The World Surf League was born from a desire to repackage the entire sport of surfing from the top down. Broadcasting a whole new message and a more fan-friendly brand could only create a more viable business. And a solid money making machine at the top of the sport will support a healthier economy and sustainable life within the surf industry. It’s a fairly solid line of logic that got the wheels turning on today’s WSL Elite Tour, and I whole heartedly believe the entire surf community will be better off for it. The new broadcast structure was just one tweak WSL CEO Paul Speaker and company made in order to make surfing more relatable to the masses. But Speaker’s recent visit with FOX’s Stuart Varney was a good indicator that mainstream media is going to need a lot of coaching when it comes to “consuming” surfing.
Now, Speaker showing up to talk shop on Varney & Co. is exactly the kind of publicity we imagined this rebranding process to bring. It’s his opportunity to put the goings on of the surf world into plain english for an audience that more than likely thinks Bethany Hamilton is just a fictional character in Soul Surfer. You know, that Blue Crush sequel, right? And as to be expected, the interview gets off to an awkward start when Varney asks Speaker to clarify whether or not he said the WSL will overtake the NFL – the same NFL with 25 of its 32 teams valued at over $1 billion. The same NFL Speaker used to work for as a marketing executive. Before Speaker can elaborate on his answer and clarify that he’s not that crazy, Varney spaces out, interrupts his guest, and starts asking about the footage of Owen Wright at Fiji that’s showing on the studio monitor. Within a minute Varney is making us all hit the wall when he asks who Kelly Slater is, and if he’s capable of earning $20 million a year.
“Has and will for a very long time,” Speaker says. But according to Forbes’ 2015 list of the 100 highest paid athletes, that’s not true. The NBA’s James Harden ends the entire list with salary and endorsements combining at just under $19 million. In fact, not a single action sports athlete, let alone surfer, is on that list. It suggests surfers as individual brands have quite a ways to go before we sniff that “mainstream” conversation. Speaker goes on to share how the WSL is structured differently from other sports organizations (it’s the only sport that’s primarily broadcast on a digital platform) and how there are some similarities to others (athletes own 10% of the company and have a pension fund, similar to collective bargaining agreements between certain athlete unions and their sport). Then Speaker drops a bomb that raises a lot of questions: 22 million people watched the Rio Pro in Brazil alone. And according to an article in the NY Post, just under 30 million Brazilians tuned in for Fiji. That number passes the amount of American eyeballs glued to the early stages of the the 2014 World Cup, according to Fifa. And if the WSL is truly turning in those kind of broadcast numbers on a streaming webcast, I’d have to imagine the work Paul Speaker and his team have done in a short amount of time must have turned some other heads. Other heads with deep pockets looking to invest in something. But Varney could care less. “Oh look, a bunch of sharks!” he quips, rather than letting the implications of those broadcast numbers spark a real conversation. Then Speaker’s cut off again, and that pretty much does it for this segment, folks. Time for a commercial break. It’s Varney’s clear condescension toward the entire segment that is frustrating. He suggests people will only watch surf broadcasts for the hope of a wipeout. His producers decide to drop in b-roll of swarming sharks while Speaker tries to elaborate on broadcast numbers. Because that’s relevant and isn’t sensationalizing at all.
You see, whether you’re ok with Speaker suggesting double overhead Cloudbreak breaks over two inches of water or not, whether you care to know how much money Kelly does or does not make, even on a mainstream media outlet, surfing is still a novelty. His job is to pump interest into the sport, and sometimes that means dumbing things down so the general public can digest it. The only problem seems to be Average Joe, who in this case is the host of a cable news network show, clearly has no interest unless…oh look, we’ve got a shark!
