Figure Skating governed like tennis: would that work?

So curious question: would it be possible to make figure skating work like tennis does: ATP and WTA tours?

First strip the skaters from their nationalities. They are just skaters in open circuit on tour. Going from tourneys to tourneys making money. Make them national federation independent.
Yes, governed by a single body of ISU, just like ATP/WTA. Single rules, single organization.

Skaters would represent themselves only. This would make pairs much much more interesting, as they would be able to form multinational pairs, just like tennis doubles.
Create totally open circuit of touring skaters. Totally open circuit. Remove eligibility vs. illegibility. Everyone is legible.
There would be competitions of different degree giving points and money. Skaters would collect points and form individual rankings under strict ISU umbrella. There would be slams. Grand Prix would be slams! Winning Grand Prix would be much bigger than even winning the Worlds. Who in tennis cares about OG now? Winning a slam is the pinnacle of a career.

Yes, the strict technical rules regulated by single organization (ISU) will have to stay. It's the only way to maintain the integrity of the sport. But there are strict rules in ATP/WTA too.

Would it help revive the dying sport? Would it attract viewers, media and sponsors? Would it bring back life?
Look at the sport. It's dying. I remember times when Grand Prix were televised live on prime time. Now you have to seek obscure channels to watch pre-recorded events. And it's not even HD!
Even the Worlds is leaving prime time. I remember when the Worlds was a major TV event! I remember when Figure Skating was a major sport! What happened???
Why is it dying so quickly?

Look at WTA. WTA has more money now than most sports around the world. It is now one of the most major sports in the world. It shows how opening the sport can bring energy to it!

Very soon figure skating will be limited to three countries: Russia, China and Japan. With some very occasional Canadians. And when limited only to those three countries it will start dying there too. It will become a third grade sport bringing some attention ONLY during Olympics and virtually non-existent in between. Will become another ski jumping or hammer throwing. Even snowboarding is surpassing figure skating now. What really happened?

So would opening figure skating to the totally open circuit help it? Just like in tennis?

CezarMart said:

So curious question: would it be possible to make figure skating work like tennis does: ATP and WTA tours?

First strip the skaters from their nationalities. They are just skaters in open circuit on tour. Going from tourneys to tourneys making money. Make them national federation independent.
Yes, governed by a single body of ISU, just like ATP/WTA. Single rules, single organization.

Skaters would represent themselves only. This would make pairs much much more interesting as they would be able to form multinational pairs, just like tennis doubles.
Create totally open circuit of touring skaters. Totally open circuit. Remover eligibility vs. illegibility. Everyone is legible.
There would be competitions of different degree giving points and money. Skaters would collect points and form individual rankings under strict ISU umbrella. There would be slams. Grand Prix would be slams! Winning Grand Prix would be much bigger than even winning the Worlds. Who in tennis cares about OG now? Winning a slam is the pinnacle of a career.

Yes, the strict technical rules regulated by single organization (ISU) will have to stay. It's the only way to maintain the integrity of the sport. But there are strict rules in ATP/WTA too.

Would it help revive the dying sport? Would it attract viewers, media and sponsors? Would it bring back life?
Look at the sport. I remember times when Grand Prix were televised live on prime time. Now you have to seek obscure channels to watch pre-recorded events. And it's not even on HD!
Even the Worlds is leaving prime time. I remember when the Worlds was a major TV event! I remember when Figure Skating was a major sport! What happened???
Why is dying so quickly?

Look at WTA! WTA has more money now than most sports around the world. It is now one of the most major sports in the world. It shows how opening the sport can bring energy to it!

Very soon figure skating will be limited to three countries: Russia, China and Japan. With some very occasional Canadians. And when limited to those three countries only it will start dying there too. It will become a third grade sport bringing some attention ONLY during Olympics and virtually non-existent in between. Will become another ski jumping or hammer throwing. Even snowboarding is surpassing figure skating now. What really happened?

So would opening figure skating to the totally open circuit help it? Just like in tennis?

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YES, YES, YES!!!! Somebody else who thinks like me!!!

Although I did not go as far as this, I have made suggestions along these lines a few times.

For the issue of nationality, see this post in the "Takahashi and Tran Split" thread from December 2012.

And for having a tiered system of competitions, see this post in the "Russian Team for 2013 Euros and Worlds" thread from January 2013.

Suffice to say, my proposals did not go down very well. Maybe it was because I was using snooker as my model rather than tennis...

At the time I made my proposals, I didn't even know that figure skating had a ranking system. But it does (and they can be found here). I would love to see this become more prominant and significant.

