A Shocking Exit and a Sad Day for Tennis

Naomi Osaka, a superstar in the sport, pulled out of the French Open after she was fined for skipping a news conference. Did it have to end this way?

Naomi Osaka’s wave to the French Open crowd on Sunday proved to be a wave goodbye.Credit...Pete Kiehart for The New York Times

PARIS — Naomi Osaka’s withdrawal from the French Open was not the outcome anyone in tennis desired, and yet it happened just the same.

It could have been avoided through better communication and smarter decisions, but on Monday night the sport’s most prominent young star felt she had no better option than to pull out of the year’s second Grand Slam tournament.

Her second-round match with Ana Bogdan will be a walkover for Bogdan instead of another chance for the second-ranked Osaka, 23, to make steps forward on red clay, a surface that has long bedeviled her.

“Above all, it’s just really sad: for her, for the tournament, for the sport,” said Martina Navratilova, a former No. 1 who has seen plenty of tennis turmoil in her 50 years in the game. “She tried to sidestep or lessen a problem for herself and instead she just made it much bigger than it was in the first place.”

It is not wise at this stage to speculate on the full scope of Osaka’s issues. She is still coming to grips with them herself, and she said in her withdrawal announcement on social media that she had experienced long bouts of depression since the 2018 United States Open that she won by defeating Serena Williams in a tumultuous final.

What is clear is that the catalyst in Paris, if only the catalyst, was one of professional sport’s staples: the news conference.

Osaka, citing her mental health, announced ahead of the tournament that she would not “do any press” during the French Open. News conferences are required at the Grand Slams for players who are requested, and Osaka was the first tennis star to make it clear that she intended to break the rule for as long as she was in the tournament.

Her announcement on social media caught the French Open organizers and sport’s leadership by surprise. That was her first misjudgment. Her next was failing to be accessible when those tennis leaders justifiably sought more information.

Gilles Moretton, the new French Tennis Federation president, and others repeatedly tried to speak with her without success.

When she did indeed skip the news conference after her first-round victory on Sunday over Patricia Maria Tig, the French Open fined her $15,000 and the Grand Slam tournament chiefs made it clear that she risked being defaulted from the tournament and future Grand Slam tournaments if she continued to decline to fulfill her media duties.

It was a hard line: too hard in light of what Osaka explained on Monday night. “I feel for her, and I feel the sport in general has mishandled this,” said Pam Shriver, a former leading player and president of the WTA Tour Players Association. “I just feel that Grand Slam statement poured fuel on the flames in a way that was irreversible. I feel they should have kept their views and efforts quiet, not made them public, and worked behind the scenes. All the more so because the pandemic is still the elephant in the room and has been so hard on so many young people.”

Depression is more common in sports than many would expect. The problem was that Osaka did not offer tennis’s leaders that explanation — in public or apparently in private — until Monday night.

Considering Osaka’s prominence and the increased awareness of and sensitivity to athletes’ mental-health challenges, it is hard to imagine that Moretton or the other Grand Slam leaders would not have tried to work with her to find a more conciliatory short-term solution if they had been given a clearer picture.

Instead, they were left too long in the dark: with Osaka focusing her pretournament complaints on reforming the sport’s player-media model, citing overly repetitive questions and lines of inquiry that made her doubt herself. There are perhaps better ways for professional journalists to find out more about tennis players and their matches.

Tennis champions and would-be champions have been dealing with such challenges in the interview room for decades and if Osaka is sensitive to questions about her weaknesses on clay, imagine how Pete Sampras felt when he was asked about his own failings for more than a decade as he tried and failed to win Roland Garros.

And yet he kept showing up for news conferences and chasing the prize, just as Jana Novotna did at Wimbledon before finally winning the singles title in 1998.

As Billie Jean King likes to say, pressure is a privilege, and repetitive questions are an inconvenience but also a reflection of legitimate public interest. Media coverage, much of it favorable, has helped Osaka become the world’s best paid female athlete. She earned more than $55 million in the last year, nearly all of it from sponsorship deals.

That brings its own new pressures. “She has lots on her back,” said Marin Cilic, the Croatian men’s star who once broke down in the middle of a Wimbledon final.

