Why would you want to play tennis when you’re not going to be No1?
PATRICK McENROE ON LIFE IN THE SHADOW OF HIS FAMOUS BROTHER ... WHO LIKED TO YELL JUST LIKE OUR ANDY
I love the Murrays. It’s amazing what they have done
HE made shots, he made finals, he now makes tennis players. He helps shape human beings, too. It did not take serious illness to remind Patrick McEnroe of the realities of life. But it did make them starker.
The coach and former tour player — and brother of John, of course — has recovered from a bout of Covid-19 and in the immediate aftermath of that ordeal found a link with his past.
McEnroe, once general manager for United States Tennis Association player development, was always concerned with those under his care.
‘I watched a video on Covid treatment in New York the other night,’ he says. ‘Right in the middle of it was a doctor called Ryan Thatcher. He was in our programme. I always remember noticing how good he was but people told me that he was not interested in a career in tennis he wanted to be a doctor.
‘He is doing that now, helping people who were ill like me. Life is amazing.’
Now in his role as a director of the John McEnroe Tennis Academy, the 53-year-old can use his experience as a player, a coach and a brother to help those who not only want to excel on court but prosper in life. McEnroe reached the top 30 in the world, was a Grand Slam winner as a doubles player and captained the US Team to a Davis Cup victory in 2007, yet inevitably sits in the shadow of his more famous sibling. He does not shrink from this perception.
‘We still work together in the academy, we do commentary together. We have had a long road together, some bumps along the way,’ he says of his role at the three academies in New York state. ‘The truth is that John was my biggest supporter. When I graduated from Stanford, I had done really well until in my last year tennis-wise I didn’t do great. I wasn’t sure if I should try the pro tour.
‘My mom was a hard ass, God rest her. An amazing woman, but she was tough. She was tough on my dad, too. When he finished No 2 in law school class at Fordham, she said: “Who finished No 1?”
‘When I was coming out of college, John was No 1. She asked me: “Why would you want to play tennis when you are not going to be No 1?”
‘I said: “Yeah but not many people are going to be No 1”. My brother came into the kitchen and told my mom: “Patrick could be a really good pro player so get off his case. He can do it”.
‘He spurred me on and my mom got on board. She was trying to protect me. She knew I was going to have to deal with being John’s brother, which I had my whole upbringing. I have managed okay.’
That is an understatement. Apart from his singles career, he won 16 titles as a doubles player, including the French Open of 1989.
He was, too, a stellar junior player. In 1983, he reached the junior semi-finals at SW19 — big brother was winning the gentlemen’s singles the same year — and served for the championship at the US Open juniors but lost to Stefan Edberg. ‘Yeah, he went on to do all right,’ says McEnroe of the Swede with a chuckle. The young New Yorker did all right, too.
His tenure at the USTA lasted six years from 2008 and when McEnroe left there was an air of perceived failure about his reign. This verdict has been strongly reversed of late as his regime has produced players such as Taylor Fritz, Reilly Opelka and Frances Tiafoe in the men’s game, while the women’s side has produced spectacular performers such as Sloane Stephens, Coco Gauffe and Madison Keyes.
‘On the women’s side, we have been very lucky,’ he says. ‘The truth of it is that better women athletes pick up a racket in this country. There are not so many options for women in the professional sports here. We have softball, soccer and lacrosse but, in terms of making money, then tennis is at the top of the list for the better female athletes.
‘We really didn’t do that much differently in our training, our philosophy, with the girls. We just had a better pick of athletes.’
His policy was never to pursue the creation of greatness. ‘There was the push to find the next Pete Sampras, John McEnroe or Andre Agassi. I realised that’s hard for a federation to do. You can help in that situation. You can raise the bar on fitness, training and instruction. You then have a better chance of getting a lot of really, really good players as Spain did,’ he says.
‘They had a ton of great players and then a Nadal came along. Now, a system helps with a Nadal but he would have been great anyway like a Federer, Djokovic or Andy Murray. But a system can and should produce good, even very good players.’
But sometimes a family can just create two from the same home. ‘Yeah, I suppose the McEnroe story is unbelievable,’ he agrees. ‘But not quite as incredible as the Williams sisters. Or the Murray brothers (right). I love the Murrays, a great family. It is all the more amazing what they have done coming from Scotland — it’s not quite a tennis country, is it?’
