Initiatives for a Professional System in the West

[jts]

If we do set up an American pro system, it does have to stand up on its own and allow players to be professionals based on merit and not about spending a year overseas.

If the content of "American professional" is "Korean funding, Korean training, access to Korean tournaments", then it's perfectly reasonable for the Koreans to insist on some quality control.

[shapenaji]

It's mandatory, they won't allow that player to compete in their tournaments without it.

That would immediately lose a lot of support in my book. They would not be American pros but be American players certified to play in Korean tournaments. I guess more correctly, I would consider them Korean professionals living in the US just as Redmond is a Japanese professional.

If we do set up an American pro system, it does have to stand up on its own and allow players to be professionals based on merit and not about spending a year overseas.

If that's the case, most of the original Korean and Chinese pros were not Korean or Chinese pros at all, but rather Japanese.

And even if you subscribe to that, while the first crop were "Japanese Pros" they enabled the creation of pro systems in their own countries so that the next crop were trained inside their country.

[Josh Hatch]

Here's the thing that bothers me: what's the exit strategy for Vincent after a year? If he makes it to pro, that's great. It's much more likely that he won't. What then?

If this system is set up so that a kid gets a year overseas, then it's a lot like a high school exchange program and any harm can be mitigated. But if the structure has no cutoff point, then we have a real possibility of someone staying longer than they should.

As a community we have a moral responsibility not to endorse a system that takes young kids and throws them away if they don't make it. We don't want a situation where a kid spends his high school years playing go, fails and then has no prospects for a livelihood. It's just as wrong as encouraging a someone to bet his future on making it to the NBA.

Isn't this an issue that players in China, Korea, and Japan already face? They haven't really come up with a solution yet either. If a player doesn't make it, they don't make it. It's unfortunate but I don't know what can really be done about it. If someone wants to put in the effort to try to get strong enough to be a pro at the expense of a regular education it's just a risk they have to take because it's so competitive. How many new pros are there each year and how many people are trying to become pros?

[tapir]

Isn't this an issue that players in China, Korea, and Japan already face? They haven't really come up with a solution yet either. If a player doesn't make it, they don't make it. It's unfortunate but I don't know what can really be done about it. If someone wants to put in the effort to try to get strong enough to be a pro at the expense of a regular education it's just a risk they have to take because it's so competitive. How many new pros are there each year and how many people are trying to become pros?

1) They have a system that can at least support some (hundred) professional players, even if they don't earn much. And some hundred more in Baduk related jobs. (Teaching, publishing, commenting, online servers...).
2) They have age limits.
3) Likely many young koreans do throw away their youth in Baduk schools, when they learn there for a career and fail.

[hailthorn011]

I obviously don't know very much about the politics that would be involved with an idea I thought of last night, but it seemed like an alright one. I was thinking that instead of trying to establish a bunch of disjointed professional Go systems for the west, why don't we just create an umbrella organization that oversees the west?

Basically the idea is, you'd have a much larger pool of players. A larger talent pool. And you'd definitely get more exposure this way. I guess it would be similar to FIFA. I figure it could accept any nation that doesn't have a pro system of its own, but also get support from Asian pro systems.

I can see some flaws to this, but it feels a lot more secure to me. I doubt this idea would get any steam, but I just thought I'd share it and see what people thought of it. You could still have your domestic leagues, but there would also be room to expand to the international scene this way. Just a thought.

[Josh Hatch]

Isn't this an issue that players in China, Korea, and Japan already face? They haven't really come up with a solution yet either. If a player doesn't make it, they don't make it. It's unfortunate but I don't know what can really be done about it. If someone wants to put in the effort to try to get strong enough to be a pro at the expense of a regular education it's just a risk they have to take because it's so competitive. How many new pros are there each year and how many people are trying to become pros?

1) They have a system that can at least support some (hundred) professional players, even if they don't earn much. And some hundred more in Baduk related jobs. (Teaching, publishing, commenting, online servers...).
2) They have age limits.
3) Likely many young koreans do throw away their youth in Baduk schools, when they learn there for a career and fail.

