Athletes And Mental Health — Do We Know Too Much?
Naomi Osaka, the young tennis phenom, has withdrawn from Wimbledon, citing mental health issues.
Articles on SportsIllustrated.com and ESPN detail the stresses and strains of relief pitchers in baseball.
And this week, SI.com published a 5,600-word article on the travails of NFL and NBA cheerleaders.
The common message — being an athlete, or a dancer, is very difficult.
Getting asked annoying questions at post-tennis match news conferences — no fun.
Pitching in relief creates a lot of pressure — very upsetting.
Cheerleaders are underpaid and overworked — not ideal.
Okay, I empathize.
But on some level, I’m wondering why I should be asked to care.
Part of the issue is the “maw” — the endless challenge the news media, including sports media, faces because it must fill endless hours of broadcast time and endless column inches with…well, with something, anything.
Part of the issue is that sports journalists want to do more than report scores and wins and losses — they want to feel important and relevant.
Part of the issue is the times — we’re so Oprah-ized that the idea of keeping a personal matter private is an absurdity today.
Otherwise, why would God have created social media?
Put it all together and you have unprecedented access to the mental states of athletes and even cheerleaders, whether you want it or not.
If my Mom were still alive, she’d just shake her head dismissively.
She’d been through World War II.
Annoying questions from reporters, or not getting enough money to dance on an NFL sideline?
Get over yourself.
Or to put it another way, it’s a free country, so if you don’t like your job, quit and get another one.
I don’t like seeing people going through tough times, and my heart really does go out to the young athletes who find themselves in these highly pressurized roles.
But let’s take a deep breath and remember what they get to do.
Play Centre Court at Wimbledon.
Pitch the ninth inning in Yankee Stadium.
Dance in front of 80,000 fans.
These are not exactly horrible ways to make a living.
Last time I checked, these are the childhood dreams of millions and millions of people.
If it were easy, or not stressful, to pitch to Aaron Judge or face Serena Williams in a tie-breaker, or dance with perfect precision in a packed NFL stadium, everybody would do it, and would do it well.
Stress?
Kinda goes with the territory.
I remember years ago reading Getting Better, a book about the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous, by Nan Robertson, a New York Times reporter.
She quoted from an interview with a middle aged, recovering alcoholic who described his work as incredibly stressful.
What did he do for a living?
He was an upholsterer.
An upholsterer, ladies and gentlemen.
It’s great that people can speak openly about their mental health challenges today.
My cousin Peter was bipolar and schizophrenic.
He had a lot bigger issues than dealing with inappropriate questions from reporters.
Yet he never even held a press conference.
This is a long way of saying that maybe instead of helping these athletes and dancers by publicizing their struggles, we’re actually enabling them.
If I were an athlete and I had to withdraw from Wimbledon because I didn’t like reporters, I think that’s something I would keep to myself.
And that’s coming from someone who writes these columns twice a week and keeps virtually nothing to himself.
If you don’t want to be a relief pitcher or an NFL cheerleader, fine.
Quit.
Get another job.
Maybe one that’s less stressful.
Not upholstery, of course, but I’m sure you can find something.
Folks, life is stressful.
It’s dangerous.
There are no guarantees.
Bad things happen.
Nobody gets out alive.
Should we all give in to our anxieties and fears?
Or worse still, confess them to sports reporters?
I say no.
I say, work out what you have to work out, and get on with it.
But don’t ask anyone to make life less stressful.
That’s not reality.
Work your private issues out in private.
And then come out and play, or pitch, or dance.
We’ll be waiting for you.
