Episode 218: NWSL Mess
In this episode, Lindsay Gibbs, Shireen Ahmed and Jessica Luther start the show with a few of their favorite U.S. Open moments. Then, they discuss the off-the-field mess in the National Women's Soccer League, including a high turn over of coaches, broadcasting issues and an overall lack of transparency and accountability. They also talk about what changes are vital for the league to improve.
Following this discussion is Thursday's interview preview of Lindsay's talk with Courtney Stith and André Carlisle of the Diaspora United Podcast about NWSL on-the-field excitement. Then, they burn the worst of sports this week in the Burn Pile. Next, they celebrate those bringing light to sports and the world, which includes Golden Slam (!!!) wheelchair tennis champ Diede de Groot, and U.S. Open women's finalists Leylah Annie Fernandez and Emma Raducanu. Then, they wrap up the show with what's good in their lives and what sports they're watching this week.
This episode was produced by Tressa Versteeg. Shelby Weldon is our social media and website specialist. Burn It All Down is part of the Blue Wire podcast network.
Links
🚨 Donate to the Transgender Education Network of Texas, which is fighting against the transphobic school sports bill being introduced in the Texas legislature.
As NWSL gets more airtime, broadcasts struggle to keep pace: https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2021/07/27/nwsl-broadcats
‘He made me hate soccer’: Players say they left NWSL’s Spirit over coach’s verbal abuse https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2021/08/11/richie-burke-nwsl-spirit-verbal-abuse
Co-owners of NWSL’s Spirit fight for control after abuse allegations against coach: https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2021/08/30/washington-spirit-owners-steve-baldwin
How we'd fix soccer: Homegrown rule, academies would be great for NWSL — and USWNT https://www.yahoo.com/now/how-wed-fix-soccer-homegrown-rule-academies-would-be-good-for-nwsl-and-uswnt-180254345
Olivia Moultrie presents challenge to NWSL, MLS structures: https://theathletic.com/2516805/2021/04/13/olivia-moultrie-nwsl-mls
Imani Dorsey on activism, advocacy, and the Black Players of the NWSL Coalition: https://justwomenssports.com/sky-blue-fcs-imani-dorsey-on-activism-advocacy-and-the-black-players-of-the-nwsl-coalition
Transcript
Lindsay: Hello, flamethrowers. Lindsay Gibbs here. Welcome to Burn It All Down, the feminist sports podcast you both want and need. Joining me today is Jessica and Shireen, and we're going to talk a little tennis, a lot of NWSL. And then of course we've got the burn pile, we've got some torchbearers to lift up, and we'll finish this episode like we always do with some positivity, because this is where you come [Shireen laughs] for positivity every week. [laughter] It’s what we are best known for! But listen, I mean, speaking of positivity, I just can't do anything else until we talk about the US Open for like five minutes.
Shireen: Yes, yes!
Jessica: Let’s do it.
Lindsay: Just so everyone knows, we're recording this before the women's final, so we have not seen the women's final between Leylah Fernandez and Emma Raducanu. But I think we still have enough good things to talk about, that this is going to be fine. Jess, I'm going to go to you first, because after Shireen goes we might not have any time left! [Jessica laughs] So Jess, what's been your favorite moment of the US Open so far?
Jessica: It's hard to answer this question because it's been really fun. I know that Shireen will be talking about Leylah Fernandez, but the semi-final against Sabalenka was just phenomenal tennis. But one of my favorite matches that I watched – and I actually will admit, I turned it on in the middle, at the beginning early in the third set – but it was the round of 16 on the men's side, which…Here I am, talking about men's tennis! It was Frances Tiafoe from the US, and he played Félix Auger-Aliassime. They split the first two sets with Tiafoe taking the first, FAA taking the second, and then they played a tight, fun and intense third set that went to a tie break. And Tiafoe had to save three set points even to get there!
And like, it's one thing to watch tennis where they're just not playing well or like one player’s dominating. But there's like a whole other thing when both players are just fucking playing out of their minds, and these two were just playing at the top level of their tennis. It was 3-3 in the tie break! It was 6-6 in the tie break! And finally Félix at 6-5, he rattled off three points in a row. He took the third set. Frances kind of faded in the fourth, and so Félix won it in four. And it was just really exciting to watch these two Black men, one from Canada, one from the US, play on Arthur Ashe stadium and play just phenomenal tennis. And I had just so much fun watching it.
Lindsay: There've been just so many good matches.
Jessica: Yes.
Lindsay: Shireen…Go.
Shireen: Okay. So, I was on TV last night in Toronto, on CP24 talking about this, and a lot of really interesting conversations are coming out–
Lindsay: [laughs] Sorry! I just love how you, “I was on TV…” [laughs]
Shireen: I was on CP24!
Lindsay: I think you could have said this without mentioning that, but I'm glad you did. [laughs]
Shireen: One, I think it was the president of Tennis Canada, Eugène something was on as well. And I think what I really want to happen is…I’m so happy for Leylah Annie Fernandez, because she was on a radar. Dr. Courtney Szto had been talking about her for a long time, and she was like, you need to have her on your podcast. And this is one of those times where I was like, Courtney, you were a hundred percent right! And she was saying this to me like three years ago, and I'm like–
Jessica: It’s too late now! [laughs]
Shireen: It’s too late now! And I think that she's on the radar. It wasn't like she was under the radar, but also she didn't have a seamless thing. She was dropped by Quebec tennis when she was seven, from the development program. So now that people are claiming her, being like, oh, we always stood behind her. I'm like, no, that's not what happened! But she absolutely kept...This is a story of also her indomitable spirit and her family.
