It's a little different inside Butch Buchholz's office in Key Biscayne than it was when he first stepped up as patron saint of tennis of South Florida and a good piece of the rest of the world 25 years ago.

''Like it?'' Butch casually asks a visitor.

''Who wouldn't like it?'' answers Tony Trabert, that golden all-time name, now a mellow 79.

What's not to like? Buchholz's quarter-century has zoomed from cardboard digs in Delray Beach to munificently solid quarters in Key Biscayne.

People such as Trabert, although in truth there are few such as him, drop into Buchholz's Sony Ericsson Open kingdom all the time. Everybody enjoys playing a part in this story.

Buchholz started with nothing except his own reputation and a few old-timers who thought an annual tournament would make a nice little touch for this end of the peninsula.

''Little'' grew real big. From those few graybeard boosters, the tournament now crosses all age lines.

One minute Butch is chatting with Trabert. A few sentences later and he's chewing the fat with ballboys and ballgirls.

EVERYONE'S EVENT

This is everybody's event, as much for simple socializing as tennis. A substantial percentage of customers go home without seeing a shot struck, on a natural high from just schmoozing with peers from 10 to 90.

To be sure, if they do want to see some shots struck, they have had plenty to see, from Chris Evert and Andre Agassi on. Buchholz vividly recalls seeing Agassi and Steffi Graf practicing at some ungodly early hour here back in the 1990s, ``and that's when I first knew something was going on with them.''

Now the star roster includes Rafa Nadal and Roger Federer and the Williams sisters -- Serena and Venus, regular as sunshine.

The tournament has grown from shaky upstart to a classic on a footing with the Orange Bowl Classic as this sporting area's two prime tourist draws.

It isn't perfect and won't be as long as so many players are so spoiled and temperamental. But this year's event will generate a reported $300 million in economic impact in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.

Tourists, especially from South America, come in with money and leave it -- what the players don't take with them, anyway. Buchholz has paid out $109 million in prize money across the years.

REMEMBERING PAST

Now, gabbing with Trabert at headquarters, Butch reels back to a day in Rhodesia in 1962.

''I was 21, and I had just finished a final doubles championship match and a final singles championship match in the same day,'' he remembered. ``I don't think I've ever been so tired.''

''Yeah,'' Trabert said. ``You were slumped in the bathtub when I walked in. You looked just about dead.''

Buchholz nodded.

'Then Tony handed me one of the biggest glasses I'd ever seen. It was full of bourbon and Coke, and Tony said, `Well done, rookie!' ''

At 68, Buchholz does it better than ever.

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