Tennis players having to talk to the media.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

If I can’t handle being a professional, I shouldn’t be a professional. If I get injured doing tennis, perhaps I shouldn’t do tennis.

[Jaded]

If I can’t handle being a professional, I shouldn’t be a professional.

No, you shouldn't.

But this isn't about you.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

No but that opinion doesn’t change, regardless of who we are talking about.

Either every Grand Slam professional does media interviews or none of them do. Both of those situations are fair. A single competitor getting an advantage over the field by avoiding stress and lost recovery time is not fair.

Change the rules so that there are no media interviews at Grand Slams. Fine, no complaints from me. That would be fair on all the competitors.

[DuncanM]

It's basically the contract - when you sign up to play in a tournament you agree to abide by their rules, which include media duties. The media are the people who keep the cash coming in, and enable to tournament organisers to pay the players. Especially in the early rounds, the interviews can be more interesting than the matches.
Ferguson got away with it because the contract and the obligation lay on the club not personally on the manager. Maybe that would be a way around it - maybe her coach or some other member of her team could do the media duty, but I doubt that would satisfy the organisers as a big part of the tennis broadcast event is hearing the players talk about the game afterwards.

[citoyen]

Either every Grand Slam professional does media interviews or none of them do. Both of those situations are fair. A single competitor getting an advantage over the field by avoiding stress and lost recovery time is not fair.

That's assuming that everyone is equally affected by having to do post-match interviews. Some relish them more than others.

(Andy Murray clearly never enjoyed them, but he dealt with it by being surly and taciturn. Maybe Naomi Osaka could find a similar strategy that works for her.)

Either everybody does media or nobody. If there is no media, the event goes downhill.

I always wondered what made a good tennis tournament.

Now, I know. 

LWaB is right on this. Media obligations are part and parcel of being a professional sportsperson these days. I'm sure when I was growing up you never saw the Wimbledon champion being interviewed on court immediately after the game finished, but presumably it has been determined that this is what the paying public want, so it is very much part of the job, part of the spectacle. If you want to enjoy the vast rewards that come from being at the top of your sport, you have to find a way to deal with the expectations that come with that. No such thing as a free lunch.

Really don't get why people are so interested in hearing what they have to say, though - most sportspeople give very dull interviews.

That said, I do have a lot of sympathy for Naomi Osaka - if being in front of a camera and expected to speak is causing her anxiety, the organisers should be doing what they can to help, not acting like callous bullies - and it would be to their own benefit. The top tournaments are only the top tournaments because they feature the top players. Start expelling them for matters other than the game itself and the sponsors will stop forking out, the crowds will start staying away...

Naomi Osaka has to make a decision about what she wants from life though. There are many cases of people who have left professional sport to avoid that kind of pressure. Taylor Phinney comes to mind - while rehabilitating from his injury, he discovered that he preferred not having to live with the stress of being a pro cyclist, and although he tried to make a comeback, it was clear his heart was no longer in it. He now rides a bike for fun and seems to be a much happier person, judging by his social media.

[Mr Larrington]

ISTR that triple F1 champion Nelson Piquet refused to get involved with all the PR flim-flam and sponsor-schmoozing that normally goes with the job, but in his case it just meant he didn’t get paid as much as the drivers who did.  He wasn’t particularly arsed, saying you could only loaf about on one yacht at a time.

[rafletcher]

I think a blanket refusal to do media was a mis-step. And it’s all media, not just the French Open, not just slams. Not just when losing. I think it came to a head now because she, as one of the top 30 ranked players, is obliged by her contract with the sport to play at the French. She’s (currently) a very poor clay court player (FCVO poor) - witness the world no. 2 being taken to a tie break by a very lowly ranked opponent in a first round match. She’ll probably be out by the 3rd or 4th round. She would inevitably have this unpleasant reality pointed out to her in press after the matches, even should she win matches - today’s report in the Guardian pointed out her poor movement on the court, and that she won mainly due to her extra power.

I wonder what her sponsors are making of it. Last year she was paid $55 million, the highest amount in history for a sportswoman. That’s on top of the (relatively modest - $19 million total as a pro) prize money. I’m sure they’ll be trying to persuade her to do the press.

I also think she exacerbated the issue by, having made the announcement out of the blue, refusing to engage either with the tournament or her professional body.

Like many of us, she’s paid to do a job, and that means all of the job, not just the bits she enjoys. If we don’t do it, we’ll get disciplined. Other players (Austin, Capriati, Henin, Hingis) have chosen to step away from the sport at one time or another. In Tracey Austin’s case, it led to rule changes.  Maybe Osaka can have a similar outcome.

FWIW I don’t think anyone wishes her ill over this matter, but IMO she’d have been better to withdraw citing her health problems than take the route she has. But maybe sponsor pressure prevented that. At 23 it’s a lot of responsibility for anyone, and in particular those in the public eye.

[T42]

She signed a contract. She can either honour it, find a reason for pleading force majeure, or suffer the consequences.  Just whining "mental health" without substantiation isn't a reason.

[rafletcher]

Interestingly another player that’s had issues in the past, Milos Raonic, has withdrawn from the tournament without hitting a ball. He’s not played any clay court tournaments this year, and hasn’t played in the French since 2017. He doesn’t like playing on clay, so he doesn’t. No idea what reasons he gave.

[citoyen]

But maybe sponsor pressure prevented that. At 23 it’s a lot of responsibility for anyone, and in particular those in the public eye.

