For Love and Money : After 2 Big Upsets, 16-Year-Old Decides to End Amateur Status and Turn Pro

Pete Sampras has finally figured out what every high school kid would like to know: how to ditch four days of school and receive congratulations for it rather than a reprimand.

When Sampras, a junior at Palos Verdes High School, entered the Newsweek Champions Cup tennis tournament in Indian Wells early this month, he did it as a 16-year-old amateur.

Five days later, Sampras walked away from the tennis courts at the Grand Champions hotel with a check for $7,000.

Along the way, he opened the eyes of the tennis world with a brace of stunning upsets over top professionals. His victims were Ramesh Krishnan of India, ranked No. 37 in the world, and 25th-ranked Eliot Teltscher.

He fell in straight sets to 18th-ranked Emilio Sanchez of Spain in the third round, but Sampras’ immediate future had been decided. After losing to Sanchez, Sampras set the ink to the paper work officially ending his amateur career; he became a professional just six months after earning his driver’s license.

The next day, he was back in the classroom. His teachers didn’t slap a readmission slip on top of his desk.

“They just congratulated me,” Sampras said sheepishly. “The school sent a letter to my house saying I was missing too much class, though.”

Sampras’ tennis game isn’t missing too much, however.

His weapons are a blistering forehand and a scrappy serve-and-volley game, and the 5-foot-10, 140-pounder has caught the attention of Tennis Magazine and World Tennis, publications that tout Sampras and his youthful peers, Andre Agassi and Michael Chang, as the brightest American hopes for the future.

“All the tennis experts call him an unbelievable talent,” said Bob Kain, chief of the tennis division of Cleveland-based International Management Group, which has represented players such as Martina Navratilova, Bjorn Borg and Chris Evert. As of last week, Kain’s firm represents the fledgling pro Sampras.

“There haven’t been too many Americans come along in the last 10 years with his ability,” Kain said. “And after qualifying for two major tournaments, he knows he can play with the big boys.”

Sampras made his major tournament debut in February at the Ebel U. S. Indoor Championships in Philadelphia and qualified for the main draw. He fell to Sammy Giammalva, 6-4, 6-3, in the first round.

“I got my expenses paid for in that tournament, but as an amateur I couldn’t accept any money,” Sampras said. “I would have won $1,800 for making it to the main draw and losing, but I had to leave $600 sitting on the table there.”

That convinced Sampras to forgo his amateur status if he made it past the second round of another pro event. He knew the time had come when he shocked Teltscher, a 10-year veteran of the pro circuit, who lives just a long lob away from Sampras in Palos Verdes.

Sampras’ big week at the $700,000 Indian Wells tournament was like a dream:

It began when he mowed his way through a trio of would-be qualifiers--Americans Todd Nelson (the top-seeded qualifier and No. 87 in the world) and Dexter McBride, then Fredrik Waern of Sweden--to reach the first round of the main draw and earn a date with Krishnan.

The match against the veteran Krishnan--whose deceptive, smooth base-line game put him in the quarterfinals at Wimbledon in 1986 and who led India to the Davis Cup final last year--turned out to be a classic.

In the first set, the opportunistic Sampras took advantage of Krishnan’s spotty ground strokes and won, 6-3. But the crafty Krishnan conjured up some magical second-set shot-making and evened the match at 6-3, 3-6 against the youngster, who admitted he had psyched himself out by that point.

“It went into my mind that this guy’s in the Top 30 in the world. I was wondering when he was gonna start playing,” Sampras said.

They dueled to a 6-6 deadlock in the final set, but Krishnan took a commanding 6-4 lead in the tiebreaker. It was the first of five match points the Indian held, but the dogged Sampras hung in with a mix of brilliant and blatantly lucky shots.

Then Sampras rifled a backhand volley past Krishnan to win the tiebreaker, 11-9, and the match, 6-3, 3-6, 7-6.

“He played so well in those tiebreaker points,” Krishnan said. “It is amazing to play that well when he’s young.”

Sampras was almost as stunned as Krishnan.

“It all happened so fast,” he said. “I got some lucky breaks. But I’m sure I’ll lose a lot of close matches like that in the future.”

After a day off, Sampras did battle with Teltscher, who has been a fixture on the pro tour for 10 years.

Teltscher and his youthful neighbor have been friends for six years and practice together often. But on stadium court at Indian Wells, the two were all business.

“He knew and I knew it,” Sampras said. “We were out there to beat each other.”

A partisan crowd pulled for an upset by Sampras when he showcased some of his finest play of the tournament en route to a 7-5 first-set victory. Teltscher rallied back to match his neighbor, 3-3, in the second set, but Sampras rattled off the next three games and gave the crowd what it wanted, toppling his 29-year old opponent, 7-5, 6-3.

Sampras was poised for his third straight upset when he fought Sanchez, a clay-court specialist, to a 5-5 tie in the first set of their third round match. Then Sampras, who was serving at 40-love, lost five straight points--and his concentration went with them.

The Spaniard rallied to take the first set, 7-5, and was flawless the rest of the way. He won, 7-5, 6-2.

“My lack of concentration gave Sanchez a lot of confidence,” Sampras said. “He was really free on his shots after that. Plus I was still a little down on myself.”

