To put this sport into perspective, the NBA oversees NBA basketball events, the NFL oversees NFL football events, the MLB oversees MLB baseball events, etc., and the PDGA oversees PDGA evnets. These overseeing entities in some manner control player behaviors in their "sactioned" events they have a lot of influence on the culture of the event at hand. In basketball, there are a lot of rules that are enforced and called, travel is a normal call, technical fouls are called all the time and this comes with a financial penalty, a foul is nothing special, the same goes for the NFL and MLB. The PDGA oversees PDGA events and they need to work on controlling their events better when it comes to their different sactioned events, like maybe 5 officiators are required for a B tier, and maybe 8 to 10 for an A tier or whatever, maybe Nikko should be called for a technical and he would pay a minimal fine and that might change his behavior. I don't know the answer to making this sport more lucrative, but if the overseeing body does have a lot to do with it. Blame Nikko, blame anyone, but in the end some of the blame is with the PDGA, maybe not all is within their control. They might respond with legitimate reasons why the sport is the way it is. The PDGA board might say that making it a more professional sport is just not feasable, it costs to much to have rules enforced because there isn't enough money in the sport to pay for officiators. At the same time I think if this sport is going professional, the PDGA has to control their events which would mean doing their bestto controlplayers behaviors in their PDGA events and maybe Barsby has great points on what rules need to be changed, but has he considered that might not be financially feasable to entertain everything that he wants? Does he think about the money aspect of what he proposes? He does say that to be a professional dger is already a cash strapping deal, is Barsby willing to pay more to make this a professional sport (the fees would increase to pay for officators)? I don't know the answer, but very serious professional events deal with some serious money and take their refing very serious and it isn't about who your like and dislike...rules are rules.
My guess is that if the PDGA is going to take this sport to the next level, maybe they have to have PDGA events that have high entry fees to pay for real officiators who will call Nikko or anyother player on anything like a foot fault or any rules for that matter. The PDGA has some contorl over the culture of their events, and most PDGA events that I have been in, all do drugs and drink...very very family oriented and very professional (being faceious). My guess is that most of the dgers don't want a change in the culture...inexpensive and lets drink and do drugs and that is what is important...fun fun fun...it isn't a serious sport, fun is the word of the day, not seriousness. Fun is great, but for the professional seriousness and professionalism are very important.
Maybe the solution to making this a professoinal sport is increasing costs to play PDGA events, pay for refs which would pay for more enforced rules and in the end you are paying more for professionalism. Rules lead the way, enforcement is key to success. If this sport is going to get serious, rules and enforcement lead the way and if enforced propery have an effect on the players, they make the sport more professional by imposing rules without any bias. Michael Jordan has been called for fouls in his time, getting called for a foot fault shouldn't be anything special, it should be normal to get called here and there. In boxing the ref does his best to keep the game civil and under control.
R for this thread - WORDS WORDS WORDS