Although I do agree with most of what you are saying, I wouldn't say that the Grands Prix would become more important than Worlds. If the ranking system was done right (like in Snooker and Tennis), the major ISU championships would still hold more weight than the Senior B's and Grands Prix.

But, I do want to correct you on one thing. Although it is obscure in North America (and here in the British Isles), Ski Jumping is HUGE on mainland Europe. Especially in the German-speaking countries and Scandanavia. Like, when there are World Cup events in Norway, even the King attends!

Good luck with the onslaught!

CaroLiza_fan

I like this idea!!! But this may end up having like 1000 Russians in the ladies competition

Killing off figure skating in the U.S. once and for all would be a more likely outcome of this plan, IMO.

golden411 said:

Killing off figure skating in the U.S. once and for all would be a more likely outcome of this plan, IMO.

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Not to mention killing off the little countries, who can't always afford to send skaters anywhere and everywhere, and almost never get Grand Prix assignments because they can never accrue enough ranking points from Senior Bs.

golden411 said:

Killing off figure skating in the U.S. once and for all would be a more likely outcome of this plan, IMO.

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Why is that? It's becoming dead here already, so what would be the difference?

karne said:

Not to mention killing off the little countries, who can't always afford to send skaters anywhere and everywhere, and almost never get Grand Prix assignments because they can never accrue enough ranking points from Senior Bs.

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I don't see it happening in tennis. Except for Serena, the rich and big US does not have competitive players, while the biggest players come from smaller and poorer countries. WTA is dominated by Eastern Europe. Poor Serbia is hundred times more competitive than the entire US.
The size and wealth of the country is completely irrelevant.

It would completely alienate "weaker" countries. The way its setup now allows skaters from smaller countries a chance to compete on an elite level.

shiroKJ said:

It would completely alienate "weaker" countries. The way its setup now allows skaters from smaller countries a chance to compete on an elite level.

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False. Look at my previous post. WTA is dominated by Eastern Europe. The poor Eastern Europe. And training a world class player in tennis is even more expensive than in figure skating.

First strip the skaters from their nationalities. They are just skaters in open circuit on tour. Going from tourneys to tourneys making money. Make them national federation independent.

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Tennis Players still have nationalities that they represent... but unlike with figure skating they can have doubles teams from two nationalities(though it's a lot easier to switch partners in tennis).

And yes, I don't like how figure skating is structured. It's oriented way too much towards national interests for the Olympics. I honestly think that figure skating could be structured in a way that say the top 3-6 lady skaters could be genuine international celebrities. Not Serena or Sharapova big, but bigger than almost any other female athletes big. From an attention and financial standpoint, winning Olympic Gold in figure skating is not really all that big of a deal... to see the harm in this belief google Oksana Bauil. Celebrity status for figure skating is pretty much nil outside the skaters home country and inside the country correlates with how nationalist the country tends to be. To win an Olympic medal in figure skating(especially as an American) is to end up a name people know they have heard before but don't remember why anymore. And it is completely the fault of how the sport is structured. The ISU needs to work to provide the top girls(and yes I'm focusing on the girls) bigger and better things to dream of.

If the largest event for your sport is the Olympics, that's not great for your sport.
All the sports that are most successful do not have the Olympics as it's pinnacle event.

Time for the ISU to go to the drawing board, look at what other sports which are doing well successfully and make changes.
This issue with the ISU is that it's stuck in the past and their new initiatives fail to go far enough to cause people (especially younger viewers) to tune in to skating.

The idea of structuring the skating season sort of like tennis is a very interesting proposal. If Figure Skating had it's own skating union, it would be easier but with speed skating attached, things get a bit muddy. The idea that it's about "individual skaters or couples" instead of "being a representative of your country" is very appealing.

Of course there are issues about the major countries suffocating the smaller nations but since we are discussing hypotheticals, we don't need to go there.

There are lots of skating events currently to begin something like this maybe at the start of the next olympic cycle after Korea 2018.

GF2445 said:

Of course there are issues about the major countries suffocating the smaller nations but since we are discussing hypotheticals, we don't need to go there.
.

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Again, this is not actually true. The most successful countries in tennis are not US or China, but Serbia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Switzerland, basically the entire Eastern Europe. Really small, and often poorer, countries.
And, of course, Russia.
USA is far behind, with all its power, media, money and influence.

CezarMart said:

Again, this is not actually true. The most successful countries in tennis are not US or China, but Serbia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Switzerland, basically the entire Eastern Europe. Really small, and often poorer, countries.
And, of course, Russia.
USA is far behind, with all its power, media, money and influence.

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Yeah, I heard Switzerland is super poor.

