Serena was always quick to play the racism and misogyny cards in the latter part of her career when her onetime awesome powers were fading. There's no doubt she experienced plenty of both during her time in tennis but a truly great athlete is no longer a great athlete when they start blaming stuff like that.
Personally, I felt sorry for her in her twilight years - she couldn't gracefully finish a wonderful career - couldn't enjoy the sendoff. Maybe her makeup and the fight she had to put up to get to the top meant that she could never graciously accept the inevitable in a classy way. She was bang out of order that night in 2018 and it was made even worse by her embarassing carry on with the press afterwards. I guarantee that every coach and psychologist she ever used had trained her not to lose her cool and her focus but she just couldn't help herself and once the cat was out of the bag, all hell broke loose.
In fairness, after a year out with injuries, her very last few matches and her run to the third round at the US Open were different. She seemed to enjoy the games and she played great tennis in that defeat to yer wan the Aussie before bowing out gracefully. The years of decline however, were not pleasant viewing.
