McEnroe
Posted: August 29th, 2008 | Filed under: Media, Other Sports | 58 Comments »
George, the remarkably old guy who used to hang out at the cracked tennis courts in our apartment complex when I was in high school, used to say that the toughest shot in tennis is the low volley. Actually, when I think back and remember, he sort of muttered those words — “The low volley’s the toughest shot in tennis†— the way someone else might mutter that, oh, it’s time to take down the Czar or that the world was better when women didn’t have the right to vote or that the most important part of a good pizza is the crust.* He was kind of a creepy old guy.
*I want to thank brilliant Detroit columnist Michael Rosenberg (at least I think it was him — it was in China and all of that is a blur) for the poll question about what is the most important ingredient for great pizza. We’ll have a big post on that coming up.
In my limited tennis playing experience, though, George was right. The low volley is the toughest shot in tennis and, without getting too technical about it and losing all of the non-tennis fans, I believe this is because of a variable called “the net.†Man, that thing is a pain in the neck. The game would be, like, SO much easier without it.
Yeah, a volley in tennis is a shot hit before the ball bounces — announcers get this wrong ALL THE TIME when doing tennis highlights — and it is almost always a shot hit when standing close to the net. So hitting a low volley close to the net by its very nature requires that the player volley the ball up, obviously, just so that it clears the net. That’s why it’s so hard. You don’t have to play or watch the game to appreciate that hitting up in tennis more or less limits your options. That’s how you hit tennis balls out. That’s how you get tennis balls slammed back into your face. Up is bad in tennis. And yet, on a low volley, up is really the only choice.
Except for John McEnroe.
There’s a wonderful story in this week’s New York Times Magazine by the terrific Nicholas Dawidoff about McEnroe, one that delves into his complicated nature, his brilliantly pointed announcing, a sort of portrait of the mad artist as an old man. And it reminded me that Mac isn’t the only one getting older, that it is has been 24 years since he won his last tennis Grand Slam title — when he mentally, physically and emotionally destroyed Ivan Lendl in the 1984 U.S. Open final. And, from there, it’s worth noting that it has been 23 years since Ivan Lendl destroyed him right back in the 1985 Open final, a straight set beating, the last time that McEnroe reached a Grand Slam final.
That’s a long time ago, almost a quarter century, and tennis has changed, faded, become technological, become bland, and it might be hard for anyone younger than 35 or so to appreciate that McEnroe, as a tennis player, was fundamentally different than any other athlete of his era. He was the only athlete, in my mind, who came close to being a true genius at his game. Nicklaus putted with steel and hit qualitatively higher shots than the rest. Magic played point guard at 6-foot-9, and he had a brilliant sense of what was happening on the court around him. Montana understood physics, especially in the final moments, and he could throw parabolas that cleared linebackers fingers by millimeters and fell softly into receivers hands. Wade Boggs taught himself all the possibilities of Fenway Park and in 1985 and 1987 he rapped enough doubles off the Green Monster to hit .418 and .411 at home.
Still, only McEnroe seemed to play an entirely different game than his opponents. He sliced and chopped and brushed tennis shots in an entirely different way from anyone else, it would have been as if Nicklaus swung the golf club one handed or Montana threw passes with his weak hand. The closest thing I saw as a kid was the brief highlights you might catch of Pistol Pete Maravich.
Nobody ever hit the low volley better than John McEnroe. Nobody. My first memory of watching him play tennis was, I believe, when when he played Bjorn Borg in the Wimbledon Final in 1980. I may have seen him before that, but it does not register in my memory. I remember that match for two reasons. First, I remember that because of the limited television technology then — and also because even on the clearest days it snowed like Rochester inside our TV set — you couldn’t see the ball at all. From the basic view high and behind the baseline, it looked like two guys playing tennis shadowball.
The second thing I remember, though, is that the ball bounced in a fundamentally different way off McEnroe’s racket. My only experience with tennis balls at that time — this was years before I played — was our own version of stoopball, where we would throw tennis balls off porch stairs. That’s where we learned about angles. If you threw the ball at too shallow an angle, the ball would carom off the stairs and go FORWARD, right into our aluminum screen door, which would then make a crashing sound roughly the volume of garbage trucks colliding. This would bring out angry parents and end games. It was important to avoid that angle. But you needed to risk it because if you threw the ball precisely off the corner, right at the point where the step flattened out, it would take a wild and unpredictable and powerful bounce, usually flying to the street which counted as a home run.
That was McEnroe’s racket. He would reach his racket down for those low volleys, seemingly no effort at all, and the ball would just ping off at the craziest angle, or come back so hard it seemed to go through the net, or land so softly on the other side hat it did not even bounce. It looked like a magic trick (on those rare occasions when we could actually see it on TV).
I’m sure that by then I knew about McEnroe’s temper, his various rampages against umpires, it seems to me that Mad Mac was already part of pop culture, like Mister Bill and the “Ya doesn’t have to call me Johnson,†guy. But it was watching McEnroe hitting optical illusions at Centre Court that made him seem real to me. And you have to understand, I could not stand the guy. Even in that match I rooted hard for Borg, the machine, who stood back impassively and returned shot after shot, his face never changing expression. I was drawn to him, I suppose, in the same way that I was drawn to James Bond; those men had cool, they knew secrets, they felt certain that nobody could hurt them and nobody could beat them and that when everyone thought they were trapped, they had already won.
