Rapinoe vs Green... who you got?

[Sactowndog]

If you listen to what each of them actually said, she is in the right. But mind you that's way different from what this discussion will boil down to which is women's sports suck and don't generate revenue so shut up.

But I hope some people will take the time to actually read the quotes before their usual lazy commentary. Several female athletes actually engaged with him in very meaningful ways to acknowledge some of what he said while correcting him on the areas he missed on.

It spurred a good dialogue, but we won't have it here sadly.

So, let’s have some good dialogue. How exactly is she right?

I'd start with her point that its not just the job of the marginalized to fighting against it. Yes, absolutely women athletes have a responsibility if they want more pay to help to figure out new revenue streams, lots of female athletes including her not only acknowledge that but having been fighting those fights for years. Worth noting that the UWNT generated more revenue than the men in her sport and still got paid less.... Same thing has happened in tennis where they tried to use the 3 sets versus 5 argument and Serena and others were like okay we'll play 5 now pay us--which did eventually happen.

I think too many people jump to the conclusion that women are asking for the same pay as men in every sport and that's simply not the case. But it makes it easy for people to have a quick lazy take instead of trying to take a longer-term view on the issue. Is investing in something that isn't currently a revenue producer valuable? If yes, then let's work together to figure out solutions instead of telling women figure it out, but not only with no support from me as a man, but I'm going to actively make it harder with comments like this.

Now maybe some don't think women's basketball is worth investing in. Fine. I personally think that's short-sighted, but I don't expect everyone to share my view. But sports invests in all kind of loss-leaders because they see potential long-term benefits. And paying the WNBA players for instance just enough more so they aren't having to go play in Russia in the off-season might just be worth doing.

I would just add the Rapino’s comments were highly biased and ignore two critical facts.

1) a portion of revenue is determined by the success of the World Cup which is shared to the various national teams. The men’s World Cup makes revenue at an order of magnitude higher than the women’s World Cup.

2) the women opted for security of pay over an increased risk reward. Had the women had faith in themselves, then they could have been less risk adverse like them men. Now they want to have their cake and eat it too which is why their lawsuit got thrown out.

Here is a good and balanced fact check article on the topic:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/07/08/are-us-womens-soccer-players-really-earning-less-than-men/


Total prize money for the Women’s World Cup in 2019 is $30 million — the champions will walk away with about $4 million. For contrast, in the 2018 Men’s World Cup, the champions won $38 million from a total pool of about $400 million. In other words, the champions from the men’s world cup were awarded more than the total prize money in the women’s tournament. So there’s no question that there’s a huge gap in earning potential here.

[Texas Chuck]

So, let’s have some good dialogue. How exactly is she right?

I'd start with her point that its not just the job of the marginalized to fighting against it. Yes, absolutely women athletes have a responsibility if they want more pay to help to figure out new revenue streams, lots of female athletes including her not only acknowledge that but having been fighting those fights for years. Worth noting that the UWNT generated more revenue than the men in her sport and still got paid less.... Same thing has happened in tennis where they tried to use the 3 sets versus 5 argument and Serena and others were like okay we'll play 5 now pay us--which did eventually happen.

I think too many people jump to the conclusion that women are asking for the same pay as men in every sport and that's simply not the case. But it makes it easy for people to have a quick lazy take instead of trying to take a longer-term view on the issue. Is investing in something that isn't currently a revenue producer valuable? If yes, then let's work together to figure out solutions instead of telling women figure it out, but not only with no support from me as a man, but I'm going to actively make it harder with comments like this.

Now maybe some don't think women's basketball is worth investing in. Fine. I personally think that's short-sighted, but I don't expect everyone to share my view. But sports invests in all kind of loss-leaders because they see potential long-term benefits. And paying the WNBA players for instance just enough more so they aren't having to go play in Russia in the off-season might just be worth doing.

I would just add the Rapino’s comments were highly biased and ignore two critical facts.

1) a portion of revenue is determined by the success of the World Cup which is shared to the various national teams. The men’s World Cup makes revenue at an order of magnitude higher than the women’s World Cup.

2) the women opted for security of pay over an increased risk reward. Had the women had faith in themselves, then they could have been less risk adverse like them men. Now they want to have their cake and eat it too which is why their lawsuit got thrown out.

Here is a good and balanced fact check article on the topic:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/07/08/are-us-womens-soccer-players-really-earning-less-than-men/


Total prize money for the Women’s World Cup in 2019 is $30 million — the champions will walk away with about $4 million. For contrast, in the 2018 Men’s World Cup, the champions won $38 million from a total pool of about $400 million. In other words, the champions from the men’s world cup were awarded more than the total prize money in the women’s tournament. So there’s no question that there’s a huge gap in earning potential here.

