournaments ended respectively on March 3 or 4 and April 12, 1970), Gonzales defeated Laver 64 64. I've picked up this result from "Lawn Tennis, May 1970" (absolutely no competition was dated in this magazine : in that edition were the results of the Dunlop Open at Sydney as well as the South African and Natal Chps evoked before).

I'd be interested in the possibly missing matches results between both players in 1969. Thank you in advance. Carlo Colussi (talk) 12:05, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

• • • • thanks carlo. Your 4-0 for 1969 confirms my initial research. The extra match I found was at Orlando on feb 10 where laver beat Gonzales 9-7, 6-2 in the sf. Since you found only 2 one-night stands in 1969, I think that 5-0 is the final total. I've seen the draws of all Laver's tournaments except the last 2 played in Barcelona and madrid in the 1st week of December played immediately after the stockholm open. Gonzales played London the week before but did not play Stockholm. He obviously went home and I can't see him coming back across the Atlantic for these 2 minor events in Spain.

jeffreyneave —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.160.205.173 (talk) 22:00, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

• • • Hello Jeffrey

All right for the 5-0 record. About the 1967 Auckland event, Andrew thinks the same as you but he can't confirm today (he's answered me : "Carlo Yes I thought that too about the Auckland tournament because it has the same format as the Melbourne tournament. I haven't looked it up though to confirm).Carlo Colussi (talk) 07:01, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Nationality

Someone ought to put his nationality somewhere - preferably in the first sentence. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.196.81.85 (talk) 04:57, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Archive 1

Name

Gonzales is not an "Anglicized" version of González, in the Americas, many names ending in -ez became -es, as they have the same pronunciation in the Americas (not in Spain). The change to -es also eliminates the need for an accent mark. Before the emergence of modern identification, especially Social Security numbers, many Mexican Americans used variant spellings of the same name (one variant may appear in government records, another in Catholic parish archives).Many priests were Spaniards, and rendered names like González as Gonzales to match the "local" pronunciation70.115.171.96 (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 12:05, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

Untitled

I think that Lewis Hoad have win only four Slams, not five. I'm not going to change anything because I don't know very much about tennis or english, but in the page of Lewis hoad, you can see than he have win only 4 majors, and you can see that in the lists of winners too, so maybe the one who writes this article can repair the mistake. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.221.38.194 (talk) 01:55, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

My Mother, Juanita Nunez, has many stories working as a Nanny with Pancho and his family. She has nothing but great stories of always being treated as family and the utmost respect. As I read read the information on his death she is saddened that he passed friendless. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.128.35.97 (talk) 03:28, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Sourcing unknown material

I'm not sure I like the term edit warring being used by the moderator. Unknown IP 71.197.77.124 who is also IP 67.161.160.59 is continually adding material that could be bogus. No one knows who this Mr Pate and Arzy are. They could be viable additions to this article... or they could be names pulled out of a hat... who knows. All I asked for was some reliable sourcing so that the tennis project could be comfortable that the article has remained factual and verifiable. I have asked many many times and the response has been a big fat zero, nada, nothing. I'm at a loss to explain why he would be so obtuse but there has been no answer to my queries at all. I look at it now as vandalism/mischief and revert on sight until we see some proof those names should be there. I certainly don't think the article should be fully protected but I had asked for temporary semi-protection. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:08, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

As an uninvolved editor (I just noticed the WP:DIS by the IPs), I agree with the comments of Fyunck(click). I warned the IPs, as Fyunck(click), and there's been no engagement or discussion by this (per WP:DUCK) user. Cheers, --4wajzkd02 (talk) 22:29, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm the guy who originated this article and wrote most of it before moving over to Citizendium exactly for reasons like this character who keeps putting in the unsourced edits. The funny thing is, his edits about Chuck Pate (?) are probably correct -- I actually *have* a copy of Pancho's early autobiography -- in it he mentions Pate a dozen times. Why this character won't simply list Pancho's book as a source is beyond me. Stop wasting your time here dealing with him and come work at Citizendium.... Hayford Peirce (talk) 22:35, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Hayford. Any chance of you providing the source? And what about this Arzy guy he also keeps adding? A lot of info sounds good and slides in here at wiki without any sourcing but when two names are added, one linked to a wiki article that doesn't exist, red flags go off and I ask for proof. I go to his talk page and notice others who are challenging his edits on other articles. Then with two different IP's from the same guy more flags go off as to... is he hiding from a wiki ban that he needs to use IP addresses only? I would love for there to be sources to keep the added info as Pancho was an all-time great and worthy of a good wiki posting... I just want a written source from somewhere. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:50, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

The book is: Man with a Racket, The Autobiography of Pancho Gonzales, as Told to Cy Rice, A. S. Barnes and Company, New York, 1959. "Chuck Pate" has half-a-dozen page entries in the Index. He ran the tennis shop at the park, I think. There's no "Arzy" in the index -- there might be a "Smith, Arzy" or some such, but I didn't see it while glancing through. It's a thorough index: my old tennis coach Ray Casey is listed there.... Hayford Peirce (talk) 00:55, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Chuck Pate coached Pancho and Frank Poulain owned the Pro Shop at Exposition Park, this information is covered in Pancho's book "Man with a Racket" published in 1959-why won't you include them? this text moved and attributed to: Djensen409 (talk)

I have no problem with anything being added here... But I do expect that if names are added for being Pancho's coach or friend or mentor that a proper source is added also. A book title is fine as long as you include the page number and put it all in the proper wiki format so we can look it up for accuracy. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:29, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

17 majors

Why not 18? Gonzales won Madison Square Garden Pro.

Why is TOC a major and this one isn't? wikipedia article lists both tournaments as pro majors. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.188.196.216 (talk) 03:20, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

You are both correct and wrong. It is about the same thing as TOC. The thing is,,, the TOC was not an official pro major either and must be removed. It was important to be sure, but there were only three Pro Majors... even per the wikipedia article on the subject. Fyunck(click) (talk) 04:49, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

In terms of prestige, media coverage, and money, the three "pro majors" were not always the top tournaments, especially in the late fifties. In fact, there were years when the "pro majors" were not even held. Often ad hoc, one-year events like the 1966 Forest Hills, even burdened by its strange scoring format, offered the most money and television coverage,Tennisedu (talk) 21:00, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

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Segura quote about Gorgo and his wives

I'll track this done in the Kramer book and put in an actual reference. Hayford Peirce (talk) 22:35, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

Speaking Spanish

I think Kramer says that in his book but I'm too lazy to look through dozens of pages to try to track it down. I've read Gonzales's old autobiography, and I don't remember whether he mentions this or not. Hayford Peirce (talk) 15:01, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Gonzales' backhand change 1958

[TennisFan] It appears that the only source for this story may be Vines himself, which raises the question, how did Vines learn of this extraordinary story? Vines relates details which only first-hand experience could reveal, so perhaps Vines himself was acting as Gonzales' coach in the redevelopment of his backhand. Which, if true, would make Vines something other than a disinterested observer of this achievement.

The major problem with this story is that the drastic change and turnaround in the results of the tour actually coincided with a sudden deterioration of Hoad's back injury, and not with any development of Gonzales' game. Vines' emphasis on the Gonzales' backhand as the explanatory factor is a little forced, given the facts of the tour.

This is not to say that Gonzales' game did not improve, but that the timing of the sudden change in results relates to another factor, namely to Hoad's sudden inability to play well. 64.229.32.48 (talk) 03:45, 26 June 2019 (UTC)TennisFan— Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.229.32.48 (talk) 03:35, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that Kramer says the same thing in HIS book. And I read his book MANY years before seeing the Vines book AND I'm pretty sure that *I* am the guy who put in that info in the original Gonzales article of many years ago. Sigh, this afternoon I'll go through the Kramer book VERY carefully and see if I can't track it down. Hayford Peirce (talk) 19:29, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

Well, I just spent an hour going through the Kramer autobiography and then the Gorgo autobiography and then a couple of other tennis books and I can't find a THING about Gorgo changing his backhand against Hoad. All of them focus on Lew's bad back. But I'm still sure that I'm the guy made that statement back in the early days of the Gonzales article. And if I did do that, I must have got that info from some *secondary* source that none of us can identify. I'll try going back to the early days of the Gorgo article and see if anything springs to mind. Hayford Peirce (talk) 21:36, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

I've gone back to the very early days of the Gorgo article and it was in my edit of 22 Feb. 2006 that I added a completely new paragraph about Gorgo vs. Hoad. And I said that he revamped and improved his backhand against Hoad, just as Tilden had done in 1920. I've certainly written some stupid things over the years in WP, mostly trying to put a POV into various articles, but I certainly never made anything up out of thin air. Somewhere I must have read something about the improvement in the backhand and then stuck it into the article. I've got a couple of other tennis books that I haven't yet consulted, and I'll take a look at them sometime to see if I can find out what on earth I was thinking of back in 2006. I do know THIS, however, I never even KNEW about the Vines book until about three years ago, so it certainly wasn't from that source that I got it.... Hayford Peirce (talk) 21:53, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution of March 22, 1960 quotes Trabert: "Take his backhand. We all knew he preferred to hit his backhand down the line. He used to do it 90 per cent of the time. Now he’ll cross-court you, and that makes him twice as effective." Trabert doesn't say when this change occurred, but per the source I added the other day to the article (in addition to Vines), Gonzalez mentioned having a new backhand in the April 28, 1958 edition of Elmira's Star Gazette, right in the middle of the Hoad tour: "This backhand stroke I have now – it’s got more of a drop on it than the old one – gives me more top spin and a better chance to keep him back."

That sounds perhaps like a grip change.

Hayford, I feel like I've seen the backhand-change account in other sources, too, besides Vines. Perhaps in standard histories by Bud Collins; and those accounts may or may not have been taken from Vines' book, or they could be independent accounts. I'll keep looking too. Krosero (talk) 01:39, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

I agree -- I THINK it might be a Bud Collins source -- he wrote SO much! I'll keep tracking -- none of us could have INVENTED this! Hayford Peirce (talk) 01:46, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

Another source from '58, looks pretty definitive, I'll put it into the article. Minneapolis Star of May 8, 1958 asks Myron McNamara, the publicity man for the WS tour, how Gonzales was able to turn the tour around: “Well, I know one thing. Gonzales was a worried individual when Hoad licked him consistently. He did something about it. One thing was to increase his practice sessions every day. Another was to develop a new backhand stroke. He changed to a lighter racquet. He studied Lew’s weaknesses. Pancho began to win. He caught Hoad and still is ahead of him." 02:13, 29 June 2019 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krosero (talk • contribs)

And here's Hoad himself, during the '58 tour, describing a change in Gonzalez's backhand as a major factor in the turnaround. Baltimore’s The Evening Sun of April 21, 1958: "Lew Hoad agrees his long losing streak to Pancho Gonzales (24 out of 29), after getting jump on tour, was due to two things. Pancho developed new backhand crosscourt passing shot, then kept taking more and more time to get set to play until he got Hoad’s 'goat.' " Krosero (talk) 03:18, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

Wonderful, you've done a terrific job of tracking this stuff down! So I didn't INVENT it -- but I wish I knew where I had gotten it from in the first place! Hayford Peirce (talk) 04:06, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

<preachermode>That is exactly why adding proper citations is so important. It allows everyone, editors and readers, to see and verify where the information comes from and determine if it is accurate.</preachermode> I don't really remember myself but way back in 2006 adding citations/references to an article probably did not receive the same emphasis as it does nowadays.--Wolbo (talk) 09:50, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

Earlier in '58 the improved backhand was noticed by Hoad when he was ahead in the series 9–6. On 13 Feb 1958, in the New Jersey Record, there were several things of note.

"Two points were proven last night to the satisfaction of the largest tennis crowd in the history of Madison Square Garden. The number one item is that Lew Hoad is a far better player now than he was last year. And the second being that Pancho Gonzales is the same as he was last year - the world's greatest tennis player." Pancho said "I was especially happy over my backhand. The reason I've been concentrating on my backhand is to compensate for Hoad's tremendous power. Normally I like to move in a lot, but I can't against him. So the work on the backhand." Hoad also answered queries. "of course Gonzales was tremendous. Once he had me he didn't let go. I was also stunned by the accuracy of his backhand."

So even in early '58 the new backhand was starting to show results. This match ended with a Gonzalez win, 7–9, 6–0, 6–4, 6–4, with Gonzalez at one point having won 10 straight games. Crowd size was 15,237. Fyunck(click) (talk) 09:41, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

[TennisFan}This still leaves us with questions....if Gonzales' backhand was developed by February 12, why did Hoad turn things around after this MSG match and win ten straight matches indoor (no less, Hoad's least favourite venue), and cause Gonzales to talk to Kramer on Feb. 28, telling Kramer that he had lost confidence in winning the series?

Another issue, in those newspaper reports, in contrast to the much later accounts by Kramer and Hoad, there is no reference to Hoad's back troubles as a contributory factor. Those back issues exactly coincided with the drastic turnaround in the results. Obviously, the backhand restructure helped Gonzales' game, but turning wins into losses evidently required something more. Now, it was important to not mention Hoad's serious injury, I guess, to maintain ticket sales, thus no mention in those newspaper clips of it. But trying to pin down Gonzales' backhand rehab is difficult, and without that we do not know how important it was to the wins/losses outcomes.64.229.32.48 (talk) 17:45, 29 June 2019 (UTC)TennisFan

I noticed in several sources, including an article from The Guardian in 1961, that Hoad was suffering from an arthritic back that had been bothering him severely since 1956! And his game would be up and down accordingly through all the years since 1956. So there was no big coinciding of any back injury in later years... he always had it. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:07, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

        TennisFan....Fyunck, the information about his back injury has been updated on the Hoad bio page at Wikipedia, he suffered two ruptured discs and a herniation as a result of a self-invented weight-lifting exercise, doing pushups with round 50 lb. weights placed on his lower back, which caused severe back trouble beginning 1956, operation in 1978 which was successful in restoring it. In early 1957, Hoad was placed in an upper body cast for six weeks, which left him pain-free for 11 months after it was removed.  Hoad experienced a sudden reversal of symptoms in early March 1958, and a short while later a severe pain during play, which caused him to leave the tour for a stretch and void his contract guarantee. He took three month periods of rest, and claimed that he was feeling well in early 1960, but later complained of back trouble in the Wembley finals of the early sixties, and other physically trying events. There was no "arthritis", that sounds like an attempt to calm the fans.64.229.32.48 (talk) 22:49, 29 June 2019 (UTC)TennisFan

One thing I DID find in Kramer's book when I went through it yesterday was on pages 234 and 235 -- Kramer says "that the era that Cash-and-Carry Pyle had started three decades earlier came to an end March 1, 1958, in Palm Springs." That was a chilly night on which an enormous crowd turned out to watch the Gorgo-Hoad match. The next morning Hoad woke up with a bad back and that was when the head-to-head tour turned around and from which Hoad never made a permanent physical recovery. Hayford Peirce (talk) 20:47, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

Hmmm. That may have happened at a bad time for the tour, but Kramer was wrong if he thinks that's when it started. Shall we take a look at some headlines. 27 January 1957 - "Lew Hoad, plagued by his bad back, saw his renewed bid for a tennis "Grand Slam" shattered." Let's try another that same year of 1957 - "Lew Hoad's back injury has become so painful that he is unlikely to play tennis for some weeks – or even longer." Injury could be a slipped disc. Hoad himself says, he first started having trouble with his back at the 1956 Australian Championships and that it was bad at the 1956 Davis Cup Challenge Round where he was being treated by physiotherapists and heat treatments, neither of which worked. By January of 1957, doctors told him if it was not the National Championships he would not have been allowed on the court. In July of 1957 it was revealed that "Lew Hoad told he'd never play again." This from doctors in February 1957, after which they placed him in a full body cast to try and fix his back ligaments.

He seemed to have only minor flareups over the next 11 months, until early 1958. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:40, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

I put in a May 4, 1960 report that had this:

Like Tilden, Pancho has the ability to rise to the occasion, to win the big point needed to turn the tide. Where his game was weak, he made changes. Where it was strong, he improved it.

“His backhand wasn’t much when he turned pro,” according to Kramer, who licked Pancho 96-27 in 1949. “But every day he’d go out and have Pancho Segura hit backhand shots at him until it turned into a big weapon for him.”

