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Saudi World Golf Tour 2022/2023 Thread

Liquid Karma said:
That would move the needle.
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Which needle? Oh you mean the total number of douche bags over at LIV, I got it. DR smirking somewhere, but has the PGA really lost anything yet? Nobody likes watching any of these clowns anyway except maybe DJ when Paulina greets him at 18 in some slutty dress.
 
The PGA tour is going to have to try to work with the LIV tour I’m afraid. They can’t keep losing guys like Brooks and not turn into a secondary tour.
 
Not a Koepka fan, him not playing on the PGA tour won't impact my viewing. But from a world rankings standpoint, he is a loss. Young, 4 time major winner. Albeit with an injury history.
 
Makes sense for Brooks if he doesn't care about the Saudi aspect. He has often talked about his lack of interest in non-majors, so he potentially gets the best of both worlds here if the majors continue to permit LIV players.
 
Leaving out the asshole/douche piece of the equation as a given, you have to think the following criteria are huge if you're going to take the LIV leap but you're still relevant in real golf.

1. You're a big enough name that LIV will give you $100M+ to leave.
2. You're out of the FedEx Cup this year. $17M in cash is legit money.
3. You won some majors or big enough tournaments so you have individual exemptions into all the majors for a while which aren't likely to be rescinded - ie. you don't really care about the world golf ranking points
4. You are or lean Euro tour over PGA tour - these guys have been playing the Race to Dubai for years, the DP World Tour is dragging its feet, etc.

Brooks is a perfect fit. DJ has 4 years left of exemptions into the majors and signed his LIV commitment for... you guessed it... 4 years. It'll be interesting to see if LIV can break out of that silo for players, because you can't become what LIV is paying for without having won on the PGA Tour (obviously the crap players are just filler). The LIV tour format is essentially a joke, so they're not going to create famous talented golfers from it. So if it's just a cash grab for a few years once you've hit it big, how long does that last? And once these 1-2 year contracts start dying out and the players like Gooch want exemptions again or just to play a legitimate tournament aside from a major, where would LIV turn to for replacements?

I feel like if you could fire Greg Norman and his vendetta and make the LIV Tour essentially "The Match" but bigger and with more events, maybe you get an agreement that their events only go up against smaller PGA weeks in the states and smaller DP events in Europe and you can co-exist. I just don't see how the LIV Tour survives once this initial PGA Tour talent suck is over - if the parasite succeeds in killing its host it usually doesn't end too well for the parasite.
 
I think the question is going to be whether fans are more interested in the PGA Tour and its regular competition or essentially every-so-often exhibition matches. All of the LIV golfers have said they went to LIV so they could play less and make more. Do fans want to regularly turn in and watch championship level golf on a week-in week-out basis? Will stars emerge on the PGA Tour? Or will fans be interested in the "names" on LIV playing meaningless matches?
 
It still doesnt matter. These guys were relevant because they made their name on the pGA Tour. Now they will no longer be relevant. And its still just a relative handful of guys. It doesnt affect the PGA Tour because these guys will fall off the map. Bottomless pit of potential stars on the PGA Tour and now several of those will be the stars. Koepka is just another asshole player that nobody likes whose best days are behind him. He had his moment for a few years, and he's cashing in and essentially retiring as a relevant player. People are way overreacting to a handful of players. It wont matter. They got their check and they disappear for the most part as new stars are coming up.
 
MichDeac25 said:
I think the question is going to be whether fans are more interested in the PGA Tour and its regular competition or essentially every-so-often exhibition matches. All of the LIV golfers have said they went to LIV so they could play less and make more. Do fans want to regularly turn in and watch championship level golf on a week-in week-out basis? Will stars emerge on the PGA Tour? Or will fans be interested in the "names" on LIV playing meaningless matches?
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I don't expect the LiV tour events to pull large numbers of spectators anytime soon. There is nothing compelling about the events other than curiousity.

But, I don't know that the people behind the LiV tour care? I'm not sure what they care about but legitimacy of their events, attendance, and viewership appear to be 3 things they don't care about - at least so far.
 
The players leaving will matter if it starts impacting PGA event sponsorships and ratings. To me, there is not a LIV golfer who impacts my interest in the PGA Tour, and as mentioned above, the few "good" players that have left for LIV are having a crappy season; so, they were unlikely to get the end of the season PGA Tour Championship payday.

What will matter if Farmers' Insurance, Sony or Wells Fargo decide that the PGA Tour has been reduced to the point that its not worth it kick in the big bucks to sponsor their events because they feel the field are weak and interest is limited. Always thought Bryson was a tool, but what minor interest my kids have in watching golf was essentially to watch how far he could hit the ball. Will TV ratings suffer without Brooks and Bryson?

The LIV Tour is so flawed, as mentioned above, it needs the PGA Tour to create the names and reputations of the golfers that it poaches, but remains to be seen if the PGA Tour can keep the infrastructure in place to keep developing the best players. There's going to be major pressure to increase purses and have fewer standard PGA events to keep the big names, and in the long run, that means fewer tournament opportunities for up and coming players to build their brand. Will be very interesting to see what the 2023 season looks like.
 
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If strength of fields drop enough the networks are rumored to be able to get out of their contracts with the tour
 
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