How I Would Change the PDGA

[coupe]

response mostly to coupe (post #269):

I'll try to unconfuse you. Perhaps I haven't been clear enough, or blunt enough, about EDGE and educational initiative. I'll make two key points, and then probably move on to other things.

1) I can't imagine that I could ever vote for the PDGA to fund an educational initiative unless its participants were free to buy their equipment from any manufacturer.

Participants in EDGE absolutely are free to buy their equipment from any manufacturer or vendor the choose. I'm currently working with a private school that has done just that. By choosing to buy equipment from a different vendor rather than through EDGE, they voluntarily forfeited the not insubstantial equipment discount that EDGE is able to provide.

2) The PDGA is absolutely capable of staffing and funding a fabulous educational program. We are spending over $300,000 on a few top-end events, and we have a small army of staff people spending man-months of time running around helping to run them.

My argument here, as it often is, is that our priorities are very badly out of whack. We need to reallocate.

Not without:

A) gutting the support, both financial and administrative, for the current competition model;

B) either hiring additional staff or radically rewriting the job descriptions for current staff to run the program; and

C) dramatically increasing the dollars allocated to (wasted on) administrative overhead.

By continuing to vote in a majority of the Board who support the current model, the membership has expressed, repeatedly and overwhelmingly, that they do not think the priorities are badly out of whack, and that they do not think reallocation of resources is needed.

 

[Picked_Up]

to Picked Up:

You make several good points (post#276). The most important to me is this one ("You made an awful lot of objections to the proposal based on the quality of work produced. Maybe it is time for someone to grab the reigns and ensure that the work being produced is worth the investment.")

Mine is not the only important opinion. Obviously the strong consensus of the Board and the Office is that I am wrong -- that the video/TV portion of the budget is allocated wisely and that DGPtv is a most worthy recipient of the money we pay them. So, in the sense you introduced, they have grabbed the reins.

And that's just why I am here (on the Forum). I want to know what the membership thinks. I need to know what the members think, and to let them know what I think, because they elected me and because I'm asking them to do it again.

Well, since a portion of my membership dollars are going towards the funding of DGPtv, I would like to know exactly where they are spending all this money. Since they are quoting you for $70,000 they should be more than willing to provide itemized reports for spending and their planned return on investment.

Would it be possible for the PDGA to allocate that proposed money to start-up its own streaming coverage of major events? Just in doing a quick bit of search, the PDGA could start an online streaming tv service for somewhere along the lines of $10,000. Just a thought.

At this point, I realize that I have been harping on online tv an awful lot. Rest assured that there is reasoning behind this. Whether or not the reasoning is sound or not is your call.

First: I really want the organization to start to look years down the line when it comes to growing the sport. Every dollar spent should be done-so with a "how is this dollar going to bolster our efforts ten years down the line?" mentality. Looking at the meeting minutes, there really doesn't seem to be a vision for that. Everything falls within the two to five year range. Foundations don't seem to be being laid.

Second: There was speak of educational programs and targeting young people. The internet is where the young people are. You have to cater to your target audience when you want to sell product. You know where they are, go get them.

Third: Money. It may sound odd. But in spending the money to start your own operation you also have the luxury of controling the revenue stream. If more people are sitting through ads while watching online tv versus getting up and doing something while watching cable, what form of consumption do you think is going to be more attractive to sponsors?

 

[shive]

Comments in red:

The issue with a membership org is that members should dictate where money should be spent, first to provide services of direct benefit to members and a distant second to peripheral activities should any money remain. While there's lip service supporting education as a good thing, the historical momentum and actions taken by the PDGA have been focusing on competition and related services members need and want which has been creating a future career path to the professional sports world or at least more money flowing into it. Potential new players, especially kids are currently not members and helping them falls into one of those distant second peripheral activities. The members posting here about education don't seem to think of it as a "distant second peripheral activity". Neither do I. Our members have never really been asked how they would rate education. They might well prefer a PDGA that put $50,000 into education and $250,000+ into the top end, rather than zero into education and $300,000+ into top end.


