All The Angles Padel Business Podcast S2 E2 Focus on Player Associations

Episode 2 of Season 2 focuses on the role and future of player associations in the rapidly developing world of professional padel world.

So much is changing and evolving for players: the young Premier Padel tour, other tours and circuits in the calendar, exhibitions around the world, prize money, appearance fees, sponsorship obligations, IP-based projects and opportunities etc.

Carlos Gonzalez is the Head of Strategy and Business at the Professional Padel Association (the men's player collective). In the back end of 2024, they made a few announcements that ruffled some feathers, so it made sense to try to understand their objectives, short term and long term.

Joining Carlos on this episode is Jonas Baer-Hoffmann, who protected European basketball players, then went on to lead FIFPro, the global association for professional football players, and now works for OneTeam, the commercial arm of some of the most powerful player unions in North America.

The endemic and non-endemic experts meet on this episode to explore the vital role of player associations, and to look into the future for padel players worldwide.

Transcript

Introduction

Alex 0:05

Ladies and gentlemen, damas y caballeros, thank you for joining us for another episode of All The Angles, the Business of padel podcast worldwide, powered by the Hexagon Cup. This week, our objective is to give you, our audience, a unique insight into the launch of the padel Player Associations in padel. And explore the future possibilities for them. We're fortunate to have two individuals very well versed in this area. First of all, the person currently running from the executive point of view, the padel association for the men's side, Carlos Alonso Gonzalez. He spent a decade as a CIO. He spent more than a decade after that as a CEO. And he's a board member of numerous companies. Before now leading up the PPA alongside Alex Ruiz. Joining him is Jonas Baer-Hoffmann. He has spent almost 20 years in player representation, 11 of those at FIFPro of which four of those he was general secretary leading effectively the organization. He's now the special advisor to MLB baseball player association, and is also the SVP global business affairs and the head of one team international. We'll get into what that means further down the conversation. Before we get started, if you enjoy this episode or have benefited from previous ones Please like share subscribe. It really does help. So without further ado let's go back in time a little bit, Carlos. So the PPA and the IPPA, which is the men's and the women's player associations, respectively, they've been launched fairly recently. What were the circumstances or the tipping points that really led the players to feeling that this development was really necessary in the first place?

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 1:50

Well, first of all, nice to be with you both. Thank you for this opportunity to explain where we are. According with your first question, the real thing is, almost three years ago, there was not any association about padel really in place because that was created in the context of creation of the Premier padel. In the process of the change between World padel Tour and Premier padel. Obviously before that, the groups have been working together And in a small organization being or reviewing things together, maybe supporting decisions, but not really as association. Association was created on the change of World padel Tour to Premier padel. That's the real truth. And in fact, it's a specific solution or a specific way to solve the contract between the tour and the players. That was the real moment of the creation of the association for both: for men's and women's

Alex 2:51

And so it was felt, I think, at the time that as the, correct me if I'm wrong, that as the premier padel was trying to establish a kind of credibility and a multi stakeholder offering, it felt that it was important that it aligned itself with both the international federation, FIP, And also obviously the two players associations who really show that everyone was behind this new project. Is that fair to say?

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 3:16

Right. That was seen more or less in the same moment. And what it was the beginning of Premier padel and, uh, International padel Federation. That's right.

Alex 3:27

and before we get to your start? In those last two or three years, how did the ppa develop As premier padel found its feet?

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 3:37

In fact, that was the way the association was living in the beginning. Everything was around Premier padel and, International padel Federation. That was the scope, the scenario where the association was working just in making focus on that, making focus in the relationship with Premier padel and with the International padel Federation. That was the beginning of the association and that's what the focus and the only scope for work.

