Sep 20, 2025
On September 20, 1973, in the highly publicized “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match, top women’s player Billie Jean King beat Bobby Riggs, a former No. 1 ranked men’s player.
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On September 20, 1973, in the highly publicized “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match, top women’s player Billie Jean King beat Bobby Riggs, a former No. 1 ranked men’s player.
Does anyone know what Billie Jean King thinks of the current feminism level being at "women are inherently weaker than men and so having trans women in women's sports is unfair because cis women aren't good enough and can't win against the big scary male creatures :'( " right now?
Fifty years ago tonight
Billie Jean King defeated Bobbie Riggs in straight sets to win the so-called 'Battle of the Sexes'. (Yes, she was allowed the doubles alleys but that patently didn't matter). I was tending bar in a sports bar/meat market in Denver (anybody remember the Bull & Bush?) and every TV was on the match.
The atmosphere slowly changed from raucous chauvinism to stunned silence as the whuppin' unfolded. People forget that in the early 70s there was a grim recession which pretty much ended the 'women's lib' movement as women were forced into the workforce (and bras were required).
In 1973 women couldn't open a bank account in their own name, or have a credit card. The 'weaker sex' wasn't a throwaway line, it was a belief. This night was one of the first cracks to appear in the macho world. As the Virginia Slims ad had hopefully said a few years earlier -- "you've come a long way, baby". There was/is still a long way to go.
(＾3＾♪ MORE!
1979.
Arte Johnson meets Bobby Riggs.
On This Day In History
September 20th, 1973: Billie Jean King beats Bobby Riggs in the Battle of the Sexes tennis match.
Men's singles champion Bobby Riggs congratulates women's singles champion Sarah Palfrey at the National Tennis club in Forest Hills, September 7, 1941.
In 1973, Riggs publicly claimed that female tennis players were inferior and that even at his age (55) he could still beat any of the top women players. He beat Margaret Court in California, which landed him on the covers of Time and Sports Illustrated. Then Billie Jean King, whom Riggs had challenged before Court, agreed to play him. In a televised "battle of the sexes" match at the Houston Astrodome, King defeated Riggs in straight sets, 6–4, 6–3, 6–3. A headline at the time read, "Women Ecstatic, Men Make Excuses."
Photo: AP via My Record-Journal
Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs - “Battle of the sexes” (1972)