MLTT: Ushering in a New Era of American Table Tennis Fans
Unpacking the world of professional table tennis and an upstart league looking to bring the magic of the sport to the US
America’s Olympic Table Tennis Moment
Growing up in a house with four overly competitive brothers, the basement ping-pong table represented much more than just a place to entertain ourselves and our friends.
It was a battleground. It’s where legends were born, fights emerged, tears were shed, victories were celebrated and sometimes, paddles were thrown (you know who you are).
But I never really viewed the basement game as more than, well, a game.
That was until this past summer when I locked into an epic Olympic table tennis match, cheering intensely with my roommates as we watched another American athlete pursue their olympic dreams.
My eyes were glued to the screen as I watched a 24-year-old American table tennis star named Kanak Jha, ranked 125th in the world at the time, close out an incredible upset of Korea’s Cho Daeseong, the 20th-ranked player in the world.
It was awesome….here are some quick highlights from the epic upset.
I’m sorry Jha, “I wasn’t really familiar with your game”.
Like all Olympians, Jha worked incredibly hard to propel himself to the top of his sport.
But Jha’s journey to Paris was particularly pretty nuts. Here are the cliff notes:
Left his home in Milpitas, California at just 15 to chase his table tennis dreams at top-notch training facilities in Sweden and Germany
Quickly qualified for the Rio Olympics in 2016 and despite an early exit, was the youngest member of Team USA
Qualified for the Tokyo games in 2021, and was on track to make the team again in 2024 but in March 2023 was suspended from all competitive play by the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) for 17 months for forgetting to add a +1 extension on his US phone number on a form (not a joke)
Was stripped away from his livelihood and all of his ranking points, and started a GoFundme, which brought in ~ $29,000, to fund his journey to the 2024 games.
Jha not only qualified for the games but he battled his way to the round of 16, marking the furthest any individual American male has reached in the sport’s olympic history.
The guy legitimately bootstrapped his way to American stardom…..now if that’s not a true patriotic sports story, then I’m not sure what is.
Jha’s incredible run generated plenty of media hype along the way But while America was having its first true olympic table tennis moment, they may have been a bit late to the party….
Table Tennis: The World’s Other Game
From the pool to the track, Team USA dominated at the 2024 games, closing out on top with a world-leading 126 total medals and tying China for the top spot with 40 golds.
But with no American ever medalling at the Olympics for table tennis, the country’s historical showings in the sport haven’t been much to write home about.
This is particularly surprising when you consider the sport’s massive market.
Here’s a couple of points to illustrate:
The sport has an estimated 850 million fans worldwide, making it the seventh most popular sport on the planet.
The sport’s roots can be traced to 19th century England, but make no mistake, It’s China’s game. Table Tennis was declared the country’s national sport in 1952 and they’ve since gone on to win 116 World Champions, 32 Olympic Gold Medals, and 149 World Championship Medals
P.S. table tennis only became an Olympic sport in 1988!!
It’s one of the top five participation sports worldwide, with an estimated 300 million people playing regularly.
The global table tennis market was estimated to be worth $242 million as of 2023 and projected $432.8 million by 2030 with a CAGR of 8.5%.
table represents an interest survey conducted by research firm GWI
If Soccer (Futbol) may be considered “The World’s Game”, Table Tennis may be the World’s “Other” Game
Outside of the Olympics, which is the pinnacle of the sport, the structure of elite professional table tennis mostly revolves around large-scale international tournaments organized by the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) under the umbrella of its commercial arm, World Table Tennis (WTT).
The WTT series consists of Contender, Champions, and Finals series, culminating in four yearly Grand Smashes (think Grand Slams in Tennis) that feature the best 64 players in the world competing in men's & women's singles, as well as doubles & mixed doubles competitions.
These events are full of spectacular points and electric crowds.
The professionalization of the now-globalized game has led to huge viewership numbers with fans tuning in live from every corner of the globe to watch the best in the world compete.
According to data provided by WTT, the 2023 World Table Tennis Championships Finals in Durban (South Africa) reached an incredible 1.134 billion people across 176 territories and had a cumulative live audience of 526 million people.
To put that in perspective, that is >4x the live viewership numbers from the 2024 NFL Super Bowl, far and away the largest American Sports event.
What about “US”? America’s Ping Pong Problem
Despite its global reach and popularity, American fandom hasn't risen to the levels of Europe and Asia, leaving the top US players often under-resourced and underappreciated and frankly, underperforming when compared to the rest of the world.
