By Ed Valentine

How many economists are there in the world? Or footballers? Or lawyers (some would say too many)? How many “new entrants” are there annually across these professions and make a solid career out of it over time? Of course, there is a greater chance of an individual becoming a lawyer or accountant than a high ranking professional tennis player. World number 531 Marta Kostyuk’s run to the 3rd round at the recent Australian Open generated notoriety for it’s rarity and got me thinking if there is a “regulars only” effect in professional tennis where breakthroughs into the lucrative top 100 are uncommon. Is it more likely that the number 531 ranked player in the women’s game can make the 3rd round of a Grand Slam tournament than it is in the men’s game?
 
The analysis started with the assertion that in prize money terms about 100 male and 100 female players every 5 years (prime cycle) make a career out professional tennis. Sponsorship or endorsements have not been counted given that good players, who rank consistently highly attract these offers, where as those outside the top 100 do not command a media premium – Anna Kournikova may argue that however.
 
This analysis was conducted from data covering 18 seasons from 2000 - 2017 using year end rankings as per the ATP (male) and WTA (female) rankings. Year end rankings were chosen for consistency purposes.
 
At a basic level the data demonstrates that it is “easier” for a player to have a chance at launching a successful career in the WTA than in the ATP with 6% more female players making it into the top 100 at some point throughout the 18-year study. Whilst this represents more churn it does tell us that the opportunity to gain entry into a “career” status is greater. This is backed up by c13.5% more WTA players* making the year end top 100 just once than for those in the ATP. WTA players may not have stayed there due to the increase in competitive balance but they enjoyed the tournament privileges and chances to play in the more lucrative tournaments that come with the top 100 ranking.

​Interestingly the top 50 rankings saw the biggest gap between the WTA and ATP. This gap suggests that over the course of a career a WTA player can expect to play against more varied styles of opponent. This may be caused by the increase in Eastern European female players, enjoying brief success in the early part of their careers, only to be replaced by the very same in the years after.
 
While the odds for female players are better in terms of opportunity, almost a fifth of all of the players to have made the top 100 in both lists across the last 18 seasons appear once and have little chance of appearing there again. 

By Robbie Butler

Rafa Nadal recently won his 16th Men’s Singles Grand Slam Title when he beat South African Kevin Anderson in the Final of the US Open at Flushing Meadows. By any standards this is an incredible achievement. Nadal becomes the 2nd most successful player in the history of the game and ranks behind only Roger Federer in terms of the number of Grand Slam titles won.

Between them, Nadal and Federer have now amassed 35 Grand Slams. This is made all the more remarkable given that they played in the same era and are still active. And that is not all. Joint 4th on the list is Novak Djokovic with 12 Grand Slams.

A quick look at the data shows just how unique a period of tennis this is. Taking the year of Federer’s first Grand Slam win in 2003 as a starting point, the trio have won 47 major titles in total. This is almost 80% of all those on offer during that time. That concentration of wins to majors is quite remarkable. At no other point in the Open Era or before, have all 4 majors been dominated by the same three players.

Even the great trio of Bjorn Borg, Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe can’t compare to the current crop. Using Borg’s first win in 1974 as the starting point, and extending forward the same number of years as above (to 1988), this trio won a combined 26 Grand Slams. That is less than half of all on offer. During the 15-year period there were 19 major champions.

Since Federer’s first win at Wimbledon there have been just seven champions other side of Nadal and Djokovic. Only two, Andy Murray and Stan Wawrinka, have been multiple champions. In fact, both are probably unlucky that they are playing in this era and have to compete against three of the greatest players of all time. In total, the 5 have won almost 90% of all Majors since 2003!
​
In 2006, Federer and Nadal shared all four majors. They did the same in 2007, 2010, and again this year. What remarkable players they are. There is nothing to suggest that 2018 won’t be the same. 

Further reading in this area can be found here. The link provides access to a 2009 Journal of Sports Economics paper by Julio del Corral called "Competitive Balance and Match Uncertainty in Grand-Slam Tennis - Effects of Seeding System, Gender, and Court Surface".

By David Butler

I gave a short lecture to senior cycle secondary school students (high school) on the Economics of Sport yesterday. The talk focussed on prize money distributions across sports. The event took place in University College Cork and my slides from the talk can be viewed below.

