Speaker 1: Before we begin, a reminder to please rate and review
Speaker 1: our show. It helps new listeners discover us and grow
Speaker 1: the program. On this episode of Sports Illustrated Weekly, this
Speaker 1: year marks the fiftieth anniversary of Title nine, a landmark
Speaker 1: and crucial federal civil rights law that's had a huge
Speaker 1: impact on women's sports. But despite all the progress that's
Speaker 1: been made over the last half century, there's still work
Speaker 1: to be done. Our producer, Jessica your Mooski, spoke with
Speaker 1: four SI staffers about five very real hurdles that women
Speaker 1: in sports are still facing. You'll hear Kristen Nelson, Emma Bachelory,
Speaker 1: Julie Kleigman, and Jamie Losanti talk about how to close
Speaker 1: pay gaps, improve media coverage, fixed disparities and merchandise, ensure
Speaker 1: that trans women have a place in athletics, and how
Speaker 1: women's sports can become accepted by the mainstream. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: John Gonzalez from Sports Illustrated and I heart video. This
Speaker 1: is Sports Illustrated Weekly. I'm Kristen Nelson. I am an
Speaker 1: associate editor at S. I work primarily on the special
Speaker 1: Projects team, and I'm also are Women's Sports editor. Right now,
Speaker 1: the paid disparities between men and women's sports can be
Speaker 1: anywhere froment to The average female athlete is making anywhere
Speaker 1: from a hundred percent less than her average male counterpart,
Speaker 1: and that's according to a study from last year from
Speaker 1: Adelphi University. That's not an entirely encouraging thing to hear,
Speaker 1: but the last couple of years have been really encouraging,
Speaker 1: especially when you look at the US women's soccer team,
Speaker 1: who had their big settlement back in February to have
Speaker 1: equal pay as the men's team. It's still a lot
Speaker 1: of to be done. M Title nine kind of creates
Speaker 1: this pipeline of female athletes where at the youth level
Speaker 1: and at the college level they are given the same opportunities,
Speaker 1: which then sets the groundwork for the professional level, and
Speaker 1: therefore there's now so many more women athletes who can
Speaker 1: then go on and do it professionally rather than just
Speaker 1: playing when they were younger and then having to change
Speaker 1: their career or become a mother or whatever it is.
Speaker 1: The gap exists because on a bigger scale, women's sports
Speaker 1: is kind of in its infancy compared to men's sports.
Speaker 1: In terms of being recognized by the modern society, there's
Speaker 1: really only been fifty years of women's sports. All of
Speaker 1: these professional leagues did not exist fifty years ago. I
Speaker 1: think a lot of the progress that we've seen at
Speaker 1: chipping away at the pay gap in women's sports is
Speaker 1: from the athletes themselves and not necessarily the executives or
Speaker 1: the leagues. It requires the athletes to either take these
Speaker 1: teams or these governing bodies to court or their players
Speaker 1: unions to really battle in the boardroom at the table
Speaker 1: to really bargain for what they deserve. Thankfully, it seems
Speaker 1: like a lot of the commissioners and the leagues are
Speaker 1: listening right now, and I think that's turning into the
Speaker 1: fact that we're seeing these minimum salaries go up and
Speaker 1: we're seeing these settlements. And it also turns then to
Speaker 1: investors and finding people on Madison Avenue willing to put
Speaker 1: in money to these leagues, into these teams and see
Speaker 1: these athletes to give them the investment that they deserve.
Speaker 1: The n c AS Name, Image and Likeness Rule has
Speaker 1: been a massive success for women. About two thirds of
Speaker 1: the n I L deals have gone to men, but
Speaker 1: through March, the non football deals have gone to women.
Speaker 1: So when you look at the breakdown of college athletes
Speaker 1: who have n i L deals. Women's basketball is second
Speaker 1: behind football, and then women's volleyball, women swimming and diving,
Speaker 1: and softball or within the top six, and that's of
Speaker 1: all sports. The n i L deals are giving them
Speaker 1: a resource that they never had before. You think about
Speaker 1: it a lot with some of the Olympic sports as well.
