Rod Laver and Arthur Ashe. Notice how both players are so eager to get to net at any opportunity

Sampras vs Agassi. This match is a great example of two very different type of players facing off against each other, Sampras would look to get to net as much as possible and Agassi would try to pass him

Here is a video of one of the greatest serve volley players of all time-Pat Rafter.
Rafter never had the biggest serve but his volleys were truly great

NOW LETS COMPARE THE ABOVE TENNIS TO TODAY'S GAME

Above is a match between Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic at Indian Wells 2011.

This match is a great example of today's modern game, we see much longer rally's, points being played mainly from the baseline and both players pushing themselves to the limit physically.

Now lets ask the questions.

Are the new slower courts to blame?

At Wimbledon 2008 there were some tests done on the speed of the ball travelling from one players racket to the baseline on the opponents side.
Both shots were the same speed but when they reach the baseline, the ball from 2008 was nine miles slower than the ball from 2003 and was also higher, making it easier to return balls and play from the baseline, something Nadal had taken advantage of on the Wimbledon courts.

Even the players feel the change:

“Larry recognized there is a change in the game,” Andy Roddick said. “It seems like everything is slowing down a little bit as far as surface and balls, and therefore you see a lot more guys dependent upon their running ability and their legs.”

Nadal is a fantastic champion, his effort and talent level are just phenomenal. However, as great as Nadal is, I do not think he would have the same kind of results that he is having today if he was playing back in the '90s. His clay court results would have been similar, but his hard court record, and his grass court record especially, would not have been as great as they are now.

Why would SV disappear after almost every player in the past serve and volleyed their way to victory, champions such as Laver and Mcenroe?

Because it no longer pays dividends. Serve and volleyers cannot play like that anymore without being passed at the net by baseline sluggers.

Serve and Volleyers used to rule the roost at Wimbledon, yet two baseline, hard hitters made it to the Wimbledon final this year. *(Nothing against them)

Everything points to a court slowdown:

WIMBLEDON's slowing grass courts are hastening the end of serve-volley in tennis, according to former world No.1 Mats Wilander.

"I'm personally very disappointed (at) the way they are making Wimbledon these days," he said.

"We're slowly losing the style of playing tennis which is the serve and volley."

Wilander, Sweden's non-playing captain for this weekend's Davis Cup World Group playoff tie with India in New Delhi, said ideally players should mix serve and volley with a solid baseline game.

"But we are slowly losing that because the grass courts in Wimbledon are getting slower and slower," said the 41-year-old, winner of seven grand slam titles in the 1980s.

Because of the courts having been slowed, pretty soon, the ATP might degenerate into the WTA.

So if all the champions say it, all the evidence points to it, and the death of a playing style is because of it, does anyone still not believe the courts have slowed down?

The below column is from wikipedia

Serve-and-volleyers benefit from playing on fast courts, such as grass or fast concrete. The quick bounce and faster pace of play give them an advantage because opponents have less time to set up for a passing shot. However, the number of serve-and-volley players is decreasing in today's professional tennis, because this strategy requires more experience to master and defeat other playing styles (as well as changes in racquet technology that have improved players' passing shots). In addition to this, there has been a trend toward the slowing down of tennis surfaces over the past few years. The serve-and-volley technique works better on faster surfaces because the volleyer is able to put more balls away without the baseliner being able to chase them down.

NOW DID THE NEW BALLS KILL SERVE AND VOLLEY

Below is a article from CNN sport on the 25th March 2011

(CNN) -- They are tall, powerful and capable of serving a tennis ball at over 150 mph (241 kph). They are the rocket men of tennis, and they're getting faster.

Leading the race is Ivo Karlovic, the 6 ft 10 in Croatian they call the "King of Aces," who was clocked at 156 mph (251 kph) during a Davis Cup tie in Zagreb last month.

The 32-year-old's world record is unlikely to go unchallenged for long. Andy Roddick has twice hit the 155 mph (249 kph) mark, and 20-year-old Canadian Milos Raonic is already firing at 153 mph (246 kph).

But as serves continue to get faster, tennis is staring down a difficult problem -- what to do when rallies become a rarity, and every other point is an ace.

"Players like Raonic and Karlovic combine great technique with height and long arms to generate racket speed," said former Wimbledon champion Pat Cash, of CNN's Open Court.

"It seems the only way to slow the serves down is to limit the size of players, cut some of their arms off, or make them stand in a hole."

But there may be an alternative. In 2002, the International Tennis Federation (ITF) included a new, larger tennis ball in its official rules.

While its primary purpose is for recreational players and use at high altitude, the Type 3 ball is also intended to "help curb where necessary the dominance of the serve and corresponding lack of rallies in the professional game."

The graphic above demonstrates how. The 6% increase in diameter means the ball travels more slowly due to greater drag, and also bounces higher. Put simply, it makes the game easier.

"That's why we've got them. We're waiting in the wings for a time when there are too many aces in professional tournaments," said Jamie Capel-Davies, Senior Project Technologist at the ITF.

"For the moment our research suggests reaction times are keeping up with the increases in serve speed, because the number of aces has not really increased since 2002. But when we see evidence that aces are going up, that's when the bigger balls will come into play."

ITF research suggests it's a matter of when, and not if. The mean average of men's serving speed in the four grand slams rose from 130 mph (209 kph) to 137 mph (221 kph), between 2002 and 2010.