Later, that accurate undercut backhand proved vulnerable to the power generated by Lew Hoad of Australia who came along in 1958.

Long sessions on the practice court brought Gonzales a new topspin backhand, bristling with power as well as accuracy, and that chink in his armor was closed tight.

And Hoad was interviewed in the Baltimore Sun of April 3, 1958, naming unfamiliar conditions of the pro tour, and Pancho's improved backhand, as the two major reasons for the turnaround. Gonzalez was interviewed as well and he mentioned hitting new shots he'd never hit before. Hoad says that he was taking advantage of Pancho's defensive backhand return (I believe that is what Vines says as well) and that Pancho changed that shot, mixing it up with dinks, angles, lobs and topspin drives.

I know Gonzalez had some success in matches against Sedgman and Laver, by mixing it up, slowing down the pace, giving power hitters less to work with.

All in all there's a lot of support for Vines' account in contemporary sources, from a diverse witnesses including Lew and Pancho themselves. There's more support than I expected, because in my research I often have trouble finding a contemporary source -- to say nothing of several sources, as is the case here -- to support accounts in memoirs from many years later. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krosero (talk • contribs) 03:44, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

1963 Forest Hills U.S. Pro

There has been much discussion and controversy about the 1963 U.S. Pro at Forest Hills.

First, was it approved by the USPLTA? The USPLTA had withdrawn recognition of Cleveland as the U.S. Pro in 1951 when Riggs and Kramer had arranged a U.S. Pro event for Forest Hills, obtained the title from the USPLTA, and Cleveland, which still held the Benrus Cup to award for the anticipated 1951 U.S. Pro, found itself without an authorized title, choosing instead to bill itself as "The Cleveland International Professional Championships", switching to "World Pro" in 1954 when the venue was moved to the Cleveland Arena. Kramer obtained USPLTA approval for the 1954 L.A. U.S. Pro, had a good working relationship with the USPLTA, and presumably arranged some understanding with the USPLTA for use of the "U.S. Pro" title for 1963 Forest Hills, and probably also for Longwood 1964. (documentary evidence remains undiscovered)

Money losses, no prize money? Hoad and Rosewall were the proprietors of the pro tour in 1963, and perhaps received a share of the gate, although there is no documentary evidence for this, beyond Gonzales' statements in 1963 that the prize money did not reflect the money received by the tour's proprietors.64.229.32.48 (talk)TennisFan —Preceding undated comment added 17:27, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

I don't think the mention of Tilden's backhand in 1920 is irrelevant

I think it VERY interesting that two of the very greatest players of all time both had to revamp their backhands at certain points in their careers in order to either achieve dominance or to retain it -- some experts know this about Tilden, very few about Gonzalez. I think it would interesting to ANYone reading this deep into this article to see the comparison. I will object strongly if this sentence is removed. But thanks for at least bringing the topic up WITHOUT removing it. If there is a consensus from the other editors that you are correct and I am wrong, I will, of course, go along with it. Hayford Peirce (talk) 22:21, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

TennisFan----Yes, it certainly is interesting, but there is no direct connection here, Tilden's revamping did not have any influence on Gonzales' revamping, Gonzales was not inspired by Tilden's example to revamp his backhand, or else I would support leaving it in.

Hey, every pro player revamps his backhand from time to time, Newcombe made a major backhand revamp, apparently inspired by Hoad's observations, and learned to hit his backhand crosscourt, which won him some big majors. There is no reason to connect with Tilden here.

Every player adjusts his game while on tour, Hoad certainly adjusted his game during this tour... there is no news there.

I would be interested in finding out if Vines was taken on by Gonzales as a coach to help with his backhand, that would be very interesting, and worthy of inclusion. I know it is very inspiring to think that the ghost of Tilden helped Gonzales revamp his game, but there is no support for that idea in the literature.64.229.32.48 (talk) 22:27, 29 June 2019 (UTC)TennisFan

Federer also had to work on his backhand late in his career. Chris Evert had to work on her fitness. Pros have to adjust to new players and challenges from time to time. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:44, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

I don't see any mention of Vines at all in the Gonzales book. And if Vines HAD worked with Gorgo in the late 50s, you'd think he would have mentioned it in HIS book. My own feeling about the Vines book is that it was written 99% by the co-writer from the Los Angeles Times, a VERY minor sportswriter who, in MY opinion, was putting his own thoughts about tennis into the book supposedly written by Vines. And that Vines may have had no input at all. The Gonzales book ("as told to Cy Rice") is even MORE ridiculous. Pancho sounds like a Harvard professor giving a lecture most of the time -- I doubt if there could be any greater disparity in sports writing than Pancho's "voice" in the book and his voice in real life. Hayford Peirce (talk) 00:09, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

I am open to new evidence, if you could find some source to indicate that Gonzales was aware of or inspired by Tilden's backhand revamp, that would constitute relevance, and would be worth including. Just comparing the two players for revamps does not make a special connection, every player adjusts their backhands from time to time. I left in the reference to Gonzales' backhand revamp, and I would add Tilden again if we could find some evidence of Gonzales getting inspiration from Tilden.64.229.32.48 (talk) 00:44, 30 June 2019 (UTC)TennisFan

Gorgo MENTIONS Tilden a couple of times in his book, but fleetingly. He certainly doesn't mention him as an inspiration or a role model in any way. So I doubt if there is any direct connection between Tilden's backhand revamp and Gorgo's. As you CORRECTLY say, all tennis players make adaptations from time to time. I certainly did in MY 60 years of playing. Hayford Peirce (talk) 01:03, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Gorgo and the ten (or more) Wimbledon champions he beat

If we're going to include Sexy Rexy (who was a GREAT player when he really concentrated), then why not Kramer? Didn't Gorgo and Segoo and Kramer tour together in '54? And Gorgo certainly beat him a couple of times during that tour. If you reply, "Well, that isn't one of the seven tours we're talking about," then *I* reply: "If not, then how we can put in Hartwig from *another* tour?" I think we have to be consistent here. Hayford Peirce (talk) 23:10, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Fully agreed, Hayford. And just a note about the original wording of this claim: "beating, in head-to-head tours, all of the best amateurs who turned pro, which included every Wimbledon champion for 10 years in a row." I don't know what that means, and maybe there's a translation issue, but in any case, if you google that exact wording, you get a long list of places where the claim has been quoted verbatim for many years; you even see it being debunked on Talk Tennis way back in 2007, where a poster points out: "Gonzales beat Wimbledon champs Sedgman, Trabert, Hoad, and Cooper on head-to-head-tours, after losing his initial tour to Kramer."

I'm not sure how it makes sense to expand that list by including Wimbledon doubles champions, because the sense of the paragraph is not about doubles; and the H2H tours were not arranged around doubles.

And including Rex Hartwig just because Gonzalez "beat" him on the 1959 Ampol tour is meaningless. The Ampol tour was not a H2H tour, it was a tournament circuit like what we have today. It was not a H2H tour (or else Hoad would have lost the Ampol tour to Gonzalez, who had an edge over Lew in their personal meetings on that circuit). Yes, Gonzalez finished ahead of Hartwig in the standings; but he finished ahead of nearly everyone who participated on that tour (except Hoad). It's like saying that the world-ranked #2 player today finished ahead of the hundreds of players who placed below him on last year's tournament circuit.

So Hartwig can't be included on that basis. If there's any claim to salvage here, it would be Gonzalez's defeated opponents on the H2H tours. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krosero (talk • contribs) 01:52, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

You make many good points here. I don't know *who* put in the original statement about him beating the "ten" Wimbledon champions -- and it certainly doesn't make sense (from my point of view) to include doubles players among the ten. Why not *mixed* doubles champs in that case? Let's either take it out completely OR completely rewrite it. Hayford Peirce (talk) 14:56, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

I agree with removing it. It just opens the way to the creation of dubious/trivial records here on Wiki, and I see that on the Hoad bio two new "records" were created yesterday in imitation of this one (which again, was quoted verbatim on multiple sites going back more than a decade--as if Wikipedia itself was a source). This is especially true if you try to put Hartwig in there, when the passage was only about opponents beaten on H2H tours. Did Gonzalez even meet Hartwig on that Ampol tournament circuit of '59? Not that a meeting would matter, because it was a tournament circuit, not a H2H tour. But if there wasn't even a meeting, and Gonzalez merely finished ahead of Hartwig in the Ampol rankings, well that's the very definition of trivial. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krosero (talk • contribs) 15:42, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I'm glad you agree! I've traced the "In that period, Gonzales won the United States Professional Championship eight times and the Wembley professional title in London four times, plus beating, in head-to-head tours, all of the best amateurs who turned pro, which included every Wimbledon champion for 10 years in a row." back to at LEAST 2011, so it's been around for a LONG time. And become totally accepted as fact, apparently. Years ago, the pros played a round-robin at the L.A. Tennis Club that I saw a couple of matches of. Hartwig and Gonzales were both in it, so they played at that point. I dunno who won that match, but Segoo won the tournie, beating all six or seven of the others without losing a match. Hayford Peirce (talk) 15:48, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Yes, it became totally accepted as fact, until I challenged it the other day....why did it take so long for someone to challenge it here? The same is true of the claim for the 8 U.S. Pro titles, which is a subject worthy of a separate page by itself. A very complicated subject, similar to Hogan's possible claim for another U.S. Open title from 1942. So we should not just blindly accept these questionable claims without some research, especially when the sources are in dispute with one another. I was trying to salvage the Gonzales record in some logical form, but obviously it is just a little too stretched, having to broaden the definition of "Wimbledon champion" to get 10 players. The Hoad claim, on the other hand, is well defined, more on that on the Hoad page.Tennisedu (talk) 21:21, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Tennisedu (talk) 08:17, 21 January 2020 (UTC)There is another issue of interest, when is a tour classified as a "hth" tour? When there are only two players/ That would seem logical, because if there is a 4-man round robin tour, the hth results could be a loss and the loser still win the tour, which actually happened in 1959. I would not call the 1959 4-man tour a hth tour. Or 1954 or 1960. Those are 4-mans, not hth. So Gonzales actually won 3 hth tours in my classification, and 4 tours with broader participation. 1961 had a hth playoff.Tennisedu (talk) 08:17, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Tennisedu (talk) 21:24, 25 January 2020 (UTC)Okay, so we now have the source for this Gonzales Legend, but not as expressed here previously, from Olmedo in a 1994 comment. Gonzales beat 10 Wimbledon champs in a row....actually, he "had wins" over 12 Wimbledon champs in a row from 1947 to 1959, five of them in the amateur circuit before Gonzales turned pro.

They are 1) Kramer (Gonzales had wins over as a pro) 2) Falkenburg (Gonzales won two of three amateur meetings) 3) Schroeder (Gonzales had losing hth as amateur, but won last two meetings) 4) Patty (Gonzales beat as amateur) 5) Savitt (Gonzales beat in amateur circuit) 6) Sedgman (Gonzales beat as amateur and pro, also lost some big ones to Sedgman as a pro) 7) Seixas (Gonzales beat as amateur) 8) Drobny (Gonzales beat as amateur) 9) Trabert (Gonzales beat and lost to as both amateur and pro) 10) Hoad (Gonzales beat and lost to as pro) 11) Cooper (Gonzales beat and lost a few to as pro) 12) Olmedo (Gonzales beat as pro) So, that is the record, with six of these players being from the amateur ranks, Gonzales having some wins over them before he turned pro.Tennisedu (talk) 21:24, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Legends of Gonzales, True or False?

As stated above, the legend that Gonzales defeated ten Wimbledon champions in a row is not possible, but it carried a lot of momentum and added weight to the Legend of Gonzales.

We have now removed it from this article.

Another legend is the famous "112.88 mph forehand drive", which McCauley accepted...however, did McCauley perhaps misread his source?

There is no mention of "forehand drives", only "drives", and apparently these were service drives, comparing to Tilden's 1931 measured service speeds, which were timed from a film with a stopwatch at 151 mph.

Sports Illustrated in 1959 referred to the Philadelphia measurements as service speeds. So did other tennis writers in the 1950's, such as Tingay.

So this is another legend which needs updating and correcting. I have already started the process, and will go also to Segura's page.Tennisedu (talk) 03:23, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Tennisedu (talk) 02:03, 25 January 2020 (UTC) Some legends die hard. I hesitate to mention this, but...the source for Gonzales beating ten Wimbledon champions in a row is found in a 1994 interview with Olmedo, Olmedo repeats this claim as if it was well known. However, there is no reference to a tour context, there is no claim that this was done on those seven pro tours which Gonzales won. And, in fact, Gonzales did beat or had wins over ten straight Wimbledon champions, from 1947 to 1959, he beat every one somewhere, four as amateurs. So, that is what the record really is, ten Wimby champs, but not all on the pro tour.Tennisedu (talk) 02:03, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

1954 U.S. Pro

Of all the 8 claimed U.S. Pro titles for Gonzales, only the 1954 L.A. version was reported to have official USPLTA approval. That is the distinction which is cited here, with the L.A. Times as a source. None of the other purported U.S. Pro wins of Gonzales has reported USPLTA approval as a U.S. Pro, and that is true both at the time and in hindsight.Tennisedu (talk) 19:18, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

My family moved to L.A. in '56, and I started playing tennis there at that time. And reading the L.A. Times. They had an ENORMOUS sports section, with many reputable columnists, one of whom, Jim Murray, was actually FAMOUS. They covered a LOT of tennis in that section. It was the home town of Gonzales and, in a sense, Kramer also. When the pro tour came to town, they gave it a LOT of coverage. I remember that Murray once wrote an entire column about Rex Hartwig, for instance. In which Hartwig said that HE frequently lost concentration, which was why he didn't beat the other guys even when he should have. My point, however, is that if the L.A. Times printed some info about a tennis tournament, it PROBABLY had pretty good reasons for doing so. Like any paper, they could make mistakes, but in this case I think we ought to give the Times a lot of weight in judging whether its info was right or wrong. Hayford Peirce (talk) 19:55, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

The hindsight claim is totally false! They are recognized by historians and writers as 8 US Pro titles. At the time they were simply world champions in the US but that morphed into US Champions rather quickly in tennis time. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:32, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Hayford, what you say about LA Times is true, and I have no problem with that source in general, or with keeping the statement that '54 LA was reported as a US Pro. But the statement that '54 LA was the only one of Gorgo's US Pros officially sanctioned by the PLTA is misleading -- besides also being original research, ie, none of the sources in question have surveyed all the newspaper reports for all US Pros, that is something that we are doing here. But I say it's misleading because the PLTA website today does not list '54 LA as a US Pro; and I have recently found that '54 LA is not listed even in the official PLTA Yearbooks of the time period, which listed all of their events back to 1927 (the earliest Yearbook I have on hand is 1961, but that's early enough to be contemporary). So it does call into question what the LA Times was reporting when it said that Kramer managed to get PLTA sanction for his event. The LA Times could have been perfectly correct about that, but whatever form this sanction took, it did not last, as you can see from the PLTA Yearbooks and their current website. The PLTA was at odds with many of the touring pros and their player organizations; one of the player organizations gave their own sanction to Cleveland as the US Pro in 1951. This was a complex political situation and no one knows exactly what kind of accommodation or sanction the PLTA gave to Kramer's event, or whether they gave any accommodation to the Cleveland tournament -- which in the early and late 1950s was called US Pro both by newspapers and by Pancho Gonzalez himself (he called the '57 Cleveland event "the National Professional Championship", which is a common term that had always been used to refer to the US Pro, whether or not it had PLTA sanction; that's how it was described for example when Budge won the title in '42).

