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      Carlos Alcaraz Is Bending Tennis to His Will and Taking Over the Game

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      Alcaraz, the defending U.S. Open men’s singles champion, has forced the best players in the world to adapt to his playing style, or risk losing for a long time.A little after 5 p.m. last Wednesday, Carlos Alcaraz, racket bag over his shoulders, bounded into the U.S. Open player garden outside Arthur Ashe Stadium like a high school quarterback striding into the cafeteria on the first day of school.He slapped hands and bro-hugged with new friends and old ones. He posed for selfies with other players and their hangers-on. He double-kissed and hugged a few kids his agent had brought along. A few minutes later, as he began a slow, autograph-filled walk to a practice court, a roar rose from beyond the high hedges.Less than a year after his breakout win at the U.S. Open, and a little more than a month after his thrilling five-set win in the Wimbledon singles final over Novak Djokovic, there is no longer any question: Alcaraz has pushed tennis permanently into its future.Djokovic, 36 years old and with 23 Grand Slam tournament singles titles, knows that his career is sunsetting, and that Alcaraz, the 20-year-old Spanish star who has established himself as the game’s new standard, is at daybreak.“The talk of our sport for the last two years, and, of course, deservedly because he has done things that probably no other, you know, teenager has ever done,” Djokovic said of Alcaraz during an interview last week.Beyond all the accolades and the attention, Alcaraz is forcing the best players in the world into a devil’s choice — to change how they have trained to play for years and adapt to him, or to likely spend most of the next decade or more smothered by an athlete who plays on every inch of his side of the net and tries to hit balls to every inch of his opponent’s.“There’s lots of power, not a lot of weaknesses, but also the all-court game, and the transition from neutral or defensive to offense is so quick,” said David Nainkin, who leads player development for the United States Tennis Association. “And now every player knows if he is going to compete with him, he’s going to have to do that as well.”Alcaraz knows that better than anyone. He has said his goal, along with winning as often as possible, is to entertain and thrill the spectators who pack stadiums for his matches, which have also sent television ratings soaring. Winning efficiently is not enough. He wants to win spectacularly, showcasing his power and speed and touch from everywhere on the court.“It’s dynamic,” Alcaraz has said time and again of his style.For years, this was the sort of shift that might happen every half-decade or so, though for roughly the last 15 years, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Djokovic and, for a while, Andy Murray turned the sport into an exclusive scrum of skill and wit. Each took a turn or two redrawing the tennis court to suit his style. First came Federer’s supreme and unmatched shotmaking, which ran into Nadal’s power and competitive fire, which ran into Djokovic’s relentless defense and angular creativity, which ran into Murray’s magical touch and movement.Now Alcaraz has begun collecting the sport’s most important championships and also accomplishing the far larger feat of forcing nearly everyone to think and compete differently. He is inside their head every time they step on the practice court.The days of winning by hitting a big serve and whaling forehands from a foot behind the baseline, a style that has mostly dominated play in this era, appear to be numbered, as everyone goes to school on the talent that, barring injury, they know will be at the top for the foreseeable future.Tommy Paul, an American ranked No. 14 in men’s singles, summed up Alcaraz’s game: “Once he is on offense, you’re probably toast.”Kareem Elgazzar/USA Today Sports, via Reuters“There’s pretty much never going to be a chance to go from defense to offense in the middle of a point against him unless you are a ridiculous athlete like Novak,” Tommy Paul, the rising American who is ranked 14th in the world, said last week as he prepared in the Hamptons for the year’s final Grand Slam event. “Everyone now only has one choice. You got to get forward and go on offense before he does, because once he is on offense, you’re probably toast.”Paul, 26, is worth listening to, since he is the rare player other than Djokovic who has consistently tested Alcaraz, winning two of their four meetings, including this summer in Toronto. A week later, near Cincinnati, Alcaraz needed all three sets to beat Paul, with two of those sets decided by tiebreakers.Jannik Sinner, 22, is also in that category, winning three of their six meetings. At the moment, he has positioned himself as Alcaraz’s most likely rival during the next decade. Their five-and-a-half-hour, five-set battle in the quarterfinals at last year’s U.S. Open ended just before 3 a.m. and was arguably the match of the year.In a sport that is all about matchups, Paul and Sinner are pretty sure they know why they can go toe-to-toe with Alcaraz while other players who have won far more prestigious titles often struggle. Both are plenty comfortable hitting the ball hard. They are able to cover the whole court. They aren’t afraid to move forward and use as much of the playing surface as possible to make Alcaraz move. They stay cool in tight moments because they are confident they won’t be forced outside their natural skill set.“He causes me problems, but also I cause him problems,” Sinner, who was also preparing — and relaxing — last week in the Hamptons, said recently. “Sometimes I try to overpower him, which is sometimes also the only solution.”It’s hard to overestimate the level of fascination with Alcaraz at every level of the sport.Coco Gauff has been studying his matches to learn how to become better at staying calm and composed, noting that sometimes Alcaraz even smiles after making a mistake or losing an important point.At the moment, Jannik Sinner has best positioned himself to be Alcaraz’s chief rival for the next decade.John E. Sokolowski/USA Today Sports, via ReutersMurray went to the All England Club on the Sunday morning of the finals to take care of some business, with no intention of staying for the afternoon. But once there, he realized he should stick around, got his hands on a ticket for a Centre Court seat and sat mesmerized for nearly five hours, shooting videos on his phone and trying to figure out how Alcaraz was hanging with Djokovic, who had won the last four Wimbledon singles championships and seven overall. Murray paid special attention to Alcaraz’s movement, his return positions — and Djokovic’s as well — and when and how he decided to play aggressive and offensive tennis.“You could sort of see Alcaraz learning as the match went on,” Murray said last month.J.J. Wolf, the 24-year-old American ranked 44th, watched on television and decided then and there that he needed to hit the weight room.“I’ve always been in decent shape, but he’s so physical,” Wolf said in early August at the Citi Open in Washington, D.C., where he was already making plans for an off-season training program that would begin in November. “If I’m going to be able to play like that, I’m going to have to get stronger.”Jimmy Arias, a star of the early 1980s who is now the director of tennis at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla., a leading talent incubator, has struggled in recent weeks to wrap his brain around how Alcaraz can hit a ball from 10 feet behind the baseline to a deep corner of the court and then get to the net, a play that forces opponents to be aggressive on that shot or else give Alcaraz an easy volley.He compared it to when Federer destroyed Lleyton Hewitt in the 2004 U.S. Open final, 6-0, 7-6(3), 6-0. Hewitt could hit the ball as hard as anyone, but Federer had such exquisite timing, and could step in and return Hewitt’s shots so quickly, that the rhythm of the game that Hewitt had played with for years disappeared.“The only thing you are going to be able to do is out-Alcaraz Alcaraz,” Arias said. “Good luck with that.”Patrick McEnroe, the former pro and ESPN commentator who runs a top tennis academy in New York City with his brother, John, the seven-time Grand Slam winner, said he is now planning to incorporate parts of Alcaraz’s game into his curriculum this fall. Players will have to learn how to follow a big serve with a drop shot the way Alcaraz does, and how he uses the drop shot as an offensive weapon, coming in after it for an easy finish.There was a time, not long ago, when a slice backhand was not all that important. Then Murray used one that rarely missed to become the world No. 1, and now no one serious about winning Wimbledon shows up without a slice. After Djokovic started hitting powerful second serves in pressure moments, hitting a 115-mile-per-hour second serve became almost normal.Now Alcaraz has come along, following his serve with a drop shot and a topspin lob, a risky combination, serving for the Wimbledon title against Djokovic.“He has taken the game to a different place,” McEnroe said. “He does things no one thought was possible.” More

