Novak Djokovic needs new tennis quests. Can the U.S. Open provide them?

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NEW YORK — What motivates Novak Djokovic now that he has nothing left to fight for?

The 24-time Grand Slam champion finally won his coveted Olympic gold medal in Paris this month. In so doing, he essentially completed tennis, sweeping up the only coveted title in the sport that had eluded him. Djokovic has other targets, like the 25th Grand Slam title that would take him clear of Australia’s Margaret Court, but the Olympic gold was the true white whale for a player who has accumulated trophies like interest.

Not so much recently. He arrived in New York without his name already engraved on one of the three majors for the first time in 14 years.

The most interesting part is that he has been here before.

In 2016, in Paris, Djokovic finally won the French Open. In so doing, he completed the career Grand Slam, and became the second male player in the Open Era, after Rod Laver, to hold all four Grand Slam titles at the same time.

It felt like he would carry on dominating tennis forever. Instead, he bombed out of Wimbledon against Sam Querrey, and then didn’t win a major for another two years in a period that took in elbow surgery and some hugely uncharacteristic upsets, the mother of all comedowns.

“I wasn’t mentally in the right place,” he said later.

In 2024, the early signs are that he is working to avoid a repeat. Djokovic was asked about his motivation ahead of the tournament starting, and he spoke of his rivalries with Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner, his advocacy work with the Professional Tennis Players Association (PTPA) and his belief in his competitiveness.

There is little to be gleaned from a 6-2, 6-2, 6-4 first-round cruise against the overmatched Radu Albot, but Djokovic — and the rest of the tennis world — might learn more from what awaits him Wednesday. He faces compatriot Laslo Djere, in a repeat of their fourth-round meeting in 2023. Djokovic trailed two sets to love, eventually coming through in five on the way to the title.

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Djokovic is in a curious position. He is coming off what he calls the “greatest achievement” of his career, but his season as a whole is more trough than peak. Despite beating Alcaraz to win that Olympic gold, Djokovic has lost to the Spaniard in consecutive Wimbledon finals. Sinner overwhelmed him at the Australian Open, an event where he had previously seemed invincible. The rivalries that motivate him are, as of recently, not going to plan.

Novak Djokovic’s struggles date back to the clay-court swing. (Filippo Monteforte / AFP via Getty Images)

This could help Djokovic. He finally has two younger rivals who are at his level, and he will be desperate to reassert himself at the top of the sport, vanquishing them like he has done so many players in the last 10 years. He may be the U.S. Open champion, but here in New York, it’s reigning French Open and Wimbledon champion Alcaraz who has the biggest target on his back. It’s Sinner, not Djokovic, who is world No. 1.

Djokovic likes nothing more than proving a point, and silencing those who have written him off. This is not like June 2016, when it almost looked too easy for Djokovic to dominate tennis, as he turned the “Big Four” to the “Big One.”

Just over eight years ago, there wasn’t even a suggestion that Djokovic’s motivation would wane. In retrospect, it might seem obvious that achieving the tennis Holy Grail could occasion a lull, but at the time it wasn’t on the forecast.

Looking back at his pre-Wimbledon press conferences, Djokovic wasn’t asked about whether he’d struggle for new targets. Only when he suffered that seismic shock of a defeat to American Sam Querrey did the topic emerge.

Novak Djokovic’s defeat to American Sam Querrey at Wimbledon is one of the biggest shocks in recent tournament history. (Adrian Dennis / AFP via Getty Images)

“It’s an amazing feeling to be able to hold four Grand Slams at the same time,” Djokovic said that summer. “Coming into Wimbledon, I knew that mentally it’s not going to be easy to kind of re-motivate myself.”

Djokovic has since spoken of suffering an existential crisis in that period.

“I was going through a period where I was really looking for myself off the court,” he later reflected. During the defeat to Querrey, there were a couple of rain delays, and Djokovic recalls asking his team to leave him alone in a room during one of the interruptions.

“I just looked at the wall and I was dull. Literally, no drive inside of me,” he said.

In a 2018 interview, he added that the injuries he suffered in the middle of the previous year happened when he was “experiencing some emotional imbalance.” He parted ways with Boris Becker at the end of 2016, and had broken up his team during the 2017 clay-court season in a bid to recover his drive to win matches. Djokovic even considered retirement, as his motivation completely disappeared.

He has since been able to reframe this difficult period as a valuable learning experience. He even said he was “super glad” to have been through it. If ever there was a time when that experience would come in useful, it would be now.

At 37, and still only a couple of months on from knee surgery, physical rather than mental challenges may present the firmest obstacles to Djokovic’s quest for renewed dominance. “I don’t have any limitations in my mind,” he said at Wimbledon. “I still want to keep going and play as long as I feel like I can play on this high level.”

At the homecoming celebration in Belgrade that followed the Olympics, Djokovic hinted that he had nothing left to win. “I feel fulfilled, complete, let’s celebrate!” he said. In the next breath, he was opening up the possibility of playing into his 40s, and defending his title at the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.

There are some factors in his favor. His kids are now at an age where they can watch their father in action, which seems to act as an additional inspiration, Djokovic weeping in their arms in Paris and developing a new and knowing violin celebration for his daughter.

The Olympic gold was an occasion to celebrate for the entire family. (Amin Mohammad Jamali / Getty Images)

Most of all, he has the sport. One of the great things about being a tennis player is that even when you’ve won it all, there are always new challenges to overcome. New shots to develop, new tactics to try.

Against Albot on Monday, Djokovic certainly looked motivated as he performed some of his party tricks in Arthur Ashe Stadium. Breaking serve having been 40-0 down. Hitting the forehand harder than seemingly any point in his career. Sealing the second set with a second-serve ace. Why not? A second-round match against Djere on Wednesday may not be quite the Olympic gold-medal match, but give Djokovic a court, an opponent and a crowd and he’ll still find a point to prove.

(Top photo: Erick W. Rasco / Sports Illustrated via Getty Images)