“You’re out”- Andy Roddick Calls for Total Revamp of US Open Marketing Amid Influencer Row
· Yahoo Sports
It almost feels like the influencer strategy worked too well. The creator program was supposed to get younger audiences talking about tennis, and it succeeded. The problem is that now everyone is talking about the influencers instead of the tennis.
Former world No. 1 and 2003 US Open champion Andy Roddick has no problem with creators helping bring more attention to tennis, but he wants the circus around them cleaned up. “Influencers in the wild is the craziest thing… It’s like a full photo shoot,” Andy said, before drawing the line at ring lights. “Stop the f****** ring lights. Just stop the ring lights… You use your ring light, you get caught, you’re out. Blacklisted.”
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During Naomi Osaka’s first-round match against Anastasia Zakharova, a group of influencers in a suite started filming videos and using bright lights during play. The chair umpire had to step in and tell them to sit down, saying, “Guys, please, in the suite behind me… please take your seat.”
What should have been a routine first-round match quickly became the face of the US Open’s influencer backlash. The filming, portable lights, and photoshoots around live play turned content creation into an actual distraction for the players below.
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The incident quickly became bigger than Osaka. Coco Gauff, Jessica Pegula and Daniil Medvedev also weighed in on the growing influencer presence at the US Open.
Roddick’s strongest comparison, however, came from ESPN’s own experience at the tournament. He explained that even the network covering the US Open had to work around lighting restrictions during live matches.
“True story. So the ESPN Terrace, right, up top. Yesterday we had to go do all of the show from there because the fountain set – there was a lightning warning,” Roddick explained. “But we also can’t turn on the lights to our set at certain times in the match because it’s distracting. So don’t use your ring light. If ESPN can’t use a f****** ring light on the Terrace desk, you can’t use a ring light either.”
That comparison hits because ESPN was hardly anti-content. The network had its own ESPN and Disney photo-booth activation at the US Open, where fans could choose from 16 Disney characters, pose with Arthur Ashe Stadium as the backdrop, and leave with both a printed photo and a digital version specifically designed for social sharing.
The difference was basic etiquette. ESPN could build an entire social-media experience around the tournament, but once live tennis started, even its own broadcast operation had to keep distracting lights off. As Roddick put it, “There’s a time and a place… and that time and place… it’s not when somebody’s serving.”
That leaves little room for excuses. If ESPN, the broadcaster actually responsible for covering the tournament, can work around lighting restrictions during live play, an influencer in a luxury suite certainly does not need a ring light in the middle of a point.
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