U.S. Women’s Soccer has been fighting a very public battle for pay parity for years.
World Cup Champion and Olympic Gold Medalist Hope Solo joined Cheddar for a special #chedHER day of programming to discuss how the wide gap has affected her life.
“Even being among the best soccer players in the world, I wasn’t making a good enough living,” she told Cheddar in an interview. “I had to supplement my income by doing appearances, by doing photo shoots, oftentimes having my former agent try to convince me to do things like Playboy.”
Solo and her teammates filed a lawsuit with the U.S. Soccer Federation back in 2016 to protest the disparities between men’s and women’s salaries in the sport.
The men, who failed to qualify for this year’s World Cup after a stunning loss to Trinidad and Tobago in 2017, have not had much luck at the biggest events.
But they reportedly get paid four times as much as their female counterparts, who incidentally have brought home three World Cups and four Olympic Golds.
Part of the reason, Solo says, is broad pay inequity that plagues so many industries. But it also has to do with how the athletes are portrayed in the media.
“We sexualize female athletes,” she told Cheddar. “Before every Olympic Game, many different media come out with a list of the sexiest female athletes. If you scroll down on any article, maybe about me, you’ll see at the very bottom, women on Sports Illustrated covers.”
The women’s team reached an agreement with the sport’s governing body last year, but it stopped short of mandating equal pay for both teams.
For full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/hope-solo-on-closing-the-gender-pay-gap-in-sports).
The drama surrounding tennis star Novak Djokovic continues after he was deported from Australia over the weekend due to the nation's COVID-19 vaccine requirements. Djokovic was forced to leave the country on the eve of what was to be his first match in defense of his Australian Open title after three judges ruled in favor of his removal and revealed their reasoning for doing so. Adding to his woes, a law recently passed in France is putting his chances of defending his French Open title in jeopardy. The director of Marist's Center for Sports Communication, Jane McManus, joined Cheddar to discuss the ongoing fallout.
Alex Silverman, senior reporter covering the business of sports at Morning Consult, joins Cheddar News to discuss why the number of those betting on sports doubled in 2021 and what's next for the industry in 2022.
If you have not placed your buffalo wings order yet, hurry up. The biggest weekend in NFL playoff history kicks off in just under 48 hours with six games being played over three days. Sports Analyst at Yahoo Sports Pamela Maldonado joined Cheddar to give us a preview ahead of the Super Wild Card Weekend.
With the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing rapidly approaching, clouds of controversy continue to swirl around China's treatment of the Uyghur Muslim minority population, its surveillance state, and security for visiting athletes. Phelim Kine, China correspondent for Politico, joined Cheddar to break down the big storylines surrounding the Beijing Games and highlight what he saw as the complete disregard by top corporate sponsors like P&G, Airbnb, Intel, Visa, and Coca-Cola, for the controversies. "They spend $100 million for every Olympics that they sponsor, and they have frankly shown absolute willful indifference to any type of entreaty to essentially be more vocal about their concerns about human rights in China," he said. Kine also touched on the data privacy fears for athletes as visiting contingents are being told to carry burner phones to avoid security risks.
NFL games continue to be among some of the highest-rated programs on television. In 2021, viewership jumped 10 percent from the previous year to an average of 17.1 million as the league debuted its first 18-week season after running on a 16-week schedule since 1978. Fans — and team owners — welcomed the change with open arms, but a vocal percentage of players were not as ecstatic (despite the union signing off). Those who were against adding games cited health and safety concerns as their main reason. While the extended season means fatter pockets for the league, the opposition asks: is it worth the risk? Cheddar's JD Durkin breaks it all down.
With the Australian Open set to begin on Monday, Novak Djokovic is once again being threatened with deportation from Australia after his visa was briefly reinstated and revoked again over alleged discrepancies. Djokovic’s team will sit for an Immigration hearing on Saturday.
Decorated skier Lindsey Vonn did not hold back when touching on mental health in "Rise," her new memoir. "My mental health is definitely part of my story," she said. "Now I'm just thankful that this conversation is so much more talked about — Simone Biles, Naomi Osaka, Kevin Love, Michael Phelps, all have been outspoken about it." She noted that she felt happy that readers, particularly kids, get to see a vulnerable side to her in the book. The gold medalist also went on to note what she's most looking forward to watching in the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
It was 'game on' for sports bettors in the state of New York, as mobile betting kicked off on four major betting operating platforms Saturday. This comes at an exciting time for sports fans with some of the biggest NFL games of the season right around the corner. Cam Rogers - Host of Lock It In with Cam Rogers, Betting Analyst at the Bleav Podcast Network joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss.
Former wide receiver for the New York Giants, Victor Cruz has partnered with Krystal Restaurants, a popular burger chain in the South, to bring the franchise to his home state of New Jersey. Cruz and Alice Crowder, CMO of Krystal Restaurants, joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss the venture. The five new locations will be known as "Victor Cruz's Krystal," decked out with memorabilia from his football career, with the former player explaining how "hands-on" he plans on being. "You never know, OK? You might walk in and Victor Cruz will be flipping a burger back there, and you might be getting it directly from the source," he said.
