-
Bill Connelly, ESPN Staff Writer
The Big Three of men’s tennis — Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic — owned the sport for most of the 2000s. No one had won more than 14 men’s Grand Slam titles before they embarked on journeys to win 20, 22 and 24 of them, respectively. They vacuumed up so many records and so much of the sport’s history that it’s a wonder that they left any of it for anyone else.
And yet, Carlos Alcaraz has already staked out new ground. After winning the 2022 US Open — and becoming the youngest player in 32 years to do so — he became the youngest ever No. 1 player in the ATP rankings, aged just 19 years and four months. Then he won another Slam, and another, and another.
His French Open win in June made him the youngest man to win Slams on all three surfaces (hard, grass and clay). When he won his second Wimbledon title a month later, it made him the youngest man in the Open era to win the “Channel Slam” (the French-Wimbledon combo in one year). And if he wins either the US Open or the 2025 Australian Open, he will become the first person to ever win five Slam titles before his 22nd birthday. (Winning the Australian Open would also make him the youngest by far to win a career Slam)
The Big Three warped history, but Alcaraz is making a lot of it anyway. It’s impossible to look at his accomplishments to date and not already begin envisioning his path toward 20-plus Slams. But before Federer, Nadal and Djokovic, such feats were unthinkable. They have mostly aged out of competition: Federer retired, Nadal appears he will soon, and while Djokovic still rolls on, he’s 37 years old and in the middle of his least accomplished season in years. (Even though, for Djokovic, “least accomplished” still includes a Slam final and an Olympic gold medal)
Alcaraz appears to be the standard bearer for the future of the sport. This is apt considering his game is a futuristic mix of Djokovic’s speed and flexibility, Nadal’s passion and Federer’s shotmaking.
But what feats are actually possible — and fair to expect — in a post-Big Three universe? And what stands in the way of Alcaraz making an all-time career run?
Injuries and cautionary tales
It was only three years ago that Alcaraz enjoyed his first major breakout, surging to the 2021 US Open quarterfinals at age 18. He won matches at all four Slams that year, already hinting at potential all-surface and best-of-five prowess. And a year later, he survived epic five-setters against former US Open champion Marin Cilic and American Frances Tiafoe and took down Casper Ruud in the finals to win Slam No. 1.
In the years that have followed, Alcaraz’s body has occasionally betrayed him. He missed the 2023 Australian Open due to a hamstring injury; then, after splitting two sets with Djokovic in the French Open semifinals, he suffered full-body cramps and quickly dropped the final two sets. He beat Djokovic in an incredible 2023 Wimbledon final, and he battled past a forearm injury to win the French Open and Wimbledon this summer. When it comes to Alcaraz’s attempts to post an enormous career Slam total, his biggest enemy might be his own body. His physical, full throttle playing style appears to push limits at all times, and he occasionally breaks down. (Of course, Nadal also pushed limits and broke down and still found time to win 22 Slams.)
If we look at other successful young players, however, we find another hurdle for Alcaraz to clear. As incredible as the Big Three have been from the standpoints of talent and adaptability, they have also been extreme outliers when it comes to sustained success. Others who saw Alcaraz-level success at Alcaraz’s age couldn’t continue it.
Besides Alcaraz, four other players won four Slam titles before the age of 22: Ken Rosewall, Bjorn Borg, Mats Wilander and Boris Becker.
Rosewall’s story doesn’t really apply — a product of the pre-Open era 1950s, he probably would have finished with 16 to 20 Slam titles had he not been forced to choose between winning Slams and making real money — but the other three share similarities.
Borg was unlike anything the tour had seen when he erupted on the scene at age 18. He won his first French Open title in 1974, repeated in 1975, then won Wimbledon in 1976 and 1977. He had four Slam titles just one month after his 21st birthday, then he won the French Open and Wimbledon each year from 1978 to 1980. He took a sixth French Open title in 1981, but his motivation quickly flagged. The tour began attempting to enforce minimum participation requirements just as Borg began wanting to play fewer tournaments. He lost in the final of the 1981 US Open and never played in another Slam. He announced his retirement at 26 years old, and while he began a half-hearted comeback in 1991, he never won another tour match.
As Borg disappeared, another Swede, Wilander, took his place. He won the 1982 French Open as an unseeded 17-year-old, beating four top-five opponents in the process. He won the Australian Open in 1983 and 1984, then beat John McEnroe and Ivan Lendl to win the 1985 French Open, his fourth Slam, a couple of months before his 21st birthday. His peak form was otherworldly, but he wasn’t consistent enough to reach the top of the ATP rankings until 1988, when he rode a retooled serve to three Slam titles in a single year. He won his seventh Slam a month after his 24th birthday, but he would never reach another Slam final. Once again, motivation trailed off quickly, and he was consistently unable to maintain his peak level of play.