Bottom line here is, I have no problem with LA Times as such -- only with original research being placed here, claiming or implying that Gonzalez really did not win 8 US Pros but rather won only 1 or maybe zero. Plenty of reputable sources (Joe McCauley, Bud Collins) regard him as winning 8 US Pros; Pancho Gonzalez himself thought so; even Kramer says in his memoir, "For a time, after the U.S. Pro left Forest Hills, it sort of merged with Jack March’s tournament [in Cleveland]." Krosero (talk) 20:36, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Names mean something. In 1942, the U. S. Open was renamed "the National" with the winner, Ben Hogan, not getting recognition for a U.S. Open victory. Now, that was a decision by the USGA, and despite many golf historians and writers claiming ever since that Hogan won the U.S. Open in 1942, the USGA has never changed its mind and given the credit for a U.S. Open win. Neither has the USPLTA come forward and changed the recognition so that the Cleveland post-1950 (Cleveland actually WAS the U.S. Pro in 1950) would have official recognition as the U.S. Pro. And that is as it should be, because Gonzales, I am sure, would understand the significance of the term "U.S. Pro",, and to avoid using it, instead using "the National", much as golf did in 1942 and tennis did in 1942, indicates an awareness of the distinction of those two titles. And do not forget that the Cleveland promoter applied to the USPLTA in 1952 to get permission to use the term "U.S. Pro" as their title, was turned down, and accepted the judgement, using International Pro as the title.:Tennisedu (talk) 21:21, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

I am not familiar with golf and will not take anything written here at face value, but presuming for the sake of argument that this is all true, it shows what a different situation it was in tennis. The USGA resumed holding US Opens after the war, whereas the PLTA never resumed holding a national championship after 1951. They held a tiny event, which may have been restricted to teaching pros, and which they called "US Pro"; it is listed on their site today as having their official sanction. So there is no evidence that the PLTA ever gave sanction to all those US Pros won in the 1960s by Laver, Rosewall, or those won by Borg in the 1970s, or any of the champions listed by Collins et al through the tournament's final edition in 1999. Think about that again: the PLTA essentially gave up mounting a truly national pro championship -- or could not successfully mount more than a tiny event, possibly restricted to teaching pros -- which is nothing like the situation in golf.

And yet the argument is that we should treat PLTA sanction as the only definition of what constitutes a US Pro!

Really, what's supposed to happen here? We're supposed to take away Gorgo's US Pros but leave in place all the ones won by Laver, Rosewall, Borg, etc., on the mere speculation that PLTA must have given official sanction to those titles but not to Gorgo's? And on the presumption that only PLTA sanction is our guide as to what is a US Pro?

It's not even as if the PLTA was the only organization that had put on the US Pro, before the Cleveland years. American Lawn Tennis reported that the '46 US Pro was held "under the joint auspices" of the PLTA and a players' organization, the Professional Players Association. This is how it was on the old pro tour (as opposed to golf in 1942): there was no single organization that "ran the show"; as everyone knows, most tennis events on the old pro tour were put on however they could be, by whomever could mount them. So again, why is the US Pro history being chained exclusively to the pronouncements of one organization?

Bottom line, I see no justification for arguing or implying that Gonzalez did not win 8 US Pros, based merely on PLTA's website/yearbooks -- if for no other reason that the PLTA does not list any US Pro won by Laver, Rosewall, Borg et al, anymore than they list Gonzalez. We're not just dealing with 1 year (like Hogan's 1942), or even one event (Cleveland). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krosero (talk • contribs) 22:04, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Interesting questions you raise, Krosero. Now lets try and answer them. In the 1941 U.S. Pro field, there were 26 players. In 1942, there were 28. In 1947 there were 26. In 1948 there were 32. In 1950 there were 24. Huge fields. And where did all those players come from? There were only a small handful of touring pros, maybe three or four who were actually under a touring contract. The bulk were teaching pros or club pros, the USPLTA brought them aboard. Otherwise there could not be a large tournament. So the USPLTA was a central organizing force through 1951. Now, in 1954, it looks like the USPLTA was not involved in organizing the L.A. event, BUT Kramer was given the Benrus Cup to offer to the winner, so obviously the USPLTA had given approval. And it makes sense that Kramer would get approval for the title "U.S. Pro" in 1963, a title which Cleveland did NOT use for its own event, even though they had applied for it. Now, the local Cleveland newspapers would certainly know if the local tournament was the "U.S. Pro", and the failure to find any mention of it in Cleveland newspapers is a decisive indication that it was not the U.S. Pro. And, of course, when the Cleveland promoter applied to the USPLTA for the "U.S. Pro" title in 1952, the USPLTA said "no", and the Cleveland promoter accepted that response, and used the title "International Pro" for the Cleveland event. That constitutes an acknowledgement of the authority of the USPLTA to grant authorization for use of the "U.S. Pro" title. And Gonzales understood the significance of that title, and chose instead another title name, "National Pro", which was not actually used in Cleveland. Case closed.Tennisedu (talk) 23:15, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

As usual we start to go around in circles, but some things have to be corrected, particularly this speculation about the language that Gonzalez used. Gonzalez used the term, "U. S. National Professional Championship." You can search in newspapers.com, it's very easy to find US Pros, pre-Cleveland, being called, either by that full name, or sometimes just "National Professional Championship." The US Pros contested by Budge and Riggs in the late 40s, were referred to that way typically in the press. So this picayune speculation about why Gonzalez didn't exactly enunciate the words "You-Ess-Proh", is just that: picayune speculation, and to boot, also quite uninformed about the language actually used in that time period.

Same with the '63 edition at Forest Hills: if you really want to hang your hat on picayune word-splitting, please note that the '63 tournament called itself "US Pro Grasscourts." Some journalists called it "US Pro" -- just as some journalists called, for example, the 1953 Cleveland event, the "US Pro" -- but it was noted in the press that the official title used by the tournament to refer to itself was "US Pro Grasscourt Championship." If language is what you're going to make such a decisive criteria, and any deviation from "US Pro" is decisive, then '63 was not a US Pro either.

This argument that Rosewall's title in '63 must have had PLTA sanction while Gonzalez's titles can be dropped because they didn't have sanction, doesn't fly even under its own premises, but again, this is just an attempt to downgrade Gonzalez's US Pro titles while keeping Laver's and Rosewall's and Borg's, etc. This is not consistent. The statement in the Gonzalez article that '54 Los Angeles was the only one of Gonzalez's titles known to be officially sanctioned by the PLTA -- besides being contradicted by the PLTA Yearbooks, but leave that aside for the moment -- should really be duplicated on the Laver and Rosewall bios, to be consistent.

If the statement stays in the Gonzalez article, we should state in Laver's bio, "None of Laver's US Pros are known to be officially sanctioned by the PLTA." Same on Rosewall's bio, and Borg's, etc. You would ask, "Why? How do you know this? Is it your own research?" And I would have to reply, "Yes, it's my research; I've never found a report stating that any of Laver's titles were officially sanctioned by the PLTA. Moreover, the PLTA does not list Laver's titles as US Pros; the PLTA lists only their own (minor) event as the official US Pro." Of course, that would be wrong, and I'm not suggesting that it should be done. But then what is such a statement doing in the Gonzalez article? It was put there in precisely the same way: 1) personal research about the '54 LA report being unique; and 2) the PLTA website. It's exactly the same thing.

The Gonzalez statement is misleading and has no place there; at the very least it should remain with a "citation needed."

And the fundamental problem remains. If PLTA sanction is the only definition of a US Pro, then please have a look at the champions roll of the US Pro at the PLTA website. Tut Bartzen was the winner in 1962-32, followed by Sam Giammalva in '64 (rather than Laver), Mike Davis in '65 (not Rosewall), Pancho Segura in '66 (again not Laver). The PLTA-sanctioned tournament is still going on today. But tennis histories do not list it as the US Pro, for all the reasons discussed above. Krosero (talk) 02:52, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Okay, Krosero, but we are not going in circles, we have some basic points to address which are obvious ones.

Whatever Gonzales chose to call it and he chose "National" Pro, not U.S. Pro, does not really matter, that is beside the point. The basic point is that Cleveland APPLIED to the USPLTA in 1952 for PERMISSION to use the U.S. Pro title, they were denied permission, and the Cleveland people ACCEPTED that verdict, and chose instead the "International Pro" title.....now, that constitutes acknowledgement of the USPLTA authority to grant use of title. Period. No question there. And the Cleveland promoter did NOT use the U.S. Pro title, and the local Cleveland press did NOT use the U.S. Pro title. Those are simple and pertinent facts which decide this issue. There is no point in rehashing non-essential facts again and again. We know the facts, and the U.S. title was simply not used. That settles the issue, and to try and rebrand this event from a later perspective, which is what apparently happened here, is not consistent with the facts of history. And, yes, I give credit to Kramer for being able to get USPLTA approval to use the U.S. Pro moniker for the events at Forest Hills 1951, L.A. Tennis Club 1954, and, I suspect, Forest Hills in 1963, given his obvious good working relationship with the USPLTA. That makes sense, because no one was using the U.S. Pro title without the consent of the USPLTA.Tennisedu (talk) 03:29, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Basically your argument is simply to return to the fact of PLTA sanction. You merely insist, and repeat, that only PLTA sanction matters (yes, that's going in circles).

Fyunck, you were right to state above, that the hindsight claim is false. Cleveland being the US Pro is not something that was done only later. Probably the PLTA prevented Jack March from calling Cleveland the "US Pro", but journalists and players were under no such legal obligation to toe the line of one organization. The Philadelphia Inquirer referred to '53 Cleveland as "US Pro" and referred to Gonzalez as the "US Pro" champion. The Times of Shreveport, LA had a profile of Pancho Segura, in 1956, which listed 1952 Cleveland as one of his "US Pro" titles (which sugggests strongly that Segura himself regarded it as such). And like we've been saying, Gonzalez, writing in '58, referred to Cleveland events that did not have PLTA sanction (1952, 1957) as the US National Pro (which language was commonly used to refer to all US Pros).

So we can go farther than merely saying that this wasn't done in hindsight. We keep forgetting here that Cleveland was called US Pro from the beginning, both in 1950 when it had PLTA sanction and in 1951 when the pros themselves defied PLTA authority and called their event in Cleveland the US Pro.

The players' organization that refused in 1951 to recognize the PLTA's authority on the issue of the US Pro consisted of Jack March, Pancho Gonzalez, Pancho Segura, Bill Tilden, Frank Kovacs, Frank Parker, Carl Earn, Sarah Cooke, George Lyttleton-Rogers and Don Budge. On the other side, accepting the PLTA's authority, were Jack Kramer and Bobby Riggs.

It cannot be stressed enough, that this was a political conflict, and something that was there from the start -- not a hindsight imposition of a US Pro/Cleveland identification that no one wanted at the time.

Looking at all those names above who defied PLTA authority, and looking at that political conflict, this insistence on reverting merely to the issue of PLTA sanction and saying that it alone decides these matters, looks fundamentally ahistorical. Krosero (talk) 03:47, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

No, my argument was NOT only the USPLTA authority, but also the ACCEPTANCE of that authority by the Cleveland management. It is the acceptance which proves the authority of the USPLTA to authorize the title. The local Cleveland press accepted that as well. The facts are clear. You have not found ANY Cleveland press report calling the event U.S. Pro.Tennisedu (talk) 03:53, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Acceptance is not your criteria, because your argument is that Forest Hills in '51, backed by the PLTA, was the US Pro for that year, even though the players' organization, made up of all those players I listed above, publicly stated that they did not accept the PLTA's authority on this. So acceptance by Jack March of PLTA authority in later years means something to you, because it lines up with your argument that Cleveland was not US Pro; but rejection of PLTA authority in '51 means nothing to you. You still go with PLTA authority, alone, to decide what was the '51 US Pro. So your true and sole criterion is PLTA authority.

As for titles: you can't get very far in deciding an event's importance, as you're trying to do, by concentrating on its exact title. Wembley Pro's official title was London Indoor Professional Championships, a very modest title -- probably carefully chosen for political reasons, ie, not to come into official conflict with other authorities -- but no tennis historian doubts its supreme importance in the old pro game. Krosero (talk) 04:21, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Whoa, whoa....no, the Cleveland management DID accept the 1951 decision of the USPLTA to give the U.S. Pro title to Forest Hills, and Cleveland, even though they still awarded the Benrus Cup in 1951, chose the title of "International Pro" for 1951. Then, with no other U.S. Pro on the horizon for 1952, Cleveland applied to the USPLTA for the U.S. Pro title for 1952, it was refused, and again the Cleveland management accepted that result, and again used the title "International Pro". The facts are simple here. There is no doubt what they mean.Tennisedu (talk) 04:43, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Now you're getting basic facts wrong. This is what American Lawn Tennis reported for '51 Cleveland: "Kovacs … was presented with a pair of trophies—the P.O.C. (Pride of Cleveland) Cup as International ruler and the Benrus award, annually presented to the national professional singles ruler." More from the St. Louis Dispatch: "CLEVELAND, June 18 (UP)—The Professional Players Association of Tennis [PPAT] hailed “Clown Prince” Frankie Kovacs as International and United States champion today, while giving a “cold shoulder” to the Bobby Riggs-promoted tournament next week at Forest Hills. Kovacs ... earned the applause yesterday when he revenged himself on Pancho Segura of Ecuador, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3, 1-6, 9-7, in the final round of the International Professional tournament....While heaping Kovacs with honors, officials of the P.P.A. made this clear—the pros will consent to compete in the Riggs affair, but they won’t recognize it as the national championship."

So the Players' organization announced beforehand that they were not recognizing the PLTA event as US Pro, and treated their own event as the US Pro (despite calling their event "International Pro", which is just a beautiful illustration of how little you can rely on exact language of titles).

I don't know why you think the Players' organization accepted the PLTA authority, because I've posted all these reports and excerpts at Talk Tennis and you saw them all. Krosero (talk) 05:01, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

No, what you have said here supports my statements above. The Cleveland management ACCEPTED the decision of the USPLTA to give the title to another event, and Cleveland management used the title "International Pro", which constituted an acceptance of the USPLTA authority to decide the title authorization. If the PPA and the Cleveland manager/promoter had wanted to challenge the USPLTA authority, they would have continued to use the "U.S. Pro" designation, but they clearly did not do that. That is what I read in those newspapers, and I have asked you to cite any Cleveland newspaper report which calls the Cleveland event "U.S. Pro". I did not see anything along those lines, right? And the Cleveland management returned the Benrus Cup to the USPLTA in recognition of the rightful possessor of the official U.S. Pro cup. The USPLTA then used the cup for the 1954 L.A. U.S. Pro, which was the official U.S. Pro for 1954 with authorization by the USPLTA. Where was the PPA in 1954? Did they just disappear?Tennisedu (talk) 05:10, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

You've completely misread those reports. Enough. Krosero (talk) 05:21, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Krosero, if you think that the PPA event was fine as the U.S. Pro and did not need the approval of the USPLTA to hold a national championship, then why did Cleveland apply to the USPLTA for permission to use the "U.S. Pro" designation for the 1952 Cleveland event? They were turned down by the USPLTA, there was, in fact, NO billed U.S. Pro for 1952, and Cleveland accepted the refusal of the USPLTA as determinative and authoritative as regards the title nomenclature. Cleveland remained "International Pro", a name which offended no one, and challenged no one. Cleveland never did get that U.S. Pro designation again after 1950. This issue has nothing to do with Gonzales' stature or record, Gonzales won many other important tournaments, tournaments with higher status than Cleveland, such as the three Tournament of Champions he won in 1957, 1958, 1959, and the Philadelphia Indoor in 1950, 1952, and White Plains in 1964. There is no loss of prestige involved here for Gonzales. Gonzales himself chose to skip Cleveland in both 1950 (when it really was the U.S. Pro) and 1951. Tennisedu (talk) 16:56, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

You seem to be fixated on exact wording of events and that just didn't happen back then, or even today for that matter. Tournaments retroactively incorporate past events into their history rolls. In 1964 the Chicago Tribune advertised the final at Longwood where Laver beat Gonzales as "the first United States Professional grass court tournament". What happened to all the others? No mention of 1963. In 1965, the same event was advertised as "the 38th U.S. pro Singles Championship at Longwood." An amazing change of heart. The same type of thing happens even today when tournaments change venues or area codes. By 1967 sources were saying the U.S. Pro was won in 63 and 65 by Rosewall, and twice in a row in 66 and 67 by Laver... "the first back to back winner since Pancho Gonzales won seven straight titles beginning in 1953. Butch Buchholz - in 1962 - was the last American to win the U.S. Pro title." Sources today still follow that mantra no matter what we think here at wikipedia, and it's what we use. I'm thinking this bbq is done by now and we should move along. Fyunck(click) (talk) 07:11, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Yes, Fyunck, I agree, there was a sea-change in 1964, when the U.S. Pro moved from Forest Hills to Longwood. It was decided by most tennis writers to incorporate the Cleveland events after 1950 into the roster of U.S. Pros, somewhat belatedly. But that now raises problems with our current list....what do we do with 1954? The Cleveland 1954 is usually included in the post-1964 list as the U.S. Pro, however the L.A. U.S Pro in 1954 obtained official status through Kramer's association with the USPLTA. So what do we do about 1954? I suggest that we ignore the standard list and go back to L.A. That had official status. But this is what happens whenever a group of tennis writers tries to rewrite the record, things don't fit. But at least we now have the L.A. event recognized as the probable U.S. Pro for 1954.Tennisedu (talk) 07:48, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

I still don't see the Cleveland '54 as a "standard" in lists. Per our own wikipedia article we have the 1954 US Pro listed at the Los Angeles Tennis Center. So we don't need to change anything as far as that chart. Pancho's performance timeline also links to that same event. Pancho's pro Slam chart also links to that event. The only thing that could be considered an error would be on the Pancho Gonzales career statistics article, in the professional era section. In that 1954 section it should be the U.S. Pro Championships that should be in blue, NOT the World Pro Championships in Cleveland. I just changed that color. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:26, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Fyunck, that's a very sensible approach to the language issue, and the retroactive issue. I've been repeating myself about the fact that Rosewall's US Pro titles starting in '63, and Laver's in '64, are in the same boat as the Cleveland events. As you say, the '64 event was called the "First U.S. Professional Grass Court Champs". So you are not singling out Cleveland as lacking PLTA sanction and somehow arguing that only Cleveland should not be called US Pro. There was some retroactive designation for all these events (but only some! Cleveland in some years like '53 and '57, Forest Hills in '63, Longwood in '64, all were called "US Pro" by some players and journalists WHEN they were held); and that's to be expected in an inherently messy situation.

