In creating
last week’s list of the 20 greatest moments in modern sports
history, I quite obviously shortchanged several major categories or
sports — all for reasons that make sense to me — but they do
merit acknowledgement nonetheless.
(I write this, by the way, before reading any reader comments or
letters, so as not to be affected by the tenor of those
responses.)
The first category is women’s sports. Of 30
moments (including honorable mentions), the single women’s entry
was Nadia Comaneci’s series of perfect “10s.” The problem is that,
aside from tennis, women’s sports just haven’t been consistently
high profile — and that the ones that do grab attention every four
years, namely gymnastics and figure skating, I just have a strong
distaste for sports whose scores themselves (not the rules, but the
actual scores) are determined by judges.
Nonetheless, women’s tennis probably deserved more attention.
The problem with the great Evert-Navratilova “rivalry” was that the
contest really was rarely close: when Navratilova was pudgy, Evert
won almost every match; after Navratilova suddenly used whatever
means she did to get fit virtually overnight, she completely
dominated Evert.
The start of the great era of women’s tennis as a major public
sport was probably Margaret Court’s epic 14-12, 11-9 victory over
Billie Jean King at Wimbledon in 1970; Court’s Grand Slam that
year, and Steffi Graf’s Grand Slam in 1988, probably merit
inclusion on any list of all-time great sports achievements.
The other great women’s event that most people would include is
the 1999 Women’s World Cup victory by the USA in a shootout with
China. It was riveting theatre. Sorry I couldn’t find room for it
on my original list.
The second shortchanged category is team
dynasties. The Montreal Canadiens in the 1950s, '60s and
'70s; the Boston Celtics of the 1960s; the UCLA Bruins of John
Wooden; the New York Yankees of the 1920s and 1950s; the Los
Angeles Lakers of the 1980s and Chicago Bulls of the 1990s; and
probably the Pittsburgh Steelers of the 1970s and San Francisco
49ers of the 1980s-90s all have good reason to complain. The
problem is, it’s hard to fit dynasties into the category of sports
“moment.” Clearly, Michael Jordan’s last-second,
championship-winning shot in 1998 was better than the best of
fairy-tales — but then he went and sort of ruined the effect by
coming out of retirement and ending his career with a slow
fade.
(Speaking of career-ending high notes, John Elway finishing his
career with two straight Super Bowl titles is as good as it gets.
Now that was an extended “moment” that is hard to
top.)
In general, basketball was under-included on my
list. Yes, Hondo stole the ball. Yes, David Thompson’s
extraordinary performance in the 1974 Final Four, breaking up
Wooden’s string of titles, was about as good as individual
performances ever get in team sports. Yes, Bobby Knight’s
undefeated 1976 team of Quinn Buckner, Kent Benson, Scott May, Tom
Abernethy, and others was astonishingly good (although its very
dominance robbed its championship games of pulse-pounding drama).
Yes, Magic and Bird had some great match-ups. Yes, Lorenzo Charles
stuffing it home over Phi Slamma Jamma to send Jimmy V racing
around the court was as dramatic as sports can get. I have no good
excuse for not including such events, other than that they just
didn’t “stick” in my memory with the vividness that other great
contests did.
Next, non-championship events were deliberately
excluded from my list, specifically because they weren’t ultimately
definitive. Mind-boggling NFL playoff games such as the Steelers
“Immaculate Reception” win in 1972, the Raiders “Sea of Hands” win
over Miami in 1974, the Chargers’ “Epic in Miami” (also known as
the “Kellen Winslow game”) in 1982, the 49ers takedown of the
Saints earlier this year, and of course “The Catch” by Dwight Clark
in 1981 all created lasting memories. (I did include the Ice Bowl
on my list even though it was followed by a Super Bowl because,
before the Jets’ win in SB III, the NFL championship really was the
bigger deal.) Similarly in baseball, the Red Sox over the Angels in
1986, the Mets over the Astros that same year, and the “Greatest
Night in Baseball History” last September (the final day of the
regular season, with its multi-stage dramas), all were wonderful
showcases of sport.
Baseball, in general, fared less well than it
should have, considering that it is America’s Pastime. I wasn’t
alive yet for Bill Mazeroski’s blast to beat the Yankees in game 7
in 1960; Joe Carter’s walk-off homer in the 1993 World Series, Tug
McGraw’s infectious enthusiasm and last-out save in 1980, and the
Miracle Mets of 1969 all deserve a place in the sun as well. Ditto
Cal Ripken’s homer as he broke the consecutive-games streak. Oh,
well….
