MELBOURNE, Australia -- Forget Tom Brady and Russell Wilson. Forget Pete Carroll and Bill Belichick. Forget Richard Sherman and Darrelle Revis. The athlete you should be talking about right now is Novak Djokovic. Not only because he once again proved he is the best tennis player in the world but because he is more than that.
Djokovic is calm, collected and relentlessly determined on the court. He is intelligent, funny and consistently gracious off it. I mean, he distributed chocolates to reporters at his pre-tournament news conference here. What athlete does that? Certainly not Marshawn Lynch.
Imagine the media day performance he could deliver. Djokovic speaks multiple languages (Serbian, German, English and Italian plus some French) and greeted Chinese reporters during the chocolate delivery by saying "Ni-hao" (hello in Mandarin).
Djokovic also has the sort of backstory worthy of a United Way ad. He grew up in bombed-out Serbia, playing for a time in a drained swimming pool. And from such beginnings, he has become the best player in the world.
And yet, people will be talking about the Super Bowl commercials more Sunday than Djokovic's impressive 7-6 (5), 6-7 (4), 6-3, 6-0 victory over Andy Murray in the Australian Open. Which is simply not right because this is an athlete who deserves some hype, who should be in a Campbell's or Budweiser commercial Sunday (as long as the soup and beer are gluten free).
What more does he need to do to grab people's attention -- a wardrobe malfunction? Sunday's Aussie title was Djokovic's fifth, the most of the Open era. He won his eighth Grand Slam, tying him with Andre Agassi, Jimmy Connors and Ivan Lendl.
And he's going to win more. He's just 27 years old, six years younger than Roger Federer. Although he speaks as if he is decades older and more mature.
"I think it has deeper meaning, more intrinsic value now to my life because I'm a father and a husband now," he said. "It's the first Grand Slam title I won as a father and a husband. I just feel very, very proud of it.''
This was not the first match between Djokovic and Murray, who were born a week apart and began playing as juniors when they were 12. Their rivalry isn't as lopsided as Serena-Sharapova, but Djokovic holds a firm 16-8 advantage and has won eight of their past nine matches. (Murray's lone victory in that stretch was his milestone 2013 Wimbledon championship.) He especially dominates in Melbourne. This was the third time the two have played and the third time Djokovic won.
For a long while Sunday, though, the victor was seriously in question. The two brought similar games and for quite a while, it seemed as if match would last so long it would be going head-to-head with Katy Perry's Super Bowl halftime show. Similar to their match at the 2013 final here, the first two sets took 2 hours and 32 minutes with both going to tiebreakers. Djokovic won the first and Murray the second.
The sets exhausted both players, so much so that Djokovic was falling to the court in the second and third set. Unfortunately, there are no substitutes who can come off the bench in tennis.
"You could see that I had a crisis end of the second, beginning of the third," Djokovic said. "I just felt very exhausted and I needed some time to regroup and recharge and get back on track."
Murray won the first two games of the third set but went quickly downhill. He oddly said he let himself get distracted by Djokovic falling to the ground. Then once the fourth set began, Murray said, "He was just ripping everything. Returns he was hitting on the baseline, this far from the line all the time. Once he got up a break, he just loosened up and was just going for his shots. I couldn't recover."
Djokovic came back to win 12 of the last 13 games, including the final nine. He broke Murray in five of his last six services. And just as he did in the semifinal against Stan Wawrinka, he bageled Murray in the final set so that both players could leave in time to catch Puppy Bowl XI on Animal Planet.
"I try never to give up. Even though I went through that [exhausted] moment, I believed that I'm going to get that necessary strength," Djokovic said. "I'm going to have to earn it, and that's what I did. I started hitting the ball more, covering the court better, shortening the points, and allowed myself to come back to the match."
Djokovic has the skill, the delivery, the inspiration and the drive of the man who deserves sports fans' full attention Sunday. He won't receive it because of the Super Bowl. But perhaps he will if he wins the French Open for the first time in June or Wimbledon for the third time in July.
I would mention winning the US Open for a second time, but alas, that final will be played on the first Sunday of the next NFL season.