I think it's fine to include '54 LA as a US Pro, because PLTA sanction does not mean nothing. I only have to reiterate, that the sanction given to LA was temporary. LA does not appear in the champion's roll of the PLTA Yearbooks as early as 1961. It would be interesting to find any earlier Yearbooks, to see if LA ever appeared in the champion's roll of the PLTA.

Good to hear from others on this issue.

Incidentally, I can no longer find on the PLTA website, the article that has been quoted here many times, "“Renowned Players Grace USPTA Championships.” Perhaps it's been moved or archived (though I still have a copy that I can email anyone who might wish to see it -- I also have the PLTA's roll of champions to the present day). Krosero (talk) 14:57, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

The USPLTA article "Renowned players" is still linked to the Wikipedia article on U.S. Pro, and still shows up, I pulled it up two days ago. It does does not easily appear, though, if you are starting from scratch on the USPLTA website, but its there. It has been moved to the archives section. It states clearly that the U.S. Pro "was not held" between 1952 and 1961, and the one-off 1954 L.A. U.S. Pro which awarded the official trophy, the Benrus Cup, provided by the USPLTA to Kramer for that purpose, clearly shows that Kramer had official approval for L.A. Further, the lack of notice in USPLTA publications for L.A. is related to the change in organization. The USPLTA no longer provided fields of club pros to the event.Tennisedu (talk) 17:31, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

I think ALL of you people have done a TREMENDOUS job on this AND on the various Lew Hoad issues, all of which are very, very MINOR indeed to anyone in the world except the most devoted fans of old-time tennis AND devoted fans of complete ACCURACY in WP articles, no matter what the subject. Thanks to all of your polite back-and-forth, and quest for truth, I think that we ought to consider these issues, both for Gorgo and Hoadie, a wrap -- and move on to other things! Thanks and congratulations to all of you! Hayford Peirce (talk) 17:46, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Hayford, agreed to move on, certainly; and thanks for the kind words. Krosero (talk) 18:05, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

I agree that this one has been talked through pretty well, and at least the issues are now laid out. In my own personal list I still have Gonzales getting that great win at L.A. in the U.S. Pro in 1954.Tennisedu (talk) 01:11, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

That's great, but you say that as if Wikipedia has it the other way. We have it the exact same way as you no matter what page I look at. Where do you see it differently? Fyunck(click) (talk) 07:20, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

I just have that one authorized U.S. Pro title on my personal list for Gonzales. Tennisedu (talk) 22:26, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Oh my. Ok. Fyunck(click) (talk) 00:11, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Oh my, indeed. It is not a problem per se to have a biased personal opinion or view on this (or on similar Hoad / Rosewall topics) as long as this bias is checked at the door when editing Wikipedia articles. Failure to do so constitutes a violation of one of wiki's central policies, namely Neutral point of view. Editorial bias is not acceptable but unfortunately has been a problem lately, mainly on the Hoad, Rosewall and Gonzales articles. It damages the neutrality and credibility of these articles and needs to stop. If it doesn't I don't see this ending well.--Wolbo (talk) 00:22, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Ranked Number One eight years

This claim does not have a citation...why is that? It is the sort of statement which begs for a source. It might be very difficult to find a source. The claim is now linked to the Wikipedia article on men's rankings. However, I understand that the Wikipedia article on rankings is not acceptable as a source, even though it shows 8 years at number one for Gonzales.Tennisedu (talk) 02:13, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

You've got me, mate. I was the guy who basically wrote the Gorgo article 15 years ago and put in most of the info. Then I moved to Citizendium and worked for a long time on *their* #1 rankings. With a lot of sources and details. A lot of that got ported over to WP, and vice-versa, and there were arguments about whether Gorgo should be ranked #1 in 1960 or co-ranked, or ranked #2, and at some point I just shrugged my shoulders and said the hell with it. I suppose you can FIND people who say Gorgo should only be ranked #1 for *seven* years. But you can also find people who say he should be ranked #1 for *ten* years. So I'll leave it to you and others to sort out. Cheers! (And the best of British luck to ya!) Hayford Peirce (talk) 03:38, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Hayford, good to hear from you, hope all is well in Britain. I think that the rankings is an issue not be taken too seriously. It's a clouded issue, usually not possible to rank players clearly.Tennisedu (talk) 07:04, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

It was actually not difficult to find at all. I just went to the Hall of Fame. Fyunck(click) (talk) 04:38, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

However, the Hall of Fame is not a source for the rankings, it merely refers to the fact that Gonzales was supposedly ranked first eight times...the HOF does not provide a ranking list. So I think that still leaves us looking for a source.And the eight years are not specified, we can only guess which years they might be. I think that if you scratched the surface, the HOF might simply say that they found the statement in Wikipedia, the HOF itself is not really a source for the work. I have no problem with the eight years at number one, but this is really vague, we don't even know which eight years are being referred to. Also, the statement is qualified by "possibly" and "probably", which does not support the bald certainty of the claim.Tennisedu (talk) 05:24, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

The statement that Gonzales was ranked No. 1 in the world for 8 years does indeed require a reliable source. The Hall of Fame is, as such, a reliable source which can be used but I have noticed several times in the past that they use info from Wikipedia on their website which is problematic. They once mentioned on Lendl's page that he had won 29 or so Super Series titles which could only have come from the Wikipedia article (the info was incorrect and was later removed). Another example is mentioning world No. 1 status for players pre-1913, e.g. Laurie Doherty, which is simply historically inaccurate as there were no world rankings pre 1913, only national ones. The big problem with this circular referencing is that editors in turn use the Hall of Fame as a reliable source for Wikipedia articles which in these instances is not valid. In short, caution must be taken when using the Hall of Fame as a source.--Wolbo (talk) 09:41, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

We don't know the exact years, true, but the Tennis Hall of Fame is an excellent source nonetheless. "On the pro circuit he won 15 major championships, including the U.S. Pro Championship eight times – 1953–1959 and 1961 – and rose to the world No. 1 ranking, holding that lofty perch for a record eight years from 1952 to 1960." Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:32, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Fine, but it also states "the status of a few of the early years is not clear", as I recall. That may be a suitable qualifier. Segura was actually the formally ranked number one for 1952. 05:39, 22 April 2020 (UTC)Tennisedu (talk)

But there was nothing really official back then other than magazines and retired pros. Budge ranked Gonzales number one in part because of a 5–2 head to head, plta had Segura. Wikipedia simply took those rankings and posted them as co-No. 1. The Hall of Fame obviously has Gonzales as No. 1 in 1952. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:03, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Well, there is nothing wrong in making that 8 year claim, even though some of the years are questionable. Rankings are usually vague and unclear.Tennisedu (talk) 07:05, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

This is all too true. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:10, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Why not simply look at this article at Citizendium – scroll down a bit to the 1950s and you will find ALL the information you want, along with citations from relatively reliable sources. http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Tennis/Catalogs/World_No._1_male_players Hayford Peirce (talk) 15:19, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Can't use it as it's simply a copy of Wikipedia. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:26, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

A slight correction: Wikipedia is a copy of the Citizendium article. Not that it matters as long as all the same facts are there. Hayford Peirce (talk) 18:30, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Just did some research. I created this article for WP back in April '06 and for a long time I did most of the research and writing. In July of '07 I began to replicate it at Citizendium, but Larry Sanger was having a spasm about using "Catalogs" for this sort of thing, so it got moved into a Catalog category. But I continued working on it for years. Some of that info then got ported back to WP's article. Essentially they're the same. Hayford Peirce (talk) 20:55, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

TGo return to the issue at hand, we need some identification of what exactly the record is....which rankings are being referred to. Just dancing around citations which may all trace back to Wikipedia gets us no further ahead. And who actually proposed this record? They should be able to direct us to the source material.Tennisedu (talk) 23:29, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

What's interesting is you are the one who put in the term "some rankings" and then asked for clarification of what "some rankings" are? That's a bit strange. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:36, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Well, it's not strange, because it highlights the problem here, which is locating the rankings which are supposedly being referred to. It is strange to me that this problem is not clear to everyone, that when we refer to rankings, those rankings are not to be located anywhere...that is strange. I notice that my notice of need for clarification has been removed again without any more light being shed on the rankings which supposedly support this record. Did you find the rankings being referred to, Fyunck? Otherwise we are no further ahead, we are still looking for the rankings which are supposedly supporting the claim. And we still need clarification. If there is no ranking support for the claim, the record does not exist.Tennisedu (talk) 00:51, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

It is very strange indeed. It was removed because the wording was changed to fit the sources. It reads "he was the world No. 1 tennis player for eight years per the Tennis Hall of Fame and other tennis historians." That is sourced to the Tennis Hall of Fame and tennis historians. I see no reason for more clarification, but obviously you do. My guess is the clarification template will now be there for years. Fyunck(click) (talk) 01:53, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

It should not be there long, because I think that this is a supportable claim in some form, but not as it stands.You could probably find eight number ones for Gonzales from SOME combination of rankings, but probably not from a single ranking source. For example, the USPLTA had annual rankings of the pros, but probably not eight for Gonzales. Now, if they did, that would be the support for the claim, "Gonzales was ranked number one eight times by the USPLTA." But without knowing which ranking authority is doing the eight number ones, the record claim is UNDEFINED. That is the problem. We don't know what that claim means. Ranked number one by whom? By Tennisedu? By the Good Humor Man? The record means nothing if we have no idea who did the rankings. This record cannot be compared to the achievements of other players of the time as it stands, so there is no real record demonstrated here as of now. I don't know who originally put this record on the article, but they should have had some idea where the claim came from and what it means in terms of ranking support.Perhaps we could ask that editor now what he had in mind?Tennisedu (talk) 02:27, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

We don't need the original poster because we have the sources added now. Fyunck(click) (talk) 02:37, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

I just checked the Raymond Lee source you gave, but it is very puzzling. He gives no ranking evidence at all, there is no ranking source mentioned at all. That does not advance our knowledge of what this record is supposed to mean. Right now, no one has a clue as to what this record actually refers to. That should give us pause. Raymond Lee says that Gonzales was considered "the top professional player for an 8 year period", but gives no mention of which years these were or which rankings would support this claim. Lee states that this was an 8 "consecutive" year period, but that does not support the claim, which I believe is for the years 1952, 1954, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1960, 1961. Not consecutive. So Lee does not seem to give us anything to support the claim.Tennisedu (talk) 02:44, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

If I might suggest a solution, both the USPLTA and Lance Tingay published annual rankings in the 1950's and 1960's. Those two ranking series were widely read at the time, were contemporaneous with the play and events we are concerned with, and should supply whatever is needed to give a ranking support to a reasonable claim. I would suggest that we start with those two series.Tennisedu (talk) 05:02, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

I have no issue with adding those rankings to make the article even better sourced. Those added to the new sources I added will make the article even better. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:46, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

Some of the new sources being cited are from many years after-the-fact, and are not contemporary to the events. For rankings we need contemporary rankings, not ones which were derived many years later. I think that the consensus was that only contemporary rankings are relevant. And so far, we have no rankings at all being cited, so we really have not made any progress to support the claim of eight years No. 1. Simply repeating that somebody "was ranked" by some unspecified ranking does nothing to enlighten us. The claim remains without support and without a contemporary source.The Raymond Lee source was from 2010, many years after the fact, and did not refer to any rankings.Tennisedu (talk) 06:51, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

For Gonzales to be number one for eight consecutive years, it would have to be from 1954 to 1961, which is apparently the time span for Lee. However, in the Wikipedia rankings, Gonzales' eight years are from 1952 to 1960. So, to be blunt, which eight years are we supposed to be looking at? The years for Lee, or the 1952–60 period? That needs to be settled first, before we get any rankings.Tennisedu (talk) 07:07, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

Some people are screaming about disruption , but there is a clear need for clarification in those quotes from the HOF. The years being referred to are not specified, and I made that crystal clear when the clarification tags were posted. What part of that is not clear? It seems very simple to me. 1952 to 1960 is not an eight year stretch, it is nine years...so which eight years are being claimed by the Hall of Fame statement? That is a clear question which needs clarification.Tennisedu (talk) 22:08, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure who is screaming about disruption but I can say we disagree hugely about any need at all about clarification of the HOF quotes. I am 100% fine with it as is, and you are not. I don't care about what years are specified. If The sentence narrowed it down to a set of years then the quote better reflect that. If the sentence does not then the quote does not. It needs clarification to you, but no one else. If we had the quote of exact years we would use it. What part of that do you not understand? Your clarification/citation tags are starting to get a bit messy. If you are putting them there to try an make some sort of point, that is disruptive, so be careful about that. The whole bit about a rigid point system should be dumped. They didn't really use one till the late 1970s so no big deal, and even today it gets messy. He has sources multiple sources that say he was number one for 8 years, so that pretty much is what the article should say. No more, no less. Just what the sources say. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:44, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Template notice

Everyone, please read the template notice at the head of this article,

"This article's tone or style may not reflect the encyclopedic tone used on Wikipedia.....". Wow.

In other words, there was a lot of work to do to bring this article up to the standards deserving of the article for Gonzales, perhaps the foremost American tennis player of all time.

So, yes there was a pressing need to subject every part of it to a careful scrutiny and upgrade the quality of the content. Thus, the appearance of so many notices for clarification and citations, the need to assemble some genuine rankings from the contemporary world of Gonzales which would support some of the claims for his career.

There is no need for anyone to be upset about this. The purpose here is to upgrade the article, so that one day this warning template may not be necessary. We do not need puff statements and unsupported claims to bolster this article, that is not doing any service to Gonzales' career.

