September 11, 2025 • 23 mins
In 1981, John McEnroe walked into Wimbledon, the cathedral of tennis etiquette, and went on a rant for the ages that culiminated in a four word soundbite that echoed across the ages: “You cannot be serious!”
This episode dives into McEnroe’s rise from Queens kid to tennis rebel, how his infamous Wimbledon rant went against the very nature of the sport itself, and why it may have saved tennis from sliding into irrelevance in the United States.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Modern tennis, or just tennis as we call it, directly
descends from real tennis, also called court tennis in the
United States and royal tennis in England and Australia. It
began to spread across Europe during the fourteen and fifteen hundreds,
eventually earning the nickname the sport of Kings due to
(00:49):
its popularity among royalty I'd argue a nickname like the
sport that kills Kings and queens might be a bit
more accurate, if not as catchy, and that's because real
tennis has led to or been involved in several royal deaths.
While being pursued by a group of assassins at his
compound in Perth in fourteen thirty seven, King James the
(01:11):
First of Scotland attempted to escape through a large drain
outlet that led to safety, but when he got to it,
he discovered that it had been blocked off to prevent
the loss of tennis balls. Its common belief that King
Henry the Eighth's second wife, Anne Boleyn, was arrested for
her execution while watching him play a game of real tennis.
(01:34):
Henry was such a big fan of the sport that
he built multiple courts as monarch of England, and even
though it's probably stretched to say that real tennis directly
encouraged his habit of chopping off people's heads, I have
to point out that at its core, the sport is
essentially about swinging or slicing at a spherical object until
it falls to the ground. French King Louis the tenth
(01:58):
developed a serious chill from playing this sport and died
not long after. To follow that up, fellow French King
Charles the eighth smacked his head and died during a match.
By the nineteenth century, lawn tennis had emerged from its
more deadly predecessor, moving the indoor walled courts to the
outdoors like lawns, and simplifying the rules. Lawn tennis aka
(02:23):
the version we play now, was a huge hit throughout
the upper and middle classes of Victorian England. The sport
mirrored much of the eras emphasis on etiquette and manners.
Remember this was a time when there were manuals that
explained how to sit correctly, laugh politely, and why it
was vulgar to clap with cupped hands. Those same ideals
(02:44):
seeped into tennis players wore all white attire to hide
sweat stains, as visible perspiration was considered improper. Crowds were
expected to watch silently, only applauding politely after rallies, and
the most prestigious and oldest tournament of all, Wimbledon, played
on perfectly cut grass courts, became a monument to these manners,
(03:08):
a cathedral of constraint the problem. By the early nineteen seventies,
the sport was teetering towards pop culture irrelevance due to
its own decorum, especially in the United States. Compared to flashy,
superstar dominated sports like baseball, basketball, and football, which embraced
larger than life personalities, raw displays of emotion, and the fierce,
(03:33):
borderlined violent nature of competition, Tennis and its best players
were falling far behind with their emphasis on modesty and restraint.
The sport was in dire need of a jolt, and
then came a scrawny kid from Queens, New York named
John McEnroe, loud, brash, and utterly uninterested in preserving Victorian
(03:54):
ideals or displaying any semblance of good manners. On one
fateful day in nineteen eighty one, he would walk into
the hallowed grass covered grounds of Wimbledon and pierce its
veil of politeness with a stunning SoundBite for the ages,
capped off by a ForWord phrase that horrified traditional tennis
lovers and some onlookers, electrified the rest, and catapulted tennis
(04:18):
into its modern era, whether it wanted to or not.
On today's episode of Sports Dot MP three, we are
diving into the story of John McEnroe's infamous shout, how
it made him enemy number one in tennis and yet
also saved it. So sit back, relax, and let's get
into it. John McEnroe's mouth has always been his defining characteristic,
(05:13):
for better and for worse. Just a few days ago,
during the twenty twenty five US Open, one of tennis's
four major annual championships, as he was commentating a men's
quarterfinal match, a veteran staff member made her way onto
the court in order to deliver a restrung racket to
(05:34):
one of the players. As this was happening, McEnroe couldn't
help himself and said thanks Grandma in reference to the staffer,
before ultimately following that comment up by saying, quote good
time for her age group unquote in the aftermath of
the match, Susan Perkins, who was on the receiving end
of those quips, spoke out against McEnroe's comments, and the
(05:58):
rest of the tennis world largely took her side. If
you try and google this scandal, you might have a
hard time, and that's because this recent one was just
a drop in the really, really, really big bucket of
controversies created by John McEnroe's mouth. Long before he was
screaming at umpires and roasting elderly staff members during ESPN commentaries,
(06:20):
McEnroe was just a kid growing up in Queens, New York,
an upbringing that undoubtedly influenced his loudmouthed, rebellious style. He
was technically born in Germany, where his father served as
a US Air Force officer, but the family moved to
the Big Apple before John was a year old. By
most accounts, he was an exceptionally bright child, if not
(06:42):
a bit mouthy. He began playing tennis at eight years
old and clearly had a natural talent for the sport.
