Rafael Nadal won his 11th French Open on Sunday. But he double faulted on celebrations when he served up reportedly sexist and politically incorrect opinions on equal pay for men and women in Tennis:
Female models earn more than male models and nobody says anything. Why? Because they have a larger following. In tennis too, who gathers a larger audience earns more.
(CNN Bleacher Report, June 11, 2018)
Except that Nadal is right.
What’s more, he has an even stronger case. I have been making it for over 10 years, arguing that to get equal prize money, women should play the best of five sets, like men do, or men should play the best of three sets, like women do. After all, any proud (and principled) feminist must take exception to equal pay for unequal work.
Of course, Nadal’s point poses an unassailable exception to this rule: If the women’s best of three matches generate at least 40 percent more revenue at Grand Slam tournaments than the men’s best of five, that would justify equal pay.
Apropos of which, there’s no gainsaying that the bottom line, not sexism, explains why not a single woman appears on the current Forbes list of the world’s highest-paid athletes. For context, Serena Williams is No. 1 among female athletes, earning $27 million in 2017. But some obscure basketball player is ranked No. 100 among male athletes, earning $47 million.
More to the point, I would bet good money that, if you listed the top-5 professional sports you watch on a regular basis, those that feature women exclusively (e.g., women’s Boxing, Basketball, Golf, or Soccer) would not make it. You might want to consider how this contributes to the unequal pay at issue, especially if you’re a woman.
Enough?
Meanwhile, here is why I usually feel so alone when I’m watching women’s Tennis – when women and men play outside the four Grand Slams on separate WTA and ATP tours, respectively:
I prefer women’s tennis because their fierce baseline rallies are far more titillating to watch than the serve-dominated men’s game.
As it happens, this tournament marked Williams’s return to Grand Slam competition after maternity leave. And she was cruising through the rounds until she withdrew just hours before her fourth-round showdown with Maria Sharapova, citing a pectoral injury.
As has become customary, they added fuel to the media hype by volleying pre-match barbs. Their barbs on this occasion centered on petty, locker-room gossip about Williams, which Sharapova memorialized in her autobiography. I won’t dignify the tabloid fodder they provided by repeating any of it here.
Suffice it to know that I think the back-and-forth got into Williams’s head. Specifically, Sharapova’s defiance in the media and apparent resurgence on the court caused Serena to question whether she was fit enough to beat her on this occasion.
Mind you, she had beaten Sharapova in 18-consecutive matches coming into this French Open. Yet I suspect her nerves made her decide that it was better to play for sympathy in the media than risk losing to Sharapova on center court.
That said, iPINIONS might be only one who thought it was a mistake for Williams to wear that black catsuit throughout this tournament? She claims she had to do so for some spurious medical reason. But, far from looking like Cat Woman, she looked like the Michelin Man … attired blackly.
Bad look, Serena.
NOTE: Sharapova flamed out in the very next round. Perhaps William’s withdrawal lulled her into a false sense of invincibility. Simona Halep defeated Sloane Stevens for the women’s championship.
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