Fiend at Court Unplugged
The USTA uses the US Open as an opportunity to wine and dine VIPs. It makes sense because a registered non-profit, the USTA needs donations from generous benefactors in order to operate. The USTA brass enforces a strict dress code in the Presidential Suite at the US Open which hosts the upper echelons of benefactors for their own and related causes. The list of prohibited attire includes denim jeans and shorts. Perhaps most shocking of all, tennis shoes are not allowed.
In “Own the Arena,” former USTA president Katrina Adams described a dress code kerfuffle that once spilled over to celebrity gossip sites. The story was probably included to provide some color and context for how important donor management is in the US Open Presidential Suite. Adams declined to name the “rich New York City businessman” at the center of the story in her memoir, but the details weren’t terribly hard to track down in other sources.
During a match between Andy Murray and Nick Kyrgios in 2015, Steve Osman and Adams had a clash after one of his guests showed up wearing faded blue jeans and was denied entry to the US Open Presidential Suite. Osman shared some choice words about Adams the next day in the New York gossip rags: “I couldn’t get over her rudeness. I don’t have a problem with the USTA. I have a problem with this woman.”
A USTA rep responded to the allegations with an official statement: “We have a dress code … a no-jeans policy. Mr. Osman, according to people at the front desk, became the ‘single rudest person’ they ever dealt with … They were shaken.” He said that when they called Adams, Osman “began to ‘educate’ her on his generosity” and his friendship with King.
He also asked, “Do you know who I am?” I was wondering the same thing myself. That sent me down a rabbit trail, as is my custom.
Professionally, Steve Osman is listed as the president and CEO of Metropolitan Pacific Properties. The media source that “broke” the story is essentially a celebrity news gossip site. In that source, Osman was listed as the host of “an annual US Open benefit that he founded 18 years ago with Billie Jean King for the City Parks Foundation.” It is likely that information was provided to the gossip columnist by Osman himself.
The City Parks Foundation is a non-profit organization with the mission to encourage New Yorkers to use their neighborhood parks by offering free environmental education, arts, sports, and community-building programs that bring people into their local green spaces. Every year since 1998, the USTA has conducted a fundraiser for the organization at the US Open. The City Parks Program includes free tennis lessons for New York area kids who probably wouldn’t get to play tennis otherwise.
Osman was certainly not a co-host of the fundraiser in 2015. The earliest website for the City Parks Foundation archived on the Internet Wayback Machine was in 2000. In every single year that the fundraising event was promoted on the City Parks site, the co-hosts are listed as Billie Jean King and John McEnroe. That specifically includes 2015. I could not find any credible reference to Osman ever co-hosting the event.
A Wall Street Journal article that profiled the 2016 fundraiser listed King as the co-founder along with with City Parks sports director Mike Silverman and… Osman. It is possible that he was involved in some capacity at the point of inception perhaps as a founder. I can find no other linkage between Osman and the event outside of that source.
In 2015 his denim tirade, Osman claimed to have donated $25,000 to the City Parks Foundation tennis program earlier in the day. Curiously enough, that donation level correlates to a “Platinum Sponsor” for the City Parks Foundation fundraiser that was held that very evening. Donors were treated to a cocktail reception, dinner, live auction, and tickets to the Open’s evening matches in Arthur Ashe Stadium. The $25,000 Platinum Sponsors also received the following perks:
- Premium table for ten
- 10 USTA President’s Box tickets to the US Open evening matches
- Full-page ad on the inside cover of dinner journal
- Recognition from the podium
Perhaps Steve Osman was involved when the annual fundraiser was established in 1998, maybe even as a co-founder as he claimed. It is also plausible that he was merely a long running “Platinum” sponsor. It is likely that the “recognition from the podium” indicates that the event was “made possible by” or similar language.
5 months following the run-in with Adams in the US Open Presidential Suite, Osman ran into his “good pal” Billie Jean King at Michael’s restaurant in New York. The gossip pages dutifully reported the encounter including the detail that King and Osman had not spoken since the US Open jeans incident. Their exchange was reported to be cordial. That sounds like more of an acquaintance situation.
As a footnote to this story, current internet searches for Steve Osman turn up a lot of unflattering headlines relating to his real estate dealings and legal actions. One example describes him as a “Manhattan property manager with a history of fraud accusations.” When the question was asked, “Do you know who I am?” perhaps the answer from USTA personnel was actually… a resounding yes.
- US Open warfare over a pair of faded jeans, Ian Mohr, Page Six, September 2, 2015.
- The US Open war over jeans has faded, Mara Siegler, Page Six, March 1, 2016.
- CityParks Celebrates Grass-Roots Tennis, Pia Catton, The Wall Street Journal, August 31, 2016.