Jorge Fernandez: What I'm telling you is that we're an immigrant family and we had nothing, we got in with nothing. So, Canada opened up its doors, and if they wouldn't have done what they did, I wouldn't have had the opportunities that I have, and I wouldn't have been able to give them to my daughter. That's it. So, it means a lot.
Shireen: You know, as much as I love that in the final there are two racialized women, literally in a sport where it's predominantly white, and they're coming in, they're talking about multiple identities, because both of them have multiple identities. And Raducanu is of east Asian descent and her father's Romanian. And then on the other side, Fernandez is Ecuadorian and Filipino Canadian. So it's like…I love this. I love that the lines are blurred, and I don't love that people are questioning them all the time. I don't love that. I don't like the conversations about “the good immigrant” that are popping up in Canada. But I do love maple syrup. I do love Steve Nash being in her box.
Lindsay: Can you explain the maple syrup moment, please?
Shireen: Yeah. So, she was–
Jessica: Can I just say that Shireen loves maple syrup so much that, when she came to visit me once, she brought a can of it in her luggage.
Shireen: And I remember Aaron’s face–
Lindsay: Shireen, you know you're just reinforcing Canadian stereotypes, right? You know you’re just… [laughs]
Shireen: Hockey, French, maple syrup–
Jessica: Carries it in her luggage when she visits people.
Shireen: Okay, but it was checked luggage, Jessica. That's the reason why I had to check my bag in!
Jessica: I’m just saying.
Shireen: And I remember Aaron's face when I presented it to you both in your kitchen. He was like, “Oh……Thank you!” [laughs] It was a gift!
Lindsay: Sorry, can you explain why you're talking about it in the tennis context right now? [laughter]
Shireen: God, I'm so sorry–
Jessica: She’s not sorry.
Lindsay: [laughs] I love you.
Shireen: Not sorry at all. After she won the quarterfinals, she was interviewed – and also just to recap, she beat out three top 5 players, Fernandez did. So this is like, wild! So we're hyper enough as it is. And when she's interviewed on the court at the US Open, she's asked, what is it about Canadian tennis? Because you know, Félix was doing amazing stuff too.
Interviewer: What is it that they're feeding you up north in Canada that is producing such incredible, inspiring tennis this week?
Leylah Fernandez: I would say it's the maple syrup. [laughs]
Shireen: And she says it’s the maple syrup in Canada, it's that good. So, I'm not saying that maybe her dad was listening to Burn It All Down and heard me talk about maple syrup this often, because I talk about it a lot on the show sometimes. I’m not saying that that became part of their game plan and strategy. I'm just saying that it's a nice coincidence that Burn It All Down, that maple syrup is connected to us. And it's also the winning key here. I'm just saying.
Lindsay: Yes. We are not, [Shireen laughs] just like, for all legal reasons, we are not actually taking credit for Leylah Fernandez’s success. But I just had to say, to me, I mean, it's all been so much fun to watch. But watching Leylah come off court after beating Sabalenka in that really intense semifinal and immediately be greeted by Billie Jean King and six of the Original 9 who were about to go on court to be honored in between these two women's semifinal matches. Like, I actually don't cry that much, and like, I cried. It was just such a beautiful moment, and she seemed to recognize the gravity of it, even though like all 19 year olds, 18, 19 year olds wouldn’t, and you know, she'll at least be winning $1.25 million from this run, because that's what the runner up gets. The winner gets over $3 million. And there are these six women who started this women's tour by signing $1 contracts, right? Because they weren't getting what they were worth. So, I'll be thinking of that moment for quite some time
This week for our main topic, I just can't stop thinking about everything that's happening in the NWSL, the National Women's Soccer League. And so we're going to do a little roundup of the off-field drama, and then have a conversation about how this could be fixed. Like, what is the way forward here? Both for the NWSL, and kind of what do we want from women's sports owners and the leaders of women's sports in general? So we're going to get a little existential, a little deep here. But I think we just need to start by laying the groundwork, by talking about the drama. So, we're going to get us all on the same page here. I'm going to start. There's an entire section here devoted just to the Washington Spirit [laughs] and just everything going on there. And actually The Athletic, Meg Linehan and Steph Yang, friends of the show, did a great roundup of just everything that's going on with the Washington Spirit.
I am going to very briefly summarize this – and I'm leaving a lot out because there's just too much. Essentially, if we just kind of go back to…We’re starting like three weeks ago, three, four weeks ago. August 10th, the Spirit announced that Richie Burke, their head coach, was no longer the head coach, saying he had been been reassigned to the front office due to his health. That narrative was quickly blown up when the Washington Post, Molly Hensley-Clancy, detailed the next day allegations of verbal abuse from Burke, including racially insensitive comments. Kaiya McCullough went on the record. She was one of several Spirit players who left the team due to Burke's abuse. And I want to shout out that she actually has a podcast episode that came out this week, on Unfiltered, her personal podcast, where she talks in depth about these allegations. It's a must-listen.
So, Steve Baldwin, the majority owner, announced that Burke is suspended pending investigation. Less than a week later, the Spirit announced that IntelliBridge, which is a defense contractor, essentially, homeland security premier partner, is going to be a front jersey sponsor for the remainder of the 2021 season. Lindsay Barenz, president of business operations, parted ways with the Spirit after that. She had apparently been very vocal against the sponsorship, and participated in the Richie Burke investigation. Then we had fans raise a “Sell the team, Steve” banner at a home game, and the Spirit made them take it down.
