Lets Honestly Discuss Tourney Money/Fees

[Dave242]

Recalling that bolf pros get 100% of the field payed out,

At least 100% of those that make the cut and play on Sunday get paid (which is around 50% - not sure of the exact cut line and how that works)

 

[jtencer]

I'm not sure how decreased event participation would lead to course improvements or growth of the sport, I'd love to hear your reasoning.

Decreased event participation and course improvements would both be effects. The cause would be decreasing/eliminating pay outs and instead giving the money to the course/club.

 

[denny ritner]

good to see a lively debate.

there are really only about 10-20 real disc golf pro's today. these are people that tour enough and win enough to net a sum of money, after travel expenses, that approximates a living.

the rest of the "pro's" are really amateur athletes that win some cash money. they may be highly skilled at the game, but they are not pros.

i am optimistic that at some point in the next 5-10 years a real professional disc golf tour will emerge that will be able to support 50-100 full time touring pros. this tour will have a corporate title sponsor, ala the nike, hooters, or hogan tour in ball golf. in my opinion, disc golf has the potential to be a much better sport to watch on television than ball golf. discs are bigger, fly slower, have cooler shaped flights, and are more colorful than golf balls. disc golf has plenty of colorful personalities to root for or against.

there are a couple significant hurdles that must be jumped to get to that point. the first, and possibly biggest, being that we must drive a spectator base to the course. this goes hand-in-hand with the second, that being we need tournament courses that are well suited for video coverage, but are not wide-open bombfests or wide-open bombfests that are choked down with yellow rope. the only place that yellow rope belongs is for crowd management. (my opinion on that has evolved over the years, and doesn't fit in this post.) on the other hand, courses with super-tightly wooded, technical holes doesn't work for the camera or the gallery. the courses we need will be 18 holes and have SSA's of at least 65. (not 19,21,24, 27 or any other number and will be numbered 1-18 with no letter holes.) the courses will allow for a mix of bomber shots, controlled mid-range shots, and most birdies will be made with 40-80 ft. putts that present some risk of three-putting. without super-tight fairways and/or yellow rope to drive score separation, we will soon enter a new era in course design where greens are envisioned and sculpted.

the elevated baskets and steep drop-off's like the ones present on many of the great charlotte-area courses, are the first baby steps in this direction. there is great opportunity to take these concepts and radically expand. having a basket on flat, wide-open ground where 3 putting is virtually never done by pro players is BORING! hole 18 at winthrop is a fine example of a dramatic disc golf green. this needs to be the norm for the sport and not the best of the best. i can hear the crowd murmuring, "but that means renting a machine to move some dirt and shoring up the dirt with some railroad ties and planting grass seed and waiting for that grass to grow, we CAN'T do that, this is a cheap sport, we'll just keep things the way they are and keep waiting and bitching until our NIKE in shining armor comes and swoops us away to never-never land.

and on the AM front: different players in different geographical areas have different expectations. td's are free to experiment with different combinations of price, sanctioning level, player's packs, payout, added ammenities, etc. have an idea? give it a try. if the pdga won't sanction the event, get with the southern nationals or start your own event series or find a charity to work with. the worst that can happen is that only two dudes show up (happened to me) and the three of you enjoy a round of golf together. all you have to do is accurately advertise and give players a good picture of what they can expect for their money and then deliver.

 

[LukeButch]

PDGA payout tables

as far as I know PDGA has never enforced their payout table, nor will they.


also with the pdga sanctioning agreement they request 40% pro payout but only want you to pay out 40% of the field, they do not care how you do it. the tables are a guideline not a requirement

 

[LukeButch]

all you have to do is accurately advertise and give players a good picture of what they can expect for their money and then deliver.

THIS!!!

cuts down huge on complaints/whining. most people don't like things that are unexpected. If I play a tournament and come in 1 spot out of the cash when I assumed TD would pay at least 40% and instead he payed 30%, good chance I might be upset that day and complain to friends later on.

 

[mashnut]

It definitely seems to cut down on complainers when TDs are really open about how the payout is going to work. There's one TD around here who always has the payout posted when you come in from the first round and I almost never hear complaints about the payout after the tourney.

 

[dreadlock86]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. I don't know why ams play for payout instead of trophies only.

How many ams here would not play a tourney if there were no players pack or payout other than trophies?

i think the reason so many AMs expect a player pack or payout is because most tourney fees are too high to be worth it otherwise.

i'd play a sanctioned event every week that had no payout and no player pack if it were $10 or $15.

 

[Dave242]

all you have to do is accurately advertise and give players a good picture of what they can expect for their money and then deliver.

THIS!!!

cuts down huge on complaints/whining. most people don't like things that are unexpected. If I play a tournament and come in 1 spot out of the cash when I assumed TD would pay at least 40% and instead he payed 30%, good chance I might be upset that day and complain to friends later on.

