This is the end of Billie Jean's 1983 semifinal match with Andrea Jaeger. As they leave the court, King turns around to give the court a final glance. Afterward, she said she had never done that before.
You can tell how emotional the great King is to leave Centre Court for the final time. Jaeger should have slowed down and let her have a longer moment too I think.
@hardsam68 Andrea Jaeger beat Billie Jean 6-1, 6-1 in their semi-final at the 1983 Wimbledon. It wasn't Billie Jean's farewell to the Centre Court a few days later she played on the same court in the final of the mixed doubles with Steve Denton. They lost narrowly to John Lloyd and Wendy Turnbull.
Martina was in tremendous form in this (1983) tournament. Nothing would have stopped her. She had just come off a bad loss to Horvath in Paris (6-4 0-6 6-3) and it was in fact Chris who had won the previous 3 slams....It was at this 1983 Wimbledon that Martina started to build her aura of greatness. She demolished everyone. BJK wouldnt have got a game!
I see your point, but no less than Bud Collins said that "..If Billie Jean reaches the final, she WILL win the championship match against Martina..." I remember that so distinctly because it took me by surprise...The quote came during a radio interview with Bud just prior to the ladies semis being played. I remember the Jaeger-King match. It was the first time I ever saw BJK so nervous and tight. That match meant so much to her & she was so complimentary to Jaeger at the post match interview.
Not exactly the last time... A few days later, King was back on Centre Court for the Mixed Doubles final, partnering Steve Denton. They lost in three sets. 7-5 in the third set. THAT was the last time King left Centre Court as a player.
Jeager's remarks about "letting Martina win the final," are absolutely insane. I can't believe she'd say that. 83-1, I don't think Martina needed charity. This Wimbledon was weird with Chris losing early to a formidable Kathy Jordan and Martina's semifinal opponent, Yvonne Vermaak, taking nothing away from her fine performance, was, by all accounts, a shock to get to the semis. I do think Billie, a six-time champion, would have possibly put up a better battle against Martina in the final.
According to Andrea she would have made King win the match but the latter sad something on their way to the court (no need for towels) which riled her.
Jaeger had avenged an earlier loss to King at the Virginia Slims Championships in New York, the season ending tournament in 1982. Many people believed that if King could beat her on indoor carpet, she could certainly win on grass, her favorite surface, and hardly Jaeger's best. I saw this actual match (wow, thirty years ago!), and was frankly surprised by the lopsided result. King had just defeated Kathy Jordan in the quarters, Jordan having earlier beaten Chris Evert.
As much as I admire King for her tennis I never thought she gave her opponents any respect . I wish I could have liked her more but I didn't. Court, Evert, Goolagong and Navratilova all were much nicer on the court than she was.
In 1982, I really felt she could have won the Wimbledon title. She beat Tracy Austin in the quarterfinals, and barely lost to Chris Evert in the semifinals. Chris Evert was very fortunate to have won that match. Billie Jean King always played well against Martina, so it would have been a great final had she had beaten Evert in the Semifinals. It was a shame she didn't do better in the 1983 semifinal, but at nearly 40 it was a great effort.
I agree with you about 1982. Billie Jean had break points in two games during the first set, each time up by 15-40 on Chrissie's service. She said that she lost the match by not converting any of those four set points in set one.
Bud Collins gets overemotional quite a bit, and allows this to darken his judgment. Navratilova crushed Jaeger in the final, and would have won almost as easily against King. King would have won a few more games solely on the basis that her style of tennis was similar to that of Navratilova. This was 1983, the year that Navratilova lost only ONE match, a close three setter to Kathy Horvath in the fourth round of the French Open. No way she was going to lose at Wimbledon, her favorite grand slam.
These comments saying bjk OWNED mn mentally are silly. 9 - 5 in favor of mn, last loss being in 1980. It was more complicated for mn vs bjk or evert...they knew how to exploit the friend/opponent angle better than mn...imo
Billie wasn't reacting to Andrea. Asked in the interview room if she turned around to look at the Centre Court, she said, "I did take a look. I thought it might be for the last time." Sadly, it was her worst ever defeat at the Big W 1/6, 1/6. I agree that if she had beaten Andrea (which she well could have done..She had defeated Andrea in their only previous match at the Virginia Slims of NY in March of that same year (1983) 5/7,6/2,6/2) she would have defeated Martina, whom she owned mentally..
