Dick Savitt, self-taught Tennis Hall of Famer, dies at 95

Well into his 60s, Dick Savitt was renowned for striking what tennis aficionados call a “heavy ball.” World-class players half Savitt’s age would hit with him in New York City and consistently be rocked on their heels by the thundering drives he would crack off both sides. Then again, this was a man who in 1951 had won both the Australian Championships and Wimbledon.

Savitt died on Friday, January 6 at the age of 95. Long regarded as the greatest Jewish player in tennis history, Savitt was a major contributor to a wide range of tennis-related causes, including the Israel Tennis & Education Centers and at Columbia University, home to a facility that bears his name. He was elected to the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1976.

Richard Savitt was born on March 4, 1927 in Bayonne, N.J. His father, Morris, was a meat broker. Playing a variety of sports as a child, Savitt taught himself to play tennis at age 14. His role model was Don Budge, owner of a lethal one-handed backhand that Savitt attempted to mimic down to the last detail.

Savitt’s first athletic love, however, was basketball. When Savitt’s family moved to Texas in 1944, he became an All-State forward. Following a stint in the Navy, Savitt enrolled at Cornell University in fall 1946, intending to play basketball and tennis. But an injury in his sophomore year curtailed his basketball career. Instead, Savitt devoted extensive hours to tennis.

Upon finishing at Cornell in 1950, he made a major mark on the tennis world later. A year earlier, Savitt had lost in the first round of the U.S. Nationals (the forerunner to the US Open). This time, he made it all the way to the semis, losing a tight four-setter to eventual champion Art Larsen. By the end of the year, Savitt was ranked sixth in the country.

His role model was Don Budge, owner of a lethal one-handed backhand that Savitt attempted to mimic down to the last detail.

Savitt’s march up the ranks accelerated even faster in 1951. That January, he won the Australian Championships. Along the way, Savitt earned what he would call “the biggest win of my life.” That semifinal victory came over one of the great Australians of that country’s golden era, Frank Sedgman, by the unusual score of 2-6, 7-5, 1-6, 6-3, 6-3. In the final, Savitt beat another Aussie, Ken McGregor, in four sets.

Six months later, Savitt was on the top of the world at the All England Club. Seeded sixth, he reached the Wimbledon final with a quarterfinal victory over Larsen followed by a comeback over another American, Herbie Flam—a player Savitt to that point had never beaten. After losing the first set of that match 6-1, Savitt trailed 5-1 in the second—but came back to win the set, 15-13, and then take the next two sets handily.

His final opponent once again was McGregor. Said Savitt years later, “Ken was a good matchup for me.” On the biggest stage in tennis, won that match 6-4, 6-4, 6-4.

Later in 1951, there came a controversial moment. As champion of Australia and Wimbledon, Savitt appeared the likely lead player on America’s Davis Cup team. And though he played in two of the preliminary rounds leading up to the finals—then called the “Challenge Round”—Savitt was left off the team for the last stage of the competition versus the mighty Australians.

Over the years, a number of theories for this have surfaced, including the desire of an ostensibly retired American, Ted Schroeder, to play; to various political machinations between Davis Cup captain Frank Shields and the team’s advisor, Jack Kramer; even to rumblings of anti-Semitism. While no one has ever learned the true answer as to why Savitt was benched, what is known was that a rusty Schroeder lost two of his three live rubbers. Savitt always refused to cite anti-Semitism for his exclusion.

Nonetheless, by the end of the next year, 1952, Savitt opted to stop playing tennis full-time.

“I wanted to make a living,” he said. “I didn’t want to become a traveling pro tennis player, nor did I want to be a teaching pro. So instead, I went into business.”

In Savitt’s case, that meant a return to Texas, where he worked for several years in the oil industry before relocating to New York City and entering the world of finance.

But even during that period, Savitt continued to intermittently dip his toes back into tennis—and these were hardly lightweight forays. One significant Savitt statement came in 1956. Having gone four years without playing a major, Savitt entered the U.S. Nationals and reached the quarterfinals. There, he took on the second-best player in the world, the great Australian Ken Rosewall. Trailing two sets to love and 3-4, love-40, Savitt launched an incredible comeback, winning the next two sets with a series of incredible shots from all corners of the court.

Though a weary Savitt had nothing left for the fifth, losing it 6-1, he’d clearly shown all the genius that had made him a champion. Writing in the New York Times, Hall of Fame writer Allison Danzig described the match as, “a display of racket virtuosity that approached the sublime.”

After losing the first set 6-1, Savitt trailed 5-1 in the second—but came back to win the set, 15-13, and then take the next two sets handily. Dick Savitt's semifinal victory at Wimbledon—which he would go on to win—in 1951

Of the 37 singles titles Savitt earned, 20 came after he stopped playing full-time. These included significant victories in Houston, St. Louis and Dallas. In 1961, at age 33, Savitt won the prestigious U.S. National Indoor Championships. The man he beat in the final, Whitney Reed, would that year be ranked No. 1 in the country.

An iconic fixture in the New York City tennis landscape, Savitt continued to practice and be an informal and inspirational mentor of sorts to a great many ascending players, including such notables as his fellow New York residents, Arthur Ashe and Vitas Gerulaitis.