This is the time of Wimbledon. In fact, the men's final between Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz is being played right now, as I write this.
Indeed, we are seeing a lot of great players coming close to achieving some great things, but falling short. Sometimes just short.
Sinner was on the verge of winning his first ever French Open title last month. He quickly won the first two sets and appeared on the verge of winning it surprisingly easily, before Alcaraz came storming back. They battled to an instant classic, with Alcaraz just outlasting Sinner in the end.
Of course, sports has to have a winner as well as a loser. Everyone wants to win. Yet sometimes, it seems like you need to lose in order to elevate your game and rise to the next level.
Still, sometimes people never quite get there. For all of the attention that the "Big Three" got in years past, or that Alcaraz and Sinner now get, there are those who never quite rose to win Grand Slams. I remember Marcelo Rios, the Chilean tennis great who reached the number one ranking, but who never actually won a Grand Slam. To this day, he still has the distinction as the only man to have reached the number one ranking without ever having won a Grand Slam title. There were others, too, of course.
Only just the other day, Grigor Dimitrov had number one ranked Jannik Sinner seemingly on the ropes. Dimitrov was playing brilliantly, and was leading two sets to none, and it was 2-2 in the third set. In short, it appeared that Dimitrov might be able to pull off one of the biggest upsets of the tournament. Perhaps he could finally qualify for a Grand Slam final, which would be a first in his career.
Then he got injured.
Perhaps his one chance at going beyond any distance he had gone before a ta Grand Slam event, and it was taken from him.
Maybe it's bad luck. Maybe it's something else.
But it sure might seem unfair.
There are two athletes who addressed some legendary matches that they were involved with, and on the losing end of.
Boxer George Foreman had that famous fight against Muhammad Ali back in 1974. It was the "Rumble in the Jungle." Entering that match, Foreman was the undefeated, undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. It seemed that no one could touch him, that his reign atop the boxing world would be a long one. Certainly, few people believed that Ali might have a real chance to being the one to finally stop Foreman.
At the time, Foreman was the killer in the ring that Mike Tyson would later become maybe a decade and change later. He was huge, he was muscular, and he had made short work of some of the greatest heavyweights of the age. There were astonishingly quick and decisive knockouts to his credit, and they were mighty impressive wins. He had quickly and seemingly easily dispatched with formerly undefeated heavyweight champion Joe Frasier, in which he won the heavyweight title. Also, he had then just as convincingly crushed Ken Norton, ending the fight with astonishing speed and power, as he embarrassed Norton with devastating power. Norton literally looked like he did not know what had hit him.
Both of those men Ali had struggled against. So it sure seemed like Ali was not going to be able to hold his own against a powerhouse like Foreman.
As it turned out, however, Ali found a way to beat him. A new strategy, which would come to be known as the "rope a dope." Foreman, many years later, would even be able to joke about having been "the dope" in that scenario.
The loss was simply devastating for him. He sank into a depression which lasted years. Of course, we know that he did bounce back. In fact, he won the heavyweight championship again, two decades after losing it to Ali.
His perspective on the loss to Ali changed over time, as well. As much as it might have depressed him at the time, he came to have a mature perspective on that loss:
"I was out of boxing for 10 years and the only picture that I saved was Muhammad Ali knocking me down. There I was going down from that punch, I kept that and looked at it all the time, mainly because I realised what a big moment it was for sports and for boxing. And it kept me humbled, I never forgot that, and it’s made me a far better person than if it had been me knocking him down."
~ George Foreman
Similarly, tennis legend John McEnroe was in a huge match that actually not only lived up to the billing, but if anything, exceeded it.
Yet, he was on the short end of that one. He was a player on the rise, taking on the greatest tennis powerhouse of his age. And he almost won.
Almost.
Still, it was the number one ranked Bjorn Borg who ended up winning.
The match became legendary. Many people did not like McEnroe going into that match. After all, Borg was a hero, and a sex symbol. He was the dominant tennis player of his day and had elevated the popularity of tennis like no one before him. By contrast, McEnroe seemed like a poor sport, yelling and sometimes threatening people, particular chair umpires. Compared to the cool, silent figure of Borg, McEnroe seemed to many like the wrong direction for the sport to take.
So yeah, it is safe to say that a majority of tennis fans wanted to see Borg win, and figured that he would. He was the number one ranked player, was coming off a French Open win (his fifth in seven years) and had also won the prior four Wimbledon titles. He seemed unbeatable, frankly.
Yet, the match became a classic. It was well-played on both ends. McEnroe seemed disciplined and well-behaved. He later admitted that Borg brought that out again. To my knowledge, he never erupted or had any of the controversial scenes with Borg that he had become infamous for under other circumstances. McEnroe played extremely well and pushed Borg to the limit, testing him in almost every way possible. In fact, McEnroe himself played so well that he won over many people who were skeptics, or clearly not fans. That match was so epic, that it immediately came to be recognized as the greatest match in tennis history afterwards. Very few tennis matches since can even be said to compare.
Still, McEnroe ultimately lost. Yes, he played great, but he still fell short. At that point, he had won the US Open, and positioned himself to challenge Borg's number one ranking. He came very close to finally topping Borg and winning the Wimbledon, the most prestigious tournament in the sport of tennis. But he would have to wait another year before getting another crack at Borg, although he would finally defeat Borg in the Wimbledon Men's Final in 1981.
Nowadays, like with Foreman, McEnroe's perspective on the loss is very different than you might expect. He also feels that the loss taught him something. In fact, he believes that it made him a better person.
Also, nobody can argue with results. Those losses by Foreman and McEnroe were brutal at the time. Difficult to overcome, surely.
Yet, they both became legends, in their respective sports, as well as very well-respected and liked away from their sport, as well. That same opportunity is open to either of the two young guys playing right now at Centre Court in Wimbledon.
Below are some links to articles, as well as a video, about the losses by these two legends of their sports. I recommend taking a look at the articles and watching the video. All very fascinating stuff. And who knows? You might learn something.
George Foreman exclusive interview: 'Mum never wanted me to step inside the ring' by Gareth A Davies 24 April 2023:
Ferocious heavyweight puncher turned preacher tells Telegraph Sport about his enduring boxing memory
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/boxing/2023/04/24/george-foreman-muhammad-ali-interview-knockout/
PressReader https://www.pressreader.com › the-daily-telegraph-sport “There I was going down from that punch, I kept that and looked at it all the time, mainly because I realised what a big moment that was for sports and for .
https://www.pressreader.com/
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