Let’s Add Another to the List of Top Greats …

When discussing the greatest men’s professional tennis players of all time, the conversation generally includes Rod Laver, Roger Federer, Pete Sampras, Bjorn Bjorg, John McEnroe and Rafael Nadal. These men are undoubtedly amongst the best to ever swing a racket. However, a name often overlooked and much unheralded is Bill Tilden—the preeminent player of the early 20th Century who dominated international tennis in the 1920s. He was the Babe Ruth of tennis.

Unfortunately, Tilden’s well-chronicled and shameful off-the-court troubles toward the end of his life tarnished his legacy, and he died destitute and devoid of the fame and fortune tennis brought him. While Tilden’s off-court actions are unforgiveable, his on-court prowess must not be forgotten. Tilden’s legacy is the basis for today’s champions.

Tilden left the tennis community with several books on the sport, as well as a plethora of handwritten letters sent to one of his protégés, Arthur Anderson, that help us understand his thoughts on the game. Tilden considered Anderson and his mother Marion to be his family. He took Anderson under his wing, teaching him the game of tennis and monitoring his results like a modern-day coach would. While I’ve handled dozens of these autographed letters, it’s the following letter that I just obtained that I consider to be one of the best tennis-content letters in existence, with Tilden offering his “manifesto” on tennis, as follows:

The coming tournament starting next Saturday is a very good test for you Babe. It is the first time since you put your teeth really back into the game, to show just how far you have gone in the past few weeks. If you will really "give,” refuse to lose, dominate every match, get in and push your opponents around all over the court, hitting with the freedom and confidence that you seemed to have mastered in practice, you will be outstanding in your class.

Please, Babe, for me give in every match. Let me see the winning spirit show up. If you get a lead, fight it home at once, push every chance to win so pressure never lessens on your opponent. Have complete confidence to hit hard and aggressively when the chance comes, and always when you are attacked. Prove to me, that you have completely made up your mind to win. Bring out all your new power and use it with confidence. Do not even think you might lose. Forget defeat and think and believe victory.

Read this over a few times Babe, perhaps it might be worth taking along to remind you I am thinking of you, believing in you and pulling for you in every point of every match.

Win!

As I continue to compete around Long Island and teach students at Bethpage Park Tennis Center, I find this letter from Tilden, written in 1949, to still stand true today. It is worthy of carrying a copy in a tennis bag to remind any player of correct strategy and how to react in certain situations. Tilden pleads with his student to believe in himself, to have confidence in his game and to be determined enough to allow himself to win—that is the basis, in my belief, for any competitive sport in which we strive to succeed.

Regardless of how history remembers Bill Tilden, this letter affords a firsthand account of how a champion viewed the game he loved and dominated, and offers insight into his tennis philosophy—a philosophy that is as fundamentally sound and inspiring today as it was when Tilden put pen to paper over sixty years ago.