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      A Fan Favorite Is Still Trying to Clear Her Major Hurdle

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      Ons Jabeur, the Tunisian player who is popular among spectators and fellow competitors, is the only woman to appear in three of the last five major singles finals. But she has lost them all.Seven weeks was not nearly enough time to soothe Ons Jabeur’s emotional wounds. After losing the Wimbledon women’s singles final in July, she returned home to Tunisia to put some space between her and another painful loss in a Grand Slam tournament final — the third in her career, all in the past 14 months.In the aftermath of that tearful defeat, Jabeur’s ubiquitous smile and easygoing humor are still there, and so is her refreshing honesty.“They say time heals,” she said on Friday. “I’m still waiting a bit. The Wimbledon loss still hurts.”Jabeur is the only woman to appear in three of the last five major singles finals. But with no titles to show for those runs, the pressure mounts for a player who is so popular with fans and competitors that many of them would be delighted to see her finally take home a winner’s trophy.“She’s got the world on her shoulders, unfortunately,” said Billie Jean King, who won 12 major singles titles in the late 1960s and early 1970s, including four U.S. Opens. “She is so nice. Everybody loves Ons. Everybody. So of course I’d like her to win and get that monkey off her back, because she is a real pioneer for her continent and her country.”Jabeur on her way to a 6-4, 6-4 loss to Marketa Vondrousova last month in the Wimbledon final. Adrian Dennis/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBorn and raised in Tunisia, Jabeur became the first Arab woman to win a WTA Tour title, at the 2021 Birmingham Classic in England, when she was 26. A year later, at Wimbledon, she became the first African woman to reach a Grand Slam tournament final, and later that summer, she was the first African and first Arab woman to get to a U.S. Open final.The world cheered her on, and continues to do so, both for her trailblazing accomplishments and her magnetic personality. In almost every match, she is favored by the majority of spectators, many of whom yearn to see her win the most coveted titles. Even outside her country, she is a sentimental favorite.“I do feel that,” she said last week, “especially when I step on a tennis court, most of the people cheering for me. That’s a privilege. It’s a positive thing. I don’t think anyone would hate that. But I do take it as a great energy.”Jabeur developed into an elite player relatively late in her career, and did not break into the top 20 of the singles rankings until Aug. 16, 2021. Her 29th birthday is Monday, the day before she faces Camila Osorio, a Colombian ranked 68th, in the first round of the U.S. Open. It is realization that helps her cope with the disappointment of going 0-3 in major finals. Sometimes, it just takes time.Always ready with a quick one-liner and often poking fun at herself and others in a playful way, Jabeur elicits smiles wherever she goes. At the recent tournament near Cincinnati, Iga Swiatek, the world’s top-ranked player, lamented the vicious messages she receives on social media after certain matches, often from disgruntled gamblers. They will sometimes lash out at players, even after the players win, because it was not by enough to win a bet. Swiatek said she had received abuse for winning a match in three sets instead of two.“I believe these people should not exist,” Jabeur said in support, then added, “But, yeah, next time, Iga, don’t lose a set.”She was joking, of course. And she is one of the few players who can make such a comment without incurring the wrath of fellow players. They know how she is and recognize her wit. Before she lost to Aryna Sabalenka in a quarterfinal on Aug. 18 in Ohio, Jabeur referenced her victory over Sabalenka at Wimbledon a month earlier.“I know she didn’t forgive me for Wimbledon semifinals,” Jabeur said with a smile.But when the match commenced, Jabeur injured her right foot. An athletic trainer taped it tightly and Jabeur finished the match, but she was not moving well, raising concerns for how she would fare at this U.S. Open, where she is seeded fifth. Sabalenka, despite their rivalry and despite Jabeur’s cheeky comment about not being forgiven for Wimbledon, was sympathetic toward her popular opponent.“I’m a little bit sad for Ons,” she said. “I really hope she’ll recover fast and she’ll be ready for the U.S. Open.”Jabeur was not specific when asked about her foot injury on Friday. She did, however, account for a slight bit of congestion heading into the tournament.“American A.C. kills me,” she said about the air-conditioning.Jabeur was also asked about practicing with Marketa Vondrousova, who played the villain by beating Jabeur, 6-4, 6-4, in the Wimbledon final in July. Was the practice session an attempt by Jabeur to exorcise some demons?“Tried,” she said. “It did not work.”Her humor accounts for much of her popularity. But so do her tears. Sometimes the entire tennis world aches for Jabeur.Jabeur broke down during her on-court interview at Wimbledon.Tolga Akmen/EPA, via ShutterstockAfter she lost to Vondrousova at Wimbledon, she broke down during her on-court interview, evoking heart-wrenching memories of Andy Murray and Jana Novotna, who each cried on the same court after losing finals. Jabeur called it the most painful loss of her life, and it was plain to see. Her vulnerability in the moment, allowing the world to grasp how much it all meant to her and how painful it was to leave so many supporters disappointed, made Jabeur an even more sympathetic figure.Andy Roddick, the 2003 U.S. Open men’s champion and one of Jabeur’s favorite players when she was a child, messaged her after Wimbledon and urged her to take time to recuperate — advice she followed. Roddick also told her he had more faith in her eventually winning Wimbledon than he had had in himself (that was probably because Roddick had to contend with Roger Federer, who beat Roddick in three Wimbledon finals and one U.S. Open final). Roddick discussed his admiration for Jabeur in his blog after the loss.“She’s someone I really hope wins a Grand Slam title at some point,” he wrote.But with each successive loss, the challenge grows more daunting and the pressure grows. Playing for so much and knowing that millions of people look to her to find inspiration is a weighty responsibility, indeed.“During a match she’s got to find a way not to be thinking about the world at all,” King said. “Just the ball and you. One ball at a time, in the now, play every point. She’s got to stay there for the whole match. It’s the only way she’s got a chance.” More

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      The Suddenly Hot ‘Coco and Jessie Show’ Is Ready to Open in New York

