Two shorts about the US Open 2006

Andre Agassi steps onto the court with that funny pigeon-toed walk of his. He looks like a small man, although he is just under six feet tall, and his head is shaved clean like a monk’s. He is 36 years old, an ancient of the tennis world. This is his last US Open, and this may be his final match ever. Imagine that. This could be the last time we hear the crowd roaring "Ahn-DRE!"

His opponent is a qualifier named B (not Boris) Becker, a US-based German player 11 years younger than he is. Becker is a qualifier ranked in the 100s, but he beat an excellent player, Sebastien Grosjean. He has nothing to lose.

I used to hate Andre Agassi, that long-haired, neon-outfitted, showbiz-y, Barbra Streisand-dating, Brooke Shields-marrying Vegas act. I particularly disliked his style of play: staying back and whacking the stuffing out of every ball as if he intended to kill it. In the late 1990s Agassi went on a long losing streak and fell off the map. He went from top ten player to has-been ranked147. Good riddance, I thought, and then he came back. He looked into the pit, and he didn’t like it. With newfound calm and grace, Andre took Roland Garros, then the US and Australian Opens. He married Steffi Graf. Whatever you may have thought of Andre in the past, he busted his chops to make you love him.

Today Andre is in pain. After his grueling first-round, four-set match against Andre Pavel, he needed a cortisone shot. Then he played world number 8 Marcos Baghdatis in the second round – the worst thing that could happen to an aging player with an aching back. It was spectacular. Baghdatis, like Agassi, is a player who thrives on drama. The minute you count him out, he executes an impossible shot that brings him right back into the game. (I admire the fact that he doesn’t seem to go to the gym.)

Baghdatis decided that he wasn’t going away, and Agassi decided that he wasn’t going home. It was a match that summed up the things we love about tennis that are not exactly about tennis. You leave it all on the court. You hold nothing back. You kill yourself out there.

By match point Agassi is groaning from the pain and Baghdatis is hobbling from cramps. And Andre wins! The New York crowd goes nuts!

Afterwards Andre has to lie on the sidewalk until his car arrives, because it’s too painful for him to even stand up.

It’s obvious from the first point of this match that Andre is hurting. His mobility is limited. His service is impaired, he can’t chase down the balls, and he stands too far behind the baseline.

The first set is close, and he manages to take the second, but it’s only a matter of time. The crowd rallies behind Andre, but they know that their adoration is not enough. He‚s only warding off the inevitable, postponing fate or whatever you want to call it.

And it’s beautiful. Because Agassi isn’t just battling his younger opponent anymore. Agassi is saying No to Time and Age and Certainty.

It’s like watching Camus or Dostoevski translated into tennis. For three, four sets, Andre Agassi defies the cosmos. (It’s about two in the morning and I’m talking to the TV. "Andre, please quit. I can’t look anymore. Go home.")

The inevitable transpires, and then the waterworks.

Andre Agassi says goodbye to a stadium awash in tears. Then he packs his bags and goes home to wife, kids, life.

The Girl’s Got Game

Maria Sharapova is everywhere.

She is on television, hawking digital cameras. She is on billboards, selling sportswear. She is in fashion magazines, wearing couture. She is in gossip columns, reportedly dating Andy Roddick. She is tall, thin, blonde, pretty, and famous. She makes tens of millions of dollars a year, and that’s before her income from playing tennis. It is easy to hate Maria Sharapova.

She seems to have everything you don’t have, and if you’re discontented with your life you can even blame her for it ("That Maria took everything, so there’s nothing left for me").

You make fun of her for grunting (Decibel-wise I think Monica Seles was louder). You suggest, meanly, that in tennis practice she plays quietly, and then has another practice session for those near-pornographic sounds she makes. You compare her with Anna Kournikova, the earlier tennis pin-up, who never won a tournament in her playing career. (No, wait, I think she won some doubles titles.. . playing with Martina Hingis.)

Then someone points out that Sharapova won Wimbledon in 2004, at age 17, and you dismiss the win as pure dumb luck (As if luck were not a factor in Everything). In fact you dismiss her as a creation of the media, down to the story of the father who saw her playing with a racquet as a small child, then sold his meager possessions so they could leave Chernobyl ("There must be something in that irradiated air"), come to America, and get the right tennis training.

Well now you REALLY have reason to hate Maria Sharapova. She has just won the US Open women‘s singles title, and there is nothing you can say to disparage the achievement. In the semifinal she was up against Amelie Mauresmo, currently the world number one and reigning Wimbledon and Australian Open champion. For years Amelie was viewed as a talented player who lacked the nerve to win the big matches; this year she finally seized the crown. Sharapova kicked Mauresmo’s derriére in the most comprehensive fashion, 6-0, 4-6, 6-0. Two bagels against the world number one!

Maria strode into the final wearing a black glittery $3500 Nike tennis dress and a look of grim determination. She comprehensively kicked Justine Henin-Hardenne’s Belgian derriére in straight sets, 6-4, 6-4.

You don’t just beat Justine Henin-Hardenne. She’s tough as nails, plus she has the finest backhand in the game.

Now you have to consider that maybe Sharapova is worthy of the hype and the big bucks. Maybe she’s the real thing. Oooh, that must really rankle.

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