Andre Agassi will continue his association with pickleball by kicking off a tournament in Miami called the South Beach Slam taking place between November 17-19.
The tennis legend will be involved in a ribbon cutting as well as pickleball lessons and clinics for those who are signed up. He will also partner with the city of Miami Beach to make a major announcement for the city as a whole.
There will be $12,000 on offer for the amateur doubles pickleball tournament, which now has a star-studded element.
"We’re already 90% sold out for the tournament, and our Friday community programming is sold out and on a waitlist, with only days to go before the start of this historic inaugural tournament,” Miami Beach City Manager Alina T. Hudak said in a statement.
Agassi himself will take part in Pickleball Slam 2 next year alongside his wife Steffi Graf to face John McEnroe and Maria Sharapova albeit for vastly more money than the Miami tournament he will open.
$1,000,000 will be on offer there and it is a sport that he has become a fan of and thanked tennis for giving him the opportunity to find his way into it due to his name value. "I've been playing a lot. And I've been playing with [John McEnroe] on my mind, but I've been playing with my wife too. Which, by the way, can add a great deal to a relationship or ruin it! So you gotta be careful with that."
"We had such a blast last year, I think the most fun part was watching all these champions who knew how to direct their blood pressure and their energy and get through the intensity of 20,000 people going silent once you were on a tennis court."
"Here we are with the same kind of experience and discipline, yet we have nowhere to direct it. Cause in Pickleball, you can't just "energy" yourself through these shots. You have to calm down when you hit it, it was so disorienting for all of us to deal with the pressure," he added.
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Maria Sharapova will play a Pickleball tournament with John McEnroe against Steffi Graf & Andre Agassi:
“Dare I say I’m getting a little competitive. Slightly nervous & anxious.” 😂