Alex 4:06

I think it's fair to say carlos you've come on board in an executive role in the last Three or four months, um, since pretty much the summer. And it's not been quiet since then. There was the change of leadership, which came not just with yourself, leading the executive, but also Alex Ruiz coming in as the president. And I guess my question to you is what precipitated, what created those changes? What was the reasoning behind those changes? And I think that kind of brings us to where we've seen recently the increased press interest and press activity around the PPA. First of all, there was obviously the announcement about representing all players. So premier padel as well as A1 padel players, as well as I'm sure any other players. And of course, during the Dubai tournament, we saw the announcements related to the heat concerns that were making life uncomfortable for some of the players. And the PPA again, came out with a statement in order to support the players. And there was a bit of back and forth. The PPA made a statement. Premier padel made a counter statement. The PPA made a counter statement to the counter statement. So in a situation where the PPA before Alex Ruiz and your involvement was fairly quiet, the last few months have been a lot more vocal. Can you talk us through why that change happened? And what does this mean for the PPA and for pro padel?

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 5:34

As we have been discussing before, in the first two years and a half before, the only focus in the PPA, it was to manage the relationship with Premier padel specifically, and in regarding with Premier padel with the International padel Federation. And that was the moment when the new board, leading for, Alex Ruiz. And you are right, that was in last June. And after that, the current management team, come in with me and other ones who is Jose Luis Lopez in the sport management. that was the moment when the PPA decided to change the strategy about which objectives we could have on place from this day. And in fact, that's supposed to have in place a Totally new roadmap, totally new scope, totally new objectives about the association. And mainly that's supposed, I think, two important things. One of these is to represent all the professional players around the world, independently where they are playing. That is not, uh, issue. And the important thing is to have the players in the right position regarding the professional padel market. We need to be on the position to be a part of the main decisions about the market of professional padel and to be the main part of the decisions about the professional padel development globally. That is the main objective that we already have today. The according with the new board and obviously supported with all the players at the end are selecting the new board. That is a chain of trust at the end, okay? And that is the challenge where we are working today about how we could join all the professional padel players around the world. And, how we could achieve to be these players taking decisions in the main factors about the professional padel market. That is the new strategy.

Alex 7:39

And just before we add Jonas into the conversation, was this kind of decision to really move into a different phase of objectives and priority and activity? Was that something that the players were calling for and asking for and eager to initiate? Or was this something where players were being more passive and were being said, listen, you are aware that you could be doing this, or you are aware that you should be involved in that. And they were like, Oh, wow. Okay. Fair enough. Who's really sparking the ideas?

Organising & Educating Players

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 8:10

Yeah, I think mainly that is something natural. That is the natural position of the players in every sports around the world. I think if you consider which one is the main factor in any sports around the world-must be the players. We believe that is something natural. Not something simple. Other thing, is maybe, when the players are not organized, are not with the right structures, or with the right teams leading the players, that maybe not happen. But it's not because that is not natural, it's because they are not organised. That is the key factor. And today we are organized. We already have the structures. We already have the people supporting all the objectives that we already have in place. I think that is the only change. And my opinion, that is the history of all the sports. In all the history. It is the moment when the players are organized and in a right way to be, together, and following the targets together. And that is a moment for the padel.

Alex 9:15

JOnas that's,, I think there was a time not too long ago where there were sports and player groups where players weren't really that familiar exactly with what they could do, what they could strive for, how they could do this, what was the process. Now, when we live in a world, which is so connected, social media savvy, all the players can see what other players are doing. The tennis players can see what the ice hockey players are doing. The padel players can see what the basketball players are doing. It's so much easier to join the dots. But when you started working 20 years ago, I'm assuming it was a little bit more of an educational process, or is it actually still pretty much a lot of education going on?