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      Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula enter the U.S. Open with both on a roll. Can they withstand the home-country pressure?A little more than a month ago, the idea that Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula might enter the U.S. Open as the two hottest players in tennis would have seemed preposterous.Gauff had endured a disappointing and disheartening spring and early summer. There was yet another one-sided loss to Iga Swiatek, the world No. 1, at the French Open, and then a first-round exit from Wimbledon.Pegula had run into her quarterfinal wall once more at Wimbledon, despite having a break point for a 5-1 lead in the third set against Marketa Vondrousova, the eventual champion. And as a doubles team, Gauff and Pegula had lost the French Open final and fell in the fourth round at Wimbledon.Then came August.There are essentially three women’s singles tournaments that matter during the North American hardcourt swing before it culminates in the U.S. Open. Gauff and Pegula swept them.On successive Sundays, Gauff won the Citi Open in Washington, D.C., Pegula won the National Bank Open in Montreal, and Gauff won the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati. In the course of a month, they positioned themselves as legitimate contenders to take their home-country Grand Slam.That can be a double-edged sword for Americans coming to New York, where the spotlight burns hottest, distractions abound, and there is so, so much noise, both literal and metaphorical. Subways and commuter trains rumbling by the stadiums, planes from LaGuardia roaring above and crowds screaming from the stands represent the Sturm und Drang that goes with carrying the hopes and expectations of the hometown fans.Before winning in Washington and Cincinnati, Gauff had been frustrated with the shakiness of her forehand.Michael Hickey/Getty ImagesGauff kissed her two most recent trophies from the Citi Open and the Western & Southern Open.Alex Brandon/Associated PressKatie Stratman/USA Today Sports, via Reuters Connect“Just embracing it,” Gauff, 19, said after the tournament in Cincinnati. It was the biggest win of her career, especially given that she beat Swiatek, in the semifinals, for the first time. Gauff had been 0-7 against Swiatek, losing all 14 of their sets, heading into that match.“Everybody’s path for you is not what’s true, it’s not what’s going to happen,” said Gauff, who has been playing with weighty expectations since she made the fourth round of Wimbledon when she was just 15. “Even the path that you want for yourself may not happen.”Pegula, 29, has come to this moment from the opposite end. A classic late-bloomer who doesn’t have the height or obvious athleticism of many of the best women, she did not crack the top 100 until she was 25 years old. Now she is ranked third in the world, yet she often goes unmentioned in discussions of the world’s best players.That is not necessarily a bad thing for Pegula, who last week was trying to keep things low-key, even as she headlined a junior tennis clinic in Harlem and bounced from one sponsor event or interview to another.“I didn’t think I would be here, but at the same time, I’m really happy that I am,” Pegula said before banging balls for more than an hour with some of Harlem’s better young players.As the U.S. Open gets underway, American tennis is riding high on optimism. A year after the retirement of Serena Williams, there is a “who’s next” vibe coursing through the sport. The U.S. is the only country with two women in the top six. The country also has two men in the top 10 for the first time in years, with plenty of eyes on last year’s breakout semifinalist, Frances Tiafoe.That is no small thing to manage.“It’s our home slam,” the American Danielle Collins, 29, said in an interview last week. “You so want to do well.”Collins arrived in New York for last year’s Open just seven months removed from coming within a set of winning the sport’s other hardcourt Grand Slam, the Australian Open, where she lost in the finals to the world No. 1 Ashleigh Barty.Last year Collins didn’t know how she was going to react to what awaited her at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. Organizers scheduled her in a series of featured night matches, and she found herself soaking in the energy and the surreal experience of living through something she had dreamed about when she was a child watching the tournament on television. In the moments when her heart raced, she focused on slowing her breath, sometimes alternating her inhales from one nostril to the other.“This is going to sound strange, but you have to play like you don’t care,” said Collins, who made the fourth round before falling in a three-set match to Aryna Sabalenka.That is easier said than done, especially for Gauff and Pegula, who know they are in one of those rare moments in their careers where their form and their fitness are peaking and they are brimming with confidence.In Montreal, Pegula easily overpowered Liudmila Samsonova, who had been forced to play her rain-delayed semifinal earlier that day.David Kirouac/USA Today Sports, via Reuters ConnectPegula hoisted the National Bank Open trophy after her straight-sets victory in Montreal.Minas Panagiotakis/Getty ImagesIn July, Gauff was frustrated with her recent results, the shakiness of her forehand and the dichotomy between the progress she felt she was making in training and her inability to get crucial wins. She added a new coach to her team who should be familiar to anyone who has paid attention to tennis, especially in America the past 40 years.Brad Gilbert, the former pro and ESPN commentator who coached Andre Agassi and Andy Roddick, had spent much of his coaching time during the previous year turning Zendaya, the actress and singer, into a serviceable tennis player for her part in the movie “Challengers” due out next spring, about a professional tennis love triangle.Gilbert, 62, was keen for another gig with a top player, and began interviewing with Gauff’s parents and agent after her loss at Wimbledon. Gauff was reluctant.To Gauff, Gilbert’s coaching success had mostly happened before she was born, she said with a giggle during the Citi Open. That said, Gilbert did start with both Agassi and Roddick shortly before they each won the U.S. Open. And his tweaks to her strokes, making them slightly shorter and more controlled and reminding her at every turn of her supreme athleticism — no one covers a court like Gauff these days — began to show immediate results.“Let’s be real, anybody who is watching me play knows what I need to work on,” Gauff said in Washington when asked whether there might be conflicts between Gilbert and Pere Riba, the coach she hired in June. “You know, they know, the fans know.”For Pegula, she said she let the sadness of her Wimbledon loss marinate for a couple of days. But once she arrived home in Florida, the relentlessness of the tennis schedule forced her to start mapping out her U.S. Open training plan — gym sessions, court time, treatments with her physiotherapist.Then she headed to Montana for a few days. She rode a horse and went fly fishing. She immersed herself in the natural beauty and felt rejuvenated.Still, she arrived in Montreal feeling slightly under the weather and unfocused. Her initial goal was just to survive the first match, and she did. Three days later, she beat Swiatek in the semifinals, then won the final, 6-1, 6-0, beating an exhausted Liudmila Samsonova, who was forced to play her rain-delayed semifinal match earlier that day.Pegula brushed off her round-of-16 loss in Cincinnati to Marie Bouzkova and headed to New York, where she tries to let the energy of the city and the fans flow into her tennis, especially when she takes the court with Gauff for doubles.“I remember even last year,” she said. “We lost the first round, but we had an amazing crowd.”More of that is on the way. More

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      Novak Djokovic, Back in New York and Loving It as Never Before

