Change has finally come to tennis, though its new phase feels pretty familiar. The sport’s 21st century, up until recently, was the dominion of three individual dynasties. And now? Two new dynasties have taken root.
The ATP’s last “Big Two” era began in 2003. That’s when Roger Federer (The Artist) won Wimbledon, his first major victory. From then until 2008, he and Rafael Nadal (The Grinder) won all but three of the next 18 majors. Then Novak Djokovic (The Psycho) entered the fray, and the Big Two became the Big Three. From 2008 up until January 2024, that trio won 50 of 62 majors. Over a 20-year period, from Federer’s first title to Djokovic’s last, there were 80 trophies to be had, and 65 were grabbed by just three men.
Two of the 15 they didn’t collect were scooped up by Carlos Alcaraz, the 22-year-old Spaniard who now—alongside the 23-year-old Italian, Jannik Sinner—makes up the New Big Two. The Artist, Grinder, and Psycho had their era. Now we’ve got The Dramatist and The Scientist.
Either Alcaraz or Sinner has won all of the past six major tournaments, culminating in their bewildering marathon final at June’s French Open; pure tennis entropy, it was a nearly six-hour masterpiece that showcased the sport at its absolute highest level (Alcaraz won by a hair). As both of them move through this Wimbledon field, seemingly destined for a rematch, they leave in their dust the ghosts of a failed transition from the Big Three into something else. Alexander Zverev, Stefano Tsitsipas, Frances Tiafoe, Matteo Berrettini, and Daniil Medvedev were all out in the first two rounds; fleeting apparitions of what they were once hyped to be, when Djokovic just kept winning more instead, mounting eight additional major victories in the 2020’s as his epic counterparts faded away.
By keeping those young strivers down, Djokovic closed the window that was so briefly open to parity. And as he lingered on the main stage for longer than expected, his dynasty gave way to those of Alcaraz and Sinner. Djokovic hasn’t totally gone away, just yet. A semi-finalist at Roland-Garros, stopped only by Sinner, Djokovic coasts past everyone except these two guys. Rung No. 2 of the championship ladder isn’t satisfying for the notoriously churlish competitor, though, so he’s been peppering in clues of retirement all year—he recently painted the image of “sip[ping] a margarita on a beach with Federer and Nadal”—so this Wimbledon and August’s U.S. Open look like his final chances at puncturing the Alcaraz/Sinner era with one more trophy.
There are plenty of other players with some chance at disrupting the New Big Two. Any of the men who failed to take advantage of the post-Federer, post-Nadal times can still reinvent themselves and join the party—Cameron Norrie and Taylor Fritz are still alive at Wimbledon, and Grigor Dimitrov, the 34-year-old once dubbed “Baby Federer,” was ahead of Sinner in the round of 16 before retiring with an upper-body injury. There’s also a younger crop that figure as ensuing problems for Alcaraz and Sinner. One of them is the American Ben Shelton, who’s facing off against Sinner in the quarter-finals. He’s a Sampras-style serve-and-volley monster who overwhelms opponents with power, and he’s still evolving as a baseline strategist (He’s also dating Trinity Rodman, FYI).
The Great British Hope, Jack Draper, lost in round 2 of this Wimbledon, but he’s been near the top of the sport since he was a semi-finalist in last year’s U.S. Open. Joao Fonseca is a Brazilian teenager who clobbers the ball as thunderously as anyone, despite his raw form. Arthur Fils is a young Frenchman who sat out this tourney with a back injury, but he could be big trouble soon. Flavio Cobolli is in a better position than any of them, right now—the young Italian has stormed his way into the final eight players of Wimbledon, much further than he’s ever made it in a major before.
For the moment, though—and probably for a while—they’re all background characters in the Sinner and Alcaraz show. Both superstars have gotten through this tournament in characteristic style: Sinner is an honor-roll clinician, coldly pulverizing opponents, winning almost every set he’s been in; Alcaraz is the procrastinating, chaos-loving wunderkind, often only coming alive in matches after he’s dropped an unnecessary set or two, setting the scene for something more romantic. Where you land along the line struck by the Sinner/Alcaraz contrast in styles depends on whether you prefer watching metal put together with pleasing proficiency on TLC procedurals like How It’s Made, or if you’ve instead got the heart for a player who’s endlessly rewriting a creation myth, collecting more and more titles while never really coming of tennis age.
Pick a side, or don’t. Seeing these two crash into each other is pure sport cinema either way. Sinner is a rocket engineer who hits the ball way outside anyone’s margins of movement, but Alcaraz just happens to be the post-physics superhero who can run to all those far-off places and return the ball on the run, with uncommon zeal. At Roland-Garros, his unforgettable comeback took Sinner the groundstroke genius out of his comfort zone. But in that ramshackle, improvisatory version of tennis, Jannik proved to be up to the challenge even after his game-plan was all burned up, and he found new emotional depth as he pushed Carlos up to the very end. Should they meet for another high-stakes tournament final on grass this weekend, they will again show us this 150-year-old sport in a brand new shape.