I'm aware of all that. The hundreds that the system does support are still outnumbered by those who try and fail. Of course some of them will have given up less in trying to become a pro but the way it works right now there are still many players that give up the other opportunities they may have to pursue Go. My point was just that the system as it is now doesn't do anything for those who fail to make it so I don't think Westerners would get any kind of special treatment in that regard.

[tapir]

My point was just that the system as it is now doesn't do anything for those who fail to make it so I don't think Westerners would get any kind of special treatment in that regard.

Yeah, but what will the "AGA professional system" provide for those who don't fail but end their insei-year as "AGA professional". The right to compete in korean tournaments makes you somehow equivalent to Hanguk Kiwon professionals, but when you combine this with residence in the U.S., you will need some serious sponsorship just for the damn plane tickets. Do you think there is enough money around to just pay for travel expenses (say they compete in 6 tournaments, 12 flights per person * 20 persons for some minimal size + a coach or so)? You are instantly talking about money in the magnitude of the whole AGA budget.

[gogameguru]

If there really was some sort of world wide go league, there's no reason why some of the preliminaries couldn't be played online. It would save the sponsors some expenses too. However, it could affect TV broadcasting negatively, so it would no doubt be controversial and complicated.

Anyway, if someone did well enough to participate in the finals I'm sure the sponsor could then fly them to Korea. In the future, we may be more concerned about the monetary and environmental costs of air travel anyway, so it's possible other tournaments would go online, even just within Asia.

Just a thought.

[Josh Hatch]

My point was just that the system as it is now doesn't do anything for those who fail to make it so I don't think Westerners would get any kind of special treatment in that regard.

Yeah, but what will the "AGA professional system" provide for those who don't fail but end their insei-year as "AGA professional". The right to compete in korean tournaments makes you somehow equivalent to Hanguk Kiwon professionals, but when you combine this with residence in the U.S., you will need some serious sponsorship just for the damn plane tickets. Do you think there is enough money around to just pay for travel expenses (say they compete in 6 tournaments, 12 flights per person * 20 persons for some minimal size + a coach or so)? You are instantly talking about money in the magnitude of the whole AGA budget.

This isn't something I'd be concerned about. For all intents and purposes at this point anyone that becomes a pro through the proposed system may as well be a Korean pro. If all it does is make them eligible to play in Korean pro tournaments then they're AGA pros in name only. It would make more sense for them to stay in Korea than to fly back and forth every month or two both because of travel expenses and because of the ability to study with other pros while they're there.

Until there is a way to establish leagues or tournaments with enough money to support the players without them having to leave the country, we don't really need to have a pro system of our own. That's not a point that I was ever arguing though.

[tchan001]

It seems to be a chicken first or egg first issue. How to find enough money to support Western pros and how to find enough Western pros who sponsors want to promote. In the American culture of celebrating winners, sponsors opt to give support mainly to charismatic individuals who dominate their sport so that by association, their winning appeal is associated with the sponsors' products which are geared towards those who follow these sports. Unfortunately, currently in the West, there is neither the vast crowd who enjoy the game (in terms of percentage of population) nor the home grown heroes who can stir up this crowd.

There are viewpoints that looking at how the Japanese supported Chinese and Korean pros in the beginning of their pro system establishment may be the key for replication in the West, but let's not forget that weiqi and baduk have been played in China and Korea respectively for centuries prior to the Japanese pros support. Go is one of the four virtuous arts of Asia, the other being music, calligraphy and painting. Many people in Asian cultures know and respect this game even if they don't play it.

What the West needs is probably celebrities from other fields who show their fans that they enjoy playing go. Just as the hit manga, Hiraku no go, revived the interest in the game amongst the Japanese youth when it first came out. In my opinion, it will require sponsors to see that this game is really an important part of their marketing campaign for a professional system in the West to really take off. And this will not happen if the population of go enthusiasts is too small and the prospective pros too weak to be celebrated as heroes.

[EdLee]

Go is one of the four virtuous arts of Asia...
Many people in Asian cultures know and respect this game even if they don't play it.