By Robbie Butler

In recent years I have watched tennis not so much because I am a massive fan of the sport but more so because I believe we are lucky enough to be witnessing a golden generation. Roger Federer (17), Rafa Nadal (14) and Novak Djokovic (7) have to date won 38 Grand Slams between them. Since Federer won his first Grand Slam in 2003 (Wimbledon) only seven others (excluding Nadal and Djokovic) have won a Grand Slam title. Between them the three have won nearly 87% of all Grand Slams since Wimbledon 2003. This covers a massive 45 Slams! While the three have dominated tennis for more than a decade, there is still uncertainty of outcome when it comes to them playing one another. 

Many sports fans are often critical of champions that are 'too dominant' and suggest that they are beating a sub-standard level of opponent. World Heavyweight Boxing Champion Wladimir Klitschko comes to mind. The current WBA (Super), IBF, WBO, IBO and The Ring world champion is now unbeaten in his last twenty-one fights, with his last defeat coming way back in 2004. However, Dr. Steelhammer is often criticised unfairly for the standard of opponent he faces. Surely, this isn't his fault? All he can do it beat what's put in front of him. Great boxers are often remembered not because they won every fight but because they were part of a golden generation which fans of the sport were privileged to be part of. Sugar Ray Lenoard, Roberto Duran, Marvin Hagler and Thomas Hearns are still considered some of the greatest boxers ever to enter the ring. All were defeated. However each fought against one another in what many consider to be a golden generation of middleweight boxers. 

Fans of equine sport will recall the titanic battles between Kauto Star and Denman from 2007 to 2010. The great Arkle, regarded by most and more importantly the national hunt handicapper, as the greatest national hunt horse of all time, had to overcome the almost equally great Mill House. 

One could argue Messi and Ronaldo are locked in an equally great struggle to be crowned the greatest player of all time. 

It seems sports stars become legends when they are faced with an equally great opponent and are not just defined by their own ability but also the ability of those around them. Federer, Djokovic and Nadal are very lucky in that regard. Each is surrounded by greatness on two sides. We are lucky enough to have front row seat. 

We'll take a closer look at the data on this in Part 2.

By David Butler

If Roger Federer had managed to overcome Novak Djokovic in the Men’s Wimbledon final yesterday, at the age of 32, he would have become the oldest man to ever win it, ousting  Arthur Ashe who claimed the title in 1975 at the age of 31. This would have been a remarkable achievement to top an illustrious career in the sport.  

Since 1968 when the ‘open era’ commenced the average age of Wimbledon winners across sexes has been 24 years of age. This period has also seen particular tennis dynasties come about as male and female players have dominated for numerous years.  Borg (20) Sampras (21) and Federer (21) all won their first tournament below the mean age and in the case of Sampras and Federer, both went on to dominate into their late 20’s. The same is largely true of the ladies; Navratilova (21), Graf (19) and the Williams Sisters (both 20) won their first title below the average age and went on to dominate. Below is a graph of the age of Wimbledon winners since 1968.

For all tennis fans with a passion for stats, Tennis28.com is a good resource that provides data on all the Grand Slams. In particular this site produces some great charts that show how compeditors across all grand slams are getting steadly older since the late 80's.

By Robbie Butler

The future of the ATP World Tour Finals is unknown beyond 2015 when the current deal between the Association of Tennis Professionals and the O² Arena in London expires. World number 7 and Grand Slam record holder Roger Federer recently said he hoped the end of season event would remain at the O². However, both Rafa Nadal and Novak Djokovic have said the event should be moved after 2015. Nadal argues that because players qualify for the ATP Tour Final by playing on all three surfaces (clay, grass and hard), the final event itself should be rotated between those surfaces. Djokovic has repeated commended the O² Arena as a venue but believes the location of the tournament should be changed in order to promote the sport of tennis to a wider global audience. 

This poses a dilemma for organisers. The incentives structures at play make sticking with the O² beyond 2015 a sensible choice. The venue is the 2nd biggest tennis arena in the world. Demand for tickets continues to at least match supply, with all sessions at the 2013 event sold out. The British public appear to have very much taken to the O² spectacle. 

This was not always the case. For many years the ATP World Tour Finals had a nomadic life moving from place to place with Tokyo, Paris, New York, Frankfurt, Sydney and Shanghai among the list of host cities. 
 
