CHAPTER TWELVE
1975: Wuvanich Wins $3,000 Detroiter
Nationals (No Women’s Event!). 1975: Wuvanich Wins Zakarin’s $1,750 Pro Tour
#1. 1975: $2,175 USOTC’s: Champions:
Canadian Men and Juniors; U.S. Women.
In the First Annual Detroiter National’s, held Nov. 1-2, 1975 at the Oklahoma City Myriad, Charlie Wuvanich, having arrived bat and baggage in the U.S. from Thailand and Australia, Bangkok-boxed and kangaroo-kicked straightaway into the Open Singles to win the $500 1st Prize. And who did he take it away from? Why Danny Seemiller of course—no longer centered #1 in the U.S. table tennis ring.
This National’s—sponsored by the Michigan Ladder Company whose representatives, President Mark Lippincott and Manufacturing Director George Perrett, were on hand to survey the scene—invited comparison with the 1974 U.S. National’s in that it featured the same venue and the same Director, Ron Shirley, who was not without his problems. Friday night, just before the start of the weekend tournament, there was a near paralyzing last minute refusal by the trucking company to deliver the tables to the Myriad. But Ron was able to enlist his Table Tennis Oklahoma (TTO) buddies to get the tables there, four at a time—and even managed to pick me up at the airport as well.
Ron’s highly experienced behind-the-desk crew of Billie Watkins, Barbara Coffman, and Sue and Gene Sargent had an ingenious peg-board system for calling matches. The board itself was sturdily backed and mounted with pegs made of aircraft rivets and dowels glued together and painted red. It could hold over 200 inserted slips of alphabetized names, so that anyone working at the desk could tell at a glance who was playing a match and who was not.
Detroiter gave away $3,000 in money prizes in Open Singles, Open Doubles, A, B, C Class events, and Senior Singles. Which meant that more than half the participants (76 out of 137) won money—from 32nd in Open Singles ($10) down through the Class events to 8th in Senior Singles ($10). Since the sponsors had decided to give out $2300 of the $3000 for Open Singles and Doubles, there was still some money left over for the majority of entries playing in the popular A, B, C, even Senior divisions. Let’s hope that mercifully one poor hand wasn’t responsible for all the checks made, signed, and handed out….What’s that? Women’s prizes? Sorry, said the sponsor, there wasn’t any suitable prize money available for the top women players. And since it was impossible to be so unfair as to have money prizes for the men but not for the women, the only thing left to do, as if hopefully nobody would notice, was simply not to have the Women’s Singles and Doubles.
Of course Takako Trenholme, for one, did notice, and complained (TTT, Jan.-Feb., 1976, 16). “How,” she asks, “can the United States expect to build a top quality women’s team if the major tournaments offer no incentive for women to participate?” She urges (1) that “Every USTTA sanctioned tournament must have a Women’s event” and (2) that “the prize money for the first and second places in the Women’s Open should not be less than one-third of the corresponding prize money offered for the Men’s Open.” Is that too much—or too little—to ask?
When a spokesperson for TTO responded that, hey, women had the opportunity to enter any number of other events, including the Open Singles, Takako felt that such a response suggested a cavalier disregard of sex-based events. She wonders how many players would care to do away with boys, girls, junior, junior miss, senior women’s senior men’s, esquire’s because they can all play in one big Open Singles. TTO’s response was absurd.
San Antonio’s Cindy Garza said with a wink that maybe the girls should have boycotted (girlcotted?) the tournament. But Cindy did play in the one “sport” event the men couldn’t play in unless the women did—the Mixed Doubles—where unfortunately for Cindy and her partner Doug Hibbs there was no prize money, not even for being runner-ups in the event.
Leslie Harris, from Memphis, thought it was “awful’ there weren’t any money prizes for women, but was thankful she’d earlier gotten her “man’s” forehand by playing against men. She wasn’t too put out because she not only got to play in the Mixed with Mike Veillette but in some other events as well, one of which, the E’s, she won from Mike Roddy in five.
Pretty, provocative, 14-year-old Kasia Dawidowicz, another smiling but penniless winner, said she likes to run and ride a motorcycle. Her dad, by the way, is quite a hustler. He affably takes out a compact mirror and, keeping the picture of himself hidden in his hand, says he hasn’t got a racket but will play you with this thing, and with only a 15-point spot. No, they wouldn’t let him enter the $100 1st-Prize A’s.
Kasia said she was very interested in what people should and shouldn’t do. So she likes to read. A law book, perhaps (“When parents get divorced, what happens to the children?”). She also said she was trying to straighten out her English and Polish—“I can’t always get my sentences together,” she confessed. “I get all mixed up.” But there sure wasn’t anything mixed up about her play here at the Myriad. She got Danny Seemiller for a partner in the Mixed and they never lost a game. And in a mini battle of the sexes, Kasia beat both her male rivals, Johnny Cortez and Mark Stoolz to win the Under 15’s. However, Johnny and Mark did come 1st in the 15 Doubles over Kasia and Keith Kalny in five.
Young Stoolz took the Under 13’s from Toby Fleharty without any trouble. He expects to have a problem or two though in a nation-wide Frisbee contest. After three years of competition Mark’s gotten good enough (can, for example, pinpoint straight flights, curve flights, skip flights into an outstretched hand in a circle to win his 15 and Under Regional competition, and is now looking to flick Frisbees on TV for a $1,000 bond. Already it’s as if he’s a little professional. “Maybe I’ll be on the Howard Cosell Show,” he said. “But that’s low-rated, so we’re trying for Merv Griffin or Dinah Shore.”