Then Washington Post came out with another article about a power struggle between Baldwin and Michele Kang. They both own 35% of the team. Baldwin apparently had wanted to sell his stakes to Kang, but has changed his mind, and now he is the one in charge driving this, and it's ridiculous. September 2nd, they hired former DC United head coach Ben Olsen as the president of team operations, and then two days later the Washington Spirit versus Portland Thorns game is postponed because of four positive cases of COVID-19. Sources have said there's as many as eight unvaccinated players on the Spirit. That's not confirmed. But they did fly these players who were sick to Portland, it seems. So, that’s not great.
That same day it was reported that Michele Kang is being investigated by the NWSL under the anti-harassment policy. This was all of Baldwins people, it seems like, are behind the news of Michele Kang being investigated, and throwing Michele Kang under the bus. There's also a racist tweet by this reporter who never reports on women's sports. It was said that Kang hosted a dumpling party that is believed to have led to the COVID-19 outbreak on the team.
Shireen: I just want to clarify one thing – the dumplings weren't being made together? All the participants were in their own homes. So I'm still very upset about the dumpling thing, and about obviously the racism that surrounded that whole situation.
Lindsay: [groans] Honestly, we could have a whole episode talking about that. And that's kind of where we are today. We're waiting to see whether they'll even be able to play this week due to COVID. We’re waiting to see these investigations take place. It is a giant shit show of a power struggle, and that's just one team! Jess, we've got a lot of other things going on in terms of broadcasting and venue problems. Can you sum up some of these other issues?
Jessica: Yeah. So, on the broadcasting front, there is just this big problem of poor production quality of the actual matches themselves. So, Ben Strauss wrote about this for the Washington Post in July. The NWSL produces their own broadcasts – not the network that airs the games – so you're not getting CBS-level productions. He led off the piece by talking about Marta scoring a beautiful goal, and you don't actually see it. The cameras don't capture it. So it's that kind of thing. According to Strauss’s reporting, and I'm just going to read straight from it here, “The NWSL hires a company called Vista Worldlink for production services like TV trucks and camera crews. The budgets are small for the digital-only telecasts: around $10,000 for a remote production, according to two people with knowledge of them. For the cable and broadcast games there are more people on site, and budgets jump to $50,000 and around $100,000 respectively, in line with the cost to produce many games on regional and national cable networks.”
And so, especially with these remote productions, you get producers who are offsite, you get broadcasters who are offsite, and you often have broadcasters with less experience because they can't pay for better broadcasters. There are fewer cameras. There are major sound issues – apparently sound will just drop out for minutes at a time. There's also the issue of, during the broadcast, the misgendering of Quinn, a trans non-binary player for the OL Reign. In an official league segment, as well as by the announcers, there was the misidentification of Jessica McDonald's kid after a Juneteenth segment celebrating the relationship.
Lindsay: [laughs] After it was about their relationship! That’s what gets me. It was about their relationship!
Jessica: Yes. And then they showed a child that was not her child and said it was her child.
Shireen: She actually tweeted out and was just like, “This is not my son!” And I was like… [groans]
Jessica: They had to apologize. The league had to apologize to her. So yeah, it's one thing to have distribution, and it's a total other thing to have good production for that distribution. And then there's this latest problem. This week, the NWSL championship, it's going to be played on Saturday, November 20th in Portland, Oregon at 9:00am local time. Yes, 9:00am in the morning. Only four teams in the league own and control their own venue, and ultimately Portland was the only one to bid on the game. And so CBS, needing to squeeze in this final during the college football season, said 12:00pm Eastern is the time that they could do it. Players and fans of course are upset, but both the league and CBS are saying their hands are tied and this is all they've got.
Lindsay: [groans] It’s not even just the Spirit. It's not even just the broadcast. There's more drama. Shireen, how many coaching changes and madness has been going on elsewhere in the league?
Shireen: So, I had to step off a little on the NWSL, just between the Olympics and everything that was happening, and my own work in the summer. But when I got into this document for prepping and Lindsay had listed all the coaching changes, [Lindsay laughs] it's ridiculous. It's like there's a revolving door. I couldn't believe it. I think there's at least six. And I was like, this is not a huge league. The fact that the turnover is so fast, as Jessica already mentioned, we'll talk about more. The lack of transparency as to why…Because although when the anti bullying and harassment policy came in, we were like, oh, okay, this might be a good thing. However, not detailing why the coaches are dismissed is a huge part of the problem. But isn't, I don't know, transparency an important part of that? It's just so messy. Freya Coombe left Gotham FC for Angel City FC mid-season, and Scott Parkinson is the new head coach. Farid Benstiti resigned as the head coach of the Reign, OL Reign, and Laura Harvey is the new coach.
Then Marc Skinner left Orlando Pride; Becky Burleigh is a new interim coach. And Mark Parsons left the Portland Thorns, not because of anything to do with harassment or bullying, but to coach the Netherlands, and we knew that that was going to happen. He's been a stalwart at the Portland Thorns. He's been amazing, and we know him, and we love him, not just because of his legendary loyalty to Christine Sinclair. But Christy Holly was fired last month, which we did mention on the episode last week, 217, and Racing Louisville announced that he was gone but also gave no indication as to why – twice they said no reason why. So, you're trying to connect the dots here, and you know that Winona Ryder gif where she's looking at the math and going…This was me looking in the document at the coaching changes. There's a lot!
