At the 32nd annual ESPY Awards—held Thursday at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles—Black athletes had the most wins in the competitive categories, while Serena Williams made history as the first Black woman to host the show.
The ESPY Awards, also known as the ESPYs, is an acronym for Excellence in Sports Performance Yearly Awards. The star-studded show included actor/producer Quinta Brunson, actor/playwright Colman Domingo, retired Olympian Allyson Felix, tennis legend Venus Williams, Buffalo Bill Damar Hamlin, and actor/songwriter Halle Bailey as presenters.
Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes repeated his two individual ESPY Award wins from 2023: Best NFL Player and Best Athlete, Men’s Sports. Las Vegas Aces player Wilson was also a double winner, picking two individual awards for Best WNBA Player and Best Athlete, Women’s Sports. Mahomes was a no-show at the ceremony, but Wilson, also not there, pretaped an acceptance speech.
“It’s great to think that a young girl who didn’t even want to play basketball is up for the running and even won an ESPY,” Wilson said.
ESPY Awards host Williams raised some eyebrows with a sweet and salty, seven-minute opening monologue that included jokes about the Kendrick Lamar/Drake feud that erupted earlier this year. She also explained why she chose to host the ESPYs.
“First of all, an opportunity for me to wear 16 outfits in three hours, I’m going to take it,” she said. “I also won 23 Grand Slams. A documentary about my life [‘In the Arena: Serena Williams’] is airing right now on ESPN+. My movie ‘King Richard’ got nominated for several Oscars and won for Best Actor. So, honestly, the only thing left for me really to do was tell jokes in front of football players, basketball players, and [ESPYs presenter] Rob Lowe.”
A joke linking the version of actor Will Smith who slapped Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars to the Will Smith who played her dad in the 2021 film “King Richard” fell flat.
Williams then stopped herself before finishing one of the jokes that seemed to reference the Tom Brady/Gisele Bündchen divorce and how Brady was mocked for his marital problems during the Netflix special “The Roast of Tom Brady,” which premiered on May 5.
“A lot of you athletes are in the prime of your career,” Williams said. “Savor it while you can. Because soon, you’ll have to retire, and the best you can hope for is a three-hour roast joke about how your wife left you for a jiu jitsu … You know what? I’m actually not going to go there. I don’t want get anyone’s family upset. Let me stop.”
Williams, who is a close personal friend of spouses Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, joked about the couple being at the awards show, where Prince Harry received the Pat Tillman Award for Service, for his work with the Invictus Games.
“Please, Harry and Meghan, try not to breathe too much because this is my night,” Williams said. “And I don’t want to be overshadowed by the accusation that you guys are taking up too much oxygen.”
She ended the monologue with a advice for young people.
“I know a lot of kids look up to us athletes. And I want to say to these kids right now: Get up. Get off of TikTok. Work hard. Find out how capable you are. Be great. Be so great, they don’t want to believe in you. And then, be even greater. And after all that, still don’t pick a fight with Kendrick [Lamar].”
University of South Carolina women’s basketball head coach Dawn Staley received the Jimmy V Award for Perseverance, a noncompetitive prize. In her acceptance speech, Staley paid tribute to three people affected by cancer: her former assistant coach, Nikki McCray-Penson, who died of breast cancer in 2023 at the age of 51; Staley’s sister, Tracey Underwood, a cancer survivor; and UVA Health Children’s Hospital cancer patient Blakely Thompson.
“I realize how Nikki, Tracey and Blakely’s fight inspires me [so] that I might be that source of inspiration for someone else.”
Staley, who coaches the South Carolina Gamecocks, also talked about fighting against injustice and inequity.
“How do I not fight pay disparity when I do the same job [as male college basketball coaches] and get paid less but win more?” Staley asked.
She told the professional athletes in the audience that they have an opportunity to fight for what’s right too.
“You can call it destiny, your given right, or luck. I call it a blessing,” the coach said. “And with this blessing comes a chance to live extraordinary lives and taking even more extraordinary responsibilities—responsibilities you may not have asked for, but are yours nonetheless. You have the power to make a difference.”
The South Carolina Gamecocks won the award for Best Team.
JuJu Watkins of USC Women’s Basketball won the Best Breakthrough Athlete Award.
“I want to thank all the great, powerful women who came before me that made this possible,” she said.
Jaylen Brown of the Boston Celtics won the prize for Best Championship Performance.
Lamar Jackson of the Baltimore Ravens won the award for Best Play, for catching his own pass for the first down during an AFC championship game against the Kansas City Chiefs on Jan. 28.
Meanwhile, Jayden Daniels of Louisiana State University Football won the award for Best College Athlete, Men’s Sports, which was a category whose award was not given during the televised part of the ceremony.
Black athletes who won in other categories but who were not at the awards ceremony were Coco Gauff (Best Tennis Player); Kylian Mbappe of Real Madrid (Best Soccer Player); Terence Crawford (Best Boxer); and gymnast Simone Biles (Best Comeback Athlete).
Ciara opened the show with a medley performance of “Goodies,” “1, 2 Step,” and “Level Up.” Flau’jae Johnson later performed “Came Out a Beast.”
A complete list of winners can be found on the official ESPY Awards website.