Speaker 1: College gymnastics had a huge boom this season because of
Speaker 1: the n i L deals that they were allowed to make.
Speaker 1: If she's sick this dismount it could be another ten
Speaker 1: for studies a lead conto. So I think in a
Speaker 1: way it keeps some of the really star athletes in
Speaker 1: college because they can start making that money that they
Speaker 1: deserve a little sooner. But it's also just recognizing the
Speaker 1: women who only for so long have college as the
Speaker 1: final stopping point to make at least some money from
Speaker 1: the sports that they're playing. I think we are not
Speaker 1: close to seeing women athletes being paid the same as men.
Speaker 1: I think I saw a graphic this week that Lebron
Speaker 1: james Is salary this season was three times as much
Speaker 1: as the entire w NBA salary for the whole season,
Speaker 1: which is absurd. I do think these last couple of
Speaker 1: years have been really encouraging though that things are moving
Speaker 1: in the right direction. When it comes to closing the
Speaker 1: pay gap, it's still an upward battle, but it seems
Speaker 1: it feels a little less deep because people are finally
Speaker 1: starting to look at it a bit differently. And what
Speaker 1: it's going to take is just more exposure, more promotion.
Speaker 1: It just needs to be a bit more of the
Speaker 1: every day and not a special event. These are athletes
Speaker 1: who are putting their entire careers and bodies and souls
Speaker 1: into the sports that they play, but a lot of
Speaker 1: times we don't see that full commitment like we do
Speaker 1: with men's sports, and you can't just expect things to
Speaker 1: change overnight, especially when we do live in a patriarchal society.
Speaker 1: We need to find these certain subjects and chip away
Speaker 1: at the issues. It is burdensome and it's frustrating to
Speaker 1: think that it does have to be done, but you
Speaker 1: have to start somewhere. You can't see true equality without
Speaker 1: doing these smaller battles. First, my name is Jamie Losanti
Speaker 1: and I am the assistant managing editor of Special Projects.
Speaker 1: As Sports Illustrated fifty years post o nine. I really
Speaker 1: feel like for women's sports media coverage. This is a
Speaker 1: huge turning point moment in Now that we've passed the
Speaker 1: anniversary and we've got six seven months of women's sports
Speaker 1: under our belt, it's more evident than ever that this
Speaker 1: is a big point in time for leagues, for women,
Speaker 1: for the media outlets, for everyone across the board. The
Speaker 1: anniversary is definitely a celebration worthy, but there's also so
Speaker 1: much more progress to be made right now. The sports
Speaker 1: industry realizes that there's an appetite for women's sports and
Speaker 1: people are hungry for it, and they're getting really frustrated
Speaker 1: by the fact that they can't find things. But on
Speaker 1: the flip side, when they do put women's sports front
Speaker 1: and center, the proof is there. If you give them
Speaker 1: the opportunity to watch it, women will match or even
Speaker 1: beat what men's sports are doing ratings wise and viewership wise,
Speaker 1: and even the tenants wise. I think the Euros are
Speaker 1: sort of the best example because it was sold out,
Speaker 1: everyone was watching, and now all of a sudden, the
Speaker 1: USA England Friendly that's going to happen in October immediately
Speaker 1: sold out and people are like, Okay, when can I watch? Right,
Speaker 1: there's this renewed interest which is really well timed ahead
Speaker 1: of Women's World Cup in the summer. In the next
Speaker 1: few years, both the NWSL and the w n b
Speaker 1: A are going to have the opportunity to renegotiate their
Speaker 1: broadcast contracts. So right now both leagues are locked into
Speaker 1: these seals, and whether it's with ESPN or other big partners,
Speaker 1: the games are on TV, you can watch them. But
Speaker 1: I think there's a lot of frustration by fans, players, owners, teams,
Speaker 1: et cetera. That the games are there, but they're sometimes
Speaker 1: on at strange times, and they're sometimes hard to find,
Speaker 1: and maybe they're also overlapping with other big sporting events,
Speaker 1: particularly men's sporting events. The renegotiation of these broadcast deals
Speaker 1: is going to be a huge factor increasing visibility and
Speaker 1: accessibility for fans. Again, the appetite is their fans have