No, but it seeks to be. And McEnroe is a part of that.
McENROE has strong links with the efforts to produce elite players from a base at Stirling University. Leo Azevedo, GB National Tennis Academy head coach, once worked with McEnroe at the USTA and the two men this month collaborated through Instagram to bring a masterclass to willing pupils. The American was once Azevedo’s boss. That did not stop him learning from the Brazilian.
‘Ah, the great Leo,’ he says. ‘When we first hired him, he was something special. He has an amazing passion for tennis but a passion, too, for helping kids learn and progress.
‘His genius is in his passion but also in his patience. He also loves to learn and not just in the sphere of tennis. I learned from him.’
Freed from his administration duties that consumed much of his time at the USTA, McEnroe can now spend much more time on court with kids, particularly at the McEnroe academy on Randall’s Island, New York.
‘This is the key to coaching,’ he says. ‘In tennis, there is an emphasis on it being one on one. The coach may be responsible for a lot of players but the work is done individually.
‘A huge part of being a good coach is knowing about your player. How are they doing? What are their interests? How are they doing in school? What makes them tick? I am not talking about prying. I am talking about stuff that directly ties in to how they go about things on court.’
He has learned much since moving from the politics and protocol of the USTA.
‘I have found out what is important. It is not just about what you say to kids but how you listen to them,’ he says. ‘You don’t yell at them. I never heard Jose Higueras (the famed coach who worked at the USTA) raise his voice. Leo, too. It is about communicating and listening to what the kids are saying and finding out what they are thinking. That is how you get through to them.
‘I like to acknowledge what the players are thinking. That’s the insight I have learned. The first thing I do when they are having a bad day is to hear them out. A player might shout: “This is the worst I have ever played” or “How can I have hit that shot?”
‘I don’t say that to them that they shouldn’t say that. I say: “It sounds like you are having a really hard day”. Or I say: “Hey, you are frustrated today. What’s that about?” You
must acknowledge their feelings and what they’re going through.
‘It becomes a lot easier to get through to them and develop them. If you say: “Don’t say that”. You are not paying attention. That’s what I’ve learned the most.’
His years on tour had bruising lessons. He famously lost to Jimmy Connors after more than four hours at the US Open in 1991. He took the first two sets and was 3-0 up in the third before Connors came back to win. It was the most crushing of losses in front of a hometown crowd.
Yet McEnroe said in its aftermath: ‘Later in my career I ended up winning a lot of matches from two sets down, so even though people remember me for that match, I still felt like I got something positive from it.’
His philosophy now is strengthened by such trials. ‘Tennis is a very tough sport. It is lonely, it is difficult,’ he says. ‘I tell kids all the time that I had a pretty good career. I made semis of the Australian Open, I was in the top 30 in the world and was a good doubles player. ‘But in my entire career as a singles player, there was only one time that I walked away from a tournament having not lost. One time. In ten years.’ He is referring to the Sydney Outdoor Championships in 1995 and emphasising how pro tennis makes demands on both technique and personality. ‘You have to show kids that part of tennis is making mistakes and learning how to react to them,’ he says. ‘I wish when I was coming up that I took it a little bit easier on myself. I’m not talking about the pros when I realised I had to work hard. I am talking about beating myself as a kid. I am pretty proud overall of my career in that I got the most out of what I had. I wasn’t that quick, I wasn’t that strong. I had good timing but I didn’t have a lot of things that the other top guys had.’
His brother won seven single Grand Slam titles and is considered one of the best of all time. How would Patrick have coached John, particularly over the older brother’s outbursts?
‘Tennis is an emotional game. You are basically by yourself. There are emotional people like Andy (Murray) or my brother,’ he says. ‘Andy has his team to shout at. My brother did not have a team, so he yelled at the umpire, the line judge, the photographers.
‘It depends on your personality. He found a way to express his intensity. You don’t coach that out of a player.’
This is all in the raucous past, of course. The McEnroe future is about a new generation.
‘My interest in life is to allow the kids to get the most out of themselves as a tennis player but also as a human being,’ he says.
These pupils may become a tennis player. They may one day win a Grand Slam. But they may not. They may, instead, be like Ryan Thatcher, the alumni of a McEnroe school, who now saves lives.