And Alyse LaHue, who was basically ousted from Gotham FC after an investigation. And again, we don't know the particulars of this. And I will say this, that I have bugged Meg Linehan in chat groups and poked, but she’s like, “It’s not public.” And she's fair to say that. And it's almost like there's nothing that can be reported because it's not public enough to be reported, even with people that are like the best woman’s soccer journalists in the world asking these questions. So, the answers are not out there. We don't know.
And you know, I will say this: women’s soccer, woso fans are not the most chill on the block, so there's a bit of excitement about that. And there's frenzy and chaos all the time, but not in the good chaos that we want, because I love chaos, but this ain't it. And it's almost like…A couple of weeks ago on the show, Lindsay asked, “What’s your favorite couple?” So it's almost like all the joy that I'm getting right now is just looking at Sam Kerr and Kristie Mewis. That's it. It has nothing to do with the actual teams and coaches. It's just looking at a coupledom. That's what's carrying me through the NWSL season at the moment, to balance out all this fuckery.
Lindsay: So yeah, things are a mess. And so I just kinda want to ask, what do you all think the biggest problem is in the NWSL? For me, it just starts with there's still no CBA, like, we're almost done with the ninth season and there is no collective bargaining agreement. As we talked about on the show many a times, the WNBA got a CBA between their second and third season. Very aware that like, you know, US Soccer's involvement, there are extenuating factors here. But players need to have a say. Like, things like 9:00am championships and harassment policies, like player health and safety. These are the things that a CBA can really help players have a voice in, and I know the union is working really hard on it right now. I know the executive committee is working really hard on it right now, but I just think so many of the problems to me come back to the fact that this work wasn't done earlier to really give players a voice in these types of negotiations. Shireen?
Shireen: And coming off that, for me, I hate the lack of accountability. I hate the vagueness by which they handle very public problems, be it racism, harassment, abuse, dismissal of GMs and coaches. I feel that there needs to be more conversation. There needs to be more transparency. And I talk about this all the time, but also underlying systemic issues within the NWSL, be it racism, be it, you know, misgendering of players, all of those things that are part of these systems of oppression. I feel like they need some hardcore PR help, but not even that, it's not just the PR. It's the internal. And I feel like it's a mess.
Jessica: Yeah. I mean, I think those are obviously probably the two biggest things going on with the league right now. I also, whenever I think about women's soccer in the US, it's so wild because they still sort of struggle with…I think they're like overshadowed even by the US women's national team and its popularity, and I don't have an answer for that at this point, of like how we're constantly saying we want them to figure out how to capitalize on that, but it seems like that's just where all the eyeballs go, that the nationalism really overshadows just the domestic league itself, and I don't know what they can do about it, but it just always feels like a missed opportunity in some way.
Lindsay: Yeah, absolutely. It's frustrating. A big kind of question, but like, in women's sports in general, what are the things that we actually want and need from the leaders of these sports teams and leagues as a whole? Like, what qualities are we looking for from them? Jess, I know you have a lot of thoughts on this.
Jessica: [laughs] I do! Well, I want to echo Shireen and just…Transparency, transparency, transparency. I feel like so many people right now are so frustrated at the NWSL in particular, and it almost comes off to me like the vagueness and keeping everything in the shadows is like a weird paternalism. It is related to the supposed “fragility” of women's sports, like, if we understood, if fans and the public understood anything about the league’s actual operations, that it would speed up the downfall somehow? Because of course the picture's not always going to be rosy. So there's a weird paternalism to it for me. And I just don't think that helps build loyalty among the fans. Shireen talked about like, you know, woso fans are not chill, and this is like putting up a literal curtain. It creates distance between the league itself and the fans, like there's just a curtain there. And that just seems ridiculous. I want transparency.
But there's like basic building block stuff, right? I'd love investments and academies, or more of an emphasis on homegrown players. It was really exciting earlier this year, the Houston Dash had their first homegrown player, Michaela Abam, and she was spectacular – scored a goal, everyone was thrilled. It was very exciting. I think that helps build a tighter community between the fans and the teams when they see the homegrown players out there and they're part of this build with the team. And you know, we need better refs. Like, we've talked about it on the show so many times, but just always better refs, better reffing.
Lindsay: Ugh, yes. Is it hard to want people in charge of women's sports who actually care about women's sports? Like, I was reading…So, The Athletic, just shoutout to The Athletic and all the work that Steph and Meg and Pablo are doing over there. They did this Q&A with Ben Olsen, the new president of the Spirit, and their questions were great but honestly some of his answers to me just like bowled me over in frustration. Now, I get that the Spirit don't really have maybe their choice of people lining up to take that job right now. Like, it's not an ideal situation. And I don't even mean this as badly to Ben as I do just to the Spirit leaders, right? For hiring him, and for this being okay.
So, Ben Olsen's quotes were just like, he was like, “This opportunity came out very recently. This was not something that was months and months in the planning. I sat down and talked to him and shortly after I was offered the job. And then after I thought about it more over a week or two, the thought of being the president of the Spirit was kind of intriguing to me.” [laughing] It was like after he's already gotten the job, he has to commit himself!
Jessica: Wow. Wow.
