Why LIV Golf captains see team golf as future for the sport
Bryson Dechambeau and Bubba Watson detailed the future of team golf in a press conference with Jon Rahm, Phil Mickelson and Brooks Koepka.
It was one of those news drops all golf fans never will forget.
June 6, 2023: The PGA Tour and LIV Golf announce a “framework agreement” to merge business entities after weeks of secret negotiations.
The PGA Tour, whose roots go back more than a century, and LIV Golf, the upstart league launched in June 2021 with tour antagonist Greg Norman as its face and financed by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, forming an alliance?
This cannot be happening.
After two years of player poaching, lawsuits, nasty insults from both sides and talk of Saudi Arabia’s atrocious human rights violations, the vision of PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan and PIF governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan side-by-side on a CNBC set detailing how the rival leagues will combine commercial businesses and rights into a new for-profit company, and drop all lawsuits, truly was surreal.
How has that gone?
At first, we were told that the “merger” — later reframed as an “agreement” — would be finalized by Dec. 31 and the PIF would be writing a very large check (somewhere between $1 billion and $2 billion) to boost PGA Tour Enterprises. But New Year’s Eve came and went without a deal, and now, one year later, we appear no closer than we were six months ago.
And after a brief cease-fire, some members, from both sides, resumed taking shots at each other, and LIV Golf, which has headquarters in West Palm Beach, went back to poaching PGA Tour stars.
“It’s messy, and it has been and it seems to get messier every week,” Seth Waugh, CEO of the PGA of America, said at the PGA Championship. “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.
“I hope there’s urgency because I do think it’s doing damage to the tour, to the game. … I just don’t think it’s a healthy situation right now.”
Here is a timeline of the ebbs and flows of the PGA Tour and LIV Golf when it comes to a possible merger:
If you can’t beat them, join them
While surprised that everything came together so quickly, Rory McIlroy said the PGA Tour’s partnership with the PIF ultimately will be good for the game. Speaking the week the agreement was announced, McIlroy said much of it has been mischaracterized and it should not be viewed as a merger with LIV Golf.
“LIV has nothing to do with this,” he said. “It’s the PGA Tour, the DP World Tour and the Public Investment Fund that are basically partnering to create a new company. That’s where I was a little frustrated. All I’ve wanted to do was protect the future of the PGA Tour and protect the aspirational nature of what the PGA Tour stands for. I think this does this.
“If you look at the structure, this new company sits above everything else. Jay on top of that. Technically, anyone involved with LIV would answer to Jay. The PIF was going to keep spending money in golf. At least the PGA Tour controls how that money is spent. You’re dealing with one of the biggest sovereign wealth funds in the world. Would you rather fight against or have them as a partner?”
Greg Norman’s message to staff
Although not involved in the negotiations, LIV’s chief executive and commissioner Norman, who lives in Palm Beach Gardens, had a positive message for the staff. Norman, who was left out of the negotiations and not mentioned in any of the news releases associated with the agreement, told more than 100 people on a 30-minute call that LIV will see no operational changes and that work is already being done on a 2025 schedule.
“The spigot is now wide open for commercial sponsorships, blue-chip companies, TV networks,” he said. “LIV is and will continue to be a standalone enterprise. Our business model will not change. We changed history and we’re not going anywhere.”
Players losing trust in Monahan
The main topic of conversation at the U.S. Open at the Los Angeles Country Club was the announcement the previous week. Some players were open about expressing their anger and lack of trust in the tour and Monahan.
“I think it gets to a point where you want to have faith in management, and I want to have faith that this is the best thing for all of us, but it’s clear that that’s not the consensus,” Jon Rahm said. “I think the general feeling is that a lot of people feel a bit of betrayal from management.”
Those words were prophetic coming from a man who, six months later, became the biggest name to defect from the PGA Tour.
Agreement dissected on Capitol Hill
About a month after the agreement, drama played out on Capitol Hill with tour COO Ron Price and policy board independent director Jimmy Dunne, of North Palm Beach, testifying at a Senate investigations subcommittee hearing.
They were grilled by a bipartisan committee that was concerned about antitrust violations. Aside from politicians attempting to bully Price and Dunne or just looking for air time, one of the more interesting revelations was the PIF proposing Tiger Woods and McIlroy being granted ownership of LIV Golf franchises. This idea was shot down by the PGA Tour.
Tiger getting involved
Before joining the PGA Tour policy board on Aug. 1, Woods led a group of more than 40 players in signing a list of demands of Monahan. The move was made to reestablish control of the PGA Tour after players heard about Monahan’s secretive meetings with the PIF.
Woods became the sixth player director on the policy board, giving players more say in any final decisions.
Monahan regrets agreement rollout
Speaking for the first time since taking a medical leave of absence one week after the deal was announced because of anxiety over the deal, Monahan took responsibility for the awkward rollout of the framework agreement, saying there was a lot of misinformation leading to distrust.
“That’s on me,” he said.
“My biggest regret was not being more patient on the night of June 5, moving to make this announcement the next day.”
Norman confident about LIV’s future
In October, Norman spoke publicly for the first time since the agreement. He was at LIV’s final event of the season at Doral.
Norman was upbeat and confident his league was on the upswing and promised LIV was here to stay. As far as his future … when asked about Price’s comment at July’s Senate subcommittee hearing that Norman is “out of a job” if a deal is reached, Norman shrugged.
“I knew it wasn’t true,” he said. “There’s so much white noise floating around out there that I actually paid zero attention to.
“Sitting in this seat today, I know every step I’ve made has been for the right reasons. Right reasons for the game of golf. … So I was never in any fear of anybody saying anything or any animus against me or anything like that. Because the business model works.”
