It Could Be Good if They Try Wood

Well, that was the worst Wimbledon ever, wasn’t it?

I used to love watching tennis. It had heroes and villains, like wrestling. You could cheer for the classy player to beat the uncouth loudmouth. Or, you could root for the rat, as many often do. Bad guys are sometimes more fun than good guys. For example, when I go to Steven Spielberg’s movies, I root for the dinosaurs.

And then there was shot-making. Tennis players used to make spectacular shots, brilliant backhands, fine forehands, lovely lobs, deft drop shots. Boris Becker would dive for a save, like a guy playing beach volleyball. Chris Evert could keep a point alive long enough for a spectator to run outside, buy a souvenir, return and not miss a thing. John McEnroe, well, that guy could make a foot-fault interesting.

Now, all the men do is serve.

Bang. Ace. Bang. Ace. Bang. Weak return into the net. Bang. Ace, yawn, game to Mr. Sampras, while the Duke twiddles his thumbs and the Duchess of Kent sits on her crumpets.

Men’s tennis is all about power now. Serves go so fast, it’s like the ball is made of Silly Putty. Fuzzy yellow balls fly faster than our Mars space mission. Pete Sampras hits speeds so high on the radar gun, his nickname should be Big Unit. We don’t watch service any more, we listen to it.

As for the women, they come out there now with those rackets the size of a Les Paul guitar. These rackets are so large, I wouldn’t be surprised if a doubles team shared one. They could hit a four-handed backhand. There must be three sizes of women’s rackets now: Prince, Big Prince and Great Big Prince.

Let’s arm these players with wood rackets again. That way the men could actually return a serve once in a while, without worrying about wearing a protective tin cup.

And if the women went back to wood, maybe the game would become more about shot-making and less about equipment. If you agree with me, give out with a Monica Seles grunt.

I miss the Wimbledon of yesteryear. The one they concluded last Sunday, all I remember is that Sampras defeated Some Guy From France in straight sets, in something like 14 minutes. OK, 15 minutes.

I usually enjoy “Breakfast at Wimbledon,” once each year when I can catch the sunrise telecast here on Pacific time, sit back with my eggs and my bacon and my Starbucks and listen to Dick Enberg and Bud Collins talk longer than Jimmy Stewart did in the filibuster scene from “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.”

Not this time. This time, I barely had time to cream-cheese my bagel. I had the knife out, when the broadcaster said, “Match point for Sampras.” I looked up in time to see Pete kissing the trophy. Then I heard a rooster crow. It was dawn.

All right, so I’m exaggerating. It simply seems to me that this was the most boring Wimbledon, by far, in the history of tennis, dating to the 1895 championship match when Wilfred Baddeley defeated Wilberforce Eaves, 4-6, 2-6, 8-6, 6-2, 6-3, but bored everybody stiff because nobody gave a damn about a match played by a person named Wilberforce.

Was there a match at Wimbledon this year that anybody will talk about, ever again? Sampras-Becker, possibly? Nah, the only interesting thing there was that Becker said he would never play Wimbledon again. Boom Boom’s getting old now. He’s nearly 30. Tennis players are such wimps. I know children with lemonade stands whose careers last longer.

I want matches like Bjorn Borg played. His five-setters in 1977 with Vitas Gerulaitis and Jimmy Connors were practically as good as it gets. His 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7 (18-16), 8-6 win over McEnroe in the 1980 Wimbledon final was as good as it gets. Boy, I haven’t seen a good 34-point tiebreaker in a long time, have you?

Meanwhile, from this year’s Wimbledon I remember . . . uh . . . well, it rained.

We didn’t even get a good tantrum out of Jeff Tarango. That wacky Tarango, I thought the least he could do was slap an umpire, or swat strawberries at the crowd, or forfeit a match by showing up dressed like the queen.

I miss misbehavior. I remember once, Billie Jean King and Rosie Casals both walked out of a 1971 tournament final in Los Angeles, either because they were sore about a line judge or the prize money. Billie Jean also walked out of a 1973 U.S. Open match against Julie Heldman. And I bet you thought only men behaved badly.

Tennis once was fun.

But I probably won’t watch Wimbledon again until the players use wood rackets or until the tournament leaves London and is moved to Lake Havasu City, whichever comes first.