SPORTS ILLUSTRATED Q SI.COM 102to analyze 3,800 tennis strokes—has been coy. “I won’t
disclose whether I am vaccinated or not. Whatever you
say—I have, I have not, maybe, I do not know or I am
thinking about it—they will use it against you.” At this
writing, it is unclear whether Djokovic will enter the
2022 Australian Open, an event he has won nine times,
now that the tournament has a vaccine mandate. This
is a man, to mix sports metaphors, with an uncommon
knack for scoring own goals.
Here’s both the pity and the offset: Djokovic is, overall,
a force of good. He is smart. He is multilingual. He is
charismatic. He can talk about international affairs, just
as he can talk about wolf energy. Ask him a question, you
often get a lengthy answer that doesn’t hew to cliché.
Questioned about his winning formula, he smiles, strokes
his chin and remarks: “I know that everything matters.
At the end of the day, it all affects and contributes to the
performance in one way or another. But then also we have
to consider the fact that when you’re on the court, also
there are some unpredictable things that can happen,
whether it’s on the court with your opponent, whether
it’s the sensations that you have...whatever it is.”
In the most ruthlessly individual of sports, he fancies
himself a teammate. When Naomi Osaka announced after
the U.S. Open that she would be taking time off to deal
with her mental health and her struggles with anxiety,
only one male player reached out to her. (Hint: It was the
same player who was the first to contact Osaka after she
initially made her mental health revelations last May.)
Djokovic is also quietly generous. The 2021 U.S. Open
featured a record purse, more than $57 million. But the
singles winners made “only” $2.5 million, the lowest
champion’s purse in nearly a decade. Djokovic is part of
a breakaway group that has lobbied for a more equitable
payout of prize money. Surely the USTA’s redistribution
of wealth, from the tennis squires down to the rank and
file, would not have happened without Djokovic’s lobby-
ing against his own financial interests.
Why isn’t Djokovic more popular? is a persistent trope
among casual fans. Not so among those deep inside. As the
former player and current BBC commentator Mark Petchey
put it on Twitter: “Whatever your view of @DjokerNole
if you can’t respect the work, sacrifice he has put in and
the success he has achieved in arguably the toughest era
of men’s tennis ever that is more a ref lection of who you
are than any negative on him.”SEEING RED
AND FEELING
BLUE
In September,
Djokovic shed
tears (above)
after his only loss
at a 2021 major,
in the final of
the U.S. Open;
he’ll need more
of the ferocity
he showed in
his win at the
French Open
(right) to have
another historic
season in ’22.FR
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NOVAK DJOKOVIC