This keeps getting pointed out as some sort of giant gotcha.

But it again is misleading(intentionally?) because its talking about the entire world cup and not just the Americans. We know the Men's World Cup is insanely popular world wide and generates a ton of revenue. But this is not true of the USMNT specifically.

Context is vital. Always.

[Sactowndog]

I read the tweets and they both made some good points. Green was listing ways Women's USA soccer can raise attention and therefore revenue for women's soccer; however, I believe Green is unaware of what team usa has done to gain the attention. And while I partial agree with Megan that the reason why women's soccer has gotten the funding it deserves is because of male dominated society, I do believe just because you throw money at something doesn't mean that it is just going to grow. Key example is the WNBA. At some point the product has to draw revenue it self. But I just hate how this makes Green look like a woman hater, the debate is truly about how to get attention for women's soccer. They are both on the same side.

Yeah if we want sustainable viewership for women's sports we can't do some half assed thing where we just throw extra money at them for a few years. There needs to be a cultivation of fandom for the sports, and I still that starts with targeting young people and developing strategies to get them interested in watching women's soccer or basketball. And then you also have to be patient and realize that it isn't going to change overnight, we probably need a few generations of slowly growing fans for women's sports.

This is one of the best posts of the thread, and I think gets at what Rapinoe is saying. It is not about salaries - it is about grass-roots investment in women's sports, as well as a cultural shift where women's sports receives both more funding and support, as well as an acknowlegement that girls need to be encouraged from early childhood that the sky is the limit for them, that they can do whatever they put their minds to, and that existing sexist beliefs about what is "appropriate" for them to pursue in life need to be brought out in the light and destroyed. As with the racial issues we have in our country, this won't happen overnight. It will take true generational change - as older people set in their racist/sexist ways die off (or, more hopefully, renounce those racist/sexist views) and girls see not only structures in place to pursue their dreams, as well as ENCOURAGEMENT of those dreams - as opposed to messaging that they are not biologically wired to be "competative" or that some areas of sports (or career pursuits) are more appropriate for boys/men.

It will take time...but it starts with the acknowedgment that sexism and an imbalanced playing exists in the first place.

The problem with both their posts is a lack of understanding the soccer and increasingly basketball are both global sports. The revenue gap isn’t in the US, it’s in the 100 other countries around the world that causes the Men’s World Cup to generate 10x the revenue of the Women’s World Cup.

And sorry it’s not just about encouragement of little girls it’s about priorities. I have a son who plays pro Water Polo in Europe for around 50,000 Euros a year. I have a daughter who had agents trying to interest her in playing pro basketball and pro Volleyball in Europe. She turned them all down to go to physical therapy school. I told my daughter to go but she flat out refused.

It just wasn’t a priority for her. She’s not the only one. My daughter in law gave up the starting spot on the Canadian water polo team to go to med school. You see this all the time. A good friend of mine, his daughter was offered a full ride scholarship to Villanova to play water polo and declined it because she didn’t want to play any more.

[Texas Chuck]

This would be like justifing the UTD men's basketball budget being 5x the women's because Duke and Villanova generate a ton of revenue in Men's college basketball. Just largely irrelevant.

[Sactowndog]

I'd start with her point that its not just the job of the marginalized to fighting against it. Yes, absolutely women athletes have a responsibility if they want more pay to help to figure out new revenue streams, lots of female athletes including her not only acknowledge that but having been fighting those fights for years. Worth noting that the UWNT generated more revenue than the men in her sport and still got paid less.... Same thing has happened in tennis where they tried to use the 3 sets versus 5 argument and Serena and others were like okay we'll play 5 now pay us--which did eventually happen.

I think too many people jump to the conclusion that women are asking for the same pay as men in every sport and that's simply not the case. But it makes it easy for people to have a quick lazy take instead of trying to take a longer-term view on the issue. Is investing in something that isn't currently a revenue producer valuable? If yes, then let's work together to figure out solutions instead of telling women figure it out, but not only with no support from me as a man, but I'm going to actively make it harder with comments like this.

Now maybe some don't think women's basketball is worth investing in. Fine. I personally think that's short-sighted, but I don't expect everyone to share my view. But sports invests in all kind of loss-leaders because they see potential long-term benefits. And paying the WNBA players for instance just enough more so they aren't having to go play in Russia in the off-season might just be worth doing.

I would just add the Rapino’s comments were highly biased and ignore two critical facts.

1) a portion of revenue is determined by the success of the World Cup which is shared to the various national teams. The men’s World Cup makes revenue at an order of magnitude higher than the women’s World Cup.

2) the women opted for security of pay over an increased risk reward. Had the women had faith in themselves, then they could have been less risk adverse like them men. Now they want to have their cake and eat it too which is why their lawsuit got thrown out.