LIV releases most of 2024 schedule
Soon after the conclusion of the 2023 season, LIV made it official that it was moving forward without interruption. Despite the ongoing negotiations, it announced most of its 2024 schedule, which included seven domestic and seven international events.
The original schedule did not include sites for the final two events: the individual and team championships. Those later were announced as Chicago and Dallas, respectively.
Rahm proves he has a price
Six months after the framework agreement, Rahm announced on Fox News: “I have officially joined LIV Golf.” He was wearing an LIV letterman’s jacket.
The Spaniard and No. 3 golfer in the world clearly is LIV’s biggest and most important addition since its launch, sending the message, “We are still here, we are not going anywhere.” And for LIV, that was worth the reported $550 million Rahm will receive, including bonuses.
The man who once refuted all LIV rumors by saying $400 million would not change his lifestyle proved he had a price after all.
Woods stands firm on deadline
Despite reports negotiations were dragging and Dec. 31 would come and go without a deal, Woods remained optimistic, right to the end.
Speaking in December from the PNC Championship in Orlando where he teamed with his son, Charlie, Tiger insisted nothing has changed when it comes to the deadline.
“As of right now, that is our time frame and our deadline,” he said. “That was set forth back in early June. And that hasn’t changed.”
Nothing drops on New Year’s Eve
Like the ball in Times Square, the PGA Tour and PIF were hoping to drop an announcement that would put an end to golf’s civil war.
The year came and went and the only announcement was that the sides were prepared to continue negotiating.
PGA Tour finds major investor in SSG
The long-awaited deal between the PGA Tour and Strategic Sports Group was announced in late January. The SSG, a collective of marquee professional sports franchise owners headed by Fenway Sports Group, is pumping $3 billion into the tour. That included an initial investment of $1.5 billion into the launch of a commercial venture, PGA Tour Enterprises.
That makes SSG the tour’s major financial partner, which had some, like Woods, now hinting maybe the tour no longer needed PIF’s money.
“The monies that they have come to the table with, and what we initially had agreed to in the framework agreement, those are all the same numbers,” Woods said about the SSG investment.
Tyrrell Hatton follows Rahm to LIV
LIV’s strong offseason continued with the long-awaited signing of England’s Tyrrell Hatton. The 16th-ranked golfer in the world joined in February, just before LIV’s first event of the year, in Mexico. Hatton joined Rahm’s team, confirming LIV would be adding a 13th team.
Hatton’s signing came after Germany’s Adrian Meronk, No. 39 in the world, joined LIV.
Monahan offers little at Players
Monahan’s much-anticipated state of the game address from The Players Championship in Ponte Vedra Beach in March lacked substance. The commissioner offered very little, other than confirming he recently met with Al-Rumayyan and talks are “accelerating.”
While McIlroy continued to believe in Monahan’s leadership and a deal being finalized — that later eroded, as we will see — Xander Schauffele was not so sure. “I would say in my book he’s got a long way to go to gain the trust of the membership,” Schauffele said.
And world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler placed the blame for golf’s fractured state squarely on those who joined LIV.
“If the fans are upset, then look at the guys that left,” Scheffler said. “We had a tour, we were all together, and the people that left are no longer here. At the end of the day, that’s where the splintering comes from.”
More false hope after Bahamas meeting
Members of the PGA Tour Enterprises board, including Monahan and all six player directors — Woods, Jordan Spieth, Patrick Cantlay, Adam Scott, Webb Simpson and Peter Malnati — met with Al-Rumayyan in the Bahamas soon after the Players Championship.
Monahan called the meeting “constructive.” Woods said. “We’re headed in the right direction.”
LIV players: Deal needed to save sport
LIV golfers weighed in on the negotiations from the event at Doral with Bryson DeChambeau saying there needs to be more of a sense of urgency.
“The only answer is for us to somehow come together in some sort of terms where it makes sense and for us to be playing all again in somewhat of the same boat,” DeChambeau said. “And it needs to happen fast. It’s not a two-year thing. Like it needs to happen quicker rather than later just for the good of the sport. Too many people are losing interest.”
LIV looking to buy golf courses
Norman revealed in May that LIV Golf has thought about owning all its golf courses with each team having a home venue on which to host an event.
“And now you can build out around that,” Norman told Bloomberg News. “It’s not just a golf course. You bring in education, hospitality, real estate, merchandise, management, and all these other different opportunities that the game of golf has to deliver to a community or to a region. We are going to be doing that.”
Jimmy Dunne resigns from PGA Tour policy board
Dunne, one of the architects of the framework agreement, resigned from the tour’s policy board the week of the PGA Championship. The North Palm Beach resident and president of Seminole Golf Club said since helping negotiate the agreement, “no meaningful progress has been made towards a transaction with the PIF, I feel like my role is utterly superfluous.”
Woods said the amount of work and dedication Dunne put into the board and into the PGA Tour has been “incredible.”
McIlroy offered a grim outlook on the negotiations with Dunne no longer involved.
“I would say my confidence level on something getting done before last week was, you know, as low as it had been,” McIlroy said. “And then with this news of Jimmy resigning and knowing the relationship he has with the other side, and how much warmth there is from the other side, it’s concerning.”
One year later and still no deal
A year has passed since that stunning announcement of a framework agreement and about six months since the deadline to turn that into a final deal.
And still, nothing.
But are we getting closer? According to The New York Times, possibly. Maybe?
More: Strong list of LIV, PGA Tour golfers attempting to qualify for U.S. Open at Bear’s Club
The Times recently reported that negotiations between the PGA Tour and the PIF not only are very much alive but term sheets have been exchanged.
But it also added a deal is far from certain with the future of LIV Golf still to be decided.
And so we wait.
Tom D’Angelo is a senior sports columnist and golf writer for The Palm Beach Post. He can be reached at tdangelo@pbpost.com.