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      For two years, Novak Djokovic has been dreaming about New York.He has had plenty of success here, winning the U.S. Open three times. It’s where he made one of his most famous shots, returning Roger Federer’s serve with a walloping forehand when he was down double match point in their semifinal in 2011.His mind, though, has been stuck on one of his lowest moments, just before the end of his disappointing loss in the 2021 U.S. Open singles final against Daniil Medvedev.Djokovic was one win away from just about the only thing he has not accomplished in his career — becoming the first man since Rod Laver in 1969 to win all four Grand Slams in a single year. He sat in his chair on the sideline before the final game listening to the crowd of 23,000 in Arthur Ashe Stadium, who had long mostly cheered for his beloved opponents, roaring for him instead. He sobbed into a towel.He knew that New York crowds appreciated seeing greatness and history. He had felt and heard them pulling for him as soon as he walked onto the court, and they were still there for him as he sat on the edge of defeat.“Kind of a signal that I’m feeling very comfortable on the court,” Novak Djokovic said after practicing at Arthur Ashe on Wednesday. “Good fun. Positive energy.”Amir Hamja/The New York Times“I fell in love with the New Yorkers and New York in a completely different way that day,” Djokovic said during an interview on a quiet Wednesday evening in the player garden outside the stadium.After missing the tournament last year because of his refusal to be vaccinated against Covid-19, Djokovic is finally back at the U.S. Open. Like his collection of Grand Slam singles titles, now numbering 23 and the most of any man, the love he felt that Sunday two years ago seems only to have grown, on both sides.“I cannot wait to have Novak back in New York,” Stacey Allaster, the tournament director, said during a recent news conference.Djokovic has always been a gladiator on the court. He roars, pounds his chest, returns taunts from fans and smashes the occasional racket. He got himself defaulted from the 2020 U.S. Open when he swatted a ball in anger and inadvertently hit a line judge.But now, at 36, he has grown into being relaxed and introspective off it. While he has no shortage of pointed political stances, which he does not hide, he also apologizes for being late, makes fun of himself, and is easy with a smile. He wants people to like him, and he isn’t afraid to admit it.Djokovic after losing the U.S. Open singles final in 2021 that robbed him of achieving the Grand Slam.Ben Solomon for The New York TimesThe public has seen more of the latter since the French Open in June, when Djokovic overtook Federer and Rafael Nadal, his longtime rivals, in the race for the most Grand Slam singles titles.Fans packed the lower bowl of Ashe for his first practice at the stadium last week. Amid cranking serves and banging backhand returns, Djokovic acceded to the shouted requests for his famous tennis impersonations, mimicking the motions of Maria Sharapova, Andy Roddick, Pete Sampras and others that are part of a routine that began in the U.S. Open locker room in 2007, many championships ago.“Kind of a signal that I’m feeling very comfortable on the court,” he said afterward. “Good fun. Positive energy.”Afterward, he told Allaster that it was one of the best practice sessions he had ever had.When security guards gave the signal that the hitting session was nearing its end, children — and plenty of adults, too — pushed toward the edge of the court, waving phones and oversized tennis balls as they clamored for pictures and autographs. Djokovic spent more than 20 minutes working the edge of the court like a presidential candidate on a rope line as fans from the other side of it chanted his name, hoping to get him to come over there next.He couldn’t. A gym workout awaited. He has not come for another round of sympathy cheers. He is studying videos of the top competition, keeping to his strict regimen, getting his sleep, eating before it gets too late, and watching every morsel of food he puts in his mouth.Djokovic indulged fans seeking autographs after his practice session.Amir Hamja/The New York TimesWednesday night’s protein- and carbohydrate-packed dinner, eaten shortly after his gym session, was two salmon steaks, two large baked sweet potatoes, healthy servings of small yellow potatoes and chickpeas, and a bowl of pasta with olive oil and fresh vegetables.“The matches are going to get tougher, more demanding as the tournament progresses,” he said between bites. “So I’m always thinking in advance. I’m focusing on the next challenge, of course, but I also have in the back of my mind the long-term goal and the long-term plan, which is to win this tournament.”Much has changed since Djokovic last came close to winning here. He has become the elder legend of the sport and solidified his status as the greatest player of the modern era. Federer is retired. Nadal is recovering from surgery and on the edge of retirement. Carlos Alcaraz, the 20-year-old Spanish upstart long touted as the sport’s next big thing, has emerged ahead of schedule to fulfill every lofty expectation. He is the U.S. Open’s reigning champion and the world No 1.Fending him off, and all the other comers of the so-called next next generation (an ungentle swipe at the mid- and late-20-somethings like Medvedev and Stefanos Tsitsipas, whom Alcaraz has leapfrogged) is likely the final chapter of Djokovic’s career. His Grand Slam rivalry this year with Alcaraz, a rare and tantalizing intergenerational duel that pits raw talent and athleticism against inimitable experience, is the story of the sport.Djokovic prevailed in their first match at the French Open, where Alcaraz succumbed to stress-induced cramping, but lost in five thrilling sets in the Wimbledon final. Maybe it was a torch-passing moment. Maybe not. Either way, Djokovic is enjoying himself. Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner of Italy and Holger Rune of Denmark, he said, are members of a generation that unapologetically believes it is capable of beating him to win big tournaments. They are bold, and he loves that.“My role nowadays is to prevent them from that,” he said with the sly grin that has become a late-career trademark.Carlos Alcaraz greeted Djokovic at the net after his victory at Wimbledon.Patrick Smith/Getty ImagesHe can remember when he was one of them, in his late teens and early 20s, showing up in New York and, like many players before him, being blown away by the size and energy of the city. For a kid from a mountain town in the Balkans, even one who had traveled throughout Europe for tennis, it was a lot.On his first visit, he stayed with family friends in New Jersey, commuting every day to the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. Every time he sees a sign for the Midtown Tunnel, his thoughts drift back to the innocence of that first trip in 2003.Now he spends the week before the U.S. Open at a hotel in Manhattan, soaking in the energy of the city, before moving with his wife and young children to a friend’s estate in Alpine, N.J. There, he switches into “lockdown mode” and finds peace and serenity among the trees and nature, especially on the days between matches, when he will often practice with hitting partners there rather than trekking to Queens.There is another advantage to that locale. Djokovic has heard plenty of stories in the locker room of players who have fallen victim to the pull of the New York night. Some of them involve his peers, and he may have even accompanied them to a club or two in an earlier life.Djokovic on a pop-up tennis court during a U.S. Open event at Times Square.Leonardo Munoz/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“I was lucky early on to have people around me that kept me at bay,” he said. “But I did have freedom to explore and go around. Let’s say that I did get to know New York at night as well.”That will not happen this year, not with the memory of the loss to Alcaraz so fresh in his mind and the young Spaniard presenting a challenge equal to Djokovic’s greatest duels with Federer, Nadal and Andy Murray in his prime. After that Wimbledon loss, Djokovic put his rackets away for two weeks and headed for Croatia and Montenegro to vacation with his family in the mountains and the waters he knows so well. He pulled out of the National Bank Open in Toronto, citing fatigue.The tennis schedule does not indulge regret and hindsight, though, and quickly it was time to begin preparing for the next quest, the tournaments that often unfold in the sweltering, late-summer humidity of Cincinnati and New York. He trained in the hottest times of European summer days. Then he did two more “big heat” workouts when he arrived in Cincinnati for the Western & Southern Open.Good thing. Last Sunday’s final against Alcaraz was an enthralling, three-set slugfest that Djokovic won in a deciding-set tiebreaker that lasted nearly four hours and pushed him to the edge of heat stroke. Alcaraz cramped in the climactic moments. Djokovic called it one of the toughest mental and physical challenges of his career.Djokovic after defeating Alcaraz in the Western & Southern Open.Kareem Elgazzar/The Enquirer, via USA Today Sports, via ReutersA grueling test like that wasn’t really a part of his U.S. Open prep plan, but the intent was to win the tournament. It always is.“How you win and how long does it take, that’s something that’s unpredictable,” he said. “Better this way than losing a match like that, that’s for sure.”Or, love and dreamy moment aside, the one that happened in New York the last time around. This year, he hopes, another kind of dream awaits. More