Here is a good and balanced fact check article on the topic:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/07/08/are-us-womens-soccer-players-really-earning-less-than-men/


Total prize money for the Women’s World Cup in 2019 is $30 million — the champions will walk away with about $4 million. For contrast, in the 2018 Men’s World Cup, the champions won $38 million from a total pool of about $400 million. In other words, the champions from the men’s world cup were awarded more than the total prize money in the women’s tournament. So there’s no question that there’s a huge gap in earning potential here.

This keeps getting pointed out as some sort of giant gotcha.

But it again is misleading(intentionally?) because its talking about the entire world cup and not just the Americans. We know the Men's World Cup is insanely popular world wide and generates a ton of revenue. But this is not true of the USMNT specifically.

Context is vital. Always.

Not misleading at all. It’s part of the revenue stream like it or not and to ignore is disingenuous. It’s a small world and as the NBA has made clear you audience is global not national.

By your point we should pay CEO’s just for profits they earn in the United States and ignore their profits in the rest of the world.

[Sactowndog]

This would be like justifing the UTD men's basketball budget being 5x the women's because Duke and Villanova generate a ton of revenue in Men's college basketball. Just largely irrelevant.

The budgets for Cal Water Polo is 5X the budget for Pacific because they are part of the PAC-12. Cal water polo players fly to games in LA while UOP takes Vans.

Context does matter and Men’s World Cup generates orders of magnitude more revenue than Women’s.

[Texas Chuck]

It's funny because I keep getting told that women deserve no money because they don't earn it. Yet here we know the USWNT earns more revenue than the USMNT yet because other national teams earn a ton of money the US men profiting from it is a-ok. Ironic don't you think?

IF you were really about merit, you'd side with the USWNT on this issue, but you don't. I'm guessing because the issue isn't so much about merit but rather this idea that men are simply superior and thus should always get more even in instances where purely on the merits they deserve less. Interesting.

Or how nobody ever talks about how the 15th man on the roster who generates essentially zero revenue for anyone is making 7 figures and we just accept that's the scale. But the WNBA has some players who are actual draws even if the league isn't profitable these specific women definitely create more revenue than Taj Gibson or Mike Scott.

So if we are mad that women get paid anything at all, shouldn't we say that it's the stars drawing all the revenue in the NBA and we need to up the max salary considerably and lower the minimum considerably as well? Or do we accept that's been collectively bargained and just don't think about it?

I've never argued the women should make as much on average as the men. But I do think if we actually look at the economics a little closer instead of in these broad swaths we'd reach some different conclusions. Or at least we should.

[Sactowndog]

It's funny because I keep getting told that women deserve no money because they don't earn it. Yet here we know the USWNT earns more revenue than the USMNT yet because other national teams earn a ton of money the US men profiting from it is a-ok. Ironic don't you think?

IF you were really about merit, you'd side with the USWNT on this issue, but you don't. I'm guessing because the issue isn't so much about merit but rather this idea that men are simply superior and thus should always get more even in instances where purely on the merits they deserve less. Interesting.

Or how nobody ever talks about how the 15th man on the roster who generates essentially zero revenue for anyone is making 7 figures and we just accept that's the scale. But the WNBA has some players who are actual draws even if the league isn't profitable these specific women definitely create more revenue than Taj Gibson or Mike Scott.

So if we are mad that women get paid anything at all, shouldn't we say that it's the stars drawing all the revenue in the NBA and we need to up the max salary considerably and lower the minimum considerably as well? Or do we accept that's been collectively bargained and just don't think about it?

I've never argued the women should make as much on average as the men. But I do think if we actually look at the economics a little closer instead of in these broad swaths we'd reach some different conclusions. Or at least we should.

So by your model SDSU should get more revenue than Nebraska basketball because SDSU performs better and has gone further in the NCAA’s. The fact that Nebraska is part of the Big 10 and gets far more in TV revenue doesn’t matter. It’s clear the Country has a bias against cities in CA.

[Sactowndog]

It's funny because I keep getting told that women deserve no money because they don't earn it. Yet here we know the USWNT earns more revenue than the USMNT yet because other national teams earn a ton of money the US men profiting from it is a-ok. Ironic don't you think?

IF you were really about merit, you'd side with the USWNT on this issue, but you don't. I'm guessing because the issue isn't so much about merit but rather this idea that men are simply superior and thus should always get more even in instances where purely on the merits they deserve less. Interesting.

Or how nobody ever talks about how the 15th man on the roster who generates essentially zero revenue for anyone is making 7 figures and we just accept that's the scale. But the WNBA has some players who are actual draws even if the league isn't profitable these specific women definitely create more revenue than Taj Gibson or Mike Scott.

