The unquenchable fire in Novak Djokovic—and Venus Williams

NEW YORK—Novak Djokovic looked as if he were wading rather than walking through the still air in the bowl of Arthur Ashe Stadium. He was in the midst of his second-round match at the US Open, not long after noon on Wednesday. The sun was overly bright, the crowd listless, and Zachary Svajda, a 22-year-old American qualifier, was giving the 38-year-old icon a load of trouble.

As Djokovic approached his chair, ESPN analyst Cliff Drysdale remarked, “That’s a slow amble to the sideline.” It expanded on an earlier comment by Drysdale’s boothmate James Blake, who had said, “He’s just not animated the way he usually is.”

Djokovic sank into his chair, ran his hands over the stubble on his cheeks and through his hair, then tilted his head all the way back, taking a deep breath. It was easy to wonder why Djokovic is still putting himself through all this, patiently trying to stem the tide of another young challenger hoping for even a small taste of the glory on which Djokovic feasted for roughly two decades.

Djokovic himself might have been pondering the same question, which would explain his weary look.

The answer was so obvious that it is easily overlooked and perhaps even disappointing. The men’s Grand Slam singles title record holder may have nothing left to prove, but his love of the game—the act of competing with all the unseen drudgery it entails—is unquenchable and overarching.

Back on the court, Djokovic held serve to force the tiebreaker. Svajda worked the points artfully and found himself serving for the set at 6-5. Djokovic then engaged Svajda in the kind of long, punishing rally that has been the No. 7 seed’s career calling card. But unlike so many of those countless times, Djokovic played it safe, hoping the younger man would crumble. Instead, Svajda jumped on a cautious cross-court backhand and smoked his own backhand for a winner down the line.

Djokovic was wallowing through a tough day, but his persistence, and an unfortunate leg problem that visibly hampered Svajda’s effort beginning in the middle of the second set, enabled the four-time US Open champion to paste another gold star on his tally sheet as he won, 6-7 (5), 6-3, 6-3, 6-1.

“There is always something to prove once you step out onto the court, which is that you're still able to win a tennis match,” Djokovic told reporters in his press conference after the win, when he was pressed on the issue. “One can always think that there is nothing more to achieve or to prove because you've done it all, but it's quite relative. It's quite individual, the way you see it.”

Djokovic went on to explain that he still had the desire to compete with the younger generation. That wasn’t the problem. Rather, he seemed unable to unlock the skills that had carried him so far.

“I'm not pleased with my level of tennis, but you have days like this, where you're not playing at your best, but you just kind of find a way,” he said. “Not to get too philosophical about it, but I still love the feeling of competition, the drive that I feel on the court.”

Djokovic isn’t the only icon to see that success and satisfaction are relative terms for someone who loves the game. There has been a lot of attention focused lately on mental health, some compelling narratives revolving around burnout and the loss of spark. Then there’s Venus Williams, whose passion for tennis at age 45 glows with an intensity that may even supersede what Djokovic feels.

Some suspected that Williams’ re-emergence from an assumed if unannounced retirement was a lark. Let’s see how long she sticks around after she gets schooled by some bright-eyed 18-year-old. But guess what? Although she won the first match some weeks ago in her re-debut in Washington, D.C., she was beaten in her next two starts. Then she gave Karolina Muchova, the No. 11 seed here, plenty to fret about in a three-set battle.

What some forget is that for Williams, as for Djokovic, it’s no longer about the Ws, as much as she may carve the validation they provide in their own narrow, black-and-white way. She just loves to play, and is reveling in her good health and the sense that she can finally play—just play, not necessarily win—freely. It’s almost comical, how much pleasure she is taking the most basic act in tennis:

“It's a lot of fun to go literally hog wild out there,” she said after losing to Muchova. “To hit as hard as I can. I'm happiest when I can just hit hard.”

There is always something to prove once you step out onto the court, which is that you're still able to win a tennis match. Novak Djokovic

Djokovic will continue trying to work through what, for him, is a patch of indifferent play. He said that the disgruntled image he’s projecting is not about a lack of motivation, but an abundance of it.

“It's just that I’m a bit frustrated with my game, you know?” he said. “Then I kind of go through stuff internally. You don't want to know the details of what I'm going through and telling myself. It's not like I'm not finding joy on the court, competing. I just don't enjoy not playing well.”

Who knows if Djokovic will rediscover his unique blend of seemingly infinite patience and the willingness to pull the ripcord on a bold shot when the opportunity presents itself. He is playing a greatly reduced schedule and dedicated to his family because, as much as he loves to play tennis, it’s time. It pains him to think that, should he find his game, he may miss the eighth birthday of his daughter, Tara.

“Those are the types of things that I really don't want to be missing anymore,” he said.

Some things can co-exist, perhaps even take precedence, over Djokovic’s undiminished love for tennis. But not very many.