McEnroe refused unbelievable payday for – Sports News
Seven-time Grand Slam winner John McEnroe, now an analyst on ESPN and TNT, burst into the highlight in 1980 after grabbing a second consecutive US Open title on the age of 21.
His fame introduced the guarantees of riches. South African businessman Sol Kerzner provided him “one million dollars,” in line with McEnroe (The New York Times reported the precise determine as $600,000, with a $150,000 successful bonus) to face Bjorn Borg within the nation.
The match was to be performed in Bophuthatswana, a segregated black territory during the nation’s apartheid regime, at Kerzner’s Sun City on line casino, a place dubbed the “Las Vegas of South Africa.” It would have been an alternative for the at all times opinionated McEnroe to make a lot of money.
While the tennis star admitted he “could have bought a Van Gogh” with the money, he rejected the proposal. “It felt wrong….this was an unbelievable amount of money at the time, but there’s a reason why they’re offering an unbelievable amount of money,” he mentioned on a lately aggregated clip from ‘The Graham Bensinger Show.’
“They’re going to take advantage of me, and use that [as] propaganda in a way. I was 21, but I could get that. I wasn’t going to be the pawn in that whole thing.”
“Why are they offering me this amount of money to play in South Africa [for] one match when I’m getting 10 grand [for other opportunities]. Obviously, that’s an immediate red flag.”
At the time, McEnroe consulted US Laver Cup captain Arthur Ashe, a black man who had extensively spoken towards South Africa’s regime, in regards to the choice.
Ashe, the primary black man to win the US Open a half-decade earlier, known as Bophuthatswana a “phony homeland” and alluded to McEnroe’s alternative as a cut-and-dry instance of sportswashing. That’s why all these sports activities occasions are going down there,” he said. Famed singer Frank Sinatra accepted a $1.5 million gift for a week-long residency shortly before.
McEnroe and Borg played in two exhilarating 1980 finals — Wimbledon (won by Borg) and the US Open (won by McEnroe) — en route to earning the collective “Fire and Ice” nickname.
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When McEnroe met future South African president Nelson Mandela — jailed in 1980 — he learned Mandela would listen to his matches in prison.
“When he advised me he was at Robin’s Island listening to my match [against Bjorn Borg] on the jail radio, I’m like ‘What a jerk [I] am’ sitting right here whining about every little thing,” McEnroe mentioned, referencing his cantankerous mood.
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