It was the great Jim Brown, arguably the finest of running backs, who when asked from the distance of retirement to analyze his career said a person should be occupied by things other than trying to judge his own importance.

Brown was of a different era, a different time, when sport and humility were interwoven. He ran for a touchdown, handed the ball to an official and moved to the sideline, without self-promotional gyrations. He performed. We cheered.

Andre Agassi was born in 1970, five years after Brown left the NFL, and the connection is that there's a disconnection, even if Agassi reached a point in his sport, tennis, that Brown reached in his, the top.

The difference was Andre found it impossible to remain silent.

Sports autobiographies remain puzzling. Does the subject simply want to sell books or does he or she want to sell us an idea, the climb from poverty, the escape from an overbearing parent, the attempt to disprove the critics?

In one of the more orchestrated releases of non-fiction particularly one dealing with the toy world of life, we have been assaulted by Agassi's "Open: An Autobiography,'' in which through an unlisted ghost writer - one J.R. Moehringer - Andre tells us more than we need to know.

Before the book arrived in stores a few days ago, Agassi had appeared on CBS' 60 Minutes, given interviews, asked for contrition, been knocked by the World Anti-Doping Agency and told us he hated tennis.

And there was that little matter of Agassi in 1997, when he was injured, using crystal methamphetamine, the sort of confession needed to grab headlines which in turn would cause the public to grab copies of the book, at $28.95 per.

Andre - or Moehringer - recalls, "I snort some, I ease back on the couch and consider the Rubicon I've crossed.'' We knew Andre was brilliant on the return of serve, but that sentence is a Grand Slam of prose.

Nobody ever doubted Agassi's skill or resilience. He dropped to 141st in the world rankings and then worked his way back to winning the French Open. It was his style which always made one suspicious.

Maybe 20 years ago, when I was at the old San Francisco Examiner and the men's tour was in town I was given the chance to have breakfast with Andre Agassi, who would have been around 19. His reputation then was less than enviable. Over eggs and potatoes, he seemed cooperative and friendly, which is what his handlers were hoping.

Who was the real Andre Agassi, the rude, arrogant teenager? Or the reformed young man? Was it a case of maturity or of programming? Not long after, with Agassi as the front man, Canon cameras began the "Image is Everything,'' advertising campaign. A bit of skepticism is permitted over a new Agassi image.

Especially when Agassi concedes in the book he later lied to authorities about using drugs. Especially when earlier in his career he tanked matches, a poorly kept secret. Especially when we learn the ponytail he wore until 1996 was a prop, a wig, an attempt to compensate for going bald far too early.

Agassi is one of six men in history to have won each of the Slams, the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and U.S. Open. Pete Sampras couldn't do it. Bjorn Borg couldn't do it. John McEnroe couldn't go it. But Andre Agassi, who used to skip Wimbledon because he couldn't, or wouldn't, learn to play grass, did it.

The last few years, Agassi, married to Steffi Graf, whose 22 total Slams put Andre's eight into a thimble, admirably has used his wealth and energy in support of educating the less fortunate. He has evolved into an elder statesman, if at age 39 metaphorically.
His record, his deeds, his comeback, required no fancy rendering in print, not after all the things that had been written season after season.

But here came Agassi, spurred perhaps by his own guilt over the meth, perhaps by what he saw as a stolen childhood - and that's been depicted previously- to tell us how becoming a champion was more agony than ecstasy.

Of Sampras, his rival and frequent conqueror, Andre, (through Moehringer) says, "I envy Pete's dullness. I wish I could emulate his spectacular lack of need for inspiration.'' Why is Agassi saying that now, rather than when he had to stand across the net from Sampras?

Did Andre have a story to tell? Did he simply want to make sure three years after his last meaningful match, he would not be forgotten? Those questions remain "Open'' to speculation.