Speaker 1: proven that they want to watch women's sports. So I
Speaker 1: think we're going to see these major leagues start to
Speaker 1: have super lucrative deals, but deals that also allow fans
Speaker 1: to watch on many different channels, or on channels that
Speaker 1: are just easier to find, part of packages, more streaming
Speaker 1: options things like that. I think fans have proven that
Speaker 1: when there's something big on TV, whether it's a women's match,
Speaker 1: men's match, whatever it is, if you give them that
Speaker 1: prime time, you'll capture that prime time audience. So I
Speaker 1: think that will be a huge factor in visibility. In
Speaker 1: accessibility for me are the two most important ones that
Speaker 1: broadcasters and leagues need to figure out to get the
Speaker 1: product out there. And on the flip side, places like
Speaker 1: Sports Illustrated can start to tell the story of these
Speaker 1: women and their personalities, and we can get to know
Speaker 1: the women both in competition and we can see crazy
Speaker 1: highlights and we can really get engaged in the competition,
Speaker 1: but then also get to know them and their personalities
Speaker 1: and what they stand for and all of the things
Speaker 1: that we attached to with men's sports. In a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, we talk about cultural acceptance or the idea
Speaker 1: of the mainstream fan embracing a female athlete versus a
Speaker 1: male athlete. I think when you see something, it's a
Speaker 1: lot easier to kind of quote unquote accepted, and then
Speaker 1: that personality angle really can bring people down to a
Speaker 1: personable level where you can kind of feel connected to
Speaker 1: an athlete in a lot of ways. I like to
Speaker 1: think of myself as a positive person, so I'm hopeful
Speaker 1: because doing all of this research and learning and hearing
Speaker 1: from the women of fifty years ago who were coming
Speaker 1: up at this time of Title nine, there has been
Speaker 1: already so much progress, And because I feel like with
Speaker 1: the anniversary of Title nine and everything that's been happening
Speaker 1: in women's sports and just generally in our country, I
Speaker 1: feel like this is a turning point. This is a
Speaker 1: big moment, and I don't think the sports industry, the
Speaker 1: money makers, the stakeholders of people who are involved here
Speaker 1: that steer the ship in a way. I don't think
Speaker 1: they will let this fall through. I think this is
Speaker 1: the moment where things start to climb. Is it going
Speaker 1: to happen a straight shot? Not at all. I don't
Speaker 1: think so. I think we'll have some issues where there's
Speaker 1: a game at the same time of a really big
Speaker 1: men's event, or something gets bumped onto ESPN to These
Speaker 1: things are going to happen, but hopefully less so as
Speaker 1: we continue to go along. My name is Emma Bachelory.
Speaker 1: I'm a staff writer a Sports Illustrated where I primarily
Speaker 1: cover baseball, but also women's sports, including women's college basketball
Speaker 1: and college football. If you'd like to buy an NBA
Speaker 1: jersey and you log onto NBA dot com and navigate
Speaker 1: to the store, you'll see that you can buy pretty
Speaker 1: much any jersey you want. There are two thousands, seven
Speaker 1: and seven currently available for sale, which includes every single
Speaker 1: player in the league, any size you want, youth, adult, men's, women's, home, away,
Speaker 1: alternate jerseys, plenty of options two thousand, seven and seven.
Speaker 1: If you'd like a w NBA jersey, on the other hand,
Speaker 1: you navigate to w NBA dot com to the store
Speaker 1: section and you'll see forty five jerseys, not forty five
Speaker 1: players whose jersey are is available for sale. Forty five jerseys,
Speaker 1: which includes multiple options for a handful of the biggest
Speaker 1: stars like super and Diana Trassi, and none at all
Speaker 1: for many others. If fans want a jersey for a
Speaker 1: favorite player, they might have to do a more expensive
Speaker 1: customized option because the jerseys simply aren't made. In reporting this,
Speaker 1: I talked to Tyrone Palmer. It's the Chicago Sky fan
Speaker 1: was followed the team for years. He was very excited
Speaker 1: when the team won the w NBA Finals last year
Speaker 1: and decided it was finally time for him to pick
Speaker 1: up a Colleia Copper jersey. She was named Finals MVP.
