John McEnroe was the most famous temper in tennis, and Boris Becker was the teenager who had to face him in front of a hostile American crowd. In this clip from his 2019 London Real interview, Becker tells Brian Rose what McEnroe was really like as an opponent, why he rates him as the best commentator in the game, and how a marathon Davis Cup match turned bitter rivals into close friends.
It is a warm, funny portrait of one great champion by another.
▶ Watch the full episode: Boris Becker – Play To Win: How I Reached the Wimbledon Hall of Fame
Talent and temperament
Becker starts with the tennis. McEnroe, he says, was one of the most talented players of all time, a left-hander with a unique style, wonderful touch and a great serve. But what most people remember is the temperament.
In those days there were no microphones on court, and players spoke to umpires and opponents in their own way. McEnroe was very verbal with everyone around him. Becker calls it his trademark, and his intimidation factor. He was fined often, and Becker recalls a match McEnroe lost because he was defaulted for his language. People forgave him, Becker says, because of the quality of his play. He was a New Yorker, and he lived it out on court.
He broke the rules, and changed them
Brian points out how un-tennis it all was, and how Wimbledon cringed. Becker agrees that tennis has always seen itself as a classy sport where you play within the rules. McEnroe, he says, “broke the rules every time he played”, but he was world number one for a long time, so the sport had to embrace him. It took a while, he notes, for Queen’s Club and Wimbledon to accept him.
If today’s players used a fraction of that language, Becker jokes, they would be fined for six months every year. He believes some rules were changed because of McEnroe, though he adds that McEnroe credited Jimmy Connors, and Connors credited Ilie Nastase. The 1970s were simply a wilder era.
Six hours against McEnroe
Then comes the Davis Cup. Back then, Becker explains, it was by far the most important team competition in tennis, and an honour to represent your country. His German teammates were ranked well below an American side that included McEnroe, Tim Mayotte and the world’s top doubles pair, Ken Flach and Robert Seguso.
Playing in front of a huge American crowd, with only a small group of Germans supporting him, Becker says he took it personally. Neither man would give in. With no tie-breaks in Davis Cup at the time, the sets went on and on, and he remembers the match lasting well over six hours, one of the longest ever played. Becker won in five sets.
How do you keep going in the sixth hour? “You get into a zone,” he says. The emotion carries you, and seeing the older McEnroe start to struggle physically only made him stronger. He savours the memory of quietening the home crowd, if only for a few minutes.
From enemies to friends
McEnroe was not happy afterwards, Becker says, and did not say a word to him. Today, though, they are close friends who have dinner together in London, at Wimbledon and in Manhattan, and he speaks fondly of McEnroe’s family.
He explains the old rivalry with an image: “when an old king faces a young king”, there is natural friction and tension. Each wanted what the other had, and that made for great matches. Time has calmed them both down.
Who is Boris Becker?
Boris Becker is a German former world number one. In 1985, aged 17, he became the youngest man to win the Wimbledon singles title, and he went on to win six Grand Slam singles titles, including three at Wimbledon, as well as two Davis Cup titles with West Germany. He later coached Novak Djokovic and has worked as a tennis commentator, including for the BBC at Wimbledon.
This clip comes from his 2019 London Real episode, Play To Win: How I Reached the Wimbledon Hall of Fame.
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Transcript
Transcript: Boris Becker – John McEnroe, The Davis Cup Epic And An Unlikely Friendship
0:00 Brian Rose: You mentioned learning some great new English language phrases from Mr John McEnroe. You had an epic battle with him at the Davis Cup, and there was a lot on the line there, because you’re defending your country in the Davis Cup, and you’re playing in New York City against John McEnroe. These days most people know John from commentating, as you do as well, but back then it was a different John. What was it like to play someone like him? And how would you describe John back then to someone who doesn’t know?
0:29 Boris Becker: John McEnroe was one of the most talented players of all time. Very, very successful in his own right, with a very unique style. But mostly he was known for his temperament. Back in the day, they didn’t have the microphones on the court, and players actually still talked to the umpires in their own kind of way, and even to the other players sometimes. So John was very verbal with them and everybody around him. That was his trademark, and that was his intimidation factor in a way.
1:05 Boris Becker: And so he got fined a lot. He did lose a match because he couldn’t finish it: he was defaulted by the umpire because of foul language or obscenity, or whatever it was called then. But that was his thing. People forgave him because of the quality of his play. And it did settle down at the end of his career; it became a bit calmer. But he’s a New Yorker. He was born and raised in Manhattan. If you’ve ever been there, you know what they’re like. So he was a typical New Yorker, and he lived it out on a tennis court.
