Shortly after Roger Federer won the French Open, convincingly over Swede, Robin Soderling, questions arose as to whether Roger Federer was the best ever.

Two events occurred that made the discussion possible. First, of course, was the French Open title, the one missing piece to his career Grand Slam. Federer had won the other titles numerous times, had reached the finals of the French three years in a row, but had nothing to show for all that effort.

But beyond that, he tied Pete Sampras’s record for most Slams overall, the last Slam being the 2002 US Open when Sampras had literally stopped winning tournaments of any kind. Prior to the US Open, Sampras’s previous win was 2 years earlier when he won his seventh and last Wimbledon title.

Let’s begin with the arguments against Federer being greatest ever.

Probably number 1 on this list is Rafael Nadal. Federer has a losing record against Nadal, although the majority of these losses are on clay. Nadal’s ascendancy to number 1 has also made Federer’s domination of this period suspect. Federer has lost to Nadal three times at the French, once at Wimbledon, and once at the Australian Open. This is five times in seven meetings in a Grand Slam final. He also lost to Nadal in the semifinals of the French Open the first year Nadal won the title. Meanwhile, Federer has beaten Nadal twice, both at Wimbledon.

Number 2 on this list would be a lack of a Grand Slam. Of course, by this standard, you’d have to rule out Pete Sampras, because he never won the French Open, and never contested it once.

Number 3 is lack of quality opponents. It’s claimed that Sampras had to play Agassi, Edberg, Becker, Lendl, Chang, Courier, Martin, and Rafter, and the quality of his opponents were better than the quality of Federer’s opponents which would include Nadal, Nalbandian, Safin, Roddick, Blake, Hewitt, and lately, Djokovic, Murray, and del Potro.

Each of these arguments can be countered to some degree. There’s no doubt if Federer had beaten Nadal in 2006 and 2007, the two years he won 3 of 4, he would be crowned best ever, and perhaps no doubt if he had won it one of the two years. Not only would he have the most titles ever, he would have beaten Nadal on clay, won the Grand Slam, and had the most titles ever.

However, Federer has not done that.

What he has done is altogether remarkable.

Let’s start with Nadal. Federer got a bit unlucky, but this is the lot in life. He got mono at the end of 2007. The difference in preparation may have meant the difference between winning Wimbledon again and not. But that aside, consider that Federer mostly met Nadal in the French. It took a while for Nadal to make the finals of anything besides Wimbledon and the French Open. Nadal has only reached the finals of the Australian once (this year) and never reached the finals of the US Open, when Nadal’s body is generally dealing with the wear and tear of the clay circuit and Wimbledon.

Federer would have been favored on faster surfaces like the Australian or the US Open, but Nadal was never there to meet him. Nadal has never reached the finals of more than two Grand Slam events in any year.

Federer, on the other hand, has reached the finals of 3 of 4 Grand Slam events three times (2004, 2006, 2007) and in two of the years (2006, 2007) he reached the finals of all four events, winning 3 of 4.

Sampras, by contrast, has only ever reached the finals of 3 of 4 Grand Slam events once, in 1995, when he won Wimbledon and the US Open and reached the finals of the Australian.

Sampras also came onto the scene as several players were starting to decline in their career, most notably Ivan Lendl, Mats Wilander, and Stefan Edberg. Edberg and Becker were still good for the early 90s, but basically, by the mid 90s, they weren’t that competitive.

Sampras also faced a series of players that were solid, but not great. He fared very well against his contemporaries, including Agassi, Chang, Martin, and Courier. He beat Agassi in 1990 when Agassi was still struggling to win his first title. Courier came as close as anyone to beating him at Wimbledon in 1993, but Courier faded by the mid 90s, unable to maintain the play that lead him to number 1. Then, there was Cedric Pioline (twice), the most unlikely multiple Grand Slam finalist, Goran Ivanisevic, who primarily played very well on grass with his huge serve, and Patrick Rafter who had a pair of US Opens to his name. He also beat Carlos Moya (Nadal’s hero) at the Australian, which probably says more about the Australian Open’s penchance for unlikely finalists compared to the other Slams.

Agassi was probably Sampras’s most notable rival, but Sampras mostly had Agassi’s number. Agassi had a hard time dealing with Sampras’s serve. He could keep close, but Sampras would always come up with the big shot.

Sampras’s record against players of Federer’s generation, namely Hewitt and Safin, is decidedly bad. He lost to both in straight sets.