Speaker 1: This is her fifth season, but the Sky her sixth
Speaker 1: season in the w n b A. He assumed it
Speaker 1: would be easy to get a jersey. You know, she's
Speaker 1: been on this team for a while, she's been in
Speaker 1: the league even longer. Why wouldn't you be able to
Speaker 1: get a jersey of the Finals m v P. And
Speaker 1: yet he found out that it was impossible. It just
Speaker 1: wasn't available. He was looking looking five surely after winning
Speaker 1: Finals MVP, something is going to change here, and it didn't.
Speaker 1: The fact that that wasn't available was just frustrating. He
Speaker 1: knew he wasn't alone. That he wanted to give his
Speaker 1: money to the league. He wanted to support his favorite team,
Speaker 1: a player that he loved, and it just wasn't there.
Speaker 1: The league has said it would be working on this
Speaker 1: for a while. This last year has kind of made
Speaker 1: it into a tipping point, and so finally, eventually Cleo
Speaker 1: Copper jerseys were made available, putting stock on the league's website,
Speaker 1: and Tyrone Palmer was finally able to get his hands
Speaker 1: on a jersey. This is a complicated, multilayered issue. The
Speaker 1: league has said that they're interested in making a change
Speaker 1: here and we have seen more investment in the last
Speaker 1: couple of years, but they only got their first major
Speaker 1: merch partner in exporting goods two years ago. The last
Speaker 1: two years have obviously been kind of a fraud time
Speaker 1: for supply chains for trying to build out new products.
Speaker 1: There are complicated moving pieces there that it takes a
Speaker 1: while to get something up and running. But I do
Speaker 1: think part of it is not realizing what the demand
Speaker 1: is there. The reason it took so long to get
Speaker 1: this off the ground, even as you had fans clamoring
Speaker 1: please let me give you money. I want to buy
Speaker 1: a jersey, I want options. I will do what it
Speaker 1: takes to be able to wrap my team, my favorite player.
Speaker 1: Just let me pay you for that. Those voices were
Speaker 1: being heard on social media. You here it out arenas,
Speaker 1: and it took a really long time for them to
Speaker 1: recognize that, Okay, this is an actual demand. There's a
Speaker 1: constituency in w n B, a fan base that wants this,
Speaker 1: and it's worth going out and trying to meet it.
Speaker 1: I think this is a situation where yes and raw
Speaker 1: numbers the fan bases here are much smaller than what
Speaker 1: you might see in older and more established leagues that
Speaker 1: have that kind of big mainstream popularity in many men's sports.
Speaker 1: But even though the fan bases can be smaller, they're
Speaker 1: so passionate because they've had to really fight to get
Speaker 1: access to the sport they want to see. You can't
Speaker 1: accidentally walk into becoming a fan of women's sports. It's
Speaker 1: usually you have to make a conscious choice, like this
Speaker 1: isn't in prime time, this isn't on basic cable. I
Speaker 1: have to go seek this out. I have to put
Speaker 1: in the effort to to follow this, to establish this fandom.
Speaker 1: It's not the sort of thing that you can just
Speaker 1: pick up by osmosis. There's real dedication here for a
Speaker 1: lot of these fans. I'm Julie Kligman and I'm the
Speaker 1: copy chief Sports Illustrated. I also report on mental health
Speaker 1: and trans athletes. This might make me sound really cynical,
Speaker 1: but I think the landscape for trains athletes right now
Speaker 1: it's kind of bleak. It's very daunting. There are so
Speaker 1: many states more than fifteen that currently banded trains athletes
Speaker 1: from participating on it might be the middle school level,
Speaker 1: at high school level, the college level. Most of those
Speaker 1: laws are targeted at girls and women but there are
Speaker 1: laws targeted at boys and men too, And so the
Speaker 1: question is who has the right to be a woman
Speaker 1: under Title nine? And that's at the center of all
Speaker 1: of this, and I think we have a long way
Speaker 1: to go if we want to prioritize inclusion in those spaces.
