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This column isn't about tennis. It's not even about sports.

It's about existential inspiration.

And it's up to you to decide to whom to turn, if you could, to find it. A kind of theoretical search.

Sports figures so often are seen as extraordinary, people worthy not just of your cheers but your emulation, people who should be role models. Sometimes that's a big mistake. Sometimes, though, it is not.

In cases of the latter, which sports icon, local, national or international, or what human being in general, would you seek out to get good guidance in your own life? Not about how to throw or catch a football or baseball, how to drain a 3, how to bend a soccer ball. No. Just about how to work better and live better and be better.

If you could pick anyone, who you got?

It would have to be someone with knowledge, someone who knows how to apply it, someone with perspective, someone with wisdom, someone with ample life experience, someone who could help you become a better salesperson or manager or computer programmer or teacher or business leader or garbage collector — whatever it is that you do, whatever you aspire to do.

Would it be Kyle Whittingham? Kalani Sitake? Larry Krystkowiak? Jerry Sloan? LaVell Edwards would have been a tomahawk dunk, may he now soar through the eternities. How about Tom Holmoe or Chris Hill or Dennis Lindsey? Quin Snyder? Gail Miller? For the younger folks, would you turn to Gordon Hayward or Joe Ingles or Joe Johnson? Rudy Gobert? How about former Braves slugger Dale Murphy?

Who in sports, active or inactive, do you admire most, based on what you know about him or her? Derek Jeter? Charles Barkley? Mike Trout? Urban Meyer? Serena Williams? Steph Curry? Jack Nicklaus? Who could you learn from? Who would push you to new heights?

What brought up this subject is Novak Djokovic's new association with Andre Agassi heading into the French Open as Djokovic attempts to defend his title and break out of a slump. Folks don't expect the 47-year-old Agassi to actually coach Djokovic as much as guide him, advise him, and, yes, inspire him.

Anybody who attended the Utah State of Sports event a few years ago, at which Agassi was featured and honored, could easily discern that the man has learned a thing or two or two thousand through his years as a high-profile athlete.

According to Sports Illustrated's Jon Wertheim, Djokovic has hinted that some of his slumping results can be attributed to "personal issues." Makes sense. Everybody has some of those, even regular people who don't compete at the world's top level in their chosen professions. Agassi has been forthright about his own struggles earlier in his life, writing about them in his book, "Open." Since then, as mentioned, he seems to have stabilized his existence, finding meaning in truly significant things and transforming a once-egocentric view into one in which bettering other people's lives is a priority.

He now will try to better Djokovic's game.

"We are both excited to work together and see where it takes us," Djokovic said. "We don't have any long-term commitment. It's just us trying to get to know each other in Paris a little bit. He will not stay the whole tournament. He's only going to stay to a certain time, and then we'll see after that what's going to happen."

So in the theoretical sense, who would you lean on for that kind of arrangement?

Two local guys who likely would be great, regardless of anyone's specific position, are Frank Layden and Ron McBride.

Each of them is a community treasure, having lived long and well enough to know what's important and what isn't. They could teach us all how to perform better, win more and to understand deeper. Layden once was asked to speak to an assembly of Harvard Law students. Asked afterward how it went, he said, in a way only Frank can: "It was hoooooorrrible. I was the dumbest one in the room and everybody knew it."

He, of course, was not the dumbest one in the room.

His appreciation for sports is terrific, but he loves music and the arts and literature every bit as much, and loves his family even more. He said during a recent interview that when he is approached on the street by a homeless person asking for money, he said he tries to give what he can. He doesn't judge the person or try to decipher with any kind of self-defined righteousness how that person will use his modest gift. He doesn't worry about that. He just gives.

McBride is about as sage as they come. Though fully aware of his own flaws, he's a guy who could give good advice on darn-near anything, a man whose own hit-and-miss experiences have taught him how to recognize and fix what needs fixing. He once told me: "Some coaches have big philosophies. All that's a bunch of bulls—-. What it comes down to is: 1) kids have to want an education; 2) they have to be totally committed to the program; 3) they have to give their best and be accountable for that. You get good players because people believe you. Parents will send you their kid if they trust you. When I go into a home, I focus on the family. I say what I say and they like it or they don't. I don't know how people perceive me, I'm just me. I'm no genius, I know that."

But he was/is smart enough to know how to connect with people, communicate with them, care about them and motivate them.

Inspire them.

That's enough of an answer to the original question, at least for me.

Who's your answer?

GORDON MONSON hosts "The Big Show" with Spence Checketts weekdays from 3-7 p.m. on 97.5 FM and 1280 AM The Zone. Twitter: @GordonMonson.