Now if the PDGA were a for profit corporation like our manufacturers, then looking at developing wider demographic of customers becomes a higher priority, thus we see programs like EDGE. I think it's going to be tough for a non-profit member org like the PDGA to raise the priority and allocate enough funding for peripheral growth activities to any extent unless perhaps it was privatized. Interestingly, I've never heard this mentioned as a possible future for the PDGA where it would be sold to stockholders, probably since this idea mostly comes up when an org is struggling financially. No problems there, of course. We've been running big profits every year for some time, and we have over a million dollars in the bank.

 

[JC17393]

Would it be possible for the PDGA to allocate that proposed money to start-up its own streaming coverage of major events? Just in doing a quick bit of search, the PDGA could start an online streaming tv service for somewhere along the lines of $10,000. Just a thought.

Could you source that please. What exactly would the $10,000 cover in starting the service?

My guess is that that is a start up price (equipment, broadband accounts, etc), and would not include any actual broadcasts.

I believe that the $70,000 that the PDGA puts into DGPtv, while seeming like a lot, is not close to enough to sustain the operation by itself. I don't say that as a defense of the PDGA's helping to underwrite DGPtv so much as illustrating that there's no way in hell the PDGA or anyone else is going to match or exceed what DGP has done so far with just a $10,000 investment.

 

[Cgkdisc]

Peter, you seem to be presuming most of the people posting here are members. I think you would find a higher percentage of nonmembers (who are interested in growing the sport) considering education a more important priority even if it meant taking money away from top level competition support and member services. Notice that touring pros have also been voted on the Board over the past several years significantly above their percentage of members. Yes, it's name recognition but that is indicative of the interest voting members (those more engaged in PDGA affairs) have in that aspect of PDGA pursuits.

 

[Picked_Up]

Could you source that please. What exactly would the $10,000 cover in starting the service?

https://www.tvstartup.com/internet-tv Now I am just throwing that out there as my quick research. I also factored in the cost of another camera (roughly $2000) in the start-up cost. This seems to cover every thing needed from a basic level. I'll try to elaborate a bit more in a bit. Work got hectic.

 

[shive]

foreign post

to michael bacon (who posted this in a different forum):

"I would like to vote for you bit I would like your position on the following: Disc limit in bags in tournaments. The PGA has a 14 club limit. For speed of play and to show athleticism. Official review at tournaments. All legitimate sports have official review-ask Tiger. Self policing does not work. Elimination of the jump putt. It is really a touch and go midrange shot which was illegal by Folf rules until the PDGA made rules where players found a loop hole to use the shot. As a person who understands marketing I don't like the term disc golf because it suggests Folf is golfs little brother. An alternate to golf is not how it should be marketed. Looking forward to your reply. By the way I've been playing since 1965 and I don't like the irreverence from the younger PDGA members. I don't get it from young Folfers."

I haven't thought enough about club limits. I do think it's way too late to change the name of the game. It actually seems to me that many PDGA members do in fact think of disc golf as "golf's little brother".

I agree with you strongly about official review. I voted for the legality of video evidence, as long as it is presented promptly. But I got outvoted. I don't much care about the jump putt. It would be far less a problem if video reviews were admissable.

My experience with young PDGA members is different from yours, and I'm probably older (72 in July). I feel like I've gotten all the reverence I deserve, and maybe even a bit more. I submit in evidence the fact that I've never been trashed on this thread, not even close, even though I often take positions that are very unpopular with some posters.

 

[mashnut]

I agree with you strongly about official review. I voted for the legality of video evidence, as long as it is presented promptly. But I got outvoted. I don't much care about the jump putt. It would be far less a problem if video reviews were admissable.

I like the idea of video review, but with videographers following only the top card it could easily lead to much stricter adherence to certain rules and an advantage for players on lower cards trying to catch up.

I do think that allowing photo/video evidence for things like OB questions where a player could throw a provisional and later show the picture to the TD for a ruling would be a great step.

 

[shive]

Peter, you seem to be presuming most of the people posting here are members. I think you would find a higher percentage of nonmembers (who are interested in growing the sport) considering education a more important priority even if it meant taking money away from top level competition support and member services. Notice that touring pros have also been voted on the Board over the past several years significantly above their percentage of members. Yes, it's name recognition but that is indicative of the interest voting members (those more engaged in PDGA affairs) have in that aspect of PDGA pursuits.