As a twelve year old, he was ranked in the
top ten for his age group and frequently competed in
regional and national tournaments. When he graduated Manhattan's Trinity School.
As an eighteen year old, McEnroe didn't take long to
make a splash in tennis, as he became the youngest
(07:05):
ever player to reach the semi finals at Wimbledon, one
of the other four major championships, in nineteen seventy seven,
losing to fellow American Jimmy Connors, who was ranked number
one in the world at the time. McEnroe then attended
Stanford University. Later that year, won the singles championship, led
(07:25):
the team to an NCAA title, and turned pro. I
should probably mention that he had already earned a reputation
as a bit of a well a brat or, according
to the media at the time, a super brat. Side note,
this was before Charlie XCX existed, and so it wasn't
a good thing to be brat. During his Wimbledon quarter
(07:47):
final match against Phil Dent, which he would win before
then losing to Connors, McEnroe became increasingly frustrated with the
umpire's line calls. He started off by simply questioning some
of them, though it didn't take long for him to
flash his iconic intensity, which in this case culminated in
him smashing and then kicking his racket toward the sidelines,
(08:10):
earning a chorus of booze from the shocked spectators. Even
at this point in his career, crowds and players alike
were already quite critical of how he carried and conducted
himself on the court, and the funny thing is he
was just getting started. In nineteen seventy nine, at twenty
(08:46):
years of age, John McEnroe won his first US Open,
becoming the youngest winner of the competition in thirty one years,
and he did it in dominant style, winning the finals
in straight sets. If you're unfamiliar with men tennis, you
have to win three of the five total sets in
a major championship match to win, meaning in this case,
(09:07):
he won three in a row or three straight poetically.
His style of play was a fitting match for his personality.
He was extremely aggressive and loved to play at the net.
He could serve with pinpoint accuracy, had catlike reflexes, and
an uncannyability to take and make shots that others wouldn't
even attempt. He was also left handed, an uncommon trait
(09:30):
that forced his opponents, who were used to playing right
handed players, to deal with weird spins, angles and bounces
they weren't as familiar with. In nineteen eighty, McEnroe, who,
according to The Sun, an English tabloid, was quote the
most vain, ill tempered, petulant loudmouth that the game of
tennis has ever known unquote, entered Wimbledon as the number
(09:53):
two seed and battled his way to the finals, where
he was set to face the number one seed, Bjorn,
a player that was, for all intents and purposes, the
antithesis of McEnroe. If John was a boisterous rebel from Queens,
New York, Borg was an ice cold stoic that looked
like he had just walked off of Viking raiding ship
(10:15):
due to his previous appearances in conduct. The crowds at
Wimbledon probably rightfully viewed McEnroe as the villain, but by
the end of the match they were actually cheering him on.
Borg had won four consecutive Wimbledon championships, and when it
was all said and done, he'd add another to that. Taally, So,
how did the arrogant, loudmouth bratt from New York win
(10:37):
over the crowd in a loss? Well, he tried really,
really hard and just never gave up. With McEnroe trailing
two sets to one. The fourth set went to a tiebreaker,
and in that tiebreaker he faced five separate championship points,
meaning if he lost any one of those, he would
lose the entire match, and yet he prevailed, eventually winning
(10:59):
the tiebreaker eighteen to sixteen, before then losing the fifth
and final set eight to six, a brutally devastating result.
