Rok, I think you inadvertently hit on why it's sometimes difficult to have a discussion about some of this. I never said that I thought Mariano was the best saxophone player. I said he was my FAVORITE ALTO player; and one that is often overlooked. To say that any one player is "the best" is tricky to say the least. Are we talking about who the best "swing" player was? Bebopper, hard-bop, ballad player, post-Coltrane, avant-garde, funk? You get the picture. But, we all have a favorite; that doesn't make him "the best". I suppose that if one also looks at which player was the most influential as a criterion for being the best, then we can narrow the field. Who those would be we all know.
If one takes the term "best saxophone player" at face value, then perhaps I can add a bit of perspective. If you put aside issues of style and ask a bunch of saxophone players who the best saxophone PLAYER was/is from the standpoint of being the player with the greatest command of the instrument; the player who demonstrated the greatest ability to control the instrument in any register and basically make it do whatever he wanted to with a sense of ease, evenness of tone and flawless intonation, the overwhelming majority would say, without hesitation: Michael Brecker. He had it all. Now, one may not like like his funk-infused post-Coltrane style, but that is a different issue.
If one takes the term "best saxophone player" at face value, then perhaps I can add a bit of perspective. If you put aside issues of style and ask a bunch of saxophone players who the best saxophone PLAYER was/is from the standpoint of being the player with the greatest command of the instrument; the player who demonstrated the greatest ability to control the instrument in any register and basically make it do whatever he wanted to with a sense of ease, evenness of tone and flawless intonation, the overwhelming majority would say, without hesitation: Michael Brecker. He had it all. Now, one may not like like his funk-infused post-Coltrane style, but that is a different issue.