Stuff You Should Know - The Battle of the Sexes

Episode Date: February 26, 2026

Back in 1973 a male chauvinist played tennis against champion Billie Jean King. This is that story.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Tell me a sound that's better than this. IHart TikTok's most influential creators all in one place. Search for IHard TikTok Radio. Make it a preset and stay connected all day. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of IHart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's Chuck. It's just the two of us.

And that's great because I'll be playing the role of Billy King and Chuck's going to play the role of male show venous pig Bobby Riggs. Oh, man. Take it, Chuck. Hey, before we get going on this one, I have a quick shout-out. And this is coming out a couple of days after I did this because we're cutting it so close because of our week off last week. But that makes me happy because I was asked, a friend of mine's son, his name is Royce. He is a student, a junior at Midtown High School here in Atlanta.

Nice. And he has a teacher, Ms. Smolko, who is a longtime stuff you should know listener. And when Royce told Ms. Smokko, like, hey, I know that guy. We're buddies. We got a hogs games together. She kind of flipped out and was like, oh, my God, I wonder if, like, would he be interested in helping us out with our podcast program? Oh, cool. And they set it up via email.

And I spent yesterday, which was in our world, Monday, at Midtown High School. addressing the junior class, about 200 kids. And I got to say, man, it was an incredible experience. The students were into it. They were engaged. They had great questions. They had great answers. They were, you know, a lot of it was sharing, you know, what they're doing with this podcast project, which is based off of like stuff you should know style stuff.

Neat. Which was super cool. Like these real philosophical questions that they're digging into and taking opposite sides. and debating and they were seeking advice. And it was just, it was an incredible experience. And I just, I left like on a real high about Gen Z and like where our future is headed. And it was just awesome.

Great. So the, the broad strokes are Gen Z got Chuck High yesterday. Yeah. Yeah, they got me super high. It was really cool. They were all just amazing kids. And Ms. Smolka was wonderful. and the other teacher,

I think his name was Alex. I can't remember his last name, but he was super nice, and they're just, like, hats off to these teachers. Yeah. What's going on? And at least at Midtown High School is amazing.

And I just left feeling great. That was awesome. I think Royce is getting an A. You know, Royce wasn't even there. He does like a late arrival thing because of like work study or something. Uh-huh. And so I was like, dude, I texted him. It was like, where were you?

And he explained the whole deal like he's not even allowed in school till later. So it was just one of those things. Okay. But everyone was super nice. And it was so cool to see how into it everybody was. That's awesome. What way to go, Chuck? Oh, and real quick, there were a couple of students.

I won't name them. I have permission to name Royce because he's a pal. But there were two legitimate big time stuff you should know listeners in the junior class that came up after and said hello. And they were both like really, really nice. Awesome. Shout out thing one and thing two. That's right. Way to go, Chuck. You were basically a teacher for that moment.

I kind of felt that way. It's like maybe one day when I retire, I'll just like go and teach for real. I'll let you borrow my tweet jacket with the sweet elbow matches. The don't be dumb jacket? Mm-hmm. Wow. That's a big deal. You have to overlook all the stains on it. All right. So we are talking about the Battle of the Sexes today, which I guess, I mean, this is a tough act to follow.

after your story, frankly. No, this is a great fun sort of pop culture history story and sports story. There was a movie about it just a handful of years ago starring Steve Carrell as Bobby Riggs and Emma Stone as

Billy Jean King, where they portrayed the very famous tennis match between a male chauvinous pig and aging over-the-hill hustler tennis star that you know, basically came out and said, you know what, men are better at women than everything. And an old me can beat

a young champion in Billy Jean King. And let's do it on national TV at the Houston Astrodome in front of a ton of people. Yeah. And that's what happened. The end. That's right. So this was a really big deal. I mean, it sounds like just kind of lighthearted, maybe a bit of a joke. This actually still happens today. They're Battle of the Sexist Tennis matches. Yeah. This was the first one, and it was a very big deal for everyone involved. On the one hand, you had Bobby Riggs, like you said, over the hill. He was 55, and he was trying to, he was, right, he was trying to figure out.

He was, oh, that's right, the Iads of March are coming up. Oh, boy. Yeah, so over the hill, I get it. Okay, yes. Although 55 in 1973 was a lot different than 55 now, right? Yeah, yeah, I don't look like Bobby. regs. But he was over the hill not just necessarily because of his age. He'd just been so far out of tennis for so long. He was an attention hound and he wanted to get back in the spotlight. So for him,

this was a gambit. It was a lot of work to do it, but it was something he was trying to do. On the other side was Billy Jean King, who took this very seriously because to her, this was symbolic of women's rights, which she was a tireless fighter for, not just before this, but after. for essentially your whole life still today. Yeah. She's great. Love Billy Jean King. She's a hero.

Bobby Riggs, we'll talk about him in depth. We're not going to make excuses for the guy, but I will say Billy Jinging remained very good friends with him and never came out and said like, you know, I mean, when they were going at it, she was kind of playing him up as a male chauvinist pig, which he was. Right, right. But she would end up saying like Bobby Riggs was a man of his time and sort of a victim of being a man of his time. So she kind of went easy on him.

