Having announced Wednesday that 2020 will be their final season, Mike and Bob Bryan will likely spend next year on a well-deserved farewell tour of sorts, competing at the biggest events on the tennis calendar one last time before drawing the curtain on their illustrious careers at their home Slam in New York City.
Their final chapter at the US Open, the site of some of their most memorable successes, will close the book on the greatest doubles team in the history of the sport.
The brothers will leave the game as holders of virtually every meaningful doubles record. But early in their careers, they were not sure whether they would ever win more than one major title together, let alone the 16 they have accumulated over a quarter-century of dominance.
Coming into the 2005 US Open, Mike and Bob were on the unlikely precipice of losing in the final of all four Grand Slams in the same year, the "anti-Slam," as Bob had dubbed it.
Even more unlikely, in hindsight, was that they feared they would be considered one-Slam wonders, having won just one major, at the French Open in 2003, in 30 tries since debuting in the Big Apple as 17-year-olds in 1995.
Of course, as history so often does, the brothers' first US Open title in 2005 flipped that script on its head, banishing the talk of both the "anti-Slam" and the "one-Slam wonders" to the cutting room floor.
"You know, we didn't want to go down as one of the only teams to lose all the Slams," Mike told reporters after lifting the trophy in New York. "It's more kind of a relief. But, you know, to do it here at the US Open, I mean, it's worth giving up five in a row."
Added Bob: "Yeah, we almost completed the anti-Slam. That would have been a feat. So, win or lose, it was gonna be amazing. You know, it feels awesome to do it in the U.S. It's been a long two-and-a-half years, it's been a lot of heartbreak. We've been really consistent, and we've been the No. 1 team in the world, and really beaten all the teams. We struggled just right at that last step. So it's good to get it now."
The brothers had lost the 2005 Aussie Open final to the fifth-seeded Zimbabwe duo of Wayne Black and Kevin Ullyett, and they fell to Jonas Bjorkman and Max Mirnyi in Paris, despite winning the first set in the championship match. While those were tough losses to take, the one that really lingered in their minds was the Wimbledon defeat to qualifiers Stephen Huss and Wesley Moodie, a tandem that beat the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 seeds in consecutive matches to claim an unlikely title.
Australian Huss and big-serving South African Moodie almost didn't even enter qualies that year, making their historic victory—they were the first qualifiers to win a men's doubles title on the London lawns—even more jaw-dropping for the Bryans to wrap their minds around. "It hurt pretty bad, especially losing to those guys, who we thought would be kind of a gimme final," Mike said.
"But we knew if we got to the finals enough times, we'd eventually crack it loose, you know," Mike said about the "one-Slam wonder" moniker that fortunately never stuck. "I thought we played one of our best matches of the year, maybe of our career. We went out there and just went for it and just let everything go. Didn't worry about winning or losing, stayed in the moment, and it happened, which feels pretty good."
And crack it loose they did.
After reaching the semifinals in 2002 and the championship match the following year, the Bryan brothers won their first US Open title in 2005 with a 6-1, 6-4 victory over Bjorkman and Mirnyi. The No. 2 seeds were pushed to three sets in three of their six matches, including in the semifinals, when they had to rally from a set down to beat fellow Americans Paul Goldstein and Jim Thomas.
"We always thought it would be pretty damn cool to win the US Open," Mike said.
Nine years later, the Bryans lifted their fifth title together in New York. It was the 100th of their careers.
"It's amazing relief, you know, ecstasy," said Bob. "You know, I was having flashbacks to my whole career towards the end of that match. It was wild. I was thinking juniors, college. It was an incredible moment. I was trying to stay in the moment, but it was impossible. I mean, this number right here, we have really been looking at for a couple of years. There are so many things that go along with this US Open title. We were really just trying to win the title. Then you got the 100, the 10 years with the Slam, first Slam of the year. Yeah, our fifth Open—there are no words to describe it."
The Bryans have found considerable success at their home Slam since debuting as 17-year-olds in 1995. Here's a look at the other four of their record five US Open championship titles and what they had to say about their successes throughout the years.
2008: Coming off a successful hard-court summer campaign that saw them reach the final at the Rogers Cup and win their first title in Cincinnati, the brothers did not drop a set in winning their second US Open title. The second-seeded brothers won a tight championship match against Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy, 7-6, 7-6.
"It feels really sweet to get the last Grand Slam of the year," Mike said. "You know, it's been a while since we've been in a Grand Slam final. Last year at Wimbledon, we were in the finals, and I think our last Grand Slam was early last year. So it feels really good to win, especially in the U.S. after a long, long summer. This ranks as one of our top achievements."
2010: The Bryans came into the 2010 US Open on the heels of consecutive titles in Toronto and Cincinnati and with wins in 13 of their past 14 matches. They had surpassed Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde's record of 61 doubles titles in LA earlier that summer, and the top seeds rode that momentum all the way to a third title in the Big Apple, again not dropping a set in six matches. As with their US Open title two years earlier, they needed two tiebreaks in the championship match, this time beating unlikely finalists Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi.
Said Bob: "It's just been a crazy summer. There was a lot of pressure building, and breaking the record in front of our whole family actually just released a lot of tension, I guess, that had been building. Maybe we were playing safe up to that point, but we kind of just... the flood gates have kind of opened since, and we've played the best tennis we've ever played. This is the craziest summer we've ever had. To win Toronto, Cincinnati and the Open is a dream come true."
2012: Just three weeks after fulfilling a lifelong dream of winning an Olympic gold medal on the grass courts of Wimbledon, the Bryan brothers rolled into New York looking to win at least one Grand Slam title for the eighth consecutive year. The No. 2 seeds did just that, defeating the fifth-seeded combination of Leander Paes and Radek Stepanek, 6-3, 6-4, in the finale, in a rematch of the Australian Open final.
"We weren't thinking too much about revenge today," Bob said. "We were just thinking about playing a good match and executing the scouting report our coach gave us and winning our home Slam in front of all these fans that were pumping us up the whole day. We're extremely pumped to leave 2012 with a Grand Slam title. I think it's eight years in a row now we've at least got away with one of them, which we're very proud of."
2014: Twelve months removed from missing out on the chance to complete the calendar-year Grand Slam, the Bryans were back on top of the world with a record fifth US Open title. The win was also the brothers’ 100th career title. They beat three all-American teams en route to the final, where they defeated Marcel Granollers and Marc Lopez, 6-3, 6-4. Granollers and Lopez had earlier defeated 2012 finalists and defending champions Paes and Stepanek, the duo who denied the Bryans history in New York in 2013.
"It's always sweet winning a Grand Slam," said Mike. "This just adds some extra whipped cream and cherries and nuts on top. To win a Slam for the 10th consecutive year, that was kind of in the back of our heads, too. We do get nervous. I think it was something like our 27th Grand Slam final. It feels like it was our first. You know, we were jittery. Tough to eat, tough to sleep. You know, but we kind of rose above it."
