Has a tennis player ever claimed that he likes the fact that Wimbledon follows so hard on the heels of the French Open? For decades, pros and fans and supporters of sane scheduling have cried out for more than two meager weeks between these very different major tournaments. Yet as soon as our wish came true and Wimbledon moved back a week, along came Novak Djokovic to make a strong case that the events are just fine as they are. Couldn’t be better, really, as far as he’s concerned.

“I think it’s actually great that after a couple of weeks we have another Slam,” Djokovic said at Wimbledon this year. “It’s very good because you get back in the competitive mode right away. You come here and feel the importance of this event; you can’t think about what happened at the French Open.”

It’s hard to say whether any other player shares, or will ever share, Djokovic’s enthusiasm for the blink-of-an-eye turnaround from clay to grass. But maybe that’s because so few of them could ever hope to do what he has done the last two years: Shake off the memory of a bitter defeat in the French Open final by coming back to beat Roger Federer for the Wimbledon title a little more than a month later.

Djokovic has long been the rubber-band man of tennis. With him, the term is appropriate both for physical and psychological reasons. During a rally, he can stretch and flex and contort his body into positions that have never been dreamed of by tennis instructors or textbook writers. And during a match, where he is prone to wild swings in mood and form, he has a unique—and if you’re a fan of his, heart-attack-inducing—ability to bend nearly to the breaking point, before snapping back into place just in time to win.

Now we can add the French Open and Wimbledon finals to his bounce-back list. Few champions have ever returned to the victory stand in London so quickly and convincingly after such devastating defeats in Paris. The question now, and the one that will ultimately define Djokovic’s legacy, is which of those performances—the wins at Wimbledon or the losses at Roland Garros—will become the norm for him.

For much of 2015, it looked as if Djokovic would not have many problems at all. He won 41 of his first 43 matches, including 28 in a row. Djokovic’s 2011 season, when he went 70–6 and won three of four Slams, has been called his miracle campaign; by May 2015, he was making the miraculous look routine.

“It seems that he’s inhuman, a machine that’s unbeatable,” John McEnroe said this spring.

Djokovic may or may not have agreed with that statement, but by the time he had won the Rome title in May, even he had to admit that he had reached a career summit.

“So far, this is the best season of my life,” Djokovic said after blitzing Federer at the Foro Italico. “I’m playing with great joy and concentration, and I hope to continue.”

Few people believed he wouldn’t continue. There was talk that he could win the first calendar-year men’s Grand Slam since Rod Laver’s in 1969. We had, by all accounts, reached peak Djokovic. So how did the man who had uttered such jubilant words in May end up tweeting the following somber statement in June?

“For each of us eventually, whether we are ready or not, some day it will come to an end. There will be no more sunrises, no minutes, hours or days. All the things you collected, whether treasured or forgotten, will pass to someone else.”

The words are from the 2006 cancer-treatment documentary Dying to Have Known. The previous week in Paris, the best stretch of Djokovic’s career had just come to an end. His long win streak had been halted, in stunning fashion, by Stan Wawrinka. It was Djokovic’s third loss in a French Open final, and likely the toughest defeat of his career. The player who had been so resilient all year, who had recovered from every stumble, couldn’t cross the final hurdle without hitting the bar.

“He played much better tennis,” Djokovic said of Wawrinka, “and was more courageous. In the important points, he came up with the big shots, and I didn’t.”

The loss brought an old and seemingly forgotten vulnerability of Djokovic’s back to the forefront: Despite his methodical excellence, he has been only an even bet to win the matches that mean the most. Djokovic’s loss in Paris left him 8–8 in Slam finals.

That was hardly an embarrassing record. Ivan Lendl was 8–11 in major finals, and his status as a legend is secure. Yet as we look ahead to an era that seems likely to be dominated by Djokovic, we know that these matches will determine his place in tennis history. Simply put, the best players win on the biggest stages: Federer is 17–9 in Slam finals, Rafael Nadal 14–6 and Serena Williams a sparkling 21–4. Pete Sampras, Djokovic’s first idol, was 14–4. Those are the numbers, rather than winning streaks, that get you called the greatest ever.