I'm not sure I'm going to go so easy on him. Well, I saw in places that there's, it's questionable whether he actually, like, even believed most of the stuff he was saying. But again, all this was a gambit. He figured out a really good way to get media attention was to just be like the most loudmouthed chauvinous pig, just saying the most offensive stuff

and becoming loathsome to women, that this would just generate more buzzer. and more hype for what he was trying to do, which, I mean, just doing that is a jerk move. But it's not set in stone that he was someone who actually harbored these feelings personally. So you've got to bear that in mind while we're telling this story. Because a lot of people don't realize that. Like anti-feminists, a lot of men don't realize it, and a lot of feminists don't realize it. They took everything he was doing very seriously.

But like you said, Billy Jean King didn't, which is a huge signal right there. Yeah. And I just hit this just hit my brain. If I'm going to go hard on Bobby Riggs, then I also need to do the same to Andy Kaufman and his whole wrestling stick, which I think is one of the great, funny kind of comedy bits. But it was kind of the same thing, like playing a role to get women riled up to get attention. Well, really, if we learned anything from this battle of the sexist tennis match, is if you're going to go hard on Bobby Riggs, you need to go hard on Billy Jean King.

Right. Should we go back to the early 70s and set the stage? Yes. All right. Early 1970s was a pretty volatile time. It was a big time for women to start kind of standing up for real and saying like, hey, we want attention, we want rights, we want the same rights as men. Roe v. Wade was decided in 73.

The Equal Rights Amendment was all over the news. in the case of sports, certainly 1972 with Title IX of the Education Amendments Act, that required schools to offer girls and women the opportunities to basically get equal funding and participate equally in athletics as boys and men. So it was a big time for women's advocacy and feminism and women's rights between like 19,

and you know, certainly before that, but definitely between 1970 and like 1970. Yeah, just as an aside, we did it, if I may say so, a pretty good episode on the Equal Rights Amendment in 2021 called Why Is the ERA Still Not Ratified? Yeah, which is true. Yeah. So, yeah, it was a big time. There was a lot of momentum for women's lib for feminism. It was also a big time for tennis, which was becoming really, really popular, especially in the United States. The number of Americans who played tennis tripled from 1970 to 1970. And one of the reasons why is because the tennis world started holding opens.

I never knew this before, but the U.S. Open, the Australian Open, the reason they're called opens, because they're open to all players. You can be an amateur, you can be a pro, and you can compete in these tournaments, an open tournament. That was brand new. I think Wimbledon was the first one to start it, I think, in 1968. So a lot of really freaky, exciting stuff's going on in the world. That's right.

Billy Jean King was, and we should also point out that, you know, as far as wage disparity, in 1968, if you were a professional tennis player, you earned two to three times as much as a woman. And when the sport grew, that gap actually grew. It didn't get more narrow, which was pretty startling at the time. But Billy Jean King was born in 1943, and by the time this event rolled around, she was huge. She had won 10 grand slam titles by 73. She was number one ranked tennis player six different times in 1970 or by 1973 was the 1972 Sports Illustrated sportsperson of the year. And like you said, was a real feminist activist kind of from the jump.

I think there was a story from when she was a kid, when she was 11 or 12. a junior player, she was not allowed to be in a photo, like a tournament photo, because she wasn't wearing the tennis skirt. She was wearing shorts. And they said, you can't be in this picture. And immediately, little 12-year-old Billy Jean King was like, what the hell? Yeah. She was like, these are scorts. They said that doesn't count. Right. That's not a thing yet. So, yeah, and one thing about Billy Jean King from a bunch of stuff I read and saw about her is that, like, she was tireless. And still it. She's a, she's a, she's a, she's a,

tireless activist for women's rights. Like, she did never slow down. And when you kind of learn about all the side stuff she did to promote women in tennis and women's rights in general, like on top of that, bear in mind, she's one of the top tennis players in the world by dominating in tennis. So that takes a lot of practice, a lot of dedication, and she's doing all this other stuff at the same time. So she's like basically the definition of tireless. Yeah, and she was doing this in the 1960s because all those accomplishments I mentioned was by 73. But in 1966, she was the number one women's tennis player in the world, and she was making $100 a week as a playground instructor at Los Angeles State College. So the money the athletes were making was not anything like it is today, and it was way, way worse for women.

I think that first open you mentioned at Wimbledon in 68, she won. She won that tournament and won 750 pounds. Rod Labor, the men's champion, won 2,000 pounds. And she was like in 68, she was like, this is totally unfair. What's going on? Yeah, and money comes up a lot. It was the reason why is it's an easy shorthand to basically point out women's lesser treatment compared to men. It's also something that most people can just kind of wrap their minds around like, yeah,

$750 pounds is a lot less than 2,000 pounds, but they're both the, champions? Well, that doesn't make any sense. So money is a big focus throughout this, but it's not just because everybody wants money, you know? Yeah, totally. So in 1970, Billy Jean King was like, we need to do something sort of official and sort of big here. So she looked at a woman named Gladys Heldman, who was the founder of World Tennis Magazine. She was a very big, prominent figure in the tennis world overall, obviously because of World Tennis. And also because she was at the time the mother of a very high-ranked player named Julie Helmann. That was her daughter.