At the match's start, he had been booed by the crowd,
probably because of his heated exchange with officials directly after
his semi finals victory over Jimmy Connors just a few
days prior. By the end of the match, he hadn't
(11:21):
completely changed his reputation, but he had earned their respect
for his grit and unyielding determination. The match between Borg
and McEnroe was not just legendary due to how entertaining
it was to watch. It also rocketed tennis's TV ratings
to previously unattainable heights. According to the Nielsen Television Index,
(11:43):
the average number of US households that tuned into NBC's
finals coverage of Wimbledon Championships from nineteen seventy three to
nineteen seventy nine was three million, nine hundred twenty seven thousand,
five hundred and sixty. McEnroe in Borg's nineteen eight eighties
Wimbledon final drew in five million, seventy two thousand, three
(12:05):
hundred and fifty three, over a million more households than
the average of those prior years. Now, it's not fair
to say the rise in American TV viewership was solely
driven by this rivalry. In truth, there were a number
of factors at play, including a rise in popularity of
women's tennis throughout the seventies thanks to the efforts of
(12:25):
Billy jan King and others. The big three tennis players
at the time, John McEnroe, Bjorn Borg and Jimmy Conners
did play a pretty massive role too, especially considering John
and Jimmy were both Americans, and Americans love a sport
that Americans are good at. Trust me, I'm American. Lastly,
the rivalry between Borg and McEnroe was one of those
(12:46):
rare rivalries that represented more than just two players going
at it. The fiery, loud, net rushing McEnroe clashed so
perfectly against the cool, quiet, baseline hitting Borg that it
almost felt like Yen versus Yang or mister heat meser
versus mister snow miser. And yes it's snow not cold.
(13:07):
You can look it up. From nineteen seventy three to
two thousand and seven, only one Wimbledon finals match would
surpass the US viewership numbers of the nineteen eighty Wimbledon Finals,
and that, of course, would be the one that took
place the very next year, a rematch between Borg and McEnroe.
(13:48):
When the nineteen eighty one Wimbledon Men's Championship began, the
top three seeds stood unchanged from the year before, number
one Bjorn Borg, number two John mcinroe, and number three
Jimmy Connors. To win Wimbledon, you have to win seven
straight matches the first round, second round, third round, fourth round. Nope,
(14:11):
not fifth round, it's actually the quarterfinals, semi finals, and final.
At the start of the tournament, it was clear the
masses wanted to see Borg and McEnroe meet again in
the finals. After that crushing defeat in nineteen eighty, McEnroe
had faced Borg in the US Open finals only a
few months later and defeated him in a grueling five
(14:32):
set match. The two had faced off two more times
since then, with Borg taking both, making their all time
head to head record seven wins for Borg and five
for McEnroe. To make matters even more interesting, McEnroe would
have the opportunity to end Borg's streak of five straight
Wimbledon championships if the two met in the finals. If
(14:53):
the crowd still had some traces of respect for McEnroe's
gutsy performance from the year prior, he instantly eradicated any
of those remaining traces of respect. During his first round
match against Tom Gullikson. It was June twenty second, nineteen
eighty one. McEnroe served the ball and his opponent was
unable to hit it, which is called an ace. Unfortunately,
(15:16):
the chair umpire aka the official or referee, thought the
ball had not been served in bounds and called it out,
nullifying the ace and requiring McEnroe to attempt a second
serve to put it lightly. McEnroe disagreed with the call,
and he made sure everyone in the vicinity knew it.
The white lines on tennis courts that make up the
(15:39):
borders of what's in and out of bounce are drawn
with white chalk, and a ball that lands on the
line is considered in I'm adding that context. Because McEnroe
mentions that that chalk where his ball landed after the
serve flew all over the place, indicating that it was
in bounds, this rant would become not only the most
(15:59):
iconic SoundBite and tennis history, but the future title of
his biography. You cannot be serious, idea. But you can't
be serious, man, You cannot be serious.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
That ball was on the line, short blew up.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
It was clearly it How can you.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Possibly call that out?
Speaker 1 (16:22):
How many you can miss that he's walking over, everyone
knows it's in his full stadium. Then you call it out.
Explain that. Explain was the linesman called a fault because
the ball was on this side of the court and
it came out? Doesn't matter? You know the viny fact
that there is a spread of talk because you can
see mister McIndoe. It's worth noting that, at least according
(16:46):
to other onlookers accounts and grainy footage of the incident,
the ball was definitely inbounds and his serf should have
counted as an ace. McEnroe's outrageous outburst earned him a
warning from the umpire Edward Games, but that warning just
acted like kindling for the eternal fire raging inside McEnroe.
