Story And Photo By: Arthur King
Editor’s Note - Earlier this year, Arthur interviewed Peter Fleming at The Classique, an exhibition at the Mottram Hall Hotel in the United Kingdom. Fleming is best known for partnering with John McEnroe for seven Grand Slam doubles titles.
Peter Fleming still has that youthful California golden boy look although he was born on the east coast, Chatham, New Jersey. The American has an aura of calm, sophistication and deep philosophical thought on life; an almost Alistair Cooke (the former BBC Letter from America correspondent ) combined with Hollywood film star Robert Redford’s blond hair rolled into one.
Yet as I talked to Peter he still has a playful personality while also wielding some sharp insight.
He later turned to the packed corporate crowd at the stately Mottram Hall hotel just before he served and shouted “Be quiet I’m trying to play!” A silence suddenly covered the stand, then with a broad genial smile Peter said “Don’t worry, I’m only joking! Enjoy your drinks and talk.”
Right then let’s get this doubles partnership started; with my nerves I start this game by serving first.
I am reading from an article about this former top eight tennis professional and World’s No. 1 doubles player with John McEnroe. Straight away I serve a fault with a quote. Peter was at UCLA when Glenn Bassett, the head coach, put the Bruins through training, Fleming headed for the pool. Glenn Bassett had said if anybody didn't want to work, he should take a hike. Fleming took the coach at his word. He took a swim.
Peter, with his reassuring presence, calms me and I’m able to carry on with the interview. My confidence soars. Second service.
“No it’s not entirely wrong but it’s totally out of context. He basically said it was a blanket statement addressing the whole team; there was ten of us and he said I want you guys to work hard out here but if there is any day you don’t feel up to it then I don’t want you to show up.
The other guys said we will have to try our hardest and work hard; their places on the team depended on it. The first year I was at UCLA I was a what they called red shirt because I had transferred, I wasn’t eligible to play for the team, so I didn’t feel the same pressure to do everything that the all the other guys were doing.
As they were scared to death it didn’t matter to me, I was playing well and I was playing tournaments and beating good players. I knew I was pretty secure. There were days when I was tired and I thought I wasn’t going to practice today, it was no big deal I just said I’m not going to practice.
The tennis courts were between my dorm and the pool, right at practice time these guys were ready to do three hours of working and I would walk past them and the coach would say ‘So you’re not coming to practise today Pete? You’re not practicing today?’ and I would say ‘No coach I’m feeling a little tired today. I’m going to the pool,’ and the guys were really pissed. I heard it about so I just liked taking the piss out of them,” Fleming said with a smile.
Peter, it was written you had accepted Michigan instead of California; a fear of the liberal ways it mentioned.
Once again he steadies my game and comes to my rescue.
“I applied to Stanford, got accepted into that university but the coach couldn’t give me any money for a scholarship so that was out. The Michigan coach was good and very persuasive, and they had a good team already so it was a good situation. Two weeks after I agreed and I signed a commitment form, the UCLA coach called me and said come on out and take a look. I said I can’t, I’m all ready committed ... the timing wasn’t right, it just wasn’t in my thinking at all.”
Peter had been setting me up for easy put aways in this interview and I felt I had to somehow return the favor.
That quote, “John McEnroe and anyone else.” Why was it such a self inflicted low punch to yourself when you reached No. 8 in the world in your own right? Was it a throwaway line to deflect all the praise on John?
I wanted to get the truth so Peter can bury this label once and for all.
“I had been a top 10 player for a while but for one reason or another and issues like injuries, etcetera, leapt up and just hammered me. Most of them were self inflicted; I had played relatively poorly for a year even though I was still ranked No. 2 in the world at doubles I was frustrated and I had put a lot of work and we were in the Davis Cup final in Grenoble (France) and I had played Leconte and Noah I had been practising pretty well.
I was winning sets off of Jimmy Arias who at the time was ranked No. 5 in the entire world and he was a clay court specialist. I was taking sets off him in singles and I was thinking I’m playing really great I am back and ready to show everybody that I could play. In the match I played ok, nothing great. I was disappointed, that’s all it was–and I just said that thing, and Junior (John McEnroe) looked at me and said ‘Don’t say that, what are you talking about? That’s stupid.’