McEnroe, meanwhile, was Goldfinger, brilliant, maniacal, a touch unhinged but protected by beautiful pilots and determined henchmen who threw deadly bowler hats. McEnroe had so many shots, and he hit them so brilliantly, and it seemed that Borg could not survive. He did, that year anyway, Borg won in five sets (despite losing the most famous tiebreaker in tennis history), and it was so thrilling that I became a tennis fan though as far as I knew there was not a tennis court within 500 miles of our Cleveland neighborhood.
And I stayed a tennis fan for a long time because the characters were so amazing in the 1980s — tennis then had all the drama and absurdity of pro wrestling without the drama and absurdity. Sure it’s tempting, always, to believe that the sports characters of your youth are more interesting and colorful than the athletes today, but in the case of tennis it is true. Everyone seemed different then, everyone played in a slightly different way, everyone represented an individual dream.
There was Jimmy Connors, who was street-tough, a hustler from East St. Louis, a guy who would crack two-handed backhands a tenth of an inch over the net using a racket with a head only slightly smaller than a Canadian penny, a guy who, on occasion, would run over to the other side of the net and do a stomp dance on the line to prevent umpires from checking the mark of one of his shots. He was brash and obscene and bullying and impossible to knock out. This made him lovable as an old man at the Open in New York, when he taught some young kids about will.
Guillermo Vilas was a left-handed player from Argentina who would stand at the baseline and hit topspin shot after topspin shot, again and again, so many and with such violent spin that after a while his left arm would bulge to roughly three times the size of his right. It was a freakish thing, so much so that I remember our family doctor telling me that I should never play tennis because I didn’t want to have the right arm of Schwarzenegger and the left of Olive Oyl.
Ivan Lendl came along just a little later, and he added a certain Cold War feel to the game. He was a taciturn Czech who looked like he could play the evil Russian in the movies. He had tennis strokes that looked as if they had been pulled directly out of an instruction book, in large part because his tennis strokes had been pulled out of an instruction book. He played mechanically, and with violence, he would pound shot after shot after shot, nobody hit the ball harder, nobody hit more ferocious passing shots. As a young player he would sometimes break when thing went against him, give in, and in a weird way it gave him a sort of maddening humanity. Then, against McEnroe in Paris, he came back from two sets and a break down, and that changed the way he viewed himself (it also changed the way McEnroe viewed HIMSELF) and he won seven more major championships and twice reached the Wimbledon final even though he was allergic to grass, both literally and figuratively.
Roscoe Tanner hit an impossibly hard serve and, from afar, seemed to have no other noticeable tennis skills. He was like a fastball pitcher who could not throw strikes but, on the right day, under the right sun, on the right surface could strike out 18 and leave everyone in the crowd breathless. Tanner beat Vilas in straight sets Australia in ‘77, and I’ve always wanted to see that match because I suspect that nobody — not Roddick, not Greg Rusedski*, not Goran Ivanisevic anyone — has ever hit a tennis ball harder.
*Mentioned this before: Back in my Cincinnati columnist days, I got to face Greg Rusedski’s serve. You might remember Greg, big lefty from Canada, who longed for the hometown cheers at Wimbledon and so became an English citizen and started using words like “telly†in conversation. I was playing a lot of tennis in those days, and when the Cincinnati tournament was going the players actually used to practice on the tennis courts in my apartment complex in Blue Ash. So I got to face his serve. And here’s what surprised me: It was not the hard serve that blew me away. No, wait, I mean sure that serve blew me away too, I couldn’t return it or anything, but I’m saying that’s not what impressed me. No, it was this spin serve he had … he would put so much spin n the ball that it would hit the ground and then catapult forward so high and fast — like it had hit a trampoline — that I would reach my racket as high as it would go, and jump as high as I could, and the ball would go about TEN FEET over that. Greg would say helpfully, “You gotta move in, mate,†and I did, and he hit the serve, and this time I got my racket on it but now the ball hit the racket and bounced straight up in the air. Damn, that was a nasty serve.
Vitas Gerulitas was incredibly fast … that seemed to be his one tennis skill. He was like the Flash of tennis, no real superpowers except an ability to reach every ball no matter where it was hit. Of course, that’s not a bad skill and he did win the other Australian Open in 1977. Those one-skill wonders were big in Australia that year.
Ilie Nastase was mean and tricky and underhanded, sort of a Simon Bar Sinister with a racket. Jimmy Arias was just this little American kid hitting big topspin forehands with an oversized racket. Johan Kriek was a minor character from South Africa but an interesting one to me because on the right day would hit these precise shots that made you wonder how anyone ever beat him. He reminded me, for whatever reason, of Bruce Berenyi, the old Cincinnati Reds pitcher who had ridiculous stuff and in 1981 threw a two-hit, 12-strikeout shutout against the Mets and threw a one-hit, 10-strikeout shutout against Montreal and threw a two-hit shutout against San Diego. He never threw another shutout again in his career.
