On the verge of her second retirement, Martina Navratilova sounds as though she feels overshadowed by Andre Agassi's impending exit.

Asked Saturday if she's going through the emotional turmoil Agassi's discussed at length at the U.S. Open, Navratilova responded: ``Oh, I am going through all of that. It's just that the whole world doesn't know it.''

Navratilova, who turns 50 in October, left the sport in 1994 after winning 167 singles titles, but then returned for doubles in 2000. In the past six years, she's won 12 doubles titles and two mixed doubles titles.

At the U.S. Open, she's playing mixed doubles with Bob Bryan, and women's doubles with Nadia Petrova.

Although she's ready to stop playing competitively again, Navratilova is not anticipating life in an easy chair anytime soon. In addition to promoting her book and a credit card that raises money for the gay and lesbian community, she's thinking about starting a small-scale tennis academy.

``I'll keep pretty busy. It's not exactly putting my feet up. So like Billie Jean (King) says, I might just be getting started,'' Navratilova said Saturday, when the entire U.S. Open schedule was wiped out by rain. ``A lot of people are after me to go into politics, because I've been certainly speaking my mind for the last 20 years on that.''

Never shy about expressing her opinions, Navratilova weighed in on a few tennis issues Saturday. She thinks, for example, that today's game is being hurt by advanced racket technology that makes it easier for players to play power tennis from the baseline instead of a serve-and-volley style.

``I am disappointed with the direction the game is going, period, not just in doubles but in singles. I'm disappointed that the racket manufacturers are dictating what kind of tennis we're watching,'' she said. ``The rackets are just so forgiving, it makes it very easy to hit great shots.''

Navratilova's views on a few other topics:

_ The new system for challenging calls is ``a great step in the right direction.''

_ The let _ in which a serve is retaken if it touches the net but lands in _ should be done away with. ``Just play the ball,'' she said.

_ The third-set tiebreaker set to end mixed doubles matches is a mistake. ``Players hate it. The crowd hates it,'' Navratilova said. ``I don't know why they have it.''