Early yesterday morning, Raymond Moore, the CEO and tournament director of Indian Wells, made some really, really, really stupid comments about female tennis players. While speaking about the Women’s Tennis Association, Moore suggested that female tennis players should offer up prayers for the male tennis players who have, in his opinion, helped carry the sport.
“In my next life when I come back, I want to be someone in the WTA, because they ride the coattails of the men,” he said. “They don’t make any decisions, and they are lucky. They are very, very lucky. If I was a lady player, I’d go down every night on my knees and thank God that Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal were born, because they have carried this sport. They really have.”
Serena Williams (hey, Raymond, remember her?!) responded to Moore later in the day after losing a match against Victoria Azarenka and said that women “shouldn’t have to drop to our knees at any point.” It forced Moore to issue an apology, but apparently, he wasn’t the only one who made some questionable comments about female tennis players yesterday.
Believe it or not, Novak Djokovic did, too. He was asked bout Moore’s comments after he beat Milos Raonic in the men’s final at Indian Wells, and he managed to make things worse by saying that he believes male tennis players should make more money than female tennis players.
“They fought for what they deserve, and they got it,” he said, according to The Guardian. “On the other hand, I think that our men’s tennis world, ATP world, should fight for more, because the stats are showing that we have much more spectators on the men’s tennis matches. I think that’s one of the reasons why maybe we should get awarded more. Women should fight for what they think they deserve, and we should fight for what we think we deserve.”
Djokovic then went on to attempt to pay a compliment to all of the female players out there. But his choice of words was, well, not good, so the compliment ended up backfiring on him.
“I have tremendous respect for what women in global sport are doing and achieving,” he said. “Their bodies are much different to men’s bodies. They have to go through a lot of different things that we don’t have to go through. You know, the hormones and different stuff.”
*cringe*
Djokovic actually went on to say some really nice things about female tennis players and even revealed that he is “surrounded with women” both in his personal and professional life. But it’s hard not to read “hormones and different stuff” and wonder what in the world he was thinking. That phrase has upset more than a few people and overshadowed everything else that he had to say.
You can check out all of Djokovic's comments here.
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[via USA Today]
