Andre Kirk Agassi ( AG-ə-see; born April 29, 1970) is an American former professional tennis player. He was ranked as the world No. 1 in men's singles by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for 101 weeks, including as the year-end No. 1 in 1999. Agassi won 60 ATP Tour-level singles titles, including eight majors, an Olympic gold medal, the 1990 ATP Tour World Championships, and 17 Masters titles, and he was part of the winning United States Davis Cup teams in 1990, 1992 and 1995. Agassi is one of nine men to complete the career Grand Slam in singles, and one of three men to complete the career Golden Slam in singles.
A teenage phenomenon, Agassi contested multiple major finals before winning his first at the 1992 Wimbledon Championships. His ranking dropped afterward due to surgery, but he recovered and won the 1994 US Open and 1995 Australian Open to reach the world No. 1 ranking for the first time. He was then troubled by personal issues during the mid-to-late 1990s, and despite an Olympic gold medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, Agassi's ranking declined to as low as No. 141 in 1997, prompting many to believe that his career among the elite was over. Following a rigorous training regimen, Agassi then enjoyed the most successful run of his career over the next several years. He returned to the world No. 1 position in 1999 after completing the career Golden Slam at the French Open, and during this latter half of his career also claimed a US Open title and three Australian Open titles. Competing well into the 2000s, Agassi retired from the sport following the 2006 US Open.
Agassi is regarded by many as one of the greatest tennis players of all time. He was the first man to win all four singles majors across three different surfaces (hard, clay and grass), and remains the most recent American man to win the French Open (in 1999) and the Australian Open (in 2003). During his 20-plus year tour career, Agassi was known as "the Punisher" due to his excellent return of serve. Outside of tennis, he is the founder of the Andre Agassi Charitable Foundation, which has raised over $60 million for at-risk children in Southern Nevada. In 2001, the Foundation opened the Andre Agassi College Preparatory Academy in Las Vegas, a K–12 public charter school for at-risk children. He has been married to fellow tennis player Steffi Graf since 2001.
Andre Agassi was born in Las Vegas, Nevada, to Emmanuel "Mike" Agassi (né Aghasi), a former Olympic boxer and casino worker of Armenian descent from Tehran, Iran, and American Elizabeth "Betty" Agassi (née Dudley). Agassi's paternal grandfather was born in Kiev, Ukraine and left for Russia to start a carpentry business in Saint Petersburg, before escaping to Iran in the 1920s following political unrest in Russia. His parents married in 1959 after dating for two months, then moved from Chicago to Las Vegas. He has three older siblings: Rita (who was married to former number one tennis player Pancho Gonzales), Philip and Tami. Andre was given the middle name Kirk after Kirk Kerkorian, an American businessman. Emmanuel Agassi, then a waiter at the Tropicana Las Vegas, had met his employer Kerkorian in 1963 and they became friends.
At the age of 12, Agassi and his good friend and doubles partner, Roddy Parks, won the 1982 National Indoor Boys 14s Doubles Championship in Chicago. Agassi describes memorable experiences and juvenile pranks with Roddy in his book Open.
When he was 13, Agassi was sent to Nick Bollettieri's Tennis Academy in Florida. He was supposed to stay for only three months, because that was all his father could afford. After 30 minutes of watching Agassi play, Bollettieri, deeply impressed by his talent, called Mike and said: "Take your check back. He's here for free." Agassi then dropped out of school in the ninth grade to pursue a full-time tennis career.
1986–1989: World number 3 as a teenager
Agassi turned professional at the age of 16 and competed in his first tournament at La Quinta, California. He won his first match against John Austin, but then lost his second match to Mats Wilander. By the end of 1986, Agassi was ranked No. 91. He won his first top-level singles title in 1987 at the Sul American Open in Itaparica and ended the year ranked No. 25.
In addition to not playing the Australian Open (which later became his best Grand Slam event) for the first eight years of his career, Agassi chose not to play at Wimbledon from 1988 to 1990 (although he first played there in 1987, only to lose in the first round to Henri Leconte) and publicly stated that he did not wish to play there because of the event's traditionalism, particularly its "predominantly white" dress code to which players at the event are required to conform.
Strong performances on the tour meant that Agassi was quickly tipped as a future Grand Slam champion. Agassi reached the 1988 French Open semi finals before losing to Mats Wilander. "I've learned I have to do a lot about my serve and groundstrokes. But next year I'll be playing better than this year and better the year after that" said Agassi afterwards. At the US Open, Agassi lost in four sets to Ivan Lendl. "The power and steadiness of Lendl's strokes were too much for the 18-year-old Agassi to overcome". He won six tournaments in 1988 (Memphis, U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships, Forest Hills WCT, Stuttgart Outdoor, Volvo International and Livingston Open), and, by December of that year, he had surpassed US$1 million in career prize money after playing in just 43 tournaments—the fastest anyone in history had reached that level. During 1988, he also set the open-era record for most consecutive victories by a male teenager (a record that stood for 17 years until Rafael Nadal broke it in 2005). His year-end ranking was No. 3, behind second-ranked Ivan Lendl and top-ranked Mats Wilander. Both the Association of Tennis Professionals and Tennis magazine named Agassi the Most Improved Player of the Year for 1988.
At the 1989 French Open, Agassi lost in four sets in the third round to Bollettierri stable-mate Jim Courier, who "beat Agassi at his own game". At the US Open, Agassi won a five set match for the first time when he beat veteran Jimmy Connors in the quarter finals, with the crowd "firmly against him, even applauding his double faults". He lost to Lendl in four sets in the semi finals. He ended the year ranked 7.
He began the 1990s with a series of near-misses. He reached his first Grand Slam final in 1990 at the French Open, where he was favored before losing in four sets to Andrés Gómez, which he later attributed in his book to worrying about his wig falling off during the match. He reached his second Grand Slam final of the year at the US Open, defeating defending champion Boris Becker in the semi-finals. His opponent in the final was Pete Sampras; a year earlier, Agassi had crushed Sampras, after which time he told his coach that he felt bad for Sampras because he was never going to make it as a pro. Agassi lost the US Open final to Sampras in three sets. The Agassi-Sampras rivalry would evolve into the biggest rivalry in tennis over the next decade+. Agassi ended 1990 on a high note as he helped the United States win its first Davis Cup in 8 years on home soil against Australia (3–2) and won his only Tennis Masters Cup, beating reigning Wimbledon champion Stefan Edberg in the final. He ended the year ranked 4.
In 1991, Agassi reached his second consecutive French Open final, where he faced fellow Bollettieri Academy alumnus Courier. Courier emerged the victor in a five-set final. The Las Vegan was a set and 3–1 up when came the rain. The rain delay proved to be a confidence builder for Courier. Agassi decided to play at Wimbledon in 1991, leading to weeks of speculation in the media about the clothes he would wear. He eventually emerged for the first round in a completely white outfit. He reached the quarterfinals on that occasion, losing in five sets to David Wheaton. He ended the year ranked 10.