Dean Galardi was carrying around all day Saturday and Sunday what he said was a two-gallon jug of orange juice. Deano took down just-back-from-Japan Perry Schwartzberg in the Under 17 final. Perry was telling people how the tables in Japan were so different from ours. “They were so slick,” he said, “the balls didn’t grab, the tables didn’t ‘take’ any of the spin. In the five weeks I was there,” he said, “I couldn’t even learn how to hear the ball, their tables were so thick.” In the semi’s of the 17’s, Galardi knocked out Michigan’s Kurt Lloyd who was later to get a $100 revenge of sorts by winning the A’s in five from Deano’s buddy Rob Lange. On losing a game to penholder Lloyd in the Men’s, Bernie Bukiet said, “Where he learn to play like this? He went to Japan?”
Brock Huler, also from Michigan, teamed with Kurt to win the Under 17 Doubles from Schwartzberg/Dawidowicz, and then on his own took the D’s over Jose Marin. More importantly, he lost in the finals of the C’s—won $25. Colorado’s Dana Jeffries, the C Champ, dropped a deuce-in-the-3rd match in the B’s to Baton Rouge’s Bruce Smith who was already priming himself for some of that $2,000 prize money they’ll be offering in their pro tournament in the spring. Bruce in turn lost a five-game final in the B’s to Allan Lee who’ll be going back to Kansas City $75 richer.
Also $75 richer from the Senior’s event alone was indestructible three-time U.S. Champ Bernie Bukiet. This summer for a few days Bernie had been in good company at a Super Sports Show at the Doral in Miami. Mantle, Mays, Havilicek, Goodrich, Wills, Carter, and Norton were some of the stars he and exhibition partner Jerry Thrasher were posing with. Although I remember Bernie wearing a colorful, collegiate “Property of City Jail” t-shirt with a picture of some unshaven bum looking out resignedly from behind bars on it, I know he feels free and happy in Miami and has a loyal friend in Joe Newgarden who for years has helped to keep table tennis alive and well in Florida.
Bernie’s under doctor’s orders to keep himself in shape. It seems that for 20 years he’s had back trouble. So each morning here in Oklahoma City I would watch as he started his day with a number of exercises. First he would carefully spread a bath towel on the carpet, then to the accompaniment of TV—Bugs Bunny or The Roadrunner (“Beep-Beep! Beep-Beep!”)—he would lie down on his back, clasp his hands behind his head, and then (“Without this I couldn’t play, I would be so scared”), head down, would kick his feet up and so upend his barrel torso to a sit-up position. Over and over again with a great rush of blood and much heavy breathing and huffing and puffing Bernie would get himself up into that position. “No way—not in Poland, not in Germany, not in Chicago did I ever have to do this.” But now, he said, it was good for him. “This gets me confident,” he said.
Sam Shannon, who plays out of the Evansville, Indiana Club, was another cripple of sorts who was also a winner. Troubled with arthritis, both his knees bandaged, he yet won all his matches in the round robin Esquire over runner-up Marshall Gordon and other tough-minded Texas/Oklahoma competition. Ohhh, all those Over 40, Over 50 guys play as if their life depended on it. Me too. Case in point: the Open Doubles, where I partnered Bukiet whom I’d been runner-up to in the Senior’s. In the past we hadn’t been very successful playing together—Bernie had been afraid I was too often going to swing away with my hit-or-miss forehand. But this time he never said a word to me—and we damn near did the impossible. Against Wuvanich and Chan in the semi’s, we twice won deuce games to stave off defeat and then in the 5th from 10-7 down, putting together a string of smashed serves, all-out counters, and flat pick-hits, we went up 13-10…alas, only to lose at 16. The Thais then went on to an easy final over Seemiller/Mike Bush who’d eliminated Hibbs/Bob O’Neill in the semi’s.
A Doubles went to Gary Garner/John Hewes over Hibbs/Irl Copely. B Doubles to Dick Coffman/Tang over Garner/Steve Arnold. C Doubles to Garner/Jeff Wise over Paul Sumrall and James Rautis, the Open Consolation winner over David Babcock. Senior Doubles: Boggan/Hugh Lax over R.C. Watkins/Wise.
Mentioning my own play has allowed me to move on now to the Open Singles, where in the 8th’s (quarter’s got you at least $75) I had a 24, 17, -10, 18 win over Mike Veillette. Mike gave me every break in the 26-24 first game, correcting two calls of mine where on both occasions I’d strangely thought he’d won the point when he said he hadn’t. On rallying for the win in that last game after being down 9-2, I finished with my customary deep, deep quite ridiculous but to me immensely satisfying roar heard round the arena.
Another 8th’s that could have been as upsetting, but wasn’t, was Larry Thoman’s match against Mike Bush. Earlier in close play, Larry had surprised Joe Cummings (“Crazy Joe Cummings” I’d called him before in print, and this weekend, not so crazily, he’d wanted to know why—“It just sounded right, Joe,” I said, “matches your game”). Had Bush lost that opening deuce game to Thoman who allowed him only 12 in the second, Mike’s black t-shirt that read “Bad Company” would have given off much stronger vibes.
Al Everett, who’d played so profitably in the $3,000 tournament in Phoenix in August, put up strong resistance in his 8th’s match with Lim Ming Chui before losing in four. Ming had flown in at the last moment from somewhat inaccessible Vermont and, surprised that the Open and Mixed Doubles draws had been made, wondered who he’d been paired with. Imagine his further surprise when he discovered the answer was…“No one.”
It irritated me that all the 8th’s matches were played at one time and were indiscriminately assigned to tables where the lighting was good or bad. Clearly, with his $2,300 prize money allotment, the sponsor was showing the importance of the Open Singles and Doubles. But to the women running the tournament every player seemed an identical peg in the board. Same thing when it came time to play the quarter’s—all four matches were put on together.
