This article originally appeared on SI.com.
Lets start with the pants.
They were conversation starters but they were so much more than two-legged novelty acts.
Credit: Al Levine/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty Images
Like the owner, they were fun and quirky and generous in spirit.
They both conveyed a point that tennis was playful, not pretentious.
Plus, each pair told a story.
And no one could spin yarns like Arthur Worth CollinsBud, as he was presciently nicknamed as a boy.
They say dress for the job you want, not the job you have.
But for this guy, those two were one and the same.
Bud covered everything and everyone, from Muhammad Ali and Ted Williams to the Vietnam War.
And, yes, he has an inventory of stories for each assignment.
But his real passion resided with tennis he was once a national champ and thats where he ultimately settled.
He covered the sport like no one before or since.
Sometimes earnestly, other times lightheartedly.
He embraced the sports history and famously wrote an entire tennis encyclopedia.
But he was also progressive, rooted in the present and future.
Bud also is credited with being the first sportswriter to make the transition seamlessly to television.
By decades, Bud prefigured everyone from Tony Kornheiser to Stephen A. Smith.
In September, theUSTAchristened the media centerat the National Tennis Center in Buds honor.
In-fighting and petty land-grabs are to tennis what heartbreak is to country music.
It was a rare tennis decision that was met with zero objections.
Its a fitting honor that Bud, bless, was able to accept before his passing.
But we all know this truth: it just made official what was always tacitly understood.
It was Buds room.
The rest of us were just fortunate to be in his company.
