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What: John McEnroe at Wimbledon

Henmania may have ruled Britannia for nigh on a fortnight, and Pete Sampras may have pummeled the men’s field for his fourth title in five years, but the real star of Wimbledon ’97 was John McEnroe.

Early in the tournament, McEnroe, joined by NBC colleagues Dick Enberg and Chris Evert, lit up a routine conference call with reporters by lashing out at the current state of professional tennis. McEnroe said he was “personally embarrassed by this sport right now,” deriding the current cast of players for being too self-involved to realize the sport’s popularity is “receding,” and advised Pete Sampras “and all the players who have made so much more money than they deserved [to] get off their rumps and do something about this sport.”

The tirade was classic McEnroe: impassioned, combative, provocative--and, as is usually the case, dead-on accurate.

Likewise, McEnroe’s match commentary was no-nonsense, brusquely honest and, often, very funny.

He admitted NBC was disappointed to have Sampras face Boris Becker in the quarterfinals: “We sort of wish this was the final. . . . Look at that men’s draw. It’s, like, Becker-Sampras and ‘Who are these other guys?’ ”

He delighted in jabbing the needle at quasi-Brit Greg Rusedski, who whined incessantly about being overlooked “at home” because of the English media’s infatuation with Tim Henman.

“You mean that Canadian?” McEnroe teased. “I want to see Henman play Rusedski in the semis. Then we’ll see who [the English fans] are really rooting for.”

McEnroe’s passion for the game--and to see the game played well--is a commodity that needs to be bottled and added to the teapots in the men’s clubhouse. Petr Korda’s jubilant leg kicks after taking Sampras to five sets in the round of 16 thrilled McEnroe: “He’s a fiery dude. I love to see that energy.”

A member of the NBC broadcasting team for five Wimbledons now, he’s still the most interesting personality in men’s tennis. His IBM commercials alone made wading through five sets of Michael Stich-Cedric Pioline worth the wait.

And, McEnroe reminded on one broadcast, “I never retired. I’m thinking about reinstatement. Now that Becker’s gone . . . I can hit Pete in the knees and who knows?”