So if we are mad that women get paid anything at all, shouldn't we say that it's the stars drawing all the revenue in the NBA and we need to up the max salary considerably and lower the minimum considerably as well? Or do we accept that's been collectively bargained and just don't think about it?

I've never argued the women should make as much on average as the men. But I do think if we actually look at the economics a little closer instead of in these broad swaths we'd reach some different conclusions. Or at least we should.

Granted I’m biased a bit.....

I was an All-American swimmer and my sister was a far better athlete than I who chose to be a cheer leader to my fathers endless dismay.

My son is an Olympic Water Polo Player and my son in law was the starting point guard on a sweet sixteen level college team. And both of them get grief to this day that their sister/wife is a far better athlete. She could have been pro in two sports and was invited to join the US Olympic handball team which she also declined.

For some percentage of women, sports just isn’t as high of a priority and that has all kinds of implications.

[TwitterFingers]

The WNBA is a subsidiary of the NBA and has been hemorrhaging money since its start. Green gets paid less money because the WNBA exists. If he were to call for the WNBA to be disbanded he wouldn’t be out of line.

[Pharmcat]

The WNBA is a subsidiary of the NBA and has been hemorrhaging money since its start. Green gets paid less money because the WNBA exists. If he were to call for the WNBA to be disbanded he wouldn’t be out of line.

Draymond is getting paid 22 million to average 6 ppg

If anything he should make less

[Nate505]

It's also very possible that there is some monopoly economics happening. Is it possible that one day women's soccer (or basketball) could become as popular as male? Is there a level playing field for that development to happen or is the historical and economic bias of male dominated sports keeping the female leagues from developping?

I played competitive soccer all the way through college. If I had to choose to watch only one, I’d watch the USWNT over our current Men’s national team. Far more success and player development happening on the women’s team. The women are chasing financial equality while the men’s team is chasing relevancy.

The answer to this debate is very simple as many others have stated...sell more tickets and increase your TV ratings and more money will flow your way. Like it or not, financial success in life depends on productivity. I have plenty of gals that work for me in Sales that earn twice what most of the guys do because they produce more. It’s as simple as that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The bigger issue is that the USWNT is successful, but plays a competition that only comes around once every four years that people seem to care about it. Plus I'm not sure that the other competitions that they have garner any ratings at all. Do people watch the Concacaf Women's Championship more than the Gold Cup? Do they watch Women's World Cup qualifying matches more than the Men's?

It would seem like those ratings would need to improve before anyone would even think of investing a lot of money into a domestic women's league here. I mean I know the NWSL exists...but that's as much as I know about it. Granted, MLS isn't exactly the 5th major sport in the US, but they have average attendance numbers NWSL can only dream about. Interestingly enough MLS used the Men's 2002 WC performance as a springboard to grow the league, but NWSL hasn't seemed to really pull that off yet, despite greater success from the USWNT national team.

[Slim Tubby]

It's also very possible that there is some monopoly economics happening. Is it possible that one day women's soccer (or basketball) could become as popular as male? Is there a level playing field for that development to happen or is the historical and economic bias of male dominated sports keeping the female leagues from developping?

I played competitive soccer all the way through college. If I had to choose to watch only one, I’d watch the USWNT over our current Men’s national team. Far more success and player development happening on the women’s team. The women are chasing financial equality while the men’s team is chasing relevancy.

The answer to this debate is very simple as many others have stated...sell more tickets and increase your TV ratings and more money will flow your way. Like it or not, financial success in life depends on productivity. I have plenty of gals that work for me in Sales that earn twice what most of the guys do because they produce more. It’s as simple as that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The bigger issue is that the USWNT is successful, but plays a competition that only comes around once every four years that people seem to care about it. Plus I'm not sure that the other competitions that they have garner any ratings at all. Do people watch the Concacaf Women's Championship more than the Gold Cup? Do they watch Women's World Cup qualifying matches more than the Men's?

It would seem like those ratings would need to improve before anyone would even think of investing a lot of money into a domestic women's league here. I mean I know the NWSL exists...but that's as much as I know about it. Granted, MLS isn't exactly the 5th major sport in the US, but they have average attendance numbers NWSL can only dream about. Interestingly enough MLS used the Men's 2002 WC performance as a springboard to grow the league, but NWSL hasn't seemed to really pull that off yet, despite greater success from the USWNT national team.

Good points. The USWNT is clearly more successful by a staggering amount but when it comes to ratings and ticket draw, key factors, I’m not sure how they compare.

Soccer is the only sport I’d personally watch the US gals play over the men’s team. I’m a huge Barca fan and follow European soccer. There are plenty of Women’s pro leagues in Europe as well but I have zero interest in that.

