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Don’t Shrink Doubles—Teach Fans Why It Is Fun
Don’t Shrink Doubles—Teach Fans Why It Is Fun
Professional tennis has an unusual business problem.
It has more international athletes, personalities, rivalries and weekly competition than almost any other sport.
Yet most of its marketing remains concentrated around a small group of singles stars.
When those stars retire, withdraw or lose early, tennis behaves as if it has suddenly run out of stories.
It has not run out of stories.
It has failed to introduce them.
That failure is especially visible in doubles—and it is now being used to justify proposals that could reduce doubles draws, prize money and professional opportunities.
Doubles does not have an entertainment problem. It has a recognition problem.
Are tennis draws becoming smaller?
The main US Open singles draws remain at 128 players for both men and women.
Every player who reaches the 2026 US Open singles main draw is guaranteed at least $140,000.
The current concern is primarily about doubles.
Proposals discussed within the ATP would reportedly reduce Masters 1000 doubles draws to 16 teams and draws at smaller tournaments to as few as eight teams.
Doubles’ share of tournament prize money could also fall from approximately 20% to 10%, with more money potentially redirected toward singles. The ATP says it is reviewing draw sizes, compensation and the long-term sustainability of doubles.
An eight-team draw is not a healthy professional competition.
It is a small showcase.
Fewer teams mean:
- Fewer jobs
- Fewer ranking opportunities
- Less prize money
- Less geographic diversity
- Greater dependence on wildcards
- Fewer opportunities to develop lasting partnerships
- A weaker pathway into coaching, broadcasting and tennis leadership
Doubles players train, travel and absorb the same financial risks as singles players.
Shrinking their profession because it has not been marketed effectively would punish the players for an institutional failure.
The mixed-doubles experiment
The US Open demonstrated the commercial temptation when it redesigned its mixed-doubles championship.
The field was reduced from 32 teams to 16. Entry was primarily based on combined singles rankings, matches used abbreviated scoring, and the competition was moved ahead of the singles tournament with a $1 million first prize.
The objective was clear:
Bring major singles names into mixed doubles, create recognizable partnerships and package the event into a compact television window.
Commercially, that makes sense.
Carlos Alcaraz playing mixed doubles will attract more immediate attention than two doubles specialists unknown to casual fans.
But the reigning champions, Sara Errani and Andrea Vavassori, argued that the changes transformed a legitimate championship into a “pseudo-exhibition” and disrespected the doubles profession.
They had a point.
Tennis should not have to choose between legitimacy and entertainment.
It should learn to package legitimate competition entertainingly.
Doubles contains what modern audiences want
Doubles is fast, tactical, social and relatively easy to understand.
It contains almost everything sports marketers claim younger audiences want:
- Shorter points
- Quicker momentum changes
- Visible teamwork
- Personal interaction
- Frequent pressure points
- Fast reactions
- Net play
- Clear tactical adjustments
- Compact match duration
It is also the version of tennis most recreational adults play.
That should make professional doubles a bridge between tour tennis and club tennis.
Recreational players can watch a doubles match and immediately recognize situations from their own games:
- Who covers the middle?
- When should the returner lob?
- When should the server’s partner poach?
- Who takes the overhead?
- Where should the net player stand?
- How do partners recover after a mistake?
Singles can inspire fans.
Doubles can educate and entertain them at the same time.
The real problem is presentation
Professional doubles matches are often given uncertain starting times and placed on outside courts.
Broadcasters provide limited backstory. Partnerships change without explanation. Players receive minimal individual promotion. Fans are rarely shown the team’s tactical identity.
Then tournaments see modest television numbers and conclude that audiences do not want doubles.
But audiences cannot follow stories they have never been introduced to.
Doubles has not failed to create entertainment. Tennis has failed to create recognition around its entertainers.
When famous singles players enter doubles, crowds frequently appear.
That does not prove only singles stars can make doubles successful.
It proves that marketing works.
If fans know the players, understand the partnership and recognize what is at stake, they watch.
The task is to create that familiarity around doubles specialists too.
Let fans hear the strategy
The ATP has already tested one of the most promising ideas: player microphones.
During a trial in Washington, selected doubles teams wore microphones during competition, giving audiences access to tactical discussions and lighter exchanges between partners. The ATP also experimented with shorter changeovers, faster shot clocks and freer spectator movement.
Microphones are particularly valuable because doubles contains something singles cannot:
Conversation during competition.
Fans could hear:
- Where the next serve will go
- Whether the net player plans to poach
- How partners respond after errors
- Which return formation they will use
- How they recognize patterns
- How they manage tension
- How trust changes under pressure
That is compelling sports television.
It is the tennis equivalent of hearing an NBA huddle, an NFL quarterback calling an audible or a Formula One driver speaking with the team.