I said sorry but that was how I was feeling right now and typically that is the most famous quote I have ever given. It is the most re-quoted thing that I have ever said. He is the greatest doubles tennis player of all time in my eyes there is no question about that - I always like to overstate things for dramatic effect – that was one of those things, it was good.”
I served another fault, another miss quote. Boy, I’m really struggling to keep this partnership stable.
Tony Pickard, who coached Stefan Edberg, said he wanted the Swede to gain as much experience and knowledge of the game and this is why Stefan played doubles and singles early on in his career.
Is this generation of tennis players missing a vital part of their tennis education by not playing doubles? The instinct to volley in matches seems to be absent; even Federer looks nervous and hesitant to get to the net these days.
“I think a lot of guys have sold themselves a little short. I think that had Roger Federer played doubles consistently that maybe that’s unfair but he did play for couple of years prior to winning Wimbledon for the first time and he was a good serve and volleyer. Before he won Wimbledon for the first time, I commentated on the match where Federer beat Sampras at Wimbledon and he served and volleyed every ball.
I do believe had he continued in that vein he would have a much better record against (Rafael) Nadal than he now actually has simply because he is not as comfortable at the net even though he is an incredible athlete. I think a lot of the guys, not that they can't volley, they can volley well but they don’t move very well at the net with the exception of Nadal and (Andy) Murray they both move very well at the net.
You think Andy Roddick. What a perfect guy, what a perfect game, what a perfect start he has with that serve. To be a great serve and volleyer and yet he never quite got comfortable defending the net. It’s much harder now defending the net with these strings they use and more top speed.
You saw (John) Isner do it in Paris and it gave him a chance against Nadal when he didn’t have a prayer had he stayed back. That is something that is missing today and I think the next generation of players will be able to attack the net and win from the baseline.”
We are just going through a period. Why is it Federer in 2002 served and volleyed all the time and at some point he thought that does not work as well as staying back. Clearly he evolved with the conditions of the times to say this is more effective so therefore I don’t want to come in as often. Who’s to argue with him, the greatest player of all time?
So I think something will change. The powers that be will give faster balls, incorporate more facets of the game and then the generally accepted thinking will be you have to go into the net and then we will see more guy playing doubles. I hope so.”
Port Washington ... where the legendary Harry Hopman and Tony Palafox resided. Did they have input into your game? Warren Woodcock had belief in you.
“I had my own coach: Warren Woodcock, who was an Australian guy. I had started with him when I was 12 and I liked him and his way of thinking – I didn’t appreciate Tony Palafox as a coach until I was much older, until I was about 27. He had a very easy going, relaxed style and that was hard for me to embrace because I was a strident, tunnelled sort of fella. I needed someone to say do it this way, do it that way, and Tony was so easy going I that I didn’t really benefit from him when I was at Washington.
Mr. Hopman, on the other hand, had a profound impact on everyone not because of what he said, he most probably said five things to me over the course of two years apart from hello how are you and some jokes. He never said ‘boo’ and of the five things he said to me, four of them were ‘go for the lines, Peter! Go for the lines!’
And one other thing, he had the energy about him. One time I was playing this guy from New Jersey at Christmas; I was a higher-rated player and I played really bad. He beat me 4-1. I had choked and two months later I am playing another tournament, the same guy at Port Washington and Mr. Hopman was looking out to play.
I was really nervous. I can’t lose to him twice. Mr. Hopman popped out of the curtains, he was always lurking somewhere, you know, he didn’t want people to know he was there. He wanted a word, we walked out together, I thought it would be this amazing strategy, but he was telling me to go for the lines. I thought wow, this guy who had coached Laver and Rosewell, Lew Hoad, and these other unbelievable icons, thinks I can go for lines and actually succeed in doing that telling me to go for the lines.
That’s amazing just that little exchange; it gave me the confidence to win the match. I won the match love and love. That guy who had beaten me two months before. It’s hard to quantify, (Hopman) didn’t talk much but he had a huge impact on everyone who came through that place.”
How difficult emotionally was it to play your partner, John McEnroe, in singles then have to go on court and play as team?
