While being interviewed on the radio over the weekend, former tennis great John McEnroe said Serena Williams, widely considered the best female tennis player of all time, would be ranked No. 700 if she were on the men’s tour.
Headlines and tweets have been volleyed back and forth since.
McEnroe’s controversial statement raises a question: Who is the No. 700–ranked man in the world? Issam Haitham Taweel. There’s “no bio available” for him on the official ATP World Tour website, but according to Wikipedia he is a 27-year-old Egyptian who started playing tennis at the age of 13. Also, he stands just 5-foot-2.
Taweel has had slightly less success than Williams. He has earned $3,528 so far in singles in 2017, while Williams has made $2.7 million this year (winning the Australian Open helped). Taweel has racked up $53,000 in career winnings, while Williams has made $84.5 million — not including endorsements.
While speaking with David Letterman four years ago, Williams said she would lose badly to a top 5 male player.
But beyond saying how the top few women would do against the top few men, comparing male and female athletes is complicated and fraught. And, to be fair to McEnroe, he said Williams was “the best female player ever — no question.” But the interviewer asked him why he didn’t call Williams simply the best tennis player ever. “Why say female player?” the interviewer asked him. To which he replied, “Well because if she was in, if she played the men’s circuit, she’d be like 700 in the world.”
Williams was not happy about what McEnroe had said.
The most famous “battle of the sexes” took place in 1973, when 55-year-old Bobby Riggs, a former men’s Wimbledon champion, played 29-year-old women’s tennis pro Billie Jean King. Before the match, Riggs made several misogynistic comments, including that “the best way to handle women is to keep them pregnant and barefoot.” In front of 30,000 fans at the Houston Astrodome, King beat him 6-4, 6-3, 6-3.
Williams, 35, is pregnant and due in the fall, so she is not currently playing on the tour. But when she won the Australian Open in January — in the early stages of her pregnancy — it was her 23rd Grand Slam singles title. That’s more than anyone in the open era, which began in 1968 and marked the first time that both professionals and amateurs could compete for titles. Steffi Graf has 22. On the men’s side, Roger Federer has the most, with 18.
Williams is the only woman in Forbes’s recently released 100 highest-paid athleteslist. She made $27 million in 2016 — $8 million in tennis winnings and $19 million from endorsements.
As far as McEnroe is concerned, he isn’t saying he could beat Williams. On Tuesday’s “CBS This Morning,” discussing the controversy, he said he would rank himself No. 1,200 on today’s men’s tour.
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