So back in 1973 I, naturally, watched. Along with pretty much everyone else in this country. And when tennis queen Billie Jean King whipped has-been Bobby Riggs in straight sets inside the Houston Astrodome, it was hailed as an historic milestone for women in pro sports.
Now 30 years later, thanks in part to Billie Jean’s bravura act, America’s female pro athletes have ceased to be a novelty act, boasting far more than just a league of their own. Yet how far have we–or, more to the point, they–really come when the PGA debut of Annika Sorenstam on Thursday morning makes the biggest splash in distaff sports in years? Because when you come right down to it, the Annika show is essentially nothing more than an updated version–right down to the Texas setting–of that very same, very tired “Battle of the Sexes.”
I confess that I’ll be watching when Annika tees off Thursday for what will certainly be a daunting, pressure-packed 18-hole adventure. And maybe good ratings is all anyone involved in this circus really cares about. But I won’t be cheering. Not for or against her. I won’t be delighted if Sorenstam blisters the course and actually bests a number of the male PGA elite. Nor will I be secretly pleased if she succumbs to the heat–and I’m not talking about the Ft. Worth weather–and stinks up the course, exposing herself to the predictable chorus of male ridicule. I’m withholding, a one-man emotional boycott.
Why? Because put most simply, I think Sorenstam’s crossover challenge, while possibly good theater, is very bad for sports. And, even more important, very bad for women’s sports. Not because she might embarrass herself. Frankly, under this kind of pressure and the relentless glare of the spotlight, it will be amazing if Annika can keep par in sight. It’s that Sorenstam, whether she succeeds gloriously or fails miserably, is giving lie to what women have spent years insisting: that their games are not better or worse than men’s, but simply different–and must be judged on their own terms. And as one who prefers the pace of women’s tennis to the serve-and-volley men’s game, who has admired the fundamentals of the gals of the WNBA and who delights in the stellar teamwork in the WUSA, I have often said vive la difference.
Sorenstam makes no claim to anything beyond individual aspirations. But few others will see it that way. Annika, whether she wants to be or not, is woman out there on that golf course. And in playing the PGA tour and proclaiming it the ultimate challenge, Sorenstam is giving credence to the notion that the men’s game is the standard to which the female elite should aspire. And because of that, an Annika success might be even worse than an Annika flop. Where would that leave the other ladies of the LPGA? In a league of their own, for sure, but perhaps more than ever one that is a viewed as minor league. You know, the one reserved for lesser ladies who can’t step up and hold their own against men.
Billie Jean King told me that she salutes Sorenstam’s effort–“I think everybody should approve,” she said–and believes it’s not the result that matters, but that women are seen as accepting ever greater challenges. “And if she even makes the cut,” said King, “I think it will be like she won the whole thing.” Yet Billie Jean clearly recognizes the pitfalls of Sorenstam’s long walk in the Texas sun. She conceded to me that “it’s really scary” that in this day and age a women star has to perform this kind of stunt “to get the proper exposure.”
Only a few years ago, it sure seemed the exposure would be there for the asking. After Title IX babies produced a string of stirring Olympic and World Cup triumphs, this nation had appeared to embrace a new vision of its sports future. There were two women’s pro basketball leagues, a softball league, a soccer league and talk of a hockey league. Looking back, it’s easy to see how, for example, so many people confused one lazy summer’s obsession–the 1999 women’s World Cup team–with a real fervor for watching women’s soccer. Patriotism can cloud all kinds of things. But if they were really the same thing in sports, I might be going to a pro gymnastics meet tonight to watch Shannon Miller instead of to the Yankees-Red Sox game to watch Rocket Roger.
There was also the understandable misassumption that all the young women playing sports would automatically and rapidly become fans. But it turns out that athletes and fans aren’t necessarily the same. And while being a fan appears to be hard-wired in men, or at least conditioned from an early age as a price of their masculinity, women aren’t born with a couch-potato gene. And they don’t develop one just because they start competing in sports. Val Ackerman, president of the WNBA, says she was surprised to discover how steep the learning curve is for women to become fans. Many weren’t familiar with season tickets and didn’t intuitively grasp such basic concepts, at least basic to men, as ticket-splitting.
None of this might have mattered if the robust economy of the ’90s had kept steaming along. But it didn’t. As a result, all startup ventures, including ballyhooed men’s sports initiatives like the XFL, have encountered major difficulties. The new women’s leagues–without a significant corporate embrace, without a huge subsidy from TV deals, without extensive media coverage–were particularly vulnerable. A couple of leagues folded and the survivors like the WNBA and soccer’s WUSA have scaled back their ambitions and, though they might not admit it, are in survival mode. Even the longtime ladies’ tennis and golf tours are struggling to find sponsors and, at times, to attract fans.
Billie Jean says that it’s time once again for a crusade on behalf of women’s sports. This time not just to shore up Title IX because, regardless of any tinkering with it that might occur, there has been already been a sea change in this country. That women can and will play sports is taken for granted. So too, to a very large extent, is an underlying belief that it’s beneficial for girls to play sports. As a result, the very best young female athletes grow up today with the absolute faith that there will be opportunities for them to play sports in America–and to keep playing them beyond college–if they prove their mettle. And that’s what ain’t necessarily so.
Billie Jean wants women to use their political muscle on behalf of these girls’ dreams; for women to pressure corporations to put some money behind what they already give lip service to; to insist to the media that women’s sports deserve more than the scant coverage it now receives. All that would certainly help in what is a desperate time. But crusaders are ultimately of limited value. Sometimes they buy tickets as a show of support, but don’t bother to attend the games and, thus, don’t buy hot dogs, Diet Cokes and souvenirs that are critical money-makers for the teams.
What women’s sports needs far more than crusaders embracing a political ideal is fans simply showing up every day to embrace the product. And media showing up to cover it. Does anyone out there know that the WNBA opens its seventh season tomorrow? That Lisa Leslie, Chamique Holdsclaw, Sue Bird, Rebecca Lobo, Nykesha Sales, Teresa Edwards and a host of terrifically talented ladies will be playing for our entertainment? That Mia Hamm, Tiffeny Milbrett, Brandi Chastain, Aly Wagner, Cindy Parlow and friends are in midseason form and playing WUSA games in Boston, New York, Philly and North Carolina this weekend? And that, even without Annika, the LPGA is playing its 25th annual Corning Classic in upstate New York this weekend? How could anyone know when everyone is so preoccupied with Anna’s pipe dream.