But facing unwelcome questions, even in defeat, does not seem like too much to ask. “No comment” or a more polite demurral remain legitimate options. But one of the takeaways from l’affaire Osaka may be the realization that some players really do find it all too much to bear (and it did not go unnoticed that Moretton took no questions at his own short news conference on Monday night). The debate will be, how much special treatment should such players receive?

One of the reasons for the Grand Slam tournaments’ hard line with Osaka was the desire for fairness.

“I think Naomi has always struggled with public speaking and dealing with the press has always made her anxious and so it’s finally come to a head,” said Rennae Stubbs, a former No. 1 doubles player who is now a tour-level coach and ESPN analyst. “You cannot allow a player to have an unfair advantage by not doing post-match press. It’s time consuming, so if one player is not doing that and others are, that is not equal. But after this, it’s time to really take a hard, long look at all of it.”

Williams was sympathetic after her first-round victory in Paris on Monday.

“I feel for Naomi,” she said. “I feel like I wish I could give her a hug because I know what it’s like. I’ve been in those positions. We have different personalities, and people are different.”

“I’m thick,” Williams said, possibly referring to being thick-skinned. “Other people are thin. Everyone is different, and everyone handles things differently. You just have to let her handle it the way she wants to, in the best way she thinks she can.”

That is a fine sentiment, but it is also important to learn when things go awry. It seems clear that if this unfortunate situation had been handled differently from the start, Osaka would not have felt she had become too much of a distraction and would be getting ready for round two in Paris instead of packing her bags, unsure of when she will play next with Wimbledon starting in less than a month.

But the underlying issues that Osaka faces would likely have remained.

“The bottom line is that this is about more than talking to the press,” Navratilova said. “This goes much deeper than that, and we have no way of knowing, nor should we speculate, just how deep it does go.”

Naomi Osaka's withdrawal throws athletes' mental health into sports spotlight

Tennis star Naomi Osaka's decision to push back against the sport's authorities and share her mental health struggles has drawn support from across the sports world and boosted hopes that greater attention will be given to the pressures faced by athletes, particularly women and players of color.

Osaka withdrew from the French Open on Monday after clashing with officials over her desire to skip media interviews to prioritize her mental health.

The move has thrust her into the heart of an ongoing debate about what sports demand of athletes who compete at the highest levels — as well as the burden placed on minorities in traditionally white-dominated spaces.

Ranked No. 2 in the world, Osaka moved to the United States at age 3 and has Japanese and Haitian heritage. She said this week that she has "suffered long bouts of depression" since being catapulted into the global spotlight after an unexpected victory over Serena Williams in the U.S. Open in 2018.

Osaka said that she found some of the tournament rules for players "outdated" and "thought it was better to exercise self-care and skip the press conferences."

A number of Black female tennis players from the U.S. have expressed their support.

On Tuesday Coco Gauff said she admired Osaka's "vulnerability," while Serena Williams said it was important to remember that everyone was different when it came to handling the spotlight.

Sloane Stephens said Osaka should be applauded, adding that she hoped her decision would lead to more frank dialogue about the pressures many players face.

"A lot of people play through being miserable and being upset. ... I think instead of basically traumatizing her and making fun of her situation, we should be more accepting," Stephens said at a news conference after her first-round victory Tuesday.

"Feelings are real, and we're all human," she added.

Other athletes joined in the chorus of support, including NBA stars and Olympic champions.

But will Osaka's decision prompt lasting change?

Despite the solidarity from fellow athletes, some sports experts were critical of what they saw as a slow and inadequate response from tennis authorities.

French tennis officials initially threatened to suspend Osaka and fined her $15,000 for not participating in media interviews during the tournament.

However, on Tuesday, the four Grand Slam tournaments released a joint statement commending Osaka for sharing her experience and promising to make things better for players.

"On behalf of the Grand Slams, we wish to offer Naomi Osaka our support and assistance in any way possible as she takes time away from the court," the group said in a statement. "Mental health is a very challenging issue, which deserves our utmost attention."

The tennis community pledged to create "meaningful improvement" for players at all tournaments, the statement added, although it did not outline specific steps.

"The French Open has mishandled the situation terribly and hurt themselves, and the game of tennis, in the process," Dan Kilvington, co-creator of the Talking Race podcast,told NBC News.

"Rather than reach out and support Osaka, tennis decided to sanction her. This has to change."

