The talk is out there--what will become of the Pro Beach Tour post 2024? Will the Volleyball World experiment end after a pretty dismal and financially unviable 3 years? And more importantly, will the FIVB finally relinquish control of all the global competitions and allow the sport to recreate itself and find its own place as a professional sport?
Beach Volleyball is not truly professional for 2 core reasons: (apart from the obvious lack of prize money currently available)
Players are required to play only with someone on the same passport as themselves.
Tournaments have "country quota" limits, severely restricting athletes from playing.
Until these 2 conditions are removed there can be no true professional era in the sport of Beach Volleyball. The basic reason being that a truly professional sport gives the freedom to all athletes to make a living to the best of their ability with no undue interference or limitations from governing bodies or similar. King of the Court have removed these conditions and as such have created one avenue for athletes to play professionally. However there needs to be many more avenues to cater for athletes all over the world to earn a living. While the FIVB have allowed KOTC to establish itself alongside traditional beach volleyball, until they relinquish control of the traditional format we won't see the creation of other possible avenues such as leagues, exhibition tournaments, world series etc. that could all offer athletes new and greater opportunities to earn.
Recently the AVP announced it will create an 8 city league for later in 2024. While we don't know anything yet of what this will look like the idea is new for the sport and one I have been waiting to see tried. In 2022 I wrote down some ideas for a league concept and a continental world series concept that could help fill a calendar in a post World Tour era. Below is the draft calendar I created to show how multiple leagues or series can fit into a global calendar. And below that a further explanation of some of the league and series ideas.
Global Calendar possibilities in a pro era
Beach Volleyball Professionals (BVP) Global Comp (high shoulder season - April - June)
Take the AVP Tour concept and make a European comp, a South American comp and North American comp.
Normal beach volleyball rules
Must play in the conference you are a resident in. (rest of world players can apply for wildcards)
Players can play with any athlete from within their conference. (no country representation)
Wildcard teams can be either mixed countries from the rest of the world or one player from within the conference they will be playing in and one wildcarded player.
Coaching in the box allowed
Regular Season (April-May)
64 team single elimination pro events x 5 events
32 team double elimination gold series x 3 events
Major prize is the Overall Tour Champion (individual athlete points race) - Bonus Prize pool paid out to top 32 athletes per gender per conference
Season wildcards available for best athletes from rest of world (ie aussie women, qatar men)(maybe 2 per season per gender per conference)(athletes receiving this wildcard can not play in any other conference that season)
Event wildcards available at every event for athletes from rest of world. (maybe 2 per gender per event)
Note: all wildcards are individual athlete wildcards not a team wildcard, athletes receiving them must pair with each other or another athlete already resident in that conference. Wildcard applications must state who they plan to play with and wildcards may be given with provisos about who the athlete can play with.
The top teams from each of the 3 competitions progress to the World Series.
World Series (June)
8 team Double Elim or 16 team Single Elim?
Top 2/4 teams per comp plus 2/4 wildcards
Wildcards awarded to teams wildcarded in the regular season with outstanding performances.
European top historical locations by crowd engagement etc
Austria - Klagenfurt
France - Nice/Marseille/Paris
Norway - Stavanger/Kristiansand
Spain - Barcelona/Ibiza/Majorca?
Switzerland - Gstaad
Netherlands - Scheveningen
Germany - Timmendorf/Hamburg/Berlin?
Poland - Stare Jablonski
London