Lindsay: And Ben Olsen is the former head coach of DC United. And he has other quotes where he's like, “Do I know a lot about women's soccer? No. Do I know a lot about running the team and business and…” You know what I mean? Like, “No, but you know, I have an outsider perspective and a lot of passion for the job,” or something. And like, I just would like to say that I would like people who are experienced [laughs] and who really care about women's sports. It doesn't mean you've had to have only worked in women's sports your entire life, right? I think like there are a lot of interchangeable skills. But like, maybe have thought about it more than like a month ago, right? Like, I would like actual planning to be put…Because what we've seen in so many of these hiring…
So, Christy Holly, who was just fired, he left Sky Blue where he was the coach before a few years ago, and he left there under really suspicious circumstances, talks of inappropriate relationships with players. I mean, he's engaged to Christie Rampone now, who was a player there. And you know, that it really was not good for the locker room. And then he was just hired immediately. Richie Burke, there were so many allegations of him being an abusive person and an abusive coach before the Spirit hired him. I'm just kind of sick of no due diligence. I'm sick of not taking these seriously. And I'm sick of treating these women's sports jobs as like playgrounds and rehab centers. Do you know what I mean? For like problematic or unimpressive men. Shireen?
Shireen: Yeah, just piggybacking on that, I recently interviewed Diana Matheson last month, and I asked her about it because she spent a large part of her career in the NWSL at Washington. And she talked about it, you can reference that interview for that. But I mean, I just want to clarify about coaching and not having experience in the women's game before. Folks, this isn't a Ted Lasso situation where someone who doesn't know it can come in and win the hearts and minds of everybody in football. It actually isn't like this! And I'll bring to your attention another Premier League coach – or rather aspiring coach! And my voice is getting louder, because even SAYING this name makes me angry! Phil Neville coached the women's team in England, the national team, and when he was hired by his former teammate at Manchester United, David Beckham – who we actually do love, and when I say “we” I mean me in particular. He was hired at Inter Miami.
He said, “To be in sports, my plan was to always just go for the three years and then get into the day-to-day running of a club job, which would be what I wanted to do.” So basically attesting to the fact that it really was a stepping stone, and this idea of using women's sports, that in itself…And women's football is a very legitimate, important part of the football world. To use that as some type of platform to reach his ultimate goal, because that couldn't possibly be it! This man needs to sit down with Bev Priestman, actually who he's worked with – who, for all that don't know, Canada won gold at the Olympics because of this woman and her coaching! You know, I was going to bring that in there.
The point is that this type of thing leaves a poor taste. And it's not something that's respected. When you're coaching, you put yourself and invest yourself into what you're doing. You don't debase women's sport and disrespect it in this manner. Also, just as an example, I love Marcus Semien of the Toronto Blue Jays, and this love is very recent and I'm passionate. Does that mean I should be the GM of the Toronto Blue Jays? No, I don't think so.
Lindsay: I don’t know… [laughter] So really quickly, are there any things that other sports leagues are doing that we think the NWSL can learn from or borrow from? You know, one thing I would like all women's sports leagues to kind of borrow from is what we just saw from the NWHL, which is taking the “women” out of their name. And they just rebranded to the Premier Hockey Federation. Now, I don't know that they were doing that as much with like, including non-binary athletes and things like that in mind as I would like to, because if you read their press release it doesn't seem to acknowledge that. But I do think that that's a good step in the right direction, of branding yourself as just elite sports and not just the women's side and almost like falling back on that as a scapegoat a lot. Jess?
Jessica: Yeah. Going back to production and distribution, the FA Women's Super League in England has a new three-year domestic broadcast deal where matches are going to be both on Sky Sports and the BBC, and Sky Sports is going to $13 million per season. And unlike what I talked about earlier with CVS here in the US, it will be handling the production of the matches. So, Sky Sports will actually be producing all of it. They'll be spending an additional $7 million on marketing and exposure efforts. The clubs in the league are going to receive a portion of that revenue, and 25% of that portion that they get is actually going to be distributed to the second tier women's championships. So they're like building from the bottom up, right? We’d love to see something like this with the NWSL. I mean, we already talked about all the problems that they've had with production. This would be amazing if they could do something like this with CBS or any other network.
Lindsay: Totally. Amazing. Shireen?
Shireen: There’s a couple of things, like the collective bargaining agreement from the WNBA, which could be used as a blueprint, for example. Also, as well, the NWSL actually has a Black Players Coalition. Yes, that was an initiative started from the players themselves. It's a great thing. I think that any time you get some type of mobilization from the players, that's very important, and that's something that should be highlighted and say this is a good thing and that it should continue, and that there's recognition of that. So, that's good.
Lindsay: Absolutely. I guess to close it off, this is a big question that I wrestle with a lot. This was kind of Brenda's premiere question, right? Like, you know, how can teams and leagues in this space stay true to marginalized fans and players and respect them and still engage in capitalism that is necessary to run these teams? And you know, still try to attract sponsors and build brands in a world that, you know, is pretty bigoted still. Are these things incongruous?
Jessica: Yeah. I mean, capitalism is always messy, but my gut tells me that it's a false dichotomy, this idea that you can't center marginalized people and be successful. I think that's a line that a bunch of white men have sold us for a long, long time, the idea that if they're not centered and catered to, that then there can't actually be a market. And I think it's hard because so many white men are still in power and make a lot of the decisions – like, in order for the league to sign with CBS, my guess is that the people that they're dealing with are these exact men, right? Or when they're going to brands and trying to get deals, I'm guessing they're dealing with these exact kind of men. But we also know that the support from fans is there, whenever women's sports is given even a fraction of the platform that they deserve, and that often those fans are from marginalized groups. And so it just always feels like the potential is so real. And so I don't think it's incongruous, but I do think it's messy.