(17:06):
Only a few points later, he snapped again, calling the
umpire the quote absolute pits of the world unquote, which
earned him a point penalty, which pissed him off even more,
which then led him to call the umpire an incompetent
fool and demand a new official. Take a listen to
this second rant, which followed only a few minutes after
(17:29):
the one. You just listened to? What because that thing
verified in what you guys, the absolute pits of the world.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
You know that.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
Now you can repeat it. You can repeat it. It
wasn't anything. We're not gonna have a point taken away
because this guy's any confident fool, you know.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
That's that's what he is.
Speaker 1 (17:51):
That's what he did. So we're not gonna have a
point taken away because I said nothing that he's like
a scene on anything. Now I want him to repeat
what he said.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Why don't lose your points.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
McEnroe, who often seemed to play better the angrier he got,
won the match in straight sets, and also earned another
point penalty for slamming his racket on the ground towards
the end of the match. He didn't win any props
from his opponent Tom Gullikson, however, who said the following
about McEnroe's attitude after the match quote, it has no place.
(18:28):
Everyone's afraid of these guys. All it would take is
one default to put them in line. If it was
the one hundred and twentieth player in the world, they
would have defaulted him for reference. Default in this case
just means disqualified. McEnroe received a fifteen thousand dollars fine
for his first round tantrum, and the British press absolutely
(18:48):
battered his conduct throughout the rest of the tournament and
basically kind of forever. Not one to be intimidated by
newspaper headlines or controversy, McEnroe marched his way to the
Wimbledon final, setting up a showdown with Bjorn Borg, who
had pulled off a stunning come from behind victory in
the semi finals against Jimmy Connors to get there. The
(19:10):
stage was set, and it would end a bit differently
this time around. Borg would take the first set of
the match, but McEnroe then won the next three, breaking
Borg's bid at a record tying six straight Wimbledon championships
and winning the first of McEnroe's eventual three Wimbledon titles. Traditionally,
the winner attends a distinguished Champions dinner hosted by the
(19:34):
Wimbledon organizers. McEnroe, still pissed off about the fines he
had received the overall officiating in the tournament, organizers, decided
not to attend the dinner, resulting in the All England
Club refusing to offer him an honorary membership in their ranks,
a privilege granted to all previous winners. Decades later, McEnroe
(19:58):
explained his thought process on reefs using to attend the
winner's dinner quote, I wanted to spend the night with
my family and friends and the people who had supported me,
not a bunch of stiffs who are seventy to eighty
years old telling you that you're acting like a jerk unquote.
(20:32):
McEnroe's first round rant was so viral and iconic that
it's still remembered by non tennis fans to this day,
and it not only inspired a top twenty hit song
called chalk Dust, but earned him monetary bonuses for saying
the phrase you cannot be serious when he played on
the seniors tour. In a twenty twenty one interview, he
(20:53):
talked about the incident, stating quote, I would call it
a mixed blessing, but more positive than negative. It was
the only time I said it in my fifteen year career,
and then all of a sudden, when I played on
the Seniors Tour, I got paid a bonus if I
said it, zooming out a little. It's impossible to separate
McEnroe's impact on tennis from his rants impact on the sport.
(21:17):
The two are too closely tied to one another. His
rant was mean, arrogant, braddy, loud, and yet not completely unjustified.
His playing style, just like the rant was aggressive, loud,
in your face, and yet hard to look away from.
He was the epitome of a guy who you simultaneously
(21:37):
rooted against and yet tuned in to watch in the
first place. He was a polarizing, talented one sin, a
lifetime player who was unapologetically himself, a trait that has
remained unchanged through the decades, even as he himself has
changed from a top player into a top commentator. And
as for the rivalry between Borg and McEnroe, it was
(22:00):
actually pretty short lived because Borg shocked the world by
retiring at the age of twenty six in nineteen eighty three,
and although he would attempt a few comebacks, the final
all time record between Borg and McEnroe in head to
head matches seven wins to seven wins. Pretty fitting. Whether
(22:20):
you love or hate him. John McEnroe was instrumental in
ushering tennis into the modern era, leaving a trail of controversy,
pissed off umpires, and unforgettable quotes in his wake. And
that does it for today's episode of Sports Dot MP three.
