U.S. tennis Hall of Famer Mulloy was known as ‘Miami Mouthpiece’
MIAMI — Gardner Mulloy, a member of the International Tennis Hall of Fame who won 129 U.S. national titles and played competitively into his 90s, has died at age 102.
The longtime Miami resident died Monday night, said his wife, Jackie.
Mulloy won five Grand Slam doubles titles, was ranked No. 1 in the United States in 1952 and started the University of Miami tennis program.
Mulloy, who served in the Navy during the Second World War, was 31 when the war ended, and his tennis career had barely begun. At age 43, he won the Wimbledon doubles title with Budge Patty and helped the U.S. Davis Cup team reach the final. He would have turned 103 on Nov. 22. “I was older than most of the players of my era, and usually I was in better shape than them,” he said in 1997. “I won almost all of my five-set matches. I didn’t drink or smoke, and I watched my diet.”
In his prime, Mulloy took defeat badly and feuded with the USTA and Wimbledon. Outspoken, opinionated and occasionally ill-mannered, he was the sport’s ugly American before John McEnroe was even born. He became known as the Miami Mouthpiece.
“Gardner Mulloy,” wrote one London columnist, “should throw his racket over a cliff and forget to let go.”
Mulloy began playing tennis at age 8 on a court in his backyard.
He graduated with a law degree in 1938 and cracked the U.S. top-10 rankings before Second World War took him off the tournament circuit.