Well, I do presume some things because when the data is not there you don't have a choice. I certainly don't presume that all the posters here are PDGA members, and have even said earlier that I know they are not. I don't know the percentage. But you are presuming also (about member priorities and the reasons for it). I say, "This (education) is important, so let's none of us act on presumptions. Let's ask the members directly."

Now I find myself posting too much, and presuming that I'm boring people. I'm going to move on to other topics on my campaign list, so I can hopefully get through that list before voting begins in July.

 

[JC17393]

https://www.tvstartup.com/internet-tv Now I am just throwing that out there as my quick research. I also factored in the cost of another camera (roughly $2000) in the start-up cost. This seems to cover every thing needed from a basic level. I'll try to elaborate a bit more in a bit. Work got hectic.

I think those packages presume hardwired access to the internet as well as that you have the equipment. Obviously you tried to figure the equipment costs into that $10,000 estimate, but I think you need more than two cameras to do it right. Not to mention mixing and encoding equipment. For taped broadcasts, that probably can be done on any old laptop. For live broadcasts, it requires more specialized equipment.

So I suppose $10K probably could get you up and running with a recorded broadcast (pre-taped rounds edited for broadcast) using a service like that one (or Livestream, which is what DGP uses).

Live broadcasting would probably be out at that cost, though. Live would require specialty equipment like LiveU and a high volume 3G/4G wireless account, neither of which are cheap.

Then there's the cost of manpower to get things running. There's probably only so far this kind of venture can go running on strictly volunteer manpower. Such an undertaking probably requires at least one or two experienced and knowledgeable people, and probably a couple more that could be trained or learn on the fly. And you have to get them and the equipment to various events in order to cover them. Things really start adding up, cost-wise. Well beyond a mere $10K investment, for sure.

 

[Cgkdisc]

Peter, for your reference you can click on the Member's posting name, select DGCR Profile and see if they have a PDGA number.

 

[Picked_Up]

I'm not saying that is the end all to be all. But you have to plant seeds to have something grow. In the end it will cost more than that $10,000 startup. My question becomes "Does it have the potential to become a bigger return on investment?" Personally I think it does, but I'm also 26. I have the luxury of knowing everything for about four more years.

 

[onemilemore]

Damn good questions! I think about this a lot, and could write volumes about it. Frankly, I'm uncertain about my role, and my value, on the Board. I'm not interested in spearheading a coalition unless I believe that the membership is solidly behind me. I don't believe that yet. I almost lost in the last election. Sometimes I characterize myself as "the best known disc golfer to almost lose a Board election". And I wouldn't say that the responses to my ideas here constitute a ringing endorsement of them.

Probably my most useful function to the membership has been communication. I will tell you just about anything you want to know, and I'll give you my opinion even if I think (or even know) you won't like it. On the Board, probably my most useful function is analysis, and I'll skip the 1000 words it would take to flesh out that thought.

So yes, there is frustration because I go down in flames a lot, and I worry about irritating Brian and the other Board members. But still, I'm OK with my role (I sometimes characterize myself as "the heretic"), and comfortable about what I bring to the table, both for the membership and the Board.

Peter, I not only appreciate your self-awareness, but I also appreciate that you don't shy away from rocking the boat. Whether you are the person to enact some change in the PDGA or not, your respectful manner in trying to do so is certainly laying the groundwork. Kudos, and keep bringing us your informed opinions.

 

[michael bacon]

reply to peter

I want to know how players feel about official review at tournaments. All professional sports have official review to legitimize the game.
I also think a limit should be put on the number of discs on a bag to speed game and to show athleticism.
Eliminate what is mistakenly called the jump putt. In the 60s and 70s we considered it an illegal shot. Its a touch and go shot. Most players are not releasing their disc with the support foot planted behind the lie. The sport is not pro basketball.

 

[michael bacon]

reply to peter

I want to know how players feel about official review at tournaments. All professional sports have official review to legitimize the game.
I also think a limit should be put on the number of discs on a bag to speed game and to show athleticism.
Eliminate what is mistakenly called the jump putt. In the 60s and 70s we considered it an illegal shot. Its a touch and go shot. Most players are not releasing their disc with the support foot planted behind the lie. The sport is not pro basketball.
Decorum goes a long way toward attracting paying viewers

 

[Casual Squishy]

to DukDukgolf:

You say, "I think an Am series will simply turn into the sandbagging Pro's that can afford to travel series. It would do nothing for grassroots or building from the bottom up."

