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James Scott ("Jimmy") Connors (born September 2, 1952 in East St. Louis,
Illinois) is a former American tennis champion who was the world number one player
for 160 consecutive weeks from July 1974 to August 1977. He was also the World No.
1 player an additional 8 times during his career. He won eight Grand Slam singles
titles and two Grand Slam doubles titles. He is considered to be one of the top
male tennis players of all time. Currently, he is coaching American tennis player
Andy Roddick.
 Career
In 1970, Connors played his first international matches and recorded his first
significant victory in the first round of the Pacific Southwest Open in Los
Angeles, defeating Roy Emerson.
In 1971, Connors won the NCAA singles title while attending the University of
California, Los Angeles. He also won his first international tournament in
Jacksonville, Florida as an amateur. He turned professional in 1972 and won the
Jacksonville tournament again.
Connors's competitiveness on court quickly made him stand out. He refused to accept
that he was beaten and gave everything on every point of every game, no matter how
apparently hopeless the cause. He also was not averse to playing to the crowd (he
once remarked that "I want to bring the crowd into the match: in short, turn it
into a football game") or abusing his opponent or the umpire—anything he could
think of to give himself an edge. His brash behaviour both on and off court earned
him a reputation as the brat of the tennis world. He acquired the nickname of the
"Brash Basher of Belleville" (after the St Louis suburb where he grew up). His
high-profile romance with fellow teen tennis prodigy Chris Evert in the early years
of his career also helped to keep him in the headlines.
Connors also acquired a reputation as a maverick in 1972 when he refused to join
the newly formed Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), the union that was
embraced by most male professional players. He avoided the mainstream of
professional tennis to play in, and dominate, a series of smaller tournaments
organized by Bill Riordan, his manager and a promoter.
In 1974, Connors and Riordan began filing lawsuits, eventually amounting to U.S.
$10 million, against the ATP and its president Arthur Ashe for allegedly
restricting Connors' freedom in the game. It started when Connors was banned from
the French Open in 1974 after he had signed a contract to play World Team Tennis
(WTT) for Baltimore. The ATP and the French Tennis Federation opposed WTT because
it conflicted with the French Open; therefore, all entries to the French Open from
WTT players were refused.
The French Open was the only Grand Slam tournament that Connors did not win in
1974. He won the Australian Open, defeating Phil Dent in four sets in the final.
Connors then beat Ken Rosewall in straight sets in the finals of both Wimbledon and
the U.S. Open. Therefore, his exclusion from the French Open possibly prevented him
from becoming the first male player since Rod Laver to win all four Grand Slam
singles titles in one year. Though he reached the semifinals on four occasions,
Connors never won the French Open, failing to achieve a Career Grand Slam.
Connors reached the World No. 1 ranking in July 1974 and held it for 160 straight
weeks that was the world record of straight weeks being number 1 until Roger
Federer beat it on 26th February 2007. Over the course of his career, he held the
World No. 1 ranking for a total of 268 weeks.
In 1975, Connors was the runner-up in the three Grand Slam singles tournaments he
had won the year before. The 1975 Wimbledon final was a duel between lawsuit
opponents, as Connors lost to Ashe in what most consider to have been a great
upset. Shortly thereafter, Connors dropped the lawsuits and parted with
Riordan.
That year, Connors won two highly touted "Challenge Matches," both arranged by
Riordan and televised nationally by CBS Sports from Caesars Palace in Las Vegas.
The first match, in February, was against Rod Laver, fourteen years Connors' senior
at age 36. Connors won that match, billed as a U.S. $100,000 winner-take-all, 6-4,
6-2, 3-6, 7-5. In April, Connors played the man who had beaten him in the
Australian Open final, John Newcombe, in a match billed as a U.S. $250,000
winner-take-all. Connors won the match in four sets.
In 1976, Connors met Björn Borg, the new Wimbledon champion, in the final of the
U.S. Open, which was now being played on clay. Connors saved four set points in a
third-set tiebreak to beat the Swede 6-4, 3-6, 7-6(9), 6-4. Connors finished 1976
as the top ranked player for the third consecutive year.
In early 1977, Connors won his first World Championship Tennis (WCT) Finals, the
championship tournament of the WCT tour.
Despite his success, Connors remained an independent character. At Wimbledon in
1977, he refused to participate in a parade of former champions to celebrate the
tournament's centenary and was booed when he played in the final the following day.
He lost in five sets to Borg, who a month later was able briefly to interrupt
Connors' long hold on the #1 ranking. Connors then lost in the final of the U.S.
Open to Guillermo Vilas.
Having irritated sponsors and tennis officials by shunning the end-of-year Masters
championships for the previous three years, Connors entered the competition for the
first time in January 1978. In the round-robin portion of the tournament, which had
just moved to New York City, Connors lost a celebrated late-night match to Vilas
6-4, 3-6, 7-5 but took the title by defeating Borg in the final 6-4, 1-6, 6-4.
Borg beat Connors comfortably in the 1978 Wimbledon final, but Connors defeated the
Swede 6-4, 6-2, 6-2 in the final of the 1978 U.S. Open, which was held for the
first time at the Flushing Meadows venue. By winning the first Grand Slam
tournament ever held on hard courts, Connors became the first male tennis player to
have won Grand Slam singles titles on three different surfaces: grass (1974), clay
(1976), and hard court (1978).