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 9:52

I think Carlos used the key word here. It's all about organizing. It's a continuous journey of conversation with the players as a collective. And a lot of that is education. A lot of that is building a collective understanding of what influence, the players a group of people that is quite central to what happens on the court ultimately can actually achieve. And to build unity around it, right? Like, those are the fundamentals of organizing any group of athletes and quite frankly, any group of people behind a common cause, whether that's workers in a trade union, where that is people who want to, I don't know, affect change in politics. That's what it comes down to. But you're right. Like those journeys have started in different sports for various reasons and at different times, right? The U S player associations really started becoming powerful in the late sixties and seventies of The last century. At about the same time, some of the football players associations in Europe became influential. And you then see a journey where actually in sports or in competitions, which have maybe a shorter history, athletes are leapfrogging some of those developments, right? It's almost like they're cutting out the landline, right? They don't go from sending letters to using phones To the internet. They just jump ahead and go straight to cellular essentially. That's what you see in women's sports a lot, right? They're really, really advancing past what sometimes the men have been able to do in a similar time. And I think you see it in sports like padel, which are, I guess, not the traditional team sport context. Cause a lot of player associations are strong in team sport context, right? It's a little bit easier to organize by nature of the team aspect gives you a bit of a collective sense. Individual athletes are oftentimes, well, they're in competition, right? Like their careers stand and fall with the success that they have against each other. So organizing them has always been more difficult. But a sport like padel, which has such a really, like the hockey stick, is pretty sharply going up. pretty sharply going up right? There is so much potential that really came out of... For those who haven't followed it closely, and I wouldn't say that I have been for very long, but it really happened fast. And I think that sometimes, as you correctly point out: in a day and age where they see what other athletes are able to affect, in a way where they see what commercially other athletes are able to generate out of their careers. If you then all of a sudden see that, wait a second, we're going from playing in front of 200 people to playing in front of 10, 000 people, I think it just raises, the urgency maybe a little bit faster than it was the case. And that's a great opportunity to just become powerful, become influential, help the sport grow sustainably, maybe faster than other sports have.

The Challenges of Unification in Padel

Alex 12:32

And you mentioned the word unity.As you u said, in the team context, you've got that collective mindset already instilled from the very DNA of the game. And so it becomes a lot easier to say, listen, of course we have to look after the guy, 10 rungs, five rungs, three rungs down the pyramid. In an individual sport like tennis or golf, it might be a bit more trickier. My sense, and Carlos, obviously feel free to interrupt me if you're wrong. I think padel is somewhere in the middle because first of all, it isn't a single game, right? It's a doubles game by definition. So you do have not the full collective of a five man squad, 11 man squad, 20 man squad, but you're a little bit further away from that single, singular mentality that you talked about, Jonas. And also actually I think the other advantage is the fact that so many of the players are from actually very few markets. So you don't have players who are competing in the top 100, top 200, who are from, 80 different countries. They're probably, the vast majority of them, probably from two or three countries. And they all train together. It's a much smaller community, even if the sport is growing at incredible rate. And so Carlos, I guess you have a slightly, it's not. easy, but a slightly easier, ability to bring people together. So I guess my question that I'm leading to is. How have you found that unification process? Have you found it to be more challenging than you expected or easier than you expected because of the elements that make up the pro padel scene?

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 13:57

I'm making maybe a summary that you are both saying. I think padel is new and that could be a handicap, a concern, and at the same time could be an advantage, depending for what. Okay. I think For explaining all the players where we are now, without the right position to take decisions, for example, in general terms around the market of professional padel. I think it's easy to show that, and to have all the people supporting the change, because at the end it's something simple and, very easy to identify. Uh, this first step. it's Something easy and it's going well. I think everything is thinking on the same page: that we need to have with a right position on the decisions. Okay. Now, obviously other thing. No easier like this, could be: how we need to make the transition. Because obviously We don't want to have another crisis on place for sure. I think the crisis is not good for nothing but at the same time we need to have the change. And that the reason because we are trying to talk with Everybody, with all the stakeholder, Everybody around the market of padel: saying that, okay, we need to make the change. We need to be on the decisions. The players must be on the decision. The players must be the main part of the decisions. But okay, we agree to have a plan changing things and making the transition. Why not? And that is the point of where we are today. Obviously, the first step is not easy to have all the stakeholders understanding or supporting the change. That is something normal. But for sure, we are going to keep on looking for the change. At the end, because it's our obligation, our objective, our responsibility. We are on that. And obviously this process is not going to be easy, but we consider it's going to be possible for sure.

