Powderwombat
Semi-Pro
He looked as though he was absolutely caning every single ball, and yet made very few unforced errors. How was he able to basically hit hard and consistently?
Latter day Agassi played much differently to early Agassi. Early Agassi went for winners a lot more. Later Agassi objective was to move the opponent around the court. His shots were safer than they perhaps looked. They are many matches where he is overpowered
True, he played smarter when he got a bit older....he used the court a lot more.
I think in a way it dimished his potential a bit. He stopped going to net, he lost rallies against the likes of Sampras too often becuase Pete would be the one to take the risk. Of course Andre's career had other issues.
As far as I recall, his strategy was to control the middle of the court and to limit his own movement. Run his opponent back and forth. I don't recall him having real point-ending tendencies, but he wasn't a pusher either by any means. I think that was one of his problems - okay, you're moving your opponent, now what?
Take the ball early, work the angles, make opponent run and suffer.
Early Agassi was more brash and went for lots of winners as said before.
He hit relatively flat, around 1500 rpms on forehands.
As far as I recall, his strategy was to control the middle of the court and to limit his own movement. Run his opponent back and forth. I don't recall him having real point-ending tendencies, but he wasn't a pusher either by any means. I think that was one of his problems - okay, you're moving your opponent, now what?
completely agree. If the opponent could keep getting back the ball to a decent length, Agassi was in trouble. Early Agassi would have moved in to cut off a high ball, & he could have improved his net play to become a better player.
Yep. Take the ball early, hit it on the rise.Aggressive baseliner. Liked to dictate from the back of the court. Wasn't a great mover or vollier, so he would try and stand in the center of the court and run his opponent. Had a great return of serve, would stand close to the baseline and crack returns. Had short backswings and excellent timing on ground strokes.
true, but I remember the general playing dynamics a bit differently
First, getting the ball back consistently with depth while being runaround isn't easy... and not many could do it to Agassi
Second, Agassi's one of the best when it comes to hitting on the rise.... he'd routinely virtually half-volley balls of the baseline with power.
Tough proposition for any baseliner going up against Agassi for a few reasons
1) Depth doesn't bother him much
2) its hard to move him around because he's the one dictating most of the time
3) he makes fewer regulation errors than most (while still being quite aggressive compared to say, Muster)
What to do than?
The guy was sensational at the beginning.Basically, the objective was in what we call 'forcing' errors, rather than hitting winners
Now of course, forced and unforced errors are just abstract concepts we've created
By moving the other guy around, Agassi... shall we say, 'strongly encouraged' them to make errors? 'invited them to make errors'?
He drew a lot of errors that are skimming the borderline of 'forced' and 'unforced'... as a percentage play, its a great strategy... he can win points this way consistently, while keeping his own unforced errors down low because he's hitting relatively safely
To force errors, most players have to go for something extra on their shot, thus they'll make more errors themselves. But Agassi could force errors hitting almost his regulation shots
true, but I remember the general playing dynamics a bit differently
First, getting the ball back consistently with depth while being runaround isn't easy... and not many could do it to Agassi
Second, Agassi's one of the best when it comes to hitting on the rise.... he'd routinely virtually half-volley balls of the baseline with power.
Tough proposition for any baseliner going up against Agassi for a few reasons
1) Depth doesn't bother him much
2) its hard to move him around because he's the one dictating most of the time
3) he makes fewer regulation errors than most (while still being quite aggressive compared to say, Muster)
What to do than?
Just balls to the walls go for broke aggression... but that's a poor long term strategy. You'll make too many errors for it to work for long. Sampras could get away with it because Sampras could take care of his service games from the net, so he'd only being playing this way on return games.
Nothing to lose... if he makes errors, meh, its a return game and he can hold serve so no harm done. But if his more aggressive shots land in for a game, there's the break and Pete's got his nose in front
A great strategy that Pat Rafter used to employ was to hit no pace balls to agassi , particularly slice off the BH. Obvioulsy you had to be an excellent mover to pull it off and it would work best on low bouncing grass, but Agassi struggled to hit winners because he had to generate his own pace, which was against his counterpunching style.
Andre played like a "pinball machine" (or "flipper" in Europe), he was a speeded Jimbo. He played ping-pong on a tennis court.WOOOOOOW.
He did a great and long career even if very discontinuous, but I liked a lot more at the beginning, when he not won or won little (as in basketball I liked a lot more Shaq, Garnett and Jordan early career, not winning but devastating) .
Agassi at the beginning of career seemed to me a player who came from another planet even if he did not win.
Then he won a lot but I did not seem to come from another planet anymore.
The very young Andre is an icon character for me.Well put, KG.... I hadn't thought of his style as like a pinball machine, but yes, its a good analogy
Also agree about the changes in his playing style over the years.
Like a lovable, wild puppy that occasionally ruins your shoes or makes a mess in the wrong place... that turned into a majestic, perfectly trained dog
You'd probably prefer the second, but you can't help miss the fun times of the first
I've seen on this thread that Agassi wasn't a great mover and that he didn't overpower opponents. My feeling is that he was incredibly fast and that he hit the ball as hard as anyone ever had at the time.
Regarding movement.... initially, he had stamina problems and after a certain point, would start swinging for the fences - maybe because he was tired
i remember that and he had a reputation for not being able to win a 5 set match until the '89 usopen match against connors
where people accused him of tanking sets so he could say he won a 5 set match...lol. back then the locker room talk how to
beat andre was to get it to a 5th set... this was when his diet was mcdonalds and dunkin donuts...lol