I wonder how Women’s Beach Volleyball ratings compare to other sports in the Summer Olympics? (Asking for a friend.)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[AingesBurner]

:D

My last post in this thread will be this one.

Visually Womens sports are definetly preferable, to me.

I generally perfer to watch mens sports because im more emotinally invested.

But, VISUALLY, WATCHING, Womens sports are definetly more attractive to me.

If you guys find watching tall, buff guys run and jump more attractive for your eyes.. hey, different strokes for different folks.

Defintion of attractive for the snowflakes:
at·trac·tive
/əˈtraktiv/
adjective
(of a thing) pleasing or appealing to the senses.
"an attractive home"
(of a person) appealing to look at; sexually alluring.
"an attractive, charismatic woman"
(of a thing) having beneficial qualities or features that induce someone to accept what is being offered.
"the site is close to the high-rent district, which should make it attractive to developers"

youre super straight bro
props

You feel the need to address my coment, did you address the comments of people calling WNBA players unattractive?

There is a handful of attractive WNBA players... most of them are built like unathletic dudes.

[art_tatum]

People saying being paid their worth like the market dictates are missing the systematic problem in our society. We don't treat women sports that are traditionally masculine with the same respect due to gender stereotypes ingrained in our society. So when the market is prejudiced we can't let it dictate price.

We make lowlights of the worst plays in soccer or wnba as examples of why women shouldn't get paid equally, while male lowlights are just for jokes- they not actually bad.

I'm not saying women should be paid the same regardless of market, but we need to try to make the market less biased, which is a social problem, and only then can we let it dictate pay.

This means, on the sports side anyways, increase pay, more promotion and normalizing of women sports that are traditionally masculine. Problem is where does that money come from, since you can't convince every league like the NBA that it'll be an investment long term.

There is a reason why social media sites are taking away down voting or thumbs down options......

If you don't offer a valid counter what's the point of your empty post? And don't come back with that misogynistic gender wage gap is a myth/ women have equality lies.

[Sactowndog]

It's also very possible that there is some monopoly economics happening. Is it possible that one day women's soccer (or basketball) could become as popular as male? Is there a level playing field for that development to happen or is the historical and economic bias of male dominated sports keeping the female leagues from developping?

I played competitive soccer all the way through college. If I had to choose to watch only one, I’d watch the USWNT over our current Men’s national team. Far more success and player development happening on the women’s team. The women are chasing financial equality while the men’s team is chasing relevancy.

The answer to this debate is very simple as many others have stated...sell more tickets and increase your TV ratings and more money will flow your way. Like it or not, financial success in life depends on productivity. I have plenty of gals that work for me in Sales that earn twice what most of the guys do because they produce more. It’s as simple as that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The bigger issue is that the USWNT is successful, but plays a competition that only comes around once every four years that people seem to care about it. Plus I'm not sure that the other competitions that they have garner any ratings at all. Do people watch the Concacaf Women's Championship more than the Gold Cup? Do they watch Women's World Cup qualifying matches more than the Men's?

It would seem like those ratings would need to improve before anyone would even think of investing a lot of money into a domestic women's league here. I mean I know the NWSL exists...but that's as much as I know about it. Granted, MLS isn't exactly the 5th major sport in the US, but they have average attendance numbers NWSL can only dream about. Interestingly enough MLS used the Men's 2002 WC performance as a springboard to grow the league, but NWSL hasn't seemed to really pull that off yet, despite greater success from the USWNT national team.

Ironically the US Women would be more compensated if they won less. If the major competitions where a real competition between the US, Germany, Brazil, and India they would have much higher global ratings. Being dominant doesn’t help global ratings. Their tie against Sweden was a good thing. Did anyone else know or care they played today?

[Doctor MJ]

Women's tennis is about as far from finesse as you can get. They just hit it back as hard as they can and hope the other player is the first one to sail one 20 feet beyond the baseline.
There's nothing except stereotypes supporting the notion that men's tennis is about power and women's tennis is about skill and touch. It's the opposite.

Hmm, there's a discussion to be had here but you're oversimplifying.

About 20 years ago the men's game was getting crippled by power and the women's game was more interesting. This was caused by racket technology which made women more powerful but made men too powerful. You were seeing guys win on grass who couldn't do anything except serve.

2 things changed that as I see it: 1) They changed the surfaces to slow down the game (except on clay, which was already slow as molasses), and 2) the next generation of players learned to be able to react fast enough to return those super-fast shots.

The result then is that while power in real ways still rules the men's game, the issues of "I only serve" dominance went away.

At that point the fact that there are just more top level male players than female players allowed greater physical dominance at the top by someone like Serena than we've seen from someone on the men's side.

