The Longest Game

The 2010 Wimbledon match between John Isner and Nicolas Mahut broke many records and at least one heart, Mahut's. Its 183 games rambled over three days and it took one last 980th winning point for play to finally cease after 11 hours and 5 minutes.

The score of the final 70-68 set will be remembered for many years and the formal records set by the match will long endure. And yet, there are at least two players in the world who were reminded of their own epic battle, which though it may have been officially eclipsed by Isner vs. Mahut, remains, in their minds, one of equal might and meaning.

I refer to my own enduring struggle against my friend Edward "MoonDog" Mulligan, which began in 1956 in a narrow alley behind his house in that tennis mecca, Forest Hills Gardens. At eight years old, we were, as yet,  too young to begin our formal matches at The West Side Tennis Club, which had a silly rule requiring us to be twelve for membership.

After both of us suffered various contusions banging against Mulligan's garage, his mother "suggested" that we find another, wider court. And so, we moved our early match series from concrete to asphalt.

We became known as the Spanky and Alfalfa of the makeshift tennis court circuit (this predates Mulligan's more colorful permanent nickname, the circumstances of which cannot be explained in a family blog). Mulligan was short, rotund, left-handed, slow, with nearly toe-head blonde hair. I was lanky, a righty, swift, with a cowlick, until getting a flattop at nearby Frank's Barber Shop and Racing Emporium.

One day our fathers took us to see our first match on grass in Forest Hills Stadium and our game was changed forever. Soon, we abandoned our hard courts for the lawn at Slocum Crescent, shown on the right. Fittingly, this court stands today as it was back then, as if in tribute to our competition.

At last, with the help of some oversight or perhaps a miracle, we were both accepted into the Club; our formal court battle commenced.

Occasionally, we would play other opponents offering me opportunities to scout MoonDog's game. To say that he was slow, in that word's usual connotation, does not begin to describe Moondog's "movements." Many of them were so subtle that only I, having had vast experience, could detect and anticipate them. MoonDog used this innate trait with cunning and brilliance.

I noticed that other opponents frequently underestimated him. He had extraordinarily quick hands and could, when absolutely forced to do so, cover ground with a series of what must be called rapid baby steps. Also, occasionally calling the lines in an ungenerous fashion assisted his game. He had a habit of making remarks, while changing sides that could unnerve lesser competitors than myself. "Are those your First Communion shorts? 'Cause they look a bit tight" was one favorite.

MoonDog could make a walk to pick up a second ball for serving into a kind of Himalayan Expedition, on which an opponent's only desire was to seek rest at some unseen Base Camp, thus losing concentration.The wait between his first and second serves, complete with many bounces, could be an hypnotic event, causing a receiver's racquet hand to remain still, as if its nerves slept, while the serve spun past for an ace.

 

Over the years, I developed a zen-like focus, a fierce concentration on my purpose that only many, many years of therapy could provide most of MoonDog's opponents. Mostly, we just played each other. At fifteen, we dispensed with normal game and set scoring and began what is, we believe, the real longest set in tennis history. Even we do not recall the score, although Dog has made it clear on many occasions that he assumes he always led by a good margin. That, of course, is nonsense.

We played our set on grass, Har-Tru (en tous cas), red clay, indoor armory wood, indoor armory linoleum, all-weather hard, actual dirt. We played  in rain with specially "customized" warped rain racquets, insuring eccentric spins. And once, we even played in hail the size of gum-balls.

Perhaps our finest hour was when we bravely and somewhat secretly played for two straight days and parts of the night, telling our respective parents that we were at the other's homes. We slept in a maintenance room underneath the old Forest Hills Stadium, until Owen "Ownie" Sheridan, the head groundskeeper made a somewhat uncontrolled protest over our playing on his precious stadium court that he was preparing for the imminent "Nationals." Photos of that year's First Round show patches of lawn already worn by our two pair of Dunlop lawn tennis shoes. 

Inevitably, after many years, there came a time when we could no longer prolong our set by playing singles. MoonDog simply could no longer cover the court without risking serious injury to himself or the net-post, and my arm finally began to give out after so many years of slicing serves wide to his backhand in the deuce court. We instinctively knew that doubles would not suffice.

We devised one last game to be played on the ancient, fading center court at Forest Hills, beneath the very stands where we had seen our heroes play years before.  Ceremoniously, we entered the court by descending the brick steps, down which many of the greats had walked: Tilden, Budge, Gonzalez, Gibson, Hoad, Laver, Evert, Seixas, Hantze and many more.

Unfortunately, but perhaps fittingly, at a set a-piece and 8-all, it began to rain too hard for even us to continue. We scrambled under the Stadium by an old concession stand. There seemed to be only one way to decide things: a spin of the racquet. Mulligan grabbed his racquet first and quickly spun it calling "M or W?"

"M," I answered. "M' it is," responded a stunned MoonDog after  slowly, of course, bending to check the outcome. Our long battle, our marathon had come to an end at last. A winner had been decided, not by determination, patience or artistry, but by gravity.

Or so I thought. Later, upstairs in the old locker room, while I sat on a bench pondering my win as MoonDog took his traditional long, casual shower, I noticed his racquet lying at the end of the bench with its handle bottom facing me. On it was a large "S" for Spaulding.

In the excitement of my victory, I had forgotten: MoonDog, a true sport and champion,  had never used a Wilson in  his life.