McEnroe towered over them all because he played the game so differently. He wasn’t playing tennis, he was fencing, and he slashed tennis balls, punched them, deadened them, cut them. People would say even then that he did not work hard at the game, that it was all natural, and I suspect that wasn’t exactly true, but it was part of his aura, part of his intimidation. He was the guy who didn’t have to study to make A’s, the guy who didn’t have to work to get promoted, the guy who didn’t have to know the rules to beat you at chess. He was so good at this game that even when you BEAT him, he really beat you because you had to work like a dog to do it, and he wasn’t really trying.
When McEnroe first became a tennis announcer, I wondered how he would do because I always remember the story of Bob Gibson as a pitching coach wandering out to the mound to tell Rick Mahler to bust the hitter inside with a high fastball and then go away with a slider, fastball up, slider away. Then Gibson walked away and Mahler watched him and thought, “Yeah, sure, if you’re Bob Gibson. I don’t have a fastball OR a slider.†I wondered how McEnroe would see tennis, how he could talk about mere mortals playing the game — even great mortals like Sampras and Agassi and Nadal who played the game BETTER than McEnroe ever did but not with the same artistry or singular genius.
As it turns out, McEnroe is a terrific announcer because he’s blunt, and he loves tennis, and he appreciates players with different styles from his own (which would include everyone ever). He still loves Borg. Also he’s not afraid to be disagreeable. My favorite McEnroe announcing moment happened years ago, when he first began and someone at the network put up some sort of meaningless tennis statistic on the screen. Whoever was working with McEnroe then tried to get McEnroe to talk about the stat, and McEnroe refused. He simply said: “Let’s hope that’s the last time they show that pointless statistic.â€
And I suspect that, more and more, people will know McEnroe as an announcer, the way people know John Madden as an announcer and Tough-Actin’ Tinactin guy rather than the ranting Oakland Raiders coach, the way people know Bill Walton as the NBA announcing force of nature rather than brilliant passing center, the way people know Joe Morgan for the way he talks about guys who know how to play the game rather than as the baseball player who flapped his left elbow like a chicken wing and could beat you every way that you could be beaten.
Well, that happens, fundamental things apply as time goes by. Still, it might be worth telling about the time when McEnroe could bend gravity on the low volleys, back in the days of wood rackets and blurry televisions, bak when pro tennis wasn’t just a game but a way to talk to the world. I remember playing tennis against the ancient George once, and he was giving me tips, and then he hit a low shot and I did not bend my knees, I did not lower my head, I did not do all those technical things you are supposed to do on low volleys. Instead I tried to just reach down effortlessly with my racket and let the ball brush the strings and pop over the net. Of course, it did not. And George said: “Kid, you ain’t McEnroe.â€
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hurray for Blue Ash!
I agree, tennis just isn’t as vibrant today as it was in the 80s. I even contest that Sampras and Agassi were great to watch in the 90’s much like McEnroe and Borg. But I’m severely disappointed in Roddick these days. 140 mph serve, what’s not to like?
Wow . . . how is this stuff free? What a wonderful post, Joe.
I’m not much of a tennis fan, but this was Awesome.
Good post.
My one observation (knowing little about tennis and not particularly caring to) is that all the guys you mentioned as being known for announcing are good. Or at least used to be good (Madden is washed up). Joe Morgan has never been a good announcer, which is too bad because he was a great player, as you point out.
I almost feel bad for the guy, except he seems like such a jerk.
They used to show the non-major events on independent channels a lot more back around 1980, I remember waching a lot of indoor stuff with minor guys who didn’t do much in slams, like Gene Mayer, Eddie Dibbs, and this little guy Harold Solomon. Mayer might have been one of those guys who ushered in the techno-rackets, because I remember his stuff being in sporting goods stores, probably because he did better in doubles with his brother Sandy. You’d also still see the older players like Newcombe, Nastase, and Ashe at grass court tournaments, like Newport.
Joe, I went to Skyline Chili for lunch today and thought of you. If you are in town for the Ryder Cup, don’t forget that Skyline is available in Louisville.
Fantastic stuff Joe! As one of the 15 tennis fans out there, this was a pleasure to read. Props for your mentions of guys not named Borg and Connors – like Kriek, Tanner, Gerulaitis, et. al as well. Brings back a lot of memories.
how could you leave Yannick Noah off your list of 80’s tennis characters? He one the French Open by hitting shots through his legs as he ran away from the net! Probably the most athletic player of the decade.
Great post, Joe. I think you sell McEnroe short. He was never as consistent as some of the other folks you mentioned, like Sampras, Borg, but at his peak, I think it’s hard to argue he wasn’t as good as any of them. His peak was shorter because it relied, among other things, on superhuman reflexes, and when they started to go, his artistry wasn;t enough, but for a few years, I think Mac was as good as any of them.
Joe – great tennis knowledge. As a tennis aficianado, it always bothers me to hear people say “that was a great volley,” in reference to players hitting the ball back and forth during a point. That is called a rally. And it’s nice to see you define what a volley is.