Just because I can... in 2001 Agassi and Hewitt each won a major. Neither of them was a power player. Not of the likes of a Sampras or Roddick. I don't think what you're saying gels with my memory of the time/era. The men's game had a combination of power players and grinders (the type that just kept getting the ball back) and thankfully someone like Pat Rafter that still loved the serve volley game! There was a real mix and it was interesting. Women's tennis was suffering because there was a real gap between tiers of players - I'll expand on that below.

I viewed tennis of that era (2000-2010) as being highly successful in the mens game and far less so in the womens game. The reason wasn't about gender but about breadth of quality. In the women's game you could usually name with a high level of accuracy 3 of the final 4 because there was a small group that was always a tier well above the others. Players like Seles, Hingis, Davenport then the Williams Sisters etc that were just a cut above the rest. You only needed to tune in at the end of a tournament because the quality wasn't at the same level and there was little doubt who would win.

In the men's game though it was always far less certain. Anyone from the top 30 could easily make it to the final four or win the tournament. Which made games far more interesting to watch throughout the tournament and made you more interested in the men's results when they got to the final four because you'd been watching them all play multiple earlier rounds.

Closest basketball analogy I can give is people tuning in to the first round of the west playoffs at a far higher level than the first round in the east. Even a west 2 vs 7 or 1 vs 8 could be interesting and go to 6 games.

Now in saying all that. What changed to me was the women's game really came on with far more depth of talent, especially that huge influx of eastern European talents. Where as the men's game became the Federer vs Nadal vs Djokovic show. Basically flipping it on its head. I will admit I would still prefer to watch the men's games though because watching someone like Federer completely on his game was unparalleled. I don't think it is unfair at all to say the combination of power and precision he could produce was a step above anything in the women's game. I don't think we've seen its like by any other player male or female.

Finally, if I was a paying customer, and I have been - I've paid for flights, accommodation and tickets to the Australian Open before. Given the cost of the tickets alone I would choose to watch a men's game. Tickets for finals can go for upwards of $500.00 a ticket and some women's grand final matches have been completely finished in under an hour. Its just not good value for money. If I am paying the same amount for either final give me the one that will go at least 3 sets not the one that can only go 3 sets.

Good thoughts!

I think the thing I'm most struck by though is you talking about 2000-2010 as an era. I'm not saying you're wrong to go by standard decades if that's how it makes sense to you, but I've got a specific memory of what I'll call the Hewitt mini-era that more recently got echoed by the Wozniaki mini-era on the Women's side.

What both had in common was a consensus by tennis analysts that while these players had reached #1, it was only because there was no truly great players at the moment, and that we should expect Hewitt/Wozniaki to be surpassed while still in their prime.

And of course, both were right.

I'll go further and say that my experience during the Hewitt mini-era made me draw a connection back to the Hingis mini-era a few year's earlier in women's. There you had someone incredibly young dominating the world, which should imply that that player is going to be the GOAT...but Hingis lacked power and I think it's pretty safe to say at this point that she was going to get surpassed by Serena even if her health was perfect.

We can even talk about the Evert vs Navratilova flip. Evert was the one with better fundamentals and a much stronger mental game, but eventually when Navratilova figured out how to channel here inner Chrissy Evert, then she surpassed Evert.

So I can't emphasize this enough: This era we're talking about (Hewitt mini-era) seems to have had 180 degree different effects on our understanding of the game, but I can say unequivocally that my perspective was shaped by paying attention to the talking heads and seeing them be proven prescient.

Re: Men's game far less certain. This was certainly always the case until the RF/Rafa/Nole era, and I think we'd agree that it spoke to a weakness in development of women's tennis players. As you say, things are different now though. I mean, this is a sport that basically from its modern inception produced great male players in the US every decade, and that just doesn't seem to be happening any more at a time when tennis popularity in the US has clearly fallen despite the amazing play of RF/Rafa/Nole.

Re: If I'm paying, I want the longer match. Makes sense. I'm coming from the perspective as a Southern California guy who has largely gone to SoCal events and I'd say this biases me to see men's and women's as more equivalent. First and foremost, outside the majors, they don't play Best of 5 and doing so certainly doesn't seem like it's hurting attendance or viewership.

But beyond that, before Indian Wells became what it is now, there was a great women's tournament in San Diego that I enjoyed. And at Indian Wells, when you buy tickets for the finals, the Women's and Men's play back to back Best of 3 sets. While I'll concede that since I was going in the RF/Rafa/Nole era, and since the Williams sisters didn't play the event for so long, the men's finals were almost always what we were most interested in, I really don't think it was ever because the women's play seemed fundamentally lacking. It was just that you're always more excited when you're watching legends or potential legends than when you think you're just watching two performers who likely won't get back to the finals again.