Federer’s losses in finals have only come against Nadal. He’s had two four set losses at the French, one straight set loss at the French, one five set loss at Wimbledon, one five set loss at the Australian. Federer is a tough guy to eliminate in straight sets, in a best of 5 situation.

Argument number 2. Grand Slams. Federer hasn’t won any. OK, neither has Sampras, for that matter. The last player to win a Grand Slam was Rod Laver. First argument against Laver. He won his first during the amateur era when pros weren’t allowed to play. Most likely, had pros been allowed to play, he wouldn’t have won that first one. Second argument, three of four Grand Slam events were played on grass. A good grass court player could dominate. Had Sampras been playing in this era, his results might have been gaudier than they are now.

No one has won it in the Open era. The two closest people, other than Federer, are Jimmy Connors, in 1974, when he won all but the French Open. The French Open banned (!) him because he had played World Team Tennis. Borg won his second French Open that year. The other is Mats Wilander who won all but Wimbledon in 1988, but lost in the quarterfinals of Wimbledon.

Federer has come as close as anyone without winning a Grand Slam. He won 3 of 4 Grand Slam events in 2006 and 2007 and reached the finals of the French both year. He also won 3 of 4 in 2004, but did not make it to the finals of the French. 2006 and 2007 are about as dominant as one can be, and he did this with perhaps the most talented number 2 in the world, Rafael Nadal. This is quite an achievement.

Nadal, by the way, has never reached the finals of more than two Grand Slam events.

Then, there is Federer’s consistency. Even in down years, such as 2008 and 2009, where Federer was losing to Simon, Wawrinka, Djokovic, and Murray, Federer kept making finals. Indeed, the one exception was in the Australian Open in 2008 where he had mono. With that lone blip, Federer has made 15 of 16 Grand Slam finals, and won 10 of them. He’s reached the semifinals 20 consecutive times, and most of the times, and really only 3 times were semifinals (once to Safin, once to Nadal, once to Djokovic).

One reason Agassi looks to be a formidable rival is because Sampras was not a dominant number 1. Sampras never reached the finals of Grand Slam more than twice in a year except in 1995. This let a lot of other people opportunties to win titles. Sampras’s best years were between 1994-1997 (and 2000). Agassi won 5 of his titles after 1997.

Let’s look at a list of opponents Sampras beat. Jim Courier won 4 Slams (two Australian, two French) all early in his career. Pioline and Martin never won a Grand Slam title. Ivanisevic won only one Grand Slam title. Becker won 6 Grand Slams, but was at the end of his career when he had a late surge making the finals of Wimbledon in 1995 and winning the Australian in 1996. Finally, Agassi had 8 Grand Slams.

This is the list of players Sampras has lost to in the finals of a Grand Slam event: Agassi, Hewitt, Safin, Edberg.

This is the list of players Federer has lost to in the finals of a Grand Slam event: Nadal.

Let’s look at the list of opponents Federer beat: Safin (won 2 Grand Slam titles, runner up twice), Hewitt (also won 2 Grand Slam titles, runner up twice), Agassi (8 Grand Slam titles, near the end of his career, though), Roddick (won one Grand Slam title), Djokovic (won one Grand Slam title), Baghdatis, Gonzalez, Murray, Soderling, Phillippoussis (won 0 titles), and, of course, Nadal (won 6 titles).

Part of the reason Federer’s opponents aren’t better qualified is because he and Nadal have won the large majority of the Slam titles. It’s hard for others to win when you are winning so much.

Finally, there is the quality of opponents. Sampras’s closest rival was Andre Agassi. And yet Sampras dominated Agassi. His other rivals were either surface specialists (Ivanisevic), or players that had a few good years (Courier). One can argue that Nadal is a much better rival than anyone Sampras had, more akin of Connors to Borg. Sampras actually had a pretty even record against, of all people, Wayne Ferreira. However, Ferreira just didn’t do well in Slams.

To be fair, Federer doesn’t have a close rival at his age. He dominates over Hewitt, Blake, Roddick, and Gonzalez. His competition has come from a younger generation that now includes Nadal, Murray, Djokovic, and del Potro, and he has still fared amazingly well against all except Nadal.

While there’s no definitive way to put Federer as the very best, there is also a compelling argument to be made to consider him the best, based on number of titles, consistency (I mean, think about it: five time consecutive Wimbledons and five time consecutive US Opens).

Should he win another Wimbledon, and he’d have to be a prohibitive favorite, then he would have 6 Wimbledon titles (to Sampras’s 7), he’d have the most Grand Slam titles, and bolster an even stronger case.

And, oh yes, Federer hasn’t retired yet.