Wuvanich vs.Bukiet. Bernie was worried about his French sneakers—they were no good on this non-wooden floor. It was very important for his feet that he have basketball shoes to play here. He was also complaining about his racket. One side had bad rubber. The manufacturers, he said, sent bad stuff to this country. The Mark V the Swedish stars use and the Mark V other people use are very different. Johansson uses harder and heavier rubber. “If you’re not a good player,” he said, “you don’t know this difference. Can you tell with your glasses which side rubber is better?” And he flipped over his racket and flipped it back again. The rubber looked the same to me. “But this side is very bad,” said Bernie. And off he went to the table…to get beat 9, 11, 16. “Wuvanich has good rubber,” he said to me later.
Chui vs. Bush. “You can’t warm up around here,” Bush had complained on being called for his match. “But Mike,” someone said, “you’ve just warmed up for 45 minutes!” It wasn’t enough—he lost 10, 15, 7.
Chan vs. Boggan. Against Chan, who smiled, said a few pleasant words, smiled and carefully warmed me up in the few minutes before our match, I played every point as hard as I could (though not all-out aggressively as I should have)—and averaged 11 points a game.
Seemiller vs. Galardi. Dean, full of …Vitamin C, broke the pattern—he took the first game from Danny. But then lost the next three.
Time now for the semi’s, and I couldn’t believe it. I absolutely couldn’t believe it. They were calling both matches at the same time and mixing them in with other play on the floor. B Doubles was the match on one of the tables adjacent. Those running the tournament felt not the top players but others deserved to be accommodated. “Many players complain they don’t want to watch the top players,” said one. “They don’t want their own matches held up. People have to drive back home tonight. We’ve got wide open spaces out here. Some people have hundreds of miles to go.”
No doubt. Still this seemed a begging of the question. I couldn’t believe that those who ran the tournament couldn’t plan it so the late-round players would get the attention they deserved. “I’m not a competitive person,” said another voice behind the desk. Which, translated to me, meant, “I really can’t get very excited about the matches—the pegs are just as interesting. To get all the matches played—that’s my fun.” Moreover, word was, “The final has to be on by three o’clock. Radio’s covering it. The TV people are going to film it.” Isn’t that attention enough?
One Open semi’s was Wuvanich vs. Chui; the other, Seemiller vs. Chan. Both were scheduled to get under way on one of the nine tables in play down the line. For some reason, though, the Seemiller-Chan match was slow to start. Perhaps Danny, too, had protested—I mean, it really was infuriating: there was a guy in overalls and a drab Detroiter T-shirt playing next to him.
Wuvanich and Chui didn’t seem to be getting along too well—but perhaps it was just a kind of gamesmanship, for at Zakarin’s Pro tournament on Long Island a month later Chui would be offering helpful (though waved-off) advice to Wuvanich in his final against Seemiller. Charlie asked Ming to stop blowing on the ball—though I doubted he really thought Ming, dripping saliva, was going to serve a “wet” ball. Then, down 20-19, Chui himself received a serve that he said slid right off his racket.
“When I’m serving,” Ming said, “I feel very comfortable playing Wuvanich. So half the time he doesn’t feel very comfortable against Charlie? After Chui had taken the 3rd game to keep his hopes alive, the 4th game went crazily off balance. Ming, apparently seeing the match was hopeless, began swinging wildly, sending Wuvanich all over the place to retrieve balls that kept bouncing and rolling away from him. After which, when it was Ming’s serve, Charlie once deliberately wound up and smacked the ball 40 feet over Chui’s head out of sight.
In the Nissen Open in September Seemiller had to go five to beat Chan. So it figured he might have a problem with him here—the more so because Danny’s shoulder’s acting up and he’s applying Ben-Gay to it. In their first game, the left-handed Chan, who they say practices every day against anti (he and Wuvanich both—with of course Seemiller specifically in mind) is 19-16 up. He’s not making errors and, as I found out against him earlier, he has a very effective quick, low push which you must move fast to your forehand to topspin. If you don’t, you’ll suffer the consequences of Chan’s fast-hopping forehand. And, believe me, it doesn’t matter how many of those I blocked back—once he started hitting them I wasn’t going to win the point. Or, as Danny put it, “I have to kill, I can’t block against Chan.”
However, Chuchai couldn’t hold his first-game lead and Danny, fist all a clench, yelled he’d won a big one. The second was 21-15 easier for Danny. But in the third, Seemiller, down 16-14, served four of his next five serves off the table! “I can’t believe I’m a professional player,” he said at the break. Which of course was the perfect cue for Shirley and his tournament crew to finally make an arena court for a hell of a lot of very interested player-spectators. And now Danny, reminding himself to loop Chan’s serves if they came long, coasted to a 21-13 win.
The fiery rivalry between the country’s two best players had been fanned by their controversy at the Oct. Atlanta Open where Seemiller and Wuvanich had disputed a bat rule call, Danny to the point of cursing, throwing his racket, and doing a little name-calling. Here, however, he’s put on a 1975 Detroiter Nationals playing shirt, and appears calmly ready to do his best for the sponsor and TV. Charlie looks, as is his habit, deceptively unconcerned. That is, until play starts, for, from the first point on, he begins yelling, “Woosh!”
Danny, down 10-5 and losing still another point on his serve, offers a directive to himself: “The serve is very important,” he says aloud. Losing still another point, he says to himself, “You’re ridiculous. You’re absolutely ridiculous.” Wuvanich quite agrees—he’s up 20-6. First game to Charlie, 21-10. That’s right, Danny won four in a row before succumbing—he wasn’t giving up a thing.
Towards the end of this first game, play was momentarily stopped while Chui (at first alone, then ultimately with about 150 people around him, had to try to work out a little problem that originated at ringside then moved on out to the parking lot. “I never took an insult in my life,” he was shouting, and, continuing to disrupt play, he persisted in demanding an apology from the accused offender, if not his frightened family members. But, enough—I’m not going to detail the several bizarre scenes involving an almost beside himself Ming both before and after this match.
