Thursday, June 21, 2012
Notable Moments in Men's Professional Squash
1904: The first professional squash tournament in the world was held at the Huntingdon Valley Country Club outside Philadelphia. Six players entered.
1928: The United States Professional Squash Racquets Association (USPSRA) was founded.
1930: USPSRA holds its first pro event in Boston.
1930: 41 year old Charles Read is "appointed" British Open Champion without playing a match.
1931: Don Butcher becomes the first player to actually win the British Open as he beat Charles Read in the unique Challenger format.
1938: Professional doubles squash begins with the founding of the Heights Casino Open in Brooklyn, NY.
1954: Henri Salaun beats Hashim Khan to win the first U.S. Open (hardball tournament) in New York.
1958: Pro squash players Henri Salaun and Diehl Mateer are on the cover of Sports Illustrated
1966: U.S. Open combines with the Canadian Open to become the North American Open. Mo Khan beats Victor Niederhoffer to win the first tournament title.
1970: Six-time British Open Champion Jonah Barrington organizes a five-man barnstorming tour of Asia to promote and grow the game.
1973: Based on Barrington's successful efforts, the International Squash Professionals Association (ISPA) is founded with the goal of building a global tour.
1976: ISPA hosts its first World Open tournament.
1978: The USPSRA becomes the World Professional Squash Association (WPSA). All of its tournaments are staged in North America.
1980s-1990s: Doubles squash becomes more active with the growing WPSA tour. They promote six to eight doubles tournaments annually in the 80s and approximately a dozen annually in the 90s.
1983: Jahangir Khan (Pakistan) beats Gamal Awad (Egypt) 3-1 in Chichester, England. The match is the longest in history at 2 hours 46 minutes. Game one lasted 1 hour 15 minutes.
1985: Jahangir Khan (Pakistan) beats Ross Norman (New Zealand) to win the re-launched U.S. Open, now a softball tournament.
1986: Jahangir Khan's winning streak ends at 555 consecutive matches when Ross Norman beats him in the finals of the World Open. Khan had not lost a match in 5 years 8 months.
1993: Softball becomes the standard as the WPSA (hardball tour) and the ISPA (softball tour) merge and form the Professional Squash Association (PSA). The ISPA is notably in debt at the time of the merger.
1993: The newly formed PSA struggles mightily for a year and a half losing most of its cash reserves.
1994: Concerned for its survival, the PSA invites former WPSA Board Chairman and successful businessman Jack Herrick to join the PSA Board and to serve as its Chairman.
2000: Doubles players separate from the singles tour and form the International Squash Doubles Association (ISDA) Tour. It remains a hardball game.
2004: PSA switches to point a rally scoring to 11 in their match play.
2008: After 14 years as PSA Chairman, Cleveland, OH based Jack Herrick retires. At the time of his retirement, PSA is financially solid and the tour's annual player purse has grown from $1.2 million to $3.1 million.
2009: US Pro Squash hosts its first tournament at Cross Courts Squash Club in Natick, MA.
2010: US Pro Squash re-brands to become Pro Squash Tour (PST).
2010: Ivan Yuen (Malaysia) beats Mudh Asyraf (Malaysia) 3-2 in Kolkata, India.The match lasts 2 hours 43 minutes, the longest match under the Point a Rally scoring system.
2010: Expressing concern for its own future, PSA bans its players from competing in PST tournaments.
2011: PSA financial statements show a sizable operating loss in 2010 and liabilities substantially exceeding assets. An independent auditor has "significant doubt about [PSA's] ability to continue as a going concern." Current PSA Chairman Ziad Al-Turki pledges substantial financial support to cover any short term needs.
2011: Bradley Ball (England) is crowned PST's first World Champion.
2012: PST completes season having promoted more tournaments in the U.S. than any other squash tour.
2012: Wael El Hindi (Egypt) beats David Palmer (Australia) to win the first Pro Squash Tour World Championship Tournament, hosted by the Detroit Athletic Club.
2012: Top ISDA players announce their intent to leave the tour and form a new SDA Pro Tour.
. . .
Friday, June 15, 2012
Appearance Fees in Sport
Appearance Fees
a part of life for independent contractor athletes
Purists wince at the thought of them, but appearance fees
are increasingly a part of the deal for athletes competing in individual sports. Guaranteed
money is de rigueur for team sports, where athletes regularly demand a signing
bonus or guaranteed money to change teams. But guaranteed money in golf, tennis,
squash, snooker, darts, and running seems counter to the spirit of the
competitions.
Why are appearance fees more prevalent these days? The business of sport is increasingly competitive with regard to sponsorship dollars and ticket
sales. Though most tours are structured to require their top names to compete in the
biggest events, mid-size tournaments
still want to see at least a few stars. And they are willing to set aside money
to guarantee their attendance. Additionally, now that sports tour monopolies are becoming less common, upstart organizations are
looking for competitive advantages.
Golf
The PGA of America, for example, forbids appearance fees in
its tournaments. So Tiger Woods skipped PGA’s Torrey Pines in January and
played an event in the United Arab Emirates as part of the European Tour, where
he received a sizable check just for showing up.
