Naomi Osaka | Vital Football

Naomi Osaka

S

Straightbat

Vital Reserves Team
It’s really not difficult to sort this out.

A player should be granted exemption from Grand Slam post match interviews if they present a medical professional’s/psychaiatrist’s/psychologist’s report (acceptable medical qualifications by country would need to be agreed though) confirming that the player has known mental health grounds for which reason the interviews could be harmful to their mental well being.

If they want to establish a voluntary code of practice for the press that could be a further consideration in future.

The situation with Naomi Osaka is that she has suffered depression. My proposal gets round the problem which the Grand Slams could be understandably concerned about, of the making of exceptions undermining the necessary involvement of the press in direct engagement with the players. Other players would not be able to decline interviews without sound medical reasons and they would not lightly seek certification for mental health issues (so only genuine cases of which I suspect there would be very very few would be exempt).

Players have to be up front about physical injuries - e.g. if they have to withdraw during a match. Having to provide evidence of a mental health issue would not be that different, it just may be less obvious outwardly so some additional evidence is needed.
 
Why is this even an issue ?
Why are sports administrators so obsessed with past-match interviews ?
...esp. while the player is sweaty, buzzing from the "high", unlikely to have had time to frame thoughts.
Which is why most interviews are predictable, formulaic....
...so mostly pointless.
And get in the way of seeing the highlights.

If the Admin. people think that there is an audience for this "puff", then be content to have those players who actually want to do it.
 
Straightbat said:
It’s really not difficult to sort this out.

A player should be granted exemption from Grand Slam post match interviews if they present a medical professional’s/psychaiatrist’s/psychologist’s report (acceptable medical qualifications by country would need to be agreed though) confirming that the player has known mental health grounds for which reason the interviews could be harmful to their mental well being.

If they want to establish a voluntary code of practice for the press that could be a further consideration in future.

The situation with Naomi Osaka is that she has suffered depression. My proposal gets round the problem which the Grand Slams could be understandably concerned about, of the making of exceptions undermining the necessary involvement of the press in direct engagement with the players. Other players would not be able to decline interviews without sound medical reasons and they would not lightly seek certification for mental health issues (so only genuine cases of which I suspect there would be very very few would be exempt).

Players have to be up front about physical injuries - e.g. if they have to withdraw during a match. Having to provide evidence of a mental health issue would not be that different, it just may be less obvious outwardly so some additional evidence is needed.
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I fear that it might take, God forbid, a suicide before much is done about this.
 
Tarian said:
Why is this even an issue ?
Why are sports administrators so obsessed with past-match interviews ?
...esp. while the player is sweaty, buzzing from the "high", unlikely to have had time to frame thoughts.
Which is why most interviews are predictable, formulaic....
...so mostly pointless.
And get in the way of seeing the highlights.

If the Admin. people think that there is an audience for this "puff", then be content to have those players who actually want to do it.
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Trouble is Tarian I think the sponsors/advertisers expect their players to have this additional airtime
 
Players are there to play sport - I accept that turning them into media celebs is part of sports these days but the choice should be down to the individual.

I really don't see why anyone should take part in an interview or anything else if they do not want to outside of the game itself, and they should not need to justify their decision either.
 
99% of interviews are full of dull clichés or interviewers trying to make something out of nothing. It's be nice to get rid of them but the media need to fill airtime and inches and maybe they'd come up with even more rubbish without them.

As it's about money (from the tournament/sponsors/media side) why not make them optional and the player can get a fee for doing them if they want?
 
LockdownLife said:
As it's about money (from the tournament/sponsors/media side) why not make them optional and the player can get a fee for doing them if they want?
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The "fee" is included in the prize money - 60k euros for 1st round loser, up to 1.4m euros for winner. I wonder what the prize money would be if the sponsors didn't put their money in, to get their logo displayed?

Agree with others, not interested in the interviews myself, but it doesn't seem much effort to make for the financial rewards on offer
 
What is unclear is as to the cause of Osaka's mental illness and what is the triggering issue. Is her depression simply down to her being a shy introvert and therefore she finds interviews to be stressfull full stop, or is it as per the likes of The Guardian who suggests the mainly white male press are particularly mean to her?

Depending on the trigger, the solution will be different.

From what has been said on Talk Sport by those in the know, the tennis players are essentially paid $20k to attend the press conferences as part of the contract they agree to when entering the tournament.

If a player refuses to do the press conferences then they should lose the financial rewards associated with the doing of the media side of things. Not sure why it is contraversal that she is fined. Certainly there have been numerous male tennis players who have skipped the post match press conference and have been happy to take the fine.
 
Baghdad_Rob said:
If a player refuses to do the press conferences then they should lose the financial rewards associated with the doing of the media side of things. Not sure why it is contraversal that she is fined. Certainly there have been numerous male tennis players who have skipped the post match press conference and have been happy to take the fine.
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That shows how much they are earning. Giving up 20k for half an hour's uncomfortable work. And people moan about what footballers earn
 
I agree that, should they be happy to pay any fine, then it's up to them to do what they want re interviews.
What I find disturbing is that at a time when mental illness is (quite rightly) being raised as a serious issue, especially amongst the young, tv companies are allowed to basically bully this young woman who surely deserves to be protected? It's easy to say "man up, it's part of being famous" but, as has been mentioned above, do we really have to wait for another tragic suicide before people sit up and listen? Those same tv people will be the first to jump on and sensationalise the story if that happened.
 
Baghdad_Rob said:
From what has been said on Talk Sport by those in the know, the tennis players are essentially paid $20k to attend the press conferences as part of the contract they agree to when entering the tournament.

