You guys are all wasting time. None of the ladies are going to play the men. It hasn't happened in 30 years (maybe a few isolated times), its not going to happen now.
Regarding PPV, Accustats and TAR both know what sell. The top players sell, and not much else. And by top, its top 10 men, not even top 100 men. The women just don't fit into it.
Not being sexist, just calling it like I see it.
Well you're wrong because it's happened and it will happen again.
Let's analyze this from another perspective. What's in it for the women to go head to head in a high profile match?
Will women as a whole suddenly get more respect? Will they earn more? Will they be treated equally? Will they be allowed to play in all men's events. Will this mean the end of women's events.
I mean everyone considers them to be B-class players which is why they still have a league of their own. And as long as they have a league of their own there will always be speculation as to whether the best women COULD compete with the men and if so at what level?
So a matchup like this won't settle that question because the sample size is too small. If Chris wins one match against one female then it's "proof" that all women are weaker than Chris. If the woman wins then it's "proof" that any top woman can have a lucky match. So there is almost ZERO upside to such a match from the woman's perspective.
Personally if I had the money then I would take some of the women to the Phillipines and to Taiwan and train them in secret and then march across the USA snapping off shortstops and work my way up and through guys like Bartrum's speed until I had won well more than a couple hundred thousand.
But that's a pipe dream as well for the reason that the first decent guy one of my killer women players crushes will be splattered all over the net and her action will be knocked.
I think that such Battle of the Sexes type match are great for promotional purposes, great for PPV, but ultimately don't REALLY mean anything larger than the match itself. I hear all the time that shortstops would CRUSH any woman but I also hear from Kelly that she had a pretty solid backer down in South Carolina and they tried to make games all the time and very few shortstops stepped up to the plate.
In fact very few top pros wanted to give up much weight either. Now the crowd on AZB seems to have the idea that any top pro could give Kelly the six out and be stealing but no top pro wants to give Kelly the six out from what I hear. So maybe these guys know a little more about how to evaluate her game than the amateurs on AZB.
I am not going to go as far as Jay does with Si Ming Chen and say that she can play these guys even gambling. I think it's not fair to compare any single woman to the top male pros because it's a mass makes class thing. Top males have little competition anyway precisely because they are at the top. Everyone else is playing for second place when these guys show up. They rise to the top through a massive amount of male players. Women on the other hand make up a small percentage of people playing so the odds that a woman will become as good as the top males is about the same as the odds that a random redheaded guy with curly hair will become as good as the top male pros.
One thing I am pretty certain of though in my heart is that if Kelly Fisher had been born a man and followed the exact same path then I am sure she would be a top contender simply based on her work ethic and understanding of the game.
Allison put it out there once that people can't really understand the derisiveness and insults that women have to contend with when they are coming up. They are simply NOT treated as equals, at times coddled and at times flat out harassed. When Allison was coming up if she beat a male player then she was often treated with hostility and told she was lucky or the guy played bad because he faced a woman. However if a male beat the same person then none of that was expressed.
I do believe that Kelly or any of the top females would be interested in doing the same type of TAR or ACCU-STATS challenge matches where they are getting paid for showing up. I don't think that they want to gamble precisely because it's tough action, the same reason why the top male players don't make it a habit to seek out the other top players to play on their own money. They wait for backers to arrange matches and they show up and play.
So it's a bit of an insult to say that these matches won't take place. Such a statement assumes that the women are scared or utterly incapable. This is not true at all. The top women can run out racks with the best of them. But they know full well how strong the top male players are and know that even if they were just as strong then at best it's a coin flip.
But put up a $5000 prize fund, pay their expenses and I bet you will find that not only will some Battle of the Sexes matches take place I think that the outcomes of some of them will be surprising to many.
