By Richard Pagliaro | @Tennis_Now | Saturday, August 31, 2024
Photo: Corleve/Mark Peterson
NEW YORK-Pausing to acknowledge cheering fans, Novak Djokovic spun around and waved to the Arthur Ashe crowd.
A master of so many in recent Sundays, the Grand Slam king exited the US Open in a stunning Friday night loss to Alexei Popyrin.
More: Poor Djokovic for what went wrong
The end of the line for Djokovic marked the end of an era for Grand Slam tennis.
Djokovic’s loss means that for the first season since 2002 none of the iconic Big 3 champions-Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer– lifted a Grand Slam title trophy.
Hall of Famer Pete Sampras, Djokovic’s tennis hero, beat archrival Andre Agassi in the 2002 US Open final on his farewell tour.
The following year, Federer defeated Mark Philippoussis in his first major final at Wimbledon to capture the first of his 20 Grand Slam titles.
Since Federer won Wimbledon in 2003, a Big 3 champion had won at least one major championship – Djokovic won three of the four Grand Slam crowns in 2023 – every year until now.
The four-time US Open champion, who underwent knee surgery in June, expended physical and emotional energy to capture the Olympic gold medal for Serbia at the Paris Olympics eight weeks after the surgery.
A depleted Djokovic, who did not play in a hard-court tuning tournament in preparation for the defense of his US Open title, said he had run out of gas.
“I put a lot of energy into winning the gold medal and I arrived in New York just not feeling fresh mentally and physically,” Djokovic said. “But because it’s the US Open, you know, I gave it a go and tried my best. I mean, I didn’t have any physical problems. I just felt out of gas, you know, and you could see that with the way i played.
“Just from the beginning, from the first game, I just didn’t find myself in the field at all. It’s all I can say, you know. You know, life goes on. I mean, yeah, just try and recalibrate and see for what’s next.“
