Impending Fatherhood Suits Agassi Well

Andre Agassi actually had a little news to drop in his news conference Monday for the Mercedes-Benz Cup tournament at UCLA.

He and girlfriend Steffi Graf are expecting a boy.

That means the $10-million guarantee a New Jersey promoter reportedly offered for the child to play in his women’s tournament in 2017 is no longer valid. However, you can still get 500-1 odds from London bookmakers that he will win a singles or doubles title at Wimbledon.

If the kid emerges from this gene pool with Mommy’s forehand and Daddy’s ability to return serve, all bets are off.

Are we getting ahead of ourselves, plotting out the life of someone who hasn’t been born? Hasn’t the world seen enough dire consequences arise from fathers sticking rackets in the crib before the infants stop drooling?

Well, even Agassi can’t help picturing at least some tennis in the kid’s future.

“I’ve got to believe that if mom and dad are banging the ball around, the little fella might want to jump in,” Agassi said.

Back in the days when he wore denim shorts and a mullet, the notion of Agassi as a father might have been impossible to formulate. In 2001 it’s not hard at all.

“Not only can I easily picture it, I have many warm and beautiful thoughts that go with that picture,” said Gil Reyes, Agassi’s trainer for the last dozen years.

“Knowing him the way I do and knowing the human that he is, the heart that he has and all the love that he has to give the loved ones in his life, to people in his life that he shares his thoughts and his concerns and his joys and his sorrows with--add all that up and you put them together with someone as capable and sincere as he is as a human being and the importance that he places on life and love and family. . . . I’d say fatherhood would suit him just fine.”

Even if we haven’t been exposed to the deeper side of Agassi, which everyone from Reyes to Barbra Streisand has waxed about over the course of his career, the public side of Agassi gives hints that he’s ready.

At 31, Agassi is the oldest player in this tournament, with a birthday 25 days before the only other player born in 1970, Cristiano Caratti.

On Monday he already sounded like a proud father when he talked about Goran Ivanisevic winning Wimbledon this year.

“It was a wonderful story,” Agassi said. “Goran was well-deserving.”

With a Wimbledon trophy--and at least one of each of the other Grand Slam championships--of his own, Agassi is happy to let others share in the glory.

He wasn’t always this way. When he lost to Pete Sampras in the 1999 Wimbledon final, he pretended to whack Sampras with the second-place trophy and you got the sense it wasn’t all horseplay.

And he used to rush out of town and act as if he didn’t care who won after he suffered early losses in the Grand Slam events. But after losing to Pat Rafter in the Wimbledon semifinals this year, Agassi used the Internet and the phone to get live updates of the final, then watched the tape-delayed replay of the fifth set on television.

Maybe Graf has helped the process. After all, if she can make the transition from being the best on the court to being just another clapping significant other in the players’ box, it shouldn’t be too difficult for Agassi to learn to put others first as well.

But what effect will his new role have on his tennis?

“I’ve never been a father before, so I can’t quite tell you how I’m going to respond to the whole thing,” Agassi said.

“I can probably already identify with a certain level of prioritizing. With that being said, I think it is possible to succeed in both arenas.

“My goal has always been to play this game as good as I can play it as long as I can. It also has been to have a family and to [live] some dreams in that respect. I don’t know how it’s going to all play out. I feel a strong sense of obligation and responsibility to the game and a strong desire for it. I’ll do my best to keep things in balance.”

Agassi has not always been able to keep the scale from tipping. His ranking plummeted to No. 141 in 1997, one year after he won an Olympic gold medal. He lost in the second round of the U.S. Open last year after news surfaced that his mother and sister were battling cancer, and he stayed away from the tour for two months.

“Those of us who know him know there’s time he has taken focus off of the court and put focus onto his life,” Reyes said. “That’s one of the things I admire most about Andre--he has never placed tennis and everything else above his life.

“The times he has struggled on the court usually indicate the times he has gone headfirst into life.”

Agassi remains, if not dominant, then still very relevant on the ATP Tour. He leads the points race and is only a few thousand dollars behind Gustavo Kuerten on the money list. He won the Australian Open this year.

Sampras, Agassi’s contemporary, rival and measuring stick, appears to be satiated now that he has set a record for Grand Slam victories and is happily married.

Agassi admits that as he grows older, “It’s harder to be consumed with tennis.”

Although he sees the Andy Roddicks on the horizon and is proud to have some fresh American talent prepping to replace his generation, “I’m not going to hand anything over,” he said.

“Time will take care of that,” Agassi said. “I don’t need to help that situation out. I’m just trying to improve and keep focusing on the things that make you better and just be objective enough to know when things are . . . different.”

Different, as when the competitive instincts wane and the paternal instincts take over. Then perhaps one day Agassi will move the ball machine in closer and closer to the net, the way his dad did to develop that lightning service return, and the cycle will start anew.

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J.A. Adande can be reached at [email protected]