The Outsider: A Memoir (21 page)

Traveling with my new family worked out just fine. Patti would carry Brett in a baby sling, I’d grab our suitcases, and that was that. Baby Brett didn’t seem to mind flying at all.

During the day, when I was playing, Patti arranged for babysitters (the tournament directors were a huge help in that respect) so that she could come and watch. Nighttime was harder, since we weren’t able to take turns every time the baby woke up. The reality was I needed a good night’s sleep in order to play. I hadn’t been able to perform at Wimbledon when I was 22, after being up most of the night partying, and I didn’t stand a chance at 27, so Patti assumed all the responsibility for getting up with Brett in the middle of the night while we were on the road.

I loved traveling with Patti and Brett. In Hong Kong in November, I watched my son roll from his stomach onto his back for the first time; in Palm Springs in February, he cut his first tooth; and in Paris in May, he took his first steps.

For the first nine months of his life, he thrived on the different locations, the various people who babysat him, but then, suddenly, separation anxiety set in, and he didn’t want to be away from Patti and me. That’s when we decided to hire a nanny, someone whom Brett could learn to be comfortable around while we kept traveling as a family. We hired Adela, from Guatemala, to be Brett’s nanny when we were on the road, then she became our housekeeper when we were home because Patti and I enjoyed our roles as parents.

When Brett was still just a couple of months old, we moved from my bachelor apartment in the Hollywood Hills to a penthouse suite at the Turnberry Isle Resort, in Florida, overlooking the tennis courts. For the next three years it proved to be one hell of a great place to live, and you never knew who you’d see coming through the lobby: Elton John, Lauren Bacall, Eddie Van Halen, just to name a few. Then there was the action on the courts.

I don’t know how many thousands of dollars I won and lost down there, but that wasn’t really the point. Guys were lining up to take me on. I would play right-handed so I could work on my footwork and conditioning, and that just made the matches even more interesting. Those days and nights down on those Turnberry courts were a lot like the fun times at the Beverly Hills Tennis Club. The pressure of losing a few bucks might not have been the same, but the thrill of picking up your winnings never got old.

Friends would pass through Turnberry all the time. In between tournaments Nasty might come stay, and if we had the time, we’d rent a yacht, take the family, and go exploring in the ocean right off our doorstep. If Patti liked the idea of taking a trip to the Caribbean, then off we’d go. I knew I could arrange another exhibition with Nasty to pay for it. The money was coming in fast, and going out at the same speed.

If my buddies and I ever started to believe we were big shots, something would usually happen to bring us back down to earth. During the first year I lived in Florida, Nasty and I decided to charter the boat
Monkey Business
(long before Gary Hart’s ill-fated cruise) for a trip to the Bahamas, and we brought along my friend Gerry Goldberg.

Gerry had been the tournament director at the Montreal Challenge Cup in December 1979, where I suffered my sixth-consecutive defeat to Borg in the same year. I wasn’t in the best of moods, but I liked Gerry. I invited him to go drinking with Nasty and me that night, and we’ve been friends since then. He’s sat next to me on many bar stools and at even more casino tables. He and his wife were frequent visitors to Turnberry while Patti and I lived there. He became the bookmaker for the on-court action. When Nasty, Gerry, and I got down to the Bahamas, we decided to go look for a place to hit some balls, and we found an empty court with no one around. We’d been playing for about 15 minutes when this guy appears out of nowhere and just kind of stands there, staring at us. Not in a friendly way.

“Hi, how are you doing?” I called over, suddenly feeling pretty uncomfortable. The guy’s glare didn’t soften.

“Get out of here,” he barked.

Gerry decided to intervene. “Hey, buddy, this is Jimmy Connors and Ilie Nastase. Sorry if it’s your court, but we couldn’t find anyone to ask.”

“I don’t give a fuck who you are. Get off this court. Now.”

OK. This doesn’t happen very often.

Nasty walked over to me, looking nervous. He’s not someone who’s often intimidated, but there was something going on that neither of us wanted any part of.

“This guy’s serious. We’re out of here, right, Connors boy?”

Right.

Back on board the
Monkey Business
, we told one of the crew what happened.

“Oh, my God, guys, you’re lucky to get out of there in one piece. I know that court. It belongs to Bebe Rebozo, Nixon’s moneyman. You don’t mess around with him.”

Sometimes you just have to say “What the fuck” and move on. But sometimes you say it quietly.

