Missing In Action: What lies ahead for Serena Williams? 

TC Live: Team Williams get behind Esther Lee at LA Cancer Challenge Walk

The WTA Finals begin on Wednesday, and the ATP Finals start on Sunday. As we close in the tours' season-ending championships, we'll look at four prestigious players who won't be taking part.

Serena Williams turned 40 in late September, still one Grand Slam singles title shy of the all-time record held by Margaret Court. Whether Williams considers this unfinished business, and plans to renew the chase in 2022, or chooses to pay more attention to her other roles and obligations—mother, entrepreneur, wife, fashion maven—is a question of the moment.

And Williams hasn’t been saying much about it.

Whatever Serena decides, it will be shaped by a handful of sometimes-interrelated priorities as well as the harsh realities facing any aging champion. The proverbial elephant in the room is family.

Serena has frequently boasted that she has never spent a night away from daughter Alexis Olympia, now four years old. It’s an astonishing fact, considering the itinerant life of an elite tennis player. And Williams’ participation in tennis has been robust. Since Olympia's birth, she participated in 13 of the 15 majors that took place (Wimbledon was canceled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic).

That’s a great record, especially in light of the sacrifices demanded by Williams' level of engagement with her daughter, husband and other interests. As Williams’ agent Jill Smoller put it in a recent interview with Chanda Rubin and Zina Garrison, co-hosts of the podcast, The Goat: Serena: “What's important to her, first and foremost is her family. Olympia is the first priority, her well-being supersedes everything.”

Family concerns will certainly play into Serena’s calculations as she decides whether or not to compete at the next Grand Slam, the Australian Open. She has flourished there, winning seven titles (the same number as at Wimbledon). But the catch is that the government of Victoria, the state where the Australian Open is held, has consistently followed very strict health protocols since the initial outbreak of COVID-19. While the situation is fluid, it's unclear exactly how restricting regulations could be for players and their families. It could present Williams with a very difficult decision, and now that she’s turned 40, father time is an ever more dangerous opponent.

Even if Serena wants to hunt the record, her state of health and fitness also are uncertain. The last we saw of Williams, she was hobbling off Wimbledon’s Centre Court, unable to continue after taking a spill early in her first-round match. The hamstring injury kept her off the court for the rest of the year.

Some Williams watchers were alarmed when, in an emotionally wrenching appeal on behalf of an anti-cancer charity foot race (Williams’ long-time physio and friend, Esther Lee, was recently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer), Williams said, fighting back tears, “Register like me, virtually. I’m walking (in the race), I can’t run.”

The most intriguing element may be how Williams feels about Court’s record. Court won many of her major titles before 1969, the year tennis went “Open” and finally allowed the world’s best players to compete in Grand Slam events. Serena is already the most prolific player of either sex in the Open (read: modern) Era. Williams hasn’t addressed this divide, but the tennis cognoscenti have spoken, generally according Williams status as the GOAT (Greatest of All Time).

“To me, her legacy is already sealed,” ESPN analyst Chris Evert, a fellow GOAT contender, said during the telecast of Williams’ truncated match at Wimbledon. “If she never wins another Grand Slam, if she never matches Margaret Court, [it] doesn’t matter. She’s still the greatest.”

If Williams agrees with Evert’s assessment, she can comfortably stow the racquets for good. But don’t underestimate the pure love of competition—and the status it has earned Williams—as factors in her plans.