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James Scott ("Jimmy") Connors (born September 2, 1952 in East St. Louis, Illinois) is a former American tennis champion who was the World No. 1 player for 160 consecutive weeks from July 1974 to August 1977. He was also the World No. 1 player an additional 8 times during his career. He won eight Grand Slam singles titles and two Grand Slam doubles titles. He is often considered to be one of the top male tennis players of all time. Currently, he is coaching U.S. tennis player Andy Roddick.
Career Connors went to college for a year at UCLA, where he won the NCAA singles title in 1971. He turned professional in 1972 and won his first professional title later that year in Jacksonville, Florida. Connors' competitiveness on court quickly made him stand out. He refused to accept that he was beaten and gave everything on every point of every game, no matter how apparently hopeless the cause. He also was not averse to playing to the crowd (he once remarked that "I want to bring the crowd into the match: in short, turn it into a football game") or abusing his opponent or the umpire—anything he could think of to give himself an edge. His brash behaviour both on and off court earned him a reputation as the brat of the tennis world. He acquired the nickname of the "Brash Basher of Belleville" (after the St Louis suburb where he grew up). His high-profile romance with fellow teen tennis prodigy Chris Evert in the early years of his career also helped to keep him in the headlines. Connors also acquired a reputation as a in 1972 when he refused to join the newly formed Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), the union that was embraced by most male professional players. He avoided the mainstream of professional tennis to play in, and dominate, a series of smaller tournaments organized by Bill Riordan, his manager and a promoter. In 1974, Connors and Riordan began filing lawsuits, eventually amounting to US $10 million, against the ATP and its president Arthur Ashe for allegedly restricting Connors' freedom in the game. It started when Connors was banned from the French Open in 1974 after he had signed a contract to play World Team Tennis (WTT) for Baltimore. The ATP and the French Tennis Federation opposed WTT because it conflicted with the French Open; therefore, all entries to the French Open from WTT players were refused. The French Open was the only Grand Slam tournament that Connors did not win in 1974. He won the Australian Open, defeating Phil Dent in four sets in the final. Connors then beat Ken Rosewall in straight sets in the finals of both Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. Therefore, his exclusion from the French Open possibly prevented him from becoming the first male player since Rod Laver to win all four Grand Slam singles titles in one year. Though he reached the semifinals on four occasions, Connors never won the French Open. Connors reached the World No. 1 ranking in July 1974 and held it for 160 straight weeks. Over the course of his career, he held the World No. 1 ranking for a total of 268 weeks. In 1975, Connors was the runner-up in the three Grand Slam singles tournaments he had won the year before. The 1975 Wimbledon final was a duel between lawsuit opponents, as Connors faced ATP president Arthur Ashe. Ashe won, and shortly thereafter Connors dropped the suits and parted with Riordan. In 1976, Connors met Björn Borg in the final of the U.S. Open and saved four set points in a third-set tie-breaker (which Connors won 11-9) to beat the Swede 6-4, 3-6, 7-6, 6-4. Despite his success, Connors remained an independent character with little respect for traditions and other people's expectations. At Wimbledon in 1977, he refused to participate in a parade of former champions to celebrate the tournament's centenary and was booed when he played the following day. He still managed to make the final but lost to Borg in a five-set final. Connors also lost in the final of the U.S. Open to Guillermo Vilas. Having irritated sponsors and tennis officials by shunning the end-of-year Masters championships for the previous three years, Connors entered the competition for the first time in 1977 and beat Borg in the final. Borg beat Connors comfortably in the 1978 Wimbledon final, but Connors came back and defeated the Swede in the U.S. Open final 6-4, 6-2, 6-2, which was the first final held at the Flushing Meadows venue. With this U.S. Open win, Jimmy Connors became the first (and only) male tennis player to win this tournament on three different surfaces: grass (1974), clay (1976), and hard court (1978). After a few less successful years on the tour, Connors was back in the Wimbledon final in 1982 where he faced the new young star of the tennis world, John McEnroe. Connors defeated the defending champion, as Connors recovered from being three points away from defeat in a fourth set tiebreak to win in five sets and claim his second Wimbledon title eight years after his first. Connors also defeated another of the next generation of tennis stars, Ivan Lendl, in the 1982 and 1983 U.S. Open finals. Connors last Grand Slam final came at Wimbledon in 1984, where he again faced McEnroe. This time, McEnroe won easily 6-1, 6-1, 6-2. Though beaten, Connors' competitive fire was certainly not dampened. Asked afterwards if he now admitted his rival was the better player, he simply replied, "Never." Considered a feisty wiseguy in his earlier days, Connors gradually transformed himself into a respected elder of the tennis world in the later years of his career. He continued to compete forcefully against much younger men until he was well into his 41st year. The defining moment of Connors' later career came in 1991. His career had seemed to be at an end in 1990, when he played only three tournament matches (and lost all three), dropping to No. 936 in the world rankings. But after surgery on his deteriorating left wrist, he came back to play 14 tournaments in 1991, climaxing with his run at the U.S. Open. While celebrating his 39th birthday during the championships, Connors reached the semifinals before being beaten by the reigning French Open champion Jim Courier. During his career, Connors won a record 109 men's singles titles. He also won 15 doubles titles (including the men's doubles titles at Wimbledon in 1973 and the U.S. Open in 1975). In his 1979 autobiography, Jack Kramer, the long-time tennis promoter and great player himself, ranks Connors as one of the 21 best players of all time. Connors was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, Rhode Island in 1998 and has his own star on the St. Louis Walk of Fame. On July 24, 2006, at the start of the Countrywide Classic tournament in Los Angeles, American tennis player Andy Roddick formally announced his partnership with Connors as his coach. Personal life Connors and Chris Evert had planned to marry in October 1974 but it was called off. In 1980 Connors married the model Patti McGuire and they now have two children and live in the Santa Barbara, California, area. In the spring of 2006, Connors had successful hip replacement surgery at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. * Notes Wins (8) Runner-ups (7) Australian Open Wimbledon U.S. Open Singles record Career championships (109) and losing finalist (54) Singles champion (105) (4 non-ATP tour wins not listed): Singles losing finalist (49) (5 non-ATP tour finals not listed): | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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