!Macby Pete Bodo
Howdy. First off, sorry for being MIA for so long and thanks for being patient. It just turned out that there was so much good material produced in my interview with John McEnroe on Tuesday that we decided to use some of the material in a feature on our Tennis home page (you can comment on that story below if you wish).
Ostensibly, the interview was a question-and-answer session for use in our October issue of Tennis, where we'll tackle the challenge of tennis at age 50 and beyond. Some of that material is really terrific - family stuff, personal stuff - and I'll keep you posted as the publication date approaches. But as is often the case with John, the interview ranged far afield from the original topic. John naturally gravitates toward topics that get him more fired up than the question of how he feels at age 50, and his secrets to longevity as a tennis player. The guy just loves to talk tennis.
The interview was arranged by pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, the firm that hired John as a spokesperson for its prostate cancer awareness campaign. It took place in a studio in downtown Manhattan (where John was filming a Public Service Announcement), and in the back seat of a silver, livery-service Lexus as John and I, who both live on Manhattan's upper west side, were driven home together through the usual Manhattan rush hour traffic.
I hadn't done a major interview with John in quite some time, and I go back a long way with him. I first sat down with him a few days after he returned from Wimbledon in that enchanted year of 1977, when he skyrocketed onto the scene and slashed his way to the semifinals (via qualifying). Kay McEnroe, John's mom, invited me out to the family home in Douglaston, Queens, on that occasion. She made me coffee and introduced me to John. I frequently see Kay power-walking around the Central Park reservoir when I'm out running in the mornings. And many of you know that John P. McEnroe, who's spent half his life trying to get me not to misidentify him as "John McEnroe Sr."
I'm not going to go into my history with John in this space, but every time I walk away from a meeting with him I always have a smile on my face. John is as original a character as I've ever known. He's a little bit nuts, but in a good way (although it wasn't always in such a good way on the court during his career). John has loads of charisma, but it's of the kind that doesn't come across nearly as well in a cool medium like television. And he's nothing less than an extraordinary,animated communicator - something that doesn't always come across in his role as a commentator, because he learned long ago that nothing bugs people more than a commentator who talks too much or makes a broadcast all about him or her self, rather than the action on the court.
For example, when I opened the interview with a question about how his game has changed as he's grown older, Johnb got right to the point on something that seems to be more interesting to him - how much the game has changed, in general, since his salad years. Back at the peak of McEnroe's notoriety, I often defended him because, as big as his competitive ego was, he's fundamentally modest and frequently self-deprecating. He's always recoiled from adulation (reflecting, perhaps, at least a touch of the self-loathing that makes characters like him attractive: think Marat Safin).
What I like best, though, is that he's passionate and opinionated, a compulsive "truth-teller" with the saving grace of never mistaking his opinions - his truth - as some kind of received wisdom. This is to some degree a family trait, because his brother Patrick, our current U.S. Davis Cup team captain, is in some ways a softer version of John - if only in his outward demeanor (there's a reason the other McEnroe boys, John and Mark, always teased him for being "perfect Pat" as he cleverly navigated the waters of a middle child).
Add it all up and John McEnroe, who truly did take tennis to "another level" (in ways good and bad), and whose game reflected his own vibrant, high-relief character (after all, he was to tennis what Cubism is to painting) is what no man can make consciously make himself into: an unrelentingly interesting person.
So here are a few more outtakes from our conversation. When I asked John if he felt he understood the game better today than at any other time in his career, he said:
"I think I understood it very well when I was young, I think that’s what separated me. I always had a knack for figuring out what I needed to do. Generally, you want to do what you do best, and force your opponent adapt. I liked to take the ball early and come in, send the signal that I don't care what you do, I'm coming in whether you like it or not. That automatically made the other guy uncomfortable.
And the way the courts were then (faster), other guys couldn't afford to take big swings like guys today. Actually, I always hoped to play guys like that. I was taught (byTony Palofox) to use short backswings, and use my opponent's pace if necessary - to generate power and energy as I moved forward. It made total sense, but less so now with the slower courts and bigger guys.
Roger in his own way has a similar philosophy even though the game is different.. He was very reluctant to change his game despite four straight losses to Nadal at Roland Garros. He was stubborn and proud - maybe down deep he always believed he's better than Nadal. He didn't seem to feel that he had to change his game, or he was unwilling to change, to make what appeared to be even semi-subtle adjustments - stand farther to the left to receive serve, be more aggressive with the return, use the drop shot more. . .
"We had the sense that he was starting to do a little of that in the Madrid final, although the conditions were stacked a little in his favor there. It turns out it didn't matter - he didn’t have to do anything because he didn’t have to play Nadal in another final. And that's part of the reason Roger is great. He believes in himself and his game. And who knows what would have happened if he'd started screwing around with his game, with or without Nadal in the picture."
On the GOAT issue, I asked John if people are neglecting two-time Grand Slam champ Rod Laver in the discussion:
"I've been a little guilty about that myself. I idolized the guy, and still do. He's a wonderful man. Even if I try to get him to say something bad about someone, he won't do it. I hate to give Ivan (Lendl) props, but I think he had it right a few weeks ago when he said the best way to handle the issue is to say that Rod Laver was the pre-Open era greatest, and then there's the Open era greatest. I think that's right.
I think Roger is the greatest in the Open era, although Pete (Sampras) is right up there, too. In fact, on a given day, on a quick court, I’d take Pete. In terms of sheer beauty, Rod and Roger had it down. I'd try to go out and play like them if I were a kid. Pete was more like. . . he could just bludgeon you to death. People often don't realize what a great athlete he was, or how quick he was - how well he volleyed. that elbow might drift up on the backhand, he didn't flow quite as freely as Federer (who does?), his forehand was flatter, but it was lethal.
On changes in the game:
"I was taught to play with the same grip, somewhere between eastern and continental. I used one grip for every shot. That's good, right? No need to change. But it's not so good when the ball is kicking way up here at shoulder height. . . These guys with their extreme western-type grip, they can really get up there and hit the high-bouncing ball, where I never would have been able to get around and over it. That's why Robin Soderling (in the Roland Garros final) was able to crush that high ball - he made it look like he wanted you to hit it there for him. If we got away from these slow courts and speeded them up a little again, it might be different. The ball would stay lower.
"But the bottom line is that Soderling is going to go out and play at Wimbledon the same way that he did at the French, and in my era that would have been unheard of. The same goes for all the other players, including Roger.
I see that Roger now changes his grip a little, and he doesn't seem to have any problem with it. The grip issue also gets into the racket issue. It probably helps explain why the players, especially Nadal, use lighter rackets, so they can come around on those high balls quicker. I can't believe the small grips these guys have - what's Nadal down at, four-and-half? And his racket is a good 30, 40 grams lighter than mine. It's crazy. And the guys are getting bigger, which is where hitting that low ball could be helpful, only the courts are too slow to allow you to get away with it now."
Okay, that's it for now. I'll be putting up a post on El Jon's new book shortly. . .