So she was a good person to go to. And they said, here's what we can do to make a splash. There's a tennis tournament coming up called the Pacific Southwest Open in L.A. Where they're paying the prize purse for the men's champion is $12,500. The purse for the women's champion is $1,500, which, I mean, looking back at the Wimbledon disparity, that wasn't too bad compared to this. You know. Right. Yeah. And this was even after that.

And they said, why don't we boycott this tournament? And Gladys Helden said, you know what? Why don't we start our own tournament that competes with this tournament? And everyone went, ooh, this sounds exciting. Yeah. So, yeah, that was a huge step beyond what they were originally thinking of. And so the U.S. Tennis Association, at the time they were called the U.S. Law and Tennis Association, also to

they were like hey go ahead and try that but we are going to suspend you we might ban you from tournament play we're going to erase your rankings like it's going to be a bad jam if you guys go off and form your own tournament and

it took a lot of bravery because not all women tennis players signed on for this in fact only nine including Billy Jean King said you know what we're going to go do this anyway and so they signed contracts with Heldman And so they became pros on this other tour, which protected them from getting punished on the USLTA tour. And they started their own championship, which eventually was, I think, supported and sponsored by Virginia Slim's cigarettes.

Yeah, that's right. And we should mention that contract was for a dollar each. So they clearly were doing this to make a statement and not to make a ton of money. Right. But Philip Morris, yeah, they stepped in because they, they, they, was a recent federal ban on advertising on TV and radio for cigarettes. And so they said, we got to get our name out there somewhere.

So let's call this the, you know, we've got these Virginia Slims with its quasi-feminist message. You've come a long way, baby. That was our ad slogan for a long time. Long time. And tennis, you know,

the original nine is what they were called, those tennis players that went along, or the eight that went along with Billy Jean King and said, they're like, yeah, I mean, we're athletes. It's a little weird to have a cigarette sponsor.

But we need a sponsor, so we'll take it. And that tournament went over really well And it was so successful that they said, hey, why don't we start our own circuit? And they had the Virginia Slim Circuit. There were eight more tournaments that they sponsored. And the original nine, you know,

they initially did follow through with their threat to like ban them. The USLTA? Yeah, USLTA at the time. But they said, oh, actually, they're doing so well over there. We're in trouble now. So we need to join forces. and they gave up and they merged with the Virginia Slim events. Yeah.

And I'm not usually one to defend tobacco producers, but I saw a PBS, I think American Masters clip that was interviewing some of the original nine. And they were like, Virginia Slims showed up. Like they knew how to market. They knew how to get buzz. They put a ton of money behind advertising. And like this was not like a just a whatever.

thing to them. They were actually a really great sponsor for this. So, yeah. They, yes, these nine women and I think eventually more joined, they were, they were like, if you won't include us, we're just going to go create our own thing. Like, they worked at it like that, and it actually paid

off in Aces. Yeah, for sure. Hey, you want to take a break? Hey, yeah. All right. We'll be back right after this. Hi, this is Joe interesting, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And I just sat down with a mini driver.

The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men. Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom-loving and different perspectives. And I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius are misunderstood. Sun and Venus and Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms on different houses and different places, but just an embracing of the isness of it all.

If you're navigating your own transformation or just want to chart side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, this episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast, starting on February 24th, on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcast. I'm Clayton Eckerd, and in 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor.

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Why hasn't a woman formally participated in a Formula One race weekend in over a decade? Think about how many skills they have to develop at such a young age. What can we learn from all of the new F1 romance novels suddenly popping up every year? He still smelled of podium champagne and expensive friction. And how did a 2023 event called Wagageddon change the paddock forever? That day is just. just seared into my memory. I'm culture writer and F1 expert Lily Herman,

and these are just a few of the questions I'm tackling on No Grip, a Formula One Culture podcast that dives into the under-explored pockets of the sport. In each episode, a different guests and I will go deeper into the wacky mishap, scandals and sagas, both on the track and far away from it, that have made F1 a delightful, decadent dumpster fire for more than 75 years. Listen to No Grip on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right. So where we left off, the original nine went off and formed their own Virginia Slim Circuit.

They were, you know, endangered the USLTA such that they partnered with them eventually. But money started flowing in a little bit. In 1971, Billy Jean King was the first female athlete of any sport at all to make more than $100,000. A lot of money in $1971. Still a lot less than her peers on the male side of the equation. And so she was still, you know, banging that drum. She wasn't like, all right, our work is done. And in 1973 before Wimbledon that year, she got together in London, where Wimbledon is, in a hotel room with 63, I guess it was probably a large meeting room. Yeah.

63 other women tennis players. And they said, all right, we're doing this today. We're going to form the WTA, the Women's Tennis Association. We're going to have an actual union in place where we can, you know, do what unions do and stick up for ourselves? Yes. They threatened to boycott like pretty much immediately after they formed the WTA. They said that they were going to boycott the U.S. Open if we don't get equal prize money for women and men. And I believe that was successful. They got the U.S. Open to agree. And it was, this is like things are moving along for women's equality in tennis at this time, right?