Thank you so much for listening. Be sure to follow
(22:40):
the podcast on socials to never miss an episode or update.
And I'll be back next Thursday with a new episode.
See you next week.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Peace, don't don't. It is not a contract. Don't don't
Modern tennis, or just tennis as we call it, directly
descends from real tennis, also called court tennis in the
United States and royal tennis in England and Australia. It
began to spread across Europe during the fourteen and fifteen hundreds,
eventually earning the nickname the sport of Kings due to
(00:49):
its popularity among royalty I'd argue a nickname like the
sport that kills Kings and queens might be a bit
more accurate, if not as catchy, and that's because real
tennis has led to or been involved in several royal deaths.
While being pursued by a group of assassins at his
compound in Perth in fourteen thirty seven, King James the
(01:11):
First of Scotland attempted to escape through a large drain
outlet that led to safety, but when he got to it,
he discovered that it had been blocked off to prevent
the loss of tennis balls. Its common belief that King
Henry the Eighth's second wife, Anne Boleyn, was arrested for
her execution while watching him play a game of real tennis.
(01:34):
Henry was such a big fan of the sport that
he built multiple courts as monarch of England, and even
though it's probably stretched to say that real tennis directly
encouraged his habit of chopping off people's heads, I have
to point out that at its core, the sport is
essentially about swinging or slicing at a spherical object until
it falls to the ground. French King Louis the tenth
(01:58):
developed a serious chill from playing this sport and died
not long after. To follow that up, fellow French King
Charles the eighth smacked his head and died during a match.
By the nineteenth century, lawn tennis had emerged from its
more deadly predecessor, moving the indoor walled courts to the
outdoors like lawns, and simplifying the rules. Lawn tennis aka
(02:23):
the version we play now, was a huge hit throughout
the upper and middle classes of Victorian England. The sport
mirrored much of the eras emphasis on etiquette and manners.
Remember this was a time when there were manuals that
explained how to sit correctly, laugh politely, and why it
was vulgar to clap with cupped hands. Those same ideals
(02:44):
seeped into tennis players wore all white attire to hide
sweat stains, as visible perspiration was considered improper. Crowds were
expected to watch silently, only applauding politely after rallies, and
the most prestigious and oldest tournament of all, Wimbledon, played
on perfectly cut grass courts, became a monument to these manners,
(03:08):
a cathedral of constraint the problem. By the early nineteen seventies,
the sport was teetering towards pop culture irrelevance due to
its own decorum, especially in the United States. Compared to flashy,
superstar dominated sports like baseball, basketball, and football, which embraced
larger than life personalities, raw displays of emotion, and the fierce,
(03:33):
borderlined violent nature of competition, Tennis and its best players
were falling far behind with their emphasis on modesty and restraint.
The sport was in dire need of a jolt, and
then came a scrawny kid from Queens, New York named
John McEnroe, loud, brash, and utterly uninterested in preserving Victorian
(03:54):
ideals or displaying any semblance of good manners. On one
fateful day in nineteen eighty one, he would walk into
the hallowed grass covered grounds of Wimbledon and pierce its
veil of politeness with a stunning SoundBite for the ages,
capped off by a ForWord phrase that horrified traditional tennis
lovers and some onlookers, electrified the rest, and catapulted tennis
(04:18):
into its modern era, whether it wanted to or not.
On today's episode of Sports Dot MP three, we are
diving into the story of John McEnroe's infamous shout, how
it made him enemy number one in tennis and yet
also saved it. So sit back, relax, and let's get
into it. John McEnroe's mouth has always been his defining characteristic,
(05:13):
for better and for worse. Just a few days ago,
during the twenty twenty five US Open, one of tennis's
four major annual championships, as he was commentating a men's
quarterfinal match, a veteran staff member made her way onto
the court in order to deliver a restrung racket to
(05:34):
one of the players. As this was happening, McEnroe couldn't
help himself and said thanks Grandma in reference to the staffer,
before ultimately following that comment up by saying, quote good
time for her age group unquote in the aftermath of
the match, Susan Perkins, who was on the receiving end
of those quips, spoke out against McEnroe's comments, and the
(05:58):
rest of the tennis world largely took her side. If
you try and google this scandal, you might have a
hard time, and that's because this recent one was just
a drop in the really, really, really big bucket of
controversies created by John McEnroe's mouth. Long before he was
screaming at umpires and roasting elderly staff members during ESPN commentaries,
(06:20):
McEnroe was just a kid growing up in Queens, New York,
an upbringing that undoubtedly influenced his loudmouthed, rebellious style. He
was technically born in Germany, where his father served as
a US Air Force officer, but the family moved to
the Big Apple before John was a year old. By
most accounts, he was an exceptionally bright child, if not
(06:42):
a bit mouthy. He began playing tennis at eight years
old and clearly had a natural talent for the sport.
