Nick Kyrgios

“I didn’t ask you to come watch.”—Nick Kyrgios

Nick Kyrgios’s breakthrough match was the fourth round of Wimbledon 2014. He was playing Rafael Nadal, his boyhood hero, then world No. 1. Kyrgios, a nineteen-year-old wild-card entry ranked No. 144, beat Nadal in four dramatic sets, 7–6, 5–7, 7–6, 6–3.

Kevin Mitchell in the Guardian newspaper called the Kyrgios/Nadal match “an upset for the ages” and described Kyrgios as “an Australian teenager with no fear and a golden arm.” Mitchell wrote: “Kyrgios’s nerveless performance, built on a serve to inspire fear and admiration, embroidered the occasion so completely with his free spirit and irresistible power. . . . What a game. What a day. What a player.”

Playing the great Nadal at Wimbledon, Kyrgios exuded brilliance and confidence. And he was so young. It was his serve, including his powerful second serve, almost as fast as his first and getting faster all the time, that gave him the edge. Match point was an ace, one of thirty-seven Kyrgios aces that day. At the end of it, Kyrgios did a little dance, something he later called “a juicy wriggle.” He didn’t seem surprised that he had beaten Nadal.

Brilliant, maybe, but Nick Kyrgios is a bad boy. He’s been called immature, temperamental, petulant, lazy, rude, mentally erratic, tempestuous, unconventional, the most misunderstood man in tennis, pugnacious, a “moochy” rebellious man-boy, brittle above the shoulders, a wild child, and a pantomime villain. He often says he is in “a pretty dark place.” At Roland Garros 2017, he told reporters, “I tend to be very negative and I have lots of chats to myself, and it’s not really positive chat.” He swears at fans in the crowd who annoy him. “Put your fucking phone away!” is one of the things he yells. Sometimes he prefers to play Pokémon GO with teenage friends rather than train for an upcoming match. His fitness has become an issue. He has said, “I don’t really like running. When the rally gets pretty long, I tend to just go for a low-percentage shot.” An Australian newspaper column about Kyrgios had the headline “Nick Kyrgios is a National Embarrassment.” When Ken Rosewall said the image of Australian tennis was being tarnished by members of the current generation, Kyrgios tweeted, “Same shit everyday man. people need to stay in their lane.” But Rod Laver is a fan, albeit his praise is qualified. Says Laver: “Nick has got more talent than anybody on the tour, but sometimes his attitude just does damage to his life as a player.”

Pundits say Kyrgios can be No. 1, partly because of his supreme athleticism.

Kyrgios lost to Shapovalov in the first round of Rogers Cup 2016.

Bad boy, yes, but Kyrgios is also funny, charming, a superb shot-maker, a maturing titan, the future of tennis, and—perhaps most important of all—bankable. In January 2017, after he lost in the second round of the Australian Open to Andreas Seppi (Kyrgios was booed off the court at the end of the game), the New York Times described him as “maddening and fascinating” and a “tortured genius.” Paul Annacone, a former coach of both Roger Federer and Pete Sampras, described him in 2017 as the greatest player since Federer. John McEnroe is often critical of Kyrgios’s tantrums (he has called Kyrgios a “fellow head case”), but has said that he is the most gifted player of his generation. At Roland Garros 2017 (where Kyrgios was beaten in the second round by the South African Kevin Anderson), McEnroe said, “It is unbelievable how talented Nick Kyrgios is. He is the most talented young player in the world.” He beat Federer (Madrid 2015), Rafael Nadal (Wimbledon 2015), and Novak Djokovic (Indian Wells 2017) at their first meeting. “You give that guy an early break, man, you’re goodnight Irene,” analyst Brad Gilbert said after the Djokovic defeat at Indian Wells.

He was tipped by many to do very well at Wimbledon 2017, perhaps even win. He resigned in the first round, after dropping two sets to Pierre-Hugues Herbert, hobbled by a left hip injury. The Guardian reported, “Kyrgios shrugged his shoulders, fiddled with the skin on his fingers and buried his face in his towel. . . . More than anything, there was an unmistakable sadness to his demeanour.” The next day, the tabloid press delighted in reporting that after his defeat Kyrgios had partied with two teenage women at a London nightclub. Then, he bought a 700-horsepower $180,000 Dodge Challenger Hellcat. In October 2017, at the Shanghai Masters, he walked off the court after losing the first set of the first round. He was fined and stripped of his first-round prize money. Later, Kyrgios said he’d had a stomach bug.