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 16:02

I think Carlos, what you're talking about is: there's sometimes this feeling that when the athletes are starting to organize and to demand a voice and to maybe bring their ideas forward, which may actually legitimately make the sport and the product better, um, they're getting blamed for the disruption, right? And that that's a threat to how things should be run and how things should develop. But the resistance of the institutions and I don't say that that's necessarily the case in padel; you guys know that better than I do, but obviously I've seen this happen in many countries and many different sports, it's a resistance from the institutions that caused the crisis, right? Because if you don't listen to somebody who has a legitimate claim and you keep denying them a voice and you keep denying them participation, well, ultimately you forced them to do something a little bit more radical to be heard. However, if you have modern, progressive, inclusive governance. Which actually says, well, you know what? The players are pretty central part to all of this succeeding and all of this growing sustainably. Let's bring them in. Let's make them a partner in this. Let's frankly have the athletes co own their sport and their industry. Well, you're not forced to do anything radical. You're going to remain united. Um, you can be a massive asset because you can steer a conversation amongst the playing group, which also educates them about why maybe certain decisions are taking the way that they are and what the long term objectives are and all of these things. And in almost all the sports where the athletes are genuinely and equally participating in how their leagues are developing, those leagues do better, right? Those leagues are more resilient against disruption by other competitors. Those leagues usually commercially fare better, because the athletes are more bought in to promote the product. They're the best ambassadors for any sponsor, for any licensor, for every product that is coming out. And So it's oftentimes, I think what you find in sport, because it is traditionally a quite conservative ecosystem, there's more of a fear of maybe the loss of control rather than embracing the opportunity that comes with it. And. again, if you look at some of the sports leagues in the United States. They had to fight those battles. This doesn't come from today to tomorrow, that they're in the position that they're in. They're the strongest player association in the world. But I think we can all look at them and say that they're economically quite healthy. Um, they're the biggest leagues that have ever existed, in sports. And Part of that is because the athletes are fairly participating in what is being generated and that they're co governing their sport and that therefore they're commercially contributing at the highest level That's possible. So, I think those are lessons learned, which is sometimes maybe not appreciated enough. but athletes tend to in the end be reasonable. Not every single one of them, but once they get together as a group and they actually discuss things, they tend to be reasonable and they tend to know their sport better than anybody else. So there's a huge benefit of bringing them into decision making rather than trying to keep them out.

Alex 18:59

And one of the accusations that often gets put against associations is that players are selfish; players tend to be less educated than people who have done MBAs and, various degrees and who are running these institutions. They are distracted because they're focusing on performance on court and therefore actually it does a disservice to the sport to have them involved. Let me give this opportunity to really spell out. And I obviously, Jonas, you've already talked a little bit about it in the previous answer. What is the value that player integration, player investment, player voice can add rather than just being kept out of the room.

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 19:42

There's a million ways of looking at that. Everything that you mentioned, I mean, you can always find an argument about why somebody should not be part of a conversation. Like history of humankind has given absurd answers of why certain people should not be part of how the world is being run. I would say athletes understand their sport better than anybody else. They tend to care more about their sport than anybody else. And once they're educated, what I think oftentimes happens and what the most successful player associations are really good at athletes start understanding legacy and that their decisions and their impact is not just for themselves, but for the next generation that comes after. And once you're in the second generation of that thinking, you're reminded of what those before you have done. And the responsibility that you now have to pass it on to the next ones. And that oftentimes means that decision making is maybe more forward looking than executives who need to succeed in this given season, or will have a certain investment period that they need to return certain dollars for. So, I don't think that any of those arguments ultimately hold true. But to your question, more precisely, I mean, it really depends on which angle you're looking at it. I think commercially, institutions have a, harder time than ever to create genuine long term connection and I think a sport like padel, which. I think by its very nature will become more and, more global. Institutions are very foreign to people, right? But people can become attached to people because they understand who they are. So the growth of sport, the marketing of sport, works through individuals. So athletes being bought into this obviously makes this more successful. From a governance perspective. Well, one, there is legal protection, Right? If you can do things by agreement, you'll have certain protection that they're legally defednable, that they will hold in the case of challenge and any well run deomcratic system wants to ensure that the key contributors to that system, whether that's citizens or in this case, athletes or another case, workers, are bought into the grand strategy. And in this case, grand strategy might mean, how do we structure competitions over the next 5 to 10 years and why do maybe athletes have to also accept certain elements that on first sight are not exactly what they want to do, but they understand where this is going. Now, if you just tell them that, and you sort of expect them to blindly follow, you're going to face resistance. That's human nature. However, if you bring them in, you add what they think is best for the development of the sport, you find a compromise, you move from there. People are going to be more committed. So those plans will ultimately be more effective. A lot of this is not so different from management or effective governance in a political context. It's just applied in this very specific context, but multitude of layers, a multitude of layers from legal to commercial, to really just governance of the sport, management of the sport, where, on all of those verticals, you've got examples after examples after examples of where sports succeed, where sports fail based on how this is being appreciated. Look into the press now right? You've got the most advanced global sport in football. People are suing each other, left, right, and center. Agents, are suing FIFA; players and leagues are suing over the calendar. Others are suing over the transfer system, et cetera. All of that is an expression of a lack of. inclusive governance. And what does it mean? It puts the system at massive risk of disruption that is not always healthy and that creates friction. And obviously sometimes people will have negative consequences of that. That is what you're preventing if you've got people at the table who share in the responsibility to run the sport effectively.

