Gaby Dabrowski is the sixth-best doubles player in women’s professional tennis. She has been an Australian and French Open mixed doubles champion, and she reached the final in women’s doubles at Wimbledon in 2019. She has won 11 career WTA titles, and she competed for Canada at the Rio Olympics 2016.
Dabrowski is not eligible for endorsements, except for the Yonex racket manufacturer. She said that she could not afford to hire a full-time coach, trainer, or physiotherapist. She buys her tennis clothes online from sustainable companies and is grateful to the Women’s Tennis Association for a mental wellness program that allows her to tap into tour-sponsored psychologists.
“Doubles specialists, even during regular times before the pandemic, earn about 10 percent of what singles players make,” said Dabrowski, who relies on spot coaching at home and at occasional tournaments. “Fortunately, I am quite frugal. My father taught me how to budget at a very young age, and I don’t live an extravagant lifestyle.”
Dabrowski, 30 has made nearly $3.5 million in her 11-year professional career. Dabrowski won $198,133 at the Madrid tournament she won with her partner Giuliana Olmos. She and Olmos reached the final of the Italian Open the following week, where they won $33,815 each. Dabrowski is still not able to afford the cost of travel and hotels, food, coaching, or clothing.
“The pandemic made things a lot harder,” said Dabrowski, who sits on the WTA Players’ Council and was instrumental in the reallocation of prize money in which players at the top of the game receive a smaller share for winning a tournament, and players who lose in the first round, those who are struggling or are trying to break through, are awarded a greater percentage.
“If we learned anything, it’s that we have to be looking out for those lower-ranked players so they never say they have to quit because they can’t make a living playing tennis,” Dabrowski said. “We need to protect and sustain the game for them.”
Tennis has historically been the most lucrative of all women’s professional sports. Gladys Heldman, the publisher for World Tennis, was born in 1970. magazine, persuaded the Philip Morris brand Virginia Slims to put up $7,500 to sponsor the first women’s pro tournament in Houston.
Heldman convinced Billie Jean King, Rosie Casals, and seven other young women to sign $1 contracts for professional tennis. The so-called Original Nine players didn’t earn as much in their careers collectively as Ashleigh Barty, who won the singles title at 2019 Shiseido WTA Finals. Barty’s $4.42million was more than twice what King earned in her 31-year career which included 39 major singles, doubles, and mixed doubles championships.
That, of course, does not compare with the $94,518,971 that Serena Williams, the sport’s overall top earner, has amassed. This figure has been more than doubled in endorsements. Naomi Osaka, who has played in just nine WTA tournaments over the last year, tops Forbes’ list of highest-paid female athletes for 2022, generating some $58 million from more than 20 corporate sponsors. She was just behind Roger Federer, LeBron James and Tiger Woods but ahead of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. Since 1990, Forbes began listing the highest paid female athletes. Every year, the leader has been tennis player.
“Tennis has always led the way because we are a global sport,” said King, who in 1971 became the first female athlete to earn $100,000 in prize money. “In 1970, we literally had to kill ourselves to get prize money and attention for women’s tennis,” King said. “Even now, we have to work to be No. 1. And the way we do that is by realizing that we are entertainers and there for our audience.”
Over the last 52 years, the women’s tour has had nine presenting sponsors, including Colgate, Avon and Toyota. After 12 years without a title sponsor, the WTA recently partnered with Hologic, a women’s diagnostic and medical imaging company, which has pledged millions of dollars in a multiyear deal.
Prize money in women’s tennis grew to a high of $179 million in 2019, shortly before the tour was halted for four months because of the pandemic. The WTA’s total prize money for 2022 is $157 Million.
“The past two years have been very challenging for the WTA, our members and for many businesses around the world,” Steve Simon, the organization’s chief executive wrote in an email. “We are proud of the fact that our tournaments and players did what was required to operate over this period.”
Simon has found that one of the greatest challenges has been the loss revenue from Southeast Asia. The tour signed a $14 million deal with Shiseido, a Japanese skin care company, to sponsor the WTA Finals China 2019. Barty won the tournament and took home the biggest prize in the sport for either men or women.
The deal was ended a year later as the Chinese pandemic was raging. Simon announced that he would cancel all WTA events scheduled for China this year, after Peng Shuai, a Chinese tennis player, disappeared. Last season’s year-end finals were moved to Guadalajara, Mexico, but the money offered was roughly a third of what it had been in Shenzhen.
Another issue facing tennis is the rising profile of women’s team sports, especially soccer and the Women’s National Basketball Association. About two weeks ago, the U.S. women’s national soccer team entered into a collective bargaining agreement with the United States Soccer Federation in which the men’s and women’s teams will receive equal pay for equal work.
“Equality in team sports is essential, especially in terms of equal prize money,” said King’s business partner, Ilana Kloss. “But women still have a long way to go. Women make up 40% of all athletes, but only 4 percent receive media coverage. Many of these major tennis tournaments are owned and managed by investment groups and conglomerates. And those companies now have women at the top who are realizing that women’s sports are good for business. It isn’t just an old boys’ club anymore. We’re learning that the tide now affects all boats.”
Tennis is still dominated by women, with the exception of majors, who receive significantly less in financial compensation than men. Since 2007, prize money at Wimbledon, the Australian, French, and United States Opens has been equal. At this year’s French Open, the winner of both the men’s and women’s singles will pocket 2.2 million euros, almost $2.4 million. Equal prize money is offered at joint tour events in Indian Wells (Calif.) and Miami. But that isn’t true everywhere.
The world No. 1 Iga Swiatek won the Italian Open and was awarded €322,280. Hours later, Novak Djokovic beat Stefanos Tsitsipas for the men’s championship and won €836,355. Tsitsipas, the second-place finisher, earned more than €100,000 more than Swiatek.
“Does that seem fair?” asked Pam Shriver, who won 79 women’s doubles titles with Martina Navratilova. Shriver suggested that female players will not get equal pay in Italy if they are bought by female entrepreneurs like Serena, Venus Williams, Navratilova, and King.
“We’ve come to learn that not all joint events are created equally,” Shriver said. “At some tournaments, it’s cultural not to pay women as much. But the tennis pie keeps growing. Now we just have to take a stance and make sure it is equal.”
Tsitsipas was the second to get into the discussion earlier this spring. She asked an old question about tennis: Should women be awarded the same prize money as men if they play two of the three majors sets and men play three of five? Women argue that it’s about entertainment value and ticket sales, not solely about time spent on the court.
“I don’t want to be controversial or anything,” Tsitsipas said. “There is the topic of women getting equal pay for playing best of three. There are many statisticians, scientists, and other experts. I’ve been told that women have better endurance than men. Maybe they can play best of five.”
Source: NY Times