1:39 Boris Becker: And obviously he’s had a great second career. I call him the best commentator in tennis, because of his unique way of looking at a tennis match and also allowing himself to express himself. He speaks almost, obviously the language is a bit better, but almost the way he spoke on a tennis court. And I think that’s what people like about him. He’s real. He says it how it is. Nowadays, in this PC world we’re living in, nobody can really say it was a double fault. They say: well, the second serve wasn’t as good as yesterday. I was going to use another word for it. Double fault. So I think that’s his quality, and I think people enjoy listening to him.
2:20 Brian Rose: It was also very un-tennis. When he came to Wimbledon, everyone was cringing. In a weird way, it’s not what you were used to, because very few opponents would do that kind of thing.
2:31 Boris Becker: Yeah. Tennis was always a very classy sport. You have to play within the rules. Well, he broke the rules every time he played a match. But by what he could do, he was the number one player in the world for quite a long time, so you have to embrace him for it. Yes, it took him a while to be a member of Queen’s, and Wimbledon struggled with accepting him. But eventually they did, because he was just so good and so unique.
3:00 Boris Becker: I think nowadays, if there’s anybody similar to him, I don’t find anybody. Because he was a lefty, and the way he played and the touch and the serve and the attitude and his whole personality was so unique. And that’s why he stands out.
3:16 Brian Rose: He used to break rackets, break glasses, argue with the umpire, yell at people, mutter to himself.
3:22 Boris Becker: I mean, if any of the athletes today used 10% of the language of [unclear], they’d be fined for six months every year.
3:31 Brian Rose: But he wasn’t.
3:32 Boris Becker: Well, he was fined. He was fined. And I’m sure he couldn’t finish every year on his own terms. But I think rules were changed because of him. And then John said: well, I learned everything from Jimmy Connors. And then Jimmy Connors would say: I learned everything from Ilie Nastase. So there was always somebody before that started this. It was just a different era. The 70s were a lot wilder than now.
3:58 Brian Rose: All right. So you learned some swear words yourself as well.
4:01 Boris Becker: Of course.
4:02 Brian Rose: And how did you not let John get in your head when you’re playing in New York City, Davis Cup? You’re representing Germany on American soil.
4:10 Boris Becker: Yeah. There’s a lot of talk about the Davis Cup nowadays, but back in the day, the Davis Cup was by far the most important team competition in tennis. It was an honour to represent your country, and you wanted to do well, even though your team wasn’t always the best. My teammates were great, but ranking-wise they were much lower. And we played America with McEnroe and Tim Mayotte, also a top 10 player, and then Flach and Seguso, the number one doubles team in the world. And we played in front of 15,000 crazy Americans. Maybe 100 or 250 Germans were there supporting us.
4:48 Boris Becker: And then it became a personal thing. I took it personally. It was the only way I could play. But then he didn’t want to lose, and I didn’t want to lose, and it became the longest match in history. We had this record for quite a long time. We battled it out for six hours and 42 minutes. They had no tie-break in the Davis Cup, so one set was 15-13, the other set was 12-10. It was back and forth, back and forth. I got the lucky end. I beat him in five sets. But that match will always stand out as one of our greatest of all time.
5:25 Brian Rose: How do you keep going in hour five and hour six? How do you do it?
5:29 Boris Becker: You get into a zone. Obviously you do feel tight because of the atmosphere, and you also wanted to show the 16,000 that you can’t beat me, I’m going to be stronger today. It just carries you. The whole emotion carries you. And then you find a way. You find a way to play another point, another game. And then obviously you see the other guy. John was a couple of years older than me, maybe physically struggling in the sixth hour, and that made you even stronger, and it drove you even faster. And then it became the satisfaction of beating John McEnroe on home soil, and quieting the 16,000 for a few minutes. Just a few minutes.
6:09 Brian Rose: Did John say anything afterwards?
6:11 Boris Becker: He was not happy. He was not happy. I don’t think he said a word to me afterwards.
6:16 Brian Rose: You guys later became friends.
6:18 Boris Becker: We have. We became good friends. Whenever he comes to see me in London and Wimbledon, we always have dinner together, and the same thing goes when I see him in Manhattan. Him and his wife, Patty, are dear friends of mine, and their children, a great couple. We became very close friends. We were the biggest enemies on the court. We were going after each other, you can’t believe it. But time has calmed us down a little bit, and we’ve become good friends now.
6:47 Brian Rose: How is that? Because you both shared something special? Because you both know how each other felt at that time? You’re probably the only guys in the world who know what it’s like to be on Centre Court and [unclear].
6:58 Boris Becker: Yeah. Maybe he saw a little bit of himself in me, and obviously I respected him a great deal for his performances. When an old king faces a young king, there’s natural friction and animosity and just a lot of tension in the air. And I think that’s how we felt then. Nowadays, we realise there’s enough space for all of us. It’s good now. But back in the day, he was very competitive, and it was one-on-one. He wanted something that I had, and I wanted something that he had, and that made for great matches.
