Quotes by John McEnroe

Women have it better in tennis than any other sport, but you shouldn't push them to play more than they're capable of playing.

You're asking too much of the women. They shouldn't be playing as many events as men. If tennis is best served by women playing events with men, so be it.

In general, people are administered drugs too readily.

My best tennis at my peak was when I played a lot of matches.

I would put tiebreakers in the fifth set, no question about it.

I don't take myself as seriously as I did when I was playing, and it works, and I think people see the self-deprecation in my commentary.

I had a harsh lesson in 1996, when I lost four times to Andres Gomez on clay.

I am not a monster. I'm not all bad. Maybe 10 percent. I think I'm 90 percent good.

I know being a linesman is a thankless job, especially with guys like me around.

There's too much money and too many nice guys around.

Equipment's the biggest change. And the guys have been getting bigger, stronger, more athletic -- so the game has become more of a track meet instead of a tennis match, in a sense.

The only thing championship about Wimbledon is its prestige.

If you yell at your box, I'm not really sure it's something where it should be a penalty. It seems like you hurt yourself.

I can't speak for other people, but I still hate losing. When I did lose, I found it easier to yell than to cry. Guys aren't supposed to cry, are they?

I was a Yankee fan until 1981. That was the year the Yankees were two up on the Dodgers and lost four straight. And George Steinbrenner apologized to the city.

We all choke. Winners know how to handle choking better than losers.

I like John McCain, or he seems like a cool guy in a lot of ways. I don't agree with a lot of his policies, but he still seems like a cool guy.

If you look at the top 100 players, you would see that the great majority of them have had at least a couple of surgeries. That tells me that we have to protect the players.

Borg's won Wimbledon four straight times and out there he has just lost an 18-16 tie breaker. You'd think maybe once he'd let up and say forget it. But oh, no way.

Tennis is a funny game; unbelievable highs and the lows are just as low.

That's one of the best sets I've seen him play, although I should preface that by saying I haven't seen him play before.

The important thing is to learn a lesson every time you lose.

He Roger Federer is the greatest natural talent in tennis I've ever seen. I love to watch the guy play, he's an awesome talent.

As I got older and started moving up the ranking, the matches got more important, and my emotions ratcheted up. I guess I hid my real feelings behind the anger.

They should be required to be in less events; there should be less events for the women. It seems it takes an actual meltdown on the court or women quitting the game altogether before they realize there's a need to change the schedule.

There's always a concern when you play the week before a major. That's not the easiest time for a scheduler or a promoter, I would think.

I would not have an event before the majors. I would build them up. It very rarely happens that a player plays the week before, wins the event, and then goes on to win the slam.

I want to be remembered as a great player, but I guess it will be as a player who got angry on a tennis court.

If you want to be a tennis player, then mould yourself on Roger Federer. I won three Wimbledon titles and I wish I could play like him.

The perception is I didn't get along with umpires, obviously, and I didn't, on the court. But off the court, we had a good vibe.

You cannot be serious!

Do women golfers say they could go out and beat Tiger Woods?

I've seen tennis clubs close in Manhattan and garages put up in their place, and I'd sure like to be part of reversing that trend.

There was a line call that didn't look so great. I went ballistic. Called the umpire a jerk. Whacked a ball into the stands. Then smacked a soda can with my racket, and got soda all over the King of Sweden, who was sitting in the front row.

Nadal is one of the great champions -- a class act.

I grew up watching Dr. J, and I was like, 'Oh my God, this guy is the greatest basketball player I ever saw.'

I thought doubles was a good way for me to practice and get some reps in -- I didn't like to train in the gym as much as players these days.

Kyrgios has got to look in the mirror if he wants to become a top player and win Grand Slams.

You can't give away points and games against someone like Murray. You're not going to make it to the top with that kind of effort.

I'm 56 years old. I like to get out on the court. I continue to try to play the best I can. Obviously, I'm nowhere near where I was when half this age. But I can still hit a pretty decent ball.

I'd love to see all the guys play their best because I think it's better for tennis.

Sometimes my negativity worked to my advantage, and early in my career, it got me going. But you need to understand that you're not just fighting opponents, you're also fighting yourself.

I got a lot of publicity, but it steamrolled. Event organizers weren't used to that kind of behavior, so later, they tightened the rules.

Sitting there clapping and smiling... it's difficult. You're like, 'Don't worry about it, you just double faulted, you just played a really dumb point. Keep positive.' Then more clapping. That would annoy me as a player.

