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The Holy Triad has many, many stories around it, but one of my favorites is the one about how all 3 guys radically pushed each other to become not only better, but the best ever. And all because they all are aiming for that GOAT status.
I think if you drop any of them in any era, they end up with a GOAT resume anyway, but the fact that they ended up in the same era made all 3 better than had they not had to deal with each other. And they still ended up putting up GOAT resumes regardless of each other.
I've often said that RF was lucky to show up first and collect a bunch of Slams before his GOAT brethren were ready to challenge him. However, RF was a tad unlucky in the sense that he didn't have his GOAT brethren around to push him in his formative years.
RF blitzed the ATP from 2003-2007 (though not on clay starting in 2005), and while he was immensely successful, there were holes in his game that he wasn't really forced to improve by the field outside of Nadal on clay.
When the Holy Triad became a thing, starting in 2008 with Djokovic's first Slam and Nadal's first Wimbledon, RF was already 26/27. He was fully formed. But, the remarkable thing is that even at that age, RF managed to improve dramatically, though that process gets clouded -
by the fact that his FH did get slightly worse. I think it's easy to argue that 2015 or 2017 RF is a far superior player than the version that ran roughshod through tennis between 2003-2007. The sad thing is that the improved form didn't bring as much success of the kind he -
and all the Holy Triad guys crave: Slams. The 2015 version of RF was particularly unfortunate, given that it ran against Djokovic's all-time peak, and Djokovic was 28 to RF's 34. In an ideal world, RF plays like that with his 23 year old body.
Still, RF managed to make himself better, and only because of the 3 monsters alongside him. Nadal has a different situation, where he comes out of the gates physically ready to take over, as he showed on clay, though his tennis wasn't all that ready to take over elsewhere.
Nadal managed to make himself a better all-court player while absolutely dominating one surface from the get-go, which lets you know how hungry and greedy these guys are. They want it all - great players would've been happy to lord over clay like Nadal did starting in 2005.
But Nadal? He wanted more. He wanted to be better. He wanted to take RF down. Though ironically, it wasn't really RF who was keeping him away from stuff (with the exception of Wimbledon) - it was the field.
Still, by 2009, Nadal emphatically asserts his all-court prowess at the 2009 AO, showing off all the things he improved on. He even takes down RF in that final, which is noteworthy since RF had already won 9 Slams on Hard to Nadal's maiden one.
Now Djokovic comes along in 2008, and he is not much of a threat to the two others with the exception of the 2008 AO. You could say that he was unlucky to show up when the other two were already way more developed physically, mentally, and had more experience.
This resulted in A LOT of painful losses for Djokovic, both to his Holy Triad brethren as well as against the field. While Djokovic was very polished in terms of skill, he wasn't where he needed to be mentally and physically.
But it was Djokovic's great good fortune (when looking at the big picture, not at the time) to have RF and Nadal, as fully formed as can be, in his way. They pushed him to the heights he need to get in order to claim his spot among them. But not before inflicting years of defeats
Nadal was then forced to adjust, after the brutal 7 match losing streak Djokovic imposed on him in 2011. And he did - continuing to improve and claim more and more success. And RF did the same, and he would patiently wait until 2017 to claim more Slams.
Anyway, I hope more and more of the great Holy Triad matches go online for future generations to watch. Because they can see Djokovic beating RF in 2007 and then see him beat Nadal in 2019 and look at the progression.
They can see RF issue 2 bagels in a Slam final in 2003, yet lose that same Slam final 12 years later even though he was a much, much better player. Success is only a partial indicator for how good someone is.
And they can see Nadal losing 7 straight finals to Djokovic in 2011-2012, then beat him in the 2013 US Open final. It's all about continuous improvement and endless hunger, together with once-in-a-lifetime talent. We won't see something like this ever again.