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      Jessica Pegula Is Still in the Hunt for her First Major Title

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      She is the top female American tennis player and knows that she has to be more aggressive to win more.Jessica Pegula strode into Wimbledon’s cavernous interview room, bucket hat perched on her head, and stared at the empty room. When she realized that there were no media members there to ask her about her second-round win over Cristina Bucsa, Pegula chuckled, got up and walked out.Pegula is never entirely shocked when attention is diverted away from her. Though ranked No. 3 in the world, the highest among American women, and the champion at the Canadian Open two weeks ago, Pegula, 29, has never advanced to the semifinals in singles at a Grand Slam tournament. She is 0-6 in quarterfinal appearances at the majors, including at this year’s Australian Open and Wimbledon. The United States Open, where she lost to Iga Swiatek in a tight two-setter last year, is her final chance this season.At 5-foot-7, Pegula doesn’t have a thunderous serve, like Aryna Sabalenka. And she doesn’t possess flashy movements like the No. 1 Swiatek. Pegula can also flutter emotionally, as when she let a 4-1 lead slip in the third set against the eventual Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova. Instead, it is her consistency that sets her apart.“Her ball-striking is really, really good,” said David Witt, her coach since 2019. “If I were to think of a player who hits this clean it would be [former No. 1] Lindsay Davenport.”Pegula’s game is durable and reliable. She has a wide wingspan and hits with tremendous power off the forehand and backhand. Because of her doubles success with Coco Gauff, she has become a more-than-competent volleyer.She also studiously avoids the histrionics that many of her compatriots get entangled in.“I’m pretty chill, pretty laid-back,” said Pegula in an interview during Wimbledon in July. “It takes a lot to get me going emotionally, excited or upset. Maybe that’s good for the U.S. Open, because I’m able to stay well-balanced.”For Pegula, the Open is a mixed bag. A Buffalo native (her parents own the Buffalo Bills of the N.F.L. and the Buffalo Sabres of the National Hockey League), she likes the fan support in New York but struggles with the mayhem.“I feel like the Open is really hot and crowded,” said Pegula, who failed to qualify four times at the Open before reaching the third round in 2020. “Everything is kind of against you. There’s so much going on. You’re usually really hyped up, and it’s kind of like you’re running on fumes. There’s just so much energy, and it can be really fun, but it can also zap a lot out of you. It’s something you have to learn how to balance.”Jessica Pegula serving during a singles semifinal at the Mubadala Citi DC Open on Aug. 5. “Her ball-striking is really, really good,” said her coach, David Witt.Geoff Burke/Usa Today Sports, via ReutersBalance is particularly important for Pegula, who weathered career-threatening knee and hip injuries that kept her out of the U.S. Open a decade ago, and then she faced the emotional turmoil of her mother’s heart attack last June.Jimmy Arias, a former top five player who has worked with Pegula, once tried to impress upon her that there were two types of competitors: a lion and a rat. Pegula, with her fearsome ground strokes, has long been a lion. What she needed to adopt was the rat part.“In a nuclear explosion, a rat is the only animal to survive,” Arias said. “J.P. had the weapons of a lion, but she needed the mentality of the rat. She had to learn how to dig, claw and scratch her way out. Now, when she’s in trouble, she can find her way out of a point.”Pegula understands that; it’s just the execution that can be tricky.“I’m doing everything to put myself in a good position,” she said. “It’s just a little more belief in myself in the later stages of tournaments and being more aggressive in the bigger moments.”And if she doesn’t break through and win a major, will she feel unfulfilled?“If I had to stop tomorrow, I think I’d be pretty satisfied,” she said. “I got to have this amazing career, proved a lot to myself and to a lot of other people. Obviously, there’s more that I want to do, but I’ve gotten through the really tough parts and a lot of really big lows. To come out of that has been a win in itself.” More

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      Giannis Antetokounmpo’s Future in Milwaukee Is Uncertain