So it's a huge focus of conversation with tennis. Yeah. I mean, it was all over the media. Everywhere you looked, it was about sort of equal pay, equal rights. And that was in the regular world. And all of a sudden it was now like in the sports world in a big way. Well put. So now we can talk a little bit about our, I'm going to put it in scare quotes, our villain, Mr. Bobby Riggs, who was, I tell you what, man.

I mean, it is very Andy Kaufman-esque. If you watch interviews with this guy, if he's nothing, he is entertaining. For sure. He was a true great tennis player at one time shortly after World War II. I think he was the number one men's player in 1946 and 1947. And not just from like December to January, like both of those years. Right.

Yeah. So he had, you know, the goods to back up like this. It wasn't just some dude who had a tennis racket. But after the late 40s, he essentially left the tour. And he started hustling and taking bets from essentially anybody who would play him in tennis pool. I think you saw a 60 Minutes clip where he was gambling on throwing cards into a wastebasket. Like he would bet on. There was a quote in that 60 Minutes clip where he said,

he likes to play for big money. If he can't play for big money, he'll play for small money. If I can't play for small money, I won't get out of bed that day. Like, that's just what that guy did. He gambled, he hustled. And he was known as a loudmouth, too. But he also seems to be fairly loved, essentially. He was like one of those people that you just kind of,

you couldn't help. But like, even though, yeah, he was a loud mouth in trying to get you to bet him some money. Yeah, he was a troll. Livia called him a pre-internet troll, and that's exactly what he was. It seemed like a bit of an act and a bit of a shtick to get attention, like we said. But he would say things, you know, a woman's place is in the kitchen and the bedroom and not necessarily in that order.

Or women play 25% as good as men, so they should get 25% of the money men get. I was reading, I think it was a, oh, was it Esquire or something, an article about him and the whole idea of playing Billy Jean King was birth when I think a reporter was just talking to him about, you know, can men beat women or who could beat Billy Jean King and tennis? And he said, I think any guy in the top 100 could beat Billy Jean King. And he went, in fact, I think I could beat her. And that's sort of when he seemed to hatch this idea for publicity and money. Yeah. He was like, oh, but there's good action there. Yeah, totally. He, so, yeah, so like he said these things. actually, at least one of those quotes

is from one of his autobiographies. Yeah. So, like, he wrote this stuff down. He wasn't, this wasn't just stuff he started saying when he decided to play Billy Jean King. He was already known as a male chauvinist. Yes, he was an attention hound, and this was, again, a way that he figured out

how to do this. So he started publicly challenging Billy Jean King. He's, like, in his mid-50s. She's in her late 20s prime, and she's like, no, that's okay. I'm too busy. And again, remember, like, she was genuinely tireless organizing the Virginia Slim Circuit and, like, creating the women's tennis association all the while winning all of these championships

and grand slams. So she had a legitimate excuse, like, I'm too busy. The thing is, is there was also, like, a case you could make that she saw very clearly, like, I don't know if I have that much to gain by playing this, and I have a lot to lose for the women's movement. I could easily set it back if I lose. lose. So there was a, she had good reason to kind of avoid this as long as she could. Yeah, uh, it's sort of a lose lose proposition for her. Um, if she beats them, everyone's like, well,

of course, she'd beat this old man. Right. And that's how he probably would have played it up as, and well, we'll see what happened. But, uh, and if she loses, that's, of course, like, looks terrible to be beaten by the old man. Right. So she was wise to avoid it, I think. Um, but there was another woman. Uh, in fact, she was the, uh, I think she was the number one place. Um, uh, I think she was the number one player in the world, a women's player in 1973 named Margaret Court, uh, and Aussie. And she was like, she wasn't super active in the politics of women's sports. And she was like, yeah, sure, I'll play them. Um, she stepped right up. And in May of 1973, uh, this was in San Diego or outside San Diego. They played a three set match for $10,000,

uh, and about 10 million people, a lot of people tuned into the first one on CBS, uh, 3,500 people were there live. And, he beat her. He beat her 6-2-6-1 by playing I want to say a certain thing, but I can't. He was playing like a punk. Oh, yeah? He's playing junk shots and like drop shots and he wasn't playing like sort of real tennis. He was playing sort of joke tennis. And when you're playing against a player that can hit aggressive, strong shots and you're just plunking him over the net, like it's going to, you can't play tennis

that way if you're a real player. And it threw her off her game. She got in his head. I think the moment was a little too big for her. I don't think she realized how much attention there was going to be. And she ended up getting beat pretty badly. Yeah, he got in her head, right? Yeah. So, yes, it's called the Mother's Day Massacre because it was held on Mother's Day.

And, I mean, it was really bad. But there's a point that I want you to hang on to for later. As much of a punk as he played, he didn't play actual serious tennis. He's playing jockey tennis to win. He took that match very seriously. He trained for months ahead of time. He was playing or training like 10 to 12 hours a day every day.

