Mixed doubles is an event that is simultaneously compelling and under-covered. Over years, I wrote a few pieces really focusing on mixed doubles, at both the pro and amateur level, mostly in hopes of focusing on the challenges posed by mixed-gender competition. Those challenges (easily summed up in the question: Do I nail the chick between the eyes with the gonzo Pete Sampras slamp-dunk overhead?) are just your ticket into the mixed doubles arena. There are loads of interesting technical and labor-division issues lurking behind them.
The Hopman Cup was started by a guy I know pretty well, Paul McNamee (he was probably better known to most of you as the former Tournament Director of the Australian Open). He very generously invited me to attend his event a bunch of times, although I was never able to make it because of the obvious timing issues. McNamee is a very bright guy, and a former pro (he won two singles titles and almost two dozen doubles titles, including those of Wimbledon and his native Australia). He also is the only successful pro I know who changed from a one-handed to a two-handed backhand late in his development (he had already started playing Challenger-type events). He'll be the first to tell you that his bold (at the time,many said "Ill-advised") move to adopt the two-hander was ultimately his ticket out of the journeyman ghetto.
McNamee's regular doubles pard was Peter McNamara, who was a true-blue old-school Aussie with a serve-and-volley game, a one-handed backhand that he only sliced (if memory serves), and the kind of rugged good looks that once seemed as much part of the Aussie mystique as a monster first serve followed by the crush volley. I was friendly with Peter was well, and regret to say that he was a victim of an indiscretion I committed some years ago, when he was playing on what was unofficially but accurately known as the Jimmy Connors (Senior) Tour (who knows anymore which life insurance company or financial -services outfit sponsored that one?).
Anyway, one day during the US Open, I wandered into the player lounge and soon found myself sitting at a table with Guillermo Vilas, Peter McNamara, John Lloyd, and others, and we all got to taking about the Connors tour. Because Jimbo's tour was an invitational, it was pretty clear that it did not hurt your chances of being invited back if you showed the appropriate amount of "respect" for Connors, his game, and his status as an icon. Those of you so disposed might say that Vilas, McNamara et al were the forebearers of exo-throwing, Roger Go Easy on the Big Guy Federer.
Now I'm still not so sure how all this happened, and the only thing I can attribute it to is a terrible lapse of ethics on my part, brought on by the humor and pathos inherent in listening to a group of former top players, including at least one icon, bitterly saying things like, "I don't care what anybody says, I am not losing to an out-of-shape guy like [fill in the name of your favorite former player/Connors lackey]."
The long and short of it is that I wrote a snarky but (I hope) amusing - and truthful - column about that conversation, without even saying, "Hey guys, mind if write up a little something on this for the magazine?" And soon after the magazine came out, McNamara, who had the misfortune of being quoted by me, sought me out to report my story had caused him a heap of trouble. The moment he said it, something clicked in my head and I realized just how serious and real a violation of his (and the others') confidence and friendship it was to write that column. It was a remarkably indiscreet act, in an area where I always took pride in my ability to distinguish with what was - and wasn't - appropriate.
The incident also cast light on a key dilemma for someone like me: At what point does your "inside knowledge," or access to sources of critical information rendered under the assumption of confidence, actually cripple your ability to be truthful and honest with yourself and your readers? A journalist always tells his sources that he or she just wants to know (often, under the guise of adequately understanding a subject), yet at what point does knowing and keeping secrets become a betrayal of the reporter's mission? At what point ought a journalist turn whistle-blower? I didn't mean to get all heavy on you here, and this, after all, is just about tennis. But the quandary is a real one that exists all over the journalistic map.
I felt awful, of course, but I also appreciated that McNamara himself didn't make a huge deal out of my indiscretion. As you can imagine, I think extra-kindly of him because he let me off the hook. It was wrong of me to write that column; the truth or falsity of the work has nothing to do with it. Wherever you are, Peter, thanks for cutting me some slack on that.
