In 2022, I’m counting down the 128 best players of the last century. With luck, we’ll get to #1 in December. Enjoy!
* * *
Frank Kovacs [USA]Born: 4 December 1919
Died: 9 February 1990
Career: 1937-55
Played: Right-handed (one-handed backhand)
Peak rank: 1 (among professionals, 1945)
Peak Elo rating: 1 (1941)
Major singles titles: 0 (1941 US Nationals finalist)
Total singles titles: 40
* * *
There are a lot of different ways that an all-time great tennis player can end up underrated. Frank Kovacs somehow combined them all.
First: Bad timing. Kovacs was born in 1919, so he was 22 years old when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941. He had recently reached his first major final, at Forest Hills, where he lost to Bobby Riggs. Tournament tennis survived in the US throughout the war, but playing opportunities were sharply curtailed just as Kovacs reached his peak.
Second: He turned pro early. The currency of tennis greatness is major titles, and when amateur-era players joined the professional ranks, they passed up the most important kind of record-book glory. Kovacs had tussled with the amateur authorities since he was a teen, so when he was offered $25,000 to go pro alongside Riggs at the end of 1941, he took it. Professional careers tended to be short, and even the most prestigious pay-for-play tournaments of the era are largely forgotten.
Third: He was a clown. Newspaper reports gave him credit for a backhand to rival that of Don Budge, but Kovacs’s unpredictable personality got far more coverage. Riggs called him a “likable screwball.” Time magazine called him a buffoon. He once laid down on a court, mid-match, to get a better view of a passing airplane. He liked to toss three balls in the air, then strike one for his serve. Once, he pulled that trick at match point, and hit an ace. He was a crowd-pleaser, and his antics improved the gate receipts for his pro matches. But when your reputation is that of a “court jester,” it’s tough to be taken seriously.
Fourth: His peers didn’t respect him much. The clowning didn’t help here. Jack Kramer, whose television commentary and 1979 book, The Game, made him an authority on 1940s and 1950s tennis, wrote, “Frankie never won anything … [H]e didn’t have any idea how to go about winning.” Kovacs had enormous raw talent, and even that didn’t help his case. Bill Tilden was one of many who thought that Kovacs’s backhand was second only to Budge’s, but he was disappointed by Kovacs’s lack of commitment to improve his game. Finally, the clowning often went too far, and Riggs was one of many contemporaries who thought he sometimes crossed the line into rule-breaking gamesmanship.
Fifth: He spent his entire career in the shadow of another legend, and the rival himself is underrated. Kovacs and Riggs played each other at least 64 times, including 15 as amateurs (11 of them finals), 19 at professional tournaments, and another 30 on pro barnstorming tours. Bobby got the better of the matchup, but only barely, winning 35 times to Kovacs’s 29. Riggs is underrated for some of the same reasons that Kovacs is, as he lost some of his peak to World War II and chose to turn professional early. His well-earned reputation as a hustler, blowhard, and misogynist has led history to judge him harshly. But Kramer wrote, “I guarantee you he is the most underrated champion in the history of tennis.”
All the accusations are true. And yes, Kovacs wasn’t as good as Riggs. But when you look past the reputation, the unfulfilled potential, and the biases of history, you’re left with one of the best players of his era, a man who–albeit briefly–could beat anybody.
* * *
Frank Kovacs grew up in Oakland, down the street from Don Budge. He was only four years younger than his neighbor, but by the time he got serious about tennis at 14, Budge was already a big tennis name in California. As Kovacs sprouted to 6-foot-4 and developed his own weapon of a backhand, comparisons were inevitable. He was dubbed “the second coming of Don Budge.”
Kovacs won his first tournaments as a 17-year-old in 1937, and he claimed his first of three straight California State crowns in 1938. The same year, he made his first trips east, to Florida in January, then to the Northeast for the National Championships. Nearly everything that would define his career was already present. He lost to Bobby Riggs four times that year, including a 6-4, 6-0, 6-4 drubbing at the Longwood Bowl in Boston. He crashed out of the Nationals in the third round to Gene Mako, a fellow Californian who had no patience for the youngster’s hijinks. Kovacs showed up late, played tricks with the pre-match racket toss, and hit tweeners during the warmup. Mako beat him in straights, and looking back, he had one word for the teen’s behavior: “chickenshit.”
Kovacs was also already at war with the United States Lawn Tennis Association. The federation wouldn’t support him unless he disclaimed any relationship with his coach, George Hudson. He did so, at least publicly, but Hudson sued, and the public controversy meant that Kovacs wasn’t considered for the Davis Cup team. We might throw that in as yet another reason that history underrates him. In an era when everyone wanted to play for their country, the off-kilter youngster never did.
Kovacs strikes a pose
He lost much of 1939 to an arm injury, but recovered well enough to reach the final at the Pacific Coast Championships in October and push Riggs to a fifth set in the title match. He took another step forward in 1940, winning four tournaments and getting on the board, at last, against Riggs. At the Southampton Invitation just before the National Championships, he upset his primary rival in a four-set semi-final.