The world record stood at Greg Rusedski's mark of 149 mph (240 kph) in 2001. Just 10 years later, and the 160 mph (257 kph) barrier is very much within reach.

Bigger, stronger players, along with advancements in racket technology, are pushing the envelope. But if the rocket men keep serving faster, they might not like what's coming next.

"The U.S. seniors used those bigger balls for a couple of years, and they were soundly voted down. Not one player like them," Cash said. "It was impossible to hit a winning volley and the ball dipped severely -- making it easier to keep the ball in court.

"Introducing them would be a move in the wrong direction. Tennis is becoming like a video game as it is, with the lack of variety on the shot-making front. Taking the volley out of the game with larger balls will ruin the game. Bring your caffeine pills to keep you awake."

Capel-Davies admits the bigger balls won't be to everyone's liking: "Players will feel like they have to hit the ball harder to gain the same power with their shots, and some of our research suggests they could tire more easily."

When the alternative could be a sport where the giant serve is all-powerful, and matches could effectively be over in half the time, the ITF may be left with little choice.

Reaction times have a ceiling, and when that's reached a glut of aces will likely prompt the ITF to act.

Forget "New balls, please" -- the call for the next generation could well be, "Bigger balls, please."

As the above article points out service speed's have on average gone up the past 9 years, but can you just imagine what would happen to tennis if they slowed down the balls even more?

Below is another article on the death of the serve volley game

As Federer and Nadal continue to awe the spectators with their fabulous rallies and scintillating baseline game, most of the fans still yearn for the serve-and-volley game to make a re-entry into the sport.

The art of serve-and-volley had been perfected by tennis greats like Jack Kramer, John McEnroe, Pete Sampras, and Martina Navratilova to name a few, but of late this art seems to have lost its sheen.

Serve-and-volley is a style of play in tennis where the player serving moves quickly towards the net after the serve. The server then attempts to hit a volley, as opposed to the baseline style, where the server would stay back following the serve and attempt to hit a groundstroke.

The aim of this strategy is to put immediate pressure on the opponent, so that good returns must be made, or else the server can gain advantage. This tactic is especially useful on fast courts (e.g. grass courts) and less so on slow courts (e.g. clay courts). For it to be successful, the player must either have a good serve or be exceptionally quick in movement around the net.

In the days of wooden racquets, it simply wasn't possible to generate enough power to just crush a forehand past your opponent. To be successful, you had to work the point to create unreturnable angles. It is much easier to create angles at the net, so the serve-and-volley game was more popular.

Now, though angles can still be important, with the introduction of wider graphite racquets, everyone hits the ball so hard that it can be difficult to even approach the net.

When you do get there, passing shots from your opponent are much more difficult to handle. So it doesn't pay to work too hard on serve-and-volley skills, so no one does.

To encourage more artistry through the strategic use of angles, McEnroe advocates a return to wooden racquets in the professional game.

Some experts argue that the game has turned more 'vanilla' in the nature of the surfaces. Even the new laid grass surfaces at Wimbledon is slower and the balls sit up more than they used to, due to changes in the undersurface and the type of grass used there.

Another interesting fact about the whole issue is the lack of encouragement of serve-and-volley style by the USTA. The coaches now emphasize more on the baseline play of the junior players, and volleying is taught only in respect to doubles game.

The most interesting take on the decline is blamed on a conspiracy theory involving tennis organizers to encourage longer rallies and attract more spectators!

In support of the claim, supporters quote the introduction of new laws [supposedly] against Pancho Gonzales and Jack Kramer to curb their serve-and-volley game.

The rules include the VASSS introduction in '50s, the three-bounce rule and making the second serve line a yard behind. Though the rules were subsequently dropped, the introduction of graphite racquets, hybrid strings, and slower grass courts have eventually managed to kill the serve-and-volley game.

Others neutral to the issue consider serve-and-volley as a created opportunity, not a total game.

It is only one pattern of many used in the game. Top players still move the serve around and use variety at all sections of the court looking to come in and hit the easy volley to close out the point.

Personally, I believe the serve-and-volley can still be employed in the game, though the players need to put in more effort not only in their movements, but also mentally, in order to anticipate the location of the return and move into position early, and the only way to achieve that is practice. After all, practice makes one perfect.

WHAT DO THE PLAYERS THINK?

Stefan Edberg talking about the death of serve and volley play-

“It’s completely lost. It’s sad in a way,”

Boris Becker on the slow courts-

“I could have never won a single Wimbledon on such ‘slow’ surfaces.”

Pete Sampras speaking about todays game-
"Rackets have changed, strings have changed, balls and courts seem pretty much the same"
"I think the players today are a little bit stronger little bit bigger"
"The technology has really improved"
When asked how his serve and volley game would cope with todays hard hitting baseliner's Sampras says

"I WOULD PLAY THE SAME, i would get in (into net), chip and charge, put pressure on these guys, its just the only way i know how to play, i'm just all about coming in, it's tougher now because i dont move as well, i'm not as agile but MY GAME WOULD HOLD UP IN ANY GENERATION I FEEL, like when I was at MY BEST I FELT UNBEATABLE, technology's changed its helped guys return a little bit but it would also help me out so it sort of evens out, MAN I LOVE GUYS STAYING BACK I JUST LICK MY CHOPS"

However good the modern game has gotten surely it would only benefit to introduce a few small changes to allow the chance for some players to start the art of serve and volley again. Just imagine a match in which a Nadal or Murray plays a great serve volley player, the contrast in styles between the players would make for great tennis and a change of scenary.