It definitely seems to cut down on complainers when TDs are really open about how the payout is going to work. There's one TD around here who always has the payout posted when you come in from the first round and I almost never hear complaints about the payout after the tourney.

These are 2 different things you are talking about: 1) pre-announcing payout plans (and other details) before the event so people can decide to come or not, and 2) posting details of payout during the event.

I always tried to do both, but #1 is difficult as there is not good forum to do this. Nobody seems to read the local discussion board as evidenced by all the questions you get even if you put stuff there. The flyer is gets ways to busy if you include answers to every conceivable question on them.

What are your guys' thoughts?

 

[megamerican]

i think the reason so many AMs expect a player pack or payout is because most tourney fees are too high to be worth it otherwise.

i'd play a sanctioned event every week that had no payout and no player pack if it were $10 or $15.

I'd be very happy with this. I'd pay that much for a trophy only and ratings.

When I played in tournaments I always chose the cheapest ones ($25 for int, $35 for Adv) and was simply interested in the competition and ratings. None of them had a players pack but I ended up getting quite a few discs from doing well, which was a nice bonus but not necessary.

This is the only sport I've ever played where amateurs expect to get something other than competition. I've played a lot of baseball in my adult life, paying $100 or more for a few months of games.

I think the PDGA would do well to start an amateur organization which focuses on small, trophy and rating only tournaments. They could simply add a tier of tournament which was AM's only.

I know a lot of people like the players pack/AM payout thing and I do too, but I'm guessing there is a large segment of people who would like a lower cost alternative where they can compete, have fun and even get official ratings.

I would hope that in the future they would try such a thing out and give an incentive for people to do so and at least see if it is viable.

 

[mashnut]

I think that kind of thinking is why the pdga is looking into sanctioning leagues. That way the people who want to play cheap events and still get ratings have that opportunity. It'll be interesting to see if that works out.

 

[Connor Jones]

I'd be very happy with this. I'd pay that much for a trophy only and ratings.

When I played in tournaments I always chose the cheapest ones ($25 for int, $35 for Adv) and was simply interested in the competition and ratings. None of them had a players pack but I ended up getting quite a few discs from doing well, which was a nice bonus but not necessary.

This is the only sport I've ever played where amateurs expect to get something other than competition. I've played a lot of baseball in my adult life, paying $100 or more for a few months of games.

I think the PDGA would do well to start an amateur organization which focuses on small, trophy and rating only tournaments. They could simply add a tier of tournament which was AM's only.

I know a lot of people like the players pack/AM payout thing and I do too, but I'm guessing there is a large segment of people who would like a lower cost alternative where they can compete, have fun and even get official ratings.

I would hope that in the future they would try such a thing out and give an incentive for people to do so and at least see if it is viable.

Or they can just change the current org. won't happen,but you're right.

If people want cash,go pro,get your ass handed to you,and stop complaining. :|

 

[sidewinder22]

I think the AM parity happens at AM1 which is the division I have the biggest gripe with. Often AM1 can be $10 or more than AM2/Rec, with no player pack. So the payout is a lot more merch which is not often needed by advanced players, and the non-cashers are out a lot more than Am2/Rec players. This creates a few scenarios, the good AM1 players stay AM1 rather than not cashing in Open, and the lower AM1 players stop playing because it becomes really expensive fast playing.

Capping AM1 entry fees to AM2/Rec and offering a sliding scale entry to Open should help push the AM1 players to Open, and get more players in all divisions thus growing the competitive sport.

 

[Dave242]

I'd be very happy with this. I'd pay that much for a trophy only and ratings.
.....
I think the PDGA would do well to start an amateur organization which focuses on small, trophy and rating only tournaments. They could simply add a tier of tournament which was AM's only.
....
I would hope that in the future they would try such a thing out and give an incentive for people to do so and at least see if it is viable.

The PDGA is not the one who would do well to start this. TD's would do well to start this. The PDGA already allows this!!

For C-Tiers the only requirements are $50 sanctioning fee and $2 per player players' fee. There is no requirement for a players pack or payout $ value and no minimum entry fee. There is no requirement to offer Pro divisions (or even multiple Am divisions).

With 10 players that is a minimum of $7 per player. With 25 players $4. Of course there are some extra expenses (like insurance, course fees, cost of trophies, etc) that might come into play, but $10 per player is very do-able.

TDs just need to step up and do this if there is demand.

I think that kind of thinking is why the pdga is looking into sanctioning leagues. That way the people who want to play cheap events and still get ratings have that opportunity. It'll be interesting to see if that works out.

That would be great to see - sanctioning fees and player fees spread out over a bunch of events. TD reports that are easier. This would be a snap for clubs that already have their own insurance and no park usage fees.

 

[Karl]

"My ideal is very different. There are age/gender protected divisions only. All males in the 18-40 bracket play in one "open" division. There is no gambling, the entry fee goes towards a nice player pack, lunch, trophies, etc. If there is some extra sponsor cash, pay that out to the top few finishers in the open division. I really dislike the "gambling" aspect of putting entry fees into payouts."

