Nick Dunlap, the leading candidate for PGA Tour’s rookie of the year, is embroiled in a legal dispute with his management company, according to a report by Josh Carpenter in Sports Business Journal.
Citing court documents, the SBJ report details a months-long dispute between Dunlap’s parents and his family lawyer over whether his manager, Kevin Canning, and agency GSE Worldwide breached a contract signed in February, five weeks after Dunlap won The American Express in January as an amateur and immediately turned professional.
Dunlap’s family attorney, W. Scott Simpson, filed an arbitration demand with the American Arbitration Association claiming, among other things, that Canning disparaged Dunlap’s parents, Jim and Charlene. Lawyers for GSE Worldwide denied those allegations in a countersuit by Canning, suggesting the accusations were fabricated to assert control over Dunlap’s business dealings.
A motion hearing in the case was held July 18 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, three days before Dunlap won for the second time on tour at the Barracuda Championship, played opposite the Open Championship.
In a statement sent to SBJ regarding Dunlap’s parents, Simpson said: “They have been helping Nick adjust from being a college athlete at the University of Alabama to a very successful PGA Tour Professional. Nick needs and deserves a great agency relationship. We have faith in the justice system, and we are confident the arbitrator and the federal court will review the facts and rule in favor of Nick and his family.”
Dunlap, 20, is the first player to win as both an amateur and professional in the same season on the PGA Tour. The 2023 U.S. Amateur champion ranks No. 41 in the Official World Golf Ranking. READ MORE
Ben Jared, PGA TOUR/IGF
It didn’t take the PGA Tour long to shore up sponsorship at its annual fall stop in Napa, California. Procore Technologies, a California-based provider of construction-management software, will title-sponsor the event, the tour announced. Only two weeks earlier, Fortinet, a cybersecurity company headquartered in the Bay Area, pulled out of its six-year sponsorship agreement after three years. The Procore Championship will be played September 12-15 at Silverado Resort, where it has been held since 2014, and kick off the tour’s eight-tournament Fall Season. The news was first reported by Sports Business Journal’s Josh Carpenter. READ MORE
Protesters greeted Tony Finau before his annual charity event and clinic in Farmington, Utah, ahead of the Korn Ferry Tour’s Utah Championship, alleging the six-time PGA Tour winner has failed to repay them or their associates for helping him get started as a professional, the Deseret News’ Jay Drew reported. Finau, 34, who is ranked No. 18 in the world, has earned $42.4 million in 10 seasons on the PGA Tour. A civil suit seeking $16 million from Finau was filed by a Salt Lake City businessman in 2020 and is set for trial in October in Provo. READ MORE
Keegan Bradley has been named as assistant captain on Jim Furyk’s staff for next month’s Presidents Cup, the PGA Tour announced. Bradley, the 2025 U.S. Ryder Cup captain, will join Stewart Cink, Justin Leonard and Kevin Kisner for the biennial matches on September 26-29 at Royal Montreal Golf Club in Canada. READ MORE
Matthew Fitzpatrick withdrew after shooting 81 in the third round at the Men’s Olympics Golf Competition citing a pre-existing right thumb strain. Fitzpatrick, who ranks 38th in the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup standings, is not in the field at next week’s Wyndham Championship in Greensboro, N.C. The PGA Tour’s three-week playoff series begins in two weeks at the FedEx St. Jude Championship in Memphis, Tenn. READ MORE
Colin Montgomerie played host last week to the Staysure PGA Seniors Championship at Trump International Golf Links near Aberdeen, but the World Golf Hall of Famer told reporters it may be his last start of 2024 for health reasons.
“I haven’t been well the last six months, I have been very poorly,” the 61-year-old Monty said in a Golfweek report after he shot 71 in the first round Thursday. “I have been taking a lot of time off. I have never done that in my life. I might take the rest of the year off. I need to, I’m not well.”
Montgomerie said his health issues are “internal” but didn’t elaborate more. With potential time on his hands for the rest of the summer, he said his gardening skills are “about to become an awful lot better.”
“There’s lots of grass to do, I can’t wait,” he said. “I’ll be like Bob MacIntyre’s father. But me putting the clubs away in August? It’s unheard of.” READ MORE
TAP-INS
The DP World Tour will play five tournaments in three countries on two continents in the Southern Hemisphere late this fall in the “opening swing” of the 2024-25 season. In late November, the BMW Australian PGA will begin the tour’s new season, followed by the ISPS Handa Australian Open before the tour heads to South Africa for the Nedbank Golf Challenge and the Alfred Dunhill Championship. The swing ends on the weekend before Christmas with the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open on the Indian Ocean island nation. READ MORE
The 3.19 million viewers (3.39 million including streaming not tracked by Nielsen) who saw the final round of the recent Open Championship, won by American Xander Schauffele, represented the tournament’s smallest audience since 2015, according to Sports Media Watch. READ MORE
Portland, Oregon, and the LPGA might have ended their 52-year association with last week’s Portland Classic, the longest-running non-major championship on the women’s tour, Golf Digest’s Kent Paisley reported. The Portland event, which has been without a title sponsor for the past two years, was not listed on a preliminary 2025 LPGA schedule that was presented to players, the report said. READ MORE
ISPS Handa, a Tokyo-based nonprofit with an extensive sponsorship in golf, has added to its stable of events. The $2 million ISPS Handa Women’s Scottish Open will be played August 15-18 at Dundonald Links, the LPGA and LET announced. READ MORE
FM, a commercial property insurer and first-year LPGA title sponsor, sweetened the tournament prize fund by $300,000, to $3.8 million, and committed to escalate the money to $5 million in a five-year deal. The inaugural FM Championship will be played August 29-September 1 at TPC Boston in Norton, Massachusetts. READ MORE
Compiled by Steve Harmon and Scott Michaux