It’s official after my Montreal Challenge Cup defeat by Borg: According to the press, the Borg–Connors era is over. It’s not a rivalry anymore but an embarrassment. Jimmy’s finished. Welcome to the new Borg–McEnroe decade.

Well, screw that. Yes, it’s true, I didn’t win a Slam in 1979, didn’t even make a final, but it was a busy year and I had a new wife and a new baby, and that takes some getting used to.

I was happy with my life, and I knew I could figure out how to improve my game. Over my vacation, I thought, I’ll hit the courts, practice hard, and next year I’ll make another comeback. That’s what I do.

After Mac beat me in New York in September, I said three words to the press:

“I’ll be back.”

Who was I? The Terminator? Believe it or not, I said it first.

What I didn’t know as I was making my grand plans for the beginning of the eighties was that it would take me two years before I’d be proved right. A little longer than I expected. What the hell.

14

BACK FROM THE DEAD

T
he Masters in January 1980 was a disappointment, but a week later I secured my sixth-straight Birmingham International Indoor title, winning in straight sets over Eliot Teltscher. Seven days later, I captured my fourth US Pro Indoor championship in Philadelphia, beating McEnroe in a five-set final.

“Unfortunately, I guess he’s starting to play a little better again,” Mac told the press after I kicked his ass.

Then it was on to the WCT Tennis Invitational, a round-robin tournament in mid-February in Salisbury, Maryland.

Vijay Amritraj waits patiently at the net, like the gentleman that he is, as I jog toward him to shake his hand. Not surprisingly, he has a huge grin on his face. A 6-3, 6-3 victory will do that for you.

“Well played, Vijay. You deserved it today.”

I don’t want to say anything else because I’m too pissed at myself for the way I played. The Salisbury crowd, fans I’ve grown to know well over the years, are applauding, but not for me. Time to get out of here, Jimmy.

I grab my bag and sling it over my left shoulder. Don’t know why I did that. I always carry it on my right. Now where is Patti? There she is, coming down to meet me as I walk off the court. I want to head straight back to the hotel. No point in hanging around the locker room . . .

Then . . . WHAT?! I see a guy climb out of the stands and run at Patti. Now he’s got his arm around her neck and she’s struggling to get away.

I’m sprinting toward my wife. I’m in no mood for this shit.

I’m at a fighting weight of 160 pounds, I’m in the best shape I’ve been in for years, and I reach them in seconds.

There’s a lot of pushing and shouting around Patti, but no one is doing anything.

I shove someone out of my way and grab the guy’s hair with my right hand as I spin my bag off my shoulder. As I pull him forward my left comes free just in time.

Boom! I land a haymaker. He goes down with a thud. Thanks for the lessons when I was growing up, Pop!

I try and jump on the guy, but security pulls me back. There it is again, that flash of memory, Mom getting pummeled in Jones Park, but this time I’m not powerless.

I grab Patti. She’s shaken, but safe now.

“I thought you were going to kill him,” says Patti.

“I tried,” I say, and I still want to.

I’m supposed to play Nasty the next day, and as I walk out of there an hour after the attack on Patti, I have an ice pack on my left hand and my wrist is throbbing.

The next morning the swelling is still there, but the pain has eased up enough for me to play. Patti isn’t hurt too badly other than her neck being a little stiff, and once we discover who the punk is, we decide not to involve the police. Turns out he’s the son of one of the sponsors, and he wanted a kiss from Patti. No excuses. I still wanted to kill him.

With no serious damage done to Patti (my punch was described in the press as a “textbook left,” which is always good for your reputation), the organizers decided to treat the incident lightly. As Nasty and I walked onto the court, the loudspeakers up on the roof exploded with the theme from
Rocky.

I beat Nasty 6-4, 6-4 in an uneventful match, setting up a showdown with Borg, which I had to win to make it through to the finals. Instead, I walked away with my eighth-consecutive loss to the new world number one. Just for the record, the seventh in that sequence came during the Grand Prix Masters at Madison Square Garden a month before, another round-robin event, where at least I came within two points of ending the run before losing out in a third-set tiebreaker.

After my loss to Borg, Vitas Gerulaitis beat me 7-5, 6-2, playing incredible tennis. It was my first loss to him since 1972, bringing our career record to 16-2 in my favor. But no one cared about that, because Vitas, as always, managed to steal the show. At the post-match press conference, Vitas gave the world his memorable line:

“Let that be a lesson to you all. Nobody beats Vitas Gerulaitis 17 times in a row.”

Classic.