Connors lost his stranglehold on the #1 ranking to Borg in early 1979. He returned
to the French Open in May, losing in a semifinal. He also lost in the semifinals at
Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, repeating those results in 1980 and 1981. His best win
during these years was in 1980, when he took his second WCT Finals by defeating the
defending champion, John McEnroe.
In 1982 at age 30, Connors was back in the Wimbledon singles final, where he faced
McEnroe, who by then was established firmly as the world's top player. Connors
recovered from being three points away from defeat in a fourth set tiebreak to win
the match 3-6, 6-3, 6-7, 7-6, 6-4 and claim his second Wimbledon title, eight years
after his first.
Connors then defeated another of the next generation of tennis stars, Ivan Lendl,
in the U.S. Open final and soon regained the #1 ranking. He beat Lendl again in the
1983 U.S. Open final.
Connors' last Grand Slam final came at Wimbledon in 1984, where he again faced
McEnroe. This time, McEnroe won easily 6-1, 6-1, 6-2. Though beaten, Connors'
competitive fire was certainly not dampened. Asked afterwards if he now admitted
his rival was the better player, he simply replied, "Never."
A low point in Connors' career occurred on February 21, 1986, when he was defaulted
in the fifth set of a semifinal match against Lendl at the Lipton International
Players Championships in Boca Raton, Florida after being angered by the
officiating. He paid a U.S. $20,000 fine and accepted a 10-week suspension from the
professional tour, starting March 30. He was forced to miss the French Open,
marking the first time that any player had missed a Grand Slam tournament due to
suspension. He subsequently lost in the first round at Wimbledon and the third
round at the U.S. Open, a tournament where he had made at least the semifinals for
twelve consecutive years.
Connors gradually transformed himself into a respected elder of the tennis world in
the later years of his career. He continued to compete forcefully against much
younger men until he was well into his 41st year.
In the fourth round of the 1987 Wimbledon, Connors defeated Mikael Pernfors, ten
years his junior, 1-6, 1-6, 7-5, 6-4, 6-2 after having fallen behind 1-6, 1-6, 1-4
and again 0-3 in the fourth set.
In July 1988, Connors ended a four-year title drought by winning the Sovran Bank
Tennis Classic in Washington, D.C. It was the 106th title of his career. Connors
had played in 56 tournaments and 12 finals since his previous victory in the Tokyo
Indoors against Lendl in October 1984.
At the 1989 U.S. Open, Connors defeated the third seed (and future two-time
champion), Stefan Edberg, in straight sets in the fourth round and pushed
sixth-seeded Andre Agassi to five sets in a quarterfinal.
The defining moment of Connors' later career came in 1991. His career had seemed to
be at an end in 1990, when he played only three tournament matches (and lost all
three), dropping to No. 936 in the world rankings. But after surgery on his
deteriorating left wrist, he came back to play 14 tournaments in 1991. An ailing
back forced him to retire from a five-set match in the third round of the French
Open against Michael Chang, the 1989 champion. But Connors made an improbable run
to the U.S. Open semifinals at the age of 39. On his birthday, he defeated
24-year-old Aaron Krickstein 3-6, 7-6(8), 1-6, 6-3, 7-6(4) in 4 hours and 41
minutes, coming back from a 2-5 deficit in the final set. Connors was then defeated
in a semifinal by the reigning French Open champion, Jim Courier.
During his career, Connors won a record 109 men's singles titles. He also won 15
doubles titles (including the men's doubles titles at Wimbledon in 1973 and the
U.S. Open in 1975).
In his 1979 autobiography, Jack Kramer, the long-time tennis promoter and great
player himself, ranks Connors as one of the 21 best players of all time. Connors
was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, Rhode Island in
1998 and has his own star on the St. Louis Walk of Fame.
On July 24, 2006, at the start of the Countrywide Classic tournament in Los
Angeles, American tennis player Andy Roddick formally announced his partnership
with Connors as his coach.
Personal
life
Connors and Chris Evert had planned to marry in October 1973 , but it was called
off.
In 1980, Connors married playboy model Patti McGuire. They have two children and
live in the Santa Barbara, California area.
In the spring of 2006, Connors had successful hip replacement surgery at
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.
On January 8, 2007, the mother and longtime coach of Connors died at the age of
82.
Style of
play
Undoubtedly Connors' strongest asset was his extremely
powerful flat, double-handed backhand. In an era when topspin was becoming the
rage, Connors was one of the few players to hit the ball flat and low.
Connors' forehand was in the continental grip and also hit flat. While not as
formidable as his backhand it shared with his backhand the great advantage of
requiring relatively little energy to hit powerfully. This is perhaps one of
the reasons for Connors' unusually long 26 years as a tennis professional
(excluding his time on the senior's circuit). Connors was known to practice no
more than two hours a day and felt satisfied enough in his game not to improve
his serve, which was accurate but slow relative to the standards of the day.
Connors was unusual in being able to combine a solid baseline game with
aggressive charges to the net and agile mid-court play.
Connors' game was highly reliant on precision and to obtain this experimented
extensively with lead tape wound around the head of his racket.
Source : Some of the information on this page came
from a Wikipedia article and is licensed under the GNU Documentation
License. ©2008 www.geneticmatrix.com.
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Jimmy Connors -
Manifesting Generator - Biography