Speaker 1: Title nine is a little murky with regard to trans athletes.
Speaker 1: There's been a similar ruling on Title seven that does
Speaker 1: apply to gender based discrimination in a separate area, not
Speaker 1: about sports. Title seven prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex,
Speaker 1: and now sational origin. Is that a one to one
Speaker 1: where you can kind of like port that over to
Speaker 1: Title nine? Not necessarily Obviously, advocates think yes, and people
Speaker 1: who oppose trans rights think no. And upon taking office,
Speaker 1: President Biden said that Title nine does prohibit gender based discrimination,
Speaker 1: but that doesn't really go far enough to answer the question.
Speaker 1: So the question is kind of unresolved as to how
Speaker 1: Title nine addresses this issue. Anti trans proponents have said
Speaker 1: that protecting Title nine is what they're doing when they
Speaker 1: ban trains athletes from participation. When they talk about protecting women,
Speaker 1: they're really talking about cis gender women and girls, not
Speaker 1: transgender women and girls. Regardless of how you want to
Speaker 1: read Title nine or what your interpretation of it is,
Speaker 1: this is clear lead discrimination based on gender identity. Celebrations
Speaker 1: of Title nine honestly rang a little bit hollow to
Speaker 1: me for this reason because I think it was the
Speaker 1: very next day that some restrictions on trans athletes started
Speaker 1: coming down. Yeah, we're talking about how conditions have improved
Speaker 1: for certain categories of women and certain categories of people,
Speaker 1: and Title nine has a long way to go with
Speaker 1: regard to all female athletes. I don't think many people
Speaker 1: would dispute that that there's still gains to be made.
Speaker 1: The stakes in the Title nine debate are really high
Speaker 1: for trans athletes. It's been shown scientifically that even when
Speaker 1: these quote unquote debates happen around their identity, that's detrimental
Speaker 1: to their mental health, let alone actually being banned and
Speaker 1: p ended from, honestly just on most levels, recreational activities
Speaker 1: with their friends. That's really serious. A lot of queer
Speaker 1: youth don't participate in sports to begin with because they
Speaker 1: don't feel welcome, and this is only exacerbating that issue.
Speaker 1: I think the important thing to note here is that
Speaker 1: transgender people are people. Trans athletes are athletes. We do
Speaker 1: best in sports when we invite the full range of
Speaker 1: competition and make everybody feel welcome. And that's the first
Speaker 1: and foremost goal of sports on almost every level is
Speaker 1: to have fun, and on the Olympic and pro levels,
Speaker 1: it's about facing the best competition you could possibly face.
Speaker 1: So I don't see why we want to encourage that.
Speaker 1: Mainstream acceptance is a really amorphous concept, But I think
Speaker 1: the big thing is just feeling like a woman's sports fan.
Speaker 1: Anyone who wants to watch women's sports can just see
Speaker 1: it as an accepted part of the sports landscape, not
Speaker 1: its own little niche or silo. We've seen a lot
Speaker 1: of steps towards that in the last couple of years,
Speaker 1: I think with what's on TV social media, I think
Speaker 1: has been really great for harnessing the energy of fans
Speaker 1: who want to see that, who are excited to show
Speaker 1: up when it's put out there for them, of bringing
Speaker 1: in new fans who are recognizing there is something here
Speaker 1: that I want to engage with. So we've seen a
Speaker 1: lot of strides toward it, I think, but there's still
Speaker 1: just a long way to go to having that feel
Speaker 1: like the accepted norm. It's not just about women in sports.