The 1940s, '50s, and '60s all were
under-included; TV either wasn’t existent or wasn’t as ubiquitous
then, so fewer people experienced the thrills first-hand. Ted
Williams, Johnny Unitas, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, the
Palmer-Nicklaus-Hogan battle at Cherry Hills in 1960, the Bob
Gibson masterpieces in the mid-'60s, the Bob Mathias decathlons,
Rocky Marciano’s undefeated career, and Bob Beamon’s long jump all
suffered exclusion because of it. (For that matter, the Babe’s
prodigious feats in the 1920s and the great feats in the 1930s by
Joe Louis and Babe Didrickson Zaharias belong in any all-time
sports compendium.)
Non-human-powered racing lost out, big-time.
NASCAR and Indy racing may be hugely entertaining, but I just don’t
know how to rank a sport where the power is all mechanical. And
while I just couldn’t fail to include Secretariat’s
Triple-Crown-winning Belmont run, my pro-human bias led me to
exclude what otherwise were three of the most thrilling sports
events imaginable: the astonishing Affirmed-Alydar duals in 1978
and the extreme near-misses for the Triple Crown by Silver Charm in
1997 and Real
Quiet in 1998.
Finally, I admit to a U.S. bias. For the rest
of the globe, the World Cup in soccer equals or even exceeds the
Olympics in interest and importance. Bah, humbug. I loved playing
soccer, but watching it (unless played by cute little kids whose
enthusiasm is entertaining) just isn’t my thing. No can do. Too
little scoring, too little chance for arm-chair strategizing. And
without a strong U.S. interest, it just doesn’t rate. Likewise for
other sports like cricket, and likewise for whatever Olympic
victories other nations may consider as epics but which made no
impression on yours jingoistically truly.
So there. I’m sure there are other things I’ve forgotten. Sports
are almost infinitely able to produce excitement, highlight great
human effort, and capture the imagination.
I exit with a bonus. In the end, it meant net
to nothing — er, I mean next to nothing. It not only
produced no championship, but not even an appearance in a
tournament final. It wasn’t a match at the absolute highest level
of its sport at the time (just shy of the highest level, but still
a small step below). And it wasn’t even the defining victory of the
main protagonist’s career. But for sheer, delightful, ultra-fun
entertainment value, if I on my death-bed 65 years hence am allowed
to re-watch just one single sporting event, the odds are I would
ask again to watch the Labor Day 1991 U.S. Open tennis
match, on Jimmy Connors’ 39th birthday, in which Jimbo won his
fourth-round match (he later won
in the quarter-finals, too, before being dominated in the
semis) in a fifth-set
tie-breaker over Aaron Krickstein. It wasn’t just the scrappy
tennis. It wasn’t just the long rallies, nor the acrobatic
displays, nor the improbably multiple comebacks from the dead. And
it wasn’t just Connors’ showmanship — mugging for the camera,
showing more humor this time rather than his famous crassness,
talking through the camera to the TV audience to say “This is what
they come for. This is what they want.” Instead, it was all of
these things wrapped together in one supposedly over-the-hill
package, coming off of wrist surgery, in his personal play-yard in
Flushing Meadow, with the crowd absolutely going bonkers.
Watching it on TV as Jimbo fell behind 2-5 in the final set, I
literally found myself reciting Dylan Thomas. “C’mon, Jimbo,” I
heard myself saying, semi-aloud. “Do not go gentle into that good
night. Rage, Jimbo. Rage against the dying of the light.”
Any sports event that can inspire recitations of poetry while it
is still occurring is an event not just for the aged but for the
ages.
Jimbo did not go gentle. Jimbo raged — and joked, and clowned,
and hustled, and raged some more. Raged, in the most likable way
rage has ever been presented. This was that unique sort of rage
that grows not from hate but from sheer love of the game, a healthy
rage, indeed a joyful rage (if such a thing can be). James Scott
Connors was not the greatest tennis player ever. But, despite all
his faults, he was by far the most fun to watch. And if sports
isn’t fun, well, forget it.
But don’t forget this match. Remember it, and marvel.
