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Mike Agassi

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Mike Agassi
Born
Emanoul Aghassian

(1930-12-25)December 25, 1930
Salmas, Imperial State of Iran
DiedSeptember 24, 2021(2021-09-24) (aged 90)
Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S.
NationalityIranian
American
Occupation(s)Boxer, tennis coach
Spouse
Elizabeth Dudley
​
(m. 1959)​
Children4, including Andre

Emmanuel "Mike" Agassi (born Emanoul Aghassian; December 25, 1930 – September 24, 2021) was an amateur boxer, casino worker, tennis coach, and the father and coach of American tennis player Andre Agassi. He was born in Iran which he represented at the 1948 and 1952 Summer Olympics. After moving to the United States and becoming an American citizen, he won the Chicago Golden Gloves three times.

Biography

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Agassi was born in Salmas, Imperial State of Iran to Armenian parents David and Noonia. His father was a carpentry business owner from Kiev, Russian Empire who moved to Tehran, Iran's capital, during the Russian Revolution. His mother was from Ottoman Armenia and met his father during a family visit to Tehran, and decided to stay with him.[1] He was raised in a Christian household in Tehran.[2] One of his ancestors had changed his surname from Aghassian to Agassi to avoid Ottoman persecution.[3]

Agassi was first exposed to tennis by American and British servicemen. He represented Iran as a boxer in the 1948 and 1952 Summer Olympics, losing in the first round both times.[4] His trainer was the retired Polish-German boxer Hans Ziglarski.[5]

He followed his brother Samuel to Chicago in 1952,[3][6] and changed his name to "Mike Agassi". Less than a month after graduating from Roosevelt University, he met Elizabeth Dudley through a common friend. They married at a Methodist church in Chicago's North Side on August 19, 1959.[7] When a friend offered Agassi a job at the Tropicana Hotel, the couple moved to Las Vegas with their two-year-old daughter Rita and eight-day-old son Phillip in October 1962;[8] daughter Tamara (Tami) was born in 1967 and Andre in 1970.

Agassi described Rita, Phillip, and Tami as "guinea pigs" in the development of the methods he used to mold Andre into a world-class player. In 1984, Rita, having rebelled against her father's 5,000-balls-a-day-regimen, married Pancho Gonzales. In his autobiography Open, Andre recalled Mike and Steffi Graf's father Peter nearly coming to blows arguing over whether Andre or Steffi had the superior backhand technique when Mike showed Peter the machine he built to fire tennis balls at Andre and his siblings.[9]

Mike Agassi's autobiography The Agassi Story was published in 2004.[10] He died on September 24, 2021, at the age of 90, in Las Vegas.[11][12]

1948 Olympic results

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Below is the record of Emmanuel Agassi, an Iranian bantamweight boxer, who competed at the 1948 London Olympics:

  • Round of 32: Lost to Alvaro Vicente (Spain) on points

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Cobello, Dominic; Agassi, Mike (2004). The Agassi Story. Toronto: ECW Press. pp. 12–14. ISBN 1-55022-656-8. Retrieved October 22, 2012.
  2. ^ "How To Be Good". The Guardian. September 3, 2006. Retrieved January 26, 2014.
  3. ^ a b Nahigian, Frank (April 14, 2010). "Only in America? An Interview with Mike Agassi". The Armenian Weekly. Retrieved September 9, 2014.
  4. ^ Emanoul Aghasi Archived November 11, 2012, at the Wayback Machine at Sports-Reference.com
    "Iran Olympic Tradition". NBCOlympics.com. NBC Universal. 2008. Archived from the original on November 3, 2009. Retrieved May 23, 2009.
  5. ^ Dominic Cobello; Mike Agassi; Kate Shoup Welsh (October 2008). The Agassi Story. ECW Press. pp. 28–. ISBN 978-1-55490-362-7.
  6. ^ Jensen, Jeffry (2002) [1992]. Dawson, Dawn P (ed.). Great Athletes. Vol. 1 (Revised ed.). Salem Press. p. 17. ISBN 1-58765-008-8.
  7. ^ Cobello, Dominic; Agassi, Mike (2004). The Agassi Story. Toronto: ECW Press. p. 64. ISBN 1-55022-656-8. Retrieved May 17, 2017.
  8. ^ Cobello, Dominic; Agassi, Mike (2004). The Agassi Story. Toronto: ECW Press. p. 69. ISBN 1-55022-656-8. Retrieved May 18, 2017.
  9. ^ "Peter Graf Obituary" (December 4, 2013) The Daily Telegraph; retrieved May 18, 2017
  10. ^ Agassi, Mike; Cobello, Dominic; Welsh, Kate Shoup (2004). The Agassi Story. ECW Press. ISBN 978-1-55022-656-0.
  11. ^ Katsilometes, John (September 29, 2021). "Mike Agassi, father of Andre Agassi, dies in Las Vegas". Las Vegas Review-Journal. Retrieved October 2, 2021.
  12. ^ "Mike Agassi, Andre's Dad, Dies at Age 90". www.tennisnow.com. Retrieved October 2, 2021.
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