Alex 23:20

Let's move on to collaboration. So my question to you Carlos, is at the moment, the PPA and the IPPA are separate entities with separate player boards and separate executive teams. How much do the two entities collaborate and align?

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 23:37

Yes, I think that is a common factor in the sports, uh, to have a association for men's and women's. And I suppose that is because at the end of the day, if you are thinking on a professional sport, and that is the key factor, because if we have been only talking about sports, could be sense to be together, but so far it is a professional sport, and that means it's a business at the end. I guess that is the reason, because usually in professional sport, Are always separate. Because are different business at the end, I think. According with that, that's the reason because, in the beginning, both was created separate. and, obviously we are working together. We are working connected for sure. Why not sharing targets. But at the end of the day, we need to be separate because today, we are working together around premier padel. That is the real thing today. But probably in the new future, we are going to work together, or separate, depending the cases. That is the regular terms of the markets. And that is happening, I don't know, in all sports. sometimes are working and playing together, and other ones, separate. I think, I'm taking in account the average of the sports. I think that is the healthy way, to have working together or sometimes working separate, but always connected, I think and sharing some of the duties.

Alex 25:08

And Carlos, to build on that question, how much does the PPA work with other player associations in other sports? Are those relationships and information sharing agreements, are those in place? Are they being developed? What's the stance of the PPA on speaking to and learning from other associations?

carlos-alonso_1_11-08-2024_160343 25:30

Thinking on the connection or to be together doing things? Unfortunately, until today, no so much. That is the real truth. But if we are talking about if we are using reference, for example, obviously we are using reference of ATP or PGA or a sport that maybe could be a reference for us. By the way, we want not to be a new ATP. But for sure we can use some. pieces of ATP when apply, and to use this reference. That is the work that we are doing. But as Jonas was doing before, I think. At the end of the day, it seems like there are so many connections or so many common scenarios in different sports about the players, about the calendars, about the, I don't know, business model, about many things that obviously independently the sports you could apply common solutions for all the sports. I think it's a pain because we could work more together. Between different sport, looking for good solutions for each sport, but sharing or applying same solutions. That is my feeling.

Alex 26:46

And Jonas in your experience, how important are those conversations, relationships, information sharing relationships and collaborations, alignments between different player associations in different sports? Where does that really come alive?

