TENNIS

Being John McEnroe

A profile of the most creative and most cantankerous tennis player of all time

Print story Email story

by Julian Rubinstein

In the heavily chronicled career of tennis star John McEnroe, there is a match that received little attention but drew such ire from his opponent, Johan Kriek, that Kriek decided he couldn’t take it anymore. After the match, he was nearly apoplectic and demanded McEnroe’s ouster from the tour.

“I’m sick and tired of (McEnroe’s) bullshit,” Kriek said. “If I’m the only one that has the guts to say he needs to be kicked off the tour, fine. I work too hard to be treated like this. That guy McEnroe has got a screw loose.”

Given that McEnroe’s comportment once led The New York Times to call him “the worst advertisement for our system of values since Al Capone,” Kriek’s comments, as well as McEnroe’s actions on the day in question, may not shock: First he demanded the chair umpire have the lights on a nearby practice court turned off and when questioned by her about his request, snapped back, “Don’t give me that crap.” Later, when a serve was called out, he screamed to the lineswoman, “Get the hell off the court, lady,” then smacked a ball that just missed hitting her.

This was two years ago on the Seniors Tour.

Needless to say, McEnroe, now 42, husband and proud father of five children, Emmy-nominated tennis broadcaster and the short-lived captain of the U.S. Davis Cup team, has lost little of the intensity that made him one of the most compelling athletes of our time. Whatever it may say about the current state of men’s tennis, eight full years after leaving the pro circuit, and after an aborted attempt to become a rock singer -- which he took far more seriously than he’ll ever admit -- McEnroe remains the most captivating, controversial and explosive figure in the game.

"My time will come or whatever"

On a crisp spring morning near Richmond, Virginia, recently, where McEnroe has come to play another seniors event, he is sipping a cappuccino outside Starbucks and allowing a rare glimpse into his hyper-analyzed career and psyche. With his match against former Argentinean star Jose Luis-Clerc still hours away, he is dressed dowdily in faded blue jeans, black leather boots, and a black vinyl jacket zipped to the neck, a look that is at once brusque and disarming. A silver hoop earring clings to his left ear and a black Yankees cap is pulled so tightly over his creased forehead that sprouts of gray hair protrude clown-like from the sides. His menacing metallic blue eyes are hidden behind dark wraparound sunglasses.

Yet despite his cloaked visage and our unlikely suburban locale, McEnroe is hopelessly recognizable. As we are talking, an elderly blind man who had tapped past us with a walking stick moments ago, returns to our table and says in McEnroe’s general direction, “Excuse me sir, you must be John McEnroe.”

In the past this sort of interruption would have prompted an explosive and cruel retort, but now after a tense and protracted silence, McEnroe finally says, “That’s right,” and shakes the man’s outstretched hand before dismissing him curtly with a mocking “G’day mate.”

Next page: The official voice of tennis

MORE TENNIS

Venus Williams
What sets her apart? Her intelligence.

It's McEnroe's World
From the senior circuit to Davis Cup and back again, Johnny Mac is always making headlines.

Davis Cup
From February 2000: In Zimbabwe, Agassi and McEnroe live up and down to expectations.

Jennifer Capriati
Eaten alive by the New York press.

The Art of the Postmatch Interview
Why do such wonderful tennis players say such foolish things? SportsJones cheerfully offers a guide to "netiquette."

Martina vs. Venus
Betty Moffett and Judy Hunter critique the rivalry.

The open era opens
March 30, 1968: Pros are OK after all.

MORE BY JULIAN RUBINSTEIN