Olympics Have Golden Appeal

It took tennis 64 years to regain its medal status as an Olympic sport in 1988 and mere seconds for some of the world’s top players to renounce it.

John McEnroe wasn’t interested. Professionals shouldn’t be allowed to compete, was McEnroe’s contention at the time. The Olympic experience, he said, had been tainted.

Jimmy Connors wanted no part of it, either. Professionals who played at Seoul would receive no money, meaning that Connors’ idea of an Olympic experience had been tainted as well.

“I heard all of the complaining and it seemed absurd,” Tim Mayotte says. “When I first heard they were having an Olympic tennis event, five seconds later I said, ‘Of course.’

“Why wouldn’t you? These were the Olympics. To say no seemed insane to me.”

Mary Mayotte saw it the same way. Like son, like mother.

“The moment I knew I was on the team my mother called and said, ‘Oh, I have to go with you,’ ” Mayotte says.

In the Mayotte family, this was a momentous occasion.

Before Seoul, Mary had never attended one of Tim’s matches.

“Not in the pros, not in college, never,” Mayotte says. “It made her so nervous, she simply couldn’t deal with it. She always kept her distance. But, somehow, this was the most important thing to her.”

So Mary accompanied her son to Seoul and braved it all the way to the men’s singles final, where he lost the gold to Miloslav Mecir of Czechoslovakia.

And Mary?

“She was a basket case,” Mayotte says with a laugh. “There was a great shot on TV, with me serving to win (a semifinal) match and she’s right behind me in the stands with her head in her lap. I won the point, and her head stayed down there for three minutes.”

Pam Shriver won a gold medal in women’s doubles in Seoul and considers her absence from the mix in Barcelona probably the biggest disappointment of her career.

“Winning the Olympics ranks close to the very top when I consider the things I’ve accomplished in tennis,” she said. “My first Wimbledon (doubles) championship in ’81. Winning the Grand Slam in doubles. The win over (Steffi) Graf at Madison Square Garden during her Grand Slam year.

“I’ve had a few good ones, but the Olympics are tied for the top.”

Says Mayotte: “If you ask me if I’d rather win a gold medal or win Wimbledon, I have to tell you I’d rather be holding that Wimbledon trophy over my head.”

Still, the Olympics did something for Mayotte Wimbledon never could. They got his mom out to one of his matches.

Mary Mayotte, by the way, hasn’t been back to one since.