He really trained. And by the time he was, by the time the game came around, he knew he was going to beat Margaret Court. So just keep that in mind how hard he trained for that, okay? Yeah, and also we should point out, like, at the very beginning of that match to open it up, he presented her with a bouquet of roses and she curtseyed back to him. And Billy Jean King is watching this just like,

you know, furious inside. Like she's like, oh, he's played, and she in fact said later that she played right into his hands there, and I would have grabbed him and kissed him. If he gets dirty, I can get tough too. So she hated the fact that Margaret Court went out there and sort of curtseyed to him and took the roses and then lost on national TV, I guess international TV.

And so she was like, all right, you know what? I'm going to do it. I'm going to step up and I'm going to play Bobby Riggs. It's my turn. Yeah. So she agreed to do this, and it became immediately buzzworthy, I guess, is what you would call it if you're into that kind of thing. That's right. The liber versus the lobber is how they dubbed it. Yeah. So like I said, it's immediately generating buzz.

Bobby Rigg starts giving television interviews to any camera that will stand still long enough. And he's a magnet for that kind of stuff because, again, he's a loud mouth, he's saying horrible things about women. he's accepting like the male chauvinous pig moniker like with pride or whatever. Yeah. And he's just like one of those, like he would talk a mile a minute. He had so much energy. He was just a little, a little kind of squirrely guy. Kind of like Richard Simmons.

Did you ever see Richard Simmons when he would go on Letterman? Oh, yeah. Okay. So it's great. The way that Letterman kind of regarded Richard Simmons affectionately, but also like, this guy's, he's moving around a lot. Yeah, yeah. It was, he was like that, but amped up on, like, speed, essentially.

So he was a magnet for cameras and he was giving interviews all over the place. Yeah, and he was also, you know, he's adding hype for the event, obviously, by saying things like, you know, she's a woman. They don't have the emotional stability. She'll choke. He added more stakes. He said that he would jump from the London Bridge in Arizona or the Pasadena Bridge if he lost. And, you know, he was all over the place. He was on the cover of time.

magazine that year in September. It was a caricature of him wearing a male chauvinist badge. And then there was a picture of a pig and a banner that said the happy hustler. So it was all working exactly as he planned. But Billy Jean King, like, if he took that first match seriously, he didn't take this one as seriously. And Billy Jean King was really taking it seriously. Yeah. I'm not sure if he was just, you know, resting on his laurels because of how badly he beat Margaret Court that he just assumed that that was going to translate into playing Billy Jean King, but he did not train nearly as much as he did for Billy, for Margaret Court. Essentially, he was out partying in the lead up to all of this. He was also really, really getting more and more

offensive as things went on, right? Oh, you're going to leave this one for me? Yeah, one of the things he did was he showed up to practice one day with the cameras there. with holes cut out in his shirt so his nipples could show. And he said that Billy Jean King would look better in this. And she came out in public and she was like, this guy is a creep, which was about as tough as you could be in language back then. Yeah, and he was publicly.

And it was at a press conference with them together. And he said, well, you should take that back. And she said, nope, creep stands. And she said later I saw in an interview, she said that, like she didn't take him seriously, but she knew that there were men out there that took him seriously and that he had crossed the line and she needed to make sure that that that was demonstrated that she was not okay with that one yeah i think she kind of played it all just right it was really pretty savvy stuff on her end for sure so i say we take is this our second break yeah second break all right so the gun is going to go off when we come back hi this is joe wintersteen host of the spirit daughter podcast where we talk about astrology natal charts and how to step into your most vibrant life.

And I just sat down with a mini-driver. The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men. Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic, Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom-loving and different perspectives, and I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius are misunderstood. A son and Venus and Aquarius in her seventh house

spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms, on different houses and different places, but just an embracing of the isness of it all. If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chartside view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, this episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcast. I'm Clayton Eckerd, and in 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor.

Unfortunately, it didn't go according to plan. He became the first Bachelor to ever have his final Rose rejected. The internet turned on him. If I could press a button and rewind it all I would. But what happened to Clayton after the show made even bigger headlines. It began as a one-night stand and ended in a courtroom, with Clayton at the center of a very strange paternity scandal. media is here. This case has gone viral. The dating contract.

Agree to date me, but I'm also suing you. Please search warrant. This is unlike anything I've ever seen before. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. This season, an epic battle of he said she said, and the search for accountability in a sea of lies. Listen to Love Trapped on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Why hasn't a woman formerly participated in a Formula One race weekend in over a decade. Think about how many skills they have to develop at such a young age. What can we learn from all of the new F1 romance novels suddenly popping up every year?

He still smelled of podium champagne and expensive friction. And how did a 2023 event called Wagageddon change the paddock forever? That day is just seared into my memory. I'm culture writer and F1 expert Lily Herman. and these are just a few of the questions I'm tackling on No Grip, a Formula One culture podcast that dives into the under-explored pockets of the sport. In each episode, a different guest and I will go deeper into the wacky mishap, scandals, and sagas, both on the track and far away from it, that have made F1 a delightful, decadent dumpster fire for more than 75 years.

Listen to No Grip on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I wonder how many people are like, what is he talking about when he keeps saying the gun is going to go off? whenever Act 3 comes around. Well, I would say, study your checkoff friend. That's right. And not your checkoff friend, your checkoff, comma, friend. Right. Not the friend that you're like,

I've got to hang out with him and then you do you real quick. You check them off your to-do list. Right. Not that guy. Yeah, we all have check off friends. Yeah, I'm sure I'm a lot of people's checkoff friend. No, no, no, no, no. All right, so where are we?

