Bit harsh on Taylor there DanWarna.
It's pretty well acknowledged that Waugh built on the successes of Border and Taylor.
When you look at the side that Waugh captained, it's not far off being the best Australian test side of any era:
Hayden
Langer
Ponting
M. Waugh
S. Waugh
Martyn
Gilchrist
Warne
Lee
Gillespie
McGrath
Taylor was a great captain, but his team wasn't as intimidating, or as settled as Waugh's. But he built the test team for the Waugh era. At the end of Taylor's reign though, the foundations of that team were there:
Taylor
Slater
Langer
M. Waugh
S. Waugh
Ponting
Healy
Fleming
Warne
Kaspa/ Gillespie/ Miller
McGrath
The differences between Taylor and S.Waugh's teams as I see it are as follows:
Gilchrist- the biggest factor in Waugh's captaincy success, along with McGrath/Warne. Gilchrist made games much more winnable by batting the way he did at seven. Remember the Hobart test against Pakistan, when he made 149no, and won us the game?
The Hayden/Langer- became a very successful opening pairing after Slater lost his spot in England in 2001. Not sure it was intended to be permanant, but it happened to work really well.
McGrath/Warne in their prime- you must have two great bowlers to be a great team, and we had two undisputed legends in their prime in Waugh's time. As well as that, we had Gillespie, Lee, Kaspa and Bichel backing them up. No wonder Waugh was a successful captain.
Fielding- so many excellent fielders created chances.
In the end, a captain is only as good as his team in cricket. Anyone who'd captained Australia in Waugh's era would've had success, because we could score quickly (Hayden, Langer, Ponting, Gilly), we could bowl teams out almost too easily, and our catching//throwing in the slips and point/cover was outstanding.
Look at some of the guys who couldn't get a decent run in this era-
Katich
Hodge
Love
Law
Lehmann
Haddin
Bichel
Bracken
Williams
MacGill
We'd kill for some of those guys now!