Turning professional later that afternoon bucked up Sampras’ spirits.

It also punctuated a stellar amateur career that included the title of the U. S. Olympic Festival in 1987 and a loss to Chang in the final of the U.S. Hardcourt Championships last year.

Not to mention a prep career in which, as a sophomore at Palos Verdes, Sampras was undefeated in 56 sets and captured the CIF-4A singles crown.

Now that Sampras has ascended from the junior ranks, the United States can pin its future hopes on a new trio of deluxe young players:

Chang, 16, of Placentia, is a skilled base-liner who grinds out points and relies on counterpunching--he waits for his opponent to force the action and responds. Last year, Chang became the youngest player to win a U. S. Open match when he downed Australian Paul McNamee.

Agassi is a free-spirited 17-year-old Las Vegan with a punkish hair style and a booming forehand. He upset defending Wimbledon champion Pat Cash in the 1987 Stratton Mountain tournament and almost knocked off the world’s No. 1 player, Ivan Lendl, in the semifinals. The colorful Agassi is ranked No. 17 in the world.

Sampras, whose game is a bit of a blend of both of his peers. Quick-footed, he is comfortable sniping away from the base line, but prefers an uncompromising serve-and-volley game. He’s also become a more aggressive player, scrapping his punchless two-handed backhand two years ago (along with his wooden rackets) in favor of a free-wheeling one-hander.

Along with his new-found pro career, Sampras will also have to deal with the pressures of the American public yearning for a new champion. Recent American prodigies like Jimmy Arias and Aaron Krickstein have been both brilliant at times and erratic at others and never really fulfilled their promise.

“American tennis can’t get any worse,” Sampras said. “It can only get better.

“But I’m not too worried about what happened to (Arias and Krickstein). I think they were looking at the money signs instead of their tennis game. I’m going to work on my game. The money will come later.”

The money came very quickly for West Germany’s Boris Becker, who won his first Wimbledon title in 1985 when he was 17. But even now, at age 20, Becker admitted his ascendancy to tennis’ pinnacle was extraordinary.

“That’s not a normal path for a tennis player,” Becker said at Indian Wells. “Sometimes you go to Mars before you go to the moon.”

Sampras would prefer to land on the moon first.

When he finishes his junior year at Palos Verdes in June, he’ll embark on a tour of major tournaments, including the U. S. Open, on every surface. The next pro tourney for Sampras will be the Wild Dunes 32-draw tournament in Charleston, which begins April 25.

Sampras will test the waters in the qualifying rounds of tournaments rather than entering main draws. He wants to play at least 12 tournaments this year (the minimum to receive a world ranking), and the qualifying rounds will give him a lot of valuable match play. In the main draws, he could suffer a lot of first round blowouts at the hands of seeded players like Lendl, Becker, Mats Wilander, and Stefan Edberg.

“I don’t want to psyche myself out,” he said. “I might be playing Boris Becker. Well, this guy’s supposed to be great. But I don’t play as well when I think about who I’m playing. I’ve got to play my own game and not worry about the guy being in the Top 10 in the world. Then I might let up and get down on myself.”

Kain says Sampras’ mental stability may be the most solid part of the youngster’s make-up. Sampras plans to get his high school diploma through correspondent courses while he’s on the tour.

“He’s got a very good perspective on what’s important, and he’s got a great future ahead,” Kain said. “It’s tough being a 16-year-old pro. He can’t go at too fast a pace. But his family and his coach are very supportive. He’s got a great team behind him.”

Teltscher agreed that Sampras’ future is bright. He thinks the trio of Sampras, Chang and Agassi is the best group of American juniors since he and John McEnroe broke onto the scene 10 years ago. But he cautioned the young players to take things slowly at first.

“At the beginning, it’s all a new world,” Teltscher said. “It’s like a new toy. But you can’t play too much too soon. Right at the beginning you’ve got to make sure you’re not trying to do it all.”

Sampras’ coach for the last seven years has been Dr. Peter Fischer, a pediatrician. His father, Sam, is a mechanical engineer for the U. S. Air Force Space Division in El Segundo. Both Sampras’ mother and father encouraged him to play in his first junior tournament at age 7.

Sampras was hitting tennis balls last week at the Jack Kramer Tennis Club in Rancho Palos Verdes with 68-year-old Bodie Fite, who has been a member at the club for 55 years. Fite returned all of Sampras’ high-kicking topspin serves and bullet forehands with the patience of one who has seen a lot of good tennis talent in his days.

“I played with all those damn kids--Teltscher, Tracy Austin--all of ‘em,” Fite said. “This kid Sampras might be the best of ‘em. He’s got it all ahead of him.”

Sampras’ first-round victim at Indian Wells is another believer.

“He serves and plays the net very well, which is impressive,” Krishnan said. “He’s 16 and playing great. It’s very difficult to tell how good when you’re that young, but he does have a lot of potential.”

Sampras, whose idol is Rod Laver, agrees he has the potential. Now he just needs to set it into motion.

“My one goal is to win Wimbledon someday,” Sampras said. “It’s been my goal for the last four years.

“That doesn’t mean I will do it. But I can.”