In the second game Danny fought magnificently. He held off two game points, then pulled it out 23-21. In the third, though, he faltered again and was haplessly down 10-3. Haplessly but not hopelessly. However, after narrowing the score to 17-14, Danny, his reflexes as taut as possible, wound up lying atop the table, head over the net as over a chopping block. Did the TV cameras catch that? Sensational. But not good enough for Seemiller—he’s 2-1 down.
In the 4th it’s 10-all when Charlie gets a big break. He lofts a return that Seemiller’s all set to clobber but the ball catches Danny’s back edge. Danny shakes his head, says, “Sure point” aloud. Then another break—Wuvanich gets a net, and Seemiller is down 14-10. But then, turnabout, a 10-3 swing for Danny, and he’s up game point, 20-17. Charlie looks at Chuchai. But Chan waves him on, as if his best advice is, “Never mind, play!” And, fantastic, Charlie serves once, twice, three times, and each time follows with a devastating, point-winning forehand. Then of course (isn’t it always the way?) he gets an almost deserving edge and runs the game out.
After the match Danny is disconsolate. “You don’t go down like that,” he keeps saying over and over again. “You don’t go down blocking and pushing like that. That block of mine’s always been my nemesis. It always comes back to haunt me. Up 20-17 I thought I couldn’t lose. But he served three times long and I just patted the ball back.”
On and on Danny kept talking to himself. Aloud. As if, were enough others to hear him, at least one would give him an alternate reality. “What kind of professional am I? I’ve lost so much confidence in myself this match.”
As for Wuvanich, he’s got to be feelin’ pretty good. But of course he works at it. Joe Soucheray of the Minneapolis Tribune tells us (TTT, Mar.-Apr.,1976, 9) a bit about Charlie’s life, past and present:
“…Chayanont Wuvanich was born 27 years ago in Bangkok, Thailand after his parents had emigrated from China. His father, U Chien-wang was a basketball player, and his mother, Vipa, a long-distance runner. They were athletic hobbyists, however, and quizzical at first when Charlie began spending four hours a day at table tennis when he was seven.
We had tables in all the schools,” Charlie says. “The game was a way many of us could prove ourselves to the world. I didn’t want to be just a good player, I wanted to be famous.”
Charlie began representing Thailand as a senior player when he was 13. In 1967 and 1968 King Phumipol himself decorated Charlie as Thailand’s Sportsman of the Year.
In 1969 he visited Australia. His parents were pleased for him. They had started a string of cotton mills and fertilizer plants and were able to afford the extravagance of sending their son abroad. Secretly they hoped that Charlie, who spoke no English, would find the experience humbling and return to the family business.
“Thank you for the radio,” Charlie says. “When I got to Australia I learned English from the radio and from conversations. I started hanging around the Victoria Table Tennis Club in Melbourne, like people hang around here at Disney’s [that includes Charlie of course who has a nearby apartment but comes to the club “everyday after running the 7 miles of road work that builds his stamina”].
…A Yugoslavian there [in Melbourne] named Mike Kredinak gave me a room in his family’s home. He wasn’t a good player, but he was a fan.”
…Wuvanich trained up to 12 hours a day on weekends. He was installed as coach of the Australian national team after two years of earning his keep with clinics and exhibitions….
…Before the 1975 World Championships in Calcutta, India, Charlie [now the perennial Australian Champion] returned home for a visit.
‘Don’t keep on with this,’ his father told him.
‘I’ve just started,’ Charlie said….
‘But you can run the factories,’ the father said. ‘You can be wealthy at home, far more wealthy than you’ll ever be playing Ping-Pong.’
…[True, and since his primary investment is his athletic self, Charlie] runs daily, skips rope, swings a leaded paddle, and stretches his body like a contortionist to improve his flexibility. At 5-foot-6 and 130 pounds he is a human whip.
‘I like to show the way in matches,’ he says….I don’t think about winning or losing. I just like the battle and I like to control the excitement of the game. I figure you need one big shot to win major competition and I have that with my forehand smash. If that’s working correctly I can beat anybody.”
Zakarin’s Pro Tour #1
Well, Charlie will get another chance to beat Seemiller and anyone else at Mort Zakarin’s $1,750 World Pro Tour #1, held Nov. 15-16 at Long Island’s Adelphi University Gym. Newsday’s Greg Aiello tells us that the two-day tournament “drew about 400 people each day and that Zakarin said he expected to break even.” Mort says he’s got a “saleable product,” and hopes “to raise the prize money to $100,000 for the six-to-eight tournaments he plans for next year.” World Pro Tour #2 “probably will be in late February in Detroit, Philadelphia, or Boston,” Zakarin said.
But then, almost as an afterthought, Mort writes in his own article (TTT, Nov-Dec., 1975, 11) that, “Because we [Mort and his partner Jules Rabin who’d successfully handled the publicity for the 1972 Hofstra U.S. Open] did not have enough time for this first tournament we did not accomplish all that we had hoped for….We’re planning to have our next tournament in May with successive tournaments following closely. We are taking it slowly so that we have time to do it right.” Does that sound encouraging? Danny Ganz certainly isn’t being optimistic when he says in his Topics column, “We’re wondering just how far the [Zakarin] contract would stand up in court if the new Players ‘ group ousts the U.S.T.T.A. or if they go in direct competition with World Table Tennis, Inc.”
Later, I interviewed Mort (TTT, Mar.-Apr., 1976, 1; 10) and he told me, “I just couldn’t afford all the time I was giving to not only playing the sport but trying to organize it as well. As a commission salesman who wanted to continue making a good living, the only way I could stay in table tennis was to turn it into a business.” But the Sport’s not easy to sell. “Just last week I blew a day. Had a meeting in New York City—lunch with some people we thought might help us. Picked up the tab.” Of course “if the circuit works,” said Mort, “a number of people will make a decent living….Still at this moment in time, I hate to see young people give up their life options on the hope that this pro tour will succeed. That’s scary.” As for Mort, he says, “I’m shooting craps with my own money. I’m gonna try. But I can’t tell them what’s at the end of the rainbow. I told Bush and Sverdlik, ‘Don’t look for me to make you a living.’