"A lot of the guys play all around the world, and they
do get appearance fees,'' Woods told ESPN.[ii]
"The only place we don't get it is the U.S.''
It is a mostly unspoken fact of life on the European Tour, a
look-the-other-way reality that gives events such as this a big advantage in
attracting players -- and leaves some PGA Tour tournament directors seething as
their rules prevent them from doing the same. The Abu Dhabi event had a purse
of $2.7 million. The appearance fees to attract top players were estimated to be
in the neighborhood of $5 million, approaching twice as much as the tournament
purse. Not surprisingly, 11 of the world’s top 25 players chose to go to Abu
Dhabi.
Though the PGA of America forbids any appearance fees, some
tournaments have built clever marketing deals with players with a wink and a
nod to an implied assurance of participation. But a direct payment remains out
of bounds.
The English newspaper The Guardian suggested[iii] that the European Tour’s paying million dollar appearance fees to players like Phil Mickelson may, in time, shift the balance away from the PGA. “The US Tour remains the world's richest tour and over the course of a long season it can be said to attract the best players. But for how much longer?”
The English newspaper The Guardian suggested[iii] that the European Tour’s paying million dollar appearance fees to players like Phil Mickelson may, in time, shift the balance away from the PGA. “The US Tour remains the world's richest tour and over the course of a long season it can be said to attract the best players. But for how much longer?”
USA Today asked fans if they were ok with Tiger’s appearance
fee[iv]
and only 12% of fans objected to it.
The people who are more likely to object are the other players whose stature doesn’t yet command a fee or purist fans who would worry that an athlete won’t give his best if he isn’t fighting for every penny. But guaranteeing big names creates big buzz. And buzz is good for sponsors and attendance.
Of course, the world of golf is not the only sport where appearance
fees apply.
Tennis
In 2010 the WTA announced it would allow appearance fees in
all Sony Ericsson WTA Tour events[v].
The ATP has long allowed guarantees at tournaments below the Grand Slam and
Masters level.
Regarding the ATP Tour, ESPN reported in 2011[vi],
“playing Grand Slams and Masters-level events . . . is mandatory for ATP pros,
but the rules allow 500- and 250- level events (the number is the ranking
points earned by the winner) to compete for headliners by offering what are
typically six-figure sums to take part.”
According to the Bleacher
Report[vii],
“The Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships is the only ATP tour event that
manages to attract all the top-level players in a one week, 32-player-size draw
contest.” How do they do it? Appearance fees to players: Roger Federer, Novak
Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray.
“The tournament distributes a total of $1,700,475 in prize money, and it
is estimated that more than three times that amount is paid to the players in
the form of appearance fees.”
Auto Racing
In 1986, AJ Foyt made headlines by refusing to show up for a
race unless he received an appearance fee.[viii] “Speed costs money, and I go real fast,” said
Foyt.
NASCAR has the Winners Circle Program[ix].
This is a bonus award program that goes to the previous season's top ten
winners, by number of races won plus the first two winners in the current
season who aren't already in the program. This bonus helps ensure that the
sport's big names go to every race.
NASCAR has an additional bonus paid out to any team
currently in the top 30 in points which makes the race.
How a driver finished in a given race is only part of the
total story. Depending on how they did last year, where they are in the points
this year, which sponsor decals are on their car and several other factors
could determine whether a driver earns more or less than another driver in the
race.
Squash
According to Pro Squash Tour’s Joe McManus, PST has no rules
preventing appearance fees. “Yes, when a club or sponsor requests a specific
player, we have on occasion incented that pro to attend an event. Sometimes, you have two choices: guarantee a top player's attendance or don't do the event. We would prefer to do the event.”
Snooker
Last December BBC reported[x]
on appearance fees which range from £3,000 to £25,000 for top players on the
Snooker tour.
Darts
“The professional darts world circuit isn’t quite on the
same level as golf or tennis . . . [but] with millions on offer in prize money
and appearance fees, and the TV audience demanding some sort of spectacle,
darts in the twenty-first century has come a long way. . .”[xi]
Marathons
CNBC reported on agents telling marathoners not to participate
in races when appearance fees were in question[xii].
[i] http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/pga/news?slug=ycn-10905987
[ii] http://espn.go.com/golf/story/_/id/7493655/european-tour-plays-show-money-star-golfers
[iii] http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/jan/19/european-tour-pga-abu-dhabi-championship
[iv] http://content.usatoday.com/communities/gameon/post/2012/01/are-you-okay-with-tiger-woods-taking-appearance-money/1#.T8veVlL0_Hg
[v] http://www.tennis.com/articles/templates/features.aspx?articleid=3231
[vi] http://espn.go.com/tennis/story/_/id/6829700/tennis-how-la-survived-splurging
[vii] http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1090199-professional-tennis-the-dubai-championships-and-the-power-of-money
[viii]
http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1986-03-01/news/8601130090_1_foyt-preston-henn-grand-prix
[ix] http://nascar.about.com/cs/nascar101/a/payouts.htm
[x] http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/snooker/16031545
[xi]
The Rough Guide to Cult Sport, p. 99, © 2011,
Penguin Books
[xii] http://www.cnbc.com/id/30307506/Economy_Hits_Marathon_Appearance_Fees
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