I'm too lazy to read this entire thread, but the above sounds reasonable!!

Karl

 

[DavidSauls]

Sidebar about PDGA payout tables:

Most TDs follow these tables, not just because we agreed to do so (or, at least, pay out the minimum percentage of finishers). It gives protection from complaints. If we vary, higher or lower, players gripe about the payout not being what they usually get. If we follow the chart, at least we can deflect criticism to the PDGA guidelines.

If we pay out steeper than the tables suggest, those who would normally cash but don't, complain. If we pay out shallower, winners complain that they didn't win as much as they normally do.

It's easy for non-TDs to say we should buck the trend and do what we think is "right"....or what others think is "right"....but we're trying to do what we think the bulk of players want, and sometimes that means following the norm.

 

[DavidSauls]

You have to be careful with cause and effect here. Are there few PDGA tournaments here because DG isn't very big or is DG not very big because there aren't enough PDGA tournaments? Do you actually think that holding more PDGA sanctioned events in these areas would do much to grow the sport locally?

Late response, but....No, I wasn't making that claim. Only disputing the notion that more non-PDGA events would necessarily grow the sport.

In Southern Nationals land, there are more non-PDGA events because there's a strong anti-PDGA sentiment, the aftereffects are that there are few members because most events are non-sanctioned, and most events are non-sanctioned because there are few members. It's a few states with an alternate system, of sorts. But it hasn't created a boom.

I'm less familiar with NEFA.

 

[DavidSauls]

I keep hearing about PDGA and flexibility......as long as you follow their payout guidelines...xplain this to me.....whats the minimum number of divisions allowed? What is the payout guideline? I would think the per player charge is for the ratings to be processed and thats fine w /me but what is the actual guidelines/rules you must do for pdga sanctioning?

The flexibility is more in divisions and competitive structure than in payouts.

The guidelines allow TD to offer whatever divisions he wishes, as long as they're announced in advance. So you can offer one division (Open only). You can offer Intermediate but not Advanced, pushing all those "Advanced Baggers" into Open. You can offer the ratings-based divisions but no age-based divisions. Or vice versa. You can be Am-only.

The payout tables are more fixed, except for the "added cash". But if you want to buck them, you'll get more grief from players than PDGA, which doesn't have great enforcement powers.

And that's just what's allowed under the guidelines. You can always request a variance if you want to go beyond them. It might turn a C-tier into an XC-tier, but it'll probably be granted.

Note that the PDGA guidelines aren't just a power-trip by the PDGA. They mean that players can have a certain expectation of standards when entering an event. Non-sanctioned events can be great, but you have much less certainty how things will be done (rules, payouts, etc.).

 

[TimSyl]

Bigger AM payouts...FTW! Disc golf is supposed to be a cheap sport to play, let's try to keep it that way. It should be trophy only for AM, just like most every sport you can name. If you want more payout, just go to your local disc golf shop or go online and buy what you really want. Or if you really want to gamble you can enter a side bet/pot with some of your cohorts, but leave it out of any tourney entry fees.

It makes me wonder where the AMs that want or expect payout are coming from....have these people ever played any other sport?

I would say NO!

 

[jtencer]

Late response, but....No, I wasn't making that claim. Only disputing the notion that more non-PDGA events would necessarily grow the sport.

In Southern Nationals land, there are more non-PDGA events because there's a strong anti-PDGA sentiment, the aftereffects are that there are few members because most events are non-sanctioned, and most events are non-sanctioned because there are few members. It's a few states with an alternate system, of sorts. But it hasn't created a boom.

I'm less familiar with NEFA.

My main point is the way tournaments are generally run today (PDGA or non-PDGA) with all of the cash that's brought in going right back out to the players doesn't do anything to grow the sport or help the courses regardless of the payout scale. It's just an organized event where people show up and gamble. Newer players don't participate because the costs are too high and because they're making a bet they can't win. No money goes to maintaining the parks. No money goes to promoting the sport. No effort is put into outreach.

I'd like to see this change, but you aren't going to find the market for it in the same people that show up to tournaments now. Those are the people that like the current system. Someone is going to have to stick their neck out at some point because we're stuck right now.

 

[optidiscic]

My main point is the way tournaments are generally run today (PDGA or non-PDGA) with all of the cash that's brought in going right back out to the players doesn't do anything to grow the sport or help the courses regardless of the payout scale. It's just an organized event where people show up and gamble. Newer players don't participate because the costs are too high and because they're making a bet they can't win. No money goes to maintaining the parks. No money goes to promoting the sport. No effort is put into outreach.

I'd like to see this change, but you aren't going to find the market for it in the same people that show up to tournaments now. Those are the people that like the current system. Someone is going to have to stick their neck out at some point because we're stuck right now.

very well said....I truly blame the pdga for funneling so much of the cash back to the players in deep payouts. With more flexibility I am sure you could run a fun event that was competitive and still raised money for the local scene.