Mort said he had back-to-back scheduled tournaments in Philadelphia and the N.Y.-Long Island area (but didn’t mention any specific venues or dates). He said his next tournament would have $2,500 in prize money and a limited field of 28 players. I hope it comes about, but Mort isn’t really sounding too hopeful:
“[He says the E.C. members are well meaning, but] “the sad truth is they don’t have much talent or imagination. The same with many so-called local promoters we’ve contacted round the country. They may have been in the game 30 years, may have held weekly classes at a YMCA or Boys Club, but when you want help to really try to promote professional table tennis in their area they give off very negative vibrations. They say they don’t really see any future in the sport. And they go back to their self-enclosed little clubs. [“Amateurs,” says Mort, “are bunglers.” He and Jules “are for professionalism in table tennis.”] Surprisingly enough, then, we want to get involved with people who know nothing about table tennis.”
I said, “It sounds to me like you want something of a miracle.” To which Mort responded, “My experiences in the last six months tell me that it’s gonna be a much harder pull than I thought—and that if Jules and I can make this thing happen it is gonna be something of a miracle.”
But, o.k., we at least have Pro Tour #1, and I loved it—the class idea behind it. A 32-draw with only the top eight players automatically seeded in. The other 24 spots to be fought for by 40 contenders through eight round robins of 5 players each—positions in the draw proper dependent on whether you finished 1st, 2nd, or 3rd in your round robin (finish 4th or 5th and you’re out). The only big swing match among the qualifiers was Rutledge Barry’s win over Mike Veillette—with the result that Rutledge would go on in the 1st Round 16th’s to beat the new Carl Danner, 2-0, and Mike would go on to lose to the old Errol Resek in 3.
There were other 2-1 matches in that round of 32 that drew one’s attention. You remember D-J of course. “6-TIME U.S. OPEN CHAMP” banner screaming above him, he came out from his equipment table in the alcove, and against Gary Wittner it looked like he wasn’t sure why he’d come to this tournament. Of course, as we could see, he still played pretty well. Philip’s match with Ali Oveissi came a little too late for Dave to put it into his just out Christmas book, but maybe someone was standing by with Ali’s super-camera, just in case Ali himself would one day write his memoirs.
Down 20-17 in the 3rd against Sam Balamoun and listening to his cry of near victory, I, Tim, suddenly felt it was like accepting defeat if I kept quiet, so I cried out too. “If you care enough, you win,” I kept telling myself, and, sure enough, I got the next two points. Then I steered one of Sam’s high lobs back over—no, onto the net where it rode almost to the end of the table before going over onto Balamoun’s side. “OHHHH, MY GOD!” lamented Sam. And then two points later, poor guy, he had to endure my victory outburst.
An even more exciting match was Reisman over Ralph Robinson, 30-28 in the 3rd. Marty had arrived default-time too late, but got back into the draw through the varying good graces of his round robin opponents and sponsor Zakarin’s, Look, I’m determined not to have any hassles here; what the professional players want, that’s pretty much what I want to give them. Marty obligingly did his break-the-cigarette trick for any amateur photographer who wanted to climb over the barriers out into the court to snap it, then was ready for Robinson. Or almost ready. Late in the 3rd game a ball from an adjacent table came bounding over, interrupting play, and Ralph, without saying anything, wound up and swatted his own ball away—so that Reisman, in the absence of an umpire, now claimed the point. Ah, how the mighty have fallen. Marty said he was used to playing the ball through, wherever it was he played, and was under the impression that they were not calling lets. Moreover, said Reisman, refusing to yield, “You didn’t even call a let!” Sure—but don’t actions speak louder than words.
As play went on, Robinson had 4 or 5 ads, but couldn’t close. Finally, at I believe 27-all, Reisman, who’s been quite unflappable throughout, stops play and turns to the table next to him and asks Rory Brassington who’s in a no-net high-wire match with Ricky Seemiller to please cool it. Oh, oh—not the right thing to say to Rory, particularly not now when he’s in the 3rd game of his 8th’s match, already more than ¾ of the way across the chasm of points and in the approaching end-game needing to move steadily ahead. But shaken by this voice that suddenly thundered it seemed into his consciousness, breaking his concentration, Brassington roaried out, “After 40 years this guy comes out of the woodwork and expects to be a superstar!” Marty goes on to win, but Rory, indignant, is down 20-18. At which point he lifts an incredible lob at least 30 feet up into the rafters of the gym, perhaps surprising a pigeon up there. Whether the ball actually dropped or not, it was quite a comedown for Rory, for he lost the point and of course the match. Over he went then to kick an offending barrier—which broke everyone up.
Also in the 8th’s, it was Wuvanich over Barry, D-J Lee over Boggan, Danny Seemiller over Roger Sverdlik, and George “The Chief” Brathwaite over Mike Bush—all in straight games. Philip, skimming as it were through his book of play at most of the right pages, just 20, 19 managed to get the better of Resek. And Dave Sakai scored the biggest upset of his (“King me!”) checkered career in 19, 20 downing Zlatko Cordas. Sakai just kept blocking, and Cordas just kept missing. After he won the last point Dave was so excited he forgot himself, went running over to the barrier to be hand-slapped by his friends before finally remembering to come back to a very patient Cordas still standing there at the table.
