There is no seeing inside someone else’s head. If tennis champion Naomi Osaka feels her mental health has been threatened by being required to engage in post-match dialogue with reporters—if that is at the core of her “long bouts of depression” which she offered as a reason for boycotting French Open press sessions and then withdrawing suddenly from the tournament—who are we to doubt her?

But she does appear to be conflating her insecurities with the routine procedure of press conferences. And, while she said she has been haunted for nearly three years by “huge waves of anxiety before I speak to the world’s media,” and that tennis officials therefore “continue to ignore the mental health” of athletes by subjecting them to those question-and-answer periods, there is no evidence she had raised the complaint before.

In a statement, she said, “I’m not going to subject myself to people that doubt me,” implying that the media—these days so often cast as the enemy by a large segment of the population—had worked at discrediting or disrespecting her.

Immediately, all sides took a defensive stance: The media, which is there because elite professional tennis is newsworthy. Osaka, in response to the $15,000 fine for her press no-show, though it was an action taken many times against many players in the past. And tennis officials, who said Osaka had declined to discuss reasons for her media boycott and first hinted at further sanctions before expression concern for one of their primary meal tickets.

Then came the cacophony of rambunctious voices from that “other” media—social media—many taking Osaka’s side, but plenty willing to give her a flogging as well. For all the postings pleading for compassion regarding Osaka’s situation—exactly what that is, we can’t possibly know—there has been an awful lot of racket casting her as spoiled and simply not in the mood to do what is contractually required of all players.

As a veteran of sports journalism who has covered the New York-based Grand Slam, the U.S. Open, for more than 40 years, I can attest that the sort of nasty accusations in on-line comment sections are not a feature of post-match tete-a-tetes. Yes, some in my tribe can be guilty of harebrained inquiries. There is such a thing as journalistic malpractice.

In general, though, those press conferences run from boring to somewhat enlightening to occasionally humorous. And, in my experience, Osaka was open and thoughtful in that setting. In her return to the U.S. Open in 2019, as defending champion and already ranked No. 1, Osaka described her developing career “as a book. It’s not quite done yet. Currently being written. I don’t know how the ending is going to be. I only know what the chapters are. For me, it’s just reading it, you know. Plot twist. But the kind of plot twist that makes you want to keep reading it.”

Insightful, no? And when she was upset that year in the fourth round by the Swiss Belinda Bencic, Osaka sounded reasonably in control of sport’s ups-and-downs. “I have this feeling of sadness,” she said then, “but also that I have learned so much. I feel I’m more chill now. Like I grew. I don’t feel like I put so much weight on one single match. Of course, to a certain extent I do. But, lesson I’ve learned….I guess not to take myself so seriously. Just to know there’s always another tournament. I’m kind of still figuring it out, honestly, as I go along.”

My first reaction to Osaka’s surprising French drama was that if we ink-stained wretches somehow have sent her around the bend by seeking her thoughts after such upset losses, it’s thoroughly understandable that she do something about it. Preferably that she seek professional help.

Still, the purpose (and effect) of those verbal scrums is to get the players’ thoughts—not to cast aspersions. Reporters are a conduit to interested fans (who pay the freight) which results, to a great extent, in promoting the players and the sport. It was through the media’s public exposure that such pioneering advocates as Billie Jean King long ago were able to agitate for equal pay, and lots of it, for women.

In 2020, Osaka was paid more than any other female athlete in the world, more than $55 million, mostly through endorsement deals that hinge on her visibility. The New York Times recently published a story headlined “How Naomi Osaka Became Everyone’s Favorite Spokesmodel.”

In taking herself out of the French Open, Osaka issued a statement that she “never wanted to be a distraction” and that, by withdrawing, she would allow attention to settle on the other players and the competition. But, in effect, she has done what Serena Williams did to her when Williams’ duel with a chair umpire during the 2018 U.S. Open championship final took the shine off Osaka’s first of four major tournament titles.

It’s pretty obvious that, along with Williams, Osaka arrived in Paris as one of the sport’s two premier attractions, a star whom the tournament badly wanted to keep around as long as possible. Someone all concerned would want to accommodate.

Plot twist, indeed.