Player Profile: Bill Tilden

Photogenic, eh? That's a famous photo of Bill Tilden in a tournament match (Wimbledon, I believe). I edited out the crowd in the background because the quality of the old black-and-white photo is so poor.

When people talk about the greatest players of all time, he must be on the short list.

Bill Tilden dominated tennis for more than a decade, winning seven United States Championships, three Wimbledon Championships, and two professional titles. Born William Tatum Tilden II on February 28, 1893 in Philadelphia, he learned to play tennis at the Germantown Cricket Club. In 1913, with Mary Browne, he won the U.S. Mixed Doubles title. A late bloomer, however, he didn't reach the men's singles final till 1918.

Then he held the title from 1920 to 1925 and again in 1929. Tilden became the first American to win the men's championship at Wimbledon in 1920. He won it again in 1921 and in 1930.

Look at this picture-perfect jumping overhead in another famous photo of Tilden in action. One wonders what he could have done with one of today's rackets.

He was all about domination and commanded attention wherever he went, earning a reputation as one of the most colorful sports figures of the 1920s. George Lott wrote this of him entering a room:

Immediately there was a feeling of awe, as though you were in the presence of royalty. The atmosphere became charged and there was almost a sensation of lightness when he left. You felt completely dominated and you heaved a sigh of relief for not having ventured an opinion of any sort.

Not a nice person. That need to have power over others and to dominate them, in order to feed his ego by vaunting himself on others, came through in other ways too. (Which I shall not go into.)

But he was nonetheless an amazing tennis player.

Moreover, like all such people -- people with a predatory outlook and a manipulative nature -- he was an observant student of human nature. People like that always are, like predators always studying other people to figure out how to really get to them. And, like all such people, he was an expert at mind games.

Hence, it's no wonder that Bill Tilden practically invented sports psychology. Well, that isn't exactly true, because nice people like George Lott understood it too. But Tilden popularized the art of sports psychology in his books, which are still considered classics in that regard.

Tilden also won several doubles (1918, 1921-23, 1927) and mixed doubles (1913-14, 1922-23) for a record total of 16 U.S. titles. Among his other titles were many indoor U.S. championships and Italian singles, men's doubles and French mixed doubles, all in 1930. In Davis Cup play, his 21 wins in 28 matches helped the United States hold the trophy from 1920 to 1926. He died June 5, 1953 in Hollywood, California.