That's something a lot of athletes miss - a lot of them walk away too soon. They don't get everything out of their system. They have a lot of what-ifs when they're sitting around later in life. I don't have that. I got all that out of my system. I pushed it to the brink, I loved it, and when I walked away, I'd had enough.

I had true rivalries. Not only did I want to beat my opponent, but I didn't want to let him up, either. I had a rivalry with Mac, Lendl, Borg. Everybody knew there was tension between us, on court and off. That's what's really ingrained in my mind: 'This is real. This isn't a soft rivalry.' There were no hugs and kisses.

I like any title with the letters U.S. in front of it. To me, the U.S. Open is the most important tournament in the world.

People don't seem to understand that it's a damn war out there. Maybe my methods aren't socially acceptable to some, but it's what I have to do to survive. I don't go out there to love my enemy. I go out there to squash him.

You have to remember that I played longer than anybody else on the main tour; I played until I was 40, and then played another six years or so on the seniors tour.

Tennis would be much more exciting if they had pitching machines firing Tennis was given to me to keep me off the street corners of east St. Louis.

Big money encourages tanking. In my opinion, tanking is going on even with a lot of the top guys today - it's quite evident.