The above response from Jon Wertheim to the notion that basketball has suffered due to constantly comparing the current NBA to the NBA of the 1990s is spot on.
For how many years have we heard the tennis media and many tennis fans lament that someone is NOT Jimmy Connors, Bjorn Borg, John McEnroe, Andre Agassi, or …? (too many years is the quick answer)
It is fine to have preferences and I can say that I miss the geometry of the points Stefan Edberg and Patrick Rafter produced. All of that is fine, but the era of the tennis boom has just now really receded into the distance due to the virtuoso play of the Big 3.
In 2002, Lleyton Hewitt beat David Nalbandian to win Wimbledon in a baseline-centered match. In 2003, John McEnroe helped co-author an open letter to Wimbledon bemoaning the loss of serve and volley tennis.
To be sure, net rushing is largely gone. BUT didn’t 2003 usher in some of the most fun Wimbledon matches we’ve seen?
Was the Djokovic-Nadal 2018 Wimbledon semifinal the return of the serve and volley tennis Johnny Mac mourned? No. But it was great.
Admitting that the post-Serve and Volley Era is upon us did not entail assuming that the replacement will be crappy.
I wish Guga Kuerten and Juan Carlos Ferrero had stayed healthier, but it is not like clay court tennis went over a cliff when their health declined.
Tennis needs to leave room for the future as it emerges rather than drowning it with boring old stories of glory days.
This is not to say that tennis will always occupy the best of all possible worlds (No thank you, Dr. Pangloss). Tennis in the future will have things to critique. It should just be critiqued for what it is and is not doing well rather than for not being comprised of players who have hung up their racquets. That would be critiquing tennis for something it can’t possibly fulfill. In that scenario, tennis will struggle to thrive regardless of the level of play being produced.
Tennis Abides: Dan Martin on Tennis and Life 