[clyde21]

I'd start with her point that its not just the job of the marginalized to fighting against it. Yes, absolutely women athletes have a responsibility if they want more pay to help to figure out new revenue streams, lots of female athletes including her not only acknowledge that but having been fighting those fights for years. Worth noting that the UWNT generated more revenue than the men in her sport and still got paid less.... Same thing has happened in tennis where they tried to use the 3 sets versus 5 argument and Serena and others were like okay we'll play 5 now pay us--which did eventually happen.

I think too many people jump to the conclusion that women are asking for the same pay as men in every sport and that's simply not the case. But it makes it easy for people to have a quick lazy take instead of trying to take a longer-term view on the issue. Is investing in something that isn't currently a revenue producer valuable? If yes, then let's work together to figure out solutions instead of telling women figure it out, but not only with no support from me as a man, but I'm going to actively make it harder with comments like this.

Now maybe some don't think women's basketball is worth investing in. Fine. I personally think that's short-sighted, but I don't expect everyone to share my view. But sports invests in all kind of loss-leaders because they see potential long-term benefits. And paying the WNBA players for instance just enough more so they aren't having to go play in Russia in the off-season might just be worth doing.

I would just add the Rapino’s comments were highly biased and ignore two critical facts.

1) a portion of revenue is determined by the success of the World Cup which is shared to the various national teams. The men’s World Cup makes revenue at an order of magnitude higher than the women’s World Cup.

2) the women opted for security of pay over an increased risk reward. Had the women had faith in themselves, then they could have been less risk adverse like them men. Now they want to have their cake and eat it too which is why their lawsuit got thrown out.

Here is a good and balanced fact check article on the topic:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/07/08/are-us-womens-soccer-players-really-earning-less-than-men/


Total prize money for the Women’s World Cup in 2019 is $30 million — the champions will walk away with about $4 million. For contrast, in the 2018 Men’s World Cup, the champions won $38 million from a total pool of about $400 million. In other words, the champions from the men’s world cup were awarded more than the total prize money in the women’s tournament. So there’s no question that there’s a huge gap in earning potential here.

This keeps getting pointed out as some sort of giant gotcha.

But it again is misleading(intentionally?) because its talking about the entire world cup and not just the Americans. We know the Men's World Cup is insanely popular world wide and generates a ton of revenue. But this is not true of the USMNT specifically.

Context is vital. Always.

isn't the fact that the men play in a much more profitable tourney the context?

[clyde21]

I played competitive soccer all the way through college. If I had to choose to watch only one, I’d watch the USWNT over our current Men’s national team. Far more success and player development happening on the women’s team. The women are chasing financial equality while the men’s team is chasing relevancy.

The answer to this debate is very simple as many others have stated...sell more tickets and increase your TV ratings and more money will flow your way. Like it or not, financial success in life depends on productivity. I have plenty of gals that work for me in Sales that earn twice what most of the guys do because they produce more. It’s as simple as that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The bigger issue is that the USWNT is successful, but plays a competition that only comes around once every four years that people seem to care about it. Plus I'm not sure that the other competitions that they have garner any ratings at all. Do people watch the Concacaf Women's Championship more than the Gold Cup? Do they watch Women's World Cup qualifying matches more than the Men's?

It would seem like those ratings would need to improve before anyone would even think of investing a lot of money into a domestic women's league here. I mean I know the NWSL exists...but that's as much as I know about it. Granted, MLS isn't exactly the 5th major sport in the US, but they have average attendance numbers NWSL can only dream about. Interestingly enough MLS used the Men's 2002 WC performance as a springboard to grow the league, but NWSL hasn't seemed to really pull that off yet, despite greater success from the USWNT national team.

Ironically the US Women would be more compensated if they won less. If the major competitions where a real competition between the US, Germany, Brazil, and India they would have much higher global ratings. Being dominant doesn’t help global ratings. Their tie against Sweden was a good thing. Did anyone else know or care they played today?

this is a great point...being hella dominant isn't always a good thing in this case...if the competition was more competitive which means more ratings that would actually mean more money probably.

[G35]

The context that I feel is missing is that comparatively to other nations the US women's soccer team is supported far greater.

Then compare how the US men's team is supported compared to other nations. Here is some factual context.

https://www.dw.com/en/world-cup-shows-how-nations-back-womens-soccer-or-dont/a-49359480

When they're not playing for their national teams, 73 of the 552 women competing in this year's World Cup are currently employed by US clubs alone. And that's no wonder: For everything from funding and salaries to public support, the professional conditions for female football players are much better in the United States than they are in most other countries. These factors concentrate top players from around the world in leagues in a relatively few countries.

