3/19/25
On June 6, 2023, the sporting world was flipped upside down when the Governor of the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, and PGA Tour Commissioner, Jay Monahan, appeared together on CNBC of all places, for a sit-down interview. The announcement of a “framework agreement” (dropping lawsuits against each other because lawyers are expensive), working together on negotiating some deal, and the attempted goal of that deal being done by December 31, 2023. Unless Howie Mandel has surreptitiously received a phone call from “The Banker”, there’s no deal, perhaps no deal even on the horizon.
From June 6, 2023, to The Open Championship last year, LIV Golf appeared to have the majority of the leverage in negotiations with the PGA Tour. Brooks Koepka won the 2023 PGA Championship in May of 2023, Jon Rahm and his letterman jacket shocked the golf world when he announced his move to LIV with the creation of his team, Bryson DeChambeau being a content machine at the majors while putting out his popular content on his YouTube channel. After The Open, that momentum came to a screeching halt.
The LIV ratings hadn’t improved, if anything, they got worse despite their top players being at their best and putting on some spirited battles. The CW had just begun its venture into sports television, so we can cut LIV some slack. This year, LIV announced a TV deal with FOX Sports, where they would have their events on FS2, FS1, and FOX. That sounded promising at the time, and for their first event of the year, they would cater to the American audience and their newfound deal by playing under the lights in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Again, sounds promising, new, and worth spending some time watching. The first round was on FS2, which isn’t a popular channel, but it’s not too difficult to find. The ratings were woeful, with 12,000 average viewers tuning in for the five-hour broadcast. That’s the population of Poulsbo, Washington. The sad thing is, it was entertaining to watch players play competitively under the lights.
Jay Monahan has been public enemy number one since June 6, 2023, at least in the eyes of PGA Tour fans. Fans and players felt betrayed by Monahan, who had consulted with next to nobody in discreet meetings around the globe with Al-Rumayyan. Monahan talked boldly about the PGA Tour moving forward in rare public appearances but had his players do most of the legwork publicly. Since then, it’s been damage control for the Commissioner while trying to find funding for the PGA Tour. Strategic Sports Group (SSG) committed up to $3 billion, investing their money and opinions into the PGA Tour and its operations. The PGA Tour ratings have done well, routinely this year getting well over one million viewers, though their fall tournaments weren’t bringing in throngs of viewers.
Back to the question, who has the leverage in the “reunification” of men’s professional golf?
Shockingly, it appears the PGA Tour does. Despite some superstars leaving in their prime, the PGA Tour somehow has rode the wave of chaos into having the upper hand. Playing the long game was the only option for the PGA Tour, whether it was intentional or not. Likely, it wasn’t intentional, and sometimes dysfunctional franchises, or in this case, a dysfunctional league, accidentally strike gold (i.e., the New York Giants in 2007 and 2011). The PGA Tour had to wait out the initial punches from LIV by losing a lot of talent to the new tour and rope-a-dope their way into the championship rounds. Now that contracts are starting to near expiration, players must choose to either sign another lucrative contract or head back to their old stomping grounds on the PGA Tour.
With LIV ratings being so low in the United States, that makes sponsorship hard for captains, who want their franchises to have as much value as possible, so they maximize their 25% of the ownership pie. LIV Adelaide draws sellout crowds, which creates a fun viewing experience, but the other events don’t seem to live up to the same hype as Adelaide. While the PIF has nearly $1 trillion to play with in their evergrowing pot of money, eventually, they’ll need to take a hard look at what’s happening with LIV and decide if it is ever going to be profitable. They, too, are playing the long game, 20 years from now, their goal is to be profitable and continue to grow their product and team brands. However, if there are continuous losses in money, despite the pot of money getting larger by the second, the PIF might cut the cord on LIV and acquiesce to the PGA Tour’s needs.
LIV can gain leverage, but they need to figure out how they can grasp that leverage quickly. The PGA Tour can and probably should continue to wait it out. If their ratings are fine, and fans still show up to watch their favorite PGA Tour players, why change? It’s working, and if LIV’s ratings continue to plummet in America and they still struggle to gain traction globally, they will need a deal more than the PGA Tour does.
It seemed unfathomable that the PGA Tour would have any sort of leverage, even a year ago. Which goes to show how much can change in a year. It should be fascinating to see where men’s professional golf is on March 19, 2026.
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