Great Shots in Tennis History: The Don Budge Backhand

More than six decades ago a tall, redheaded teenager from Oakland, California unveiled to an astonished tennis
world what is almost universally acclaimed to be the greatest tennis stroke of all time – the J. Donald Budge Backhand.

Budge’s backhand weapon was so formidable it forced every opponent he faced to drastically alter their tactics and rethink
the way they played the game. No one was able to follow their serve to net successfully against Budge.

So great a player was he that in the 1948 World Professional Championships Budge, 10 years past his prime, broke Jack Kramer,
the greatest serve and volley player the game has seen, in his first two service games, forcing the reigning Wimbledon and U.S.
champion to stay back behind his usually devastating first serve.

My first contact with Budge occurred when I was a fourteen year old, stringing rackets at the Los Angles Tennis
Club. This was more than a decade after Budge had defined the Grand Slam by becoming the first player to win the 4 major
championships in a single year.

One day, the tennis pro handed me a racket to string. I had never seen anything like it! The handle was…