Way to go, Naomi!! … “Osaka’s efforts to take a stand for social justice and against police violence has caught the attention of the sports world, including human rights pioneer and tennis legend Billie Jean King, for whom the USTA National Tennis Center is named.
“She has shown more and more confidence about speaking up,” King said last week on ESPN. “She’s very quiet and calm but internally you can tell she’s on fire and thinking about things.”
A report by Adam Zagoria for Forbes.
Naomi Osaka had seven masks honoring African-American victims of police violence made for this U.S. Open.
She wore her fifth mask honoring George Floyd for Tuesday’s 6-3, 6-4 quarterfinal victory over American Shelby Rogers.
No. 4 seed Osaka, the 2018 U.S. Open champion, will appear in one more mask for the semifinals on Thursday against another American,former UCLA star Jen Brady, and ultimately hopes to showcase the seventh for Saturday’s championship match,potentially against 23-time Grand Slam champion Serena Williams in what would be a rematch of the 2018 final.
“I have seven [masks],”Osaka said last week in her on-court interview. “It’s quite sad that seven masks isn’t enough for the amount of names [of Black people killed by members of law enforcement], so hopefully, I’ll get to the finals and you can see all of them.”
Osaka…
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