By Scoop Malinowski
Now the tennis establishment is finally beginning to express rejection, displeasure and disgust of Justin Gimelstob’s indefensible vicious assault on Randall Kaplan which should have already initiated his ouster. Lleyton Hewitt, Amelie Mauresmo, Andy Murray, Darren Cahill, Martina Navratilova have all communicated their belief that Gimelstob has to be replaced on the ATP Board of Directors.
Reports are there will be a vote about Gimelstob next month in Rome and several candidates are emerging as potential replacements, if as expected, Gimelstob is relieved of his duties.
Tim Mayotte, is a former top ten player and ATP singles champion, Wimbledon semifinalist and Olympic silver medalist. He has a clean image in the sport as a player and a coach and was never involved in any controversy. The perfect choice to replace Gimelstob.
Todd Martin, is the head honcho at the Newport Hall of Fame, and also a class act who always represented the sport with the utmost integrity, honor and gentleman qualities. You can’t find a better ambassador for the sport. Martin deeply cares about the sport and it’s future and can be counted on to do what’s best for the future of tennis.
James Blake is another class act player who always represented the sport with class and honor. After a very successful playing career where he reached 4 in the world, Blake has had a successful post playing career as a TV commentator and tournament director of the Miami Open. So he’s qualified on the business end of the sport.
Robby Koenig, former doubles player and now a successful TV analyst from South Africa is a very popular and well liked figure in pro tennis – and very worthy of the position of ATP Board of Directors.
Stefan Edberg may or my not be interested in the role but the former world no. 1 and Wimbledon and US Open champion would certainly add prestige and respect to the ATP Board with his presence alone. Edberg is currently not involved in the ATP but that should be corrected.
Other potential candidates: David Ferrer, Feliciano Lopez, Tommy Haas, Jeff Salzenstein, Michael Russell, Alex Corretja, Tim Henman, Nicolas Lapentti, Nico Massu, Andy Murray.
Hartt · April 28, 2019 at 6:07 pm
It sounds like there are many possibilities of honourable, dedicated people who would make excellent ATB board members. I don’t think Edberg would be interested; apparently he did not get involved with the official side of Swedish tennis because he doesn’t want to be involved with politics.
But the others that you mention sound like good choices.
Scoop Malinowski · April 28, 2019 at 6:33 pm
Agree Hartt, when you think of all the class people in tennis, like Tim Mayotte, Todd Martin, etc, it makes no sense to keep a violent maniac in a position of high power. It’s a very bad look for tennis, as Jim Courier said about Sandgren’s tweets, and it’s a potentially dangerous situation for the future of tennis and those who Gimelstob has wrath for. You can suspect he’s a very vindictive person. ATP does not need that drama.