Are we at match time, basically, which was turned into a complete circus, by the way. Yes, this is September 20th, 19th. 173 is at the Houston Astrodome. Oh, man. 30,000 people showed up in person to see this. I saw all over the place, including Britannica, that 90 million people watched it around the world. That's, yeah, I think Livia had 50 million people,

but I watched an interview with her with, I mean, serious journalist. It was Kathy Lee and Hoda. And they said 90 million. And they were just drunk on white wine. at nine in the morning or whatever. So I trust them. Man, that was a weird time, wasn't it?

It was a very weird time. I did want to point out that I looked up, I was like, well, how many people see a tennis tournament at, like, the grandest stage? And center court at Wimbledon is about 15,000 people. So this was double that. Wow. Yeah. Plus, it was in the beautiful new Astrodome, so. Oh, yeah.

So great. So the odds were very much in favor on Bobby Riggs. odds were six to one that Riggs would win. And this was like the whole thing was kind of presented in the media as like the battle of the sexist thing, the man versus woman. And every juvenile joke or, you know, quip or whatever you could make out of that, that is how the whole thing was being promoted. That's how it was being played up in the media. It was not like, this is a very serious thing that they set women's, women's rights back or move them forward,

none of that was in there. It was all just this almost tongue-in-cheek approach to it. And that's how the whole thing, if you were a viewer, that's what you were kind of shown. Yeah, for sure. And that's a good thing to point out. There was, Hollywood was involved. There were a lot of actors and singers and stuff

that were in a celebrity tournament beforehand. They were really milking it. They, when they came in, the University of Houston band performed the song Conquest, which is an anthem from the 1947 movie Captain from Castile. That's when Bobby Riggs came in. They played Helen Reddy's I Am Woman when Billy Jean King came in. Libya pointed out that John Wayne, Bill Cosby, and O.J. Simpson were in attendance.

And I had probably 13 different comments or jokes written out for that. But I'm just going to let that trio stand with that. without comment. Stans on its own. Yeah, I think so. So ABC made a fat $1.2 million off of ads for this match. Yeah. Astrodome got about half that and people paying admission price.

Yeah. And so with the Margaret Court Mother's Day Massacre game that was played under women's rules in that there were three sets. That's how women's tennis matches are played. Three sets. Men's tennis matches are played. five sets. Billy Jean King was like, no, we're going to play five sets, best of five, essentially.

I love it. So there were five sets. Which is smart. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah, another thing that you'll see that's happened recently is sometimes so a woman's court might be smaller than the man's court, which makes it harder for the man to land a ball in bounds. Like in a Battle of the Sexist match.

Yes, thank you. There was nothing like that. This was like a men's match. that Billy Jean King was playing against Bobby Riggs. Oh, yeah. Well, she was like, I got this 55-year-old guy. Like, he wants the three-set match. So we're going to go five because I'm in great shape.

Right. Bobby Riggs enters on a carriage pulled by women that are outfitted as Bobby's bosom buddies. How did Billy Jean-King come in? She came in on a, basically, a platform carried by men in Togas. I also saw as Egyptians, like Egyptian servants. They were shirtless, essentially, and they were brawny dudes. So, like, both of them... Probably not her idea.

No, but she was going along with it, right? Yeah, she played along. Yeah, we were saying that she was taking it seriously, and she was. But she was also, like, willing to play along with this, too. Sure. Like, she wasn't just some, like, stick in the mud, you know? Yeah, totally. So, um, just very appropriately, Bobby Riggs was sponsored by Sugar Daddy Candy.

Right. And, uh, he presented Billy Jean King with a two-foot-long sugar daddy. Remember those? They would just pull your fillings right out of your head. Totally. And so King was like, oh, I have a gift for you, too. It was a piglet that she named Bobby Riggs because he was a male chauvinous pig. And don't worry about the pig.

She coordinated with the promoter, Jerry Perrenchio, very legendary promoter, that the pig would not be eaten or harmed. It would go to live on a farm afterward. And it did. that says everything you need to know about Billy Schenking. Yeah. Yeah. She thought of everything. She did.

She crossed her T's and dotted her oinks. That's right. So, of course, it's 1973, so you want to get the best in the business at the time to do the play-by-play. So they got none other than Howard CoSell. Initially, they had a tennis promoter and anti-feminist named Jack Kramer who was going to do, they were going to do sort of a he versus she commentary. And he was going to be on rig side. and one of the original nine, Rosie Casals, was going to be on Billy Jean King's side.

But Kramer, and this also speaks to Billy Jean King, he was one of the guys behind that original tournament that they protested and wouldn't play in the Pacific Southwest Open where they said, oh yeah, well, we're going to ban you then. So she was like, hey, this is all fun in games and everything, but if that jerk is involved, I'm not even going to do this. So they pulled Kramer off.

the broadcast. Yeah, and they didn't have Rosie Casal speak, too, and I'm really glad they didn't do that. That's, I mean, that's, it's a gimmick and it's understandable, but it would have made the whole thing suck. They brought in Gene Scott,

who was the publisher of Tennis Week, and he just gave commentary like it was a regular tennis match, which is kind of what you wanted in this one. Agreed. So, I mean, imagine Dennis Miller and Dennis Miller calling a tennis match. You don't want that. Yeah.