By now, word was out about the clown prince of American tennis. He was one of the main attractions at Forest Hills in 1940, and the tournament wanted to be ready for him. USLTA president Holcombe Ward wrote to Kovacs: “My dear boy, your deplorable clowning on the court, which has marred the current lawn-tennis season, will not be tolerated at Forest Hills. We strongly urge you to be serious.” Kovacs responded: “My dear Mr. Ward, I will try very hard to be serious on the court during the coming tournament. But something tells me I shall not succeed.”
The Californian was right. In the early rounds, he was exiled to the outer courts in a failed attempt to keep him out of the public eye. By the quarter-finals, there was little choice but to put him in the stadium, where 10,000 fans would be watching. Just as he did in the Mako match two years earlier, Kovacs started his act before the first ball was struck, posing for photographers and ignoring his opponent, Joe Hunt, during the warm-up. By the third set, Hunt was sufficiently enraged to sit down on court, refusing to play on. Kovacs countered with a sit-down of his own, relaxing on his own baseline and pretending to knit. Play eventually proceeded, and after a few more games, Hunt secured a 6-4, 6-1, 6-4 victory.
Kovacs had yet to convert his clowning into an effective form of gamesmanship, but his results were good enough to merit a third-place ranking among American amateurs. My Elo ratings are even more positive, placing him behind only Riggs, the Australian John Bromwich, and Budge, who had turned pro. In 1941, the court jester would take another big step forward.
* * *
Two years into the European war, America was the only remaining site for top-level competitive tennis. That year, American tennis was all about Bobby Riggs and Frank Kovacs.
Kovacs opened the season with a dramatic statement, winning five titles between December and March, including four wins over Riggs. The crowning achievement of the circuit was at the US Indoor Championships in Oklahoma City. Kovacs wore out his rival with a 6-4, 17-15, 6-4 victory in the semi-finals, then seized his first national-level title with a 6-0, 6-4, 6-2 drubbing of Wayne Sabin. The New York Times said Kovacs “was never more serious in his life.”
Maybe. That year, Don Budge said, “When Kovacs forg[ets] his horseplay … there’s nobody he can’t beat.” The 20-year-old replied, “[W]hen I get grim on the court I dump the ball into the net or drive it over the fence. I can’t stand the strain of being tense. … I’ve got to have laughs to play good tennis.”
Kovacs (right) with Fred Perry
Kovacs’s search for a laugh sometimes went too far. The most egregious incident that has made it into print doesn’t quite line up with the historical record, but I can’t possibly leave it out. Tom LeCompte’s 2003 biography of Riggs, The Last Sure Thing, relays a story told by Gardnar Mulloy, a player a few years older than Kovacs and Riggs who entered many of the same tournaments in 1940 and 1941.
The rivalry between America’s top two players extended off court. After Kovacs faked an injury and quit a match early at Newport to avoid exhausting himself in the heat, Riggs wouldn’t stop needling him about it. Finally, the clown prince had had enough and worked out his revenge. According to Mulloy, at the US Indoors, Kovacs took several opportunities to express his admiration for Riggs, for his skill and his commitment to never default a match. Sure enough, Bobby came down with something the night before the final, and barely survived through the final. In Mulloy’s telling, Kovacs taunted him about a possible default throughout the match, but Riggs stuck it out, losing 6-4, 6-0, 6-2.
Kovacs later told Mulloy that he had spiked Riggs’s drink the night before. Mulloy thought it became common knowledge on tour.
It’s a memorable story, and it’s just within the range of things I’m willing to believe Kovacs would do. The only problem is that Kovacs never beat him by that score. And the one time they faced off at the US Indoors, it was a semi-final. And that semi-final was two and a half years after the Newport incident. The score that Mulloy recalled is similar to how Kovacs beat Sabin in the 1941 final. A local news story from that year’s semi-final against Riggs reports that Bobby was “so tired he could hardly lift his racquet when the third set started,” but the 17-15 second set is a much more plausible explanation for fatigue than a felony in the guise of a practical joke.
A lot of details can get lost in sixty years, so my fact-check hardly proves that nothing of the sort ever occurred. Regardless of just how vicious the off-court rivalry became, Riggs knew that he’d eventually face Kovacs with much more on the line, and he was willing to play the long game.
* * *
The big match arrived in September. At the 1941 US National Championships, Riggs and Kovacs were the first and second American seeds, atop a strong list that included defending champion Don McNeill and future titlists Ted Schroeder, Frank Parker, and Jack Kramer. Kovacs reached the final in straight sets, setting aside Kramer and McNeill, while Riggs had a more difficult time, needing four sets to beat Parker and five to escape past Schroeder in the semis.
Kovacs’s path was so routine that the New York Times reduced what must have been a typically zany semi-final performance to something that almost sounds boring: He brought “an occasional cheer with his ‘cosmic’ forehand* and super backhand and occasional gyrating exploits.”
