The Bud Collins History of Tennis: An Authoritative Encyclopedia and Record Book
By Bud Collins, New Chapter Press, 756 pages
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Bud Collins, the dean of American broadcasters, has contributed mightily to tennis. His singular broadcasts have made him a household figure; his columns for the Boston Globe are the stuff of legend. And he’s written for this and many other tennis magazines. In tennis there’s just one Bud and true aficionados will read with some wonder the History of Tennis, which many in the pressroom simply refer to as “the Bud.”
This new edition of his encyclopedia eclipses his last effort, as it contains a remarkable amount of fresh material, a mind-blowing statistical section and Open Era Register, adds a section on the other major tournaments outside of the Slams, including Indian Wells and Miami, updates the year by year recounts, including brilliant sections on Federer, Nadal, Mauresmo and the U.S. ending its Davis Cup drought in ‘07. It also contains dozens of snappy profiles on the game’s most significant and relevant competitors.
Collins’ seemingly unquenchable thirst for revealing the beauty of the game is never more apparent than here. He can turn the driest fact into the juiciest tidbit. Noting that Elizabeth Ryan won her last title in Russia in 1914, Collins quotes her as saying, ‘I got the last train out as the war descended.”
Almost every contest is noteworthy, every decent player’s up and downs worth taking a gander at. “At best, tennis does deliciously evoke Kipling’s iffy imposters, Triumph and Disaster,” he writes. “Obviously a Borg-McEnroe, Agassi-Sampras, Evert-Navratilova, Graf-Seles epic does — but a first rounder between nobodies can be just as gripping. Tennis can twist you into knots.”
Tennis junkies will reel in delight with the amount of information in the Encyclopedia. Collins leaves few water bottles uncapped in tracing the roots of the game from 1874 right up until the end of last year. He has thorough and delightful accounts of every year in the sport, beginning in 1919 with a review of Suzanne Lenglen’s arrival on the world scene as a big-me player and celebrity. No player worth his or her salt escapes notice — not Tilden, Budge, Marble, Riggs, Pancho Gonzalez, Gibson, Emmo, Newc, his beloved BJK, Jimbo, Chrissie, Martina 1, Martina II and Hewitt. Of 22-time Slam winner Steffi Graf, Collins writes, “Steel-willed and industrious, she displayed full-speed-ahead-damn-the-slings-and-arrows character in the face of daunting physical injuries and emotional trials. Probably no great champion has played hurt so often.”
Of 14-time Slam titlist Pete Sampras, he observes, “He knows what he’s doing now, doing it as ‘Silky’ Sampras, smoothly, uniquely, gilding along the path of greatness in an outwardly unconcerned and effortless manner while mounting planned and concerted assaults on the citadels of the past.”
Only a true devotee is capable of penning such a tremendous tome. Collins writes, “If the grass is greener on the other side of the sea, then we must be thinking of Wimbledon.”
