SPORTS ILLUSTRATED Q SI.COM 100flourishes that make it seem like he
was touched by the tennis gods. No
one compares Djokovic to musicians
and artists. Djokovic, unlike Federer,
doesn’t play in elegant silence or appear
to be transported from another era.
And Novak Djokovic is not Rafa Nadal.
He is not a converted lefty, doesn’t
drizzle every shot with spin, doesn’t
play a sui generis ultraphysical style
and doesn’t necessarily play every point
with furious, unremitting intensity.
But, while perhaps not as obvious to
the casual fan, Djokovic’s assorted ten-
nis superpowers are just as effective.
Among them: He has a magical ability
to distort the dimensions of the court.
By rights and by rules, a singles ten-
nis court measures 27 feet by 78 feet.
But not when you play Djokovic. He
hits with such accuracy and depth
and uncovers so many angles—jerking
around his opponent like a sadistic
puppeteer—that their side can seem
like a football field.
Meanwhile, he moves so well and
anticipates so well that he forces his
opponents to aim for the smallest of
margins. “You can’t imagine how frus-
trating it is to hit what you think is a
winner or an ace, only to have Novak
send it right back,” Andy Roddick said
as he watched Djokovic play during
the U.S. Open. “When that happens
again and again, you go for too much.”
Djokovic is also devoid of weakness.
His backhand and forehand are com-
parably strong. He is perhaps the best
returner in tennis history, but he is seldom outserved. In
2021 he committed himself to sharpening his frontcourt
game. Asked how he would create a game plan to beat
Djokovic these days, Roddick thinks about it, sighs and
offers this: “pray.”
And as—and maybe because—Djokovic demoralizes
his opponents, he possesses a level of psychic strength
usually reserved for spoon-bending mentalists. Almost
as a matter of habit, Djokovic f inds ways to summon his
best tennis when he needs it most. “[Novak is] under so
much pressure,” says Dominic Thiem, the 2020 U.S. Open
champ, “but he’s shown so many times before that if
there’s a big chance, he rarely misses it.”
At majors this year, Djokovic dropped the first set
in 10 of his 28 matches. In the cases of other players,
even stars, that would trigger an upset alert. In the case
of Djokovic: no panic. No problem. It simply meant a
longer shift.
One of the few blemishes of Djokovic’s otherwise gilded
season came in the finals of the U.S. Open. He was on
the threshold of history, a match from the Grand Slam
and standing alone on the summit with his 21st major.
And...he wilted. Pitted against Daniil Medvedev of
Russia, the world’s No. 2 player, Djokovic “had little
to give,” as he puts it. Whether it was the weight of
the occasion, nerves, physical exhaustion or the effec-
tively slappy strokes of the player on the other side of
the net, Djokovic fell without his characteristic fight,
6–4, 6–4, 6–4. Before the match had even ended, he was
off-loading tears.PE
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NOVAK DJOKOVIC
“I won’t disclose whether I am VACCINATED
OR NOT,” Djokovic says. “Whatever you say. ..
they will use it against you.”