This kind of thing happens a lot across pro sport at the top level - young, talented people badly advised and exploited by greedy, corrupt agents, sponsors, event organisers and governing bodies.

The players have their heads turned by the obscene amounts of money thrown at them, and make bad decisions. Hopefully she'll be a bit wiser when it comes to signing her next lucrative contract.

[fd3]

I wonder what her sponsors are making of it. Last year she was paid $55 million, the highest amount in history for a sportswoman. That’s on top of the (relatively modest - $19 million total as a pro) prize money. I’m sure they’ll be trying to persuade her to do the press.

I reckon that they have just hit super bonus on their coverage.  Instead of getting 10 mins of airtime after a match they're getting prime news coverage that will extend beyond people who watch tennis.

[DuncanM]

She's withdrawn from the tournament. Statement here:
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/may/31/naomi-osaka-withdraws-french-open-press-conference-fines-tennis
While sad for her, and sad for tennis, I think it makes sense - hopefully tennis can work with her to allow players more flexibility and also her mental health will improve.

[Sergeant Pluck]

She signed a contract. She can either honour it, find a reason for pleading force majeure, or suffer the consequences.  Just whining "mental health" without substantiation isn't a reason.

Why should she have to publicly substantiate her mental health concerns? She has already said she has suffered from depression for a number of years. I think the professional organisations concerned have handled it really badly and I hope the sponsors will be having discussions.

Anyway, no tennis player has said anything of interest after a match since about 1984.

[Mr Larrington]

She signed a contract. She can either honour it, find a reason for pleading force majeure, or suffer the consequences.  Just whining "mental health" without substantiation isn't a reason.

Why should she have to publicly substantiate her mental health concerns? She has already said she has suffered from depression for a number of years. I think the professional organisations concerned have handled it really badly and I hope the sponsors will be having discussions.

Anyway, no tennis player has said anything of interest after a match since about 1984.

You CANNOT be serious!

Mr Google says that was 1981.  As you were

[barakta]

I think it is notable that Osaka is a woman of colour who will get a lot more shit from the media than white men, including if she was to be surly for example...

I suspect some of the "poor handling" is a symptom of the kind of mental health difficulties she is describing. In any other job, she'd be entitled to reasonable accommodations and I wonder what the Tennis world has done to try and support her before this point.

Interestingly, I read Neville Southall's book recently and if you ignore the "bigging up of Neville" he has some interesting thoughts about the detrimental mental health impacts of multi-millionaire athlete lifestyles during/after their active careers and that money creates its own problems that many people don't handle well in reality.

[DuncanM]

This is really interesting:
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2021/may/31/were-not-the-good-guys-osaka-shows-up-problems-of-press-conferences

[Jaded]

Thanks for that link.

Good to have a bit of balance...

[citoyen]

Certainly puts a bit of a different slant on things - I don't really follow tennis, so I was assuming the kind of questions they faced were similar to the anodyne nonsense footballers have to deal with...

Contractual obligations or not, no one should have to put up with that kind of shit.

[barakta]

Beat me to it with that Graun article.

That is what I was trying and failing to articulate well about the sort of question women (are more likely to) get, especially women of colour. Exoticised. Patronised. Sexualised.

[DuncanM]

Hopefully it will result in a process that is fair to the athletes while allowing the publicity machine that benefits everyone in the bubble to continue in some form. There is definitely a double standard at play  in the coverage of women's tennis, even if the prize money has become equal.

In this case, it's not clear what conversations were had behind closed doors, but I think much of the reaction is because publicly at least, Osaka simply announced she wasn't going to do the press conferences. If there were conversations behind closed doors, she's been hung out to dry, if there weren't then I think the announcement route was a poor decision.

[Jaded]

Except , is it reasonable that someone, when affected by depression or other mental health concerns, behaves in a "normal" way that non-mental heath suffers expect?

[barakta]

Except , is it reasonable that someone, when affected by depression or other mental health concerns, behaves in a "normal" way that non-mental heath suffers expect?

Agreed. I think people with anxiety often push themselves so hard to achieve anxiety inducing things that they end up crashing and appearing to be belligerent when actually they've hit the end of their cope.

[ian]

It's a job isn't it, the days of amateur sports are long gone, she takes her cut on the sponsorship and lucrative contracts. If it's too much, then all power to her to step away, but equally you can't have it every which way.

[DuncanM]

Except , is it reasonable that someone, when affected by depression or other mental health concerns, behaves in a "normal" way that non-mental heath suffers expect?

I didn't say it was unreasonable. However, she must have a team of advisors, from a coach and physio to a business manager, and one would hope they would be able to assist in diffusing the situation so it could be resolved in a way that would be less painful for all concerned. I almost put that I thought she had been badly advised, but then I felt that sounded like she was incapable of making her own decisions, so I changed it to just commenting on the decision itself.

[T42]

She signed a contract. She can either honour it, find a reason for pleading force majeure, or suffer the consequences.  Just whining "mental health" without substantiation isn't a reason.

Why should she have to publicly substantiate her mental health concerns? She has already said she has suffered from depression for a number of years. I think the professional organisations concerned have handled it really badly and I hope the sponsors will be having discussions.

Anyway, no tennis player has said anything of interest after a match since about 1984.

I didn't say "publicly".  Private presentation of a doctor's certificate, like a TUE, might suffice. The high tennis muckamucks can't be more constipated than the UCI.