8502050000
DETROIT FREE PRESS
850902
Monday, September 02, 1985
METRO FINAL
1D
Photo
MITCH ALBOM
Copyright (c) 1985, Detroit Free Press
OF COURSE IT'S AMERICAN . . . IT'S THE U.S. OPEN
FLUSHING MEADOW, N.Y. -- They are stripped naked for 10 minutes a day. All
of them. Martina and Chris, McEnroe and Lendl and Connors, even golden boy
Boris Becker, exposed for all to see every time they make the walk from the
locker room to the stadium.
Yes, the big shots must wade through the crowd here -- past the hamburger
stands and bathroom lines -- just like the regular folk, without priority,
without special privilege. Sure, they walk a little faster and try to look
disinterested.
That works for about two seconds. Then someone inevitably yells, "YO! IT'S
MCENROE!" and, boom, the free-for-all begins. Crowds swarm, cameras pop out,
and any bimbo with a beer and a program gets to shove both in the face of a
player who's due on center court in five minutes.
This is not Wimbledon, or Paris, or Australia.
This is the U.S. Open.
Care of New York City, America.
U.S. title eludes foreigners
"The people's tournament" is what Chris Evert Lloyd calls it. And she's
right. Distinctly American. If Wimbledon is a blue blazer and a tweed cap,
then the U.S. Open is cutoffs and a Springsteen T-shirt. It's tennis down
where you can touch it. Working man to its very surface. The French is on
clay, Wimbledon is on grass. But the U.S. Open is on cement, baby. Crack your
head open.
All of which makes it the toughest stop on the Grand Slam circuit. Ask the
foreign players. They'll tell you. This event plays you as much as you play
it, with an unforgiving rhythm that says, "Compete to the beat, or you're
dead."
Foreigners die here. Ivan Lendl, for all his success, has never won a U.S.
Open crown. Neither has Sweden's Mats Wilander, this year's French Open champ.
Even the magnificent Bjorn Borg, who won every other major title, could not
capture this one.
"This tournament is very difficult for foreign players," Wilander said. "It
is very . . . American."
Of course.
This is the U.S. Open.
Care of New York City, America.
The last six men's champions and the last 11 women's champions here have
all been Americans. It's partly because the Floridians and Californians and
New Yorkers who play here grew up on hard court surfaces.
And it's more. Remember, tennis is largely mental, its players often as
tightly tuned as a violin string. But between the traffic, the noise, the
crowds that hang over the practice court fences, the planes that buzz the
stadium from above and the 20,000 fans that buzz it from within, well, their
concentration can be strummed here like a punk rock guitar.
As far as anyone can recall, this is the only major tournament in which a
fan was once shot in the stands, and was upset not because of the wound but
because reporters were asking him questions and he was there with a woman
other than his wife.
Even a hometown favorite like John McEnroe gets no favors. A few years
ago, some box seat fans were heckling him so loudly that he ran over, took a
handful of sawdust from his pocket and threw it in their faces.
They went home and sued him.
This is the U.S. Open.
Care of New York City, America.
Blood and guts on the courts
And good for it. The tennis world is too often just the beautiful people
in sun hats and cultured accents. Here the game is picked from the pockets of
the country club set and for two weeks is handed over to the general public.
"They want blood and guts tennis," says Connors, who's won here five
times.
And the rules here help ensure it. In the other three Grand Slam events, if
a match comes down to a 6-6 tie in the final set, a player has to win by two
games.
Not here. In America's tournament it's a tiebreaker. Survival of the
fittest.
All of which makes this the grittiest tournament around, and, because of
its surface, the truest test of pure tennis talent on the Grand Slam lineup.
"Making it all the way here," Connors says, "means you've done a lot more
than just play good tennis."
Forgive it its grime, its corned beef atmosphere, its lack of Dukes and
Duchesses. Or don't. It doesn't matter. From the rules to the roar to that
naked walk through the eye of the public hurricane, it issues its own
challenge.
This is the U.S. Open.
Care of New York City, America.
Beat it.
Or beat it.
COLUMN;TENNIS;TOURNAMENT