When Becker Implied Nike Has Enormous Power In Tennis

From the 1995 US Open Boris Becker press conference, where he lost in four close sets to Andre Agassi…

Q. After Wimbledon, you had some candid remarks to make about Andre Agassi; that I think you referred to may not be precisely the words “special treatment” —

BORIS BECKER: I wasn’t talking about him personally. It was about —

Q. I understand.

BORIS BECKER: — his company more than about him.

Q. Just before the Open, Andre, I think made it clear that those remarks have not sat well with him and wondered whether or not you regretted making them or whether you two have talked about it since?

BORIS BECKER: I thought I had a point and I still think I have a point. I don’t talk about Andre Agassi personally or other players personally. I talk about, you know, his company and how powerful it is and, how powerful of a role he plays, unfortunately, in major championships that is all I said. And I think I have a point there – if you look back about — the past 12 months – but that nothing personal against Andre or against Pete Sampras, you know, they are fortunate enough to have such a strong company behind them who supports them so good, you know, and that is all I said. So if he felt that I said something bad about him, then that was not the thing I wanted to bring out. It was never against him personally. I have never had a bad time with him personally. Unfortunately, he has beat me five and a half years pretty badly, but apart from that, I never said any bad word about Andre Agassi.

Q. How about playing him now and after all the talk you have answered every single day, you have been hearing questions about Sampras and Agassi and now, you get to play one of them. Can you describe the matchup against Agassi?

BORIS BECKER: So far it is not Agassi yet.

Q. If you get the opportunity to play him.

BORIS BECKER: Well, he has a tough opponent tonight with Petr Korda and that should be a very entertaining match. I, you know, can’t understand all the promotion that is going of America’s Grand Slam and Pete and Andre happen to come from this country and I understand that you support them very much and if we are back in Germany, the support is a little bit on my side than on the Americans, but I think in general, it is good for tennis that you have players like Andre or Pete who play great tennis, you know, who have styles which make many players, many people at home trying to see the matches on television. It is very good promotion for a sport. On my match on Saturday I hope I am a part again of a great match for tennis and hopefully the audience and spectators here in the stands enjoy it very much.

Artwork by Miki DeGoodaboom

Andre Agassi · Boris Becker · US Open

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