As a temporary field hospital is set to open at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, Queens next week to help handle New York’s spike in COVID-19 cases, we chatted with six-time Open champion Chris Evert about the pandemic, the city’s (and the nation’s) response, the recent cancellation of Wimbledon, and more.
“Their goal at Tennis Center is 350 hospital beds in the indoor training center and 25,000 meals being assembled in Louis Armstrong Stadium every day,” said Evert from Boca Raton, Florida, where she runs the Evert Tennis Academy. “It’s wonderful that we can use this big facility for something that’s bigger than tennis—bigger than any of us—and that the tennis community can contribute to something like this when New York is looking for any resource possible.”
From 1975 to 1982, Evert fairly dominated the tennis world—at the US Open and pretty much anywhere else, winning 18 Grand Slam titles (six at the US Open) and reaching 34 Grand Slam singles finals, more than any other player in history. That said, her mind these days is focused on something far more important than triumphing amidst the raucous, unruly spirit of Flushing Meadows—or the recent decision of the All England Lawn Tennis Club to cancel this year’s Wimbledon tournament.
“The atmosphere and the spirit and the big heart of Flushing is still there in what’s happening now,” she says, “but the stakes are so much higher. This is about life and death now; this is much bigger than a tournament. Tennis has stepped up—the All-England Club at Wimbledon has offered their facility to the National Health Service, and it’s been a beautiful thing to witness it all. It makes me proud, as a player.”
I mention to Evert that I’ve had to put aside my own searing hatred of the New England Patriots—briefly, let’s hope—after seeing news that their owner, Robert Kraft, sent his private plane to shuttle a million N95 masks to the US from China. “Yeah!” Evert says, with a laugh. “I think we’re seeing some humanity amidst all of this, some people’s true colors coming out during a crisis.”
As for the larger question of the sport of tennis—which is, like virtually every other sport around the world, seeing much of its entire season and its biggest tournaments cancelled, postponed, and thrown up into the air—Evert has little time for it. “I am so concerned about the big picture that I haven’t really given much thought to tennis,” she says. “We’ve got such great champions, great fans, great sponsors, and I feel it will bounce back. When, I don’t know—wouldn’t it be amazing, after all this, if it came back at New York at the Open after all of this? But of course, nobody knows. I do think we’ll be back on track next year. But I’ve been thinking more about the lives being lost and the big picture. It’s like something in a horror movie that seemed surreal at the time we first saw it, and now it’s happening in real life.”
Evert says she's both concerned and heartened by the preparedness she’s witnessing around Boca Raton, which has yet to experience the kind of surge in COVID-19 cases that large urban areas are now in the midst of. “I’m starting to see more and more pedestrians wearing face masks, which they weren’t doing last week, but more of us still have to do the three things—wash your hands, don’t touch your face, and observe social distancing. It’s been frustrating to see that maybe half the country seems to be doing this and the other half doesn’t. But I’m hoping that everyone gets a little more serious in April. In the meantime, I turn on my television and watch Andrew Cuomo, and my heart is lifted—and then I’m disappointed that he’s not our president.”