We have a common task here, not a defense of anything, but a discovery of sources.Tennisedu (talk) 04:00, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

At the top of this page is an encouragement to those who would like to edit the Gonzales article: BE BOLD."This is a VITAL article, if you can improve it, PLEASE DO." Click on "please do", everybody. Please click on "please do" and read what it says, it says "Go for it!" "BE BOLD." In other words, this article needed help, and serious efforts. End of speech.Tennisedu (talk) 04:32, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Sounds good. Of course the notice preceded all the clarifications requests you added... some quite strange. The template was put there because of the phrasing of sentences and use of particular grandiose words, not because of clarifications needed. No one is stopping you from putting in the proper sources, in fact it is better to add them than to put in "sources needed" if possible. There are a lot of articles around here that need better writing or more sourcing. So while it's ok to beg editors to click on "please do", you are also one of us that can click on please do. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:40, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Fair point, Fyunck. But I have added a lot of material to this article already, such as solving that mystery about the serve speed (not forehand speed) of Gonzales, which has hung around for decades. I have also added large amounts to the articles on Hoad, Rosewall, Sedgman, Segura, Trabert, and all of it was supported with sound references. None of those other tennis bios had this type of warning template at the top, decrying the type of puff statements and lack of contemporary sources that have plagued this Gonzales article. So I am having a hard time understanding why some people are so upset and start threatening dire consequences when we actually do move in the right direction and upgrade this article. That makes no sense to me whatsoever. And I do not understand your reference to "strange" requests...all of my requests for clarification had to do with identifying which years in particular Gonzales was supposed to have received no. 1 rankings, there was a lot of fuzzy and confused language being employed in the article which obscured that issue. That was probably one reason why there was a warning over this article. In all other tennis bio articles, there was never this type of confusion over ranking claims, it was clearly discussed which years were in question. When we try to clarify that issue in the Gonzales bio article, some editors start screaming "disruption". Perhaps they could join the discussion here on "Talk" before they resort to pushing the fire alarm. I understand that the standard recommendation is to do just that.Tennisedu (talk) 07:33, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

You are in grave error about what that template was for. It is because the writing was too flowery and too grandiose for an encyclopedia... not because the facts were in error. And lots of tennis articles have had that type of tag, they had just been cleaned up where this one hadn't. Both contemporary and modern rankings are allowed. We don't pick and choose. Contemporary are better. That clarification is weird because the statement was perfectly sourced for the statement made. The source didn't have an exact year so the statement didn't have an exact year. There is nothing wrong with that. You seem to be demanding an exact year when sources vary on the years. Because of that your "clarification" requests sound very pointy, which is bad at Wikipedia. We aren't doing the research here, coming to our own conclusions, and then putting that in the article. We simply make sure a statement has a source. If we find better sources that's great. If we find more contradictory sources we add them to the article with more statements and let the reader decide. But that template is not there for the reasons you think it's there. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:19, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

That begs the question, why did we have some problem with the references to rankings in this Gonzales article...it was because those "sources" were not really sources, the HOF citation did not refer to any actual rankings, nor did it attempt to identify the eight years which were supposedly the basis of the claim. That rendered them of no value. None. Those statements should be removed for lack of substance. Any purported ranking must identify the years which are being referred to. This kind of basic error continues to reduce the quality of the Gonzales article. Another editor pointed out above that the HOF bio is a circular source, it appears to be a loose adaptation of Wikipedia material, so this is not something which should be used in a Wikipedia article as a source reference.Tennisedu (talk) 18:47, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

We had problems because there were no references added at all. It was an old school article that had very few references on anything. And this is not a book, dissertation, or research volume on Pancho Gonzalez. And with your no value claims on the HOF with years attached comments it's becoming quite clear that those clarification additions are certainly pointy and have no place at Wikipedia. I thought perhaps this would be a reasonable conversation but I'm not sure you intended it from the start if all you want is sourced information removed, and I see why your additions are being called disruptive by other editors. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:44, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

The only "point" I was making with the "citation needed" and "clarification needed" is the point I just made above, that if we are supposed to be citing sources, then let us by all means DO it, and cite relevant sources which actually refer to the years in question. If the source is so vague that it does not even specify the years which are involved, and makes no reference to the actual rankings, then that is of no substantial value. This is NOT a "point", just a basic observation on how to improve the quality of this article. Sorry that this is still not clear to some people. That warning template at the head of this article was put there for a purpose, a purpose related to quality.Tennisedu (talk) 20:20, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Quality of writing style, not content. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:52, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

The Tennis Hall of Fame considers that Gonzales was ranked number one for eight years, which is why they state it in their article. If you take issue with how the Hall of Fame come to this conclusion, then you should contact the Hall of Fame and discuss it with them, Tennisedu. The original editor put the remarks on the page and I merely quoted the remarks as they were written on the Hall of fame bio (which was one of the sources listed by the original editor). There is no citation needed, because the citation is there. There is no clarification needed, because the Hall of Fame has stated that they consider (through whatever method they use) Gonzales was number one for 8 years. The misuse of clarification requests is considered bad at wikipedia and the article quoted by Fyunck states that users could be banned for doing this. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 20:24, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

No one is objecting to the eight years, this is a problem with sourcing. A source for ranking should not be so vague that it does not specify which years are being referred to, or does not make any reference to the actual rankings. If it merely says "was ranked" without specifying by whom, then it excessively vague and should be clarified.Tennisedu (talk) 20:34, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

If there are better sources that give the specific 8 years, those would be better. Do you have those instead? The USTA gives the same non-qualified eight years. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:56, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Whether you personally think that is of no interest to me, Tennisedu. Wikipedia does not operate that way. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 20:43, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Well, Wikipedia has guidelines for citations In the first place, when we cite a source, it has to be an appropriate and suitable source. HOF does not do rankings, they have no ranking system. If we take a ranking from a non-ranking source, we better be sure that the actual ranking source is referred to, not just the non-ranking source. And for rankings, we should identify which years we are referring to for the ranking. That is the Wikipedia guidelines, as I understand them. Now, yes, there are relevant rankings for Gonzales, the annual USPLTA rankings, the annual Lance Tingay rankings. Those are extant, although not currently within my hands.Tennisedu (talk) 21:12, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Those USPLTA and Tingay rankings can also be used if sourced. I think Bud Collins also had some rankings. There are also books put out in the 2000's that have rankings. That's what Wikipdeia does. If you are asking whether the Tennis Hall of Fame, the USTA, or Tennis Now magazine, rankings are top shelve, bees knees, cream of the crop rankings... then no. They are simply the best we have. To be honest the USPLTA and newspaper reporter Tingay are subjective rankings from back in the day. We have voices from contemporary players that are all over the map and disagree with Tingay and USPLTA. But those sources are the best we have also. Pre-Open tennis is a very murky time period compared with baseball, football, and hockey. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:22, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

The Bud Collins rankings are not contemporary rankings, although perhaps the Collins book might have some information on the contemporary rankings by the USPLTA and Tingay, the latter being contemporary rankings. Rankings from much later, such as the Tennisbase (which I quoted in one article, and it was removed by another editor because it was NOT a contemporary ranking), and of course this current controversy over the HOF (which is clearly not a contemporary ranking, nor does it refer to any contemporary ranking). I would suggest that we apply this rule of contemporary rankings evenly across the board for all tennis related articles. In the Wikipedia article on world No. 1 Players by year, the sources used are ALL contemporary rankings, not later rankings, so this would appear to be a rule for Wikipedia. Now, is it or is it not a Wikipedia rule to use the contemporary rankings, and not rankings from much later? We should be consistent about this. Otherwise, that Tennisbase ranking should properly be restored.Tennisedu (talk) 00:21, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

I don't know where you get your information from but the rankings Bud Collins listed in his History of Tennis encyclopedia are contemporary. And no, the rankings mentioned at World number 1 ranked male tennis players are most definitely not all contemporary as there were no world rankings prior to 1913. --Wolbo (talk) 00:36, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Well, that should solve our problem, if Collins is using contemporary rankings, that information should be sufficient to provide a source for the Gonzales' yearly rankings. Tennisedu (talk) 00:44, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

No, because he used the most commonly published rankings of Wallis Myers, Olliff and Tingay which did not include professional players.--Wolbo (talk) 00:55, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Collins does not have rankings for the pros in the 50's? Yikes. We are back at square one. The annual USPLTA rankings may be the only source.Tennisedu (talk) 02:38, 17 May 2020 (UTC)Tennisedu (talk) 02:36, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

The USPLTA annual rankings were published in the USPLTA Yearbook, and since the USPLTA 1952 no. 1 was Segura and 1961 no.1 was Rosewall, Gonzales probably received the USPLTA no. 1 ranking from 1954-60...that makes it a total of seven no. 1 rankings, assuming that Gonzales does not get 1953, and gets 1960. That number seven is still enough to hold on to the record of most no. 1 rankings for Gonzales. But it looks like seven is the right answer, not eight. The many references to eight for Gonzales appear to be without accurate sourcing, and should probably be removed, unless someone can find another annual ranking for Gonzales at no. 1.Tennisedu (talk) 03:21, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

By the way, contrary to Tennishistory877 above, the HOF did NOT "consider (through whatever method they use) that Gonzales was number 1 for eight years", that was not it at all. The HOF claimed that Gonzales WAS RANKED no. 1 for eight years, and that is a statement which is capable of being disproved factually, unless someone can find eight years of number one ranking. The only regular rankings which cover all the years are the USPLTA annual rankings, which now appear to give only seven years. The HOF claim appears to be an error, unless someone can find another year.Tennisedu (talk) 03:40, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

The United States Professional Lawn Tennis Association was a United States organization. They barely had their own authority and had none over French and British tennis. We have players ranked by a multitude on sourcing, which includes both contemporary and later rankings. I said contemporary rankings are better, but later rankings don't get thrown away like you seem to want. It's why the US Pro tournament has changed in perception by all current sources as opposed to the contemporary ones. When historians later rank the years we can certainly include that as long as we include the source. Borg's ranking is far different than what it was at the time (though contemporary perception was always in his favor). We use it all. And the statement of the HOF cannot be disproved factually at all. And it's not only the Hall of Fame with those numbers as you seem to be ignoring. It's also the USTA. We have newspapers in the 60s and 70s that say he was the best player in the world from 1952-1961. We have magazines that says Gonzalez was the best in 1953 but that Kramer wouldn't allow him to play until November. Pro tennis was a dark age and Kramer ruled it with an iron fist for many years. It's why we use all sourcing, contemporary and otherwise when compiling information and who was best. Rankings are always subjective in nature so I'm sure the HOF and USTA and others use different models as to who was best in a given year. Just like the ITF and ATP and LeEquip magazine do today. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:26, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

That's fine, we can all have our own private opinions about what should have, or could have, or might have, but the statement in that HOF is clearly a factual statement capable of disproof. It says that Gonzales "WAS RANKED" no. 1 eight times, so we need those eight times from somewhere. The rule we have been using lately is to discard any rankings except the contemporary one, as I cited to you an example recently where a ranking I posted from Tennisbase was summarily removed by an editor because it was NOT a contemporary ranking. And that HOF statement appears to be referring to contemporary rankings. Do you want me to restore that Tennisbase ranking? We need to get this thing sorted out now. Surely, contemporary rankings have a special status, as it shows what was recognized AT THE TIME. In later times, any player can cobble together various rankings which support their status by drawing upon favourable supporters. Not special.Tennisedu (talk) 05:44, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Sure we can have opinions...no problems with that at all. But that is not what we are talking about here. The HOF, the USTA, and others cannot be disproved (or at least you haven't come close to it yet). You can only say the United States Professional Lawn Tennis rankings of 1952 do not agree with the Tennis Hall of fame and the United States Tennis Association. We do not discard rankings except contemporary! I'm not sure anyone cares about tennisbase rankings as they can be pretty strange. But if it's paraphrased as such in prose it's not a big problem. It's legitimacy could be in question though compared to the Tennis Hall of Fame, Arthur Ashe, and the USTA. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:00, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

I must have missed your contemporary rankings battle, so I don't know the source of the issue. If it is based on rankings from 1970 to today I can understand because we have so many contemporary rankings for all the players. Same with the amateurs in the Pre-Open Era. But with the pros, where info is scarce to non-existent we have to allow a lot more leeway. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:07, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

It was for 1960, the pros, so you are saying that we can allow it? But it was summarily removed in short order, because it was not a contemporary ranking. So I am puzzled by all this running around. We cannot have different editors working under different sets of rules, and summarily removing material without discussion. Now, I think that Tennisbase rankings are interesting because they give weights to every pro and amateur event and add up points for the ranking, it appears to be relatively objective compared to most rankings. But of course, the ranking is not from 1960, it is recent. So what are we going to do? Should I restore the Tennisbase 1960 ranking? We better get this thing figured out because otherwise we will get chaos, with different sets of rules being applied by different editors. Now, about Gonzales, we have to refine that record, and specify just what exactly that record consists of. As of now, it appears to be a record for contemporary rankings, that is the impression given. So if that is NOT what is meant by this record, we have to refine the description of the record and include ANY ranking from ANY time, not just the contemporary time. That opens the door to unending rankings popping up to puff one tennis player or another, we can all get into that game, "Hey, I found a new ranking which shows so-and-so player was NUMBER ONE for 1961...that goes into his achievement pile and now he is number four in number of world number one rankings! Hooray!" That is where we are heading with this open-ended ranking approach. Brave new world.Tennisedu (talk) 07:20, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

There will always be disagreement among editors so we iron them out on talk pages. Sort of an article by article assessment. Tennisbase is interesting and i do like the stats they give there. For stats it is pretty cool. That is why it is heavily geared for all type of gambling activities and now charges a ransom to join. I have argued with the owner, as have others, over his extremely subjective weights given to events. Those are his own personal ratings. I think the site is great for stats but not the owner's player ratings. As for as rankings I don't put the Tennis Hall of fame and the United States Tennis Association on the same par as you or me coming up with rankings. Others may disagree. As I said, with the pre-Open Era pros we have to have some latitude. We haven't had these "brave new world" ridiculous rankings infecting wikipedia thus far, so unless you start running amok I don't think it's going to happen. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:25, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

The bigger question is should we be using Tennisbase a at all? What makes it a reliable source per wiki's criteria? Since this discussion is now about the use of rankings in general I think this part of the discussion should be ported to the project talk page.--Wolbo (talk) 10:31, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

For shear number crunching power, and data, I think thetennisbase is pretty darned good. It seems to be well respected by tennis enthusiasts and gamblers. The owner, Gabriel García, is a mathematical number cruncher by trade, and a tennis historian, and it works well for him in the format. Are they always right?... no. I have seen some totals refuted in multiple forums. But the ATP numbers get crushed in comparison, mainly for pre-1990 results where the ATP, WTA, and ITF start to falter. The ATP gets much worse by the 1970s, and pre-Open it's pretty much useless. As far as sourcing for pre-open data, especially the pros, we have limited places that compile the information, are major websites for all to see, and have source fact checkers. We have tennisbase run by Gabriel García, and we have tennisforum run by Rollo. Together, those two places have better and more reliable data than any other sources I can think of. Sure, you can find a published book that has extremely reliable data, but it will only encompass a small window of time, or perhaps little actual data over a longer period of time. Now, once thetennisbase starts using it's own arbitrary methods to rank events, and it's own purely mathematical methods to rank players, it is no better than any other water cooler argument. It's fun but that's about it. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:07, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Hey, I am not the one who expanded the rankings beyond the contemporary ones, I was trying to prevent that from happening. But in reality, you have accepted some "rankings" which are not even rankings, just a one-phrase reference of "no. 1 for eight years", with no years even identified, and no reference given to the ranking source. That does not rise to the lowest informational bar. I give citations for my source rankings.Tennisedu (talk) 08:32, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

If I could make one final point before ending this discussion, just to point out the obvious, in the above discussion when I pointed out the need for sourcing and citations, I was asked by two of the editors to find the sources myself and add them on to the unsourced material. (Do it yourself!) Sorry, my understanding is that unsourced material may be challenged and removed. It is NOT my responsibility to hunt for sources for statements put into the article by other editors. Whenever I put something unsourced or uncited into an article, it gets summarily removed immediately by a very astute editor. That editor is not responsible for hunting up a source for my additions, and I do not see why it should be my responsibility to hunt up sources for the statements added by editors to the Gonzales article. That is unless we could make some agreement to cooperate on sourcing, and leave a reasonable amount of time for editors to get the sources WITHOUT an editor jumping on the addition and removing it. Is there a consensus here to allow reasonable time for editors to get the final form of citations before immediately and summarily removing the content? Could we have a show of hands?Tennisedu (talk) 02:25, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Actually no, your are not supposed to just remove it if it's been there awhile. If it is blatant spam or trivia, sure, but just because it's not sourced, since this isn't a biography of a living person, you should not just remove something because it's not properly sourced. What is best done, is that if you find something that should be sourced, do a quick search to see if maybe you could help. If you can't find something then sure, add a note that this needs sourcing. It's not your responsibility to add anything here at all or even read wikipedia. We love help in making our articles better but if the only thing an editor did was go from article to article adding tags, that can be just as annoying as not having proper sourcing.