Lindsay: Yeah. I think that's a really, really good point, Jess. I always just think like, yes, is there going to be a little bit of like…You know, do I think some fans have a purity test that will never ever be able to be reached? Do you know what I mean? That's like literally impossible? Yes. Do I also think though that there needs to be some sort of accountability, like, okay, yeah, maybe you're partnering with like a Fox Sports and there's some programs on like Fox Sports you don't like, right? Maybe you don't partner with Barstool Sports, [laughs] whose entire ethos is rooted in bullying and harassment and in attacking marginalized groups. Like, maybe you partner with Coke, which has some problematic deals in its bucket, but maybe you don't actually put a defense sponsorship on the front patch of your jersey, right?
Like, we all exist in this world. We all function on a day-to-day basis. We know that there has to be some sort of engaging in capitalism. But like, you got to have some sort of lines and some sort of common sense, people. Ultimately I think about what the Seattle Storm have done. I did an interview with Ginny Gilder, one of the co-owners of the Seattle Storm, a few months ago. They have this thing, it's called the Storm way, and it's making sure that community and activism is a core part of their business model. And they do care about making money and they do want to push things forward, but they also don't believe that maybe the way men’s sports have grown is the way that all sports have to grow, right? And they are trying to do things a little bit differently. So I think there are people in women's sports trying to do things in a conscious way. Those stories just maybe need to be lifted up a little bit more. Shireen?
Shireen: Yeah, this isn't going to be seamless. Authenticity never is. And it's building. I mean, I think there needs to be a certain amount of patience that we have, but then again, also, as Jessica mentioned, just pushing back…And I love that the spirit of Dr. Brenda Elsey is pushing through in the segment at the end, talking about anti-capitalism. But also, it's possible for us to continue to love and support the players and love and support the idea of this league, especially when models around new teams are good and there's accountability, they’re trying with accountability. But there's also ways to call in and be mindful of what's not working, but at the same time, love it. So as with everything, it's complicated. We love women's soccer and we'll be here to support it, but at the same time there's lines that we just don't want crossed.
Lindsay: In this week's interview, which will be out on Thursday, I speak with André Carlisle and Courtney Stith of the Diaspora United podcast, about some on the field action in the NWSL and the Black players that are having breakout seasons. All right, friends, let’s go to the burn pile. I'm going to get things kicked off, if you don't mind. Or what's the…Flicked off? I don't know, like, trying to like light a match? I wish there was a better word than flicked. [laughs] It doesn’t sound like a good word!
Jessica: Yeah. Sparked?
Lindsay: Sparked! Sparked off. I don’t know. I can't believe I'm still talking about this, but Antonio Brown is still on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. It turns out that we are now seven years past Ray Rice, and nobody has any clue or cares to figure out how to talk about allegations of violence against women on a national broadcast. So, Tampa Bay was playing in the Thursday night football game, which kicked off the NFL season. Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth were calling it, and they were talking about his “magnetic smile” and how great he is, and then kind of casually mentioned, “Oh yeah, I mean, even despite all, you know, his past issues and stuff…” and then just went right on with it.
We gotta be specific here. Not to a graphic extent, but he's been accused of sexually harassing and assaulting women. That's it. That's the “past issues.” He's been suspended for this, which means these allegations were found to have merit by the league. I'm just so sick of, whether it be with Alexander Zverev and the US Open, whether it be with Antonio Brown on the football field, I'm just so sick of constantly…Like, we need to call issues what they are. We need to just be, you know, if it’s sexual harassment, if it's sexual assault, if it's domestic violence, call it that. Call it that. So I'd just like to burn the NFL commentary booth, once again. Burn.
All: Burn.
Lindsay: Shireen.
Shireen: Yeah. This one actually was brought to our attention by flamethrower Elga Castro, and it's a very complicated and terrible situation, as it usually is when there are men in charge of making any decisions. This one in particular evolves around the court of San Juan and the Sanjuaneras women's volleyball team in Puerto Rico, and the league. And what had happened was this has gone to a legal court, a court of law, because the Sanjuaneras team wanted to substitute a player, former Olympic and national team player, Destinee Hooker Washington, who was pregnant. So, they wanted to substitute her out because she has a high risk pregnancy. And this is for like the league's championships.
So, the league said no. Tournament director and president of the Puerto Rican volleyball federation were all like, no, you can't do that, because the rules for substitution only apply if a player is injured. Of course there's no rules about pregnant players, because do you think the men thought about that? Do you think they care about that? So essentially, the team itself withdrew from the tournament and put in an emergency motion forward to have a hearing, which was to have happened yesterday.
Now, this is terrible for many reasons. One, it's because the team that loses out, the player feels frustrated. And again, there's no structure around considering…Because women are very often an afterthought, and their needs as mothers and their needs in any other realm but on the court are never and seldom thought of. So, I want to take this, because it's incredibly frustrating and it's unfair to the fans and unfair to the player, unfair to the athlete themself. I want to take all of this and all of these meddling back and forth…The heads of these organizations, as I mentioned are men. And that's usually the case: men making decisions about women and women's bodies and not having policies to support what they actually need. I want to take all of this, because it's shitty, I want to all of it and throw it into the burn pile. Burn.
All: Burn.
Lindsay: Jess?