I used to take pride if my kids were playing basketball, and I'd be there, and I wouldn't say anything. People were obviously expecting me to yell and scream at the ref and at them and everything. I wouldn't say anything.

Look at Becker and Djokovic. If you look at Novak's record since Boris has been there, it's been phenomenal.

Jack Nicholson didn't get anything until he was in his thirties. You have to persevere and put yourself in positions, and sooner or later, you will break through.

You have to keep persevering. An actor goes to a lot of auditions and doesn't get the part.

They would go back and listen to my matches, and two days later, I'd be fined. Because no one heard it while it was being played, but they heard it on some mic behind the court. Is that the way it should be? I don't think so.

If you really want to get it more exciting, no linesmen. And have the players call their lines. That would make the game more exciting, I promise you. It would be awesome.

I can't advocate people not liking each other. But... I'd prefer it.

I always got along with Borg, who was my greatest rival. People like to see me and Connors, me and Lendl, go at it. We didn't like each other.

Nick Kyrgios, if you don't want to be a professional tennis player, do something else.

I can tell you from experience that when you get that pent-up and crazed, it can be distracting.

You look at a guy like Michael Jordan: I can't believe there will be other basketball players like him.

Why don't they go back to wood racquets? Then we would see the best tennis to be played.

One of the things I respected about Connors was that one second he would be spewing a four-letter word, the next second he would do something that had people falling off the aisles. Yet he never seemed to lose his concentration.

I was always taught that you needed to be intense and never lose your focus.

If you're out there and things are going badly, are you going to cry or break down?

What made my matches against Borg and Connors interesting was, comparing it to boxing, it was like a puncher and a counter-puncher.

I'm sure a lot of players say it, but winning is almost so you don't lose. The thrill of winning is not as great as the pain of losing.

The sting of losing is bad.

If they think I'm better at commentating than I was as a player, then I must be pretty darned good at commentating.

You hit a wall at some stage when you don't want it so bad, but you don't know when that's going to be -- as far as competition or as far as health is concerned. Sometimes it's just natural. You just taste it, and you want it so bad that you find other gears.

Sometimes you get hungrier when you taste it.

When I felt I was rejected by my first wife, and she said, 'Some day you will thank me for this,' you know what? I do. And so, sometimes it is darkest before the dawn. You can think it is bleak and you can't see. You never know.

It's only human nature to want to know what you can do on your own or with someone else.

Roland Garros is the only one of the four majors that is 15 days, and that is too long.

Nadal and Roger Federer have great respect for each other. I think Novak Djokovic gets under those two guys' skin a little bit, and maybe they don't want to admit it, and I think that's, in a way, healthy.

I didn't get along with most of the players I played against, but the one guy I did get along with was my greatest rival, so it can be done.

I happened to be one of those guys who doesn't play much golf.

It's ironic -- people used to want to suspend me and talk about how bad my behaviour was, but now they like it when I shout and scream.

If people do things without thinking them through, that rubs me up the wrong way.

I'm a tell-it-like-it-is kind of person; I don't like being misled or someone not telling the truth. That upsets me.

When I walk out there on court, I become a maniac... Something comes over me, man.

I don't think enough players channel the energy of the crowd. If it's done properly, and you don't let anger overwhelm and distract you, it's like a shot of adrenaline in the arm, and it gets the crowd pumped up.

I'd never left America until I was 18.

There's a certain beauty and majesty to Wimbledon. The elegance, the way the grass looks on TV.

I remember when I was younger taking more pride in Wimbledon than the French. That and the U.S. Open -- they were the ones I wanted to win.

I went on safari in South Africa just after apartheid had ended.

London is great, but New York is the greatest city in the world.

I like to be close to water and the ocean, particularly. I love to get out and body surf. I like mountain biking, too.

I am finicky about making sure my sneakers are pretty tight. It is almost like a superstition for me.

I've never seen a good tennis movie. They all were terrible.

I can barely remember what I was like 36 years ago when I was 21 years old.

When I came on the tour, I thought, 'Why don't they treat tennis players the same way they look at football players?' Because I've got news for you: when they are on the pitch, they are not saying, 'Hello, how are you?' out there.

It seems like the richer you are, the more chance you have of paying less tax.

What I think is frustrating for Americans is that it feels like more was going to change with Obama.

I would have thought that a woman would have become president before a black man.

I won't admit to having a poster of Borg on my bedroom door. But I certainly found him to be someone who got me way more into tennis.