Secondly, McEnroe’s greatest shot was his half-volley. A half-volley is when you rush into the net, and can’t get to the ball fast enough to hit a volley (the ball out of the air). You’re forced to let the ball hit the ground, but you cannot give up your position on the court, so you hit it right when it’s jumping off the ground as you still run towards the net. The timing, the racquet control, the eye-hand coordination, the footwork and the confidence required of this shot makes it tennis’ most challenging shot, and its master will always be John McEnroe.
I think it may have been Roscoe Tanner that first endorsed an aluminum rocket, although Arthur Ashe was by far the most successful with metal rackets (there was really no such thing as a “composite” racket in the 70s) – I still have one of those AMF/Arthur Ashe rackets in my attic somewhere.
Joe hits the nail on the head regarding personalities in tennis, though. Who is there to root for now?
A lot of these guys were late 70s not the 80s. Still fun personalities, but Villas won all of his Grand Slam titles in the 1970s, Tanner won his only one, and Borg won most of his.
The 1980s stars has to include Wilander (do you realize he won all of the Grand Slams save Wimbledon in 1988?), Becker, and Edberg. Of course, McEnroe straddled both eras and beat the pants off of everybody because, well, he was John McEnroe.
Joe,
The most important ingredient for great pizza?
I can’t wait for you to describe it.
I don’t think it’s so much not having enough people to root for. It’s more that there really isn’t anyone to root against.
I thought Nadal might be, sort of like the Sergio of tennis, but alas he has manners as impeccable as Federer’s.
This post makes tennis seem so romantic and vibrant.
I wonder if it really was that special in the 70s and 80s, or if it’s just the quality of Joe’s writing.
I do think the era was a little off. I am 34 and remember tennis being about, Chang v. Lendl, Edberg, Boris Becker, Agassi and then Sampras. McEnroe wasn’t really a big presence for me.
Thanks for the great post, Joaldo. McEnroe was an artist, and it’s good to see that his temperament is serving him well as an announcer. I think it cost him some as a player.
At this year’s Wimbledon Final I heard McEnroe say this was the greatest match he’d ever seen. That was saying a lot, coming from him.
Speaking as a Canadian, Greg Rusedski can kiss my purple ass.
I was too young to remember Roscoe Tanner as a tennis player, but I’ll never forget the Jon Wertheim article about him in SI that made him look like a complete piece of garbage.
I remember watching Becker play with a mad youthful enthusiasm. He looked like a big kid out there in part because he *was* a big kid when he started out. But his dives and leaps at Wimbledon, when he’d walk off the court with grass stains everywhere and elbows bleeding, made it seem as if he was just thrilled to be there, to be able to play a thing like tennis for a living.
I remember his being stuck at #2 forever, behind Edberg or Lendl, losing to Stich, always seeming to be running under 100%. I don’t know if he gave himself injuries from all the diving and if that ultimately kept him from winning more Grand Slams. I’d hate to think that was the case, but it would make the most sense.
What I do know is that he seemed to me to be the second-most intense player I watched growing up. McEnroe was the first, of course. (Lendl, Sampras and Edberg seemed almost machine-like. Connors was a brat.) But Becker’s intensity always seemed to come foremost from a sense of joy in the game itself — his cursing himself, from a failure to live up to some ideal version of The Game. McEnroe was on another plane: I never got a sense of what he was feeling when playing, besides periodically “pissed off.” McEnroe was an immortal, but Becker always seemed to play the way you’d imagine we mere mortals would if we’d been suddenly granted a supernatural gift of talent — like even he was as thunderstruck to be there as you would be.
Linus,
If the era’s off, it’s not by much. I’m 35 and I remember McEnroe’s battles with Borg and (especially) Connors. In fact, I distinctly remember my interest in tennis waning once Mac was no longer much of a factor. I guess I sort of related to his hot-headedness when it comes to athletic endeavours (though my own fits of pique have always been self-directed – I won’t rage at umps/refs, but I’ll get absolutely dizzy with rage if I’m playing poorly).
As for the poll – crust? Seriously? Who are you people?
As an enormous tennis fan (and player in high school and college, and left-hander) from 1985-1995, I studied the tennis players of that time, trying to copy and emulate their game and mannerisms and the like. I could not figure out what Jimmy Connors was doing, he had odd stokes, and a somewhat weak serve, and he wasn’t particularly interesting- I did not want to be compared to Connors. I think he made the most out of the least amount of talent. Lendl was sort of the same way, and he was kind of a winer too. McEnroe had a beauty and style and was playing with the other players heads, you never knew which shot was coming, if he was coming to the net or not, if he was going to explode at an umpire or not, it was so exciting to watch one of his matches. Later as McEnroe petered out I turned to Edberg, because he was (in my mind) a better version of McEnroe. I don’t think that Edberg had quite as much talent as McEnroe, but Edberg had things that McEnroe didn’t. Edberg had a bigger, more difficult serve to handle, and he was such a surgeon with volleys and half-volleys, like McEnroe, but with more grace and fluidity. Watching Edberg was like watching ballet, with rackets. My back still hurts from hitting Edberg’s serve. And Edberg was much more a gentleman than Mad Mac.
Thanks for the tennis post, Joe. As always, you make it sound so good.
Keith- nice post, you are exactly correct.
I am one of the other fifteen tennis fans out there.