Kilvington said some of the media obligations faced by tennis players were "outdated" and that Osaka faced "additional scrutiny" for her stances, highlighting race and mental health.

"We must understand the additional pressures on minoritized ethnic athletes competing in predominantly white spaces, such as tennis. There becomes a burden of representation," Kilvington said.

At last year's U.S. Open, Osaka wore masks emblazoned with "George Floyd" and "Breonna Taylor" highlighting police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement to her global fans.

"The additional responsibility of being a role model and trailblazer from a minoritized ethnic background has been overlooked by the event organizers," Kilvington added.

"The very fact that Black, Asian and minoritized ethnic people are more likely to suffer from mental health issues such as depression and anxiety has been ignored."

Osaka's sponsors, among them Nike and Mastercard, also lauded her courage in sharing her mental health experiences.

Leaders of the Japan Tennis Association said Osaka's health should be a top priority and a Japanese government official, Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato, told a news conference on Tuesday he would "watch over her quietly."

But for some critics, sports stars should not get special treatment given the riches on offer while Osaka's race and gender should be irrelevant.

"Are high-profile women of colour exempt from criticism regardless of their conduct? Sorry, I must have missed that woke memo!" tweeted British journalist Piers Morgan.

"I have a problem with high-profile people who exploit the media for huge financial gain and then attack the same media and use mental health as a weapon to silence criticism," he said in a separate tweet after writing a newspaper column on the issue this week.

Kevin Hylton, emeritus professor of equality and diversity in sport at Britain's Leeds Beckett University, called for better "pastoral support" for tennis players but acknowledged athletes have a "symbiotic relationship" with the world media.

He said the topic of mental health was becoming more openly discussed in other sports too, such as boxing and rugby.

"Sports people are more willing to talk about mental health but the key is whether their sports are willing to listen," Hylton told NBC News.

As a woman of color, Osaka would likely face issues of racism her white counterparts would not have to contend with, Hylton added, affecting her "psyche" and mental well-being.

"Too many people will keep these problems hidden. We need people to come out," Hylton said. "I think Naomi Osaka has done the tennis world and sports a favor."

Here’s How Running and Other Sports Can Impact Your Mental Health, According to Asics

A look at how to use the Asics Mind Uplifter.

CREDIT: Courtesy of Asics

Asics wants to show people the impact that fitness can have on their own minds — and it’s turning to research to prove it.

To mark Global Running Day, the sportswear brand announced the launch of Mind Uplifter — a platform that runners can use to capture their pre- and post-run mental wellbeing. Using a combination of facial scanning technology and self-reported data collection, they will be able to see how participating in running and other sports can affect them across 10 emotional and cognitive metrics, including confidence, positivity and focus.

According to Asics, the data will feed into a live global study to create an interactive World Uplift Map, which will be able to track the so-called “collective mood” of cities, countries and even continents.

“As we all come to terms with a much-changed world in the wake of the pandemic, the uplifting power of sport is a constant that endures,” president and COO Yasuhito Hirota said in a statement. “That’s why our sole ambition is to empower as many people as possible to experience the physical and mental benefits of movement.”

He added, “By taking part in any number of our different events and activities running across the year, you’ll contribute to vital research to help us further understand the uplifting effect of sport.”

Over the past six months, Asics has worked in partnership with King’s College London researcher Dr. Brendon Stubbs and San Francisco-based bioinformatics firm EMOTIV to develop a study focused on those core emotional and cognitive metrics among a sample of 42 professional and novice athletes. It found that participants who completed a 20-minute run saw a 15.9% increase in calmness, 14.3% rise in levels of contentment, 13.4% improvement in alertness and 13.3% in relaxation.

“Our preliminary research findings outline the profound impact that something as simple as a 20-minute run can have on our minds,” Stubbs said. “With exercise playing such a valuable role in maintaining of our mental health and wellbeing, it is more important than ever that people can see and understand the positive link between the two.”

To use the platform, Asics has invited people to visit a dedicated Mind Uplifter page, scan their face, answer questions and complete at least 20 minutes of an exercise of their choosing. Then, they’re invited to complete another facial scan and questionnaire before getting their results and sharing them on social media using the hashtag #UpliftingMinds.

The brand is also hosting a World Uplifting Minds Run, as well as a series of other sporting events across the year to encourage broader participation.