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      Giannis Antetokounmpo carried around a small, black portable fan, which looked minuscule as it whirred in his 12-inch-wide hands. He was trying to counteract the hot sun at a hillside mansion as he watched his youngest brother, Alex Antetokounmpo, pose for photos near a basketball hoop overlooking Los Angeles for an ad campaign.“Alex, the eyes,” Giannis said. “Eyes of the tiger right there, and then you mix it in with a smile.”Giannis turned and grinned at a group of about a dozen people watching. He has been coaching Alex for most of his life. When Giannis began his N.B.A. career with the Milwaukee Bucks at 18, he soon brought his family out of poverty in Greece to live with him. Alex was 12 years old.“Sometimes I think I get annoying to him,” Giannis, 28, said later, though Alex, 21, shows no signs that that might be true. Giannis added: “He could be doing idiotic stuff, stupid stuff, but he’s going through a path that I’m really proud of him.”As Giannis ascended to N.B.A. superstardom — he’s won the Most Valuable Player Award twice and is the best player on a championship team — he strove to bring his family along for his journey. Three of his four brothers have played professionally in the United States.But over the past three years, he has brought them along for what he hopes can be a more lasting endeavor: taking ownership of their money and his future. A few months ago, Antetokounmpo launched Ante, Inc. to house the brothers’ projects and investments. It’s about Giannis’s life beyond basketball, though basketball still matters to him — a lot. In a few weeks, he will be eligible for a three-year extension worth about $173 million, but he doesn’t plan to sign one just yet.“The real question’s not going to be this year — numbers-wise it doesn’t make sense,” Antetokounmpo said. “But next year, next summer it would make more sense for both parties. Even then, I don’t know.”He added: “I would not be the best version of myself if I don’t know that everybody’s on the same page, everybody’s going for a championship, everybody’s going to sacrifice time away from their family like I do. And if I don’t feel that, I’m not signing.”Giannis Antetokounmpo has begun focusing more on business endeavors over the past three years as he’s become a bigger basketball star.Mark Abramson for The New York TimesThis approach and an increased focus on business investments with his brothers are part of Antetokounmpo’s evolution as he has begun to understand his own ambitions and goals more deeply.“From 2020 to 2023, people think I’ve taken a large jump on the basketball court, but I think I’ve taken 10X jump off the court,” he said.‘I gave everything.’It started in the spring of 2020 when the world shut down because of the coronavirus pandemic. It wasn’t clear what would happen to players’ salaries or endorsement deals with the season in flux. He began to think of ways to diversify his sources of income.“We were sitting in the house. OK, now what?” Antetokounmpo said. “Basketball is taken away, what do I have?” He downloaded a stock trading app and started investing on his own for the first time. He began to reach out to successful people from other industries for advice and mentorship.It was an eventful year for him, which may have contributed to his interest in growing his income. His oldest child, Liam, had been born that February, and he had won his second M.V.P. Award, for the 2019-20 season, which the Bucks finished by losing in the Eastern Conference semifinals at the N.B.A.’s quarantined campus at Disney World.A few months later, Antetokounmpo signed a five-year, $228 million extension with the Bucks. But something was not right. He felt numb, and did not know why. He told the Bucks that he did not want to play basketball anymore.He had felt that way before. During his rookie year, he missed his family so much that he had insisted that the Bucks figure out a way to get them to Milwaukee, even threatening to go back to Greece if the team would not do it. He and his brothers had shared beds growing up. When Antetokounmpo left Greece for the N.B.A. draft in 2013, he said his father, Charles, told him: “No matter where you go in this world, doesn’t matter, don’t worry about that, I’ll find you. I love you, my son. Go have a great season.”“And I remember my mom was crying,” Giannis said. “I left. And then when I came here it wasn’t the same. I was in the hotel. It was the first time I felt lonely in my life.”Alex said the siblings are “pretty much each other’s best friends.”When Giannis thought about quitting basketball in the 2020-21 season, his brother Thanasis, right, reassured him.Elsa/Getty ImagesWhen Giannis felt down during the 2020-21 season, he was reassured when he told his older brother Thanasis about his doubts. By then, Thanasis was playing for the Bucks, too, and said that if Giannis was not happy he would leave with him.“I would have walked away in 2020,” Giannis said. “I care about joy and happiness. I care about my kids.”The Bucks recommended he speak to a sports psychologist, so Antetokounmpo tried it. Doing so helped him find ways to cope with the stress and pressure he felt. He rediscovered joy in playing basketball, and the Bucks won a championship that season.“I think it’s the best feeling that I’ve felt so far in basketball,” he said.He wants it again.The Bucks lost in the first round of last season’s playoffs, winning only one game against the Miami Heat as Giannis worked through injuries.Milwaukee fired its coach, Mike Budenholzer, and hired Adrian Griffin, who had been an assistant coach for the Toronto Raptors. That change, Antetokounmpo said, is part of why he is unsure if he’ll sign an extension.“You’ve got to see the dynamics,” he said. “How the coach is going to be, how we’re going to be together. At the end of the day, I feel like all my teammates know and the organization knows that I want to win a championship. As long as we’re on the same page with that and you show me and we go together to win a championship, I’m all for it. The moment I feel like, oh, yeah, we’re trying to rebuild —”He paused briefly before continuing.“There will never be hard feelings with the Milwaukee Bucks,” he said. “I believe that we’ve had 10 unbelievable years, and there’s no doubt I gave everything for the city of Milwaukee. Everything. Every single night, even when I’m hurt. I am a Milwaukee Buck. I bleed green. I know this.“This is my team, and it’s going to forever be my team. I don’t forget people that were there for me and allowed me to be great and to showcase who I am to the world and gave me the platform. But we have to win another one.”He is halfway to his goal of playing 20 N.B.A. seasons, and he said he would like to spend them with one team, the way Dirk Nowitzki, Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan did.“But at the end of the day, being a winner, it’s over that goal,” he said. “Winning a championship comes first. I don’t want to be 20 years on the same team and don’t win another championship.”He didn’t mention any motivation for winning another championship outside of his competitive fire. But the cultural relevance that comes with winning can also elevate his growing off-court profile.‘We came from nothing.’Giannis couldn’t help but launch into a sales pitch as he sat in the living room of the home where he and Alex were doing the photo shoot. He was hyping a pain-relieving balm made by a company called Flexpower, which the Antetokounmpo brothers partially own. He has always considered himself to be a great salesman, back to when he was a child trying to help his parents sell sunglasses on the street in Athens.During the photo shoot, Giannis flitted around like a proud mother hen, beaming at Alex. Working with the company was Alex’s idea.“I knew you when you were a baby!” Giannis said, holding his hands out as if rocking a baby.Later, Giannis pondered when it was that he started thinking of Alex as an adult.“Might be today,” he said.Giannis and Alex shot photos for an ad campaign at the home of Jimmy Goldstein, an N.B.A. superfan, in the Beverly Crest neighborhood of Los Angeles.Mark Abramson for The New York TimesFour of the brothers are listed as co-founders on the Ante, Inc. website, but Giannis is the chairman. They have different roles, by virtue of their personalities. Alex describes Thanasis, 31, as very driven and bold in his style. Kostas, 25, has a quieter personality, but Alex said he excels at brainstorming.Giannis involved his brothers in discussions about his new Nike contract, which he said he negotiated himself this summer. One of his earliest investments was in the Milwaukee Brewers, in 2021. The brothers have invested in a candy company, a nutritional company and a golf team co-owned by Venus and Serena Williams and Serena’s husband, Alexis Ohanian. They have a production company in the works, like so many other N.B.A. players do.This year, Giannis became a co-owner of some funds with Calamos Investments, whose chief executive, John Koudounis, is of Greek descent. The joint venture donates 10 percent of its profits to financial literacy organizations.“He spent a lot of time talking about how he wishes that he had known about investing earlier,” said Jessica Fernandez, Calamos’s chief marketing officer. Antetokounmpo doesn’t manage the portfolios, but he does pepper those who do with questions about why and how they choose certain stocks.Earlier this year, the Antetokounmpo brothers joined the ownership group of Major League Soccer’s Nashville SC.“We came from nothing,” Antetokounmpo said. “And sitting in the owners’ suite with the other owners and enjoy the game, cheering for our team. Our team. Not just a team — our team. It’s insane.”Soccer was their first love; their father, who died in 2017, briefly played professionally. Their foundation, the Charles Antetokounmpo Family Foundation, seeks to help disadvantaged people in Greece, the United States and Nigeria, where their parents grew up.‘Protect the family.’The idea that someone with Giannis’s salary would worry about money might strain credulity, but he is thrifty — cheap, he’ll admit.“I need my kids to spend my money,” he said, smiling.He said he wants six children, and is almost halfway there. He and his fiancée, Mariah Riddlesprigger, have two sons, Liam and Maverick, and Riddlesprigger is pregnant with their third child, a girl.Antetokounmpo gets concerned when his children are pulled into the spotlight with him. In the United States, his fame is perhaps not as overwhelming as it would be were he playing in a bigger city. But in Greece things are different.“The way LeBron James is or Michael Jordan is for the States, the same way I am for Greece,” he said. “Maybe larger.”He has noticed people filming his children in their stroller and at a birthday party. He wants his children to be able to decide whether they want to live lives in the public. On social media, he typically covers their faces.When he thinks about growing his wealth, he is thinking about his children’s futures, too.The brothers try to make business decisions as a group, often on a messaging thread titled “Antetokounbros” (which is also the name of a store they have in Athens; they’re opening one in Milwaukee soon). They save personal texts for a different thread titled “F.O.E.,” which stands for family over everything.Giannis, left, with his brothers, left to right, Kostas, Thanasis and Alex in 2019 when Giannis won the Most Valuable Player Award.Jennifer Pottheiser/NBAE, via Getty ImagesHe said he has felt taken advantage of in the past by some of the people hired to handle his life, money or off-court interests, and was confident that will never happen with his family.“I see it with my teammates, some of my teammates,” Antetokounmpo said. “‘Oh, my cousin did this. My mom did this.’ You see it. It’s public. Moms arguing with their sons, suing one another for property that doesn’t belong to them. You see it every day.”He added: “The way we were raised in Greece and the things that we went through every single day to provide for our family, all those moments brought us close. They knew that at all costs I would protect the family, take care of my brothers. And I did.”Mark Abramson for The New York Times More