Jessica: Living in Texas is hard. We've been here for nearly 20 years now, our entire adult lives. I love it here on the day-to-day. I could talk endlessly about the amazing people I know here and the communities that we're a part of. But I could also spend hours explaining how terrible our state government is. I've participated in my fair share of protests and marches and written to my state representatives and senators. We've talked about this on the show – episode 194 in particular. So, my burn today is pretty short and concise. In an effort to have quote unquote “small government,” the Texas legislature only meets every two years. But it's common for the governor to call special sessions after the official session has ended. The special sessions are shorter and the governor gets to set that agenda. That's important. Texas is about to have its third special session this year. The last one was when the Republican controlled state legislature passed a horrific and incredibly restrictive voting rights bill.
In this third session, which will begin on Monday, September 20th, governor Greg Abbott has decided that one of the necessary things to cover is the anti-trans sports bill that targets children in this state. Republicans have tried repeatedly this year to pass this bill and have failed. So he's giving it yet another go, a fourth try here. We've talked repeatedly about the harm these bills do. I wrote about it in a piece earlier this year for Vox. I hate these bills and I hate our state legislature for continuing to pass bills codifying their hate into law. During the last special session, the goalkeeper for Austin's new MLS team, Brad Stuver, wrote an op-ed for a local paper here in Austin, and I'm just gonna quote him. “I’m heartbroken that the Texas government continues to fight against children, trying to take away their ability to simply play with their friends and have a normal childhood. I stand with transgender youth. Everyone deserves the right to play.” Yes, exactly, Brad. Let’s burn this shit. Burn.
All: Burn.
Jessica: If you want something to do other than yell “burn!” even though that's great and cathartic, please consider donating to the Transgender Education Network of Texas, T.E.N.T., which is dedicated to furthering gender equality in Texas, and they strive to halt discrimination through social, legislative and corporate education. They're lobbying against this bill. Thanks.
Lindsay: All right. Let's lift some good up in the world. Our torchbearers of the week, our honorable mentions…Shireen, who are our footy champs of the week?
Shireen: The Jordan football association that defeated Tunisia 1-0 to win the third edition of the Arab women's cup. Yallah!
Lindsay: Woo! All right. Our crowd attraction of the week is the Solheim Cup. Team Europe defeated Team USA to win the 17th edition of this golf team competition, and the event drew a record crowd of 130,000 fans in Toledo, Ohio, which is just…Like, that's amazing! I love…And it’s outdoors, so, you know, slightly less worried about pandemic stuff. All right! Focusing on good. [laughs] Jess, new hire of the week?
Jessica: Morgan Shaw Parker, the former chief marketing officer of the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United, is the new president and CEO of the Atlanta Dream.
Lindsay: I love that. As Renee Montgomery said, we have great executives now choosing to work in women's sports. Choosing! Shireen, who are our equality ambassadors of the week?
Shireen: The Ireland Football Association, which finally announced equal pay for the women's side, and unveiled Sky Ireland as the first ever standalone primary partner of the Republic of Ireland women's national team. Congratulations to those athletes, those footballers. They deserve this.
Lindsay: It can be done, friends. [laughs] It can be done! All right. As our golden slammer of the week, we have Diede de Groot. Her US Open victory in women's wheelchair singles sealed her golden slam. This year she won the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon, Tokyo Olympics, which happened a couple of weeks ago if that, for the Paralympics, and now the US Open – joining Steffi Graf as the only tennis players to win all four majors and a gold medal in the same year. She's only 24 years old and she won doubles at the US Open too. Our torchbearers of the week, can I get a drumroll, please?
[drumroll]
This is a joint trophy between Leylah Fernandez and Emma Raducanu for making it to the US Open final, and just absolutely capturing the hearts and enthusiasm around the world this week. Fernandez is unseeded, ranked 73rd in the world. [Jessica laughs] She beat Naomi Osaka, Angelique Kerber, Elina Svitolina and Aryna Sabalenka. That is three top five players and two former #1s and multi-time grand slam champions on her route. Meanwhile, Raducanu came through qualifying and did not drop a set! [laughs] So, she had less dominant competition, but dominated them in even more astounding fashion. I've honestly never seen. I've watched tennis for a lot of years. I've seen a lot of surprising runs, never two like this at the same time making it all the way to the final. Congratulations to both of them, and just like, what stories, what players, what people! Okay. What is good in your worlds? Shireen.
Shireen: Well, you know–
Lindsay: Or should I say professor? [laughs]
Jessica: Yay!
Shireen: I taught my first class in sports journalism this week and it was wild. It was wonderful. I love my students, and this is going to be fun. Had did a couple of jokes that didn't land–
Jessica: That’s a normal experience. Normal experience.
Shireen: But I was assured that that was on brand for instructors. So, I'm exploring some new things within the sport world. One is baseball, because of the Blue Jays that are doing amazing. I mean, they lost last night to the Baltimore Orioles. I can't believe I care, but I do care, because they were on an eight game win streak, beat out the Yankees four games, that was amazing. It was so great. I went to a Blue Jays game a couple of weeks ago. I also want to shout out Virgo season because I've realized a lot of my closest friends are Virgos, which is really weird because I'm so chaotic, but it's not really weird. So Courtney Szto had a birthday. My friend Emina Basic had a birthday, Amina Mohammed had a birthday. My best friend Eren Cervantes had a birthday. There’s a lot of people with that energy in my life, which keeps me grounded. So, shoutout to the people that center me and ground me. I also wanted to say – I got a bit distracted because, again, I'm chaotic – the CFL, I'm really interested in Canadian football and you will be hearing about it more from me on the show, because you just will. I love the faces of everybody here, if you could see Tressa and Lindsay’s faces of concern. We will be hearing more about…And Jess’s.
