"We’d have made Andre Agassi & Boris Becker look like choirboys" - When Piers Morgan spoke on 'pitfalls' of early fame amid American's drug scandal
British journalist Piers Morgan once shed light on the challenges of gaining fame at a young age following Andre Agassi's revelation about using crystal meth during his playing career. Morgan also suggested that the reality of fame was significantly less glamorous than it appeared.
Agassi's 2009 memoir 'Open' stunned the tennis community, as it included shocking details about how he had escaped a ban in 1997 despite a positive drug test. The former World No. 1 revealed that he had written a letter "filled with lies" to the ATP, claiming to have accidentally ingested a drink laced with crystal meth, when in reality, he had used the drug deliberately.
In a 2009 column for the Daily Mail, Piers Morgan opened up about being able to sympathize with Andre Agassi over his drug use, drawing on his own experience with the pressure of performing for live crowds as a TV personality.
The Brit argued that while "the accoutrements of fame sounded wonderful," they came with intense scrutiny on every comment and move. He pointed out that athletes like Agassi often lived in a "lonely bubble," as they were perpetually jetlagged after constantly traveling away from their loved ones.
"Every move you make, every comment you say, gets analysed, dissected and criticised. Nothing seems normal or real any more. Your life becomes a weird, cosseted, lonely bubble. Flying from country to country, living in hotels, away from loved ones, suffering perpetual jetlag," Morgan said.
"It all seems so impossibly glamorous but the reality, trust me, is boring, tiring, repetitive and unsettling. The strain builds, quietly but surely, and nobody who doesn’t have to do their thing in front of a big audience will understand it, let alone have any sympathy," he added.
Morgan asserted that both he and record executive Simon Cowell had experienced fame in their 40s, when they were more mature and better equipped to handle its "pitfalls." He admitted that if they had become famous at a young age like Andre Agassi and Boris Becker, they likely would've behaved far worse than the tennis stars.
"And people like Simon Cowell and I (he on a much bigger scale than me) are lucky enough to have only experienced this nonsense in our 40s, when we’re old enough to know where most of the pitfalls lie," Morgan said.
"God knows how we’d have behaved if it had come to us in our 20s like these sportsmen. I suspect we’d have made Agassi and Becker look like choirboys," he added.
"I’m struggling to get my head around why Andre Agassi would confess to something so damaging" - Boris Becker on American's crystal meth revelation
Despite having struggled through "difficult times" himself, Boris Becker was shocked by Andre Agassi's confession of using crystal meth. In a 2009 interview with The Telegraph, Becker disclosed that he was baffled by the American's decision to reveal the truth about his drug use, as it cast an ugly shadow on his career.
"I’m the last person to throw stones, as there have been some difficult times in my own life, but to hear that he took crystal meth, that certainly puts a whole new light on Andre Agassi, and it’s not a beautiful light," Becker said.
"I’m struggling to get my head around why Andre would want to confess to something so damaging as taking drugs and then getting away with it? Why would he want to be so brutally honest?," he added.
The German also asserted that Agassi's admission of deceiving the ATP to avoid a ban wasn't good for tennis, as it raised serious questions about how he got away with it.
"Andre didn’t just take drugs, he also tested positive for drugs and then got away with it, and that’s not good at all for tennis, especially for the governing bodies. People are going to be thinking, 'How could this happen? How could he get away with this?," Becker said.
Boris Becker further expressed his belief that the revelations were bound to "change how people see Andre Agassi," suggesting that the American's legacy would look markedly different if the truth about his crystal meth use had come out in 1997.