Brian Gottfried

Reliable Star 

 

As the game of tennis had been revolutionized in the 1970's, so had the men and women who play it. No longer is tennis the preserve of a ruling clique of Australian amateurs; the open era, in which professionals and amateurs alike compete together, has combined with huge financial opportunities and television coverage to alter the game irrevocably. In 1972, a collection of young, ambitious athletes, most of them American, began to make their presence felt on the international scene. By the late 1970's, this new wave of players was dominating almost all of the countless tournaments being held all over the world on a year-round basis; four of the young stars, each in his mid-twenties, had clearly emerged as the cream of the crop. They were Bjorn Borg, the blond Swede with nerves of steel and consecutive Wimbledon titles; Jimmy Connors, the abrasive but gifted American winner of Wimbledon and Forest Hills; Guillermo Vilas, the Argentinian clay-court master with a poetic nature and deadly backhand; and Brian Edward Gottfried, an American Jew whose blend of natural talent and untiring effort made him one of the biggest winners on the international circuit.

As a young boy in Miami in the early sixties, Brian was seen playing by teaching pro Nick Bollettieri, who took the youngster under his experienced wing. Brian spent six