Naturally, live audio would require sensible protections. Players may not want every private exchange broadcast in real time. Networks could use delayed or selected audio.
But the central idea is strong:
Show viewers the intelligence inside the points.
Give doubles teams identities
Tennis also needs to market doubles partnerships as teams rather than two temporary names sharing a line in the draw.
Each established team should have:
- A recognizable visual identity
- A consistent team name or nickname
- Short personality profiles
- Tactical graphics
- Partnership statistics
- Rivalry histories
- Behind-the-scenes content
- A season-long standings race
Fans should know which teams are aggressive at the net, which rely on serving power and which win through movement, anticipation or defensive returns.
They should understand partnership chemistry:
Who is the emotional leader?
Who settles the team after mistakes?
Who takes the middle ball under pressure?
Who becomes more aggressive on break point?
Those human dynamics are the product.
Lower-ranked players need a sustainable profession
The doubles debate is part of a larger economic problem.
Professional tennis remains heavily weighted toward the top.
A US Open main-draw appearance can transform a player’s financial year. But most professionals spend the rest of the season paying for flights, hotels, coaching, equipment, medical care and taxes while competing far from the revenues generated by the Grand Slams.
The 2026 US Open increased total player compensation to a record $108 million, up from $90 million in 2025 and $75 million in 2024. The singles champions will receive $5.5 million, while first-round singles players earn at least $140,000.
Players are nevertheless seeking a 22% share of Grand Slam revenue by 2030, along with stronger retirement, welfare and year-round support.
The ATP has taken an important step with its Baseline program.
Introduced as a three-year trial, Baseline provides minimum-income guarantees, injury protection and investment for newly established players. It guarantees minimum earnings for eligible Top 250 singles players, with the ATP covering the difference when prize-money earnings fall below the applicable threshold.
That is progress, but the sport should go further.
Five practical reforms
1. Measure financial security after expenses
A player earning $100,000 in gross prize money may still lose money after paying for travel, accommodation, coaching, medical care and taxes.
Income protection should reflect the cost of operating as a professional athlete—not merely the number shown beside a player’s name on a prize-money list.
2. Extend support beyond the Top 250
The difference between No. 240 and No. 310 is often a handful of points, one injury or one unfavorable draw.
Players below No. 250 still contribute to qualifying events, Challengers, national programs and the global competitive system.
The developmental tier must be financially possible if tennis wants international depth.
3. Centralize essential services
The tours can use their scale to negotiate:
- Preferred hotel rates
- Travel credits
- International health insurance
- Shared physiotherapy
- Emergency injury assistance
- Affordable coaching
- Video and performance analytics
Reducing expenses may help lower-ranked players more efficiently than simply adding small amounts of prize money.
4. Turn developmental tours into content
Challenger and WTA 125 events should not function only as ranking-point factories.
They should introduce the next generation.
Every tournament needs usable highlights, interviews, player profiles and social-media packages. Fans should be able to follow an emerging player before the surprise US Open victory—not discover the player afterward.
5. Protect doubles as a profession
Reducing draws may save money for individual tournaments, but it weakens the larger tennis ecosystem.
Doubles creates jobs, develops skills, extends careers and offers another route into coaching, broadcasting and tennis leadership.
It is not a decorative addition to singles.
It is a legitimate form of the sport.
Tennis must market the journey
Tennis does an excellent job marketing champions.
It is less effective at marketing the climb.
Fans usually learn about a lower-ranked player after an upset. Only then do broadcasters explain the qualifying losses, injuries, financial struggles, changing coaches and obscure tournaments that preceded the breakthrough.
But the story existed before the upset.
If tennis documented those journeys throughout the season, early-round matches would carry more meaning.
A player ranked No. 184 would no longer be “an unknown.”
He or she would be someone the audience had watched fighting to reach the main draw for six months.
The sport cannot market only the destination and then wonder why nobody recognizes the people still making the journey.
Formula One expanded its audience by teaching viewers about personalities, rivalries and pressure throughout the field.
Tennis has even more players, countries, tournaments and weekly drama.
It simply needs to connect the stories.
Don’t make tennis smaller
The solution to tennis’s marketing challenges is not to shrink everything around the few names audiences already recognize.
It is to make more players recognizable.
Protect professional doubles.
Support lower-ranked competitors.
Give partnerships identities.
Let audiences hear the tactics.
Tell developmental stories throughout the season.
Create condensed doubles broadcasts for television and social media.
Schedule major doubles matches at predictable times on meaningful courts.
Tennis does not need less doubles.
It needs better doubles marketing.
When a good product struggles, the first response should not be to eliminate half the participants. It should be to explain why the competition is worth watching.
Doubles is fast.
Doubles is tactical.
Doubles is social.
Doubles is fun.
Now tennis needs to sell it that way.