All this Andre Agassi bashing...it needs to end.

If you've been anywhere near a sportscast lately chances are you've heard that tennis great, Andre Agassi, has a new book out called 'Open.' In it he chronicles his tumultuous life from star-crossed rebel teen to elder statesman of the game.

Now some things have been leaked during its release but the most notable has been Andre's stunning admission that he used Crystal Meth throughout 1997, failed a tour drug test, and lied about the reasons he failed.

Now the thing that is most stunning to me is the merciless bashing of this man from his peers. And it all needs to end and here's why.

First, current and former pros alike like Martina Navratalova, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Marat Safin, and Boris Becker have all come down on the man like an iron hammer. They claim he's damaging the sport, demanding that he forfeit his titles and even calling him a cheater! Cheater!?

First to get some perspective, notice how almost all of the names condemning Andre are European. Spain, France, Switzerland, Germany...We have to remember that Crystal Meth is almost solely an American creation brought about by the conjoining of our 'frugal' nature with our own Nazi drug laws. What we couldn't buy illegally on the street we went to CVS or Walgreens, bought a bunch of chemicals in the pharmacy legally, cooked them up in the kitchen and viola. Countries with much more lax drug laws like those of Europe have far less use of the do-it-yourselfer narcotics. In a marijuana-infested area of Amsterdam you're far less likely to run in to someone who even knows what CM is than say, someone in Pheonix. So its easy to see a culture clash there.

Secondly, for anyone and everyone crying over the spilt milk that Andre 'Should've been suspended!" Were you alive in 1997 when he was using? He was 141 in the world, you couldn't even find the poor bastard on TV and he won a total of only 12 matches in 13 tournaments all year. The humiliation he suffered even showing his face in an ATP level event only to get destroyed in a 1st round match against some qualifier is worse in my opinion. That drug wrecked his entire year, life and career in 1997. What could the ATP have done that would've made it any worse? Suspend him for a year? Hello, it basically happened anyway.

But others, mostly Europeans again, are throwing around that term: CHEATER, or having you believe he was tripping on meth during his matches or something, or that somehow meth was a performance ENHANCER. This goes back to my previous point that across that pond called the Atlantic Ocean, the poor saps really are clueless when it comes to drugs. Believe me as an American when I tell you this, if Crystal Meth were a drug that actually enhanced performance as opposed to destroying lives and physiques, Major League Baseball would've made sure every pro was on it during the 80's and 90's.

He was using during matches? Have you ever seen someone on Meth? They're eyelids basically staple themselves open, pupils become the size of pinheads, they grind the enamel on their teeth down to nothing and their heartrate is through the roof. Even if Andre HAD managed to do a couple bumps in the locker room before a match. And even if Andre HAD managed to make it from the locker room to the court on Meth without at least 5 people stopping to say, "Did you see that guy? What the hell, somebody call the cops or an ambulance or both." And even if he HAD somehow found a way to play tennis at a professional level while on meth, chances are his heart would've exploded.

Forfeit Grand Slams? He won a title in '95 and then again in '99. None in between. He used in 1997. Do the math.

For anyone saying that this is bad for tennis needs a reality check. If anything its going to give the sport a good smack on the ass for letting Andre and probably other players slide so easily. I certainly wouldn't claim that every new allegation of steroid use in MLB is 'bad' for the sport. What was bad was the sport's complete failure to regulate anything it was doing for about a 20 year period. When a bone breaks, and then heals, it grows back stronger.


Andre Agassi has probably put more of his own cash into personally founded charities and goodwill efforts to fight hunger, poverty and underprivelaged youths in this counrty then perhaps any pro-athlete who'se ever walked the planet. And I don't hesistate to call him the greatest athelete philanthropist who've ever lived. Critics, most notably his peers in the tennis world, conveniently overlook that when bringing the whip down.

Now I love tennis. I grew up playing it and have played it my whole life. In fact, I'll probably die with my biggest dream that never came true being that I could've been a professional tennis player. But I think that all of this backlash says less about Andre Agassi than it does about something else. For as much as I love the sport, I could never stand the athlete. I believe as I always have that by and large, professional tennis players are, entitled, selfish, over-indulged adults that never grew cerebrally past their teen years. Their unanimous cold, condemnation of a man's honesty is just a brief flash of how selfish these people are. Life is one big summer tennis camp.

What did Andre do for the sport besides put fans in the seats anywhere he went, resurrect the sport and inspire millions of young kids in the 90's that 'that's what they wanted to do when they grew up' when they watched him and Pete play each other? The face of a generation, and he was human. He didn't cheat anything but his own talent.

For heaven's sakes I hope God himself isn't as forgiving and compassionate on Judgement Day as these Euro-morons are to Andre Agassi for coming clean. Frankly, they can all kiss my Red-White-and Blue ass.
Love you Andre. Always have, always will.