From Maryland I went to Memphis to defend my US National Indoor title, losing to McEnroe in a close final 7-6, 7-6, which put him on top of the ATP rankings for the first time, where he lasted for three weeks.

The rollercoaster ride continued into April. In a four-man invitational in Brussels, I lost to Mac 6-1, 7-5, which I then followed up with a win over him in the International Tennis Competition, in Tokyo, picking up a $110,000 check in the process.

By the end of April the tally for the year stood at Borg 2, Connors 0; McEnroe 2, Connors 2.

Borg or McEnroe, McEnroe or Borg.

The beginning of the Borg–McEnroe decade? Really? We’ll see about that.

May through September are the business months in tennis, and I’m not going into them fighting for second place. I’m out to regain my number one spot. And it all starts here in Dallas at the WCT finals. OK, Borg isn’t playing, but Mac is, and we’re meeting in the final.

During a pre-match press conference, Mac makes the statement that it would have been nice to have been able to play me when I was at my best.

Do you really want to know what I was like when I was at my best? You’re about to find out, son. I win the match in four sets and give him a taste of what it would have been like to play me in the early 1970s.

The year’s tally after Dallas? McEnroe 2, Connors 3.

Time to chase down Borg in Paris.

I don’t like the fact that today all four Grand Slams have 32 seeded players. It gives the top guys too much protection. They changed it from 16 in 2001 at Wimbledon and the US Open, followed a year later by the French and Australian Opens. In my opinion that didn’t benefit tennis.

Sure, the big names have to be looked after in the early rounds, because those are the guys who sell the tickets, but to keep as many as 32 players protected—I think that’s just nuts. When I was playing, we had eight seeded players, which seems about right to me. When the draw was made you could be facing a top-20 or -30 opponent, which meant a fan wouldn’t know which match to watch, because there were so many good ones, and that made the tournaments exciting from the very first ball served.

It was certainly the case in Paris in 1980, thanks to Patti.

Patti had the honor of making the draw for the French Open and she didn’t do me any favors. My first round opponent, Adriano Panatta, the 1976 champion and winner in Florence the previous week, was ranked 28th in the world at the beginning of the year.

Although I’d missed the French Open for five years (it took four years for me to get rid of my anger and frustration after being banned in 1974), I always knew Roland Garros suited me. Not the surface or the balls they used, which slowed everything down too much for my game, but the atmosphere. It was hot, dirty, close, and noisy . . . and I loved it. You had to be ready to grind it out. I’d buy a ticket for that any day.

Panatta takes me to four sets. In round two I meet the Frenchman Jean-François Caujolle, and the scoreboard says it all: 3-6, 2-6, 2-5, 30-40. Match point to the hometown favorite. The 18,000 fans are howling their approval and I’m a point away from defeat. They don’t know me well here, but they’ve decided they don’t like me. Not today, anyway. OK. Keep grinding and win this game. Connors 3-5.

I take the set 7-5, after which there can be only one winner and the crowd knows it. Their booing lacked the conviction it had had before. I win the next two sets, 6-1, 6-1, and go on to round three.

With Borg in the other half of the draw, I was convinced there could only be one final, and one winner, and I could feel my career Slam getting closer.

Until Gerulaitis came along again and spoiled it. I’d thought my Madison Square Garden loss was a fluke. My targets were McEnroe (who lost to Paul McNamee in the third round) and Borg, but in the semifinal Vitas matched me stroke for stroke in a seesaw match that went to five sets, which I didn’t think I would lose until he aced me on his fifth match point. By that stage the crowd was on its feet for both of us. As disappointed as I was with the result, I knew my romance with Paris had begun.

I loved everything about that city—the restaurants, the cafés, the boutiques, the Louvre, taking Brett for a walk in the parks. Of course the photographers wanted a piece of us, especially in the first couple of years of our marriage but that was OK, because we never did anything very exciting, and soon they got bored with us.

The only time we had any trouble in Paris was a day or two after the Caujolle match in 1980. Patti, I, and our nanny, Adela, were walking down the Champs-Élysées, enjoying a day off, with Brett riding on my shoulders. The sidewalk was crowded and I was just enjoying bouncing Brett up and down, listening to him laugh, when suddenly Adela was tugging at my sleeve in a panic.

“Mr. Connors! Mrs. Connors!”

Looking over, I spotted a couple of guys moving Patti toward a side alley, maneuvering her off the street without actually grabbing her. I gave Brett to Adela and charged through the crowd of shoppers and tourists.