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 27:03

Given what I've done the last 20 years, it's probably a rhetorical question. I first got involved with this when a very small player association for basketball players was set up in Germany. Really as a, I always call it as like a garage startup. No real resourcing, just bootstrapping, along the way. And from there, we pretty quickly got involved with establishing a European umbrella organization of player associations and essentially everybody but football, because football through FIFA had already an existing structure. Next step was building a global umbrella organization called the World Players Association, where today, virtually All the player associations are coming together and where younger organizations, like in padel, but also the oldest organization, like some of the football or North American PAs who are around for 60, 70, 80 years are coming together and sharing best practices and adding leverage to what each other needs to find. And look, I think the crux of it always is that it's a bit of a lonely job, right? Because if you're running a player association, you are obviously a particular stakeholder, an ecosystem that's not always, it can't always be aligned with the quote unquote establishment, right? You have to sometimes be the opposition. You have to bargain, with the employers or competition organiser. And that sometimes can get a bit frosty. Having a network of people around the world who one, understand exactly what you're doing, but also two, when you get together, the reality is usually somebody in a room has faced what you're currently struggling with or trying to overcome at some point on their journey of their player association. So it obviously just helps to not have to reinvent the wheel all the time, but being able to rely on each other and figuring out how other people approach certain things. And in my opinion, it's the surface on which you can build new opportunities. And that's obviously what we're trying to do in the commercial space right now with one team international, but also in other areas, right? Like player development programs, the education piece of what comes after your sporting careers. A lot of those programs People are learning from each other. They're exchanging, they're building the right infrastructures with each other to set those up. So, yeah, I'm a big believer in it. I also just ultimately, as we said, these organizations that build on the solidarity and the unity of the athletes, and then the same should obviously apply to these organizations amongst each other, right? To work together and to be united and to help each other to be strong. And that's the base on which we've created these bodies and I think they've added tremendous value to all the player associations across the different sports.

What Support does the PPA need?

Alex 29:40

Carlos, let's talk about the future. Can you spell out the targets or the objectives for the coming years for the PPA? And I guess where I want to end up is, and this maybe sounds like a weird question, but from the PPA's point of view, what does the perfect pro padel ecosystem look like? So you envision a world in which there needs to be a coordinating entity that looks at formats, calendars, timings, locations, creates a strategic flow and system to what is being offered to the players, as well as to the fans. And it's important to you, obviously, fundamentally, that the players associations are a pivotal piece of that entity and the decision making of that entity. Is that a fair summary? And sitting where you sit today, Carlos, what do you think the PPA needs? What more do you need in terms from the players, from investors, from partners, from the other stakeholders? Because obviously this podcast goes out to a lot of people who are in the business of padel And some of them might be thinking what can I do to support the ppa and their objectives? What are the obvious things that you are looking for to help you in your mission?

Innovation Across the Professional Ecosystem

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 35:25

There's an interesting component in here, right? Because that's where a lot of the sports systems just differ so much, right? If you compare the US system to the European system, in the European system, oftentimes you have, A regulator that sits across a multitude of competitions, but is also themselves a competition organizer, right? That's where calendar clashes oftentimes come from because there's, you know, Clashing interests, which are not actually the players interest in terms of different competitions. It's between different competition organizers. But then these entities are regulators of that same market. In the North American system, these leagues are sort of cut off from the rest of the ecosystem, right? Both in terms of youth. And international, right? The NBA does not really, I think care too much about how FIBA regulates the rest of global basketball. They've sort of insulated themselves from that. And because they're so big, they can. They're regulators of their own competitions, but the only way that they can do that is through collective bargaining because labor laws basically otherwise would clash what they're doing and also, um, antitrust laws, competition laws would clash with what they're doing unless they had bargaining as a means to basically Justify that those are democratically accepted conditions for both players and clubs slash employers. I think this is an interesting architectural question about what's the right model for padel. Where I would agree a lot with what Carlos said is that in a sport so young that quite frankly, In order to be sustainably successful, needs to tackle more markets needs to drive towards additional audiences, needs to speak to different demographics, age groups, et cetera. Innovation is really important. People need to try different things, right? The current model, the tennis model or another model may not be the right model that ultimately serves the sport the best. And probably locking yourself in too early into one operational structure that's too dominant. Well, if that model works for that structure, they have very little incentive to try something else because that maybe works according to their business plans and to their investors, interest, et cetera. But they themselves would probably benefit if somebody else tried something different. And was almost a guinea pig for how a different structure, a different format may function. And if a sport is not culturally as established as a football is, or a basketball in many parts of Europe, et cetera. And so the competitions themselves don't necessarily have that strong connection to the audiences, trying those different things early, I think is really important. Plus, Events like padel are not just competing with traditional sporting events. They're competing with these streamers sporting events, whether it's, you know, King's league or icon league and all of these competitions, which are, I guess, speaking to similar young audiences about how sports can be consumed in the future. So all I'm saying, I guess, is that in those early years to provide the platform where you have a common regulatory system in which the athletes can rely on certain minimum conditions that they should meet wherever they go. But at the same time allow people on the competition organizer side, which, by the way, might be athletes as well, right? Like, athletes might come together and say, you know what? We've got an interesting construct about how to pull up competitions. Right? Since we're driving the sport anyways. But providing space for that innovation, I think is really critical for it to. To flourish and find the best model where it's unique in the marketplace, where it speaks to different audiences, maybe in a different way than, than the more traditional, more established sports do.