If someone adds something brand spanking new, and it's information is something that someone would challenge, then remove it with a summary of "please add that source before re-adding." That usually works. If it's something longstanding, and not 100% false, then do a quick google search to see if you can help with the sourcing. If you can't find it, then tag it with source needed. A bot will date it. After a year or so if it's still there, remove it with an edit summary stating so. This keeps everyone happy. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:13, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Okay, that sounds good as far as it goes, but then I am puzzled as to why some of my recent material is just removed without any challenge as to suitability, although there is a reference to a tennis source. There is nothing unusual about the content, and it comes from a well respected publication.....so, what gives?Tennisedu (talk) 06:04, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

I will try revising the edit with a more precise citation.Tennisedu (talk) 07:46, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure you understand how this all works. You were asking about removing unsourced material, so that's how I answered. Now you seem to be asking why material you added was removed very soon after it was added. That is very different. If you make changes to an article and someone disagrees with these new additions, they can leave a summary as to why and remove it. It could be trivial, it could be far to technical, it could be poor English, or the article simply could have been better before your additions. It doesn't matter if it's sourced or not. If that happens the next recourse for you would be to bring it to the article talk page and try to convince others that your additions are best. It's a team effort. The team may agree with none, some, or all of your additions. That is how it's supposed to work. Fyunck(click) (talk) 09:56, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Gonzales serves at 112.88 mph at Philadelphia in 1951

No, Tennishistory1877, it was reported in the Philadelphia Sunday Standard, and also in a California newspaper at about the same time.

That is where I found those reports, which finally solved this mystery, which has been dogging the discussion of Gonzales for decades.

Philadelphia Sunday Standard 1 April 1951, P.12

Although I notice that it also refers to March 1 (? for some reason), perhaps quoting an article from March 1.Tennisedu (talk) 02:45, 22 May 2020 (UTC)Tennisedu

Here is the section above where I reported my discovery,

"Another legend is the famous "112.88 mph forehand drive", which McCauley accepted...however, did McCauley perhaps misread his source?

There is no mention of "forehand drives", only "drives", and apparently these were service drives, comparing to Tilden's 1931 measured service speeds, which were timed from a film with a stopwatch at 151 mph.

Sports Illustrated in 1959 referred to the Philadelphia measurements as service speeds. So did other tennis writers in the 1950's, such as Tingay.

So this is another legend which needs updating and correcting. I have already started the process, and will go also to Segura's page.Tennisedu (talk) 03:23, 21 January 2020 (UTC)"Tennisedu (talk) 02:50, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Tennisedu, in the Gonzales article, you cited The Philadelphia Sunday Standard of March 29 (a Thursday), which does not exist. It is important to list the correct date for newspapers when providing citations. I have not disputed that your information is correct on the serving speeds, only the date of the newspaper cited, which invalidates the citation. Please pay careful attention to this in future. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 11:39, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

If the source gives a date for March 29, we have to cite that. I suspect that the Sunday Standard may have recycled the report. But we have to cite the date given by the source, not second-guess the source date.Tennisedu (talk) 18:19, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

The date inside the ref tags should be the date the newspaper was published. You may list the date the event happened in the narrative. Also, there were newspapers published on 28 March that list the information on the 112.88, so the Gonzales serve wasn't recorded on 29 March. Personally I (and probably others) always assumed McCauley must have meant that the service speed was measured. He must have misunderstood the word "drive". Probably not a term that would be used these days to describe a serve, but it was then. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 18:50, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes, that is the probable explanation for McCauley's confusion. But no one, until I did recently, bothered to check the source which did not mention "forehand", it appears that McCauley added "forehand" as an explanation, but he seems to have attributed "forehand" to the source.Tennisedu (talk) 08:08, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

US Pro / World Pro

I see this is becoming an issue on these pages because of one editor's opinions on this subject, so let me lay out some facts on the issue.

Firstly USPLTA authorisation. The PLTA were an organisation of teaching pros. How important was their authorisation in the 1950s? In an ideal world it would be good to have all US pro organisations' affiliation when organising a US national championships, but in the early post-war years when the teaching pros participated, they lost to the touring pros in the early rounds of the event. The reason the major pro events are considered important is because the top touring pros played in them. How important were the USPLTA tournaments in the 1960s won by Bartzen, Giammalva etc.? Not very important at all, because the top pros did not enter. Tournament of Champions at Forest Hills was a top class event from 1957-59 and these draws contained the top touring pros and draws were not filled out with teaching pros.

In a few years the US Pro draws were less strong than others. But as a comparison, let us compare a list of champions at the Australian amateur championships to the US Pro champions. After the war in the 1946-67 period, US Pro winners were Riggs, Kramer, Segura, Gonzales, Olmedo, Buchholz (a poor quality draw that year), Rosewall and Laver. The Australian champions of this period were Bromwich, Pails, Quist, Sedgman, Savitt, McGregor, Rosewall, Rose, Hoad, Cooper, Olmedo, Laver and Emerson (some great players winning before their prime years and some one or two slam winners). I did a stat listing the number of top eight amateur players (as listed on the rankings published in Collins) that entered the slams each year and saw the number entering the Australian in most years was low, so the Australian was not even attracting the top amateurs (plus the pros were all barred from entering). Yet these Australian champions are listed as Grand Slam champions.

Now the issue of the World Pro / US Pro. Jack March was the promoter who ran the World Pro. His event ran from 1951 right through to the mid 1960s. No one disputes that this event was billed as the World Pro. McCauley lists it as World Pro in his book published in 2000. However, in some years it was also designated the US Pro. There was some confusion over which event was the US Pro in 1951, as the pros hosted their own tournament at Forest Hills and March held his event. Kramer, during his decade in charge of the pros (1952-62) only once held his own version of the US Pro, at Los Angeles in 1954. Segura may have been the defending champion of the Benrus Cup US Pro in the L. A. event of 1954 (having won the title in 1951), but he was not the defending champion of the US Pro if we consider the World Pro event designated as the US Pro. Kramer states his reasons why he was not keen on hosting his own version of the US Pro in his autobiography and in contemporary newspapers (to do with profit levels) . The US Pro designation was not something a journalist thought up in the 1960s because they thought it would be nice if the US Pro was held continuously throughout the period at Cleveland! There are contemporary sources that list the Cleveland event as the US Pro, and/or the Cleveland winners as US Pro champions. Here are a selection of them.

Corpus Christi Caller Times, 12 March 1953 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/24128017

The Philadelphia Inquirer, 4 April 1953 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/172173553

The Tampa Tribune, 11 April 1953 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/327692427

The Philadelphia Inquirer, 20 December 1953 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/177721805

The Philadelphia Inquirer, 27 December 1953 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/177683048

The Times (Shreveport) 16 February 1956 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/211499925

Star Press (Muncie) 18 March 1957 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/251855716

In his autobiography, Man with a racket (published in 1959), Gonzales makes several references to the US Pro being held at Cleveland, including the following

"I had blown the U. S. National Professional Championships to Segura in 1952, but took the title the next year beating Don Budge" page 111

After 1962, the Cleveland event was still held, but was no longer the US Pro. A similar example is in womens golf. Various events have been considered majors. For instance, the Dinah Shore tournament was not considered a major from 1972-82, but it was from 1983 onwards (since 2015 known as the ANA Inspiration event). Cleveland was considered the U S Pro up until 1962, but not afterwards. Bud Collins was not inventing his own designation for Cleveland years after the event, because these World Pro events were regarded as US Pros at the time. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 10:47, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Some good points above, but there are some further issues. Gonzales and Segura in interviews called Cleveland the "U.S. National Professional", whereas at Forest Hills after WWII in the late forties the USPLTA event was referred to as "U.S. Pro". There is a slight disjoint there. I would fell better if Gonzales and Segura had come right out and called it the "U.S. Pro". But more importantly, in 1952 Jack March applied to the USPLTA for permission and sanction for the Cleveland event to be called the official U.S. Pro, and was unsuccessful, so he was forced to use the terms "International Professional" and World Pro. That never changed, and in 1967, that later version of the U.S. Pro held by the USPLTA was labelled the "30th" version, thus excluding the Cleveland events apart from 1950.Tennisedu (talk) 19:00, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

U. S. National Professional and U. S. Pro have the same meaning. Pro is a shortening of professional. Many times the U. S. Amateur championships was referred to as the U. S. National championships or U. S. National Amateur championships. USPLTA sanction would have been preferred, but it was not essential. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 19:41, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

The term "National Professional" was not the common term for the U.S. Pro, so it looks like a bit of a dance there. If USPLTA approval had not been crucial, March would not have bothered applying to them for sanction, and when refused March would have used the term "U.S. Pro" regardless. That he did not do so shows March's acceptance of the authority of the USPLTA to decide the issue. March backed off the idea of using the term "U.S. Pro" in accord with the USPLTA refusal to sanction. And of course, the choice of "International Pro" and "World Pro" indicates that Cleveland was not a national title at all, but an international title. The title tells it all. Another problem with Cleveland is the declining stature of the event after 1957, with smaller money purses and weaker fields, not really worthy of a major status event. Cleveland was overshadowed by the truly major status of Forest Hills TOC in the late fifties, and things went further downhill in the early sixties. Not a major. Even the Longwood U.S. Pro event in 1964 had a relatively small purse of $10,000, well below many other events.Tennisedu (talk) 20:38, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

You listed a lot of opinions in your last statement. Amateur majors went through bad periods (in the case of the Australian, very prolonged ones). I find your insistence on arguing the point about "National Professional" utterly ridiculous. You can keep giving your opinions on the subject if you want to, but I have already listed the facts. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 21:11, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

I have listed the sad facts, not the cheery facts.Tennisedu (talk) 21:23, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

This was already settled long ago. If it is becoming an issue with the same editor, then it is disruptive editing. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:26, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

It was over long ago as far as I am concerned, I did not revive the issue.Tennisedu (talk) 01:26, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

And I hadn't noticed it in articles or stats. Fyunck(click) (talk) 04:47, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Gonzales vs. Trabert: outdoor results for 1956

So we now have this issue arising as to what the actual head-to-head score was for outdoor matches in 1956 between Gonzales and Trabert. I put this question to someone who had access to many contemporary media reports as well as to Tennisbase, and here is the final breakdown: Trabert df. Gonzales in outdoor matches for 1956 by a score of 15-11, including 1-1 on grass, 5-5 on cement, and 9-5 on clay. That ain't too shabby for a rookie pro against a prime Gonzales. Of course, Gonzales held a huge advantage on the indoor matches for 1956.Tennisedu (talk) 01:25, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

1952 ranking

The Tennis HOF description for Gonzales claims that "he ROSE" to the number one ranking in 1952.....this statement needs verification, and now appears to be without foundation. The previous support for this statement was cited as McCauley, but looking at McCauley shows that he referred to the rankings of Segura as #1 for 1952, not Gonzales.

This may be a claim which is without support and contrary to the cited source. Any statement which is contradicted by its own source is clearly without foundation.Tennisedu (talk) 02:42, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

There may be a contemporary ranking for 1952 which shows Gonzales as #1, although it cannot be the USPLTA ranking for 1952. For what it is worth, I believe that Gonzales had a good claim to be ranked #1 in 1952, but that is not the same thing as actually having been ranked as #1 in 1952....two different concepts.Tennisedu (talk) 03:22, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Both Tennis HoF and Ray Bowers say Gonzales was number one in 1952. He may have shared it. No need for extra citations. Fyunck(click) (talk) 03:47, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

There was certainly a need to expunge the McCauley citation, which is a direct contradiction of the statement. Hey, don't rush to thank me for pointing out the problem and cleaning up the contradiction. All in a day's work. But the date of the Bowers article showing Gonzales #1 for 1952 needs to cited, and the HOF ranking statement needs to be dated as well. There is a real danger that the casual reader might think that Gonzales actually "rose to the #1 ranking" in 1952. Whereas it appears that only many, many years later did he "rise" to a (not "the") #1 ranking for that year. There is no need to confuse the reader. 03:58, 26 October 2020 (UTC)Tennisedu (talk).

Thanks for removing the McCauley source as it was in error. I don't think they need to be dated (certainly not in the infobox). Budge ranked Gonzales #1 for 1952 in an article in 1953. It's the same thing before ranking points were given out and used for ranking in the 70s-80s... no one "rose" to number one. It was subjective and by experts. Same with college football. Until recently no team "rose" to number one. Different organizations appointed them #1. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:42, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Tennis Hall of Fame are an official body and have stated in their view Gonzales was number 1 in 1952. Tennisedu, your pathetic attempt to use the word "rose" to try and demean the statement can be seen by all for what it is. On the Gonzales hall of fame page at the bottom it says Top ranking World number 1 (1952). Personally I think all rankings before 1973 should be treated with a large degree of scepticism. Though some are definately more accurate than others, they are opinions and not based on a system. Personally I am not a fan of rankings and prefer results, particularly those in major events, to form my judgements on tennis history. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 10:28, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

I disagree to a point, especially with the 1973 number. You have to remember that when they instituted the points system in 1973 it was never ever intended to be used for year end rankings. It was only to be used to help with seeding in tournaments. The ATP Player of the Year (along with the ITF champion) was the true year-end champion up until the 1990s. The points don't take certain things into consideration, like head to head. For instance, if it was the 1920s-1970s, there is no chance that Nadal would have been ranked ahead of Federer at year end in 2017. Not with the head-to-head glaring and not with a Wimbledon championship. No chance at all. Points are great as far as they go but there are limitations. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:12, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Ranking systems (providing they are fair systems) are better than opinions. Never underestimate the ignorance of those making the judgments. For instance the Tennis Channel 100 Greatest Players of All Time list achieved nothing but highlight the ignorance about most "experts" on tennis history. As a sport I would rank tennis bottom when it comes to the knowledge of former players about its history. Tennishistory1877 (talk)

Points can be better, but they too often are not. Points can be gamed as with Connors in the 70s. And when it's close, I trust eyes better. Points don't look at head to heads in the biggest events, or the fact that players would rather win at Wimbledon than any other tournament. Points are great for seedings, but for year end the points most often only state the obvious. I do agree that tennis is abysmal when it comes to the past, but football and basketball are pretty bad also. MLB is the exception. But there will always be a problem with writers and fans going by the "ceib" philosophy. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:18, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Since 1988 (or approximately) there have been four majors with (generally speaking) singles draws that are worthy of majors. Not all players regard Wimbledon as no.1. Some clay courters prefer Roland Garros (back in the 1990s some top clay courters never even played Wimbledon). Some say Australia is their favourite, others the US. I don't have a preference and the modern slams are all equal in my mind, certainly as regards the singles events. I am very slam-orientated in my thinking for many reasons. However, before the mid 1980s the Australian was a slam in name only and for short periods the French struggled. Plus between the end of World War Two and the start of the open era the top pros were always superior to the top amateurs (even in the 1930s the pros had the edge over the amateurs). I am a huge advocate of the pre-open era pro tour. Tennishistory1877 (talk)

There are always exceptions in what players "like" but prestige hasn't waned in the same manner. In the 70s if you won Wimbledon your were likely No. 1. It must have had a 3to1 prestige factor over the other events. Aside from liking, today if you asked a player if they could only win one major what would it be, I'd bet 90+% would say Wimbledon. It's the granddaddy of them all. I too am big on pre-open pros, and major titles, but not by shear number of wins. I'm more impressed by three or more majors in a great season, or by number of major wins by comparison over the same number of years. Winning a major a year for 20 years is a great achievement. But winning nine titles in nine majors is even more incredible, even if they only wind up with 13 for a career. If you have two players where one wins two majors in a season and the other wins one, but the player with one major title also beats the other player all five times they face each other... that has to be taken into consideration. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:50, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Tennishistory1877, Fyunck and I have not been engaged in "vandalism", as you call it. We are simply trying to follow the rules of the system. Citations must be valid in their claims. Take a look at your quotation from the HOF, "On the pro circuit he won 15 major championships...and ROSE to the world No. 1 ranking, holding that lofty perch for a record eight years from 1952 to 1960." This statement describes events which never happened. We have no indication that Gonzales rose through the rankings to the #1 spot in 1952, all we have is the USPLTA ranking for 1952 with Segura #1. And Gonzales did not "HOLD that lofty perch" for eight years beginning in 1952, he was clearly not the world #1 pro for 1953. This is an invalid citation according to rules we use here. And if you want to rely on rankings made many, many, many years after the fact, then you should put a date on those rankings so that readers will not be confused, and believe that these rankings derive from contemporary sources. We are not here to glorify the subjects or confuse the readers.Tennisedu (talk) 14:34, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

