Hi Steve,
Sorry about not leaving you much of the book to quote, but you know reproducing long extracts from other publications is my specialty...
I think today’s players have been getting a bit shortchanged in this discussion, but you definitely have your finger on something when you say they’re somehow built differently than in Newk’s day. During the late amateur era, running away to become a tennis player was a bit like running away to join the circus: an attempt to make a career out of something you liked doing even though it wasn’t clear if there was much money in it – just fame if you were lucky.
Becoming a pro now is more akin to setting out to be a lawyer or a doctor, involving lengthy preparation for entry into a demanding but lucrative profession – exponentially more so the higher you climb. That’s not to say current players don’t love the game or that they chose it for the money, but the relationship is altogether different. Before, a tennis career was a loan you took from real life and tried to make it go as far as possible before having to settle down and get a real job to make up the debts. Now, it’s more of an investment, something into which you put in a significant portion of your childhood and pursue with a fair amount of single-mindedness in order to achieve a degree of financial security by your mid-thirties and then start partaking in real life.
Newk touches on this too:
So naturally, a tennis career attracted different people then than it does now: more rebellious, independent-minded, apt to take risks. That in turn fostered the kind of visionary spirit which led to the formation of the Association of Tennis Professionals and the challenging of the establishment. On the other hand, let’s not forget that the same Newcombe who dreamed up the idea for a players’ association was also dumb enough to get into the passenger seat of a car being driven by a drunk George W. Bush. (Note to self: ponder the profound meaning of that later.)
The stars of today have different problems to deal with, not the least of which is greater scrutiny. It’s ironic that ‘70s players had all this ‘colour’ at a time when reporters didn’t really need or use it, and now, when there’s such a thirst for it, players are so much more low-key or guarded. (Question is, is that coincidence?)
Players are still engaged with the larger political issues of the sport, I think – probably more so at the moment than in the eighties and early nineties. My main critique is their tendency to buy into the “what’s good for business = good” mentality, even if it means subordinating their own (or others’) legitimate interests. One of the things being seriously floated around on both tours at the moment is the idea of suspending players for pulling out of tournaments.
We know how Newk and co. felt about that, boycotting Wimbledon in 1973 when the Yugoslav tennis federation suspended Nikki Pilic for not playing Davis Cup (he couldn’t play, so they didn’t either). The right to play when and where they wanted was a hard-won one for tennis players, and a landmark power shift in the sport. Surely the current generation isn’t going to be oblivious enough to hand it back over without a fight?
Kamakshi