If a player refuses to do the press conferences then they should lose the financial rewards associated with the doing of the media side of things. Not sure why it is contraversal that she is fined. Certainly there have been numerous male tennis players who have skipped the post match press conference and have been happy to take the fine.
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If that's the case, then I think the problem is more in the way the issue is presented. A fine is a punishment, and at the moment it comes across as Osaka being punished for having mental health issues.

If they were to present it in a different way (i.e. that the players are being paid to attend the press conferences, and any player is free not to attend, as long as they accept that that means they don't get paid that part of the prize money), I don't think there would be any problems with it.
 
ThreeSixes said:
The "fee" is included in the prize money - 60k euros for 1st round loser, up to 1.4m euros for winner. I wonder what the prize money would be if the sponsors didn't put their money in, to get their logo displayed?

Agree with others, not interested in the interviews myself, but it doesn't seem much effort to make for the financial rewards on offer
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I know the end result is largely the same thing but rather than punishing them for not doing the interviews they should be rewarded for doing them. So you're not a 'rule breaker' who's punished for wanting to protect mental health or just can't be bothered.

So maybe the 60k becomes 50k with a 10k interview bonus.

Of course organisers/media/sponsors wouldn't go for it cause all the top players who people actually care about wouldn't ever do interviews cause they don't need the money.
 
madrid_gill said:
If that's the case, then I think the problem is more in the way the issue is presented. A fine is a punishment, and at the moment it comes across as Osaka being punished for having mental health issues.

If they were to present it in a different way (i.e. that the players are being paid to attend the press conferences, and any player is free not to attend, as long as they accept that that means they don't get paid that part of the prize money), I don't think there would be any problems with it.
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You got there first 😉
 
Didn’t Sir Alex refuse interviews with the bbc for some time and every time he refused, he got fined, which he appeared happy to pay (or maybe not).
 
shotshy said:
Didn’t Sir Alex refuse interviews with the bbc for some time and every time he refused, he got fined, which he appeared happy to pay (or maybe not).
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And Marshawn Lynch in the NFL, just being deliberately awkward. There are people in the press office whose job it will be to get some sort of news post match. Again, 10k or 20k is a year's income for a lot of people people.

Tennis has to be a high pressure environment. Not everybody will be able to cope with all of it, but that is factored in to how much they earn
 
shotshy said:
Didn’t Sir Alex refuse interviews with the bbc for some time and every time he refused, he got fined, which he appeared happy to pay (or maybe not).
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Didn't he always send his assistant? Maybe there was a "get out" there as the club had supplied someone from the management team. No idea, just summising.
 
LockdownLife said:
I know the end result is largely the same thing but rather than punishing them for not doing the interviews they should be rewarded for doing them. So you're not a 'rule breaker' who's punished for wanting to protect mental health or just can't be bothered.

So maybe the 60k becomes 50k with a 10k interview bonus.

Of course organisers/media/sponsors wouldn't go for it cause all the top players who people actually care about wouldn't ever do interviews cause they don't need the money.
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FYI I understand your conclusion, however the big stars make most of their money with promotions, so I dare say if they suddenly aren't rocking up to an interview wearing their omega watch etc, then they would stand to lose a lot more cash than just their fee.

One problem that I would have with the fee structure you did mention would be is that it could be construed as a form of discrimination against those who's mental health would suffer damage if they attend, as after all it's not a choice for them.

If we're comparing mental health issues to physical health issues, as we really should be, it would be comparable to saying to a player that you get 10k extra if you can jump and touch the ceiling, it would discriminate against those of a short disposition, and wouldn't pass mustard.
 
ThreeSixes said:
And Marshawn Lynch in the NFL, just being deliberately awkward. There are people in the press office whose job it will be to get some sort of news post match. Again, 10k or 20k is a year's income for a lot of people people.

Tennis has to be a high pressure environment. Not everybody will be able to cope with all of it, but that is factored in to how much they earn
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Osaka was being fined 20k per non attendance, which is not the same as the 20k being considered an interview fee. The penalties were sufficiently high to stop players sacking it off, and I dare say only those at the very top of the game like Osaka could afford to not attend.

The reason they are paid that much isn't because of stress, or anything, it's because what they do brings a lot of money in from sponsors and fans, which is the same in any sport. So to say that stress is factored in to how much they earn is not true.
 
MedwayModernist said:
FYI I understand your conclusion, however the big stars make most of their money with promotions, so I dare say if they suddenly aren't rocking up to an interview wearing their omega watch etc, then they would stand to lose a lot more cash than just their fee.

One problem that I would have with the fee structure you did mention would be is that it could be construed as a form of discrimination against those who's mental health would suffer damage if they attend, as after all it's not a choice for them.

If we're comparing mental health issues to physical health issues, as we really should be, it would be comparable to saying to a player that you get 10k extra if you can jump and touch the ceiling, it would discriminate against those of a short disposition, and wouldn't pass mustard.
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Yeah I agree what you're saying. But this is where my old school realist mentality (even if I'm young) kicks in where people need to understand they can't have 100% of situations go 100% their way. People/businesses/everyone needs to compromise and decide what they find important. So that people can choose mental health over interviews or whatever it may be.

It would set an extraordinarily dangerous precedent to say paying players for interviews is discriminatory to those who wish to avoid them on mental health grounds. It's different but, I've accepted I'm no genius but should I really be saying I'm being discriminated against because Google won't hire me for a big job because I don't have the brain power to do the job?

The whole mental health exemption idea in the OP would solve that but even then I can see people kicking up a fuss about having to prove how they feel or that doctors misdiagnosed them. Again, there has to be a compromise somewhere.

For me it's the forced nature of the interviews that is the root cause of the problem.
 
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