There is another contemporary source for pro rankings in the early 1950's, the P.P.A.T. annual rankings (these are not the USPLTA rankings, different organization), and Gonzales and Segura supported this group. The PPAT rankings, as I recall, show Segura as #1 pro for 1952. I think that Krosero has access to the PPAT rankings.Tennisedu (talk) 15:05, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

I shall repeat, the number 1 for 1952 is also listed at the bottom of the article. You speak to me as if I am some defender of the Hall of fame's position. I merely use them as a source and have no opinion on whether they are right or wrong in their judgement. Perhaps you should email the Hall of fame if you take such issue with what words they use and if you want clarification. I have nothing more to say on this. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 16:58, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

If a source is clearly wrong and contradicts the facts which it cites, it does not qualify as an acceptable citation. And I am not defending the rankings of the USPLTA or the PPAT from 1952, but the HOF source cannot claim that these rankings show Gonzales at #1 when they actually have Segura at #1. That removes the HOF citation from consideration as a valid citation. I hope that is simple enough to understand. It is not necessary for us to correct the HOF statement, but we cannot use it in a citation.Tennisedu (talk) 20:35, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

I shall repeat myself as you are not listening, tennisedu. The Tennis Hall of Fame has stated they regard Gonzales as world number 1 for 1952. If you think they made an error and meant to write Pancho Segura was world number 1, then you need to email them asking for clarification or ask them to change it. So I suggest you spend your time productively for once and send them an email instead of trying to continue a pointless argument with me about it. Tennishistory1877 (talk)

We totally disagree on the HoF being a source for citations. I feel it is a great source. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:04, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

The Tennis Hall of Fame is one of the few organisations in the tennis world that actually knows something about tennis history. They inducted Kozeluh and Nusslein. That means they have respect for the pro game. Tennishistory1877 (talk)

I read your reason for removing the citation from the infobox, fyunck. The reason I put it there was to counter the "citation needed" tag being placed there. I have no problem with the source not being there, but I dont expect to see citation needed there again when there is a citation available to support the statement. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 21:52, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Agreed. Remember, this article is a brief synopsis bio of a player. The infobox is supposed to be a briefer highlight of what is already in the body of the article. Most things in the infobox should not need references as they should be in the prose... as this is. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:04, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

I don't care if the HOF is the finest organization on the planet. That is not the issue here. They do not have the discretion to make counterfactual statements. I do not need to correct them, but we cannot use a false statement as a citation. That should be simple enough to understand.Tennisedu (talk) 22:59, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Family name only???

I see nothing in wikipedia guidelines that requires "family names only" in captions. Guidelines certainly show that the family name is often all that is needed for the subject of the article, but not for others in a photograph. In later photos if a person is mentioned again it would be fine to use only the family name. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:16, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

Amateur and Pro Rankings

It is standard to include both amateur and professional rankings in career totals. We can speculate that the top pros would be better than the top amateurs, but that is nothing but speculation. Under what terms would they be better? Then it becomes a fantasy of creating imaginary scenarios. In many years in the old pro era, it was conceivable that a top amateur could defeat a top pro, given open tennis. That would mean that these players would have some familiarity with each other in open play. I could see Laver beating the field at Wimbledon in 1961 or 1962, assuming that he had some years of experience against the top pros in an open tennis world. The best we can do is to include both amateur and professional world number one rankings earned by players. Each is a number one achievement against some tough players.Tennisedu (talk) 09:39, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

But we have a huge problem of perception when you say Laver was No. 1 for nine years when Gonzales was No. 1 for eight years. That is a huge disservice to readers and not very accurate. You are comparing apples and oranges. You would need to discern between amateur rankings and pro rankings and say Laver had seven pro No. 1s and two amateur No 1s. Otherwise Gonzales was the number 1 amateur in 1949. You can't mislead our readers into thinking Laver was greater than he was or diminish Gonzales in that way. Same with Tilden. Goodness. When we add rankings today do we start adding in Jr No. 1 rankings to the tally of players. Those were official No. 1 rankings, but of a lesser tier of tennis. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:16, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

For me there are two types of pre-open era rankings. The consensus ranking (as listed on world number one tennis players) and the cherry-picked no. 1. I prefer the consensus no. 1, as these are who was no. 1. The cherry-picked no. 1 may be just one reference to no. 1 (and this includes amateur lists). This is how players like Laver and Hoad get inflated numbers. I would prefer that the numbers given on all player pages were based on the consensus no. 1s, but I accept an argument could be made both ways. Junior rankings can not be compared to amateur rankings, but I agree with your general point fyunck. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 10:58, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

I believe that Gonzales was not number one for 1949 in the rankings, I think that it was Schroeder. If Gonzales received a number one for 1949, I would give him another number one ranking to his total. Again, we should not speculate about the relative merits of pro and amateur in the old era, there were great players in both divisions. You do not object to Budge getting a recognition for 1937 or 1938? On what grounds? Purely subjective? In general, you could pick holes in any of the rankings, they were often subjective and in some years the fields were weaker than in other years, so we are not making any case with these rankings as being a definitive measure of "greatness" of a player. Gaining a huge number of No. 1 rankings is more about "longevity" than "greatness" of play. They were what they were. The strength of field issue is a more important problem than the pro/am split issue. And I am asking for some consistency here, if you are agreeable to adding up pro/am rankings for Tilden and Vines and Perry and Budge and Riggs and Kramer, than you should not object to doing the same for Sedgman and Hoad and Laver. I do not hear you objecting to Emerson getting three world No. 1 rankings, those are listed in his article. So if we are going to asterisk the amateur no. 1 rankings as inferior (which they sometimes were NOT inferior), we have to be consistent. I do not see how we can simply rely on Wikipedia as a source for rankings, we are not supposed to do that. These Wikipedia rankings are subjective, anyway, and many, many, many decades after the fact, "retrospective" is a gross understatement. The contemporary rankings have greater historical significance, they represent the thinking at the time, although some are biased.Tennisedu (talk) 21:16, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, Gonzales probably wasn't in 1949 because he went pro before the year was out, but he was probably No. 1 until then. But that's not the point. In the same paragraph you cannot compare apples and oranges totals of different players and total them up. Just because they have a No. 1 ranking in the amateurs doesn't mean you total them up against a player's professional totals. Otherwise it's as i said... any time someone makes No. 1, even if it's jrs or Futures, we'd have to include them also. Laver was FAR from the No. 1 player in the world in 1961 and 1962. He was the best amateur, sure, but the pros ate him up till he learned how to play better. I don't even know why Laver stats are in the sentence to begin with. Fyunck(click) (talk) 21:37, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Of course, did I not acknowledge that there is no ideal solution to the ranking question? Any solution is going to be faulty, because all of the rankings have shortcomings, not just because of the pro/am split, but because in some years both the amateur or the pro fields could have a weak year. I am more concerned about the strength of the field, it gives a false impression to say that one player dominated the number one rankings if the fields were very weak. It tells us nothing about greatness of play. Laver? Take a look at Laver's early matches on grass against Rosewall in Australia, in the big venues. He played very well, winning the biggest match at Kooyong over Rosewall, and really thumping Rosewall at Adelaide in straights. Embarrassing for the champ. In best-of five set matches on the year 1963, it was something like 5-4 for Rosewall, and Laver also beat him at MSG 6-1, 6-0 (if memory serves). The best match of their careers was played at Stad Coubertin where Laver led 4-0 in the fifth set before running out of gas. Not much to choose between the level of play of these two in 1963. And if open tennis arrives in 1946, I believe that Laver has a good chance to take Wimbledon in 1961 or 1962. So I don't buy the idea that Laver was a stiff in 1963 or 1962. We have to take the historical data as we find them, that is what these stats are all about, and we can then add our own qualifiers IF we believe that the fields were weak or the pros IN THAT YEAR were unusually stronger than the amateurs. But we start with the historical facts as they exist.Tennisedu (talk) 21:50, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Fyunck, agree with removing that comparative section of career no. 1 rankings from this article, it belongs somewhere else. Perhaps it could be added as a footnote? We do that for that often-repeated Kramer ranking section, which hardly deserves it.Tennisedu (talk) 21:59, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Yes but those judgements you make are subjective fyunck. And really juniors and futures are a different thing to amateurs and pros. Pros were better than amateurs post-war (and arguably in the late 1930s also) but amateurs played at all the famous tournaments (Wimbledon etc.) and for many years it was only amateur and open results that were published in encyclopedias etc. I know McCauley is often criticised for his errors and missing info, but his was a hugely important book (first published in 2000). These were the days before internet research and his book was a pioneering work. Since then myself and other researchers have greatly expanded on what McCauley did and I am glad that now people on wikipedia and tennis forums routinely talk about the achievements of the pros. I agree with you saying Laver was far from the no. 1 player in the world in 1961 and 1962, but that is a matter of judgement. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 22:06, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

There is no ideal solution, but when comparing things at least use the same fruit. And it also sounds like we differ greatly on "strength of field" merit for ranking. If a player plays a sensational year and is the best, it matters little who they played against. All a player can do is play against their peers. There have been years in the Open Era where the fields of the majors weren't as good as Indian Wells... Indian Wells still won't get the weight of the majors. I disagree on Laver winning Wimbledon in 61 and 62 if Open Tennis started in 46. All the players would have been better. But we'll never know. You talk about a No. 1 ranking in the Amateurs being equvilent to pros and I think that's wrong. I also think the No. 1 Futures player is not equvilent to the ATP No. 1. But futures players or the ITF tour are pros too. They get ranked in their own systems. It's one thing to say in players bio that they had seven year end titles or that they had seven Pro year end titles and two Amateur year end titles. It's quite another to bundle them together to dimininish another players titles. Fyunck(click) (talk) 00:40, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

It is problematic for the old split era to just assume that the amateurs had weaker fields. In some years, that was not the case. Sometimes the pros had very weak and limited fields, especially when they could not offer enough money to persuade the top amateurs to turn pro. Many top amateurs turned down fat offers from the pro ranks, figuring they could get more money by remaining amateur. Krishnan and Emerson both reportedly turned down $100,000 pro contracts because they expected to do better than that as an amateur. Emerson claimed that $100,000 would represent a "pay cut" from what he made in the amateur circuit, and the best facilities and hotels were in the amateur ranks. The amateurs received the major television coverage. Fyunck, I do not hear you saying that we should strip Tilden and Vines and Budge and Kramer and Sedgman and Emerson of their amateur world No. 1 rankings. What is your position on that? I think that Sedgman in 1952 was probably playing the best tennis of anyone that year, the pros were out of shape, the pros could not mount a tour that year.Tennisedu (talk) 07:17, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

I never said anything about striping titles. I said while comparing you need to add apples to apples and oranges to oranges. Mixing creates trouble for our readers. Emerson did say that, but one of his main reasons for not turning pro was that he couldn't play Davis Cup. That was more important to him than anything. Plus no one would have said he was better than the best pros out there. That's dreaming on your part if you think that. Sedgman played great but I think Gonzales and Segura would have whipped him in a tour in 1952. I understand there can be issues as there always are with that time period in tennis. It's tough, I know that. And it's not that I don't like Laver... two Grand Slams puts him on top in my book not matter what today's totals look like. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:01, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

I think Kramer in 1947 was possibly better than the best pro Riggs, but after that the no. 1 pro was the best player every year, reflected in world series dominance of established pros over rookie pros. As for Emerson, the guy would probably have won one slam at best had the game been open. Gonzales/Rosewall and later Rosewall/Laver were better players than Emmo throughout the 1960s. Even Andy Murray (who was in a similar position in his career to Emmo) won three slams and briefly reached no. 1. I cant see Emmo toppling Gonzales or Rosewall in the early 1960s or Laver in the mid-late 1960s at any point in that period. There seems a simple choice. Either every legitimately sourced no. 1 ranking should be listed on player pages or the consensus no. 1 (which is very much source led but also has editors input) should be listed. Pre-open era rankings are imperfect as we all know. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 11:13, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Fyunck, you think that "Gonzales and Segura would have whipped [Sedgman} in a tour in 1952"...well, I can assure you that they would not have done that, because there was NO tour in 1952, the pros lacked the public appeal to stage a tour in 1952, it was a zilch that year, no customers for such a thing. So Kramer commented that he and Gonzales were badly out of shape for that 1952 Wembley final where Kramer simply ran out of gas at the end of a long match, and Gonzales was rusty enough to let Kramer take control of it. Sedgman was hot and well-tuned that season, and he probably would have whipped Gonzales and Sedgman in a big tournament, just as he did the following season.Tennisedu (talk) 19:42, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

You simply asked me what I thought and I told you. I can't help it if you didn't like what I thought. Everyone has opinions. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:49, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Yes, but our own opinions should not enter into our editing on these articles. If we want to start categorizing the world number one rankings by the pro/am divide, then we should also categorize them according to contemporary or retrospective, or according to the type of source of the ranking, or whether or not the ranking was created by a player who was also in the ranking (a clear conflict of interest), or whether or not the ranking authority held a financial interest in the pro tour, or any number of other criteria. Do you see where that would lead us? We would not have room to explore the range of possible ranking issues.Tennisedu (talk) 20:15, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Ok, you're getting dangerously close to being a snot about this. Knock it off! You asked about what I thought about stripping amateur titles from players and Sedgman's 1952 abilities. I thought you just wanted my own opinion so I gladly gave it. Then you put in this hogwash about our opinions entering into articles. Who the heck do you think your are? Talk about pot/kettle/black. My guess is if you asked any editors here about biases, your name would ring louder than an airhorn. You seem to have a hatred for Gonzales and love that knows no bounds for Hoad, and it shows up over and over in your editing style and others having to revert you. Maybe you don't realize it and if not it's time someone told you. I have fun on wikipedia and if someone asks me what I think is a fun opinion I give it freely... why the heck not. But if it later gets thrown in my face which shows it was simply bait to chastise me, then my respect for that person drops to zero and I have no use for that with my time.

