The business of golf may never have been better, but that doesn’t mean its challenges are any less significant.
There is a looming golf ball rollback a few years away, and the professional game remains almost paralyzed by a division that feels as if it’s widening, both of which touch the PGA of America.
Without being directly involved in the PGA Tour-Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund negotiations, PGA of America CEO Seth Waugh feels as many do that the current situation isn’t helping anyone.
“I don't think the game is big enough for two tours like that, and I think we are diluting the game in a way that is not healthy. We've said that, really, from the beginning. I hope there's a deal. I think both sides are not only committed to trying to find a deal but really need a deal, and in my history of deal making, when both sides kind of need something to happen, it generally does,” Waugh said Wednesday at Valhalla Golf Club, site of this week’s PGA Championship.
“I hope there's urgency because I do think it's doing damage to the tour, to the game … I hope it's short-term damage, as opposed to permanent damage.”
Valhalla is a neutral ground of sorts with 16 LIV players in the PGA field, including seven who received invitations despite not meeting the other qualifying criteria. The field includes 99 of the top 100 players in the Official World Golf Ranking, a number complicated by many LIV players not earning ranking points because of their ban from the PGA Tour.
Waugh is on the OWGR board, which rejected LIV’s request to receive world-ranking status based in part on the element of team play involved in the league. That’s not likely to change after LIV withdrew its application to the OWGR earlier this year without telling the group in advance.
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