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A salute to birthday girl Steffi Graf!
The talk right now is that reigning Wimbledon, US Open, French Open and Olympic champion Serena Williams is the greatest female player of all time.
I give that honor to Steffi Graf who turns 44 today.
While Serena has won 16 grand slam singles titles in her career, Steffi won 22 and in 1988 won all four slams plus the Olympic gold medal to record the only “Golden Slam” in history.
She was simply splendid to watch and one of my all-time favorite players – male or female.
She retired in 1999 shortly after winning the French Open for the sixth time and making it to the finals of Wimbledon. She was ranked third in the world at the time but had spent more weeks ranked number one than any woman or any man who has ever played.
Comments
(All comments are reviewed before being published, and I review submissions several times per day.)
Mike says:
While Steffi was/is one of the greatest womens tennis players of all time, her achievement will always be exagerated due to the stabbing of Monica Seles, the other tennis phenom of the time. Steffi had no peer with the effective removal of Monica. Who will ever know what would have been had Monica Seles gone toe to toe with Steffi during this period.
FAEM says:
Greatest player*
*won several more slams that she would have after a fan of hers plunged a knife into her rival Monica Seles who was at that point beating her like a drum.
Greg Hernandez says:
Beating her like a drum? They were 6-4 at the time of stabbing with Steffi leading. Steffi won 8 slams before Seles emerged then Wimbledon in 1991 and 1992 during Monica’s most dominant years. Also, would Evert and Navratilova had won less had Austin not been injured? Would Serena had won less if Henin not retired at 25? Everyone could have an *