For the tournament weekend, Wuvanich would be a house guest of mine (he bought his own lettuce, orange juice, fruit, raisin and whole wheat bread, milk mixed with powdered protein, steak….”Mr. Boggan, would you like to share some dinner with me?” The Friday before the tournament, Charlie had sat in on a couple of my Long Island University classes in Brooklyn. “Mr. Wuvanich,” I’d said in introducing him to my students, “How is it that you’re here, and what is it that you do?”
What Charlie had better do now in his quarter’s match was quickly marshal his strength, for Seemiller—Ricky, that is—took the first game by looping and blocking as if he were ready to play the European circuit. But then a turning point in the match occurred when Charlie looped a ball that he and some other people, including Ricky’s brother Danny, thought hit the edge. The umpire called it Wuvanich’s point, but when Ricky said, “Didn’t that hit the side?” the umpire changed his call to “Let.” Charlie eventually agreed to play the point over, and whatever magic Ricky had he lost, and Charlie went on to win the match comfortably. In other quarter’s matches, Danny Seemiller stopped Philip, and Brathwaite finished off Sakai. Chui, after beating Reisman easily in the 8th’s, went hustling off, and began giving 2-1 odds on himself over D-J Lee. Only, as it turned out, Ming couldn’t get more than 12 points a game from D-J who’d obviously been practicing. Obviously, for D-J and Charlie won the Doubles—over Zlatko and The Chief who’d ousted the Seemillers.
Time for the semi’s, and out come the four semifinalists, each batting a handful of table tennis balls into the stands. In the one 2 out of 3 semi’s, as Lee is building up an insurmountable 14-8 lead against Wuvanich in the first game, an unconcerned, unaware photographer is walking back and forth, clicking her heels and trying to get up barrier-close to flashbulb-blind the players. Lee takes lots of phantom swings, reminding me of those I watched from the window Charlie in his jumpsuit was taking up and down the street outside our house. But in the second game, D-J appears nervous and repeatedly serves into the net. Why? Some say it’s the new Chinese anti he’s trying to use on his backhand. In the third Lee’s no threat, and will have to content himself with Third Place—over Brathwaite who can’t contest his semi’s with Danny.
With the climactic 3 out of 5 final coming up (winner gets $750), one guy was going around trying to get down $100 on Wuvanich, then at the last minute bet on Seemiller. “First time I’ve ever seen the smart money so totally divided,” said Reisman. The match gets underway with Wuvanich taking 80% of the offense on his serves and more than 50% on Seemiller’s serves. No wonder then Danny is down 9-4. But now he rallies, draws to 11-10. Suddenly over the loudspeaker comes an “Important message for Ricky Seemiller!” A friend of Danny’s groans and, alluding to the possible bad news, says, “Ohh, what could be worse for Danny?” But it’s Wuvanich who looks disturbed and even downright irritated. He misses two serves in a row and the game breaks open—Danny wins it at 17.
In the second, Seemiller is red-hot, wins 12 in a row—has Charlie down 19-6. Somebody says, “Danny would beat Bengtsson playing like this.” Amazingly, Wuvanich doesn’t try to slow up Seemiller’s pace. On the contrary, he hurries after the ball as if he can’t wait to get back to the table to lose another point. Is this a form of gamesmanship? He will at least beat Danny in a non-stop physical fitness contest? Says the fellow next to me, “Wuvanich thinks he’s the fastest player in the world. You can’t tell him to slow down.”
In the third, Danny, down 17-11, has another hot streak, rallies to 19-18 up. But Charlie, either as if he doesn’t feel any pressure at all or, just the opposite, strongly responds to it, continues to pick up Danny’s long serve well and, not too safe, and not too soft, solidly takes three points in a row…to change Danny’s universe.
In the fourth, Wuvanich catches fire and now it’s Seemiller’s turn to get smacked around. Charlie, up 16-6, is unbelievably countering some of Danny’s strongest loops. In the fifth, Seemiller can’t do much of anything. If his short serve to Wuvanich’s forehand isn’t short enough, it’s so hard for Danny to win because Charlie returns service so well. And if Danny doesn’t move over and topspin Charlie’s serve, he can’t get the offense. Wuvanich, people are saying, has the best heavy and sidespin chop serves of anybody in the country.
Danny doesn’t want to accept defeat, but has to. Beaten now four out of five times in his matches with Charlie, he comes back to the barriers head down. “I fall apart at the end every time,” he mutters. And you know what he’s thinking. That after you’ve been #1, it’s almost more than you can bear to be #2.
$2,175 USOTC’s
Mal Anderson reports (TTT, Nov.-Dec., 1975, 23) on the U.S. Open Team Championships, held Nov. 28-30 at Detroit’s Cobo Hall “D”—but, as we’ll see later, he’s not alone in his comments. There were “69 Men’s teams, 13 Women’s, and 18 Junior’s,” and the tournament was so well run, “it was all over by 9 p.m. Sunday.” Mal hopes Tournament Director George Buben will host the tournament again next year. A number of top players didn’t show, but presumably that was because George and his Committee “didn’t guarantee prize money in advance.” Turns out, though, they “gave away all their profits, didn’t even pay their workers.” Mal suggests that “these top players who want prize money could help the sponsors, and themselves, by finding outside sponsors to donate prize money.”
