So, Andre Agassi has admitted that he took crystal meth while he was still a tennis player, and then lied about it to the tennis authorities. I have to confess to being baffled as to why anyone is really surprised by this. If any top player in recent memory was likely to have taken drugs recreationally it was going to be Agassi, and it was going to be in that period when his career was on the slide. I think if the story had broked come out at the time, it would have been hard for me to think much worse of Agassi than I did back then, because he annoyed me for his behaviour and the way he seemed to be wasting his talent – I should point out I have no knowledge whatsoever about the potential performance-enhancing qualities of crystal meth, if it does have performance enhancing qualities then I might have thought worse of him, though I’d probably have had a hard time believing that was why he took it. It also doesn’t make me think any the worse of him now, or be any less impressed at the way that he rebuilt his life and his career, or lessen my appreciate his tennis in the second phase of his career.
I’m not surprised he lied – I’d be surprised and impressed if any tennis star *didn’t* try and get themselves out of such a situation by any means necessary. I’m inclined to be pretty digusted at the tennis authorities effectively blinking the other way – but I’m not that surprised either: Agassi wasn’t winning anything at that point in time, but he could still make money for tennis. I hope they tested him regularly once he did make his comeback – in the same way that I hope they test all of the big names. But they have far more questions to answer than Agassi does.
I’m also not surprised that he included the story in his autobiography; no, Boris, and no Rafa, I’m really really not – and it’s not damaging modern tennis *players* (they can do that quite effectively themselves) and it’s not like we didn’t all know the authorities had questions to answer about the drugs testing/appealing/banning process (hello, Gasquet case). For a start, it’s an autobiography – what would you expect? Sports autobiographies are normally duller than a very dull thing (see for example, Wallace, David Foster, ‘How Tracy Austin Broke My Heart’ in Consider the Lobster) – my personal desire to sleep through very dull books by sportsmen I have a lot of time for reached its zenith when reading Jason Robinson’s autobiography. Agassi’s life and career are actually autobiography worth at this stage (unlike, say, that of Andy Murray…), and might actually be worth thinking about in relation to the problems that face some tennis players. Jennifer Capriati’s could be worthwhile for the same sort of reasons.
I’m inclined could be a good thing for Agassi for him to admit to this – he’s been sitting on it for a while. Isn’t honesty supposed to be part of the healing/recovery process? Would we really think better of him if he hadn’t admitted to it and then it came out later? I have a lot of respect for Agassi for admitting this – he’s taken a personal risk, and not, I think, just to sell copies. He’s a hero and example to a lot of kids as a tennis star, and I’d rather see him openly admmitting he made mistakes and what the repercussions were – I think it’s better than glossing over the ugly bits. So good on him.