As a twelve year old, he was ranked in the
top ten for his age group and frequently competed in
regional and national tournaments. When he graduated Manhattan's Trinity School.
As an eighteen year old, McEnroe didn't take long to
make a splash in tennis, as he became the youngest
(07:05):
ever player to reach the semi finals at Wimbledon, one
of the other four major championships, in nineteen seventy seven,
losing to fellow American Jimmy Connors, who was ranked number
one in the world at the time. McEnroe then attended
Stanford University. Later that year, won the singles championship, led
(07:25):
the team to an NCAA title, and turned pro. I
should probably mention that he had already earned a reputation
as a bit of a well a brat or, according
to the media at the time, a super brat. Side note,
this was before Charlie XCX existed, and so it wasn't
a good thing to be brat. During his Wimbledon quarter
(07:47):
final match against Phil Dent, which he would win before
then losing to Connors, McEnroe became increasingly frustrated with the
umpire's line calls. He started off by simply questioning some
of them, though it didn't take long for him to
flash his iconic intensity, which in this case culminated in
him smashing and then kicking his racket toward the sidelines,
(08:10):
earning a chorus of booze from the shocked spectators. Even
at this point in his career, crowds and players alike
were already quite critical of how he carried and conducted
himself on the court, and the funny thing is he
was just getting started. In nineteen seventy nine, at twenty
(08:46):
years of age, John McEnroe won his first US Open,
becoming the youngest winner of the competition in thirty one years,
and he did it in dominant style, winning the finals
in straight sets. If you're unfamiliar with men tennis, you
have to win three of the five total sets in
a major championship match to win, meaning in this case,
(09:07):
he won three in a row or three straight poetically.
His style of play was a fitting match for his personality.
He was extremely aggressive and loved to play at the net.
He could serve with pinpoint accuracy, had catlike reflexes, and
an uncannyability to take and make shots that others wouldn't
even attempt. He was also left handed, an uncommon trait
(09:30):
that forced his opponents, who were used to playing right
handed players, to deal with weird spins, angles and bounces
they weren't as familiar with. In nineteen eighty, McEnroe, who,
according to The Sun, an English tabloid, was quote the
most vain, ill tempered, petulant loudmouth that the game of
tennis has ever known unquote, entered Wimbledon as the number
(09:53):
two seed and battled his way to the finals, where
he was set to face the number one seed, Bjorn,
a player that was, for all intents and purposes, the
antithesis of McEnroe. If John was a boisterous rebel from Queens,
New York, Borg was an ice cold stoic that looked
like he had just walked off of Viking raiding ship
(10:15):
due to his previous appearances in conduct. The crowds at
Wimbledon probably rightfully viewed McEnroe as the villain, but by
the end of the match they were actually cheering him on.
Borg had won four consecutive Wimbledon championships, and when it
was all said and done, he'd add another to that. Taally, So,
how did the arrogant, loudmouth bratt from New York win
(10:37):
over the crowd in a loss? Well, he tried really,
really hard and just never gave up. With McEnroe trailing
two sets to one. The fourth set went to a tiebreaker,
and in that tiebreaker he faced five separate championship points,
meaning if he lost any one of those, he would
lose the entire match, and yet he prevailed, eventually winning
(10:59):
the tiebreaker eighteen to sixteen, before then losing the fifth
and final set eight to six, a brutally devastating result.