I always liked Edberg. Very elegant player, one of the few who could hit a volley in the same breath as McEnroe’s.
I was the greatest tennis player to wear a checkered headband, thank you very much.
The segment about McEnroe as an announcer (good) and Bob Gibson as a pitching coach (bad) reminds me of how I felt when I heard that Wayne Gretzky was going to become a coach (jury still out). That guy had a head that was three steps ahead of everyone else and I’m still not sure that it can be taught.
I think there are still characters in tennis they just aren’t really the best of the best anymore. Then again I never lived through the 80s.
Marat Safin is the most skilled tennis player on tour. 6-7 or somewhere around there, can move and can hit the ball with more angle then Federer, more power then Roddick and spin and everything. Unfortunately he’s a head case and can self destruct really easily who always seems to hit shots a little too long or just looks a little out of sorts but when he gets it all together he cannot be beaten. Watch his match from 05 against Federer in Australia, it’s crazy how good he is in that match.
Andy Murray- A Scotsman and then gets the epithet mercurial from just about everyone. Makes big brash bold predictions, has more shots in his arsenal then just about everyone not named Federer but still young and hasn’t figured it out yet. But he plays tennis differntly then just about everyone today and that’s awesome.
Djokovic- Brash, young and really good. Both Federe and Nadal seem to hate him (but are too classy to say so) and he just gets on everybodys nerves (including mine). Has a great all court game and really competes.
Nikolay Davydenko can be interesting because of the fact that he plays tennis every week was involved in a betting scandal. Watching an Andy Roddick press conference after he loses is usually very funny. Actually the US Open this year is interesting for Roddick because he skipped the Olympics to try to win it but didn’t do that well in the lead up to the Open in the events he played in.
The Spaniards all seem the same which is boring.
The French are all interesting to watch with Gasquet the talented headcase with a perfect backhand. Tsonga who has more athleticism then almost any one but can’t stay healthy. Fabrice Santoro, the Brian Bannister of tennis, (no talent but made a career in the top 100 his way) and a couple of others.
This year Roger Federer is becoming increasingly interesting because he’s two grandslams away from tieing Pete but just can’t seem to do it.
I think tennis is as interesting as ever, which is probably why I watch it more then ever.
Re: Gibson: Great anecdote. I wonder what kind of hitting coach Barry Bonds would be.
“Identify the pitch. Square the bat on the ball. Drive the ball. Easy.”
Yeah, if you’re Barry Bonds.
Re: Pizza: If the crust isn’t good, then the rest of the pizza is irrelevant. Not inedible, mind you, but it would have not chance at Greatness. You could have the most magical pepperoni and truffles, lightly dusted with Unicorn Giggles and Mom’s TLC, but it’s not worth a damn if the crust don’t represent.
I started watching Tennis right about the start of the 80s, so I saw Borg and McEnroe play that Wimbledon final (might have actually made me a big tennis fan), and I saw some highlights of Roscoe Tanner (who had a big booming serve, not necessarily the fastest, but with a powerful kick to it), and highlights of Connor etc etc.
McEnroe never really struck me as being better than most of the guys he faced. He just seemed to play harder. Kinda like you say Pete Rose always outplayed everyone. That was McEnroe on the tennis court (to me anyways.)
However, I think both Stefan Edberg and Boris Becker would have some argument on whether nobody ever played the low volley better than McEnroe. Becker was insane on that shot. He would dive at a low volley and somehow still manage to fling it 0.00000001mm over the net at a 189 degree angle.
And Edberg, well, there’s never been a better serve and volley’er than him period. Even Sampras in his prime wasn’t AS good at the volley as Edberg. Part of this is probably because Sampras’ serve was much faster, and so he’d have less time to come to the net and volley.
I don’t recall seeing Edberg ever miss a volley, even a low one. You could pass him, sure. And he was surprisingly vulnerable to lob shots, probably because he was a fairly big guy. Becker would often beat him with lob shots, and it used to drive me crazy. I’d be screaming at the TV “HERE COMES THAT DAMN GERMAN LOB!!!” and Edberg would ofcourse not listen, and the lob would come, and fall 0.02 inches inside the court, since that happens with every shot a german tennis player ever made.
I remember one Wimbledon when Edberg was at his prime (and the no1 in the world at the time, I believe), he played a dutch guy, Jacco Eltingh. And Eltingh was a good player, not spectacular, but still a very good player. He formed with Paul Haarhuis to make probably the best men’s doubles duo that’s ever played.
And Edberg absolutely destroyed him. Eltingh didn’t get a point on Edberg’s serve in the entire first set, nor on the first two (I believe) Edberg serving games in the second. When he FINALLY scored a point on Edberg’s serve, the crowd went completely wild, cheering him on like he was Tim Henman. He applauded himself for finally getting a point.
Edberg smiled wryly, then pounded another volley right into the corner. Eventually Eltingh just gave up trying to chase after those volleys, since there was no point. They couldn’t be reached.
Martina Navratilova was watching that match from the stands, a few hours before she had to go on center court herself. The BBC version of Erin Andrews asked her why she was there watching this game, if she shouldn’t be out getting warm or practicing or something.
And Navratilova said something to the tune of “He’s the best volleyer there’s ever been. How can I NOT watch it?”
