{"id":18310,"date":"2026-08-29T16:44:38","date_gmt":"2026-08-29T15:44:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/wildcard-economics\/"},"modified":"2026-08-29T16:44:38","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T15:44:38","slug":"wildcard-economics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wildcard-economics\/","title":{"rendered":"The economics of a wildcard"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A main-draw place is worth a season to a player outside the top hundred. Who gets one, and why, is the tour\u2019s least transparent decision.<\/p>\n\n<h2 id=\"what-a-wildcard-is-worth\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">What a wildcard is worth<\/h2>\n\n<div class=\"anps-statband wp-block-sportpulse-stat-band\"><div class=\"anps-sechead\"><p class=\"anps-sechead__kicker\">\/\/ One main-draw place<\/p><\/div><div class=\"anps-statband__grid anps-statband__grid--inline\" style=\"--anps-statband-cols:3\"><div class=\"anps-stat anps-stat--default\"><p class=\"anps-stat__value\">\u00a362k<\/p><p class=\"anps-stat__label\">First-round prize money<\/p><\/div><div class=\"anps-stat anps-stat--default\"><p class=\"anps-stat__value\">10<\/p><p class=\"anps-stat__label\">Ranking points<\/p><\/div><div class=\"anps-stat anps-stat--default\"><p class=\"anps-stat__value\">3<\/p><p class=\"anps-stat__label\">Qualifying rounds skipped<\/p><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n<h2 id=\"who-gets-them\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">Who gets them<\/h2>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Home players, returning names and, increasingly, whoever the broadcaster asks for. Two of this year\u2019s eight went to players ranked outside 300.<\/p>\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"682\" src=\"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/signage-1024x682.webp\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-18214\" srcset=\"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/signage-1024x682.webp 1024w, https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/signage-300x200.webp 300w, https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/signage-768x512.webp 768w, https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/signage-1536x1023.webp 1536w, https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/signage.webp 1600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The entry list, posted the morning after the wildcards were announced.<\/figcaption><\/figure>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A main-draw place is worth a season to a player outside the top hundred. Who gets one, and why.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":18184,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_spx_person_id":0,"_spx_fixture_id":0,"_spx_pick_id":0,"_spx_eg_facts_label":"","_spx_eg_facts":"","_spx_figure_caption":"","_spx_news_feat":"","_spx_video_url":"","_spx_duration":"","_spx_views":"","_spx_presenter":"","_spx_media_state":"","_spx_start_at":"","_spx_media_status":"","_spx_episode":"","_spx_subject":"","_spx_subject_role":"","_spx_story_year":"","_spx_duration_seconds":0,"_spx_view_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[142,261],"spx_comp":[],"spx_fixture_ref":[],"spx_series":[],"spx_format":[],"spx_video_kind":[],"spx_show":[],"spx_sport":[],"spx_flag":[],"class_list":["post-18310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tennis","tag-finance","tag-wildcards"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18310\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_comp","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_comp?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_fixture_ref","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_fixture_ref?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_series?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_format?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_video_kind","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_video_kind?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_show","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_show?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_sport","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_sport?post=18310"},{"taxonomy":"spx_flag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preview.sportpulse.anpsthemes.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/spx_flag?post=18310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}