Speaker 1: It's about women in society and women in other forms
Speaker 1: of media, whether it's movies or TV shows or music
Speaker 1: or anything. This doesn't happen in a vacuum, right, But
Speaker 1: I do think that part of the reason you have
Speaker 1: seen change in the last couple of years is as
Speaker 1: you've also seen change in other areas in terms of
Speaker 1: women having a seat at the table, women getting more
Speaker 1: representation in different areas of business, of media, all of
Speaker 1: that um that all built on each other. So even
Speaker 1: if it's not sports specific, I think you see kind
Speaker 1: of a humulation effect. The Sports Bar is a bar
Speaker 1: in Portland, organ that only shows women's sports. It was
Speaker 1: really cool and exciting to have this conversation with the owner, Jenny,
Speaker 1: who started this because it was something that she felt
Speaker 1: she wanted and didn't have access to. She was tired
Speaker 1: of going to a bar with friends, and the tipping
Speaker 1: point for her was going on the name of the
Speaker 1: Woman's Final Four a few years ago and having to
Speaker 1: ask can this please be put on a TV? And
Speaker 1: you get one TV in the corner with no sound,
Speaker 1: and just feeling like there are enough fans out there
Speaker 1: who would come to just to watch the Women's Final Four,
Speaker 1: to watch women's college basketball, women's sports in general. There's
Speaker 1: an audience there who would want to feel like there's
Speaker 1: a place for them to feel like there's a kind
Speaker 1: of environment that not just tolerates women's sports fans, but
Speaker 1: welcomes them and caters to them and recognizes them as
Speaker 1: their own group. She was someone who has a lot
Speaker 1: of experience working in kitchens. She's primarily a chef, but
Speaker 1: decided she was going to take a leap and open
Speaker 1: her own place and have it be a sports bar
Speaker 1: that only shows women's sports. There are lots of expected
Speaker 1: challenges with opening up your own establishment and obviously not
Speaker 1: an industry with lots of room for error, but one
Speaker 1: of the things that surprised her was that the hardest
Speaker 1: part was how do you feel a calendar with just
Speaker 1: women's sports that even though there were lots of sports
Speaker 1: out there, in terms of what's actually on TV, it's
Speaker 1: not like there is a women's sports cable package the
Speaker 1: same way you can do the NFL Sunday package. Like
Speaker 1: these options are just presented out there for fans. You
Speaker 1: really had to hunt down one sport at a time.
Speaker 1: Some of these aren't on cauble. Some of these are
Speaker 1: on Twitch on smaller platforms where you have to access
Speaker 1: in a different way when you're going to show them
Speaker 1: at a bar, So it was surprisingly complicated to have
Speaker 1: to fill out how do we actually make sure we
Speaker 1: have something on whenever someone walks into the bar we
Speaker 1: have a women's sport on TV. I'm really hopeful by
Speaker 1: what we've seen over the last few years, the viewership
Speaker 1: numbers that we've seen for women's college basketball, for women's
Speaker 1: college softball, women's soccer, the NWUSL, the US women's national team.
Speaker 1: Those numbers do give me a lot of hope that
Speaker 1: people have recognized when you put this out there, there
Speaker 1: are a lot of people who want to tune in
Speaker 1: and watch, but it's it's more complicated did than that
Speaker 1: they think the last few years have been inspiring and heartening,
Speaker 1: there's still a long way to go. Well, I don't
Speaker 1: think we're there yet. Thanks for listening, and a reminder
Speaker 1: to please rate and review the show. It helps people
Speaker 1: find us. Sports Illustrated Weekly is a production of Sports
Speaker 1: Illustrated and I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from I
Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts
Speaker 1: or wherever you get your favorite shows, and for more
Speaker 1: Sports Illustrated It's best stories and podcasts, visit SI dot com.
Speaker 1: This episode of Sports Illustrated Weekly was produced by Jessica Armoski,
Speaker 1: Jordan Rozsieri, and Isaac Lee, who was also our sound engineer.
Speaker 1: Our senior producers are Dan Bloom and Harry sward Out.
Speaker 1: Our executive producers are Scott Brody and me John Gonzalez.
Speaker 1: Our theme song is by Nolan Schneider and if you've
Speaker 1: stuck around this song, we leave you with this. I
Speaker 1: have been athletes since I was four years old because
Speaker 1: my mom put me in everything she could when I
Speaker 1: was younger because I had way too much energy and
Speaker 1: she couldn't deal with me. So she found everything that
Speaker 1: she could sign me up for and was basically like,
Speaker 1: get this child out of my house