Leslie Jones Roasts Fox Sports For Megan Rapinoe ‘Oldest Player’ Graphic
Comedian Leslie Jones has been on Saturday Night Live since 2014, specializing in both sketches and memorable “Weekend Update” commentaries. In addition to her SNL work, Jones has appeared in such movies as the 2016 Ghostbusters remake, while also frequently engaging in social media commentary about Game of Thrones and the Olympics. Her commentaries on the latter even got her a gig covering the Winter Olympics for NBC in 2018, per Forbes.
Jones has been posting video commentaries on the Women’s World Cup to her Twitter account, and one of those, after the U.S. team won the World Cup Final Sunday, got quite a bit of attention.
In a video posted during the postgame celebration, Jones expressed her displeasure that Fox had included the phrase “oldest player to ever score a goal in FWWC Final” below a postgame interview with U.S. team star Megan Rapinoe.
“Now look at this warrior and look at the f–kin’ caption,” Jones could be heard saying in the video, in which she filmed Rapinoe’s interview on TV.
“What the f–k is wrong with us?… This girl just won her second World Cup, and that’s what ya’ll put under the caption… I’m saying, would they do that do that to a man?”
The video had over 117,000 views as of Sunday night.
I’m about yo go HAM ON THESE MUTHAFUCKAS!!. Y’all fail the women every time. The athletes every time!! I need to be the commentator damnit!! @uswnt @fifawwc2019 #WARRIORS pic.twitter.com/QYpbpQJFeS
— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 7, 2019
The 34-year-old Rapinoe is, in fact, the oldest player to score a goal in a Women’s World Cup Final, as was pointed out by numerous media outlets during and after the game on Sunday. The Women’s World Cup has only been played eight times, and because goals are rare in international soccer, the list of players who have scored goals in the Women’s World Cup Final at all is quite short.
“No athlete I can think of right now has such a perfect sense of herself on a stage—nor such a command of it,” @louisahthomas writes. https://t.co/MIJS0nUlXA
— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) July 7, 2019
Most players on national teams are younger than Rapinoe is now, although Christie Pearce, Rapinoe’s former teammate, became the oldest World Cup player ever when she played for the U.S. in the 2015 World Cup at age 40. The 41-year-old Brazilian player Formiga, however, overtook that record in this year’s tournament.
Jones is wrong, however, about one thing. Sports commentators very frequently point out that male athletes are the oldest player to accomplish a particular feat. Sports Illustrated was among many media outlets who noted in February that Tom Brady was now the oldest quarterback to win the Super Bowl, just as many outlets had noted three years earlier that Peyton Manning had earned that distinction when he won the championship with Denver.