I do not propose an Amateur Tour as a grassroots or bottom-up effort. I propose it only to do something for the Ams, to compensate for their ever-increasing subsidy of the Pros. They provide the bulk of our income, and deserve more attention.

My nomination for the most effective grassroots program recently instituted by the PDGA would be Kevin McCoy's league program. My chiefly grassroots proposals are a) to give meaningful compensation to TD's, b) to leave more money with local clubs and communities (ie, lower tournament fees) and c) to reach out to recreational players.

Hi Peter. I had to bold this part because I have to differ a bit on this issue. There already is an Amateur tour in fact if not in name, It's exactly the same tour as the Pro tour, just with lesser amounts of top tier (restricted by division) events but there are a few, such as AM nats, Am worlds and even just high player number prestige tourneys such as The Memorial. I also have to disagree somewhat with the part about "Ever increasing subsidy." Maybe in actual dollars but I would imagine the percentage Ams subsidize the pros to have remained relatively stable over the years. I'll agree with you about the part about Ams deserving more attention in that it is time to change the system somewhat, they are the largest base of players in organized disc golf.
One of the biggest things that needs to be addressed is standardization, both for the few event a year Ams and the "Professional Amateur Disc Golfer," a phrase I heard last week that intrigued me. For any disc golfer that plays competitively more then just their immediate region yearly.. the tag fits. They're essentially just players playing within their rating but are self funded "touring." (some with aspirations of getting better and moving up, some just playing against fair competition and probably destined to stay the same rating over time.) The tag "Amateur Professional Disc Golfer" works equally well for pro ratings based players who only play a few tournaments a year. To some both will sound slightly offensive even though they are accurate. Between the two they make up a huge part of the player base. Both are playing "professionally" in the sense of rules, sportsmanship, competition etc. and both are amateurs in the sense that they are not fully dedicated to disc golf, they have day jobs, families, lives, etc.
The rest of the base is Touring Pros, (a tiny percent,) and regional Ams who play maybe 2-10 tournaments a year, depending on how lucky they are in local tournament availability.(a good chunk of the base, but I've been unable to find hard numbers on "average number of events per year of ams" anywhere. So how do we make everyone happy, and grow the sport at the same time? Stay tuned, and I'll rehash some of the points, suggestions, and arguments I've tossed around a few other threads, and a couple new ideas.

 

[Casual Squishy]

First, regarding pdga membership, simple solution:
First, better market the value pdga membership has in tournament structuring (providing player ratings systems, promoting overall organization of the sport, others.)
Second, improve value across the board to cater to different types of players to keep the base membership up:
Change the temp membership rules to allow a player up to 5 tournaments at the 10$ non member price, then cut them off from tournaments until they pay a 1 year membership price. Every year after they join and get a PDGA number they can either pay the full 50$ for the next year or pay the 10$ per tournament fee, and auto renew them anyways the first time they play for the year. The PDGA still gets the same amount of money either way, players who play more then 5 tournaments a year get extra value, players who play less still get what they pay for and lose the right to complain about it being not cost effective. There's no reason a player who only plays one tournament a year should be forced to pay 50$ just to keep their privilege of being current and showing their dedication to the sport. It's also helpful for PR to keep our current membership numbers high. There's also no reason for a player to complain about what is essentially a higher one time fee for all the benefits of being part of organized disc golf.
More to come on standardizing the system, growing publicity and sponsorship, the role of the pdga, the pro tour and the am subsidy issue... but may take a day or two to put together.
Thanks for opening the discussion.

