Acing Depression by Cliff Richey

Author:Cliff Richey [Richey, Cliff; Kalendorf, Hilaire Richey]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-942257-69-4
Publisher: New Chapter Press
Published: 2010-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

Ken Rosewall (left) and I walk off Centre Court at Wimbledon after he beat me in an epic quarterfinal match in 1971.

A tennis match has a natural flow to it. It has a certain cadence. The match almost takes on a rhythm of its own. Instinctively, I would cause a distraction to break up that rhythm—to try to change the hue of that match. In junior tennis, you would always break after the second set. In men’s tennis, it was after the third. You could go for 10-20 minutes to the locker room, change clothes, even take a shower if you wanted to. If one of the players wanted to go in and take that break, then both of them had to take it. Conversely, if both players wanted to continue, then they could keep on playing. The smart players would always try to use the breaks strategically.

The same principle was at work with trying to challenge a line call. Pancho Gonzalez used to advise intimidating the linesmen because if you challenge them on a call, even if you don’t prevail in that specific instance, you might influence them later to judge in your favor. Basically you’re out there playing a little mind game. At the latter stages of a match, I would often instinctively get into it with the umpire or start a discussion. It wasn’t a plot. More like instinct. It probably wasn’t the “good sportsman” thing to do.

To be fair, I also wasn’t as bad as some of the other guys. I remember a good Italian player named Fausto Gardini was playing a match somewhere in Europe and was unhappy about everything. He went over to the side of the court, put his racquet in the racquet cover, went over and took the net down, shoved it under his arm and left the court! I never did anything like that.

The most notorious Bad Boy of us all was without question Ilie Nastase. His nickname was “Nasty” because of the dirty tricks he pulled. I remember one match where he wore a T-shirt under his regular collared shirt and when he got mad at the crowd, he lifted up the first shirt to reveal his T-shirt with a picture of the infamous middle finger. He was literally saying “F you” to the crowd! I really think Nastase enjoyed the carnival atmosphere more than anything else. I think that was his way of escaping the pressure. He would take a situation and make it into something he felt more comfortable with. That way he could pretend he was in control. He won the French Open and the U.S. Open that way. He was known as the Clown Prince of Tennis.

Nastase is still a good friend of mine, but there was a time when we didn’t speak to each other for a full year. During one match we played, the base linesman called a foot fault on his serve. Nasty kicked his shoe off at the linesman. I was waiting for him.

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