People

By Sara C. Medina

"Old habits die hard," said John McEnroe last month. Not that he hasn't tried to kill them off. The once supreme tennis star and undefeated champ of testiness on and off the court, McEnroe dropped out of the game six months ago, vowing to change his attitude -- and his game -- for the better. But when the reformed McEnroe made his long-awaited return to the pro circuit last week at the Volvo International tournament in Stratton Mountain, Vt., some of his old habits surfaced again.

His running feud with the press herd had already been revived the week before, when he and Actress Tatum O'Neal were married in Oyster Bay, N.Y. McEnroe spit at a photographer a couple of days before the wedding and slipped into the church through dark curtains draped over the carport entrance. Give him points for trying, however. After the ceremony McEnroe and his wife waved, smiled and kissed for the crowds outside the church.

Two days later McEnroe failed to show up for a pre-tournament press conference; his father filled in for him. The next day McEnroe, working out with Jimmy Connors on a practice court, caught sight of British Photographer Tommy Hindley, who had tussled with him in the past. McEnroe let loose a couple of close-range volleys, one of which hit the photographer in the thigh, and, said Hindley, threatened to put the next one between his eyes.

When he went on sabbatical last January, McEnroe was, by his own admission, burned out. "I was going in a direction that wasn't beneficial to tennis or myself," he told New York Daily News Sports Columnist Mike Lupica. Two months before, he had nearly throttled a reporter at the Australian Open, where he lost in the quarterfinals after playing, as he put it, "like a dog." Then he ignominiously lost his first-round match in the Masters Tournament in Madison Square Garden. Tatum was due to give birth to their child in May, and the father-to-be admitted that he "needed to go away and dig myself out of a hole."

So he and Tatum retreated to the Malibu house that they purchased last year from Johnny Carson (price tag: $1.85 million and three hours of tennis lessons), enrolled in Lamaze childbirth class and awaited the baby's arrival. Since Kevin's birth May 23, McEnroe has shared in the 3 a.m. feedings and even changed diapers. "I've seen it with my own eyes," says his mother Kay. Fatherhood, McEnroe says, has "changed things for me in the sense that your priorities change and you do things differently . . . It's the best thing that's ever happened to me."

McEnroe began preparing for his return to the pro tour with a regimen of yoga and weight training. Aware of the odds against ever regaining the No. 1 spot he last held in 1984, he has also started to work at a game for which he had never had to push himself before. "I'm going to show my best tennis down the road," he said. "And I also believe . . . that being in such great physical shape is going to help me mentally when things try to bother me on the court."

Well, maybe. Seeded fourth last week, he produced uncertain ground strokes and he appeared rusty. Even as his playing improved as he advanced to the semifinals by defeating Peter Fleming and Wally Masur, he disputed line calls and spit in the direction of the judge. Nonetheless he fell to a fiercely determined Boris Becker in a tough match that was settled by a 10-8 tiebreaker. It is a measure of McEnroe's enduring popularity, however, that 100 reporters and 40 photographers showed up to cover the Volvo, traditionally a sleepy tournament that attracts little attention. Win or lose, polite or rude, John McEnroe still fascinates. S.C.M.