"All that playing up to the fans who provided him with an exceptional living, it was a bluff" - When Jimmy Connors criticized Andre Agassi in his book
It's fair to say that Jimmy Connors and Andre Agassi don't share the best of relationships.
in his 2104 autobiography, The Outsider, Connors called Agassi out for criticizing the sport that gave him everything while opining that the eight-time Major champion misled his fans.
“Tennis gave Agassi everything, his fame, his money, his reputation, even his current wife and he went on to knock it in his book. All that playing up to the fans who provided him with an exceptional living, it was a bluff. For me tennis was all about standing out there and being honest, not pretending to be something I wasn’t," Connors stated.
Connors also pointed out that while people admire Agassi for his comeback post-1997, a man of that talent shouldn't have allowed himself to "sink so low."
"People admire Agassi for fighting his way back after dropping down the rankings in 1997. I get that. But you can also look at it like this. He should have never allowed himself to sink so low. He had a huge talent but when things got tough for a while, he put his head in his hands and let it beat him," he added.
"Maybe he should have cleared his head before memorializing his total narcissism" - Andre Agassi on Jimmy Connors
Responding to the criticism of him, Andre Agassi said that Jimmy Connors should have "cleared his head" before "memorializing his total narcissism."
"As Jimmy said, he wrote his book after or during two hip surgeries. Maybe he should have cleared his head before memorializing his total narcissism. I guess I can only hope the fog lifts," the former World No. 1 said.
Andre Agassi and Jimmy Connors locked horns twice, with the former winning both matches. Their first meeting came in the quarterfinals of the 1988 US Open when Agassi was a teenager and Connors was a veteran. Agassi beat Connors 6-2, 7-6, 6-1 to reach his second Grand Slam semifinal.
The pair met again in the last eight of the 1989 US Open. This time, the encounter was tightly-contested, with Agassi winning 6-1, 4-6, 0-6, 6-3, 6-4.
In 1999, Jimmy Connors opined that Andre Agassi should not be held in the same regard as the likes of himself, Pete Sampras, Bjorn Borg, and John McEnroe.
"I wouldn't mention his name in the same breath," Connors told CBS.