TENNIS / THOMAS BONK : Agassi Trims Fat in More Ways Than One

Where is Andre Agassi? Why, he’s losing weight in Las Vegas and getting ready to play Jimmy Connors in an exhibition Saturday that opens the MGM Grand Garden.

It’s been less than a momentous year for Agassi, down to No. 24 in the rankings and still recovering from a sore right wrist that limited him to just 13 tournaments this year. After a first-round loss to Thomas Enqvist at the U.S. Open, Agassi decided there was just one thing to do: Go on a diet.

“I was 180 there, but now I’m down to 165,” said Agassi, who previously had denied he was overweight.

But those around him knew.

“I’m glad he’s admitting it,” John McEnroe said. “I’ve been telling him for months and months that he needs to lose weight, so I’m glad he’s losing some.”

Agassi wound up playing fewer tournaments than anyone ranked in the top 100. Part of the reason was his wrist, which limited him to only 44 matches. But another reason is that he lost track of why he liked tennis.

“So in a lot of ways, it has been a lucky year, too,” Agassi said. “The time off has enabled me to get back into the joy of what I do. I’m coming to terms with what I want out of the game. Before, I played for other people’s reasons. I was packed off to the (Bollettieri) Academy, forced to play.”

And what has Agassi discovered?

“That I absolutely love tennis,” he said. “But I don’t know when I am going to find myself.”

In the meantime, Agassi has shaken up his business interests. He parted ways with longtime agent Bill Shelton of IMG. Phil Agassi has stepped into the agent’s role for his brother. Childhood friend Perry Rogers is another part of the new team. Agassi is also no longer being coached by Pancho Segura, who worked with him briefly at the U.S. Open.

McEnroe said Agassi ought to spend more time at tennis than with his business interests. It won’t be easy, though, McEnroe said.

“There’s so much money to be made that it becomes like a business,” McEnroe said. (Agassi) is like his own business, Agassi Enterprises. That’s right. He gave me one of his cards. It was incredible. Andre was the CEO. I was amazed.”

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Book news: Did you hear about Jim Courier reading a book during the changeovers of the IBM/ATP Tour Championships at Frankfurt?

Courier, who needed to win just one match in the round-robin format to finish the year at No. 2, apparently was a burnout victim. He lost all three of his matches and fell to No. 3 behind Michael Stich.

For the record, the book Courier read on court was “Maybe the Moon: A Novel,” by Armistead Maupin.

John McEnroe cautioned against making too much of Courier’s, well, novel approach to tennis.

“He basically just needs a break,” McEnroe said. “We all go through those levels where you just sort of tap out for periods of time.

“Clearly at that point he mentally just wasn’t able to focus, so he just did something completely off the wall, I guess. I’ve seen him in the same exact mental state before. I mean, he wasn’t reading a book but I don’t think that means a lot, to be honest.

“How much could he read? Three or four lines and come back and read the same thing next time. It’s tough to get any continuity.”

But McEnroe said the book incident could affect Courier in that he might worry about when he will begin shorting out next year.

“Eventually it’s going to start affecting him earlier parts of the year,” McEnroe said.

Courier was in training in the desert last week and working with Jose Higueras on his plans for 1994.

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Add book news: Tom Gullikson, who makes his debut as U.S. Davis Cup captain in New Delhi, India, in March, has Courier on the team for the match against India.

Asked about the book incident, Gullikson said, “It made it easy for me to get him a Christmas present this year.”

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No Capt. Mac: John McEnroe said no, that he certainly had not withdrawn as a candidate for the Davis Cup captain’s job that went to Gullikson because he thought he was going to be bypassed.

“I did it because of the desire to possibly play a little bit more,” he said. “If I’m going to leave a certain amount of time, I’d rather still be involved in the playing aspect. When it came down to really thinking about it, I wasn’t happy with the way it was perceived that I was sitting here begging for this job.

“And I thought, how could I tell a guy like Pete Sampras that he is going to be a better player playing Davis Cup when here he is winning Wimbledon and the Open and gets to No. 1? I mean, it’s hard to convince someone that it’s in his best interests to play when he doesn’t and then he accomplishes what Pete did.”

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Quotebook: Steffi Graf, after winning the $250,000, 58.8-carat diamond tennis ball trophy as the 1993 Kraft Tour champion: “I guess diamonds are a girl’s best friend, and I have a lot of friends.”

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Mental note: Jim Pugh and Chris Anderson, a specialist in dealing with athletes’ emotional approach to sports, will conduct a seminar for players 11-20 and their parents at 11 a.m. TODAY (SUNDAY, 12/12) at Peninsula Racket Club in Rancho Palos Verdes.

“It’s a forum to talk about fears, anxieties and hopes as it pertains to tennis,” said Pugh, formerly the No. 1-ranked doubles player and, with Rick Leach, a four-time winner of Grand Slam tournament doubles.

Nevertheless, it wasn’t a happy time, Pugh said.

“It was probably the most miserable time in my life,” he said. “The main reason was I had a value system that was all messed up. I started playing at 4 1/2 to get attention and to please my father and I was still doing that at 26. It wasn’t for me. I thought it was the tennis, why I was so unhappy, but it was just the motivation.

“What I want to do is to give back to the game that has given me so much,” Pugh said. “I want to help people out so they don’t fall into the same trap I did.”

Pugh is making a comeback and recently won a small doubles event with Francisco Montana.

Tennis notes:

Jay Snider of Hummelstown, Pa., has been named U.S. Open tournament director, replacing Steve DeVoe of Indianapolis, who resigned last month. . . . Pierre Mareschal, 33, of Northridge was awarded the U.S. Professional Tennis Assn.’s award as male player of the year. Mareschal won the USPTA hard-court title in Costa Mesa and was runner-up at the USPTA grass-court tournament at Palm Springs.

World Team Tennis has added Boise, Ida., to its roster for 1994. Jimmy Connors and Martina Navratilova are the league’s stars. . . . Gabriela Sabatini, who hasn’t won a tournament since May of 1992, has hired fellow Argentine Guillermo Vilas as coach. “I’m doing this for my country,” Vilas told the New York Times. “She always said I was her hero and I guess that’s what heroes are made for, to help.”

Mary Joe Fernandez has replaced the injured Jennifer Capriati as John McEnroe’s partner in the Hopman Cup, a special event in Perth, Australia, Dec. 31-Jan. 7. . . . How good was Steffi Graf this year in Monica Seles’ absence? Graf finished 76-6 (.926), won 10 titles and a women’s record $2.82 million in prize money.