A Singular Career in Quotes and Comments
Bill Simons
“Venus and Serena are gonna shake up this world.” – Richard Williams
“Serena’s role model wasn’t Chris Evert, it was Thor.” – Sue Mott
“When Serena is on, she’s unbeatable. When she’s not, the ball boys wear cups.” – Time Magazine
“Serena’s talent is so singular that it feels as if it dropped whole from the heavens, a dense, crystalline meteorite of athletic prowess and drive.” – Elizabeth Weil
“[Serena] gives us the whole range of what it is to be human, and there are those who can’t tolerate the humanity of an ordinary extraordinary person.” – Novelist Claudia Rankine
“The most strongest, the most powerful, the most dangerous creature on this whole earth is a woman who knows how to think.” – Richard Williams
“I’ve built a career on channeling anger and negativity and turning it into something good.” – Serena
“C’mon, we can pull a lot of things out of our hat, but there’s no man alive that can do that!” – Stephen A. Smith, after noting that Serena won the Australian Open while pregnant
“We need to enter her into the conversation with Jordan and Ali…[that’s where] the conversation needs to go.” – Andy Roddick, on Serena‘s place in sports history
“Serena’s brand is a mix of glamor, racial pride, celebrity, adventure, motherhood, family, brushes with death, comebacks from injuries, pride in her body, sisterhood and always, trophies, ‘tude and tumult.” – InsideTennis.com
“It was said [by the late Ted Tinling] that I go from arrogance to panic with nothing in between. I think Serena and I have that in common.” – Martina Navratilova
“You need a wild streak…a kind of irrational killer instinct. You need to put it out there that you’re reckless and unpredictable – not just so your opponents take note, but so that you notice, too.” – Serena
“The Williams didn’t try to change the country club set: they simply bypassed them…They’re intimidating the way 13-year-old girls are to 13-year-old boys – they’re taller and better looking, and you get the idea that they could beat you up if they weren’t so disinterested in your existence.” – writer Devon Friedman
“[Will Venus and Serena] end up just like Paris Hilton, coasting on the vapors of fame?. Someday the patrons behind the velvet rope will see a Williams sidling through the club’s front door at 2 AM and murmur, ‘Didn’t she used to be somebody? A tennis star? Yeah, that’s what she was.’” – Linda Robertson
“So [they say] women’s tennis is getting boring because two lovely black women dominate. They’re better than the white girls and that’s intolerable. It’s downgrading, lamentable. They’re disturbed by our being there. They’ve tried everything they could to tame us, and when they couldn’t, they said I was a madman. They say, ‘The Williams sisters are going to kill tennis.’ And I say to all the old white guys, why don’t you leave the stands?” – Richard Williams
“The way I see it, I should have had 30-plus Grand Slams.” – Serena
“She was screaming, and it’s like, what is she doing? …She has a big game, but sometimes she behaves bigger than her game is.” – Karolina Pliskova
“She’s still a little girl. Just because you do adult things, you don’t have to grow up. That’s the best part of Serena.” – Venus Williams
“Fear has always been valuable in my life. Without fear, without doubt, without discomfort…what is there for any of us to overcome?…The fear of failing, it’s always right there.” – Serena
“Serena’s comeback is an act of vulnerability… She’s done everything that she set out to do and then some. Now she wants to prove that she can be the best player in the world after having a baby. She doesn’t need to prove that…[and] I don’t know we’ve seen that from an athlete of her stature.” – Katie Barnes
“When Serena wants revenge, it’s crush city.” – Pam Shriver
“My mom didn’t believe in…giving in. She wouldn’t let all the evils in hell stop her. She was a…kick-ass person. She reminds me of Serena. The evil forces of hell were afraid to come her way.” – Richard Williams on his mother, a Louisiana cotton sharecropper.
“This guy tore my heart in half. Then he ripped those pieces and stepped on them and backed his car up over them. And the worst part was he left me thinking it was me…[and] I was ugly.” – Serena on her ex-boyfriend, NFL linebacker Lavar Arrington
“I appreciate that becoming a well-rounded person is important to you…[But] I wonder whether 20 years from now you might reflect on your career and regret not putting 100% of yourself into tennis…These distractions are tarnishing your legacy.
