The three eldest all crumbled under the pressure. Armenian, raised poor in Iran and employed as a “captain,” or usher, at a casino on the Strip, Mike Agassi was determined to groom a champion and subjected all four of his children to abusive training, yanking them out of school for extra practice time.

His first cell was the backyard court his immigrant father, Mike, built behind the family’s ramshackle house in the parched outskirts of Las Vegas. Agassi’s announced theme is that the game he mastered was a prison he spent some 30 years trying to escape.

The more arresting news is that “Open” is one of the most passionately anti-sports books ever written by a superstar athlete - bracingly devoid of triumphalist homily and star-spangled gratitude. Patrick Kovarik/Agence France-Presse - Getty Images Given the current scandals involving steroids and human growth hormone, Agassi’s infraction seems minor, even quaint, characterized as it was by late-night binges that more likely retarded rather than “enhanced” his match-day performances.Īndre Agassi at the French Open in 1991. Now, three years into his retirement, Agassi’s sterling accomplishments are again being obscured, this time by pre-publication revelations from his autobiography, “Open,” especially his admission that during one low period he found solace in crystal methamphetamine, supplied by his “assistant,” and later lied about it to tennis officials, thus avoiding a three-month suspension. Even those not convinced that Andre Agassi was the best tennis player of his time will readily admit he outdid all others in attracting attention, beginning in the 1980s, when he was a teenage phenom from Las Vegas who blazed onto the pro tour in flamboyant, Nike-sponsored plumage - stone-washed denim, skintight “Hot Lava” compression shorts, midnight-at-the-roulette-wheel shades - that blinded many to the granite consistency of his game: the compact, bludgeoning ground strokes, the lethal service return, the lightning reflexes.

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