As Djokovic headed back to Wimbledon in 2015, many wondered: Was there something about his game that didn’t lend itself to these moments? Was he so consistent that he couldn’t raise his level when needed?

According to Jim Courier, who was 4–3 in major finals, the more of those matches you play, the more pressure-filled they become.

“If we recall Novak’s body language at this year’s Australian Open final,” Courier says, “the tension was evident, and that’s the tournament where’s had the most success. My experience is that once you’ve reached a number of finals, you understand how big the difference between a win and a loss is, which adds to the weight of the moment.”

According to Paul Annacone, who coached both Federer and Sampras, a willingness to embrace the stage is a key to success when the spotlight is brightest.

“Pete was very much about those moments in the finals, those accomplishments,” Annacone says. “He was one of the rare athletes that truly believed he would play his best tennis when it mattered most. I believe Roger equally revels in those moments, but also that Roger genuinely enjoys the steps of the journey a little more. The thing that both had in their minds was the belief that they would shine in those biggest moments.”

Djokovic knew all of this as early as 2013. That year he lost the Wimbledon final to Andy Murray and the US Open final to Nadal. He learned that his clinical consistency may not be enough against a player who has just won six straight matches. He learned what Andre Agassi learned when he lost his first major final: “You can’t win the final of a Slam by playing not to lose.”

To that end, Djokovic hired six-time major champion Boris Becker, a man who knew how to take over a tennis court, specifically to get him past the big-match hump. When the Serb did that at Wimbledon in 2014, he sung the German’s praises.

“Having Boris was definitely helpful,” Djokovic said. “He knows exactly what type of challenges I have to face mentally to play big tournaments and big matches.”

This year, Djokovic went even further at Wimbledon. As he lifted his third trophy there, he said that it belonged to Becker as much as it did to him. Perhaps that’s because, in his four-set win over Federer, Djokovic played with the same courage and aggression that he had lacked against Wawrinka in Paris. We have watched for years as Federer has won with clutch serving. This time Djokovic—normally the reactive player, the counterpuncher, the returner—matched Federer with his own serve.

“He’s not going to drop his level too much,” Djokovic said of Federer. “He’s going to make me earn every point. He’s not going to lose; I’m going to have to win the match if I want to lift that trophy.”

Djokovic lost the second set that day after squandering seven set points. When it began to rain soon after and he walked off Centre Court, it was Becker who gave him the advice he remembered the rest of the way: “Keep on punching.”

Tennis is often called a cruel sport, and there’s nothing crueler than winning six matches at a major and still walking away a loser because you can’t win the seventh. But this is how the game’s immortals are separated from the merely excellent, and it makes a harsh kind of sense: Only when it matters most do we see a player’s deepest, truest self revealed.

What will Djokovic reveal at this year’s U.S. Open? As the 28-year-old knows, he could make his trip to tennis Valhalla a lot smoother with just a few more key wins. But when he returns to Flushing Meadows, where he hasn’t won a title since 2011 and where he’s 1–4 in finals, he’ll be returning to a place that holds its share of bitter memories.

It was in New York, in 2007, where a tone was set: Unlike Serena, Nadal, Federer and Sampras, all of whom won their first Slam finals, Djokovic lost his, to Federer. It was also in New York, in 2012, where Djokovic lost a five-set final to Murray, a player he has beaten in 19 of 27 meetings.

One meaning of “clinical,” that word we so often hear attached to Djokovic’s name, is “putting theory into practice.” Djokovic knows what it takes to win Grand Slam finals, and this month he’ll try again to turn that knowledge into reality. He’ll try to walk out of New York the same way he walked out of Wimbledon, with another word attached to his name: Champion.

Originally published in the September/October 2015 issue of TENNIS Magazine.