 

[Casual Squishy]

I'll tackle publicity and sponsorship in a half assed late night fashion, light on detail but to the point on basics.
Money. Marketability. Media. Yeah, I know, the three things that always come up about disc golf that we have very little of from the outside. One doesn't have to be a pdga board member to have those topics come up several times a year, all a person has to be is a tournament playing disc golfer and have a pair of ears. Everyone daydreams and compares disc golf to all the other established "big" sports and it's been the undying topic since the dinosaurs roamed the earth and the A tier was invented. (They're all grandmasters now, but aging well and still talking about it.)
"Why aren't we big like (insert name of favorite comparison sport here?)"
This post isn't really directed at Peter, he probably knows all of this inside out and hears it daily.
We're not because we're not that sport. I've tried to make the comparison before but some people find it hard to understand the business concepts and history of other sports so let's try a different method. Take disc golf out of it for a minute completely. You have a game and a concept. How do you get people to play, and spend time and money on it, and how does it generate money?
It's a skill based game, and it requires a large mass of people and time and money. Playing it though is pretty much freely available (today, although many many more courses are needed before it's "facebook" available to the masses) for anyone to go out any time and try. You've tried outside investors time and again for decades but you have nothing much more after decades to offer them then you did before and that part is a viscous circle, more players equals more money equals more investment equals more players.. you're just not big enough. You're growing at a steady enough pace to be so eventually but you want to do your best to hurry it along. You have no mass media appeal, but that's ok, neither does anything else on the scale of the NFL NHL PGA or a myriad of other initials. Every single one of those sports got their start from the outside anyways, and created the mass media appeal through marketing from that money. It's an uneven comparison at best.
Now look at online poker.. hmm, a handful of commercials and web ads in the early days.. roughly similar model wise to the "word of mouth" spread of disc golf that is still the most effective marketing of disc golf today. As the player base grew.. the number of tournaments grew. The players funded the tournaments. The companies providing get a cut. Eventually along came the "World series of poker," and it was originally largely self funded too. Anyone could get in by qualifying, not just people who had specifically gone to college for it or spent 10s of thousands of dollars taking lessons and paying play costs. Qualifiers had prizes too, and payouts for making it to certain levels of play. Soon after media attention came too and spin offs such as "late night poker" etc. became popular and sponsorship money started rolling in.
This is the business model the pdga and the player base needs to look closer at, not the undying am vs pro model, the huge outside money sports model or the specious "Spirit of amateurism" model that was designed to be exclusionary in all those "big money" sports. In all those sports you're playing with and for other peoples money, not your own. Amateurism was designed to keep people out, so the money pool was not diluted. Poker tournaments went in the exact opposite direction, they had no choice since they didn't have the money from the outside. Neither did all the early disc golf leagues that spawned tournament play.
Publicity in disc golf still remains the same for probably a long time in disc golf, word of mouth and discs in hands. And free videos on youtube.

 

[Casual Squishy]

First, regarding pdga membership, simple solution:
First, better market the value pdga membership has in tournament structuring (providing player ratings systems, promoting overall organization of the sport, others.)
Second, improve value across the board to cater to different types of players to keep the base membership up:
Change the temp membership rules to allow a player up to 5 tournaments at the 10$ non member price, then cut them off from tournaments until they pay a 1 year membership price. Every year after they join and get a PDGA number they can either pay the full 50$ for the next year or pay the 10$ per tournament fee, and auto renew them anyways the first time they play for the year. The PDGA still gets the same amount of money either way, players who play more then 5 tournaments a year get extra value, players who play less still get what they pay for and lose the right to complain about it being not cost effective. There's no reason a player who only plays one tournament a year should be forced to pay 50$ just to keep their privilege of being current and showing their dedication to the sport. It's also helpful for PR to keep our current membership numbers high. There's also no reason for a player to complain about what is essentially a higher one time fee for all the benefits of being part of organized disc golf.
More to come on standardizing the system, growing publicity and sponsorship, the role of the pdga, the pro tour and the am subsidy issue... but may take a day or two to put together.
Thanks for opening the discussion.

Alternatively, just assign them a PDGA number after those 5 events, even if they're not in the same calendar year and make them current for the rest of the year. You could even get really different and make them play the 5 tournaments before they CAN get the number to make it seem more prestigious

 

[Casual Squishy]

One of the newer and lesser known benefits of pdga membership:
Many leagues these days will assign you a league handicap your very first round based on your pdga rating if you have one, a nice morsel for non scratch rated players that like to catch out of area leagues if they travel.