At the match's start, he had been booed by the crowd,
probably because of his heated exchange with officials directly after
his semi finals victory over Jimmy Connors just a few
days prior. By the end of the match, he hadn't
(11:21):
completely changed his reputation, but he had earned their respect
for his grit and unyielding determination. The match between Borg
and McEnroe was not just legendary due to how entertaining
it was to watch. It also rocketed tennis's TV ratings
to previously unattainable heights. According to the Nielsen Television Index,
(11:43):
the average number of US households that tuned into NBC's
finals coverage of Wimbledon Championships from nineteen seventy three to
nineteen seventy nine was three million, nine hundred twenty seven thousand,
five hundred and sixty. McEnroe in Borg's nineteen eight eighties
Wimbledon final drew in five million, seventy two thousand, three
(12:05):
hundred and fifty three, over a million more households than
the average of those prior years. Now, it's not fair
to say the rise in American TV viewership was solely
driven by this rivalry. In truth, there were a number
of factors at play, including a rise in popularity of
women's tennis throughout the seventies thanks to the efforts of
(12:25):
Billy jan King and others. The big three tennis players
at the time, John McEnroe, Bjorn Borg and Jimmy Conners
did play a pretty massive role too, especially considering John
and Jimmy were both Americans, and Americans love a sport
that Americans are good at. Trust me, I'm American. Lastly,
the rivalry between Borg and McEnroe was one of those
(12:46):
rare rivalries that represented more than just two players going
at it. The fiery, loud, net rushing McEnroe clashed so
perfectly against the cool, quiet, baseline hitting Borg that it
almost felt like Yen versus Yang or mister heat meser
versus mister snow miser. And yes it's snow not cold.
(13:07):
You can look it up. From nineteen seventy three to
two thousand and seven, only one Wimbledon finals match would
surpass the US viewership numbers of the nineteen eighty Wimbledon Finals,
and that, of course, would be the one that took
place the very next year, a rematch between Borg and McEnroe.
(13:48):
When the nineteen eighty one Wimbledon Men's Championship began, the
top three seeds stood unchanged from the year before, number
one Bjorn Borg, number two John mcinroe, and number three
Jimmy Connors. To win Wimbledon, you have to win seven
straight matches the first round, second round, third round, fourth round. Nope,
(14:11):
not fifth round, it's actually the quarterfinals, semi finals, and final.
At the start of the tournament, it was clear the
masses wanted to see Borg and McEnroe meet again in
the finals. After that crushing defeat in nineteen eighty, McEnroe
had faced Borg in the US Open finals only a
few months later and defeated him in a grueling five
(14:32):
set match. The two had faced off two more times
since then, with Borg taking both, making their all time
head to head record seven wins for Borg and five
for McEnroe. To make matters even more interesting, McEnroe would
have the opportunity to end Borg's streak of five straight
Wimbledon championships if the two met in the finals. If
(14:53):
the crowd still had some traces of respect for McEnroe's
gutsy performance from the year prior, he instantly eradicated any
of those remaining traces of respect. During his first round
match against Tom Gullikson. It was June twenty second, nineteen
eighty one. McEnroe served the ball and his opponent was
unable to hit it, which is called an ace. Unfortunately,
(15:16):
the chair umpire aka the official or referee, thought the
ball had not been served in bounds and called it out,
nullifying the ace and requiring McEnroe to attempt a second
serve to put it lightly. McEnroe disagreed with the call,
and he made sure everyone in the vicinity knew it.
The white lines on tennis courts that make up the
(15:39):
borders of what's in and out of bounce are drawn
with white chalk, and a ball that lands on the
line is considered in I'm adding that context. Because McEnroe
mentions that that chalk where his ball landed after the
serve flew all over the place, indicating that it was
in bounds, this rant would become not only the most
(15:59):
iconic SoundBite and tennis history, but the future title of
his biography. You cannot be serious, idea. But you can't
be serious, man, You cannot be serious.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
That ball was on the line, short blew up.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
It was clearly it How can you.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Possibly call that out?
Speaker 1 (16:22):
How many you can miss that he's walking over, everyone
knows it's in his full stadium. Then you call it out.
Explain that. Explain was the linesman called a fault because
the ball was on this side of the court and
it came out? Doesn't matter? You know the viny fact
that there is a spread of talk because you can
see mister McIndoe. It's worth noting that, at least according
(16:46):
to other onlookers accounts and grainy footage of the incident,
the ball was definitely inbounds and his serf should have
counted as an ace. McEnroe's outrageous outburst earned him a
warning from the umpire Edward Games, but that warning just
acted like kindling for the eternal fire raging inside McEnroe.