“That was the second week, the second tournament we played together. I complained about a call or something and he piled on and we lost the match. It became obvious to me pretty quickly if we were going to be consistently successful I needed to be a little cooler. And I did and it was a good thing for me and it allowed me to relax because I was a fiery character and maybe it allowed me to play better tennis when there was a lot of pressure on.
We were both fiery characters and perhaps not as much skilled at communication as I like to think I am now, so we most probably said things that hurt one another, and being macho guys we never let on. ‘Oh everything is fine, it’s fine you know, everything is fine.’ It wasn’t fine and so your relationship suffers, doesn’t it? We certainly went through that. We feel a lot of that because we have decided we were friends first, you can forgive a lot of things, and you can get over a lot of things.
There was a long of time when neither of us had that huge desire to spend time together but deep down we both always felt we will get through this period, or I felt that way, and John is still my close friend and I think we have done that and I look forward to seeing him a lot more than I did 20 years ago. I guess we had a strong chemistry that it was almost something more powerful going on here than just a business partnership.”
Peter has lived in London for more than 25 years after marrying an English women, Jennifer. They have three children.
An American in London, the culture is different from the USA. Was the transition smooth or difficult?
“I’m in the process of re-aquatinting myself with the USA so I’ll probably stay half my time in London and half in California. I would say it was disorienting (living in London). A lot of Americans do it though (stay in London). You learn new customs. I lived for 25 years with four English speaking people rather than American speaking people so what Americans would say I have a strange way of talking that English people might not recognise as easily.
I would say living in a different country can be disorienting and I would say that was the case with me. You grow up and especially if you become good at something, you see the world through a clear lens and then you move to another country and then if you accept that you have to make your way in that country to get along that maybe you need to change the way you perceive the world. That can be disorienting and I would say that was the case with me.
There were a lot of things previously I would say no, no, no, that is black then I would say oh I see there is a bit of grey here and there would be a lot of grey. Literally, I remember five or ten years ago hearing somebody on TV or radio thinking is that person American or British. I had literally totally lost any sort of clarity.
If I thought about it long enough, yes of course he’s American but no usually it was the British. But just that had become the norm, I had heard a British voice, I confused it to an American just because it felt natural. All in all I would say it’s been an incredible, valuable process for me to be able to see the world from a higher prospective.”
Your wealth of experience of the America sporting education system I would say is an invaluable. Has anyone asked for you to put any of your knowledge to help British tennis? I don’t see your name banded about and yet there has been an influx of coaches abroad employed in this country.
“No I have coached; I worked for the LTA five or six years simply as an on-court coach. The administrative side never really attracted me very much and so therefore I never campaigned or applied for any position. Had I applied who knows they may have thought of me in that vein but it never did, it never happened.
I’m not saying that is a bad thing from my prospective. I don’t know I did, I stopped coaching at some point because I realised that actually I wasn’t as good as coach as I wanted to be and so I almost said to myself that I need to grow as a person to sort of to be able to help these players to the degree that I would like to.
I’m not happy taking a guy who is 400 in the world and helping him get to 150. Well it’s actually the next step that to get a guy to the top 10 or No. 1. That is what interests me and yet I felt I actually I was not skilled enough to do that and so maybe I give him a little encouragement and suggest that the coach grows with the player.
I’ll do it at one point. I have a much better understanding now what’s required now than I did back then.”
Great. Now I let Peter serve and close out this match to erase false quotes and place the record straight.
What would be your final tip for playing tennis against friends and keeping longevity in a doubles partnership?
“I’ve come to realise as an old timer the fact is the golden rule is the only way to live. Really is to treat someone as you would like them to treat you because I do think our, John’s and my doubles partnership would have been far more successful had we lived by that.
Our lives would have been totally different. However you can’t look back and think well I wish I’ve done that, I didn’t have the understanding to do that. So I had to learn to go through what I went through.
If someone out there can take that little tip and embrace it then that is the more enlightened approach. It is not necessarily all about me, me, me. You’re insulting me, you’re cheating me. It’s about communicating with someone and finding common ground I guess and that is where we may we were not as successful as we could have been.