(by Steve Hopkins, photo WTT)
Its certainly not at the levels of Basketball, Football, or Baseball, but when WTT released their 2024 Prize Money Leaderboard, they showed 6 figure earnings across the top 13 men. As you’d expect, World No. 1 Wang Chuqin led the way with over $261,000 in prize money. Lin Shidong was close behind with over $231,000, then Harimoto at $164,000, and both Felix Lebrun and Jingkun at $147,000. The list dips to No. 35 (Oh Jungsung) with the lowest person on the list earning nearly $50,000 this year.
Each of the players on this list also play for a professional team, and many are from countries that pay top athletes to compete. Add in product endorsements and other sponsorships, and there is a sizeable group of professional table tennis players making a good living.
At first glance, perhaps the biggest surprise is that Franziska is the second highest earner among Europeans (his $119,825 is not far behind Felix Lebrun’s $147,225). Anton Kallberg is over $100,000 (the 11th highest earner of the year). And another big surprise is that Benedikt Duda is No. 16 on the overall earner list – ahead of many other better-known names. Speaking of those well-known names, Ma Long is No. 23, Fan Zhendong is No. 24, and Dimitrij Ovtcharov is 28th – all significantly lower on this list than many would have expected.
The women’s list is just as impressive. There are 11 players over $100,000 in earnings with Wang Manyu leading the way at $244,325. The 35th player is Sreeja Akula who earned $50,590. And, of interest to US fans, Lily Zhang has made the list at No. 34 with $50,995. Puerto Rico’s Adriana Diaz has also made the list at No. 15, with $82,700 in earnings.
Check out the complete Top 35 lists on the WTT website here: Men’s Top 35 | Women’s Top 35
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