SAP Open: After all these years, John McEnroe still one of the faces of U.S. tennis

Written by: Staff on 13th February 2012

SAP Open: After all these years, John McEnroe still one of the faces of U.S. tennis

Light falls across the face of former tennis star John McEnroe from the US at the official tournament draw, at the Australian Open Grand Slam tennis tournament in Melbourne, Australia, 13 January 2012. The first tennis Grand Slam in 2012 runs 16-29 January 2012. EPA/BARBARA WALTON |

When John McEnroe picks up his racket Monday night at HP Pavilion, the clock will turn back. His appearance in an exhibition doubles match at the SAP Open will provide a trip down memory lane with one of the all-time tennis greats.

And the stark reality is that looking backward is the only way to find an American among the kings and queens of the court.

“Clearly,” McEnroe said, “there is frustration.”

The decline of U.S. tennis might not be a new story, but it did reach a new low at the recent Australian Open. Not a single American, male or female, advanced beyond the Round of 16 in the year’s first major event.

No American man has won a Grand Slam since Andy Roddick captured the 2003 U.S. Open — the longest drought since the Open Era began in 1968.

There are few signs that it will start raining titles soon. The world rankings contain just six U.S. women and eight men in the respective Top 100s. Only Mardy Fish, ranked eighth among the men, is a Top 10 player.

A younger, fiery McEnroe might have ranted angrily: You cannot be serious!

These days the graying McEnroe, who turns 53 on Thursday, is an elder statesman of tennis. He’s a roving ambassador who helps promote his sport by playing exhibition matches.

One of the game’s most authoritative commentators, McEnroe still speaks his mind. But he does it in a more measured fashion, and at lower decibels. He called the Australian results “extremely disappointing,”

but not unexpected.

“We’ve sort of been spoiled over the years, and we want to see guys winning and challenging for the majors,” McEnroe said. “At the moment, that’s not there. My goal and hope is to bring the buzz back to American tennis and see American players winning majors. I don’t think there is any reason why we can’t do that.”

But it will be, he acknowledged, a long climb back.

McEnroe combined sheer artistry and a maniacal competitiveness to win seven Grand Slam singles titles. He and Jimmy Connors were U.S. standard-bearers who paved the way for the next generation of American stars such as Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, Jim Courier and Michael Chang, who were dominant in the 1990s.

But the sport’s power base gradually has shifted to Southern and Eastern Europe. The global appeal of tennis even has created what some are calling a new Golden Age.

The final rounds in the men’s bracket of Grand Slams have seen epic battles between Serbia’s Novak Djokovic, Spain’s Rafael Nadal, Switzerland’s Roger Federer and Great Britain’s Andy Murray. The Australian Open championship match lasted nearly six hours before Djokovic finally put away Nadal in five sets.

But no American man has reached a Grand Slam final since Roddick, now 29 and dealing with a balky hamstring, did it at Wimbledon in 2009.

The troubles on the women’s side have been less pronounced because of the brilliance of Serena and Venus Williams. But even the 30-year-old Serena, who has won 13 major singles titles, has slipped to 12th in the world.

McEnroe recently rounded up the usual suspects on why U.S. tennis has fallen so hard. But after talking about how the best athletes are gravitating to other sports and the cost associated with elite tennis, McEnroe touched on a reason that is particularly painful for him.

Tennis, he said, just isn’t as popular in America anymore.

“If you had told me poker would out-rate tennis 25 years ago, I would have laughed at you,” McEnroe said. “For that matter, golf, bowling, and you could go on and on. I think tennis is way better than any of those. … We need to do a better job of making it a sexier, more attractive sport to kids that maybe wouldn’t normally think about playing it, and then provide an opportunity to do it.”

Patrick McEnroe, his younger brother and general manager of player development for the U.S. Tennis Association, is pushing for a uniform training system. He would like something similar to Spain, where top youth players all are taught the same fundamentals.

For his part, John McEnroe opened a $20 million private facility in New York in 2010.

“Right now, you’re talking about a starting point,” McEnroe said of his academy. “I don’t look at guys and say, ‘Oh, yeah, there’s tons of Novak Djokovics around.’ I wish I could tell you that was the case. This is a long-term process.”

McEnroe also remains an active player. On Monday, he will team with defending SAP Open singles champion Milos Raonic against France’s Gael Monfils and young American Jack Sock.

McEnroe, who teamed with Jonas Bjorkman to surprisingly win the 2006 SAP Open title, believes he can still play doubles matches as well as he ever did.

“I don’t think you can get the competitive juices out of your blood,” he said. “I don’t know if I would want to anyway.”

And for now, an older McEnroe will have to be enough for tennis fans. It could be a long wait before another McEnroe arrives on the scene.

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