KEY BISCAYNE, Fla. — As tennis’s Big Four (Djokovic, Nadal, Federer, Murray) has been reduced to the Big One (Djokovic), the measures of that one’s greatness have become ever more striking.
Consider money. In winning his third straight Miami Open men’s title on Sunday, 6-3, 6-3, over Kei Nishikori, Novak Djokovic surpassed Roger Federer as the career prize-money leader on the ATP Tour. His $1,028,300 winner’s check put his career winnings at $98,199,548.
Or consider titles. Djokovic, still only 28, now holds the career record for ATP Masters 1000 titles with 28, and he extended to 16 his streak of consecutive matches won at the Miami Open. He has won 29 of his last 30 matches here dating to 2011, and this was the site of his first ATP Masters 1000 win, in 2007.
And then there are the rankings. Djokovic will extend to 92 his streak of consecutive weeks holding the No. 1 ranking.
What else? With Sunday’s victory, Djokovic improved to 28-1 for the season and became the first player to win three straight Miami titles since Andre Agassi from 2001 to 2003, also tying Agassi for the most wins at the tournament. Djokovic became just the seventh player in history to win the first two ATP Masters 1000 events back-to-back at Indian Wells, Calif., and at Miami, and he is the only player to win both titles in the same year four times (2011, 2014-16).
This was his 63rd career title, and he passed his coach, Boris Becker, in career wins, with his 714th.
“Boris’s wins by far is the most important record,” Djokovic said. “I had a phone call with him, and we had a laugh about it. Of course I’m very grateful and proud of all the achievements. The fact that I put myself in a position to make records and to have my name in the history books is a great incentive before matches like this, but I didn’t think about it too much, and I didn’t impose any pressure or I didn’t want to have it as a distraction, but rather as motivation.”
Nishikori broke Djokovic’s serve in the first game of the match, only to have his serve broken in the very next game. His groundstrokes were solid in the early going, and he was matching Djokovic point for point through the first four games before being broken again to fall behind, 2-4, and once more to fall behind, 3-5. Djokovic held serve to win the first set and broke Nishikori to start the second set, never losing momentum from that point on.
After Nishikori held serve to pull to 3-4 in the second set, he came up hobbling and had to have his left knee worked on during the changeover, but he did not use that as an excuse, citing Djokovic’s dominant play this season as the reason for the outcome.
“It’s tough to find his weakness, honestly,” said Nishikori, who missed out on winning his first ATP Masters 1000 event but will remain at No. 6 in the rankings. “The biggest thing is he has great defense. It’s tough to open up the space, and I had a couple of strategies before coming to this match, but I don’t think I did that well to beat him today. I hope I can step up a little more next time.”
Nishikori jogged around a bit before the start of the eighth game and then watched Djokovic win the first point on a backhand winner down the line. Djokovic went up, 30-0, with an easy crosscourt forehand winner. After he won the next point, a group of pelicans flew overhead in a V formation for a brief distraction, and he raised his arms to them. He won the game at love on a service winner to go up by 5-3 with Nishikori serving to stay alive.
Djokovic got to break point and match point twice only to see Nishikori save both, but he capitalized on his third chance as Nishikori hit a forehand long. Djokovic pumped his fist in celebration, and he would soon depart Miami. His next stop on the way to the French Open is the Monte Carlo Masters, where he will most likely surpass $100 million in career winnings.