(17:06):
Only a few points later, he snapped again, calling the
umpire the quote absolute pits of the world unquote, which
earned him a point penalty, which pissed him off even more,
which then led him to call the umpire an incompetent
fool and demand a new official. Take a listen to
this second rant, which followed only a few minutes after
(17:29):
the one. You just listened to? What because that thing
verified in what you guys, the absolute pits of the world.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
You know that.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
Now you can repeat it. You can repeat it. It
wasn't anything. We're not gonna have a point taken away
because this guy's any confident fool, you know.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
That's that's what he is.
Speaker 1 (17:51):
That's what he did. So we're not gonna have a
point taken away because I said nothing that he's like
a scene on anything. Now I want him to repeat
what he said.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Why don't lose your points.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
McEnroe, who often seemed to play better the angrier he got,
won the match in straight sets, and also earned another
point penalty for slamming his racket on the ground towards
the end of the match. He didn't win any props
from his opponent Tom Gullikson, however, who said the following
about McEnroe's attitude after the match quote, it has no place.
(18:28):
Everyone's afraid of these guys. All it would take is
one default to put them in line. If it was
the one hundred and twentieth player in the world, they
would have defaulted him for reference. Default in this case
just means disqualified. McEnroe received a fifteen thousand dollars fine
for his first round tantrum, and the British press absolutely
(18:48):
battered his conduct throughout the rest of the tournament and
basically kind of forever. Not one to be intimidated by
newspaper headlines or controversy, McEnroe marched his way to the
Wimbledon final, setting up a showdown with Bjorn Borg, who
had pulled off a stunning come from behind victory in
the semi finals against Jimmy Connors to get there. The
(19:10):
stage was set, and it would end a bit differently
this time around. Borg would take the first set of
the match, but McEnroe then won the next three, breaking
Borg's bid at a record tying six straight Wimbledon championships
and winning the first of McEnroe's eventual three Wimbledon titles. Traditionally,
the winner attends a distinguished Champions dinner hosted by the
(19:34):
Wimbledon organizers. McEnroe, still pissed off about the fines he
had received the overall officiating in the tournament, organizers, decided
not to attend the dinner, resulting in the All England
Club refusing to offer him an honorary membership in their ranks,
a privilege granted to all previous winners. Decades later, McEnroe
(19:58):
explained his thought process on reefs using to attend the
winner's dinner quote, I wanted to spend the night with
my family and friends and the people who had supported me,
not a bunch of stiffs who are seventy to eighty
years old telling you that you're acting like a jerk unquote.
(20:32):
McEnroe's first round rant was so viral and iconic that
it's still remembered by non tennis fans to this day,
and it not only inspired a top twenty hit song
called chalk Dust, but earned him monetary bonuses for saying
the phrase you cannot be serious when he played on
the seniors tour. In a twenty twenty one interview, he
(20:53):
talked about the incident, stating quote, I would call it
a mixed blessing, but more positive than negative. It was
the only time I said it in my fifteen year career,
and then all of a sudden, when I played on
the Seniors Tour, I got paid a bonus if I
said it, zooming out a little. It's impossible to separate
McEnroe's impact on tennis from his rants impact on the sport.
(21:17):
The two are too closely tied to one another. His
rant was mean, arrogant, braddy, loud, and yet not completely unjustified.
His playing style, just like the rant was aggressive, loud,
in your face, and yet hard to look away from.
He was the epitome of a guy who you simultaneously
(21:37):
rooted against and yet tuned in to watch in the
first place. He was a polarizing, talented one sin, a
lifetime player who was unapologetically himself, a trait that has
remained unchanged through the decades, even as he himself has
changed from a top player into a top commentator. And
as for the rivalry between Borg and McEnroe, it was
(22:00):
actually pretty short lived because Borg shocked the world by
retiring at the age of twenty six in nineteen eighty three,
and although he would attempt a few comebacks, the final
all time record between Borg and McEnroe in head to
head matches seven wins to seven wins. Pretty fitting. Whether
(22:20):
you love or hate him. John McEnroe was instrumental in
ushering tennis into the modern era, leaving a trail of controversy,
pissed off umpires, and unforgettable quotes in his wake. And
that does it for today's episode of Sports Dot MP three.
Thank you so much for listening. Be sure to follow
(22:40):
the podcast on socials to never miss an episode or update.
And I'll be back next Thursday with a new episode.
See you next week.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Peace, don't don't. It is not a contract. Don't don't
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