He can be uniquely horrible. At the 2015 Montreal Masters, his lewd comments on the court to Stan Wawrinka about the sex life of Wawrinka’s girlfriend earned him the adjective “loathsome” and the description “one of the most hated sportsmen in the world” in the Telegraph newspaper, and led to a postgame locker-room bust-up between the two players. In 2016 the ATP suspended him for lack of effort at the Shanghai Masters, what it described as “conduct contrary to the integrity of the game.” Simon Briggs, tennis correspondent of the Telegraph, wrote, “Nick Kyrgios’s commitment levels have always tended to wax and wane in accordance with some mysterious music of the spheres. But he has never reached quite such a nadir of indifference as he did in Shanghai today, while blatantly throwing a match against Mischa Zverev.” When asked at the postgame press conference how he felt about being booed by the fans, Kyrgios said, “I don’t owe them anything. It’s my choice. If you don’t like it, I didn’t ask you to come watch.” When he played Kevin Anderson in the second round of Roland Garros 2017, he asked fans mid-match for a beer (“Get me a beer now. Honest to God, get me one now.”), and when he lost smashed his racket to smithereens in front of some bewildered children. At the French Open, Kyrgios said he doesn’t like to practice on red clay back at home in Canberra because “it gets my car dirty.”

Playing Shapovalov at Rogers Cup 2016.

But Kyrgios can also be brilliantly charming. Here’s the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reporting on Kyrgios at the 2017 Cincinnati Masters, where he beat Nadal and lost in the finals to Dimitrov: “Kyrgios played twinkling tennis. When at his best he solicits more ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ from tennis crowds than anyone on the circuit, barring perhaps Roger Federer. He had Cincinnati in the palm of his hand. . . . Throughout the tournament, aside from being brilliant, Kyrgios was well-behaved and gracious. He had kind words for Dimitrov and charmed the crowd by praising their city and inviting them all out to ice cream next time he’s in town.”

He’s an Australian, born in 1995. His father, Giorgos, who has a house painting business, is from Greece. His mother, Norlaila, a software writer, was born in Malaysia of royal blood (early on she abandoned the title “princess”). He was devoted to his grandmother, Julianah Foster, and has a tattoo of the number “74,” Julianah’s age when she died. Kyrgios was fat as a child (“I ate a lot”), but despite his weight was an excellent athlete, particularly interested in basketball. He’s called himself an “accidental tennis player” and has said that “some days it’s fun to play but sometimes I’d rather be doing something else.”

A petulant Kyrgios playing doubles with Sock against Pospisil and Nestor, Rogers Cup 2016.

According to Kyrgios, one day he will leave tennis and become a professional basketball player. At the 2017 French Open, Kyrgios divided his time between playing tennis and watching the NBA Finals. He announced he wouldn’t miss a moment of the NBA Finals, French Open or no French Open. In a radio interview, he said, “I feel like I could have eight assists playing for the Golden State Warriors. There’s so many guys to pass to. Definitely, I would average some pretty good numbers if I played for them as well.”

In 2017 Kyrgios announced he had found his purpose. “A couple of years ago I had a vision: to build a facility for disadvantaged and underprivileged kids where they could hang out, be safe and feel like they were part of a family. There’d be tennis courts and basketball courts and a gym and an oval to kick the footy. There’d be things to eat and beds to sleep in. . . . For the first time, I feel like there is a reason for me to be doing what I’m doing. Tennis is a great life—we’re well paid and the perks are pretty good—but it can feel empty if you’re just doing it for the money.”

When will he leave tennis? Will the injuries that plague him overwhelm his motivation, as happened at 2017 Wimbledon? What will he be when he leaves the game? World No. 1, a titan of tennis? Or a reviled oddity?

Kyrgios in a good mood, wearing a basketball T-shirt.