University of Virginia Library

Illegal Procedure

Billie Jean, Bobby and the
Double Fault

With Bill Bardenwerper

How many 55-year-old athletes that you
know of are able to collect $100,000 in one
season. . . even more, a hundred grand in one
game or performance? Or, for that matter,
how about females? I thought they were
systematically excluded from any of the big
earnings. Not so, or so it seems at least.

Haste makes waste as the saying goes. So
Billie Jean King waited and waited. . . until
she won her fifth Wimbledon title that is, and
then ZOWIEE! "I'll take it." One hundred
thousand smakeroos for merely remaining
aloof to hustler Bobby Riggs' and his
loud-mouthed bullyboy commentary on the
quality (or lack thereof) of women's tennis.

Late last week Billie Jean King finally
acknowledged Bobby Riggs' challenge and
together they announced their intention to
duke it out at center court, winner-take- all.
Mrs. King conceded that she ignored Rigg's
earlier challenges because "the money was not
right." But it's there now. In fact, this match
claims the fattest purse ever offered for a
tennis match and is half as much as that
grabbed by Stan Smith in the WCT title
match held in Dallas last May. The purse is
also ten times the amount offered for the
Margaret Court-Bobby Riggs mismatch held in
San Diego also last May. Riggs humiliated
then champion Mrs. Court in that match
6-2,6-1 and set many tennis buffs to
wondering whether the swell-headed Riggs
might not have a point after all: "that a good
male player, whatever his age will always beat
a women."

It seems, however, that the strepitant
Riggs simply frazzled her nerves rather than
frayed her stroke. And as far as the equally
narcissistic Mrs. King is concerned she's not
about to humiliate herself and her sex by
doing the "lousy kind of job Margaret did."

In last week's public appearance together
Riggs and King exchanged a few other nasty
quips such as "at least I won't have to take
431 vitamin pills to boost me" (Mrs. King) and
"I want to show her that women can't play
tennis" (Bobby Riggs). . . Reminiscent of the
old All-Frazier pre-fight promo, huh?

Name-calling, flaring tempers and nasty
gestures are all tactics to win friends and
influence people. They fake their hostility
towards each other, then off-camera are real
buddies intent upon a mutual goal. . . a bigger
pot. And they have the gall to claim that "the
networks have been insulting in their offers."
Says Promoter Jerry Perenchio: "I figure we
should get the same amount as they would
spend on a John Wayne special. . . This is
great entertainment," he added.

Sure it is, but it's also a fraud with which
few are willing to take the risk. Should Bobby
triumph, he will simply have endeared himself
to a dying breed of 19th century chauvinists,
while women's tennis remains just as exciting,
just as vital as ever.

And should Billie Jean have her way, she
will have succeeded only in proving that the
champion among champions among women
tennis players can defeat a 55-year-old relic,
too old to compete with the youngsters but
brash enough and brave enough to try to
capitalize on a current fad and public innocence.