Q: So the surface didn't disappear, the specialist did?
That is the clearest way to put it. Modern training methods, the slowing of hard courts, and a generation of players built around heavy topspin baseline games translate across surfaces far more easily than the flatter, serve-and-volley-adjacent styles that used to separate grass specialists from clay grinders in earlier decades. A player who wins on clay today, whether through elite footwork, patience, or a heavy topspin shot, generally has enough of a foundation to be dangerous on a hard court too, because the two surfaces no longer play as differently as they once did.