The only reason why tennis "blossomed" in the ex-USSR countries is because it was considered the sport for the rich people. And when the economy stabilized, rich people started taking their kids to all the "fancy tennis lessons". There's already a decline in tennis involvement in most of these countries. I guess, rich people found some sport which is considered more "elite" now.

Personally, I don't believe the system will work. The sport itself has an element of subjectivity, and if huge sums of money will be involved (as in tennis), then there will be constant battle both legally and online over the scores and the prize money.

CezarMart said:

Again, this is not actually true. The most successful countries in tennis are not US or China, but Serbia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Switzerland, basically the entire Eastern Europe. Really small, and often poorer, countries.
And, of course, Russia.
USA is far behind, with all its power, media, money and influence.

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not necessarily.. yeah the US is in slump right now finding real contenders in tennis.. especially in the men.. though serena is still competing and winning.. she's not getting any younger either.. but the US has produced champions before..

and there are other popular sports in the Us.. so it's really hard to compete with baseball.. basketball..american football.. but it will take time..

All I am saying is that all those fears the open circuit system will kill smaller countries are completely bogus.

I don't know about the popularity of FS in US or Japan, but as far as I'm concerned, the main problem with popularity of FS my country (that poor Eastern-European one ) is because it's hard to understand. An onlooker who sees FS in TV just doesn't get why that skater got that much points and the other got more/les/whatever. That's why FS will never be as popular as tennis/football/hockey. Something needs to be done for sure but I doubt that FS will ever come closer to the limelight. It's not that kind of sport to practice on a Sunday afternoon, therefore it'll never that popular.

Would it be fair to say that the ISU should look at the more successful sports and find some inspiration.

Anything to brings skating into the 21st Century more would be great.

GF2445 said:

Would it be fair to say that the ISU should look at the more successful sports and find some inspiration.

Anything to brings skating into the 21st Century more would be great.

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Yes. Look at sports that are similar, but more successful.
To me, the best example of successful sport that shares figure skating's attributes of athleticism, finesse and glamour is women tennis. Or even tennis in general.
If tennis were governed by national federations sending players to few sactioned tournaments and focusing on Olympics, it would quickly desintegrate to badminton and disappear from media completely.

Why is it so successful then? Because it's completely open and country-independent. It has this incredible dynamics of the open tour, points, rankings, slam dramas, interviews and personallities. And it exploits this entire dynamics to appeal to mass media, public and sponsors. It forces the players to be public figures, to represent the sport not only on court, but also off-court and public life. It forces them to develop personalities and then it exploits those personalities. It's has clear rankings, clear and easy to follow rules. It exploits glamour and physical beauty at the same time with brute strength, technical finesse and emotional dramas. And it's open to everybody. And it's fully multi-national and national federation independent.
And is uses every possibly opportunity to appeal to TV.

And how does figure skating compare to this? Stiff, non-adaptive, snotty and closed minded.
If it doesn't quickly change it will be put in line with synchronized swimming. Nothing more.

There is a national element in tennis as well with the Olympics, Davis, and Federation Cups where all the players assume nationalities, and even Sharapova occasionally plays for Russia.

But I agree with you in general. There is too much of ISU power and too strict rules. The most irrational one will show up at this year WC where (provided Sotnikova is healthy) 2 out of 5 top skaters will be watching on TV how some of the lesser known athletes fight to get through a 50 point hurdle in SP.

You all realize that there is one basic difference between Tennis and Figure Skating as sports, don't you?

Tennis is a, lets call it, face-to-face confrontation sport. One athlete's abilities are directly and objectively compared to the other athlete's abilities in a straight forward, quick way to decide on-court who is the 'better' of the two (or four) athletes, at least for a given match.

Figure skating is, in itself, a single unit (individual or pair) measure of an athlete's (or pair of) abilities, both technical and interpretative. In a given competition, the competitors results (measures of abilities) are compared numerically to determine a winner. The competitor with the highest measure wins.

There are of course more differences, but that one (confrontational vs. individual) is the biggest and most important one. "Confrontational" sports are way more popular and profitable than individual sports. They create a fan base that can support a given team or athlete in their matches. Winning creates a satisfaction for the fan base, and satisfied fans tend to spend more money

So, in a nutshell, the competitive nature of each sport is what differences them. Bottom line, Figure skating as we know it and love it, is not and never will be a sport for the masses. Would it work to do a more WTA/ATP approach of it? Yes, it may work. Would it 'help' it you ask? I really don't know in which way you want it to be helped. If you are referring to it being more popular, then my answer is no, making the change you suggest will not help it in the way you want. Why? As I've stated and explained, figure skating will never be a greatly popular sport. You would need to change the sport itself to make it more popular.

PS.- You also realize that Grand Slams are not ATP/WTA events, right? They are ITF events.