Coaches - Salary $150,000 (can coach NCAA at same time)
Run league different season from NCAA so can attract top coaching talent
Players - $50-60k with a salary cap per team
If players play in league can not go back to NCAA
Refs - paid per game, not full time employees and no union
World Wide Championship Tournament, World Series but really with the world
Allow groups to own teams to attract more “owners.”
Each team should have a women’s team
Run like professional sports teams e.g. contracts, drug testing, set amount of games that does not change unless the owners vote to change, must have a majority.
No new teams unless voted on and approved by owners
They would technically be professional and I don’t know if NCAA allows professional players to continue playing NCAA sports. If they can make money playing in the off season and can return to their college teams, then they should absolutely return to college. I honestly am not sure of the rules.
It wouldn’t need to be that high for a short 2 to 3 month season. If a player can make $30k in 3 months, that is a great salary for a 22 year old. If they are older and trying to make a living on polo alone, they would need to coach or give lessons/camps outside of their playing season to make it work, but it’s possible.
Make it a flat amount per game with incentives for wins maybe?
For a professional league to be successful, you have to retain talent and treat them like professional athletes. Think merch. Who wants to buy merch with an athlete’s number if there is a good chance that athlete won’t be back next season because a 9-5 job pays better? How much the talent is paid sets the precedent for how the sport is valued.
If water polo actually became a professional sport in the US, you don’t want to set a precedent that water polo isn’t as important as: football, baseball, basketball, soccer. You want to pay the athletes and retain them. The season may only be 2-3 months (but if you want to make money off ticket sales you should have a 4-5 month season like other professional sports) but the teams are still training before the season starts. The mentality has to change to a full blown professional league. Who wants to put a non-athletic career on hold for no contracts and to be nickled and dimed by the owners or why not go over seas and play?
A minimum athlete and coach salary is the first step to validity. Paying and appreciating your athletes shows the rest of the non-water polo world that the players are valued and why the sport should be professional
Sending out press releases when big contracts are signed are a good way to create interest in the game. “Who are these guys and why are they considered the best players?”
You tend to get what you pay for. That’ll work if the league is paying enough to get the best referees on the games. It won’t if the officials are where the league chooses to save costs.
So… HS pay is approx $65/game for Varsity
I’m convinced that this is why USAWP fights following the HS pay rates - because the drop in pay for JOs would be too severe - easier to swallow if the drop is $45 to $40 instead of $65 to $40.
yes but usually to ref a hs game, you leave your normal job to ref one varsity and one JV game. If you are doing a tourney for USAWP you ref 4-8 games in a day usually on your day off. Highschool/ CIF has to pay more to get refs on a Tuesday at 315.
ok, you could also argue that people who work 40hr weeks - getting them to work hours 41-55 can’t be at a discount.
Also, oftentimes club is higher level play than HS.
Either way, we’re facing a referee shortage and the Refs are saying it’s not worth the money and the hassle and our leadership’s only response has been to add unpaid responsibilities and hold pay stagnant
He comes from USA Volleyball. Which (my kiddo played club for several years before focusing on water polo) is quite well run in comparison to USA Water Polo, so I’m hopeful.
My 2¢ after 6 years as a water polo dad with a kiddo who is going to play D1 next fall. The focus needs to be parent/athlete centered.
Parents are what makes this happen. We pay the club fees, the tournament fees, we forego vacations to go to ODP & JOs. We drive them to practice and so on. But we are treated mostly as a source of revenue. I have to pay to see my kid play in a tournament that I’ve already paid an entry fee for them to participate? I understand there are costs to host a tournament, but this isn’t professional sports.
I pay $149 for each of my kids to be USA Water polo members. What do I get for that? A four day tournament where the schedule is a fricken spreadsheet? Surely we can have a tournament app that is easy to navigate as a “March Madness” bracket. Why doesn’t USA water polo have an App for tournament directors/officials? They exist for many other sports. Rosters (with photos so officials could conduct check-in) , game locations (linked to open Apple or Google Maps), times, final (or even live) scores. This is entry level coding. Let’s spend some of the $12m USAWP takes in each year on that.
A 1:20 drive (from Stanford) to a pool that only has one side for officials to call the game from, and they have to walk around the two diving boards. Oh yeah, and only for a single game. Who did this?
2. Officiating
I know this is a dead horse, but it’s the Achilles heel in my view. Want to make the sport better? We need better officiating. There is little to no professional development for officials. They are not evaluated in any meaningful way. There is no accountability for poor performance. Basically once they are in, they’re in. There is no consistency. One official’s ordinary is another’s exclusion, or going the other direction a no call. You have officials who clearly never played water polo. You have officials from overseas where the game is called differently (much more physicality allowed - and you see it on the other side in the foreign “ringers” that come to JOs every year, they get excluded and they are looking at the ref dumbfounded)
Their pay is pathetic, and in life you generally get what you pay for. On this topic, why isn’t there educational content for parents to understand the rules? Videos showing an ordinary foul, and exclusion, 5M etc. and accompanying commentary about why the call is warranted. Show it in a staged manner to explain the rule, then show several game clips where the call was made. I feel like would prevent a lot of upset from parents because they would understand why the official made the call a lot more of the time.
Final rant. Why do we have to “pop” the ball to make it live in HS water polo when it is not done that way after HS.
I would also add it would be nice to provide the schedule/pools with more than a week notice. When traveling its a significant burden on families traveling to southern CA not knowing which airport, where to find a hotel, or return flight times when we find out the Monday of tournament week where and when we may be playing.
I may be wrong but I think popping the ball is relevant post HS. They just do it much more subtly. That’s what makes the ball back in play and starts the shot clock, but it does look different.
