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SAMPRAS DESERVED BETTER
By: Dan Arkans

In line with this article we have compiled some of our best found pictures of Pete Sampras, his family, and the many wonderful years that Pete Sampras has supplied us with wonderful images and pictures in tennis. To have a peak feel free to come check out the Pete Sampras picture gallery by Tennis Mates located here.

There are two types of people in this world — people that love golf or people that love tennis.
You cannot do both, you cannot waver in between. Either you love a relaxing day at the links playing 18 holes, getting carted around the greens and having some beverages in the clubhouse afterwards or you love sweating it out on the hard asphalt of a tennis court for several hours just to get bragging rights over your best friend.

Can you guess which side I fall on?

To be a tennis geek and not a golf geek these days means I‘m in the minority in this country. Ever since Tiger Woods burst onto the scene golf became cool and tennis became geeky.

It wasn‘t like this when I grew up in Moorestown, N.J. during the days of John McEnroe and Jimmy Connors where it was cool to give an ’Are you serious?‘ to your opponent even if it was just your older sister.
So, it shouldn‘t have been that surprising when recent Hall of Fame inductee Pete Sampras came to Philadelphia to compete in World Team Tennis that there was hardly any media coverage on Thursday.

Sampras, who was inducted into the Hall of Fame on July 14 showing emotion he never did when he played, held a press conference prior to his Newport Beach Breakers taking on the Philadelphia Freedoms.
It was the equivalent of Jack Nicklaus coming to town and the abundance of media covering Sampras consisted of Comcast television and The Philadelphia Inquirer.

One of the biggest markets in this country collectively decided that the greatest tennis player in the history of the game was not worthy of coverage coming off his induction to the Hall of Fame.

Even worse here was a sampling of questions asked to Sampras by the brilliant Philly media: ”Pete, have you changed much over the years? Pete, why still play? What do you have left to prove?“ O.K., the media only had the opportunity to give Sampras five questions, but with questions like that I didn‘t blame Sampras for cutting it short.

And if you wanted to watch the coverage on Comcast you better not take a bathroom break. They aired a full 15 seconds of the press conference during the final moments of their broadcast. After all, Bernard Hopkins has a press conference last week. How can Sampras compete with that?

It‘s bad enough to ignore the greatest American tennis player in the history of the sport, but here‘s a guy who actually liked Philadelphia. In fact, he won his first tournament in Philadelphia in 1990, defeating Andres Gomez.
He followed that up with Philly titles in 1992, 1997 and 1998. Philly no longer has a professional tennis tournament, but during the press conference I had the opportunity to ask Sampras if coming to Philly brings back memories to him.

”Whenever I‘m on Broad Street it‘s where it all happened for me,“ Sampras said. ”I went from a guy who was ranked 40 to 12th in the world. A few months later I won the U.S. Open. I beat a couple of guys in the top 10. Things just went from there after I won this event.“

I can‘t blame the media in Philly for missing out on Sampras or the Philadelphia Freedoms because tennis is still slighted by all national media in this country. That is unless it‘s a grand slam. If it‘s a major then all the talking heads on ESPN all of the sudden become tennis experts and newspapers around the country actually put tennis on the front page of their sections.

But it isn‘t golf where tournaments get played up every week in newspapers and will even be near the top of Sportscenter. Maybe if tennis had Tiger Woods it would be a better sell to the media. Tennis‘ closest thing to Tiger is Andy Roddick, but he wins as often as Anna Kournikova, so it‘s tough to find him when it gets to the last days of a tournament.

Here are the facts about tennis: a recent Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association study showed that while participation in traditional sports like baseball and basketball significantly fell over the last six years, tennis surged 12 percent. Only golf (2.4) and football (2.1) increased.

The U.S. Open in Flushing Meadows brings more money to the city in two weeks than the New York Yankees do all season. Each session is often sold out, especially during the second week of play.

World Team Tennis is certainly considered an exhibition by some, but it brings interest to fans that wouldn‘t give tennis a second thought. Some cutting edge rule changes include coaches challenges, no-ad scoring, sets that go up to five games, playing let serves and overtime.

While many argue that if there was a male American at the top of the rankings interest would increase, WTT co-founder Billie Jean King has certainly brought some ideas the ATP and WTA Tours could consider to create interest.

”The majors are set in their ways,“ Sampras said during his press conference. ”Billie Jean has pushed the envelope. I don‘t see this flying at Wimbledon. This has a little bit of everything. You can hit markets I‘ve never been to. I was at Schenectady, last night, St. Louis last year. Team tennis gives different people a chance to see myself, Venus, John (McEnroe). I don‘t see it going much further than that. It‘s a different kind of format but it still has its place.“

Sampras‘ visit to Philly sold out Cabrini College, leaving tennis and non-tennis fans on the edge of their seats throughout the night.

In his singles match against Frederick Niemeyer, Sampras trailed 4-1 before winning the next three games to force a tiebreaker, including showing his championship mettle by winning despite facing two set points.
Sampras did lose the tiebreaker despite rallying from a 4-2 deficit. Niemeyer won the 4-4 point on a beautiful inside-out forehand. While Niemeyer isn‘t ranked in the top 100, he still had plenty of game to keep the fans and Sampras engaged.

It‘s just too bad that anyone without a ticket missed out.

Dan Arkans is a writer for Tennis Mates and the sports editor of The Reporter in Lansdale, Pa. He was named the 2004 USTA Eastern Pennsylvania Tennis Writer of the Year. E-mail him at dan.arkans@tennismates.com.

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