Jimmy Connors Quotes

I can't say that I was my happiest on court, but I felt completely free. Free from family obligations, free from my own torment. In a real sense I was a different person. It was a place where I could not tolerate the idea of being beaten. I psyched myself up into a state where I felt something close to hatred towards my opponent, a state where I detested the idea of someone making his name at the expense of Jimmy Connors. I was in my element on court, measuring myself against someone else. I was not competitive for show. It came from deep within.

It was okay for Wayne Gretzky's dad, for instance, to give him a hockey stick, or Joe Montana's dad to give him a football, or Larry Bird's dad to give him a basketball, but it wasn't okay for Gloria Connors to give her son a tennis racquet.

I was raised by two women, and that laid the groundwork for the way I treat 'em: with the utmost respect and admiration.

I've been kicked in the teeth more times in tennis than the law ought to allow.

I always insist on my jeans being ironed. Is that a problem?

I had true rivalries. Not only did I want to beat my opponent, but I didn't want to let him up, either. I had a rivalry with Mac, Lendl, Borg. Everybody knew there was tension between us, on court and off. That's what's really ingrained in my mind: 'This is real. This isn't a soft rivalry.' There were no hugs and kisses.

In the modern game, you're a clay court specialist, a grass court specialist
or a hard court specialist ... or you're Roger Federer.

I like any title with the letters U.S. in front of it. To me, the U.S. Open is the most important tournament in the world.

Big money encourages tanking. In my opinion, tanking is going on even with a lot of the top guys today - it's quite evident.

Back in East St. Louis, tennis wasn't the real thing. If you weren't playing baseball, basketball, football, you were kind of on the outside.

With everything else that would swirl around me when I got involved in it, tennis was my main concern.

You have to remember that I played longer than anybody else on the main tour; I played until I was 40, and then played another six years or so on the seniors tour.

Nothing is like being out there and playing and performing and winning - nothing. But to have an interest in the player? The nerves and everything that goes with it? Seeing what he's learned and how he's done it? That's the second best thing to playing. I think.

I was never part of the crowd.

Rather than viewing a brief relapse back to inactivity as a failure, treat it as a challenge and try to get back on track as soon as possible.

There was never anything I wanted to do more than play tennis. Never once walked out there and thought, 'I wish I was doing something else.' Not once.

People say I'm around because I have a lot of heart, but I know all the heart in the world couldn't have helped me if I wasn't physically fit.

I never lost a tennis match, I just ran out of time

There is only one number one. It is a lonely spot but it has got the best view of all.

Use it or lose it.

I don't go out there to love my enemy. I go out there to squash him.

The minute you think you know everything about tennis is the minute your game starts going down the tubes.

From where we lived, to practise in St Louis was an hour-and-a-half drive each way, so that took a lot of the time. So really, our lives just took different paths.

When you're hot, anything can happen.

No, like I said, my dad was never really part of the tennis. His involvement around what I did with the tennis and with my mom and my grandparents was really not a part of my life.

Tennis was never work for me, tennis was fun. And the tougher the battle and the longer the match, the more fun I had.

I hate to lose more than I like to win. I hate to see the happiness on their faces when they beat me!

I'm not begging to be remembered or whatever. I did my thing, and if you remember, that's even better. But if you don't, there's so many other things going on.

For the last five or six years the most important thing in my life has been my family.

Every time I went out there I performed the best that I could and it was time to step back and clear my mind.

That's something a lot of athletes miss - a lot of them walk away too soon. They don't get everything out of their system. They have a lot of what-ifs when they're sitting around later in life. I don't have that. I got all that out of my system. I pushed it to the brink, I loved it, and when I walked away, I'd had enough.

Bjorn was a different breed, I threw my best material at him, but he would never smile, but that added to the charm when he played me and Mac. We were going nuts and losing our mind and he was sitting back like he was on a Sunday stroll.

I would watch Gonzalez play and he mesmerized you. It would be like looking into the flame of a fire. You know you couldn't take your eyes off him because you never knew what he would do next.

Nothing's perfect along the way [in life], and you ride the ups and downs. It's how you come out of those and continue on that I guess really matters.