Yesterday afternoon I had a call from John P. McEnroe, who begat the brothers, John, Mark and Patrick. And I suppose I ought to tell you that Patrick and I are working on a book in which he'll tell stories about, and render opinions on, an array of subjects and personalities spanning his 30 years in tennis. And trust me, Pat has some riveting stories. . .
Anyway, Papa Mac was having technical trouble posting comments. He wanted to respond specifically to comments posted by ManuelSantanaFan and our much-favored Ms. Rubin. I thought the story he had for MSF was too interesting to be buried in the Comments, so I asked him to email that portion of his comment, for posting here. He wrote (of the infamous1979 US Open match between John McEnroe and Ilie Nastase that became known as the Monday Night Massacre):
As I wrote yesterday, I sometimes miss those days. The other interesting bit of correspondence I had came from my fellow journalist and good friend, Ubaldo Scanagatta, proprieter of the popular weblog, ubitennis.com. It seems that Pennetta, who missed out qualifying for the Dough-ha championships in order to attend the funeral for ATP pro Frederico Luzzi, finds herself in a comparable if less tragic bind: Here's partly what Ubaldo wrote:
I'm with Ubaldo on this one. It's refreshing to see how much Fed Cup means to the Italian women, and Italian sports fans in general (wonder how all those finger-wagging, Anglo-style feminists make of that). Like I've said many times, Americans really miss the boat when it comes to events like Davis Cup and even some Europeans are puzzlingly indifferent to Fed Cup. Hey, to each his own, but those events are crown jewels of the game, and ought to be a great excuse for international celebrations and camaraderie.
I'm glad that for some tradition-minded players that's just what Davis and Fed Cup are. And I can honestly say that, purely as a fan, I am much more interested in the narratived and outcome of the Fed Cup tie than I am in the pending events in Dough-ha. That's just how it is, make of it what you will.
Please treat this as an on-topic post. . .
-- Pete