“Just a couple of years ago [you]…looked utterly dominant…Then you got sidetracked with injuries, pet projects, and indifference…You’re still only 24…Why not dedicate yourself entirely for the next five years?…You’ve become very good at many things, but how many people would trade that to be great at just one thing? I don’t see how acting and designing clothes can compare with the pride of being the best tennis player in the world.” – A 2006 letter from Chris Evert to Serena
“It was her Martin Luther King moment.” – Stacy Allaster, on Serena’s emotional return in 2015 to Indian Wells after her 14-year boycott
“I’m going to shove this ball down your f–king throat.” – Serena to a 2015 US Open linesperson
“Why is it that when women get passionate, they’re labeled emotional, crazy, and irrational, but when men do they’re seen as passionate and strong?” – Serena
“The ask of women, and especially of non-white women, since the beginning of time, is take the diminution and injustice and don’t get mad.” – Rebecca Traister
“Chair umpire Ramos couldn’t take it. He wasn’t going to let a woman talk to him that way. Pointing a finger and using a tone of aggression.” – Sally Jenkins
“[I] felt defeated and disrespected by a sport that I love…As I would try to go to sleep, unresolved questions ran through my mind in a never-ending loop: How can you take a game away from me in the final of a Grand Slam?…If I were a man, would I be in this situation?” – Serena on the 2018 US Open final
“For women to suggest that Serena’s treatment was gender related is just plain wrong.” – Writer Cindy Shmerler
“Maybe it didn’t work out for me, but it’s going to work out for the next person.” – Serena after the 2018 US Open final
“The support for Williams comes in part because some have an enduring memory of how difficult it is for women of color to make it in expensive, mostly white, sports.” – Jillian White
“We’re all made different. We all have different looks. And if you really look at it, everybody’s beautiful. One size don’t fit all.” – Oracene Price
“When Serena’s loud, she’s invested.” – Lindsay Davenport
“Except for Serena and Venus, there’s a lack of confident body language on the WTA tour. I miss the strutters. I like someone who acts like they belong.” – Mary Carillo
“I’m an athlete and I’m black, and a lot of black athletes go broke. I do not want to become a statistic, so maybe I overcompensate. But I’m paranoid. Oprah told me a long time ago, ‘You sign every check. Never let anyone sign any checks.’” – Serena
“I don’t know who that is.” – Serena when asked about the controversial US Open ump Carlos Ramos
“I didn’t play Wimbledon last year.” – Serena when asked about a particularly bad loss she’d suffered at Wimbledon
“Having a pulmonary embolism is definitely easier than heartbreak.” – Serena
“My Dearest Baby, You gave me the strength I didn’t know I had. You taught me the true meaning of serenity and peace. I can’t wait to meet you. I can’t wait for you to join the players box next year. But most importantly, I am so happy to share being number one in the world with you…From the world’s oldest number one to the world’s youngest number one – Your Mommy.” – Serena to her still unborn daughter
“Well, I hope she doesn’t play tennis!” – Garbine Muguruza when she heard Serena had a daughter
“[The day I gave birth] was the best day of my life…but Olympia is a little bit loud and obnoxious right now…Being on court is a little more relaxing than having a two-year- old.” – Serena
“[You] can be a mom and still be a badass.” – Serena, who said her wearing a body suit at the French Open was an homage to all mothers
“Society puts it out there that you’ll just kind of snap back [from childbirth], and that’s a myth…Dealing emotionally with providing for a child, a lot goes into it. I was living in this world where I thought it would just automatically come together.” – Serena
“The best part of being a mom was Olympia’s toothless smiles, holding her and the way my heart skips a beat.” – Serena
“A young baby is very weak, and as a mother you feel you need to be there all the time…Whenever she wasn’t there…she was feeling guilty. It was hurting her a lot because tennis has always been her priority…And suddenly taking care of the baby became a priority.” – Patrick Mouratoglou
“In my [tutu] dress, I kind of look like a magical fairy, but I had to…live in reality.” – Serena
“Serena won over the hearts and minds of the critics. Serena’s ‘irreverence’ has become her ‘taking the path less traveled.’ Her ‘arrogance’ has been recast as ‘confidence.’ Her ‘brute force’ has been upgraded to ‘sleek power.’ Outfits once described as ‘lapses in taste’ are now ‘bold and provocative.’ The consummate outsider has become the sport’s figurehead.” – Jon Wertheim
“I came away thinking I was part of the strongest race in human history…The very next time I held a racket…I imagined myself back in one of those dark rooms of the slave castles…I drew a line that ran from Ghana to Michigan to California to Florida to Australia…’No,’ I thought, ‘we will not be denied.’” – Serena after seeing remnants of the slave trade in Africa
“The irony of the struggle was huge… to survive all of that…[only] to be beaten into the ground on some other continent. To be further stripped of your dignity, your individuality, your freedom.” – Serena on those slaves who survived the voyage from Africa
“U stand on the shoulders of your parents and grandparents…Think of all they went through…Don’t let any girl take away your win, your destiny…At last, this is your dream. Make it happen.” – Serena’s journal
“[Being Serena] is being a champion…There’s no other Serena…Sometimes I try to be so humble that I forget I have accomplished so much.” – Serena
“I know perfect doesn’t exist, but whatever my perfect was, I never wanted to stop until I got it right.” – Serena
“The big thing you get is just how much heart Serena has, and that…defines her as a person…She pushes herself harder than anyone. She has an energy and a warmth that you want to be around…She obviously works and trains very, very hard, but she can be very silly, too.” – Serena’s husband Alexis Ohanian
“Williams became the personification of athletic greatness and — for at least two decades — carried the aspirations of gender and racial equity. Along the way, she showed the world the incredible power of breaking boundaries and obliterating norms.” – Kurt Streeter
“The day I stop fighting for justice for people who look like me and you will be the day I’m in my grave.” – Serena
“I’m not looking for some ceremonial, final on-court moment…I don’t want it to be over, but at the same time I’m ready for what’s next.” – Serena
“I’m here to tell you that I’m evolving away from tennis.” – Serena