Jha, arguably the largest American table tennis star to date, summed up this reality to the Associated Press:
“It’s impossible to be a professional table tennis player living in the U.S. Financially, it’s impossible….For the men’s side there were no real high-level training groups that you can train full time in. Now there are also a few starting up, so it’s coming slowly, but you still cannot compare it with Asia and Europe, which have huge systems in place for the sport.
US National Team Head Coach Jun Gao expressed similar remarks stating:
“It’s not easy. “You see other countries, they have a team, they have a physio, doctor… they have everything. And then we have nothing.”
The sports’ national governing body USA Table Tennis (USATT) has acknowledged this reality and responded by gradually increasing the number of training facilities and working to accumulate more funds.
But there seems to be a larger issue at play….
“The pressure, it’s so high for us, because table tennis players … I mean, the Olympic Games, of course, is a marquee event in all sports, but in table tennis, especially, it’s the biggest,” Jha said. “And for me, being from the U.S.A., it’s pretty much the only time the sport is broadcast on television.”
The truth is that to date, there has been no reason for American fans to tune into table tennis because there’s never been a reason to watch.
America has never had a top-tier table tennis league.
This top-of-the-funnel issue has led to a lack of talent development and competitive play, resulting in a lack of eyeballs on the sport during non-Olympic times.
MLTT: Ushering in a New Era of American Table Tennis Fans
Enter Major League Table Tennis (MLTT), the first-ever professional American table tennis league hoping to revolutionize the American sports landscape.
Founded in 2023 by software entrepreneur Flint Lane (who’s a massive table tennis enthusiast and previously served on the USATT Clubs Committee), the first professional table tennis league in the United States launched its inaugural season last year with two divisions and eight teams from different cities (see below for teams).
League play is structured around a 12-weekend series taking place across the country, with a rotating group of four teams competing against one another for points in both men’s and women’s singles as well as doubles matches.
Here are some quick notable takeaways from the league’s first season:
Boosted Purse: With over $250,000 committed in prize money during the first season, MLTT was the most lucrative table tennis competition in America.
Elite Talent: 12 MLTT athletes competed in the Paris Olympic Games
Star Powered Ownership: Basketball Hall of Famer Manu Ginobili is an owner of the Florida Crocs, while Dima Ovtcharov, a former world No. 1 table tennis player who has won six Olympic medals, is part of the ownership group of the Princeton Revolution.
Lane and his team are just getting started……
Following the league’s early success, it was announced just a few weeks ago that the league had secured a $5.5 million strategic investment heading into its second season.
The list of investors featured more than 20 business leaders across sectors, including Philadelphia 76ers co-owner David Blitzer and the team’s president of basketball operations Daryl Morey, who is an avid table Tennis fan.
"Table tennis is one of the most exciting sports to watch, as anyone who's seen it in the Olympics knows," said Morey. "I'm thrilled to see a professional table tennis league now established in the USA. MLTT's innovative approach is sure to elevate the sport to new heights, and I'm excited to be part of this journey."
From adding teams in new cities to creating a more immersive and interactive viewing experience by integrating next-gen technology and live stats into the matches, Lane has signaled that they’ll deploy the capital in ways that will enable them to shift the paradigm around the sport in America from niche to legitimate premium sports product.
Building a League for the Next Generation of Fans
This type of strategic investment is far from the first of its kind.
From pickleball and lacrosse to even an indoor simulator golf league, we’ve seen a recent rise in private equity investment directed toward the creation of emerging sports leagues.
Although it’s unclear which of these venture-backed leagues will succeed and which will not, the sustainability of any upstart league will undoubtedly hinge on its ability to attract and retain the next generation of sports fans.
Riding the tailwinds of a sport rapidly growing across the world, MLTT has started to lay down a strong foundation for building a sustainable product by designing a content distribution model and multi-platform digital media strategy that lines up with the consumption habits of the next generation of sports fans:
Live Content Distribution via Streaming: In its first season, the league live-streamed its competitions on YouTube and reported more than one million highlight streams from more than 100 countries.
Strong Social Footprint: The league’s Instagram account has already close to 17k followers in its first year and has reported an expanded reach of over 2,500,000 fans across all platforms
Prioritizing Athlete Storytelling: Produced additional video content around the unique journeys and stories of their athlete such as that of former olympian and current Chicago Wind player Tom Feng
Whether or not MLTT will be on our screens for years to come or will be just a flash in the pan, is still up for debate.
But the potential here is undeniable.
With an innovative approach and a massive total addressable market, I’ll be tuning in to watch as MLTT helps transition this exciting sport from niche to mainstream, all while creating new and engaged fans and perhaps even helping bring home the first American olympic medal.
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