Where is Tournament Paintball Going?

A lot has happened in the paintball realm in the last decade.  Leagues have come and gone, companies have sprouted and withered.  Enough has happened to get many paintballers wondering, where is paintball going?

I recently stumbled across an article written by a tournament paintballer. It seems many players are having a hard time coping with the "new direction" of paintball. The funny thing is, while woodsball leagues and woodsball play is steadily growing, its really not new at all.

From the article

I’m all about tournament paintball. It’s what I’ve been doing for years and it’s what I’m going to continue doing. I’m not going to talk about the changing direction that is leading us down the MilSim road. I don’t care about MilSim. I happen to think paintball needs national tournaments, but this isn’t really about that. Time will tell if we’re needed or if it’s just overhead.

The fact of the matter is paintball was born in the woods, and now its going back. There still is room for tournament speedball, but not at the scale industry leaders were once able to manipulate it to.

From the article

Once upon a time, Infamous had players on the east coast, west coast, north, south and middle America … all over the country. They would fly people in to practice and they’d have a skid of paint at each practice. Players were allowed to buy gear at special discount rates and, of course, some players were getting paid. And they weren’t the exception. XSV, Dynasty, Ironmen, Raiders and others were doing the same thing. Fast forward a few years and they are cutting players because they don’t want to fly them in. My team owner once presented a $175,000 budget to a sponsor and they agreed there was no fat on it. Now I show the same sponsor a $75,000 budget and we both shake our heads saying, “that’s simply too much.” My old captain asked me why I don’t fly people in. When I told him there’s no budget for it, he said, “just tell the sponsors you need it.” Can you imagine that these days?

It may pain many players to hear this, but tournament paintball has merely been a detour for the way paintball was supposed to go. Scenario paintball is larger than ever, and it is widely received among recballers and weekenders, which represents the largest part of paintball.

If you need proof just look at the turnout at Oklahoma D-Day. Despite current economic conditions 3,000 players attended Oklahoma D-Day in 2009. This cannot be said about tournament paintball, which is entirely elastic with the economy. When tournament players pockets go down so does the amount of teams heading off to tournaments.

Like the article says, If tournament paintball is to shine again, things do indeed need to change. However, I do not believe we can expect it to reach the level it once reached, when a more glimmering opportunity for a ubiquitous woodsball league is available.

Read more of this interesting article on BallersCafe.