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      Dwyane Wade Talks Hall of Fame Induction and a Political Hopes

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      When the Miami Heat selected Dwyane Wade with the fifth pick of the 2003 N.B.A. draft, the league was in dire need of star players to carry it out of the Michael Jordan era.Wade’s draft class — which also featured LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Carmelo Anthony — ended up fitting the bill and then some. Wade immediately became one of the league’s most popular players, and his Miami teammate Shaquille O’Neal gave him the catchy nickname Flash. It was apt — Wade routinely attacked the rim with snazzy spin moves and finished with highlight-reel dunks and layups on his way to winning three championships.This weekend, Wade will be inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, a feat that seemed inevitable as he piled up accolades over a 16-year career. He made 13 All-Star teams, led the league in scoring once and was named the most valuable player of the 2006 N.B.A. finals, which Miami won over Dallas.“To be able to be one of those select few out of an entire generation of people who have tried to play the game of basketball and to be able to walk into the Hall of Fame, it doesn’t matter if I knew 10 years ago or I just got the call yesterday — it all feels surreal,” Wade said in a recent interview.Since retiring in 2019, Wade has acquired an ownership stake in the Utah Jazz and the W.N.B.A. team in his hometown Chicago, the Sky. In the spring, Wade revealed that he had moved his family out of Florida to California because of state laws that negatively affect the L.G.B.T.Q. community. Wade’s teenage daughter, Zaya, is transgender, and Wade has been outspoken on her behalf.Wade recently spoke to The New York Times about his basketball career and potentially running for political office.This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.Dwyane Wade’s jersey is lifted into the rafters during his jersey retirement ceremony at American Airlines Arena in 2020.Michael Reaves/Getty ImagesYou grew up in the South Side of Chicago without very much. When you retired, the former President Barack Obama taped a tribute video to you. How do you reflect on that journey?My dad and I talk about it. We still can’t believe it. We still can’t believe the N.B.A. career happened and it’s gone by. I got a call from President Obama on my birthday when I turned 40, and it was like: “Hey, pick up the phone at this time. There’s going to be a call coming.” I’m like, “OK.” Once I got on, I heard, “You’re waiting for the president of the United States.” I was like: “What? This is my life, right?”Your first N.B.A. game was against Allen Iverson. You’re having a bit of a full-circle moment this weekend by having him induct you. Why did you pick him?Michael Jordan was my favorite player. But as I was growing up as a kid, as Michael Jordan decided to retire from the game, Allen Iverson became the hero of our culture. I think a lot of people know I wear No. 3, but a lot of people don’t know why I wear No. 3. And so I just wanted to take this moment as an opportunity that is supposed to be about me, and I wanted to be able to shine light and give flowers to individuals that allow me and help me get here. My family, of course. My coaches, of course. My teammates, of course.But what about those individuals that gave you the image of what it looks like and how it can be done? And Allen Iverson gave me the image of how it looks like, how it could be done coming from the broken community that I came from. So I want to give him his flowers in front of the world because he deserves it.Wade and Allen Iverson attend the Stance and Dwyane Wade’s Spade Tournament at The One Eighty in Toronto in 2016.George Pimentel/WireImage, via Getty ImagesYou’re being inducted alongside Dirk Nowitzki, with whom you had, let’s call it a tense relationship at points. What’s your relationship with him like now?I respect Dirk as one of the greatest players that ever played this game of basketball. It’s funny to have something with someone and we’ve never guarded each other. We played totally different positions, but as I’ve always said, if I’m going to have any words with anyone, I want them to come in the finals.Dirk and I have played in the finals against each other twice. His team won once. My team won one. So I call it a wash. And I’m thankful to be able to be a part of the class that I’m a part of. And Dirk to me — and there’s no shade on anybody who’s ever played — but I think Dirk will probably be looked at as the greatest international player that we’ve ever seen.You’ve talked at length about your advocacy on behalf of the transgender community, especially with your own child. What was your reaction to the Orlando Magic donating $50,000 to the super PAC affiliated with Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida? (DeSantis has supported legislation such as what opponents deemed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, a law signed last year that limits what instructors can teach about sexuality and gender in classrooms. The Magic’s donation was dated May 19, just days before DeSantis announced a run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024.)I have so many things that I’m focused on and there’s so many, so many battles to fight, in a sense. That’s one that I’m not choosing to fight, with so many other things where my voice is needed. People are going to do what people want to do. And there’s nothing that you’re going to be able to do to stop them, per se. And so I’m trying to help where the need is and where I can.There were some reports in the spring that Florida Democrats were recruiting you to run for Senate.[Laughter] I heard that.Have you ever been approached to run for office?Yes.“I’ve been able to be a star,” Wade said. “I’ve been able to be Robin.”Ike Abakah for The New York TimesSo describe to me what that approach was like.I mean, it’s just conversation. “Hey, you would be good for,” “Hey, we can see you in,” “We would love to have you in.”It’s things that I’m passionate about that I will speak out on and speak up for. And so I don’t play the politician games. I don’t know a lot about it.But I also understand that I have a role as an American citizen and as a known person to be able to highlight and speak on things that other people may not be able to because they don’t have the opportunity to do this.So you’re running.[Laughter]Let me see if I can get you to be a little spicy. I’m sure you’ve seen some of the comments Paul Pierce has made comparing the two of you. He’s said a couple of different things. But one of the things he said — I’ll read the quote — “Put Shaq on my team. Put LeBron and Bosh with me. I’m not going to win one? You don’t think me, LeBron and Bosh, we’re not going to win one? We’re not going to win a couple?”What was your reaction to seeing what Paul said about you?I’m living rent-free right now.I got so many things going on in my life. Comparing myself to someone who’s not playing or someone who is playing is definitely not on my to-do list. Listen, Paul Pierce was one of the greatest players that we’ve had in our game. And I think, you know, when you are a great player and you don’t get the attention that you feel like your game deserved, sometimes you’ve got to grab whatever attention where those straws are. And Paul believes he’s a better player than me. He should believe that. That’s why he was great. That’s not my argument, and I didn’t play the game to be better than Paul Pierce. I played the game the way I played it, and I made the sacrifices that I made. Everybody doesn’t want to sacrifice.Wade shot against Paul Pierce in 2012 in Miami.Scott Cunningham/NBAE, via Getty ImagesI’ve been able to be a star. I’ve been able to be Robin. I’ve been able to be part of the Larry, Curly and Moe, like, whatever. I’ve been able to be successful and great in all those areas.It’s easy to say what you would do if you have a certain talent on your team, but you have to play with that talent. And that’s the hardest thing to do — to play with talent in different generations and different styles, which I was able to do.What is it like to watch old highlights of yourself now that you’re 41?I just got done watching a 2005-2006 edit. I think it was 45 minutes. I watched about 15 minutes. I walked away from that edit, and I was just looking at the way I played the game and I hooped.Nowadays, we’ve got the kids. And I love what development is going on, but kids are working on their moves. I just reacted to defenders. My moves came from just reacting, and those are the moves that are being worked on and are being highlighted now. I just played the game of basketball just like I was back in Chicago playing with my uncles and my dad and my family.So I love watching old highlights of myself because, just being honest, I haven’t seen a lot of people with my game and with my style. And so it was unique. And I’m thankful to have one of those games that no one can really understand how good I really was.Ike Abakah for The New York Times More