I miss those old Tennis days. Today’s tennis is boring. Few people can touch Federer and Rafa. In the late 80s, early 90s a Wimbledon could legitimately be won by a dozen people.
As for the pizza thing, that’s like having to choose between your four kids! (Shape of slice is a fixable concept, just get a knife.)
Sauce and Crust are the most important, followed closely by quality of toppings and cheese.
Hmmmm pizza…
As for Rusedski, the thing that always made me laugh is that the guy applied for British citizenship, and suddenly the BBC gave him 12 interviews per Wimbledon, and he got most of his matches on centercourt, and suddenly all the British fans started cheering for him like he was Prince Charles.
The year before he’d been playing on court 16 and nobody knew who he was.
Also, I believe he actually switched to british citizenship because he couldn’t make the Canadian Davis Cup team?
“I was the greatest tennis player to wear a checkered headband, thank you very much.”
I think another Pat (Rafter) might disagree with you
OK, maybe I’m #15. A few random tennis thoughts….
1. GET OUT THERE AND PLAY. THe world needs more guys (and gals) on the courts.
2. Mac was seriously talented with his hands, and knew how to play the angles. With the power of today’s racquets, his style of game wouldn’t stand a chance, and that’s sad…
3. How can you not mention Martina vs Chrissy. Chrissy will be forever HOT and Martina with the muscular forearms, well, not so much. For about a 5 or 6 year span, everytime they faced each-other they raised their games to match the other one. One of the truely great personal rivalries in all of sport.
4. Rodger and Rafa… Has the makings of maybe being another Chrissy-Martina. Rafa has caught and passed the master. Rodger must now adapt and change to catch back up, just as Chrissy had to once Martina got the upper hand. Can he?
5. Did I mention, get out and play!!! Joe, take your girls out and play… It’s a great father-daugher bonding time, and it will be something you will alywas be able to share with them.
6. Joe, I hope you’re getting some $$ form someone for this stuff. Like watching Borg-Mac on free TV with not commericals. Where do I send my donation.
I loved tennis back in Mac’s era, and see it just like Joe does, but Wayne Gretsky not only belongs in the “genius” conversation, the conversation begins with him.
I feel so bad for tennis. Federer might be the best player ever, he’s just barely past his prime, and Nadal is BETTER right now. Nadal might already be the best clay-courter ever, is superlative on the surfaces, and has never spent a week at number 1. This is the best rivalry in any sport right now, and no one cares. If that Wimbledon final doesn’t make people care, nothing will. Ah, poor tennis…
Mac was a genius and why I began playing tennis. I try to explain to my wife what a great player he was but she can’t understand. I feel Mac’s abilities and those like even to the Agassi generation are soon to lost on today’s tennis players and fans.
Man in Black,
Nice comments on Edberg. I would argue that his serve wasn’t more difficult to handle than Mac’s. McEnroe’s serve was very difficult to read and of course was left-handed. On the other hand, Edberg’s serve was extremely effective – not overpowering but probably the perfect serve for a serve & volley game.
It’s an interesting debate who was the better volleyer b/w the two. IMO – Edberg was more technically proficient and had much better footwork. But McEnroe had the better touch and use of angles. In my memory, Edberg didn’t have that sense of angles and touch but part of it was b/c he didn’t need to rely on amazing shots. When his game was on (e.g., vs. Eltingh at Wimbledon or his dissection of Courier in the US Open final) it was like watching a clinic.
It’s a shame that with today’s technology – especially the new racket strings – that an Edberg would likely not succeed today. Playing a serve & volleyer is like target practice.
Loved the article, but some of us go back even farther. We started watching tennis in the early 70s. there was Rod Laver, John Newcombe, Stan Smith, to name a few.
For women there were Yvonne Gulagong, Billie Jean King and Pam shriver.
Bud Collins was the only announcer and by watching and listening I learned to play.
First of all, this article is great read.
But to look ahead, I’m really looking forward to the pizza article. I voted sauce, and it strikes me that there is a good chance that many of the crust votes are from intense pizza regionalists: New Yorkers for whom it is either coal-over or garbage; Chicagoans who insist not only on deep dish, but on deep dish done in very particular ways; St. Louisans who like the weird Imo’s cracker-crust, etc.
The thing is, I like pizza from all those places. And it seems to me that, if one is a crust omnivore, sauce is the key to determining good or bad within a particular crust genre. When I lived in Jersey, the key difference between the sublime (say, Grimaldi’s in Hoboken) and the horrible (college dives on Easton Ave. in New Brunswick) was not crust style, or even ingredient quality, but a sauce that had life and depth vs. a sauce that tasted like ketchup.
To come at it from the other end, I’ve no doubt that the key to genuinely awful pizza is sauce. Pizza with ketchup flavor–even if all other ingredients are acceptable–is one of the saddest things ever.
sorry: “coal-oven”, not “coal-over”. “Coal-over” would probably not taste very good.
