Tour Rules:
Made to be Broken

Matt Cronin

Serena's fine at the U.S. Open doesn't tell the real story about rules on the tour.

About a year and half ago, now 13-times Grand Slam champion Serena Williams was fined $82,500 for launching an eye-popping verbal assault at a lineswomen at the 2009 US Open and also put on a two-year probation at the majors. Williams was furious that so much cash came directly out of her pocket and protested it publicly.

That public protest was unusual, because the direct hit out of her pocket was also unusual. For the most part, players rarely have to give back money they earn, regardless of the offense. This is because in the ATP and WTA worlds today, the offenders are granted more out clauses than Houdini found holes in the straight jackets that he escaped from.

Both tours have thick rules books which discuss the various penalties for missing mandatory events, verbally thrashing umpires or linespeople, or skipping out of press conferences. But the tour's dirty little secret is that they are rarely enforced.

That's not always the case with the Grand Slams, which function independently from the tours. They have been known to take decent sized chunks out of players' paychecks. But it's not as if the majors frequently come down star players either.

John McEnroe-defaulted from the Australian-a rare enforcement at the Slams.

In fact, over the past 21 years, only Serena and John McEnroe have been made examples. (I'm not counting Jeff Tarango's 1995 Wimbledon slapping incident because he was not a star.), McEnroe got kicked out of 1990 Australian Open for unsportsmanlike conduct in his defeat to Mikhael Pernfors.

Believe it or not, with all the challenging of umpires, profanity, and obnoxious and lewd gestures ( remember crotch-grabbing Jimmy Connors?) , McEnroe was the first player in the Open Era get kicked out of a Grand Slam-and this was at the tail end of his career when his star value for the event was diminished..

In 1979 in the second round of the US Open, Ilie Nastase made a mockery of himself, the lines people, the spectators, and the chair umpire in front of a drunken, near riotous crowd in a five set loss to McEnroe. He was at first defaulted. But this was bizarrely reversed by the tournament referee, who allowed the circus to continue, possibly fearing a fan riot. The Romanian never paid a dime in fines.

One of the great mockeries in tennis history, but Nastase never paid a dime.

Sadly the tours have not and probably will not ever seriously discipline their players because they are dependent on the star players to drive revenue. If the top players don't buy into what the leadership is selling, then they either ignore the rules or fight back. If the administration fights back too hard, they risk the losing the cooperation of the star players. Now they have little to sell to their sponsors since the most desired actors and actresses will have exited stage door left.

The tours try to show that they can wield a big stick by seriously sanctioning their top players for infractions such as not showing up at mandatory tournaments, or doing the amount of promotional work that they are obligated to do. But when they actually confront the reality of coming down on the players the reality is they do little more than to try and find exit clauses.

Let's take the example of mandatory tournaments. The Williams sisters have not played the mandatory tournament at Indian Wells since 2001, when both Serena and Venus felt that they besieged by racists comments.

The Williams' sisters income is not impacted by skipping Indian Wells.

Personally I don't believe they should be forced to play there. But what most fans and observers don't recognize is that there is no direct cost to them out of pocket for skipping the tournament. This is because the only sanction is the elimination of their year end bonus pool money.

Neither Venus and Serena need the bonus money, because of their huge off court earnings. To avoid direct fines, they are also required to do a tour promotion within 100 miles of the site sometime during the next year. But in reality this has little or no effect. Does anyone actually remember what promotion either sister did in 2010?

The Williamses are not the only players to have pulled out of or not shown up at mandatory events. Maria Sharapova has as well. And if she doesn't feel like it, there is no way she is going to fly across continent to do a sponsors party. Not when she's earning a cool 23 million a year off court.

Kim won't go to Asia, and she won't be fined.

It's the same for Kim Clijsters, who is arguably the most popular player on tour now, but declined to play last year's mandatory event in Beijing and has already said that she is not going to go to Asia at all this coming fall.