Lindsay: And Jess’s! [laughing]
Shireen: But Jess had already heard this–
Jessica: I did make a face.
Shireen: –so she’s not surprised by my unfettered nationalism, which are two things…I thought it was “insufferable,” but it was actually “unfettered.”
Jessica: It can be both.
Shireen: I can be both. Also, tennis! I care about tennis all of a sudden, in such an incredible way, and I didn't before. So I thank Lindsay and Jessica for caring about it way, way before me, so I can go back and learn from them. And I realize I have picked up a lot on this show from you both. So thank you for caring about things that I did not pay attention to, because things you say stick in my head. Which is lovely. So I love you guys.
Lindsay: I love that. This has all been worth it. [laughter] Good. Finally, Shireen has found some use for us after all of these years of podcasting! [laughter] I love how it just occurred to you now that you've learned something from us! [laughs]
Shireen: No, I always do! But I would like…Tennis! Like, you talk about Cam Newton, right? And something happened with him this week, and I was thinking about you. I'm like, oh, Lindsay…Cam…
Lindsay: Okay, okay.
Shireen: You know what I mean? So like, there's moments.
Lindsay: I love it. It has been a joy to see Shireen be the tennis expert. It has just made my life. I've loved it so much. What's good in my life? I've been remembering that walking, like just basic walking and body movement is a good thing. Like, it doesn't have to be super challenging. But after a summer of it being 95 degrees and me not moving ever, I've just been like, okay, I'm going to get 10,000 steps in every day. And I have, and you know, it's a three to four mile walk usually every day, unless I'm running a lot of errands and get in a lot of steps organically. But most days I'm just sitting at my computer. And anyways, I feel great. Who knew! [laughs] Don't tell me “everyone.” Don’t tell me “everyone.” [laughs] The dog bar in Greensboro continues to just be a joy. I walked there and walked back from there last night. So, really combining all my interests, just those things. Outside not being scorching hot is my what's good. Jess?
Jessica: That is also part of my what's good. It was 65 degrees this morning here, which is, at the end of summer, the big moment we all wait for – I've talked about this on the podcast before – is the first night when it gets below 70. And it's normally not til October, late September. So we feel like it's early. We’re supposed to be in the upper 80s this week, which also feels very cool. Normally we're in triple digits at this time of year. So, you know, we had a massive snow storm that crippled the state earlier this year, but now you have 65 degrees in the morning and it’s the middle of September, so that is good. This is birthday week in this house. My son turns 13 tomorrow, and Aaron's birthday is on Thursday, and they each get the exact same cake from Sugar Mama's bakery. We've been getting it for like over a decade – chocolate peanut butter. So we get two cakes during the week. So that's really what's good for me. Very excited that I get to be around for that.
And then I just wanted to mention two TV shows that have made me very happy recently: Never Have I Ever, on Netflix, which is adorable and also narrated by John McEnroe, and it’s easily the most I've liked him ever. Like, there are parts where I like him so much that I almost get mad at how much I like John McEnroe [laughs] as the narrator of this Indian American high school student girl’s experience in the show. But it's perfect. And then Making It on Hulu, and I assume also on Peacock, because I think it's an NBC show. Amy Poehler and Nick Offerman, they host, and it's about makers that make lots of stuff and they're all super creative and they're all nice to each other and they hug each other a lot and it's just a very sweet show and it makes me want to make lots of things. But I don't really know how, so last weekend I just baked because that's the closest I could do.
Shireen: I just have a one really quick thing to add. I went for my first Peloton ride, and I know that we had talked about it, that I was gifted a Peloton, essentially. I won part of this comeback program. Amira had actually nominated me for this comeback and, you know, there's jokes about Amira wanting to pull people into her Peloton cult, but like, it really was awesome for me. It was 20 minutes and I cried afterwards because I think there's parts…Well, not just because my ass was hurting, it was literally hurting. But also because it was really nice to be able to put myself in a place where I didn't have to leave home. I'm not comfortable going to gyms yet because of the pandemic. So it was just really cool to be able to be in my own space, be in my home and work out in a way that was really invigorating. And this is a new journey, literally. So, we'll see. And hopefully my butt will stop hurting soon.
Lindsay: I was going to say something really sweet. And then I don't know… [laughter] I'm just going to end us there. [laughter] That’s much more on brand for us. This week we are watching…Look, there's a lot of women's soccer stuff: there's NWSL, there's the Women's Super League in action. I have to say, my main focus is probably going to be WNBA playoffs will be set by the end of this week. So, watch those games. We are jockeying for playoff positions. Then the WNBA playoffs are very close to starting, so that'll be fun. And then I'm sure you got your baseballs, and football…NFL is back. So, there's tons to be doing. That is it for this week's episode of Burn It All Down. This episode was produced by Tressa Versteeg. Shelby Weldon is our web and social media guru. Burn It All Down is part of the Blue Wire podcast network.
Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. You can like, subscribe and rate the show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Google Play and TuneIn. For show links and transcripts, check out our website, burnitalldownpod.com, and we've got a link to our merch at the Bonfire store. Thank you, thank you, thank you, patrons. Your support makes this possible. If you want to become a monthly donor, keep us in business, visit patreon.com/burnitalldown. I also want to say, Shireen did a phenomenal interview last week with Kelly Lindsey about Afghan women's soccer and what's been going on there, and I just highly recommend, if you haven't had time to listen to it, that you go back and take a minute to listen, or, you know, 30 minutes to listen to that. It's very, very important. Burn on, but not out.