I say crust for a simple reason. There are great pizzas that don’t have sauce at all. I’ve never had a truly great pizza without great crust. I like different kinds of pizza, but Chicago is a totally different animal from NY, and the St. Loo cracker stuff really doesn;t work for me. On the other hand, authentic Italian Naples-style, whcih si startig to get a following, is phenomenal, and is all about the crust…
I’m only 29, and I still remember mid-80’s tennis. Obviously
I always loved the absolute meltdowns that McEnroe would have. That’s probably what appealed to me most about him as an angry 8-year-old Iowa kid.
Sorry, got cut off mid-thought by the hungry old lady, I was saying in the first paragraph:
Obviously, I wasn’t old enough to have a nuanced view on the game, but guys like Becker and Wilander and Lendl and McEnroe were really great to watch.
Wonderful Casablanca reference.
When I was a kid back in the early ’80s, one week the Newsweek magazine arrived at our house, wrapped in a brown paper wrapper (A quick Google search confirmed this to be the September 7, 1981 issue, and the article was written by the late great Pete Axthelm, “The Champ You Love To Hate.”)
When I opened the wrapper, there was a piece of brown paper taped over McEnroe’s mouth.
Why sports were better in the late 70s-early 80s . . . I agree that tennis was more compelling then, but wasn’t everything sports better then?
My theory is that this was the period between (1) ready access to most major and many minor sports events on teevee, especially basic cable; and (2) the rise of sports marketing. Remember when a football game on CBS on Sunday was just a football game? )”Live from Soldier Field . . .”) When there weren’t exploding helmets and dancing robots (Fox, looking at you)?
The problem with marketing isn’t that it doesn’t work, it’s that anyone with a modicum of common sense knows that they’re being sold something. And, for some reason, we love things that we’re sold less than things that we think we get for free. Like Joe’s posts. If Joe were selling us something along with the great writing, we would start to like it less.
I used to love football. Now I feel like I’m being induced to watch. Baseball is less ruined for me because the individual games get less hype (unless you watch Red Sox-Yankees games). But NBA, tennis (which I used to watch) . . .
In December 1974 Jimmy Connors arrived in Melbourne as the latest sensation in tennis and proceeded to win his way to the Australian Open final without dropping a set — or a bead of sweat it seemed. Up against him was an ageing John Newcombe, who’d had a bumpy run through the tournament, including a five-setter in his semi.
I was living in Melbourne at the time and at the New Year’s Eve party I attended the night before the final all the talk was tennis [until the drink kicked in, anyway]. Newcombe was given as much chance as a celluloid cat being chased through Hell by an asbestos dog, as the saying goes. It was a fairly gloomy party, the next day’s action being viewed as a sporting Dunkirk, against a less-well-behaved enemy. (Again, until the drink kicked in.)
Anyway, Newcombe snuck the first set, Connors got the second, then Newcombe somehow snatched the third. He had to win the fourth, because you knew his body wouldn’t last five. I watched the first few games of the fourth then had to leave for work. I can recall, as clear as if it was yesterday, listening to the tail end of the match on my car radio and pulling to the side of the road and blasting the horn when Newcombe got the winning point.
Missing seeing that fourth set remained among my greatest sporting regrets for thirty-odd years and when the local sports channel announced it was replaying the match as part of the lead-in to this year’s Open I was rapt. It was liking copping an inheritance from an unknown relative.
About five minutes into the replay I’m thinking what the hell is this? Who are these cripples? These tubbies? Why are they wearing diver’s boots? Why is the ball crossing the net at the same speed as the moon crosses the night sky? Is this thing being broadcast in slow motion?
My most anticipated sporting event in years collapsed into the most disappointing in a matter of moments. I wish I’d never seen it.
All sorts of doubts crept in, the worst of them that maybe that party’s red-haired girl who’d nuzzled up and sung “this world was never meant for one as beautiful as you” as we waltzed to Vincent through the party debris . . . maybe she wasn’t the most beautiful girl who’d ever lived.
The past is another country; they do things differently there. Remember it fondly but don’t try to go back. You won’t be welcome.
Noel- I personally emulated McEnroe’s serve, both feet sideways on the baseline, toss the ball into the court and strike the ball at about nine o’clock, maybe a shade higher than nine o’clock. The ball would bend into the service box and to the returners right. Later, I emulated Edberg’s serve, looking for bigger and better results. Edberg’s serve started with one foot on the baseline, the second behind it, then the backfoot came up to meet the front foot. You tossed the ball far into the court, arched your back, jumped and hit the ball a good eight to ten inches higher than your normal reach, and struck the ball at about eleven o’clock, maybe a little about eleven o’clock. The ball would slightly bend/dive (because it had topspin) into the service box, then the bounce would jump up (again because of the topspin) and the returners left. As you landed from Edberg’s serve you were two steps into the court and your momentum was carrying you towards the net. The hop in his serve amde it hard for the returner to stay back because Edberg would be standing at the net waiting to volley into the opposite corner, if you moved in, he was still close to the net, and you just blocked back a weak return and he still volleyed it for a winner. Either way was lose/lose. Edberg also served harder than McEnroe did, probably partially because Edberg was taller, and because of better equipment. McEnroe’s serve was difficult to be sure, but teh whole package of Edberg’s offensive game was nearly unstopable.
