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Things have gone from ugly to uglier in the life of Roscoe Tanner, 1977 Australian Open and formerly the No. 4-ranked player in the world.

A native of Chattanooga, TN, Tanner is a wanted man according to a local TV station’s Web site. According to a court order in Georgia, Tanner owes his second ex-wife more than $750,000 in child support and alimony.

Tanner has been in and out of jail repeatedly over the past decade and has failed to appear in Dade County (GA) court numerous times.

Just a month ago, Tanner was the featured speaker at a $35 per ticket dinner at the Vineyard Youth Tennis Center in Martha’s Vineyard.  

In 1993, he had an affair with a woman he met on tour in New Jersey. The woman began pregnant and Tanner denied paternity. She took him to court in 1994 where the young girl was determined to be his. Tanner agreed to a $500,000 payment, but never paid.

In 1995, he bought 130 acres of land near his hometown to build Tanner Tennis Lodge – an enormous 140-room lodge that would have a restaurant, bar, spa, lake for fishing and indoor tennis courts.

He told local newspapers that Bjorn Borg and Jimmy Connors would play exhibitions there, but construction never even started and Tanner eventually sold the land to pay off debts.

In 1996, a judge ordered Tanner to pay the woman $1,000 a month, and again he did nothing. In 1997, he was arrested in the middle of a doubles match in Naples, Florida, and released when he made a $40,000 back payment.

He failed to start the payments up again and went overseas to Germany, but was eventually hauled back in handcuffs by US Marshals. He eventually served a year for the crime in the Florida State prison system.

He bounced a check for a car the next year in Tennessee and received a one-year suspended sentence.

His first wife, Charlotte, sued for divorce and got a court order for child support. Tanner in turn filed for bankruptcy in 1998 and began travelling, then announced a partnership with the Club St. Lucia hotel to run the Roscoe Tanner Tennis Academy.

He disappeared shortly thereafter, only to emerge in Tampa two years later, marrying his second wife.  He became a partner in The Court Yard, a tennis club in Atlanta, planning to turn it into an indoor facility, but nothing ever came of it.

He was arrested again on the court in Atlanta in 2001, and could only watch while his ex-wife auctioned off his Australian Open trophy on Ebay for $10,000.

During his playing days, Tanner had one of the most ferocious serves of all time, holding the record for hitting one 153 miles per hour (later broken by Andy Roddick).

He played collegiate tennis at Stanford, and won the 1970 USTA Amateur Championships. As a pro, Tanner won the 1977 Australian Open in three sets over Guillermo Vilas, and lost a five-set marathon to Bjorn Borg in the finals of Wimbledon in 1979.

At the end of his playing days in 1984, he had amassed $2 million in winnings and was set to take a job at ESPN as a commentator.