The Jamaican team: Qualified for the first time, all players employed abroad

The players of some World Cup teams are entirely employed by clubs abroad. The Jamaican team, for example, which qualified for the World Cup for the first time this year, has no players at all training with Jamaican clubs.
Ten play in the United States; the rest are in Norway, Italy and elsewhere. The team, who call themselves the Reggae Girlz, dropped out of the tournament in the group stage. But, considering the circumstances, it's impressive that they managed to qualify at all. Jamaica has a population of only 3 million, and football is far from the most popular sport in the country. Disinterest in women's soccer and attitudes toward female players have made it hard to grow a following on any level, and the Jamaica Football Federation has disbanded the team multiple times.

Leagues worldwide struggle to attract players

In other countries, the situation may be less severe, but similar stories can be found in many places. In Brazil, the Netherlands and Canada, as well, more than half of the current World Cup squad are legionaries, meaning they're employed abroad. Or take Nigeria: All 23 players were born in the country, but only 7 are currently training in Nigerian clubs.

Some players give up a lot to play for the top leagues

For female footballers, accepting a job abroad is often less a matter of preference and more a matter of necessity, Axmann says: "In many countries, women still can't openly play football at all. And, even in Germany, I've known top-class players who have quit football because they couldn't support themselves through the sport."

With their comparatively high budgets for women's football, France, England and Spain have developed into top destinations for players in recent years. Spain's national women's team qualified for the World Cup for the first time in 2015. Back then, only 21 Women's World Cup athletes total played for FC Barcelona, Atletico Madrid or other top Spanish teams. Now, 51 players from 12 different national teams play for Spanish clubs — including all but three of the women on Spain's squad itself.

Aren't these all the "colonizer countries" that people have been hating on...they are supporting women's soccer the best, along side the US...the #1 country supporting women's soccer.


https://www.forbes.com/sites/samindrakunti/2019/09/22/fifa-plans-to-invest-1-billion-in-womens-soccer-will-it-be-enough-/?sh=fc838943af87

Jamaica and Thailand reached the finals in France with the backing of individual benefactors, namely Nualphan Lamsam and Cedalla Marley, the daughter of Bob Marley. Since the World Cup, the Reggae Girlz have been in a payment dispute with the JFF, the Jamaica Football Federation. Argentina and Nigeria, other participants in the World Cup, had been cash-strapped for years.

Roughly a quarter of FIFA member associations simply don't field senior women's teams. Pakistan’s women’s national team last played a game in 2014, the year the national league became defunct. After participating in the 2015 Women’s World Cup, Colombia barely played competitive soccer. It is not all doom and gloom: Mauritania invested in excess of $100,000 since 2016. In July and August the Mauritanian women’s national team played its first official matches, including a tournament in Spain.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2020/apr/20/fifa-says-1bn-investment-in-womens-football-will-not-be-cut

Concern over the “existential threat” faced by women’s football, as Fifpro described it in its report into the effects of coronavirus on women footballers, has been growing as the time frame for a resumption of play has been extended. Many clubs are financially reliant on the philanthropy of their parent men’s clubs, making sustainability an aspiration but a long way off. Until sustainability is reached, teams and leagues are particularly vulnerable to purse-tightening.

https://www.allforxi.com/2019/6/26/18759599/europe-vs-usa-funding-will-determine-the-eventual-winner

Many have said this over the last five to seven years but it has become even more evident at this World Cup. The world is catching up to the USA (if it hasn’t already). Spain showed that when they pushed the USWNT all the way to the final whistle in their Round of 16 match up and while other confederations are lagging behind at the moment, UEFA is quickly gaining momentum and is looking to dethrone the USA’s No. 1 status.

The U.S. have always had the depth to compete with every team in the world, no matter what decade they have played in due to the sheer numbers of women and young girls who play the sport in the United States of America. That, and better funding, has always given the USWNT a leg up on the competition but this World Cup has shown that many teams are just another step in development away from switching dominance of the women’s game from the U.S. to Europe.

The USWT has the advantage of being in a very progressive country with deep pockets and a media that supports their cause. That is why they have been winning. Compared to the USMT, hardly anyone cares how the men do, because Americans support the NFL, MLB, and NBA, with a little bit of NHL, NASCAR, and College Football. Soccer/Futbol is way down the list on many American's sport priorities. But the women are not poor little step-children compared to their female counterparts around the world.

They should stop comparing themselves to the NFL, NBA, MLB, NCAA, etc and compare themselves to the women's teams from Argentina, Sri Lanka, Jamaica, Thailand, etc etc. They have very good over here in America. Once again, America gets targeted as not being progressive and tackling the problem when we are leaders in the women's soccer.

That is the context we should be looking at, the women's team has not lost a match in 2 years...barely tying yesterday vs the Sweden...why aren't we looking at helping the men's team if we care so much about soccer? But that is a question no one who is supporting the women's team is willing to answer......