Alex 39:06

Let's spend a minute about the media. So, Carlos is in the middle of this kind of growing, I wouldn't call it a media storm, maybe that's overstating it, but Carlos and the PPA are sticking their neck out around various issues. And it may surprise you Jonas, that not everyone is welcoming their position with open arms.

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 39:27

Shocking.

Alex 39:29

You've been through These trials and tribulations for a long time. How do associations and the players they represent weather those storms, weather that criticism, because it's difficult, you need a bit of a thick skin, right? Sometimes you're positioned as the rich kids who don't really know what they're talking about. You're spoiled. That's the way the media will portray players because players aren't necessarily considered as the downtrodden, underprivileged individuals.

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 39:54

Yeah. Look, a part of this comes with the profession. If you choose to do this work, don't expect to be popular. Aim for being respected. I think that's pretty much where you want to be, but, you're not always going to be popular. You have to say things that are maybe uncomfortable. Let's not kid ourselves. Especially the economic interest of the athletes and the competition organizers are not always aligned the big picture one. Yeah. We want growth. Of course, everybody wants growth, but then how is the cake being made and how is it being divided up? All of those questions. You know, they are competing interests. There's no way around that. That said, what I think is important is one, whatever you say, it needs to be backed up by the players, right? Because that's ultimately who has the power. When I'm in these positions, Carlos in these positions, quite frankly, I mean, we're both sitting here in polo shirts or rugby shirts, but we're just suits right in sort of a colloquial speak. Like it's the players who have all the relevance and all the power. So they need to really stand behind whatever is being communicated. Two: consistency, right? If you start playing political games to favor one side over another side, et cetera, that's going to get sniffed out very quickly and it's going to be detrimental. So keep consistent positions that are strongly embedded in what's the player's interest. And then I think you need to obviously just reach a very strong position that can be backed up in facts and research. And if push comes to shove data, or the law, if that's helpful, whatever you're arguing. So that you can't be called out for it, right? Because it's always very easy to discredit a position based on maybe a lack of information or, trying to establish an argument. That's not maybe so sound. And that's a lot of the work that we did at FIFPR, right? Like developing, what we called basically our IQ platform, which was really a data driven platform to start establishing things. In fact, doing research projects, pulling arguments together, which ultimately weathered the storm of opinion because they're based on facts. That's not something so common in sport actually. Opinions are a lot more common than fact. And I think those are really important pieces because you are, of course, a little bit of a, of a challenging voice, right? That sometimes gets people a little bit annoyed, but as long as you can always go back One, this is what the players want. Two, we've been consistent about it. Three, we're basing this on facts and research and not just opinion. Eventually it'll start cutting through. Now it might take a minute, but I think eventually it'll start cutting through. And then, you know, the players need to be united. That's where we started the conversation. That's what it in the end all comes down to.