The $800 1st-Prize Men’s was won by undefeated Quebec (Rod Young, Guy Germain, and Adham Sharara); the $400 2nd-Prize went to Pennsylvania (Hamid Hayatghaib, Sam Balamoun, Bill Sharpe, and Stan Smolanowicz); and the $200 3rd-Prize to Chicago. In the opening swing match between Quebec and Pennsylvania, Germain, leading 20-17 in the 3rd, saw Balamoun deuce it. But Guy prevailed anyway, winning with “a beautiful kill that caught Sam going the wrong way.” Quebec then went up 3-0 when “Sharara’s soft game baffled Hamid,” and “Young had too much power for Sharpe.” But Pennsylvania rallied. “Hamid spun through Germain.” Balamoun beat Young deuce in the 3rd “after learning not to let Rod get set to loop. Sam’s clever alternation of short and long pushes kept Rod off balance, so much so that he would often miss the ball.” When Sharpe stopped Sharara 17 and 7, the tie was tied at 3-all. Now, though, against Hayatghaib, Young rallied from 17-13 down in the 3rd to eke out a 22-20 win, and against Sharpe Germain was just too fast. Pennsylvania had to be disappointed the tie didn’t get to be 4-all. “They thought that their Egyptian, Balamoun, was better than Quebec’s Egyptian, Sharara. Sam and Adham played in the same league in Egypt a few years ago!”
The Men’s MVP Award was given to Apichart Sears who apparently played for Magoo’s (or was that Club now being called Disney’s?), the #10 finisher in the A’s. (A strange choice for the Award?) Of course had his Thai friends Wuvanich and Chan played, the three would have been a lock for the $800 prize.
Undefeated Chicago (Barbara and Dorothea Taschner, Carol Cook, and Faan Yeen Liu) won the $400 1st-Prize Women’s; the $200 2nd-Prize went to Quebec (Pauline Johnson, Sonia Duwel, and Francine Theoret). Francine won the Women’s MVP Award.
Quebec I (Pierre Normandin, Marc LeSiege, and Christine Forgo) took the $100 (Hotel Expense Allowance) 1st-Prize Junior’s; Arlington, near Chicago (Faan Yeen Liu, Joe and John Yoon), received the $75 runner-up Allowance. The Defending Champion Pennsylvania I team, “missing a high set-up at match point in the 9th match,” lost to Arlington 5-4, and also lost to Pennsylvania II! Mal wants to know how these Penn teams were selected. Bruce Plotnick won the Junior MVP with a 23-1 record, “and he probably lost rating points—which doesn’t say much for the quality of the Junior play.
Mal was happy to see some old friends there:
“Janice Martin is thinking of going to Australia for two years to teach P.E. The Hildebrandts showed up. Suzie is now Mrs. William Barkowicz, her husband is a tennis pro; they still live in Warren, Michigan. Other newlyweds at the tournament included Jim McQueen (his wife’s name is Judy) and Jeff and Yvonne Smart. Dell and Connie Sweeris brought their two kids, Michelle and Todd. They’re semi-retired from TT but look the same as ever. Connie stays slender by running after Todd! Perhaps they’ll all play when we have mother-daughter and father-son doubles?”
I know from having grown up in Ohio and going for years to many Midwest tournaments how unpopular New York players are in that section of the country. Nothing much has changed since the 1940’s of Michigan’s Graham Steenhoven and New York City’s Dick Miles and Marty Reisman. Here from Topics (Jan.-Feb., 1976, 23) are comments pertinent to these Championships.
Tournament Director George Buben:
“…The Tournament Committee agreed 100% that this was the best group of players that we have had the opportunity of conducting a tournament for. There was no hassling, no crying for preferential treatment, everyone cooperated and played their matches on schedule (keeping the tournament on schedule), and last but not least none of the swearing and other profanity that is starting to decay our Sport of Table Tennis….
…The only flaw in the whole tournament was the fact that three teams decided to default without informing the Tournament Committee and caused a great deal of inconvenience to the other teams within their groups. Several of the players suggested corrective measures that could be taken—from charging an extra $25 per Team Entry Fee that would be forfeited because of Defaults to not allowing the team to play in the next USOTC’s. Frankly I do not know the answer but I do know that it is not very sportsmanlike to have someone anxiously awaiting a Match that does not come about. Would you like it if it happened to you and you drove several hundred miles to play?
…I was sorry to see that the so-called ‘Top Players’ chose to play follow the leader and not enter, because they really missed one of our better tournaments.
[George thanks all the volunteers: “Louis Budi, who did such a beautiful job of making the round robin sheets that enabled the players to see when they played and on what table”; George and Barbara Payotelis; Barbara, Wendy, and Tracey Hart; Rosie Ryel; George’s wife Madeline; Cass, Betty and Janice Martin; and Tournament Referee Jim Rushford.]
Mark Delmar:
“Congratulations to George and Madeline Buben. The National Team Championships in Detroit was run more efficiently than I have seen in the past 3 years….There was enough room to play a match without bumping into barriers and other tables….The players were a little more efficiently dressed, since the tournament referee did an excellent job of keeping to the rules….There was a very good turnout with a total of almost 400 players.…[Mark lists half a dozen mostly Midwest players, then says] this tournament was not lacking the usual competition….The only area of the tournament that needs work is drawing spectators for the finals….”
Robert LeFebre:
“The USOC in Detroit this year was such a welcome change from what I have experienced in the past at other similar national events….
Many players said that what was really surprising was that there was no great controversy which had always accompanied an event of this type. The consensus was that this calm was the result of the absence of the so-called ‘USTTA Power Structure’—namely the New York Eastern Region contingent.
If you have followed Table Tennis during the past 10 years, I think you know what I mean. How many times have you noticed the ‘big controversy,’ the shouting, the exchange of insults, the criticizing, all centered around the representatives from the Big Apple. Think about it. How many times have you seen this outfit come to a tournament dressed in their off-beat attire, which makes them look like refugees from a side show. They then proceed to grab the center of attention by making some outrageous demands or want some special consideration.
You know darn well what I say is true. [Actually, I don’t think all you said is true. You don’t like Fuarnado Roberts’s yellow jump suit? Outrageous.] I’ve seen several members of this crowd openly gambling and exchanging money at tournaments. These guys looked like a bunch of race track bums and back-alley crap shooters. What an example for the youngsters. Hey buddy, wanta hot tip on the finals?
