Novak Djokovic, Destroyer

Novak Djokovic is the glass ceiling that the plucky underdog from community college slams into in pursuit of his dream job. He is the player who proves the existence of genetic superiority to would-be challengers. He is impossible to oppose, and almost certainly the best tennis player alive, and neither has done much to make him beloved. He stands for exceptionalism within sports, and perhaps only that.

There's an emptiness to Novak's game, a cipher where the shots would typically illuminate a larger condition. It is mechanistic, the way he ends players—the agnostic snap of a backhand, the hollow clatter of a serve, a handshake at the net. He screams and scowls and jaw-juts, and we know these are authentic reactions for him. It's just hard to feel it from where we sit as he thunders forward unerringly through brackets and tournaments and, during his annual romp through the Australian Open, whole continents. Bending a large island to his will? Sure, Emperor Novak can swing that.

He's 28 now, which is accurate biologically but also doesn't quite feel right. 28 is the beginning of the slow crawl toward fallibility for people in his line of work, and this is a man who does not exude that, even on the rare occasions in which he does fail. Terminators don't age, and Djokovic still has that T2000 vibe, regenerating himself after every point irrespective of how many forehand blasts are boomed at him or rallies he's forced to sputter through. His legs will repair themselves, new sinew stitching itself onto muscle fibers in the time it takes for the ball boys to scurry across the court and retrieve the remnants of the last point he obliterated. His cyborg brain will refine its processes in the very moments when fatigue melts his opponents down.

He will lose skirmishes and perhaps even a battle or two, but Djokovic's campaign continues onward as Federer nears the end of his distinguished service. It was fitting that it was Djokovic who finally, irrevocably crushed Nadal's decade-spanning French Open dynasty, because there is no better embodiment of the futile fight against time than a man whose entire on-court persona shows no recognition of any larger force in front of him. He crushed and cubed the greatest clay court player who ever lived like an old jalopy, because there is no sense in holding onto a vehicle when its mileage has gone past 65,000. Wherever it took you, whoever you were in it, forget it, it's over, it doesn't work anymore. Destroy it and replace it, and do not waste any tears.

No one can quite do that, of course. Nadal's reign in Roland Garros, one of this sport's greatest achievements, is being mourned, as it should be. It will not stop Djokovic from motoring forward, eyeing two more opponents with all the usual anti-sentiment. After Wednesday, even Murray, Djokovic's semifinal draw, feels less like a legitimate obstacle than another solid object to grind into splinters. He is two wins away from a long-awaited French Open title and a career grand slam, and he will approach that mandate with as much urgency as detachment, as he always does.

When it's over, he'll make a glowing speech, thanking the fans and perhaps calling the player across the court his friend. These are the things he's supposed to say, but he'll probably mean most of them, too. That doesn't necessarily mean they're true. A practical ruthlessness governs Novak Djokovic, and makes it possible for him to inhabit this contradiction. If he sleeps at all this week, he does so swathed in the comfort that he has taken apart the most recent unfortunate to face him. If he's awake, it's because he's eager to do it again.