I mean, think about it. Whose idea was it to put him on Monday night football? On the one hand, it's brilliant. On the other, it's like, what? Yeah, that was weird. But it lasted for years, too. It's not like it was a couple of games. Yeah, no, I think it was a full season, wasn't it?

I think it was more than that. That was it. Yeah, that was weird. Yeah. So the game is on, essentially. That's the point we've reached here. That's right. So Bobby Riggs takes a three-two lead in the first set.

And later on, Billy Jean King would say, like, I was in trouble. I knew I was making some mistakes. I was in my head a little bit. And I knew that I could not give this first set away, basically. Like, he needed to get that set for his psychological standing. And so that first set was so, so important for her. So she knew that she had to win it. She was down three, two.

And she came back and beat him and won that first set six to four, which was a huge. blow to his psyche. Yeah, she said that she could tell that that had gotten to them when they switched sides. So she also changed her playing style. Normally, she would be like she'd want to win the point as quickly and efficiently as possible. Instead, she started drawing ballies out and basically put the ball in one corner and then put the ball in the other corner. So she had this old man running back and forth chasing down these balls to purposefully tire them out. I mean, that's just so cool. that people are capable of doing that, you know, like, I want the ball to go right here, so I'm going to make to go right there with this racket, even though the ball's coming at me at 70 miles an hour. Yeah, for sure. So she wore him out. By the end, he was talking about hand cramps.

The levity had kind of lessened because, like you said, this 55-year-old was an old, old man. Right. So, remember we- So old. Right. Not 54, 55. Okay, okay. I got a couple more weeks. So Billy Jean King won, and she won, like, convincingly, 6-4, 6-3, 6-3.

So remember, best out of five, she beat him in three straight sets. Yeah. And she got her 100,000 check from no less than George Foreman, who I read had hoped to use Bobby Riggs the pig to demonstrate his new type of indoor grill. But it was disappointed that he wasn't allowed to. Oh, no. And so this was, it was just an immediate splash. Remember, this is a media spectacle. Everybody knows about this.

90 million people are watching. So the media just got right in on it again to let everybody know. Billy Jean King won and Let's Celebrator as a pro tennis player. And that's it. That's right. I think we know Josh's coy voice by now. That's not at all how it was reported, of course. They kept reporting sort of in the lowest common denominator way.

The AP said that screaming delirious women's livers lit up more brightly than the rocket-shooting Astrodome scoreboard. Even my beloved New York Times said, King collapsed, tears in her eyes and her husband's arms, adding later, all of a sudden she was a champion, a woman, and a little girl all at the same time. That one brings, like, my eyes water from that one. Yeah, and that's tough. That's so much worse than the Astrodome scoreboard, right? I mean, neither one are great. Yeah.

That one is just like they meant that. They were trying to like really be poignant there. And it's just like, good God. Yeah, they missed the mark. The thing about Bobby Riggs is he wasn't like, well, she, you know, she obviously is some freak woman who beat me. That's the only woman who could beat me. He did the opposite.

He accepted the defeat with dignity and grace. Yeah. He had a thing where he hopped over the net, win or lose after the end of every match. And he did. He hopped right over the net and went up to her and he said confidentially to her that he underestimated her. And then in the press conference, he went on to basically say the same thing, like she beat him very clearly. Yeah, he said she was too strong for me. There have since been rumors that he threw the match as a gambler with six to one odds against that he threw the match and bet against himself. there was a report in I think 2013 ESPN dug into that and there were like mafia figures he was working with to rig the odds. We'll never know the truth, but Bobby Rigg said he didn't throw it.

Billy Gene King said that I don't think he threw it. Like she could tell what was going on emotionally on that court and could tell that he wanted to win and that he was losing. you know, he might not have prepared like he should have, and I guess we'll never know the truth, but my money's on, she beat him. Yeah, my too, but there's, there's, that rumor does have legs. Like he did hang out with mob guys.

He was a huge gambler. The idea was that this, he was indebted to the mob like 100 grand for in gambling debts, and they would wipe it clean if he threw this, and that he was also betting on himself. And his son said, it's possible.

I don't really think that's true, but it's possible. Although his best friend is like, I won't even entertain that that's possible. Like, he just didn't do that. Yeah. But one of the things that people point to is he was making some terrible mistakes during the game. So either she got in his head and he was rattled or he was throwing it. It just seems like the general consensus is that now.

It seems pretty fringe to genuinely believe that he threw the match. Yeah, I agree. which I saw bits of that movie I never saw the whole thing the casting was incredible like Steve Carell and Emma Stone were kind of perfect I don't think the movie was reviewed

like super favorably but it looked okay It's supposedly very true to life actually Yeah yeah Billy Jean King At least you told Hoda and Kathy Lee that it was pretty true to life She said that she said they got the essence of it She said it's a movie of course

But they nailed the essence Man have you seen Begonia Oh, boy. Yeah. That is one of my new favorite movies. That is so good. I did not like, I can never remember his name. What is it?

