Professional Athletes Mental Health

Good afternoon, My name is Aryan Sharma and i’m a young athlete. The issue at hand is
Professional Athlete’s mental health is being overlooked. My contention is that Sports
organisations and the media need to a better job of prioritising professional athlete’s mental
health. 

For many children myself included, we aspire and dream that maybe, just maybe one day,
we could become a professional athlete on the world stage. We all have our childhood idols
that inspire us to be better and to follow in their footsteps. While watching these athletes at
the pinnacle of their chosen sport, we often fail to remember that they are only human.
These icons are treated as powerful, invincible, and indestructible. However, they
experience the same pains, stresses, and issues that we all do under a spotlight of constant
criticism. Mental health in professional sport, as in many aspects of the world, has been
brushed aside as an uncomfortable truth, especially in an environment where people are so
successful. According to non-profit organisation ‘Athlete’s for Hope’, 35% of professional
athletes suffer from mental health issues.

The role the media plays in damaging professional athlete’s mental health has been
overlooked for far too long. It recently came into light when Naomi Osaka withdrew from
The French Open citing anxiety and stress from the post-match interviews as the main
reason. She then refused to take part in the post-match interviews for the tournament.
During an interview with ‘Times Magazine’ she said “Perhaps we should give athletes the
right to take a mental break from media scrutiny on a rare occasion without being subject to
strict sanctions. She’s not alone, there have been countless instances of journalists and
reporters being insensitive to athletes. 

For example, ahead of the 2019 Formula One Belgian Grand Prix, journalists were seen
aggressively pursuing F1 driver Pierre Gasly just moments after his lifelong best friend
Antione Hubert died after a crash in a Formula 2 race. He was bombarded with a series of
insensitive and intrusive questions from the media. Surely there has to be a line between
‘doing your job’ and respecting the very real emotions that athletes feel. During an
interview with the guardian, he stated that “it doesn’t matter whether you are successful or
not, people struggle to understand that we also feel emotions, we also have our ups and
down. People outside, see you as an athlete and assume that sport is the only thing that
goes through your head, but you have a personal life, feelings and emotions which the
media do not seem to care about.” Surely reporters should have the ability to put aside their
job and show some compassion. 

It isn’t only the media, sports organisations and institutes also have a responsibility to look
after their athletes. As I mentioned before, Naomi Osaka requested that she not take part
into post-match interviews saying it caused her anxiety and stress. Instead of the French
Open organisers helping her through her ‘bouts of depression’, they got together with the
other three major grand slams and handed down fines of $15,000 each and threatened the
possibility of disqualification or even suspension. Is this how an advocate for mental health
who has only missed one press conference in her 7 years on tour should be treated? Even
she couldn’t imagine the backlash and scrutiny she received from the Women’s Tennis
Association. 

Again though, she isn’t alone. Australian born NBA superstar Kyrie Irving has long been
struggling with mental health issues. After a career best start to the 2020-2021 NBA season,
he took a break from the season for two weeks as he was suffering from his mental health
and had been having a tough time with his family. During his absence, he received backlash
from fans, the media, and the NBA itself. Kyrie was fined a whopping $850,000 from the
NBA. Kyrie Irving, the man who has done so much for the world. The man that donated half
a million dollars to covid relief efforts. The man that built a water plant in one of Pakistan’s
poorest areas to allow thousands access to clean water. The man who has nothing but
generosity in his heart. Is this really the message that we should be sending to professional
athletes? If you become vulnerable by speaking out about your mental health issues and
take some time to better yourself, you will be fined. He said it himself, “I’m not alone in this.
That’s the big thing about mental health, just coming in and being balanced with yourself
first is the priority before your performance.” Time and time again, these professional
athletes give their all for their sport but still don’t receive any sympathy from their
respective organisations. 

Some people may say that we are in fact making progress, which is indeed the truth. The
USA Olympic team was very sympathetic with Simone Biles and her recent issues with her
mental health causing her to withdraw from the rest of the Olympics. However, the problem
lies before the athletes speak out. As Matti Clements, the director of the Australian Institute
of Sport put it, “We need to address the everyday wellness of our athletes, rather than wait
for a situation to reach crisis point and then intervene.”

The mental health of athletes is often an afterthought, and that needs to change.

Statement of Intention

My purpose of this argument is to point out the emotional tole involved in being an athlete.
I targeted aspiring athletes, interviewing stations such as “The Times” and sporting
organisations such as Tennis Australia. I made these people/organisations my audience as
they have the ability to promote change surrounding my topic. The context behind this
argument is as a result of recent news regarding Naomi Osaka and her battle with mental
illness as a result of the media. Due to being an aspiring athlete myself, I would hate to have
to experience the hardships faced by athletes such as Pierre Gasly and Kyrie Irving therefore
it is imperative I aim to educate and persuade aspiring athletes and sports organisations into
promoting change. My main purpose to create this persuasive essay is to spread awareness
on the topic in hopes that it gains support and can cause real life changes which will still be
in place when I hopefully become an athlete, not only to benefit the life of myself but also
benefitting spectators and future athletes.

I structured my essay by starting off with an introduction about my background, the issue at
hand and my contention. This is to familiarise the audience with myself and give a brief
summary of what will be investigated throughout the essay. I then begin to dive into depth
on the issue and emphasise the seriousness of the situation in order to evoke a sense of
panic from the audience. The next 2 paragraphs effectively overwhelm the audience with a
wide variety of statistics in order to gain a sense of trust from the audience. The 5 th
paragraph is implemented to attack the audiences own judgement and elict a sense of guilt
which will hopefully promote change to occur. The following 2 paragraphs provide the
audience with stories familiar to the audience in order to be able to relate back to the
audience and create a deeper sense of truth. The essay finishes with a closing statement
which is extremely short in order to emphasise the importance of it. The closing statement
is a call to action which is emphasised by the length and abrupt finish of the essay.

I began my essay with imagery For many children myself  this allowed the audience to better
relate to the issue of Mental health in sports by comparing it to their own role models. I
introduced statistics to support my argument of athletes' mental health being brushed
aside. I followed by providing the audience with further data and examples of professional
athletes who have been battling mental health and received backlash. I used alliteration
when addressing the media's impact and repeated words such as "scrutiny" throughout my
essay. Moreover, I quoted athletes to build and included more statistics to build ethos.
When discussing the example of Kyrie Irving I used repetition of “the man” and short
sentences  to highlight the stigma around mental health. Throughout the essay I used
inclusive language such as “we” and “us” to signify to the audience that this issue must be
resolved by a larger group of people who are passionate about the topic. I included
rhetorical questions. “Is this really the message that we should be sending to professional
athletes?” to further challenge the readers' thoughts. I chose to include a rebuttal in my
conclusion to further challenge the audiences stand on the topic. I began with inclusive
language to signify the unity against the issue and provided the audience with the example
of Simone biles. I followed this up by offering a solution which further builds my credibility. I
concluded with one sentence to leave a impact on my audience and encourage change.