!1574285 by Pete Bodo
Snow day, for the second time this month!
Not only that, but both of these recent winter storms hit New York on Thursday, translating to a three-day weekend. I spent this morning cleaning off the truck (no need to screw around with snow shovels when you have four-wheel drive and the off-road suspension package), although I'm not sure how even the estimable Blue Whale (my extended cab Chevy Silverado) will like the 30-plus inches that await us in game-rich Andes tomorrow.
And on Monday, of course, we have the Billie Jean King Cup, at Madison Square Garden. I almost perversely wished that the exhibition would have taken place last night, so we could have a re-enactment of that legendary 1947 Madison Square Garden exo, which took place during a snowstorm that paralyzed the city of New York. Yet over 15,000 Manhattanites braved a severe snowstorm that shut down the rest of the city to witness Jack Kramer's debut as a pro (he lost to Bobby Riggs).
It's a pity that Riggs is better known for losing to Billie Jean King in that bizarre but astonishingly resonant spectacle in the Astrodome in 1973 than he is for cleaning Kramer's clock that night in '47, because it helped ensure that Riggs would remain probably the most underestimated of pre-Open era champions.
Live by the Sugar Daddy, die by the Sugar Daddy, right?
As most of you know, we will not have a Venus vs. Serena Williams battle for the BJK Cup on Monday night, and that's a good thing. It's hard enough for the sisters to play each other at major events; when you pair them in an exhibition, almost all your hopes for a combative, high-stakes, leave-it-all-on-the-court throwdown go right out the window. How on earth can you expect either of those women to muster the kind of intensity that plays so well to New York, with nothing but a slight difference in the cash payout on the line?
Williams sisters + Exo = Yawn. Unless, of course, you've never been lucky enough to see Venus and Serena engage in combat in a meaningful context, in which case getting a glimpse of either of those icons, alive and in person, is reward enough. But while they aren't an ideal exhibition pairing, Madison Square Garden has shown a few times over just how valuable exhibitions, done right, can be to tennis.
Madison Square Garden is often referred to as the mecca of indoor sporting arenas. I never understood that except in the narrow sense that New Yorkers tend to assume that anything they do, think, embrace or have is. . . the best. The highest (or is it lowest) embodiment of that sensibility is the person of one Donald Trump, who abuses the word "best" with unexpected and irritating creativity. Who knew the word "best" could sound so, well, offensive?
But while I find it hard to put the New York Knicks or Rangers (the two main pro teams that have called the "mecca" home) up on a pedestal, the Garden has done pretty well when it comes to boxing and - tennis.
Ignore for now the plethora of great matches once produced by the Grand Prix Masters (the forerunner of the ATP World Tour championships) or the Virginia Slims finals, both winter extravaganzas that allowed tennis to shine in the media capital of the world. The exhibitions held at MSG deserve a place of merit on their own.
In addition to that Kramer-Riggs showdown, two other exos of historic significance were played at the Garden. In 1939, the redoubtable Don Budge drew over 17,000 fans to the Garden for his debut as a pro, against Ellsworth Vines (whom Budge hammered). And in 1970, the Garden hosted that epic, $10,000 winner-take-all match that more-or-less became the defining moment of the rivalry between Rod Laver and Pancho Gonzalez. Sloughing off the liabilities of a 41-year old, Gonzalez taught the whipper-snapper Aussie a lesson, winning a thrilling five-setter. It's easy to take a crowd of 15,000-plus for granted these days, but given the times, all three of those exos were nothing less than astonishingly successful.
With no chance of Venus and Serena meeting in the final on Monday, we might yet see a great match (Kim Clijsters vs. Venus, anyone?). I tend to doubt it, though, because these aren't your grandfather's exos. Back in the day (of Budge, Kramer et al), almost all of pro tennis was exhibition-based, and those gifted outcasts from the official game played exos as if they were Grand Slam finals. For them, they were comparably critical. But as the Open era unfolded post-1968, "official" tournament tennis (with a few select exceptions) became, or positioned itself, as the only legitimate form of the sport.
That's a pity, in many ways. For a meaningful menu of exhibitions could do the sport a lot of good. If and when Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal play exhibitions these day (the same holds true for any player renowned enough to be offered exo opportunities), it's understood by everyone that they're glorified practice or hitting sessions. But I have to wonder, wouldn't it be great if some entrepreneur signed Federer and Nadal to a best-of-3 series of exos to be played over a comfortable period of time in the winter months, at sites chosen to level the playing field (clay, hard, indoor)?
I can see the inherent problems and confusion that might sow. And it's hard not to attribute some of the success of those famous Garden exos to the fact that those 15,000 fans had no chance to see any of the top pros, who were also the world's top players most of the time, in action at Forest Hills, or Wimbledon. But as the drudgery of week-in, week-out ATP Tour competition takes its toll on Federer, as well as his younger rival, something like a meaningful series of exos might enable us to squeeze a little more juice out of the Federer-Nadal orange.
And you know how it is with those two - you can never get enough.