Welcome to the latest episode of As The Golf World Turns, an ever-changing ideological and conceptual story in which the long-standing protagonist – the PGA Tour – finds itself being encroached upon by deep-pocketed visionaries who believe a good thing can be better though there has been no public or private clamor to radically change the status quo.
But what’s a good story without drama?
Previously on As The Golf World Turns, the PGA Tour found itself in the crosshairs of a Greg Norman-led group known as LIV Golf Investments which, after making a notable commitment to the Asian Tour, has promised to announce a new league in the near future.
As it is with Apple when it’s announcing a landscape-changing new product, the details of the proposed new league remain under wraps at the moment though the big reveal is promised soon, perhaps before Thanksgiving turkeys are cooked.
In media terminology, it’s a good tease – keeping everyone waiting for what’s next.
It promises stars and a new format beginning in spring 2022 and it would prefer to strike a collaboration of sorts with the PGA Tour rather than pick a fight that forces top players to choose a side. The group recently announced the hiring of former PGA Tour executive Ron Cross and former ESPN and Formula 1 executive Sean Bratches as part of its team, noteworthy names within the industry.
The PGA Tour, which has hardly been able to enjoy its new multi-billion-dollar rights deals with Discovery and the major television networks, has remained silent on the subject while doing its best to read the big room. The tour also has a partner in the European Tour, having struck a strategic alliance together in advance of this expected incursion.
Last week, a familiar character from earlier episodes of As The Golf World Turns resurfaced. The Premier Golf League, which has been brewing a concept similar to the one expected to be put forth by Norman’s group, popped back into the storyline by dropping details of its updated plan.
The PGL, guided by Englishman Andy Gardiner, has been quietly trying to shoulder its way into the upper reaches of the professional game for a few years now but it had gone quiet recently.
When news of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf Investments initiative came out, the PGL stepped from the shadows as if to say, “We’re still here and we have an even better idea.”
“This proposal should benefit all members of the PGA Tour,” Andy Gardiner told Global Golf Post. “I believe they could see this being the best thing to happen since Tiger (Woods) emerging in 1996. This is a better model.”
Andy Gardiner
A note of background here about these two characters: There was a time when the two groups – the PGL and the Saudi-backed organization – were working together in hopes of restructuring the landscape of professional golf.
As tends to happen, there were internal squabbles and one group turned into two groups. Separate but equal in terms of their desire to join golf’s pyramid – at the top.
Gardiner’s PGL concept is built around creating a bigger, richer, better version of the PGA Tour.
The PGL’s idea is to put on 18 tournaments within the PGA Tour schedule, 10 of them played in the United States, using existing tour events. The purses would be $20 million for an event – what the Players Championship will pay next year – and include a team aspect that seems to excite the creators more than anyone who’s heard about it.
“This proposal should benefit all members of the PGA Tour,” Gardiner told Global Golf Post. “I believe they could see this being the best thing to happen since Tiger (Woods) emerging in 1996.
“This is a better model.”
A cynic might suggest that after years of trying unsuccessfully to poach PGA Tour players, the PGL is now looking to join forces.
There are legal elements to the PGL idea – the tour is a non-profit organization and would have to forgo that designation in return for receiving 50 percent of something it already owns. The tour also operates five other circuits. And there are sponsor and broadcast deals in place.
In Gardiner’s vision, his group would receive 30 percent of net revenues but there would be more money for everyone involved according to the PGL plan.
One thing the two proposals seem to have in common: Both would require the players to play in every event on their schedule. No picking or choosing the way they do now as independent contractors. It would be the trade-off for getting big, guaranteed money.
“The freedom to be my own boss is nice, so I enjoy that,” Brooks Koepka said last week.
Read into that what you choose.
Here’s another thing the PGL and Norman’s group have in common: Neither has been invited to the PGA Tour’s glittering new 187,000-square-foot headquarters building to discuss any of this with commissioner Jay Monahan.
At least outwardly, they are being treated like a phone call that reads “Spam Risk.”
“I can understand the apprehension but I believe it will be overcome if we sit down and talk,” Gardiner said.
“The main thing that’s come out of this is we can better our product and we can get better because of stuff like this, we can learn from it."
JUSTIN THOMAS
The tour is taking all of this seriously because it is serious. Whether you choose to call it an attack or an approach, two groups are flanking the PGA Tour from different directions.
Who would benefit the most from this (aside from the lawyers)?
The players, especially top-tier stars, who would like (among other things) more control of their name, image and likeness, to borrow a trendy phrase.
“The main thing that’s come out of this is we can better our product and we can get better because of stuff like this, we can learn from it,” Justin Thomas said last week at Mayakoba. “I just think that a lot of it was honestly the players not knowing and also maybe the tour not understanding that it could be done differently and that the players even felt that way.
“I think all of this that’s kind of happened outside of the PGA Tour has created a lot of questions from the players to where the tour’s done a great job of answering it, but also answering that maybe we have the opportunity to better our product.”
What happens in the next episode of As The Golf World Turns?
The PGA Tour, which has indicated it will suspend or ban members who sign with one of these new organizations, is probably waiting for Norman’s group to show its cards. It will react when there is something to react to.
The two groups can keep asking for a meeting but unless enough of the tour players demand Monahan and his leadership team listen, it’s not likely to happen. The tour is also in position to weigh the merits of what is being proposed and find a way to implement its own changes, whether to formats that would include more limited-field big money events, schedules or, most importantly, compensation.
Have we reached the cliffhanger moment?
Stay tuned for the next episode.
Top: Ever since Dustin Johnson won the 2021 Saudi International, the Saudis have been teasing something bigger.
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