By 1973, Julie Heldman had put together a fine career. The 27-year-old had never challenged for a place at the very top of the women’s tennis hierarchy, but she had amassed a couple dozen tournament victories, semi-final showings at Roland Garros and Forest Hills, and victories over most of the leading players in the game. Hampered by knee problems that year, she was reduced to a bit part on the Virginia Slims tour. She still recorded upsets of Kerry Melville and Nancy Richey.
Heldman was already laying the groundwork for a second career. After an early exit at Hilton Head, she shared the commentary booth with Bud Collins and called the Richey-Rosie Casals final for NBC. She had been immersed in tennis since birth. Her father, Julius, was a strong player with several match wins at Forest Hills. Her mother, Gladys, took up the game late and with a passion. She ran the magazine World Tennis–teenage Julie and her sister Carrie were frequent bylines–and put together the groundbreaking Virginia Slims women’s tour in 1971.
None of that helped Julie on June 13th, 1973. She was in the third round of the Green Shield Kent Championships in Beckenham, a traditional grass-court warmup for Wimbledon. Her opponent, South African Linky Boshoff, was only 16 years old. Heldman was having a tough time putting away the first set. As if a sore knee wasn’t enough, now she had the yips, barely able to toss the ball to serve.
On set point, Julie snuck in what the Daily Telegraph called a “Heldman ‘special’,” an underarm serve with heavy spin. Boshoff, flustered, couldn’t get it back.
The umpire, Pat Smyth, asked Boshoff, “Are you happy with that service?”
Heldman piped up, “It’s too bad if she’s not. Am I supposed to warn her when I’m about to hit a drop shot?”
Smyth acknowledged that the serve was within the rules. Afterward, he explained, “I just wanted to add a little courtesy to the match.”
Julie hit two more underarm serves that day, and she trotted out the tactic occasionally throughout a successful grass-court season. She even deployed it once on match point. Life could be hard as a career woman on a tour full of teenagers. Occasionally, Heldman was able to get her revenge.
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Speaking of cagey veterans: Everyone was still talking about Bobby Riggs–even Chris Evert was asked about a possible match after her French Open final. Of course Bobby was going to try to cash in.
On June 13th, a businessman and avid amateur player named Alvin Bunis announced the 1973 “Grand Masters” tour, to begin in July. Riggs would be joined by several other former greats–including Jaroslav Drobný, Frank Parker, Pancho Segura, and Vic Seixas–in a series of weekend tournaments worth $250,000.
59-year-old Gardnar Mulloy, a 1948 Wimbledon semi-finalist who had been winning age-group titles for decades, would be the oldest of the group. One pressman asked Mulloy why he signed up for the tour.
“Money.”
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This post is part of my series about the 1973 season, Battles, Boycotts, and Breakouts. Keep up with the project by checking the TennisAbstract.com front page, which shows an up-to-date Table of Contents after I post each installment.
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