Kaci, pro pool and prize money

jay helfert said:
There is far more prize money in pro pool than ever before. Top players are earning over 200K a year and many others over 100K. Only a few years ago those numbers were half that.

If you can break into the top 20-30 pros you'll be making a decent living. Shane, Filler, Gorsr, Yapp, Biado etc are not complaining. Yes, there are probably 40-50 good players out there grinding to eke out a subsistence. There dream is to reach the upper echelon. Grabe has been out there a good 15 years and I suspect that 25K is his biggest payday ever.

Believe me even in golf and tennis lesser players are grumbling about the prize money while the stars make millions.

Even if the prize money continues to increase this conversation will never end.
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Biado was number one on the 2025 money list with 325k. There were 160 players on the PGA tour who made more than that in 2025. It may be true for tennis, but i feel like golf is a bad analogy.
 
nine_ball6970 said:
Biado was number one on the 2025 money list with 325k. There were 160 players on the PGA tour who made more than that in 2025. It may be true for tennis, but i feel like golf is a bad analogy.
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Comparable for tennis as well. Ella Seidel earned $337,745 in 2025 as the 161st highest earner in women’s tennis. In 2026, halfway through the year, the 284th highest earner in women's tennis, Anastasia Detiuc, has already cleared $100k.
 
Yes it seems scumbaggy, But you think renting these places is free? I think Harrah's was something like 50k a day for the US open years back.
 
Quite simply, there isn't enough outside money in pool. There isn't enough money in the pool table, cue, chalk, etc. industry for those companies to justify making pool a lucrative profession. Needing to beat 4 of these killers that play today just to break even is an absolute joke.
 
sjm said:
This is putting the cart before the horse. There is no such thing as what the players should earn, and the level of expenses borne by them are ultimately unimportant. The players can only earn to the extent that they produce revenue for event producers, who are spread pretty thin.

Expenses are estimable before one enters a tournament, as are prize money payout structures. The choice by a player to participate in a pool tournament constitutes an investment of time and money. Anyone who feels that it is a poor investment need not participate.

Of course, we'd all like to see the players make more money, but it's not on the event producers that they don't. If the event producers do not turn a profit, they will walk from the game. Making ends meet is no easy task for an event producer. Unless the game continues to grow, all but the top 25 or so players will be hard pressed to earn a substantial living.

That said, how many events are there on the world pool calendar having a first prize of $25,000 or more. I'd bet it's close to 30 and probably more. Pool offers a lot of high paydays now and the worthy can make quite a big income.
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Exactly right.

It's the same reason WNBA players earn next to nothing. There simply isn't any revenue generated by the games/tournaments themselves to drive larger salaries/purses.

To be blunt, nobody other than a very, very few fans care to pay to watch girls play basketball, or just about anybody play pool. Neither will TV pick up the slack because without significant viewership, advertisers aren't attracted.

It's just an economic fact of life...
 
skogstokig said:
really? i thought they drove from phoenix or something
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No, Phoenix started today. Unless Shane was referring to a different trip. That's a good 2 day drive, Miami to Yuma through the flat parts of the south.

I guess the good thing is it's only a 3hr drive to Phoenix from Yuma for a crack at 20 large. And you're already acclimated to the dry heat. I think it's a crisp 112° today :D
 
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I remember a time when the payouts for the US open were sketchy and there were a series of big tournaments where checks were bouncing. If memory serves this prompted an attempt to form a players union. Wasn’t Charlie Williams trying to organize that? Anyway pool has progressed some from those dark days even though it has some ways to go.
 
David in FL said:
Exactly right.

It's the same reason WNBA players earn next to nothing. There simply isn't any revenue generated by the games/tournaments themselves to drive larger salaries/purses.

To be blunt, nobody other than a very, very few fans care to pay to watch girls play basketball, or just about anybody play pool. Neither will TV pick up the slack because without significant viewership, advertisers aren't attracted.

It's just an economic fact of life...
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Uh, I don't know where you've been lately, but the WNBA has been taking off.
 
jbart65 said:
Kaci wrote in another post about losing in the first round of the Arizona Open to Sun Yi Hsuan of Taiwan:

"Dunno the guy, but he played great."

I had to wonder. Did Kaci look up Hsuan's Fargo (778)? Check any YT vids? Do any scouting at all - what else was there to do in Yuma?

Kaci seemed slow to wake up to how good Hsuan is.
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Did you see Sun's next match? He was amazing for the match vs Kaci. Played nowhere near as good in his next match. It was strange to see.
 
David in FL said:
Exactly right.

It's the same reason WNBA players earn next to nothing. There simply isn't any revenue generated by the games/tournaments themselves to drive larger salaries/purses.

To be blunt, nobody other than a very, very few fans care to pay to watch girls play basketball, or just about anybody play pool. Neither will TV pick up the slack because without significant viewership, advertisers aren't attracted.

It's just an economic fact of life...
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This is somewhat true. There isn't enough revenue generated right now, but that's not an inherent part of pool. That's something that can be changed with investment and development and the pool world simply has not had enough of that.

In 1999, the minimum WNBA salary was ~$50k in today's dollars. This year, with the new collective bargaining agreement, it's $270k.
In 1970, the US Open for tennis had a prize pool of under $1M in today's dollars. In 1999, it was $15.2M in today's dollars. This year, it'll be $90M.
In 2016, the Capcom Cup (tournament for Street Fighter, the video game) had a prize pool of $486k in today's dollars. In 2026, it had a prize pool of $1.28M.

In 1999, the World 9-ball Championship had a prize pool of ~$500k in today's dollars. In 2016, it was ~$276k in today's dollars. Last year, it had a prize pool of $1M.
 
kingwang said:
This is somewhat true. There isn't enough revenue generated right now, but that's not an inherent part of pool. That's something that can be changed with investment and development and the pool world simply has not had enough of that.

In 1999, the minimum WNBA salary was ~$50k in today's dollars. This year, with the new collective bargaining agreement, it's $270k.
In 1970, the US Open for tennis had a prize pool of under $1M in today's dollars. In 1999, it was $15.2M in today's dollars. This year, it'll be $90M.
In 2016, the Capcom Cup (tournament for Street Fighter, the video game) had a prize pool of $486k in today's dollars. In 2026, it had a prize pool of $1.28M.

In 1999, the World 9-ball Championship had a prize pool of ~$500k in today's dollars. In 2016, it was ~$276k in today's dollars. Last year, it had a prize pool of $1M.
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And the WNBA loses money every year, as do the individual teams.

How long will it continue? For the life of me, I can't understand why it still exists as it is...
 
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