Last week it was tennis pros only earn about 15% of the total revenue pot from Roland Garros though first round main draw losers pocket $88,000. (There is $78.9m up for grabs total of which the champion takes $3.7m.)
This week it’s Reilly Opelka saying world’s top golfer Scottie Scheffler’s caddy makes more money than some top ten ATP players.
Yes tennis is lucrative for the super elites but it’s the opposite for many Challenger grinders who have been stuck at that level for a decade, borrowing money, somehow keeping the dream alive after all these years.
For a golf club bag carrier to be earning more money than some pro tennis players is as outrageous as a boxing ring announcer dressed in a tuxedo and bow tie earning hundreds of millions of dollars more than about 90 percent of professional fighters.
Or an NFL TV analyst earning a bigger salary than most of the players in the league.
That’s sports today, sometimes there is no rhyme or reason.
Maybe tennis will find some kind of solution which is more fair and balanced for the players on the lower end of the totem pole. Maybe it won’t and the controversy will persist.
Everybody knows how expensive tennis coaching and travel expenses are for juniors, about a $100,000 a year in some instances.
It has been said by prominent players like Maria Bueno, that to play tennis has more creativity than some arts. Certain players do play creative tennis like Marcelo Rios, Corentin Moutet, Fabrice Santoro, while others are machine like automatons – David Ferrer, Jannik Sinner, Casper Ruud.
If coaching and repetition blunts tennis creativity, it makes you wonder about a separate tennis league for self taught players who couldn’t afford or declined any coaching.
Ok that’s enough, enjoy your day and go play tennis if you can.
Art by Joel Blanc.
No tags