I'm glad you watched that. Oh, Jesse Plymouth? No, no, no. The director. Oh, oh, oh, Oorgas Lantamos? Thank you. Wasn't that him? Let me try saying it, too.

Jorgas Lantthamos. I don't think I've ever tried it because I've always been like, I'm going to screw this up. Well, I might have screwed it up, but that's what I said. I don't think so. I think you got it. Anyway, I did not like poor things. And I was like, oh, I don't know.

Because I liked everything leading up to that, but not this. And then I saw this. I'm like, he's back. Yeah. It's a great movie. I told you a text you do to see kinds of kindness, too. Have you seen that one? I still have not, no.

I've been watching just tons of rift tracks. Yeah. It's hard to get out of that cycle once you get in. For sure. All right. So back to this, after the Battle of the Sexes, after this, he wanted to kind of keep the media spotlight on him. So he tried to jump off the London Bridge and

Arizona, but the sheriff there, so like, he can't do that. So he had his picture taken on the lake, blow it, and a raft. Billy Jean King went on to just keep being Billy Jean King. In 1974, she founded the Women's Sports Foundation, which is a nonprofit for women's and girls in athletics. And she would end up sort of very publicly coming out of the closet after being married for a long time to a guy not the Larry King, but her Larry King. In 1981, her longtime manager and assistant Marilyn Barnett, it was very sad what happened. She filed a lawsuit against her, which revealed their affair that they had from 72 to 79 because she had fallen from a balcony of Billy Jing's, Billy Jing's house in Malibu

and lost the use of her legs and said that, hey, Billy Jing King promised to give me that house and support me financially. So she took her to court and it got really messy. Yeah, so the fall from the House of Malibu I saw was an attempted suicide and that she had blackmailed Marilyn Barnett had blackmailed Larry King and Billy Jean King before the lawsuit basically said, hey, if you don't want this to come out, let's settle before I actually go public with it. They didn't.

She went public with it. And then to her great credit after being outed in 1981, what? 81. 81. Billy Jean King said, you know what? We'd never promised her the Malibu House, but yes, I'm gay. Larry and I have an open marriage and we're actually going to stay together for the time being. And they stayed together until 1987.

And they divorced because Billy Jean King fell for Ilana Kloss, a fellow tennis player. And they ended up getting married in 2018. So this is enormous. She was outed. She hadn't outed herself. Her choice to do so was removed, but she stood behind it. She didn't deny it. She didn't deny who she was.

She said, yep, I'm gay. Yeah, it was pretty great. As far as equality and pay in pro sports, that's obviously still a thing. It was 2007 when all the Grand Slams agreed to pay women equally in tennis. And they still don't. And some of the other big events, I think just a couple of years ago, the 2024 Canadian Open, there was a $5.9 million pool for the men and $2.5 million pool for women. And if, you know, if you come back with an argument of like, yeah, well, you know, the men's

events are, they get more viewers and more advertising because they're in those better time slots, then you kind of just said it yourself. It's a lot of it has to do with the fact that they're in those better time slots. And they tend to schedule the women's events in lesser time slots. And so they don't get as much advertising. They don't have, you know, a great maternity leave in professional tennis for women. So it's, you know, there's still battles to be fought, but Billy Jean King is still out there fighting him. One last little thing, Chuck, that always struck me.

Before he died in 1995, I think like the night before he died, Billy Jean King visited Bobby Riggs to say goodbye. Yeah. It was pretty great. They had a lifelong, you know, tie and friendship. So that's it. That's the Battle of the Sexus. It was great. How about that?

Yeah. I feel like Tim Robbins in Anchorman. Remember the P. He's like, you know, we have PBS are really done with women's lip. Yeah. Also, Steve Carole was in that. Yeah. He loves Lamp.

He loves Lamp. Since Chuck said he loves Lamp, I tricked him into it. He just unlocked listener. mail. Yeah, this is a listener mail where I'm going to apologize to Ifah from Ireland because apparently we have here and there dabbled an Irish erasure in our show, which is something that is a total accident and something that I'm going to be more aware of moving forward. And here's the email.

Okay. Hi, guys. Longtime listener here. I'm so sad to hear two Irish erasure moments in one episode. in the third man syndrome episode you use the example of the endurance expedition to show how it works

and you called Ernest Shackleton British and if I'm not wrong also Tom Crean but both men were reborn in Irish Shackleton was born in Kilke County,

Kildare did I say that right? I think I did. You said Kilke Yeah, Kilkee County Kildare just under an hour from Dublin City

and Kreen was born in Anaskol Anasgall County Kerry. This is a sore spot for Irish people as we are so often called British, and we don't take it so well. Example, look up Killian Murphy, also being called British. But we will forgive you, however. And that is from Ifa. And Iifa, that is me being an ignorant person.

And I certainly know there's a difference. And I have a hard time keeping track sometimes, but I need to do better at that. So apologies. Nice work, Chuck. I'm sure I've done that before, too, so I want to apologize, too. Great, two apologies in one. Yes, and who is that from? That was from EFA, spelled A-O-I-F-E.

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