Chris Evert defended by insider after being accused of making "annoying" references to Serena Williams during tennis commentary

Tennis commentators largely focus on greats, like Serena Williams and some, like Chris Evert often cite Williams' name even during matches that don’t involve Serena.

While there's a fan group who finds Evert too obsessed with the 23-time Grand Slam winner, one insider dismissed the uproar. In his Tennis Mailbag for Sports Illustrated, Jon Wertheim addressed this critique against Evert

"Distilled, this is the problem with TV. One person says, Why are you dwelling on Serena? The next person says, Serena retired with 23 majors. Why are the commentators ignoring her?

Wertheim had the perfect analogy:

"The same way people say, We need more statistics, while the next viewer says, Why gum up this theater with math?"

"Time to move on. … It's quite annoying," one fan said.

The Tennis Mailbag report focused on London’s Wimbledon buildup. SI noted that the spike in interest after the French Open and subsequent media push around Serena’s retirement fueled Evert's continued mentions.

---

Chris Evert backs Serena Williams' former coach criticizing French Open's referee decisions

Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion Chris Evert took issue with controversial officiating at this year’s French Open. The tournament is known to have balked at the idea of electronic line calling and went with human judgement.

As such, Serena Williams' former coach Rennae Stubbs called for modernizing the way the game should be refereed. It comes in the wake of an umpire call during the match between Mirra Andreeva and Lois Boisson.

In the seventh game of the second set, Boisson challenged a line call, claiming it was in. The chair umpire got off the seat and checked the mark and deemed it in. Andreeva was visibly angry with the call, which led Stubbs to write on X:

"3-3 0-30 Andreeva got screwed. U clearly see the ball push the clay off the line. Mirra actually said to the umpire, “the clay went off the line” & she was right, there was another ball mark there & that’s the one the used to say out. WHEN ARE WE GETTING ELECTRONIC LINE CALLING!”

Chris Evert echoed the sentiments of Stubbs after a poor call was made in the women's singles final at the French Open. Aryna Sabalenka hit a clean ace off her first serve, but the chair umpire deemed it out. Sabalenka didn't like it, as she went from serving at 5-1 to 6-6.

“Can’t wait for next year, electronic line calls,” Chris Evert said.

Let's see if it's time for Roland Garros to rethink the way the game should be called by referees.