Do Golfers Earn Income the Hardest Way?

In an article praising the recent performance by an older golfer during the British Open tournament, Thomas Friedman considers how unique Tom Watson's performance was. It was a singular achievement because Tom Watson was 59 years and therefore the oldest golfer among the competitors, but also lost in a play-off. Most of the field was comprised of golfers at least two decades younger.

However, the most fascinating part of the article is the way in which he chooses to distinguish golf from many other sports events. one of those is that golfers tend to play as individuals and not in team events and where ability is demonstrable to all. the playing surface for golf is also largely created to be an obstacle unlike for other sports events. But the most unusual one is the fact that playing professional golf requires that one wins in order to earn money. While this is not unique to golf, this is a poignant distinction about how sports prizes are distributed.

The lesson here is that the manner in which sports prizes are organized for team events leave scope for a lot of free riding. i wonder what the pay differential would be like if team players were paid by certain objectively identifiable deliverables. Granted that certain Formula One teams also pay huge salaries, a good number of them also pay for finishing and placing among the points. On the other hand, I think that the pay structure for team sports recognizes that a element of team work is useful and that athletes ought to see their success as a product of joint work.