Alex 42:32

I wanted to Jonas, talk to you about the one team partners model. So this is a more modern structure where you have the player association as we traditionally understand it, that unites the players more for protection and, standards and things like that. That's the tried and tested decades old model. Now you've seen these associations spin off commercial vehicles in order to really explore aggregated IP opportunities for the benefit of the collective of the players, whether that's one team partners or whether it's winning alliance or there are various commercial vehicles now sitting under these associations. You're obviously very well versed in that development. Sitting in one team partners at the moment. Can you talk a little bit about what's the benefit of that structure? And Do you think padel is in a place to be starting to look at that, or is it too early?

jonas-baer-hoffmann_1_11-08-2024_160343 43:24

So let me give the audience like a couple of paragraphs of context. So player association in the United States, because this is where most of this is emanating from, going back to the seventies, they started to aggregate what we call group player NIL rights, right? So name, image, likeness, image rights, as they're more referred to in Europe. Um, they can be individual and they can be collective, right? So collective usages, Panini sticker albums, computer games, et cetera. And so players going back 50 years have started to put them together under their union where the union basically has the mandate to represent them whenever, let's say a company like a panini or a tops or somebody else wants to use, for example, four or more players in the same product. Definitions always change a little bit. And so. Athletes have started to control those rights through their player associations, both for licensing purposes and for sponsorship purposes. And fast forward, basically about five years ago, the NFL players association and the major league baseball players association created the company called one team partners to basically hypercharged the commercial capabilities that the unions have at their disposal. Today in North America, representing NFLPA MLBPA NWSL, so the Women's Football League, MLS Men's Football League, U. S. Women's National Team in football, the WNBA Players Association, et cetera. And my job now building similar ecosystems for player associations, groups of athletes, um, really around the world, no matter what sport they potentially play. Now, a few obvious advantages of it, you create additional revenue because oftentimes, especially internationally, the licensing business is not done very well and player image rights are not represented very well. Um, so this drives additional revenue to players, but also as the players get more active in this space, oftentimes the other side benefits as well because, you know, you put out a set of trading cards or stickers, usually the brand will want to have the players in their Jersey or with the logo of the competition. So they're buying that IP as well. Second of all, it's just really good for marketing a sport, right? Because once you represent that IP, you're selling that with everything that you have, and you're trying to position the athletes vis a vis brands, vis a vis fans in the most optimal way. And you're really zeroing on the athlete's storytelling and their positioning. And so what it has done for unions on the other side is. The players are oftentimes then dedicating some of those resources that are being earned to fund those unions, which means those unions are financially independent. They have capabilities to really meet the other side of the table where they're at, right? With people who have the right professional qualifications and the means to negotiate and to represent and provide services at the right level. And you get a stake in how your sport is being built because you're part of the economic value creation, not just the, on the field or on the pitch or on the court value creation. Going to your last question there, look, I don't think you can ever be too early for that. Because the earlier you can create an appreciation for how these rights are being structured and how athletes and competition organizers or teams, Can cooperate around creating value, because this is a very cooperative process, right? Like, more than 90 percent of the revenue is being created when both of those entities and that IP works together. and I think the fact that the USPA started establishing this, also for their sport at a very early moment in the commercial growth journey, made it a lot easier than it is maybe today to step something like that up in a league or competition structure that's 50, 60 years old. So I would only encourage padel players to start thinking about how not just their, maybe their labor rights or players rights, but their economic rights can best be protected and obviously then monetized to help themselves. You know, obviously this drives revenue, but also to help the sport grow, right? Like we've spun off of the core business here in licensing. We've spun off content businesses. We've spun off venture plans and programs that we're running. And all of those things ultimately just add value to these sports that they grow faster and the fans have better chances of engaging with the athletes.

Outro

Alex 47:44

Carlos, I want to give the last word to you, we're going to have to wrap up in a minute. Do you feel like padel is ready for this, Because at the moment it feels like you're focusing on protecting player welfare, event standards, calendar, integrity, et cetera. Do you feel like PPA is ready to start thinking about, what's the, commercial and economic rights that we can start exploring on behalf of our padel player members. Okay. Well, gentlemen, thank you very much for that. That about wraps up our episode. Again, please like share and subscribe. If the content was thought provoking, please comment on LinkedIn or Twitter. If you have any recommendations around our format. Topics we should devote an episode to, questions we should ask, speakers we need to bring on. We want you all, those driving the next phase of this industry's future, to tell us what you want to hear about and who from. Thank you, Jonas and Carlos, for joining us today. We will keep doing our best to cover all the angles of the business around padel, episode after episode. Till the next one.