This was when Jaeger was the consummate "bad girl" of tennis. Hard to believe she is now a nun devoting her life to the care of poor and sick children! Chris Evert was much luckier during her last grand slam appearances. Steffi Graf was very respectful when she beat Evert at her last Wimbledon, and the microphone picked her up asking Evert nicely if she was sure she was ready to leave the court. At her last US Open match, Evert was embraced by a crying Zina Garrison who had just defeated her.
I am a huge Chrissie fan, and could not stand MN when she was dominant back in the day, although gew to respect and like her in the later 80s and early 90s. There is very little doubt MN would have crushed BJK in the final had she beaten Andrea here. Althought people say BJK owned MN mentally, MN still won 10-8 in the third 3 years before in the quaters when both MN was not as sharp and BJK was sharper. A nice ending to BJK's outstanding Wimbledon career, too bad she lost this badly.
For once I agree with you on something. A shameful way to disrespect a great champion and one of the all time greatest players and THE greatest off court contributer as well Billie Jean King. Her comment about tanking the final was also stupid. I thought the final kind of sucked, Martina didnt play her best and Jaeger was really bad, but she didnt tank, she just was way overmatched. I agree with the people who said King even at 40 would have provided a better final match.
Dont be crazy. She would not have beaten Martina in the final here. Martina was totally dominant here and King was way past her prime. Even so I do think she would have done better than Jaeger, getting only 3 games, and it would have been a much more fun final for the fans to watch, and to witness the great King one last time. Jaeger played a great match here though to crush old King so deserved her finals place, but boy she was a little cocky overhyped brat who was never a champion.
Andrea Jaeger was a Top 10 WTA player at 14 years old. She’s one of the best teenagers in the history of tennis. I ballboyed her 2nd, 3rd and 4th pro matches and worked with her father for a couple years. Andrea made two Majors finals and was ranked #2 in the world. If it weren’t for injuries, she would have won a couple majors, like Tracy Austin, who was also slowed by injuries. Andrea wasn’t overhyped. She beat Martina 4 times and beat Chris. She had a fantastic career. It was a bit shorter then she’d like however. I ballboyed her 6361 and 6264 wins over Wendy Trumbull and Sue Barker, I’m her first Tour love event in Seattle 1980. She made two Top 10 women look like they didn’t deserve to be on the court with her. And she won the French Open mixed doubles Championship at 15! She was a great pro.
Andrea really should have let her walk off first, I think even then you could see something was not right with Andrea which was such a pity as she would surely have won Grand Slams...I wander what really happened?
She got injured. Her dad put a lot of pressure on her but he helped her become one of the world’s best players. . . At 14!!! She got a little burned out but mostly injuries got her. I worked with her dad for a couple years. Great man.
king didnt win a major after 1975 did she ?. she was blized by jaeger who was then blized by navratilova. she was way past it. navratilova would have destroyed king too if she had got past jaeger.
When did Martina blitz Billie Jean? Their 1980 QF was decided by the slimmest of margins, with Martina prevailing by 7/6,1/6,10/8. A BJK - Martina match would have been far more competitive, but you could see how nervous Billie was during the Jaeger match. She was stiff and stilted. She admitted that she would hit a ball against Andrea, come to net, and then think, "Hit the deck... Here comes the Bomb". As a player ages they learn how to be nervous because each match takes on more importance as they get towards the end of their career. Chrissie admitted that she learned how to be nervous at the end of her career, because she wanted it so badly, but she was not the same player that she was in her prime to achieve victory, due to a lack of mobility that comes with age. BTW, the knee operations that BJK endured in the last quarter of 1976 virtually destroyed her mobility and her career, and she was never able to mount a serious challenge for another Grand Slam singles title. Too many surgeries finally took there toll on Billie Jean. Her last years on tour were played strictly to pay off the lawyers who had represented her in the palimony suit brought on by Marilyn Barnett.
I posted this clip a while ago, but I can't edit the description because of some technical problems with my password from that account - in any case, this was NOT King's final appearance on Centre Court - as another viewer posted below, she played the mixed doubles final there after her loss to Jaeger.
