Tennis / Lisa Dillman : U.S. Men Are Tired of Being Clay Pigeons

Every year, every spring, the record book is dusted off and the fact is duly noted--Tony Trabert was the last American male to win the French Open, when he stood tall on the Roland Garros clay in 1955.

It’s almost become larger than life, a heavy burden that seems to weigh on every American who makes it past the quarterfinals. What else explains John McEnroe’s failure to win in 1984 after taking the first two sets of the final against Ivan Lendl?

The 30th anniversary of Trabert’s victory has passed, and the United States isn’t any closer to producing a player who could stop the drought.

USA win on clay? No way.

Even at home, the surface confounds American men. At the U.S. Clay Courts in Indianapolis, there hasn’t been an American male champion since Jimmy Arias in 1983.

But, if all goes according to plan, things could be different by 1988.

Yes, if you can’t win on clay, why not change the surface?

Seriously, losing tennis matches on clay isn’t the problem at Indianapolis. Losing money is.

Organizers had moved the event from a traditional summer date to spring in 1986, hoping to draw top players trying to prepare for the French Open. It was a huge failure. The top men stayed away, the weather was miserable, and attendance dropped to 45,693 from 74,784 in 1985.

In 1987, the tournament will move back to a summer date, July 13-19. But, this time, there won’t be any women participating because of a schedule conflict with a tournament in Newport, R.I.

If that seems odd, the plans for 1988 are even more surprising. About three weeks ago, tournament officials held a press conference and announced an intention to change the clay courts into a hard court surface. They would bid to revive the USTA Hardcourt Championships, which stopped in 1971.

That move just about kills off the once strong summer clay-court circuit in the United States. It would be a regrettable move for emotional as well as pragmatic reasons.

The Clay Courts have been held since 1910 and have been at Indianapolis for 18 years. And it certainly wouldn’t help the Americans in the international game. Don’t wait for the French to change their surface anytime soon.

If an American male is to win again in Paris during Trabert’s lifetime, staying away from clay at home isn’t the answer.

The topic was Lendl’s popularity, or more specifically, his lack of it.

After Lendl beat Miloslav Mecir in the Tennis Challenge Series Monday night at the Forum, the issue came up in his postmatch press conference.

How did he feel, and how does he feel about the derogatory headline and story in Sports Illustrated’s Sept. 15 issue?

The headline: The Champion That Nobody Cares About.

And longtime SI writer Curry Kirkpatrick had this to say:

” . . . Nonetheless, in the early rounds of the Open a certain ‘Lendl Factor’ emerged. As soon as his matches were announced, multitudes would abandon the stadium and the outer courts would jam up like the Triborough Bridge in a blizzard. Lendl may someday empty entire cities. . . . “

Lendl told reporters Monday that he has received thousands of letters from people who feel otherwise.

“I don’t like it,” he said of his negative press. “It hurts me. If anybody else had won it (the Open) the article would have been the same. . . . Don’t get me wrong, Sports Illustrated is a great magazine. I feel very sad that a writer like that is in a magazine in that class. If he doesn’t like it (tennis) why doesn’t he leave it alone and write about basketball? He picks on everybody.”

The corporate infiltration of the tennis continues as two companies recently decided to make significant financial commitments to the game.

Puma is in the planning stages of developing a Junior Invitational Tennis Championship for players in four divisions--boys and girls 14 and under, and boys and girls 16 and under. The program will have a nation final and regional competitions. Los Angeles is one of the tentative regional sites.

During the next three years, General Motors will contribute $1.4 million for the sponsorship of international team tournaments. The money will be split four ways, between the Davis Cup men’s event, the Federation Cup women’s event, the men’s European indoor championship and the World Youth Cup.

Tennis Notes

Irvine’s Sally Huss is one of the top entrants in the Women’s 40 and over National Hardcourt Championships which start Monday at La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club. Huss won the event in 1984 and was nationally ranked No. 4 in women’s singles in 1959. Other contenders from California include Judy Louie of Newport Beach, Pashi Vakima of Costa Mesa, Mary Newberry of La Jolla and Louella Parsons of Carpinteria. The National Hardcourt Father and Son Doubles Championships will also be held at the same site this week. . . . The Don Sutton/United Cerebral Palsy Tennis Tournament will start at noon Dec. 7 at the Laguna Niguel Racquet Club. For more information, call Doreen Pirro at (714) 641-3374. . . . Approximately 600 junior players are expected to compete in the J.P. Yamasaki Memorial Tournament Dec. 6-7 and 13-14 at the Santiago Tennis Club in Orange. Yamasaki, who played for Servite High, was killed last April in a skiing accident at Mammoth just before his sophomore season. Jack Kramer is scheduled to make the opening address at the tournament.