To celebrate TENNIS Magazine’s 40th anniversary, we’ve chosen the 40 best players of the last four decades. Here are numbers 16 through 13.

16. John Newcombe
Photo By Clive Brunskill/Getty Images

“Newk” was old-school from the start. In the middle of Swinging London’s psychedelic summer of 1967, he won his first Wimbledon as a clean-shaven, beer-loving throwback. By the time he retired a decade later, he was the last link in a two-decade-old Australian tennis dynasty.

In the interim, Newk traded his clean shave for a handlebar mustache and served as one of tennis’ transitional figures. He embraced the mercenary ethos of the Open era while keeping faith with the sport’s traditional camaraderie. One night he would take on Jimmy Connors in a made-for-TV spectacle in Las Vegas, the next he would lay down his life for his Aussie Davis Cup teammates.

Trained by Harry Hopman, the Sydney native was a serve-and-volleyer with a heavy delivery and a lethal forehand volley. He also added a modern twist—a buggy-whip forehand ground stroke. The combination was tailor-made for the grass of Wimbledon, Forest Hills, and Kooyong, where he won a combined seven major titles. True to form, he cited a team win as his most memorable. In 1973, Australia—with Newk, Rod Laver, and Ken Rosewall—ended the United States’ five-year Davis Cup stranglehold and was proclaimed the greatest team in Cup history. There could be no higher accolade for a man as true to his mates as John Newcombe. — STEPHEN TIGNOR

 CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> Won seven major titles
> With Tony Roche, one of four men’s doubles teams to win all four majors
> Reached No. 1 in 1974

15. Mats Wilander
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Bjorn Borg was a hard act to follow. Yet Mats Wilander, a middleweight groundstroker with fierce powers of concentration, accomplished something that even Borg had not. He won the French Open the first time he played it (1982), as an unseeded 17-year-old. He was also a Swede, and just as unflappable as Borg.

Wilander’s best weapon was his mind; his next best was his speed. He was as quick as a cat and could exploit any weakness. With Anders Jarryd, Stefan Edberg, and Joakim Nystrom, he was part of a gifted Swedish generation that rose to great heights partly through the influence of Borg and partly through internal rivalry.

Wilander rarely hit aces, but he rarely double-faulted. He seldom cracked big winners but seemed never to miss a passing shot. Over the years, he evolved from a pure baseliner into an all-courter with a slice backhand and a volley good enough to win a Wimbledon doubles title (with Nystrom in 1986).

He won major singles titles on every surface and was a Davis Cup hero, playing on three winning squads. In 1988, Wilander became one of just a handful of Open era men to win three Slams in a year. But that performance also burned him out. He was never again a factor at majors, and his career was largely finished by the time he was 25.— PETER BODO

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> Won seven major titles
> Led Sweden over U.S. Davis Cup team featuring Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe in 1984

14. Stefan Edberg
Photo By Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis

If you compiled a list of the game’s most intense competitors, Stefan Edberg almost certainly wouldn’t be on it. But that would be a major omission. Sure, aside from the occasional fist pump, the Swede always appeared relaxed, even sleepy. Nothing and no one seemed to bother him. Even his elegant serve-and-volley game— that deep arch of the back and glide to the net—looked effortless and balletic.

But, as his coach Tony Pickard observed, Edberg had “the fire in his belly”—not to mention a strong streak of individualism.

Part of a wave of talented players who followed Bjorn Borg out of Sweden, Edberg broke the mold by hitting a one-handed backhand and rushing the net. It was a style created out of necessity: As a child in Vastervik, Sweden, he played on lightningfast hardwood gymnasium floors where staying back spelled certain doom. The payoff was rich: 41 singles titles, four Davis Cups, and a legacy of versatility. He won two titles at each of three Grand Slams—a feat that Mats Wilander, Boris Becker, Andre Agassi, and John McEnroe never accomplished. Edberg’s game was so solid that it even carried him to a French Open final in 1989, where he nearly beat Michael Chang for the title. No net-rushing player had gotten that far at Roland Garros since McEnroe five years earlier—and no one has done it since. It shouldn’t have been surprising. Like Mac, Edberg, though you may not have noticed, brought an intangible to the table: an insatiable desire to win. — JAMES MARTIN

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> Won six major titles
> Played on four champion Swedish Davis Cup teams
> Reached world No.1 in doubles; won three doubles majors

13. Monica Seles
Photo By Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis

When Monica Seles was a girl, her father, Karolj, a cartoonist, encouraged her to play tennis by drawing characters on the balls. Perhaps that’s why the woman with the Olive Oyl hairdo, Woody Woodpecker laugh, and superhero grunt ended up with a bang-’em-on-the-head game straight out of Looney Tunes.

Nobody accused Seles of playing artistically. But the ferocity and accuracy of her ground strokes— struck with two hands on both sides—more than compensated for her lack of imagination. She played the game with the mind-set of a sharpshooter, cleaning lines and scoring bull’s-eye winners that even the most talented retrievers (Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario) or fleet athletes (Steffi Graf) couldn’t run down.

Seles’ game was so effective that when she won the 1993 Australian Open she had just turned 19 and was already champion at eight of the previous 12 majors. She was on her way to tearing up the record books when, just months later during a match in Hamburg, Germany, she was stabbed in the back by a madman. Although the wound wasn’t life-threatening, she was sidelined for more than two years, during which time the hellbent little girl was transformed into a philosophical woman. While she added one more Grand Slam title (the 1996 Australian Open) and a dozen more quarterfinals to her résumé, she never dominated again. Her fans will always be left wondering, “What if?”  — TONY LANCE

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> Won nine major titles
> Spent 178 weeks at No. 1, fifth on the all-time list
> Youngest Roland Garros champion (16 years, 6 months)