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      in Golf

      LIV Golf Has Embraced Trump, but Others Are Keeping Their Distance

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      LIV Golf has embraced the former president. But much of golf’s establishment is keeping its distance, even as LIV and the PGA Tour seek a détente.Walking toward a tee box in Virginia in May, former President Donald J. Trump offered an awfully accurate assessment of the way many golf executives viewed him.“They love the courses,” he said, forever the salesman for his family company’s portfolio of properties, “but I think they probably consider me a little bit controversial right now.”As much as some leaders of men’s golf are trying to patch the rupture created by the Saudi-backed LIV Golf circuit, a tour Trump has championed, they seem to be in no rush to end the former president’s exile from their sport’s buttoned-up establishment. Even in an era of gaudy wealth and shifting alliances in golf, Trump remains, for now, a measure too much for many.The consequences have been conspicuous for a figure who had expected to host a men’s golf major tournament in 2022. Now, his ties to the sport’s elite ranks often appear limited to LIV events and periodic rounds with past and present professionals. Jack Nicklaus, the 18-time major champion, caused a stir in April when he publicly stopped short of again endorsing a Trump bid for the White House.Nevertheless, on Thursday, when he was playing a LIV pro-am event at his course in Bedminster, N.J., Trump insisted he was in regular conversations with golf executives about top-tier tournaments.“They think as long as you’re running for office or in office, you’re controversial,” he said.Golf has been a regular respite for Democratic and Republican commanders in chief. But no American president has had a more openly combustible history with the sport than Trump, and perhaps no president besides Dwight D. Eisenhower, who is thought to have averaged about 100 rounds annually when he was in the White House, has had so much of his public image linked to golf.In the years before Trump won the presidency, he had at last started to make significant headway into the rarefied realms of golf.Trump watched his shot from the fairway.Doug Mills/The New York TimesIn 2012, the U.S. Golf Association picked the Bedminster property for the 2017 U.S. Women’s Open. Two years later, the P.G.A. of America said it planned to take the men’s P.G.A. Championship to the course in 2022. Also in 2014, Trump bought Turnberry, a mesmerizing Scottish property that had hosted four British Opens, and he imagined golf’s oldest major championship being contested there again.Once in the White House, Trump played with a parade of golf figures (though some of them appeared more attracted to the magic of the presidency than to Trump himself): Tiger Woods; Rory McIlroy; Ernie Els; Jay Monahan, the commissioner of the PGA Tour; and Fred S. Ridley, the chairman of Augusta National Golf Club.Trump’s 2016 campaign and presidency had given some in golf heartburn. But it was the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol that most clearly chiseled away at his golf dreams. The P.G.A., which is distinct from the PGA Tour, which has dueled with LIV for supremacy over men’s professional golf, immediately moved its 2022 championship from Bedminster. The R&A, which organizes the British Open, made clear that it would not be bound for Turnberry anytime soon.LIV soon emerged as something of a life raft, an insurgent league with a craving for championship-quality courses and plenty of money to spend. It did not hurt that Trump had been strikingly cozy with the government in Riyadh whose wealth fund was ready to pour billions of dollars into LIV — and let some of those dollars, in turn, roll toward the Trump Organization for reasons that have been the subject of widespread speculation.Trump became a fixture at LIV events held at his courses, routinely jawing about the PGA Tour with variable accuracy. (He did, however, predict something like the planned transaction between the wealth fund and the PGA Tour.) This week’s event in New Jersey is his family’s fourth LIV tournament, and a fifth is planned for the Miami area in October.But the budding détente between the Saudis and the PGA Tour does not seem to be leading to an immediate one between Trump and the broader golf industry, which the Saudis could have enormous sway over in the years ahead.The PGA Tour has not publicly committed to maintaining the LIV brand if it reaches a conclusive deal with the wealth fund, and the tentative agreement says nothing about the future of men’s golf’s relationship with Trump. The PGA Tour has a history with Trump but ended its relationship with his company during the 2016 campaign. Tim Finchem, who was the tour’s commissioner then, denied at the time that the decision was “a political exercise” and instead called it “fundamentally a sponsorship issue.”To no one’s surprise, the tour’s 2024 schedule, which the circuit released on Monday, features no events at Trump properties. And although Trump said a few months ago that he thought the Irish Open might be interested in his Doonbeg course, the DP World Tour, which is also a part of the agreement with the Saudi wealth fund, has said the course is not under consideration.Other top golf figures who are not bound by any deal with the Saudis somehow appear even less interested.Trump Turnberry in Scotland won’t be hosting the British Open anytime soon, according to the chief executive of the R&A.Mary Turner for The New York Times“Until we’re confident that any coverage at Turnberry would be about golf, about the golf course and about the championship, until we’re confident about that, we will not return any of our championships there,” Martin Slumbers, the chief executive of the R&A, said on the same day last month when he signaled that the Open organizer might be willing to accept a Saudi investment.Seth Waugh, the P.G.A. of America’s chief executive, declined to comment this week, but the organization has given no signal that it is reconsidering its thinking about Trump courses. The U.S.G.A. said it did not have a comment.Some players, many of whom at least lean conservative, have suggested they would like to see Trump courses be in the mix for the majors.“There’s no reason you couldn’t host P.G.A.s, U.S. Opens out here,” said Patrick Reed, who won the Masters Tournament in 2018 and played with Trump on Thursday. “I mean, just look at it out here: The rough is brutal.”Even a sudden rapprochement, which would require executives setting aside the views of players like Reed that politics should not shape sports decisions, would almost certainly not lead to Trump’s strutting around a major tournament in the near future.The next U.S. Open in need of a venue is the one that will be played in 2036; Trump would turn 90 on the Saturday of that tournament. P.G.A. Championships are booked through 2030. Between last month’s announcement that the 2026 British Open will be held at Royal Birkdale and the R&A’s sustained public skepticism of Trump, the last major of the calendar year seems unlikely to head to a Trump property anytime soon. And the Masters, which is always played at Augusta National in Georgia, is not an option.Women’s golf offers a few more theoretical possibilities since its roster of venues is not as set, but Trump would face much of the same reluctance.Trump has mused about the financial wisdom of golf’s keeping its distance from him. A few months ago, he argued that avoiding his courses was “foolish because you make a lot of money with controversy.”He may be right.But it seems golf is reasoning that it is making plenty of money anyway. Its political bent, some figure, might be better managed outside the glare of its major tournaments — and, moreover, beyond the shadow of Trump.Trump has mused about the financial wisdom of golf’s keeping its distance from him. 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