Patti could see me coming and started shouting. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, but I thought she was calling for help. I lunged toward the guys and heard Patti yell, “Don’t get into a fight! Don’t get into a fight! You’ll hurt your hand. You’re playing tomorrow!”

I was about to ignore Patti’s warning when Patti broke loose. I grabbed her hand and we got out of there. I don’t even want to think about what those guys wanted with my wife.

Paris was always an adventure. I remember when Brett was almost three years old and we were staying at the Hilton, and he’d been running up and down the hallway outside our room, burning off some energy before bedtime. Patti and I were watching him from our doorway when, to our horror, he walked into an open elevator car, the doors closed, and he was gone. We jumped into the next elevator, but by the time we reached the lobby Brett was nowhere to be seen. In a panic we looked under sofas, in the bar (well, he
is
my kid), and asked everyone in the place if they’d spotted him. Suddenly, Claude, the concierge, came in through the front entrance with our son in his arms.

“Monsieur Connors. Do not worry. I have little Brett. I saw him run out and chased after him. When I caught him he asked me to take him to the park. He wants ice cream, I think.”

I never knew that having a family would be so hard on the nerves.

Then, a few years later (and not because of the Brett incident), we decided to try a different hotel and moved to the Plaza Athénée, on Avenue Montaigne, the hotel where I’d been invited by Sinatra to join him for a cocktail.

Nasty picks Patti and me up at Charles de Gaulle Airport, drives us to the hotel, and comes up to our room for a drink. As we’re waiting for our bags, I open the curtains to look at the view of the city skyline. About five minutes later there’s a knock on the door. Nasty answers and talks to the bellhop for a few seconds.

“Connors boy, there’s a note here for you,” he says. “It’s from Marlene.”

Who?

I open the letter. “To Jimmy. I have just seen you arrive. Good luck in your matches. Marlene Dietrich.” Noooooo. How did she even know we were here? A minute later the telephone rings and Nasty starts speaking in French and then hands me the phone.

The voice is husky and unmistakable. “Jimmy, this is Marlene.”

It turned out she lived in an apartment right across from the hotel and she had seen me at the window. We talked for a minute and she said she hoped I would enjoy my stay in Paris and wished me luck in the tournament. Nasty, Patti, and I couldn’t believe it, and a few minutes later there was another knock at the door. This time the bellhop delivered a package: a framed photograph of Dietrich from the 1930s. Written across it were six words that still make me smile:
WE JUST TALKED. FUCK THEM ALL.
Attitude plus style. My kind of woman.

I’d have loved to have her come out to the stadium to watch one of my matches, but she was in her eighties by then and it just wasn’t possible. Instead, we spoke regularly over the next two weeks. Talking to Marlene Dietrich made East St. Louis seem a long ways off. If I ever needed to be reminded of the life tennis had given me, all I had to do was remember Paris. And Marlene.

Some of my favorite encounters in Paris were with René Lacoste, a distinguished French player and the inventor of the racquet I used for almost 30 years, the T2000. Mr. Lacoste had been one of the French tennis stars dominating the game in the 1920s and early 1930s, and the world’s number one player in 1926 and 1927. He won seven Grand Slam singles titles in the French, American, and British championships. Oh, and he also founded the Lacoste clothing firm, featuring the famous crocodile logo.

I first met Mr. Lacoste in the early 1970s when Nasty invited me to join the two of them for lunch. I was nervous as hell, but I relaxed soon after Mr. Lacoste told me how much he enjoyed following my matches. I’m not kidding, this man was amazing, what he had achieved, how he had broken new ground in almost everything he tried, and there he was telling me he liked my game. I have to tell you, that felt good.

Whenever I was in Paris I’d call Mr. Lacoste to say hello. He wasn’t short on opinions, another thing I liked about him.

“Oh Jeemy, I saw you play today. You drive me crazy. You hit the ball too close to the line, too close to the net. Geeve yourself more margin of error, please.”

Topspin ruled in Paris. Hitting the ball flat was almost unheard of. Almost losing in straight sets to Caujolle in 1980 wasn’t the only scare I had that afternoon. Deep into the third set, with the tournament slipping rapidly away, there was a sudden commotion in the area of Mr. Lacoste’s seat, and I could see he was being helped out of his box.

All I could do was go on with the match and hope everything was OK. As soon as we walked off the court, I called Mr. Lacoste’s wife to find out what had happened.

“René was not feeling so well. He had to leave.”

“Madame, I am so sorry. Please tell him I’ll call him later to see how he is.”