The issues rasied by Nadal are more sensitive and go right to the heart of competitive balance. It’s no surprise Nadal wants a rotating surface. The king of Roland Garros, who has been beaten just once ever in Paris, is almost untouchable on clay. The ATP World Tour Finals are played indoors on a hard surface. It’s no surprise then that while Federer and Djokovic, both hard court experts, have ten titles between them, the Spaniard is yet to win the event. 

The fans don’t seem to mind the lack of competition however. Federer and Djokovic have won every title between them from 2006 to 2013 yet the event has never been as popular. Maybe competition is overrated and fans are more interested in saying the saw the ‘greats’ play live. 

by Declan Jordan

Last Saturday week (July 27), Johnny Watterson wrote in the Irish Times about the inequality in prize-money in tennis relative to golf. He compared two recent major winners in each sport, Marion Bartoli at Wimbledon and Phil Mickelson at the Open. He said

The point is that at the elite end of the sport, tennis players earn as much as their golfing counterparts. However, moving down the ranking list the earnings of golfers far outstrip those of tennis players. Of course, why the comparison is made between Bartoli and Mickelson, rather than Murray and Mickelson is unclear. It should be noted that since 2007 men and women earn the same prize money at Wimbledon. It's also a little misleading to say that Marion Bartoli won €1.86m for her final victory over Sabine Lisicki. It's a little like saying Phil Mickelson won just over €1m for his final putt on Sunday at Muirfield. In fact Bartoli won £800,000 for winning the final. She had already earned that amount at a minimum by winning her previous 6 matches.

The analysis referred to in the Irish Times article comes from a report by Tennis New Zealand on the 'Tennis Poor'. The article points out, among other evidence, that:

The report "noted that, given choice, it made more economical sense for an aspiring athlete to play golf." Some may be less sympathetic to tennis players at lower income levels. There are many professions where the elite earn significantly more than the other 99% of those in the profession. I am sure Paul Krugman earns more than I do and if I was unable to earn a living as an economist would I able to convince our Nobel laureates to reduce their salaries and talking fees to help University College Cork to keep me on? I would expect a tough time.

But of course this analysis is overly simplistic because economists do not 'compete' as sports people do and sports people require competition and rivalry, without which no sport exists. In any event, in this post I am more interested in trying to explain at least some of the difference in earnings between the two sports (golf and tennis). 

The first aspect is being in the top 400 golfers in the world may not be equivalent to being in the top 400 tennis players in the world. It is very difficult to get an idea of how many people play each sport. Golf World suggests there were 61m golfers in the world in 2003. Of these, 37.1m were in America. I couldn't find a comparison for tennis, but the Tennis Industry Association claim 27.1m tennis players in the US in 2011. Even assuming no growth in the number of golfers since 2003 and assuming the same proportionate relationship in the rest of the world as the US, it's likely that there are more golfers than tennis players. This means it's harder to be a top ranked golfer than a top ranked tennis player simply by weight of numbers. This however can't completely explain difference in prize money earnings. 

Another, possibly more convincing, explanation has to do with the structure of competition in each sport. Golf typically has 'first past the post' tournament styles. In a field of up to 120 golfers only one can win and it can be clear after the first round (maybe even sooner) whether a particular golfer is likely to win or not. So how can organisers of tournaments incentivise competitors to keep playing and trying even when it looks like they will finish well down the field. The prize money at the Open at Muirfield shows that there are incentives for players to finish one place higher in the tournament rankings. (Of course some tournaments will also pay appearance fees to select golfers- though this will not affect effort directly so we can ignore this for the purpose of this argument). It's also notable from that prize list that players who miss the cut also receive prize money. 

Tennis tournaments are generally operated on a knock-out basis. This means that the incentive structure has to be such to encourage the player to win the current match. A relatively smaller fee for winning the marginal match will be sufficient incentive to encourage players to put in greater effort. The Wimbledon prize fee structure shows that players will be incentivised by the increased prize from each game. It also means that while one great match will win a lower ranked player some prize money but this is less likely to happen over a week or two-week long tournament. 

In both sports of course the non-prize money earnings are very important elements of overall income. Golfers tend to have significant tournaments each weekend, attracting significant sponsorship (and related prize money). The higher prize money attracts the best golfers which attracts the bigger sponsors. And more players can play in each tournament. Typically in a knock-out tournament with one game per day (at most) there is a limit in the number of players that can be accommodated at the higher ranked tournaments (not all tournaments can run for two weeks like the majors). This limits the opportunities for lower ranked players to play at the top tournaments with the better money.