All that said, except for small exceptions, the top amateur player/tour was not as good as the top professionals player. I don't think you can find sources that show differently. Laver's own article could easily say he was twice number one as an amateur and seven times number one as a professional. I would not total those. I think writing it that was conveys to our readers exactly what it should. You do not say nine is the all-time record. You do not put on Gonzales's article that he was the top player eight years but Laver was top for nine, because that is exactly what saying Laver is 9x No. 1 and Gonzales in 8x No. 1 would convey to our millions of readers. History shows the amateurs had a learning curve to master before they matched up well on a daily basis to the top one or two pros. It's easy to do these things today, we just wait till year end and total the ATP points and listen to what the ITF awards. If they match we have the best of the year, if they don't we split the best of the year. They can still get it wrong as I think they blew it in 2017, but at least it's easy to handle on wikipedia. Often the 70s and 80s were tougher to figure out than the 40s-60s, but the 40s-60s has less experts publishing their opinions. We do the best we can with those scant expert opinions and press opinions, but we also don't go crazy and start totaling every ranking as if they were identical. Just like we have to take any ranking opinion that Jack Kramer gave if it concerned Gonzales as extremely biased. They really disliked each other and tolerated each other only for the sake of making money. Fyunck(click) (talk) 00:57, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

As I asked you above, Fyunck, how do you maintain consistency with your approach? If you insist on excluding Laver's (and Sedgman's and Hoad's) amateur No. 1 rankings, then you have to be consistant and exclude the amateur no. 1 rankings for Kramer and Budge and Vines and Riggs and Tilden and Perry. Otherwise, we are just playing favourites again. That is purely subjective. If you take away Laver's amateur No. 1's, then we have to be fair and remove Budge's no. 1 rankings for 1937 and 1938, years when the professional ranks had a strong field. Vines loses 1932, and Tilden loses a bunch. I do not see that as valid, because the amateurs always had several strong players.Tennisedu (talk) 04:42, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Exclude? I said you don't total them up to compare with Gonzales' pro totals. You mention which ones are amateur No. 1s and which are pro No. 1s. But we also have to go by sourcing. Historians who write about 61-62 don't have Laver as the best player in the world. In 61 I don't even think he's in anyone's top 10. 62 is a different story, I'll grant you that. Winning a Grand Slam is the pinnacle of the sport no matter whom you go against. But when he turned pro the next year, Laver was crushed by Hoad and Rosewall. He would have been crushed by them in 62 also and it's why those two and probably Gimeno are usually ranked ahead of laver in 62. But a Grand Slam... whew. The same with Budge in 38. I have to admit it's hard to argue with a Grand Slam. But Budge followed up his Grand Slam with a No. 1 ranking in the Pros the very next season. Now these are just my own musings as we went by the best sourcing we had for those time periods, but I can see why the historians contemporaries ranked them the way they did. It is complicated, no doubt about it, and I understand the frustration you have of getting it as right as possible. Just remember we are all on the same team and we are all frustrated with getting it right. The facts we have at our disposal are more like a jigsaw puzzle in that time period. We don't want to just show our readers a giant pile of unlocked pieces. We certainly have more concrete info than that. We can get about 3/4 of the pieces together from sources and the picture is pretty clear but not perfectly clear. And that's where legitimate arguments happen. I wish many of us were as passionate about the Ladies side. Someone like Alice Marble (and dozens of others) should have an article every bit as full and detailed as Hoad and Rosewall... but she doesn't. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:28, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

This argument is getting nowhere. My vote is that the consensus pick of no.1 should be the one used. This has already been decided largely by sources anyway with minimal editorial input (and not the complete invention of editors as you seem to think, tennisedu). Care to set up a vote on this? Tennishistory1877 (talk) 11:38, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with us here creating another subjective retrospective "consensus" ranking list. We have already done that. But that does not change the history of the rankings, the contemporary rankings remain as the historical foundation of the players' ranking. Nothing can change that, history does not respond to a "vote" from our group of editors. Just doesn't happen. Those contemporary rankings maintain a unique status as representing the thinking of the time, and have greater historical value than subjective retro viewpoints from many, many decades later. It might be possible to put an asterisk beside those rankings which were created by someone who held a financial interest in the pro tours, or who was a player in the pro tours. That would point out the conflict of interest, and the possibility that the ranking was a form of promotional literature. I have no problem with that solution. We should also point out that the various point rankings which emerged in 1946, 1959, 1964-1968 were not subjective rankings, not someone's opinion, but a tally of points won in play. That creates another type of contemporary ranking.Tennisedu (talk) 01:54, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

I dont like a lot of the pre-open era players getting inflated numbers of no. 1 rankings in their careers. Laver was a great player but he wasnt the best player in the world for 9 years. The ranking list compiled on world number one rankings page takes a consensus of existing sources to produce rankings for each year. We know the system was imperfect but we dont need to broadcast the most imperfect aspects of it at every possible opportunity. And wikipedia is a democratic place. I have to accept if the majority of opinion is against me and so should you. Thats why I think a vote should be held. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 02:06, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

However our own list is not a "compilation", or even a "consensus" (when did anyone sit down as a group for a collaborative ranking here?), it seems more like everyone throwing in a cherry-picked assessment. Historical facts are not democratically chosen, history is not democracy, the historian is supposed to DEFER TO (not CHOOSE) the relevant facts. Whenever anyone tries to CIRCUMSCRIBE the range of historical truth, the truth is avoided. I would suggest that we allow our own subjective choices as the "consensus" view, and also make reference to the contemporary rankings which represent the thinking of the time. We could eliminate the contemporary rankings which were devised by promoters and players, as they are somewhat compromised by affiliations with the pro tours. There is a difference between saying that Laver received nine world number one rankings and saying that he was the best player in the world for nine years. Those are two different statements, and do not necessarily follow one another.Tennisedu (talk) 02:18, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Fyunck has already got angry about you inferring we made that list up and now you are angering me. And I know exactly what is driving you on this issue, so lets not pretend otherwise. With cherry-picked no. 1s, Hoad has 5. With consensus of the SOURCES he has 1. I deliberately chose my words about Laver. In one sentence you harp on about historians not choosing the relevant facts and in the next sentence you talk of discarding rankings made by promoters and players. And whilst we are on the subject of historical accuracy, I find it extremely inaccurate to compile a list of no. 1 rankings in the manner you suggest and listing pre-open and open era in the same list, because the open era players have far less chance of receiving the sort of inflated ranking numbers your beloved Lewis receives. When rankings choices are largely led by an ATP computer, the facts are far clearer than they were in the pre-open era, plus there were split fields of amateur and pro in the pre-open era. So to say Laver has 9 no. 1s and Sampras has 6 is not comparing like with like. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 03:06, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

You are comparing apples with oranges. For the pre-open era, there are all sorts of No. 1 lists, from official points lists to journalists lists. But in the open era, we have also listed rankings from various sources, not just the ATP list, take a look again. Just because our own "consensus" list chooses one player, that does not mean that other players who were chosen No. 1 by some other authority at the time did not get a no. 1 ranking....they surely DID, but we chose not to agree with those choices. So they did not get our Wikipedia No. 1 ranking. But their No. 1 ranking is still a reality, they did win a no. 1 ranking from some source. Should we ignore the history and pretend that it did not happen? There is no reason not to include the non-Wiki ranking in the player bio article. And every reason to include it. Just because we did not make it the "consensus" choice is no reason to not mention it. Rosewall got number one rankings in 1971 and 1972, although not our consensus. Should that be mentioned in Rosewall's bio article? Of course it should.Tennisedu (talk) 03:21, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Its nonsense to suggest the different lists in the open era are the same as the different lists in the pre-open era. I have never said that we should deny these cherry-picked no.1s existed. I never reverted you from putting those cherry-picked no.1s on the Hoad page in the narrative section, unlike other editors who did initially. I also think it fair to point out that these are just single citations in some cases (though being careful with wording to not put sly remarks). The world number one rankings page lists all available rankings sources at the start of each year section. So whilst accepting the situation is imperfect and accepting all the ranking sources that exist (including those from players and promoters), we should also not seek to inflate or amplify the importance of these single sources at every opportunity. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 03:57, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

You did not answer the point (no surprise). Rosewall received world number one rankings in 1971 and 1972. Should we not mention that in Rosewall's bio article? It is nonsense to suggest that we should ignore this historical fact, and keep it out. Of course they should be included. We have included them in Rosewall's article, as well as other no. 1 rankings for other players who did not get the Wikipedia number one in those years.Tennisedu (talk) 04:05, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Perhaps I should be very specific on what I feel about rankings and player pages. I am against listing things such as "Laver has 9 number one rankings" in the lead paragraph of his page. The consensus number should be listed. I am against mentioning he had 9 number one rankings anywhere on his page, unless it specifically states these are not consensus figures. At the end of each year section in the narrative section cherry-picked rankings could be mentioned, but that is the only time and they should only be listed once. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 04:14, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

I am having some difficulty with your cherry-picked term "consensus" rankings. What you really mean is the Wikipedia list of world no. 1 players, which is a choice from among the rankings made for each year, and sometimes does not coincide with any of the rankings for the year in the split era (such as 1953, where Kramer was not ranked no.1 in any contemporary or retro ranking.) The disregarded rankings still have meaning for the bio articles of players who achieved the number one spot. Just because the Wikipedia list disagrees with the contemporary list does not mean that they have no value. They certainly have historical value for the player himself. In 1971 and 1972, a reputable journalist, Tomassi, ranked Rosewall number one. That is significant information and it would be ridiculous to exclude it from Rosewall's article. It would be considered "cherry-picking" to exclude it. Usually in the lead to the article information about ATP or other point rankings is referred to, and other official number one rankings. Your idea of circumscribing this information will create havoc if adopted. Incidentally, Wikipedia is not supposed to be used as a SOURCE for other Wikipedia articles, so your idea of using the Wikipedia number one list as a defining source for every other article in the tennis world is contrary to rules.Tennisedu (talk) 04:29, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

ATP rankings are official rankings. Pre-open era rankings are a potpourri of different sources ranging from the highly accurate 1964-67 point rankings (with no competing annual tour in those years) right down to pure nonsense rankings (like any ranking that lists Hoad no. 1 for 1962)! Gonzales' eight number ones statement in his article isnt sourced from wikipedia, its sourced from the Tennis hall of fame. Only adding the individual cherry-picks together does Hoad have 5 no. 1s. An individual cherry-pick does not equal a consensus. I would like to meet the historian that thinks Hoad was number 1 for 5 years! Tennishistory1877 (talk) 04:59, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Gonzales has a number of problematic number one rankings in his list, let me remind you. 1953 was a number one ranking for Gonzales which was from a group of players including Budge, who played in that tournament, and had an interest in the pro tour. The 1954 Gonzales number one ranking was from a pro players association, who had a financial interest in the tour. The Jack March number one rankings for Gonzales from 1956 and 1958 were issued by a tournament promoter who had a financial interest in the tournament. The Jack Kramer number one rankings for Gonzales in 1959 and 1960 were prepared by the tour promoter, who obviously had a financial interest in the pro tour. Gonzales did have number one rankings from uncompromised sources in 1955 (Lawn Tennis and Badminton), 1959 (L'Equipe magazine), and the ranking produced by the 1961 World Series Tour (Hoad excluded by injury, Rosewall declined to participate). A retospective "blanket" ranking from many decades later is of no value in looking at individual years. Rosewall's eight world number one rankings derive from contemporary sources, only 1962 is problematic, being Rosewall's personal ranking and obviously from someone who had a financial interest in the tour. The other seven appear uncompromised. Hoad's five number ones are all uncompromised from any financial interest in the tour. Perhaps we should asterisk those rankings which are complicated by a financial interest in the tour?Tennisedu (talk) 17:49, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Retrospective "blanket" rankings are often the most accurate. No asterixes on some rankings chosen by criterea set by you, because this would be POV editing. And it does not surprise me that you dislike the term consensus, as you spend your time broadcasting sources which receive the least consensus. But as I said before, wikipedia is a democratic place. No one is denying these sources exist, but the prominence we give them is another matter entirely. And as far as I can see, you have not established any consensus for your views. Sweet Hoad dreams. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 18:19, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Blanket rankings are invalid here because the individual years are not specified, for example which eight years for Gonzales? You would have to cherry-pick eight years of your own choosing. We cannot give the Tomassi rankings which show Rosewall at world number one for both 1971 and 1972 because Rosewall is not included among the top two players for those years by the Wikipedia annual world number one article. Under the rules, only the top two players can be discussed. That severe restriction does not apply to the individual bio articles, of course, where these very important rankings for players outside the top two in the Wikipedia rankings can be located. The idea that some rankings are compromised by a financial interest in the pro tour is not my idea, it is a universally recognized rule which applies to all published work. Placing an asterisk beside the compromised rankings would be a suitable solution to allow us to maintain these data in the articles.Tennisedu (talk) 18:26, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

I have already explained many times, that the SOURCE (not sure if you understand what that word means) states Gonzales "rose to the world No. 1 ranking, holding that lofty perch for a record eight years from 1952 to 1960". You, in your desperate quest for Hoad promotion have taken 5 puzzle pieces from 5 different 5 piece puzzles (some of which have been gathering dust in a loft for 50 years) and attempted and failed to construct a complete puzzle. You were the one who changed that world number one ranked male tennis players article so that only the top two players were listed, removing another editor's hard work in the process! "That severe restriction" was one you gleefully put in place! Rosewall 1971 and 1972 rankings can be listed in the narrative section on his page the same as any other player. Have you any more ridiculous comments to make today or are we done? Tennishistory1877 (talk) 18:55, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Let me refresh your memory, 1952 to 1960 is nine years, not eight, you yourself will have to cherry-pick which eight years you want, your blanket ranking does not specify the individual years. That is the problem with blanket rankings, they mean precisely nothing and provide zero information content, which is a burden to this article. Thank you for the contribution. The Rosewall and Hoad articles give rankings for individual years, from strong sources not compromised by financial relations with the tour, plus some points rankings which are miles ahead in terms of objectivity to the puff literature which you place so much weight on. Your blanket ranking has no breakdown by years. I was not the one who created the Wikipedia rules, it was others who insisted on maintaining them. You better check with Wolbo on that issue. You think that I am in charge of Wikipedia rules? That is very funny.Tennisedu (talk) 20:21, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

No, I don't alter sources. If a source doesnt specify individual years, then a source doesnt specify. During the course of this thread, you have won no one over with your arguments and your vaudeville act is getting very old and stale. Fyunck stated "My guess is if you asked any editors here about biases, your name would ring louder than an airhorn". How very true. No one is "in charge" of wikipedia rules, but we all have to follow them. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Consensus Go away and read. Goodbye. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 21:24, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

If a source does not specify the year or years, you have a problem, you actually have zero information. There was a biography about Rosewall entitled "Ken Rosewall: Twenty Years at the Top". So what does that blanket ranking tell us about those twenty years? When were they? Which years? Without that information, such a ranking has no value or information. So you acknowledge that I am not in charge of Wikipedia rules, yet you try to blame me when the rules are followed. I don't know what to say about logic like that, it is truly unique.Tennisedu (talk) 21:46, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

I blame you for criticising the structure of a page that you yourself implemented. You later got the consensus needed for your changes to stay on that page (I was one of the editors that agreed with your two-player listing system, though I felt for the editor who had his work removed and I didnt like the way you dealt with him). However, you have not established any consensus in this thread at all. Quit the hot air and read. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Consensus Tennishistory1877 (talk) 22:06, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

No, you blamed me for following the Wikipedia rules in a consistent way, just read your own comments above, they are there in black and white. The rules are meant to be followed in a nonpartisan way, not tailored to give advantage to some players over others. I recommend that you read the link you provided above....it says clearly that consensus is NOT the result of a vote. So why did you push the idea of a vote? Really, this is not your best day.Tennisedu (talk) 22:10, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

"When agreement cannot be reached through editing alone, the consensus-forming process becomes more explicit: editors open a section on the associated talk page and try to work out the dispute through discussion. Here editors try to persuade others, using reasons based in policy, sources, and common sense". You have persuaded no one. I notice you have become more and more obnoxious as this thread has gone on as your failure to win anyone over to your arguments has become more and more apparent. Also, you should take a look at another policy page https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiBullying Take a look at some of the examples of bullying listed on this page, in particular those sections on Asserting ownership, false accusations and misrepresentation. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 22:40, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Check out the sections on Wikihounding and personal attacks. Please avoid personal attacks and confine yourself to content only. Thank you.Tennisedu (talk) 00:27, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

You are treading on very thin ice. You have spent most of your last few posts misrepresenting what I have said. You stated "No, you blamed me for following the Wikipedia rules in a consistent way, just read your own comments above, they are there in black and white". This is a lie. I blamed you for criticising the structure of a page you yourself implemented. You stated "The rules are meant to be followed in a nonpartisan way, not tailored to give advantage to some players over others. I recommend that you read the link you provided above." This statement heavily infers I am biased and is a false accusation. You stated "it says clearly that consensus is NOT the result of a vote. So why did you push the idea of a vote?" I only mentioned a vote after you had put your arguments and argued and argued them with myself and fyunck and you had not established a consensus. Go back through all the edits you have made on pages and look through all the comments you have made on these talk threads and see how many times you have violated the wikipedia rules (including those on the bullying page I posted a link to above). And it is not only me that has criticised you for your behaviour again and again and again over a period of months. Editors may fall out from time to time but no editor on the pre-open era pro tour tennis pages has fallen out with as many people as many times as you have in the past year or so. Look at how many times editors have reverted your edits. Look at how many times editors have quoted the neutral point of view wikipedia policies to you. Look to your own behaviour and stop blaming others. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 01:03, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Wikihounding is not good. Please avoid any personal attacks and confine yourself to content only. Thank you.Tennisedu (talk) 01:06, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Read the policies. The bullying policy states "What bullying is not. A few things are often falsely identified as bullying: A robust response to determined attempts to insert disputed content into an article. Taking actions against attempts to promote a POV. Sanctioning editors who do not take on board criticism. Sanctioning editors who will not accept consensus." Tennishistory1877 (talk) 01:19, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Wikihounding is not good. Please avoid any personal attacks and confine yourself to content only. Thank you.Tennisedu (talk) 02:52, 7 March 2021 (UTC)