![](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.womentalksports.com\/images\/image364.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Once again we\u2019ve started the Diamond League without a matchup of any of the true stars of the sport. Doha produced many of the world\u2019s top marks \u2013 but that is to be expected when you begin to get the world\u2019s truly elite athletes on the track. We will see wholesale revisions of the yearly performance lists on a weekly basis now that the \u201cbest\u201d are performing. <\/p>\n
But what we were promised with the unveiling of the Diamond League last year was not just another series of \u201cEuropean Circuit\u201d type meets. What we were told was that this league was going to contract with the cr\u00e8me de la cr\u00e8me in such a manner that we would get regular servings of elite head to head matchups. Yet one of the complaints after the end of last season was that that promise went unfulfilled. And if Doha, and quotes by IAAF President Lamine Diack are any indication, we won\u2019t be seeing too many this season either. <\/p>\n
Why is getting these athletes to compete so hard \u2013 aside from the fact that the head of the sport doesn\u2019t seem to feel it\u2019s a priority? Personally I don\u2019t think it\u2019s really all that difficult. So here\u2019s my suggestion.<\/p>\n
First off, since this is supposed to be a \u201cleague\u201d let\u2019s treat it like a league. To me that means that each \u201cmeet director\u201d is treated like an \u201cowner\u201d in any other sporting league, and that the league is treated as a single unit. As such, let\u2019s develop a collective agreement between all the meets on the circuit and put all revenues into a league trust. That would include turnstile revenue, souvenir sales, corporate sponsorships, etc.<\/p>\n
A formula can be created to determine each meet\u2019s profit level and, more importantly, the payout base for athletes. Once the payout base has been set for the season, the league can set it\u2019s individual meet payouts, overall season payouts, and then begin negotiations on individual performance contracts. These individual contracts would be based on criteria such as previous season\u2019s performance, rankings within events, and number of meets the individual is willing to commit to. <\/p>\n
Once the contracts have been established the athlete\u2019s and agents are done. Now the most important phase begins \u2013 setting up the competition schedule for the season. The league should have a Competition Committee whose function would be to take the athletes that are under contract and based on the number of meets, and events they have agreed to compete in assign each athlete to a set of meets for the season. <\/p>\n
Not an easy job I know. Usain Bolt, for example may want to compete in three 100 meter races and two 200 meter races \u2013 based on talks held during contract negotiations. Conversely, Tyson Gay may want to compete in one 400, two 100\u2019s and two 200\u2019s. The job of the Competition Committee will be to see that both athletes run head to head, while also sharing time on the track with the likes of Nesta Carter, Wallace Spearmon, Yohan Blake and Walter Dix. Athletes\/agents could make some stipulations during contract talks, such as they don\u2019t want to meet a rival within X days of the start of the season, right after Nationals, amount of recovery time between meets, etc. From that the Competition Committee would be charged with ensuring that all events (in this case the sprints) within the Diamond League have an adequate number of top level athletes competing, as well as a fair number of head to head matchups among not just numbers that engage let\u2019s say the top half dozen or so athletes in each event. A daunting task I know, but one that I believe is doable. <\/p>\n
The idea here being not to end up with a circuit that becomes a series of \u201cTime Trials\u201d each meet with a major competitor lining up against a group of up and comers. But that each meet provides a series of challenging competitions to the fans. Because these athletes will be paid to compete and to fulfill contracts that require some serious competition outside of the year\u2019s major championship. After all, the public is paying to see just that, and just like other sports track and field needs to deliver it\u2019s best every meet. I can already feel the excitement of fans waiting for the unveiling of the Diamond League season. Fans waiting with baited breath to see against whom and when their favorite athletes are going to be lining up during the season. Knowing that Gay & Bolt, Robles & Oliver, Kaki & Rudisha, Felix & Campbell Brown, et al have to go through each other on their way to the next championship! Now that makes for an exciting season, not just an exciting championship.<\/p>\n
I know this is radical thinking. I can already hear that Bolt\u2019s agent or Gay\u2019s agent or whoever\u2019s agent isn\u2019t going to want to give up that kind of control. That the athletes and agents and coaches want to determine their own destiny. But if the sport is to grow, it is only going to happen by getting the athletes to compete against one another. And truth be known, it\u2019s only been in the last decade that we\u2019ve had such difficulty getting athletes to compete head to head. Maurice Greene, Ato Boldon, Tim Montgomery, Frank Fredericks and Bruny Surin competed against each other in various configurations quite often \u2013 in the late 90\u2019s and leading into the oughts. Ditto Merlene Ottey, Gail Devers, Gwen Torrence, Irina Privalova and Inger Miller in the mid to late 90\u2019s. And Allen Johnson, Liu Xiang, Ladje Doucoure, Terrence Trammell and Anier Garcia in the early oughts. Oh, and neither the Olympics or Worlds lost any stature.<\/p>\n
Besides most professional sports have no control over how the competitive season gets laid out. Scheduling committees are common place. And low and behold those sports are all thriving \u2013 primarily because they put a great product on the floor\/field every time patrons go through the turnstiles. And that is my aim \u2013 for track and field to put a great product on the track every time out. Because right now we are closer to putting the Harlem Globetrotters out to play the Washington Generals each meet than we are to putting out Kobe v Rose or Lebron v Carmelo. And it seems that the only way to effectively move in that direction is to go from being a bunch of individual meets and individual competitors to becoming more like a collective operation. And I believe that the Diamond League could be used to begin that process. <\/p>\n
I know I\u2019m whistling in the wind \u2013 nobody\u2019s listening or hears. Some people may even be questioning if I\u2019ve lost my mind. But something has to change. The direction we\u2019re going as a sport is NOT a good one. We\u2019re running races down the middle of the street because we can\u2019t get people to the stadium! When Jesse Owens ran against horses it was out of desperation \u2013 and I feel the same way about street races, begging football players to run 40 yards at a meet, and long jumping in a sand box. Kobe and Lebron don\u2019t have to play at Rucker\u2019s Park and Tyson Gay and Usain Bolt shouldn\u2019t have to run down the middle of the street. They just need to run against each other in a stadium and EVERYONE will come and watch! So if we\u2019re going to make radical changes \u2013 like racing in the street \u2013 why not make a few that will do more than create novelty. Let\u2019s get back to basics by creating competition \u2013 the one true staple of the sport!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Once again we\u2019ve started the Diamond League without a matchup of any of the true stars of the sport. Doha produced many of the world\u2019s top marks \u2013 but that is to be expected when you begin to get the world\u2019s truly elite athletes on the track. We will see wholesale revisions of the yearly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa3DCY-7L","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=481"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}