McEnroe Passes Up the Big Fight to Lend a Hand and Beat Lendl

John McEnroe had tickets to the Hagler-Hearns fight and was really looking forward to being in Las Vegas Monday night. But his plans changed Saturday afternoon when he called the Forum to ask for a favor. He was looking for tickets to the Kings’ hockey game that night.

Jeannie Buss, director of Forum Championship Tennis, got on the phone to ask McEnroe for an even bigger favor. Jimmy Connors, scheduled to play Ivan Lendl in the first match of this Forum season, had aggravated his back injury in the World Championship Tennis final tournament and was forced to withdraw.

Without a quick, superstar sub, the Monday night event would have to be canceled.

Sure enough, McEnroe--who now lives in Malibu--agreed to save the day.

“What a doll,” Buss said. “He really helped us out.”

She ended up with the No. 1 player in the world going against the No. 3 player in the world. Not bad for a last-second scramble.

McEnroe beat Lendl, 6-4, 7-6.

McEnroe, not universally considered to be such a doll, explained, “Sometimes common sense comes into play. The thing was going to have to be canceled if I didn’t do it. They had sold 7 or 8,000 tickets. It’s good for all of us.

“I had played a match here with Jimmy before and I was scheduled to play here again.”

McEnroe was scheduled to play Lendl in this series July 22, so it really was just a matter of changing the date.

Usually, when McEnroe and Lendl meet, it’s in the finals of a major tournament.

The last time Lendl, a 25-year-old Czechoslovakian, beat McEnroe was in the finals of the French Open in 1984. In the last two meeting, McEnroe beat Lendl in the U.S. Open final in ’84 and the Masters final in ’85.

“It’s good to play a match like this,” McEnroe said. “You have to get up for it. You’re playing in L.A. and you’re playing Lendl. You go to some little rinky-dink tournament where everybody is booing you and everybody wants to beat you, and it’s harder to get up for that.

“I don’t get to play Lendl that much.”

The match was hard-fought and most entertaining for the crowd of 8,454, even though Lendl was not at his best.

Lendl had just won the WCT championship finals, finishing up on Sunday in Dallas. “Actually, he was lucky that Jimmy withdrew from his match Saturday,” McEnroe said. “Otherwise he would have played three best-of-five matches three days in a row before coming here.”

Lendl came from behind in the first set to tie it at 4-4 before McEnroe won the last two points. In the second set, Lendl served three straight aces to take a 3-2 lead. But the second set was close all the way. McEnroe tied it at 3-3. Lendl went up 4-3. McEnroe tied it at 4-4. Lendl went up 5-4. McEnroe tied it again. Lendl went up 6-5 and McEnroe tied it again to force the tiebreaker.

McEnroe took a 3-0 lead in the tiebreaker when Lendl’s shot sailed long. But the tiebreaker, too, ended up going back and forth until it was tied at 6-6. McEnroe won it with Lendl serving at the end.

“I felt like I played reasonably well tonight,” McEnroe said. “I had not been feeling too good last week, but I felt pretty good tonight.”

McEnroe was eliminated from the WCT tournament last week by Joachim Nystrom .

In an earlier match at the Forum Monday night, Aaron Krickstein beat Ilie Nastase, 6-4, 6-1.