I thought my great uncle was the only one who muttered under his breath that things were better when women didn’t have the vote. When I pointed out to him that he was eight years old when women got the vote, his muttering volume would drop and his words would become inaudible.
The most important part of a good pizza is the crust?
Sorry, not convinced — perhaps if you’re already eating a number of good pizzas you’ll notice the crust more on one than on another, but the most important part of any pizza, good or indifferent, is the part that would still convince you to eat the pizza if all the other parts were average to uninteresting. I’ve never had a crust that was so good that it convinced me to eat a pizza that was basically tomato paste, 75% fat-free ground beef, and recycled kindergarten paste. I have had sauce that was so good that I ate it even though the only thing I had to eat with it was stale saltines and a half-dried out block of Velveeta.
Sauce ftw!
Agreed with those well of today’s game. It may lack the characters – such is the price of professionalism, and the price of a world in which perceived character flaws can obstruct lucrative endorsement deals. But on the court, the current crop is phenomenal, and the excitement builds as we get past a period of articstic but ultimately monotonous dominance by Federer.
Roger v. Rafa has produced some of the most exciting, creative play I’ve ever seen, with the bonus of contrasting styles. The drama of seeing Rafa get better over time and wondering if or when he might pass Roger has made for a cool storyline entering each year.
In the last year Djokovic has brought both personality and a high level of play into the mix. Heck, as recently as the week before the French there was speculation that he’d take over the #2 slot from Rafa (even from Rafa himself). He may yet take #2, but from Roger, not Rafa.
There isn’t as much depth of true contenders behind them, but there’s excellent play to be seen. And, there’s a lot of it on TV, though I wish the Tennis Channel covered more of the in-between tournaments than they currently do.
I’d give anything for Joe to write a long post on Dick Vermeil! With football season right around the corner, and with Vermeil being a compelling character that was in Joe’s backyard for five years, I think that would make a brilliant post!
The thing that amazed me about McEnroe more than anything is his announcing. He never makes a mistake. Everything he says is worth saying and nothing is not worth saying. Everything he says is interesting and nothing he says is embarassing or stupid. He is a perfect announcer. Like Joe, I remember rooting against him versus Borg. I now wish I could go back in time and reevaluate that decision.
Anyone remember his razor advertisements in which they showed his head on a someone else’s cut body?
I’m a little late to the party on this post, but I just wanted to say that John McEnroe is my favorite announcer for any sport, for the reasons you just listed. No one (that I’ve heard) in baseball (which is full of great announcers), basketball, football, or anything else even compares to how much I enjoy listening to McEnroe announce tennis. I’ve been bored with tennis since Sampras retired (although watching Agassi finish was a beautiful thing) even though Nadal and Federer are so good, but McEnroe makes it at least enjoyable to watch and think about.
His insights are marvelous as well.
“Yvonne Gulagong”? Sic?!
It’s Evonne Goolagong, fer cryin’ out loud. Trust me, I know — I had a crush on her bad enough that I once went to a team tennis match at Nassau Coliseum (home of the hockey Islanders) because she was on the visiting team. My presence alone increased the attendance by at least 25%.
Yep, Evonne was on the Pittsburgh Triangles with Vitas. I went to many a match just to see her.
McEnroe is the best color man in any sport by a wide margin. There are others who certainly good, but it really isn’t close. Johnny Mac is just off the charts.
This brings to mind one of the single greatest quips in sports history: Vitas Gerulaitis, finally beating Jimmy Connors after being 0-16 against him –
“Nobody beats Vitas Gerulaitis 17 times in a row!”
Tennis: I saw Martina Navratilova up close when she was mingling at Gorky’s restaurant in downtown LA in the late 1980s, when she was on the downside of her great career. Man, did she have muscles. I’m a strong guy, useful for helping folks move and such, but I didn’t want to arm wrestle her.
Pizza, now there’s something in my area of expertise. I’m a Chicago deep crust guy by preference, favorite place is now (of all things) a mostly-Afghan restaurant in the San Fernando Valley called Morigi’s where they still make deep dish. And it’s the best crust I’ve ever had. They coat the bottom of the crust with sesame seems which seems to have the effect of letting all the grease drip under the crust, making one of the least greasy pizzas I’ve ever tried.
But you know, I’ve their regular crust pizza too, and it’s awfully good as well. And I attribute that to the sauce; the crusts don’t have anything like the same flavor (i.e. the thin crust is more traditional New York, no sesame seeds, a little bit of crunch), but the sauce has the right blend of complexity and tang that works with either. And I’ve seen that at other places; if the sauce is good, the crust doesn’t matter as much (thick or thin or deep dish). That’s not to say that the crust doesn’t matter, or the cheese, or the toppings. But I’ll take a great sauce with a lousy crust, eat it with a knife and fork and be happy, a lot more than I’ll take a lousy sauce with a great crust and wonder why it’s bland. Fortunately, few places have just one good component. Usually if the crust or the sauce or the topping are exceptional, everything else is at least adequate.
Jimmy Arias didn’t use an oversize racket, at least not in his prime; he used a standard wood Donnay. Also, Vitas Gerulaitis was terrific at the net, not in McEnroe’s class, but not too far behind. The rest of his game, while not overpowering, was generally solid. Glad you know what a volley is.