* Anybody know what a “cosmic” forehand was? While it sounds impressive, Kovacs was better known for the backhand. The Times mentioned it on multiple occasions, but newspaper keyword searches are confounded by the contemporary racehorse, Cosmic Ray.
Whether or not Kovacs had ever drugged him, Riggs came into the final having lost four of his last five matches to the clown prince. But he was confident: Kovacs’s mental fragility was an open secret, and Bobby had been taking notes after every encounter. LeCompte writes that Bobby was “dead sure he could outthink and outfight him.” Riggs put his money where his mind was, betting all his loose cash on himself–the underdog–to win at 2-to-1 odds.
It was a windy day, and Riggs needed time to adjust to the conditions. Kovacs took the first set, 7-5, finishing the job with three straight aces. From there, things went downhill. The Times tells the story as seen from the grandstand:
[T]here was nothing cosmic any longer in the game that has invited comparison on occasion with William Tilden’s.
The outcropping of errors that had marred Kovacs’s play became epidemic as he lost three love games to start the second set. It was perceived then that there was too little real substance behind the gingerbread and tinsel that pulls in the customers, and that the calculating, concentrating young man on the other side of the net was too resourceful, too smart and too fundamentally sound in his equipment to be beaten by spasmodic eruptions of power in the raw.
That’s what the spectators saw. At court level, Riggs knew he had Kovacs on the ropes after winning the second and third sets. But there was a standard ten-minute intermission before the fourth set, and Riggs feared that if Kovacs were able to talk to his coach, he’d be able to shift tactics and make a comeback.
It was Bobby’s turn for a gentle taunt. Riggs tells the story in his book, Court Hustler:
“You look tired, Frankie,” I told him, as I toweled myself. “I guess you want to go in and lie down awhile.”
Frankie flared up. “Who’s tired? Not me. Let’s go out there and finish this.” I had outpsyched the master psycher.
Skipping the intermission, Kovacs lost the fourth set and the match, 5-7, 6-1, 6-3, 6-3. It was as close as he’d ever get to a major title.
* * *
Kovacs had always been open about the under-the-table payments from tournaments that kept “amateur” players out of the poorhouse. Between those indiscretions and the on-court antics, the USLTA sprang at the first opportunity to punish the clown prince. Two months after Forest Hills, rumors swirled that Riggs and Kovacs would turn pro. The national federation struck first, suspending Kovacs in late November of 1941.
Kovacs (right) with the runner-up trophy
It was a pointless gesture. The deal was done: Riggs and Kovacs each accepted $25,000 to turn professional. They would make their debuts at Madison Square Garden at the end of December, in a round-robin tournament also featuring Don Budge and Fred Perry. American tennis couldn’t churn out new stars as fast as the professional ranks swept them up, so the clash of established pros and recently dominant amateurs was the tennis event of the year. Budge was still only 26 years old, three years removed from winning all four amateur majors in 1938.
For Kovacs, that first pay-for-play event would turn out to be the highlight of his career. He beat Budge in his first pro match, at one point reeling off five games in a row. He followed that up with a win against Riggs, again displaying his ability to go on a tear. Kovacs won the first 16 points of the third set. While an injury robbed him of the chance to face Perry, Kovacs won the round robin against the two best players in the world.
The novelty of the pro tour, which set up shop in a new arena every few days and offered players cash rewards for victories, kept Kovacs on top for a little while. He won his first five matches against Budge. But to no one’s surprise, the youngster couldn’t keep it up. Budge won the tour, winning 52 of 70 matches. Riggs came next at 36-36, and Kovacs finished third. At the US Pro tournament in the summer of 1942, Riggs beat him in a four-set semi-final.
After a few years in the Army, the jester was back at it. He and Riggs went on tour together, and Kovacs remained a box-office draw. But the spirit of fun that made him such a popular player had faded. LeCompte writes:
The “Clown Prince” had since become more bitter and caustic, intimidating ball boys, showing up late for matches, and offering to fight heckling spectators. At the Philadelphia tournament, Kovacs swigged from a large soda bottle full of Rum Collins mix during the changeovers. When he finished the bottle, he sent a ball boy out for a refill. When the boy came back with plain soda, Kovacs held up the match while he waited for the youngster to go out and retrieve the requested libation.
Professional barnstorming tours needed new attractions, and while Kovacs held his own against Riggs, he didn’t have the drawing power to bring in crowds year after year. He continued playing pro tournaments until 1959, winning his last event in Florida in 1954. He played several epic matches against Pancho Segura, and even defeated Richard “Pancho” González in 1952.
By then, nothing Kovacs did would change the stories people told about him. Riggs once told Jack Kramer, “[D]on’t worry about Frankie. He looks great, but give him long enough and he’ll find some way to keep you in the match, and give him a little longer and he’ll find a way to beat himself.” It’s a good line, and if the stakes were high, my money would’ve been on Bobby, too.
Kovacs’s unpredictability made it easy to ignore just how good he was: very possibly the best player in the world in 1941, and a man who beat Riggs at least 29 times. Kramer called Riggs the most underrated champion. As for Kovacs, it’s hard to think of a more unsung runner-up.