Boris Becker was born on 22 November 1967 in Leimen, near Heidelberg, in West Germany. In 1974 he joined the TC Blau-Weiß Leimen club and began training under Boris Breskvar. He was playing competitively at eight and was concentrating almost entirely on tennis by twelve; he left school after the tenth grade and was schooled through the West German Tennis Federation, where his main coach was the Romanian-born Günther Bosch. He turned professional in 1984 with Bosch as coach and Ion Țiriac as manager.
On 7 July 1985, aged 17 years and 227 days, he beat Kevin Curren to win Wimbledon: the youngest men's champion in the tournament's history, the first unseeded winner and the first German. His powerful game earned him the nickname "Boom Boom". He won Wimbledon again in 1986 and 1989 and was a finalist there in 1988, 1990, 1991 and 1995; grass was the surface on which he excelled.
1989 was the only year in which he won two majors, Wimbledon and the US Open. He helped West Germany win its first Davis Cup in 1988 and won it again in 1989, and in 1991 he won the Australian Open and became world No. 1. In 1992, with Michael Stich, his fierce rival, he won the Olympic doubles gold medal in Barcelona. He won a second Australian Open in 1996.
He won six major singles titles, three Wimbledons, two Australian Opens and one US Open, along with 49 singles and 15 doubles titles, 13 Masters titles and three season-ending championships. He played the Davis Cup from 1985 to 1999 and managed the team in 1997. He retired in 1999, after a quarterfinal defeat to Pat Rafter. He later worked as a television commentator and, from 2013 to 2016, as head coach of Novak Djokovic, who won six majors in that time. His years after playing also brought legal and financial problems.