This.

Here are typical reactions to the statement, "I am a Go pro." --

in China: Oh. You must be pretty smart.
in Japan: Wow!
in the US: *Blank stare*

Go is culture in Asia, not unlike classical music or ballet in the West.
(So it's interesting to compare Go with the NFL, just like it is to
compare chess with the NFL, with TV fees the order of US $20 Billion:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NFL_on_television )

If a child in the US wants to pursue classical music or ballet as a career,
she and her parents would have to go through some decision process.
If a child in Asia wants to pursue Go as a career, it's similar.
The location of the school (which country to study music/ballet/Go)
is naturally part of this decision process.

Recently I heard this story: when Sakata Eio (more knowledgeable people please
correct me if it was another person) was a child studying at a Go school,
his father once asked the teacher whether he was good enough to make pro.
The teacher replied, "I'm teaching him this very nice art.
If you want to continue, do it; if not, don't! Don't ask me stupid questions."

Of course, this teacher's reaction may be unusual (but so was Sakata!);
another teacher might have given his honest opinion of the prospects.
And of course, given the financial investment and especially in these
economic times, it's a big decision to make.

But the teacher still had a point. Even if a child spends a few years
as an insei in Japan, or at a Go school in China or Korea, and does not make pro
for whatever reasons, those few years are not wasted.
There's (tremendous) value in the whole experience.

[RobertT]

Why would western players currently not being strong enough to compete vs. Asian professionals ever be a reason not to start a professional organization? In the beginning of all organizations few to none of the professionals could compete with the organization they emulated and many still can’t. You wouldn’t say the U.S. shouldn’t have a professional soccer organization just because they can’t compete with Spain or Italy, would you?

Also, I believe creating a professional organization would be a huge boost to the player base in the U.S. especially in the youth. Currently most western Go players view Go as only a hobby. This is because there is virtually no future in the game. There are very few western pros and the bar is set so high that it is almost impossible for a western player to have the means or incentive to train to get to the level required to compete on the international scene. If there was a western pro organization it would provide a realistic goal for young players to shoot for. All too common I hear of young players that rise rapidly through the ranks with a dream of being pro until they finally find out how impossible it currently is to become a pro Go player in the west and lose all hope in their dream.

[tchan001]

Why would western players currently not being strong enough to compete vs. Asian professionals ever be a reason not to start a professional organization?

It's really not a matter of whether you should or should not start a professional organization even if western players currently are not strong enough to compete vs. Asian professionals. The problem is mainly how to convince enough sponsors to justify starting up a Western professional organization. If you are in a position to donate millions of dollars annually towards this goal, by all mean, please do start up such an organization as you see fit.

[RobertT]

Tchan, sorry my comment wasn’t really directed at the current financing part of the discussion. I was solely commenting on the rational of previous comments stating that a professional organization shouldn’t be started until the members have the ability to compete on even footing with other professional organizations.

I firmly believe that making the jump from Go being only a hobby to being an actual career choice by starting a pro Go organization will have a huge psychological impact on the way Go is viewed in the west. This will in turn help boost the number of players and the overall strength of players in ways just teaching more players the game or funding school programs can ever compete with. To me there is no question of if we should start it but how to fund it. That question I will leave to those more qualified.

[HermanHiddema]

Tchan, sorry my comment wasn’t really directed at the current financing part of the discussion. I was solely commenting on the rational of previous comments stating that a professional organization shouldn’t be started until the members have the ability to compete on even footing with other professional organizations.

I've reread the thread, but I've found no posts arguing that.

I firmly believe that making the jump from Go being only a hobby to being an actual career choice by starting a pro Go organization will have a huge psychological impact on the way Go is viewed in the west. This will in turn help boost the number of players and the overall strength of players in ways just teaching more players the game or funding school programs can ever compete with. To me there is no question of if we should start it but how to fund it. That question I will leave to those more qualified.

Really? You truly believe that if the AGA diverted the money it spends on promotion and teaching and uses it to pay a few strong players and call them professionals that that will work better? Because to me, that sounds like a really terrible idea.