Becker was another Wilander-style prodigy who enjoyed his first breakthrough as an unseeded 17-year-old. He rode a booming serve and aggressive play to a shocking Wimbledon title in 1985. He defended his title in 1986, and after a wobbly couple of seasons, he won the last two Slams of 1989, winning Wimbledon and his first US Open. He won the 1991 Australian Open for his fifth Slam title at age 23, and he was good enough to reach No. 1 for a few weeks in 1991, but he reached only two more Slam finals after his 24th birthday.
We have no reason to question Alcaraz’s motivation — the tears following his Olympic final loss to Djokovic, plus his mini-meltdown in Cincinnati, certainly give the impression that he cares as much as he ever has — but if nothing else, the tales of Borg, Wilander and Becker serve as reminders that this story is just beginning.
In all, 13 men have won at least four Slams by their respective 23rd birthdays, and only four of them (Nadal, Pete Sampras, Borg and Rosewall) finished with more than seven. Having the Big Three serving as examples could help Alcaraz when it comes to pursuing long-term goals, but he’s still very much in the early stages of his pursuit.
Growth opportunities
Aside from extraordinary motivation levels, maybe the single greatest collective trait that Federer, Nadal and Djokovic boasted was pure adaptability. No one can match Djokovic in that regard, but all three tweaked and altered their games to get back on top of the pack.
Maybe the scariest thing about Alcaraz is that, despite what he’s accomplished, he still has clear opportunities for improvement. He takes unnecessary risks at times, which is part of what makes him incredibly fun to watch but also costs him points and makes certain sets more difficult.
Though his forehand is wicked, and his return game is about the best in the world, he’s more prone to settling for backhand slices than either of his two current primary rivals. According to match charting data from Tennis Abstract, he has sliced 18% of backhands over the past year, compared to 16% for Djokovic and only 7% for world No. 1 Jannik Sinner. He probably has the least effective backhand of the bunch, too.
Meanwhile, his serve is merely good, not great. Among the current ATP top 50, here’s where he ranks over the last year in key service metrics:
— 13th in service points won (67.6%)
— 14th in service games won (85.8%)
— 28th in break points saved (63.6%)
— 34th in first-serve points (72.8%)
— 45th in ace rate (5.9%)
Alcaraz’s serve numbers are very comparable to those of a 21-year old Djokovic — Djokovic won 73.7% of his first-serve points and 67.7% of all-service points and held 86.8% of the time in 2008 — but part of Djokovic’s transformation to greatest-of-all-time status was his massive upgrade in this department.
While Alcaraz is as good as anyone in longer rallies, he still only wins a good-not-great 52% of short points (1-3 shots), compared to 53% for Sinner and 55% for Djokovic. These don’t seem like big differences, but every percentage point adds up in this sport, and a few extra big serves and easy points can turn an elite player into an all-time great.
The 2024 US Open and beyond
Nadal (3), Djokovic (1) and Federer (0) had combined for four Slam titles by the time they reached their respective age-21 US Opens. Alcaraz has won four by himself. And while he hasn’t had to fend off a prime-age Big Three (plus Andy Murray, if you prefer the big four nomenclature), he’s still had to work through a still-sprightly Djokovic, an older generation of physical Slam champions (Daniil Medvedev) and finalists (Alexander Zverev, Ruud, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Matteo Berrettini) and a rising batch of younger stars that includes not only Sinner — who enjoyed a massive breakthrough in form early in 2024 — but also six other 23-and-under players who have risen into the top 25. He’s reached at least the semifinals of six of his past seven Slams, and he’s 4-2 in semis and 4-0 in finals. In all, he’s won 42 of his past 45 Slam matches.
The success of the Big Three has assured that surpassing their accomplishments is far more of a marathon than a sprint, and the burnout rate of past young stars with Alcaraz-level accomplishments reminds us that Alcaraz’s race is still in its early stages. But he has carved out historic achievements all the same, and his path will determine how much we rescale our expectations after the era of the Big Three.
For the third straight Slam, Alcaraz and Sinner have drawn the same side of the US Open bracket, meaning that either of them face the prospect of having to beat both their main young rival in the semis and Djokovic in the final. Three-time US Open finalist Daniil Medvedev, who beat Alcaraz in last year’s semis, is also on the Alcaraz-Sinner side of the draw, so as with Wimbledon, Djokovic was done quite a few favors here, maybe enough to become the odds-on favorite.
Still, we’ve reached the point where any Alcaraz loss, especially in a big match, is jarring. He has withstood pressure, he has taken down Djokovic on multiple occasions and he has become the sport’s brightest light moving forward. The journey may only be beginning, but it’s looking like it will be an awfully fun one to follow.