Even the juniors from that region are arrogant, self-centered punks. Maybe a little success went to their heads, or perhaps it is part of their training program. Folks, these are the guys who when they play a person of lesser ability try to belittle them. You’ve seen it; instead of playing their game, they play around, lob, or set up their opponent on purpose. When they succeed in making their opponent look foolish for a point they always look to their group of babbling supporters and laugh. Perhaps they’re looking for a thumbs-down signal. Any player, no matter what his or her ability, deserves the respect of their opponent playing a serious game.
What I have said is nothing new. It has been observed many times before by many people. I wonder what the Big Apple boys have planned for us in the future. Who knows, they might form a movement for secession.”
[I don’t know what decade of what “B”-movie world this LeFebre is in— it’s hard to believe with his parochial prejudices he’s ever actually been in the proximity of “race track bums and back-alley crap shooters” to know what they look like. But, aside from the East Coast players being fiercely and demonstrably competitive and making reasonable, if bothersome requests of those running tournaments, what he describes—especially among the Juniors, serious-minded as I know them usually (though not always) to be—sure isn’t my New York tournament world of the 1960’s/70’s.]
Tim Boggan:
“I’m glad so many players liked the USOTC’s. Why shouldn’t they enjoy themselves? This is the first one in 10 years I had to miss.
…A number of the ‘so-called’ top players (as Buben repeatedly likes to characterize them) did not come to Detroit, played follow the leader, because George kept insisting over the phone to me that there was no prize money.
Naturally these better players were not exactly delighted to see that $2,175 was suddenly found at the last minute from (unexpected?) entry fees and the (unexpected?) generosity of the Detroit tournament workers.
It may be argued that the better players should not have believed Buben— that I should have realized that George didn’t want to commit himself for fear of losing money. [Didn’t want to commit himself, too, because if the favored, but not locally respected, top players had come, there might not have been as generous a prize money commitment as there was?]
But of course that’s precisely the point. The better players want to go where they’re wanted, where they matter, where the sponsor wants to commit himself to them.
George Buben is a man who has deservingly won the respect of a good many people—a man who makes commitments and who lives up to them. Could he not, if and when he runs the USOTC’s again, make it clear ahead of time just what the prize is for the better players?
George, you and your workers run such a fine tournament. Why don’t you turn professional?”
Ron DeMent (TTT, Mar.-Apr., 1976, 15):
“I have noticed that most articles that appear in Table Tennis Topics are either written by, or slanted toward the top or ‘professional player.’…I would like to put forth some of the thoughts of an average player…thoughts [that] are not mine alone but have also been expressed by quite a few of my friends.
…First, I do not know George Buben personally and I have no occasion to be influenced by anything he has said. Secondly, in all fairness to Tim Boggan let me say I think he has been one of the best things to happen to the sport in recent history. In spite of his iconoclastic nature no one can say that he hasn’t tried his best to further Table Tennis, and as far as Topics is concerned he has done a magnificent job of making it into a consistently interesting and informative publication. May he long continue in his efforts!
…[Regarding the recent USOTC’s:] First of all I was impressed with how the teams were scheduled and the results posted. Anyone could go to the board and see which teams were going to play, which tables they were on, and the time. Mainly I noticed the following things—a complete lack of bad sportsmanship displays which were prevalent in past tournaments; no temper tantrums, especially by junior players; no constant calling for umpires; and, last but not least, no hastily called executive committee meetings to overrule a chairman’s ruling!
It seems to be an accepted fact that the tournament was boycotted by the top players. I feel that this is a shameful thing to happen to the USOTC’s! [The more so, DeMent complains, if that’s why President Charlie Disney wasn’t there.] …Ample prize money [was] offered and while it wasn’t guaranteed [it wasn’t, prior to the tournament, offered], I fail to see why that should have been expected due to the late date that Detroit was awarded the event…..I can’t help but wonder what would happen if, say at a large tournament (such as the Eastern’s), the tournament was boycotted by all the weaker to medium-type players? The very same players incidentally who are in the vast majority and account for the success of any tournament on any level from local to national!
[Depends on how you define success, doesn’t it? In the 1930’s, ‘40’s, and 50’s players would come to the National’s not so much to play but to see the country’s best compete. Gradually, with our increased accessibility to be where the best players are, with our ability to repeatedly view them in person or on film, the aura that once surrounded them has diminished. Still, though pockets of players in this country are divided as to whether table tennis really is a spectator sport, success often continues to be measured by what top players you can attract to your tournament.]
…Our ‘Professional Players’ [to be accepted, recognized, favored] will just have to [wait]…until Table Tennis becomes a big, nationally popular sport
[easy for you to say, Mr. Average Player]. In the meantime a possibility might be to let the pro-type players play each other in their own little tournaments [would you, Ron DeMent, Mr. Average Player, watch them?] and if any of us clods get good enough maybe they’ll accept us into their group. Until then we could go on having a helluva good time at our large national tournaments without catering to the Prima Donnas!
…I read with much interest a statement made by Boggan in the last issue of Topics on a match played by Danny Seemiller. He said, “it really was infuriating: there was a guy in overalls and a drab Detroiter T-shirt playing next to him.” May I say my heart simply bleeds for poor Dan Seemiller! What a terrible ordeal he had to go through! I would like to suggest a set routine for all Danny’s (and other ‘Professional Players’) matches from now on, to be as follows: First, stop all play at the tournament site before Danny’s match begins. Second, make all people with overalls leave the grounds. Third, have two young girls precede Danny into the arena, strewing rose petals in their wake. Fourth, ask all spectators (at least in the front 20 or 30 rows) to be attired in suits and ties. Needless to say, when other players achieve the exalted position of ‘Professional Player’ they should be accorded the same treatment….”
Alas, Mr. Average Player just doesn’t get it. The gulf between amateur and professional, the conceptual difference between them, is too new, too great.