There are dozens of other examples of players failing to show up for press conferences and scheduled interviews, and almost nothing is ever done about that. In fact, the ATP Tour has twisted its own rules so far that instead of having to do press prior to a tournament, the tour allows the players to pick a sponsors visit instead. If you think that any star is committing the same amount of time and energy to the sport by shaking hands for 20 minutes at sponsor's reception you are still playing with a wooden racket.

The ATP and WTA both call the tournaments "partners," and tournament owners are extremely influential in the sport. But not all are as influential as others. Size matters.

Over the past two decades, both tours have officially restricted players from unofficial exhibitions during the tour season. But the agents and players are routinely skirting the rules, even as they complain that that the season is too long.

No one stops Rafael Nadal and David Ferrer from playing exhibitions in conflict with tournaments.

For example, it was recently announced that Rafael Nadal and David Ferrer will play an exhibition match in Taiwan on October 1 during the same week that ATP tournaments are going on in Thailand and Malaysia. A women's exhibition between Maria Sharapova and Vera Zvonareva will take place on September 22 in Taipei, which is the same week that WTA tournaments are going on in Seoul and Guangzhou.

The ATP has now relaxed its rules, allowing players to play exhibitions the same weeks as smaller ATP 250 tournaments as long as the tournaments are not located with 100 miles of the exhibition, or in the same market area.

This is despite the fact that the ATP 250 tournaments themselves are totally opposed to the change. There are over 40 ATP 250 level events--actually over two thirds of the total tournaments. They offer a combined $30 million in prize money.

As one tournament director told me, "We are ATP events like the 500 & 1,000s - and we expect to be treated with the same level of respect."

Size matters and the ATP 250s don't get equal respect with larger events.

But the players like Nadal, Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic rarely play 250 level tournaments. First, it's a little known fact that only two can count toward their ranking. But more importantly, they can choose instead to play a one night exhibition for a million dollars--much more appealing than having to grind through another week long event for much less cash.

The WTA allegedly has more restrictive rules that do not allow players to play exhibitions during tournament weeks, regardless of the size of the event. Unless of course, they are granted a waiver.

Guess who was granted a waiver to play in a Nike exhibition?

And guess what? Sharapova, Serena and Victoria Azarenka were all granted waivers to play in the Nike exhibition in March, the same week as the WTA tournament Monterey. Sharapova and Gisela Dulko also played an exhibition in April the Bahamas, during a Fed Cup week.

And how about this? Every player who participated in the annual Hong Kong exhibition at the start of the year (Sharapova, the Williamses, Caroline Wozniacki, etc) was granted a waiver, even though that exhibition competes with a new WTA tournament in Brisbane, Australia, and another one in Auckland.

This type of circumvention has been going on for years, even though the exhibitions clearly hurt tour events. However, since the WTA is obsessed with making a bigger mark in exploding region of Asia it doesn't want to offend any folks there with deep pockets.

Even if the rules were strictly enforced, that wouldn't necessarily be sufficient to stop the players. For example, if Vera Zvonareva and Sharapova were denied waivers to play their fall Asia exhibition, at their current rankings, Zvonareva would be hit with a $100,000 penalty and Sharapova's be $50,000. That's no big deal when both of them are likely being paid far more than that to play the exhibitions.

Sure it makes financial sense for the players to do the exos. But the reality is they if played the WTA tournament in Seoul, many more new fans would get a chance to see them play live and possibly become hooked on the sport.

No waiver? Not a problem with the fees the top players command.

The men also shoot tennis in the foot, but for different reasons. Unlike the WTA, which has a solid working relationship with the Slams, the ATP is still fighting a decade-long, control issue battles with the majors.

One of the debated issues is whether exhibitions should be allowed the week before the majors. Even though there are two well-organized and notable ATP events played in Sydney and Auckland the week before the Australian Open, the ATP allows its star players (Federer, Roddick, Murray and more) to play an annual exhibition in Koyoong, which is actually within Melbourne's city limits. Most of the stars choose to play that leisurely event rather than to risk damaging their limbs in a more competitive ATP tournament.

Of course all this is little reported in the wider sporting press. Truth or not, the reality is this. For most players tennis professes to be a stickler for rules. But for the stars, the rules seem to be designed to be broken.