Serena Williams dropped the U.S. Open final on Saturday, but it wasn’t the quality of her or her opponent’s play that has garnered so much attention.
Williams was fined $17,000 for three code violations during her match — one for illegally receiving hand signals from her coach during the match, another for smashing her racket in an angry fit, and one more for talking back to a chair umpire, who awarded her opponent a point during the second set because of Williams’ misconduct.
Williams called the chair umpire a “thief” and then said, “Because I’m a woman, you’re going to take this away from me?” She also said there is a sexist double standard in her sport following the match — even though she doesn’t really have a case.
“I’m here fighting for women’s rights, and for women’s equality, and for all kinds of stuff,” she told the press after the match. “For me to say ‘thief’ and for him to take a game, it made me feel like it was a sexist remark,” she said.
“He’s never taken a game from a man because they said ‘thief.’ For me it blows my mind. But I’m going to continue to fight for women,” she added.
Williams broke the rules, plain and simple. Certain officials are more strict than others in any sport. The best way to not get in any trouble in the first place is by not breaking the rules — or at least by having some awareness and knowing which rules can and cannot be bent with the officials at the match. Perhaps she should have known this particular chair umpire, Carlos Ramos, is stricter than most and acted accordingly.
Williams’ anger also seems futile because she was simply outplayed in the finals, losing 6-2, 6-4 in the finals to Naomi Osaka, a 20-year-old Japanese-born player who was ranked as the No. 7 women’s singles tennis player in the world by the Women’s Tennis Association headed into the match.
Even before Osaka was awarded the point following Williams’ temper tantrum, she was still up by a set and was leading in the second match, 4-3, giving her a clear advantage.
Osaka had six aces on the day compared to Williams’ three. Osaka also earned 65 points in the match compared to Williams’ 50, according to the box score. The points Williams lost for breaking the rules would not have made a difference the way the match was going: she still would have lost.
Some have claimed there’s a double standard between men’s and women’s pro athletes when it comes to angry behavior — even trying to draw a parallel between baseball players and managers lashing out and not being penalized.
Not only is this comparison weak because it’s a different sport with a different governing body and fan base (there’s no baseball diamonds at country clubs), but players have been suspended for their words to umpires. Most notably, Toronto Blue Jays center fielder Kevin Pillar was hit with a two game suspension last season for calling an opponent a “faggot.”
Even in the sport of tennis, men are punished heavily for their misconduct as well. Last year, men’s tennis player Fabio Fognini was suspended from two Grand Slam tournaments last season and fined $96,000 for calling a female official a “whore.” Plus, the always-fiery John McEnroe racked up a slew of fines (and even a point penalty) during his career, so it’s not like his poor conduct went unpunished.
It’s obvious Williams was not happy that she lost. She is widely considered the greatest women’s tennis player of all time, so she was probably expecting to win her finals match against a virtual unknown. However, maybe next time she won’t whip out the sexism card because she broke the rules and got outplayed by another woman of color.
If Williams wants to argue that some of the rules and regulations in her sport are a little uptight, then that’s fair. There’s just something extraordinarily sour about someone losing and trying to play the victim.
Tom Joyce (@TomJoyceSports) is a freelancer writer who has been published with USA Today, the Boston Globe, Newsday, ESPN, the Detroit Free Press, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The Federalist, and a number of other media outlets.
