The Random Ramblings of One K-Dubs

I can vividly remember the first time I watched Andre Agassi play tennis.  I was 7 years old, and oddly enough, I was in Hong Kong, visiting my grandmother right before she passed away.  Hospital visits and funeral aside, my memories of that trip centered around a tennis match I was too young to understand.  Hell, I didn't even know how to keep score; I remember being incensed that this cool hip looking guy named Agassi was "robbed" of a win because he had won more total games than his opponent, Andre Gomez, despite the fact he had lost 3 sets.  And so that was the first time I ever watched a tennis match.  Me.  Agassi.  Hong Kong.  And what I later learned years later was the French Open final.

I grew up watching the golden age of American tennis.  Sampras. Courier. Chang. Agassi.  We're talking about 4 perennial top 10 players from the same country for over a decade, which may never happen again in the history of tennis.   While I never really took tennis seriously until high school, I loved to play tennis.  My dad and I would go to the courts at the local high school and just hit as often as possible until it got too dark to see.  Neither of us were any good, but we both enjoyed playing.  And we definitely enjoyed watching tennis on TV.

It was amazing how different the four players were in terms of their style and demeanor.  Sampras, arguably the best player of all time, was somebody I respected greatly, and was someone whose game I was often in awe of because of its simplicity and efficiency.  You simply weren't beating Pete if he was playing at his best.  Courier was like the bully at school; he just kept coming at you repeatedly and would never go away until he got the best of you.  And Chang was the one of the group that I tried to pattern my own game afterwards, simply because of our similar physical makeup and focused intensity on the court.

But Agassi was always the guy I rooted for.  Despite his incredible talent, he was seemingly always the underdog in any big match he played.  He certainly played second fiddle to Sampras for a number of years, and even in those situations when he did win a Grand Slam ('92 vs. Ivanesevic in the Wimbledon final, the five-set comeback at the French, etc.), it almost always seemed like he had just pulled off the impossible.  It's always easy to root for the underdog, and I don't think I've ever watched a match he played in where I didn't want him to win.   The '92 Wimbledon final has been and always be one of my favorite matches of all time, simply because the odds were simply stacked so high against him (facing a guy like Goran Ivanesevic who served like 242384748278 aces a match) and yet he still overcame them.  The '94 US Open win had a lot to do with me quitting baseball and focusing more on tennis during the following springs.  And the '05 US Open run to the final (including the Blake match, the Ginepri match, etc.) was one of the most remarkable accomplishments by any athlete in any sport I've ever witnessed.  It is those matches and countless others that made me believe I could achieve more on the tennis court than I should have been able to. 

There are two reasons why Andre is my favorite tennis player of all time.  First, he's shown many times that he is human.  We've all seen him emotional following wins and losses on the court.  And we've witnessed the tough times he's endured personally off the court, and more importantly, the perseverance and dedication he had to come back time and time again from those situations of adversity. The fact that he wasn't perfect and had flaws allowed the common tennis fan like myself to much more easily identify with him.

Which leads me to my second point.  No single player in the sport has transcended the game moreso during my lifetime than Andre Agassi.  His philanthropic efforts have been well documented.  He changed the way the game is played today, both with his revolutionary "hitting the ball on the rise" and focus on the service return game rather than the serve itself. In an interview earlier today, Lindsay Davenport said that "Andre Agassi is the most important figure in the sport of tennis over the past 20 years."  An incredibly bold, but true statement.

If you haven't followed this year's US Open, you've seriously missed out.  Watching all of Agassi's old matches during the rain delays this weekend that have become timeless classics; you just get goosebumps watching them, knowing that in each match, sometimes he succeeded and other times he didn't.  But the one constant was that he gave every ounce of his energy towards putting forth his maximal effort.  And as a fan, that's always all you can ask for.  And it's inspired me to be a better player and better person.

I'm going to miss the ridiculous return winners off of 130+ mile per hour serves.  I'm going to miss him skipping to the sidelines on the changeovers.  I'm going to miss the four cornered salute he does to the fans after every match, win or lose.  And most of all, I'm going to miss the greatest competitor in the sport of tennis I've ever seen.

As a fellow tennis player and human being, thanks Andre.  The world won't be the same anymore without you swatting tennis balls from baseline to baseline and inspiring others like myself to reach for my  dreams.  And it's been an honor being one of the millions who have lended you a shoulder so that you could reach yours.

...when you're driving late at night on the highway and blasting trance on the stereo.  Maybe it's just me, but it's very therapeutic for some reason.  A long day at work and a half hour in the car pushing the pedal and listening to Armin really made me feel better.  Man, I really need to get back to a club one of these days (Tiesto at Glow earlier in the year was sick).