LIV Golf Now Closed?

[Friz]

Its interesting, I feel my attention to LIV has completely run its course.  It was somewhat fascinating to follow in the beginning, i never wanted it to succeed but I was curious enough to tune in to a few minutes and follow the news stories.  Now, I don't even know when LIV events are happening, its fallen 100% off my radar.

However, I'm significantly MORE aware of the negative things happening in Saudi Arabia because of LIV, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.  If sportswashing was some sort of motivation in the beginning I feel like thats significantly backfired.

[Golfingdad]

4 hours ago, Friz said:

Its interesting, I feel my attention to LIV has completely run its course. 

My interest in LIV is, quite literally, confined to this thread, and this thread only.  I'm with most of you as well by being perplexed at what they're goal is, and if they think they're achieving it.

[turtleback]

9 hours ago, boogielicious said:

I love The Onion!

 

Meh, I remember whent the Onion was clever and witty.  This is just ham-handed.

[iacas]

9 minutes ago, turtleback said:

Meh, I remember whent the Onion was clever and witty.  This is just ham-handed.

Yeah, that was bad.

[Zeph]

Not to turn this topic into Saudi News, but I wonder how these players that do it for the money feel about stories like these. Feel about it really, not just what they say in interviews.

 

[chspeed]

Good article about LIV in New Yorker. Behind a paywall, but you can get a few free articles.

My favorite part of is an analysis of the hypocrisy of the PGA tour itself. As the article states:

"A sport that long excluded Blacks, Jews, and women, and with a standard share of avarice and misbehavior, had turned itself into the image of nobility—an ideal advertising vessel."

Sure, that's different than Saudi Arabia's reputation, but point taken (at least by me).

 

Will the Saudis and Donald Trump Save Golf—or Wreck It? | The New Yorker

---

High-level defections! Tiger Woods and Jared Kushner! Lawsuits and blacklists! Is the new LIV league a way to reward players, or the vanity...

 

[iacas]

3 hours ago, chspeed said:

"A sport that long excluded Blacks, Jews, and women, and with a standard share of avarice and misbehavior, had turned itself into the image of nobility—an ideal advertising vessel."

Kinda different when it is decades old versus still happening.

Weak point at best. Just like “do you put gas in your car?”

[chspeed]

9 minutes ago, iacas said:

Kinda different when it is decades old versus still happening.

Weak point at best. Just like “do you put gas in your car?”

I can see that.

I'm not fan of Saudi Arabia (to say the least) nor of LIV golf; Even if it had nothing to do with SA. However I did walk away from this article with a stronger feeling that the outrage over LIV's SA ownership is for most players and others in the PGA, a strawman. Their real concern is what's best for business.

[iacas]

14 minutes ago, chspeed said:

I can see that.

I'm not fan of Saudi Arabia (to say the least) nor of LIV golf; Even if it had nothing to do with SA. However I did walk away from this article with a stronger feeling that the outrage over LIV's SA ownership is for most players and others in the PGA, a strawman. Their real concern is what's best for business.

Of course. But as a fan I don’t care about the business, while fully expecting them to almost exclusively care about it.

[Dinglegolf]

To play Devil's advocate here, is there something to be said that LIV golf has exposed a weakness in the business model of the PGA Tour given their immediate introduction of the limited field events?  I.e. was the PGA Tour not listening to their player demands and was prompted into action by necessity?

 

 

[boogielicious]

25 minutes ago, Dinglegolf said:

To play Devil's advocate here, is there something to be said that LIV golf has exposed a weakness in the business model of the PGA Tour given their immediate introduction of the limited field events?  I.e. was the PGA Tour not listening to their player demands and was prompted into action by necessity?

 

 

Possibly, but the PGA Tour has always had some limited field events and team competitions. None of what LIV does is new except throwing enormous amounts of money at players to join. LIV has not reinvented golf. They play by the same rules and still hit the same little ball around 18 holes. 

[hunterdog]

20 minutes ago, Dinglegolf said:

To play Devil's advocate here, is there something to be said that LIV golf has exposed a weakness in the business model of the PGA Tour given their immediate introduction of the limited field events?  I.e. was the PGA Tour not listening to their player demands and was prompted into action by necessity?

 

 

You might be correct. To keep the top players, the PGAT has reorganized its league with a number of elevated events. I’m not sure how many qualify for these events. But the PGAT has a feeder process to qualify. Let’s say it’s the top 75 players: a player like Tom Kim, by playing well, can pretty rapidly qualify; while a player, like Rickie Fowler, can drop out of the list of exempted players. That would be a merit based system, unlike LIV which has an arbitrary selection process and some players, by contract, won’t be dropped. The lower ranked PGAT players, meanwhile, have plenty events to play, earn a very good paycheck, and work their way up the ladder. Not perfect but the new PGAT system will likely give televised golf consumers a better product overall and maintain a merit based system. 
Note: the issue identified by John Rahm needs to be addressed. Maybe by a couple of events ((Scottish Open) co-sanctioned by the DP World Tour become elevated events?

[Dinglegolf]

21 minutes ago, boogielicious said:

Possibly, but the PGA Tour has always had some limited field events and team competitions. None of what LIV does is new except throwing enormous amounts of money at players to join. LIV has not reinvented golf. They play by the same rules and still hit the same little ball around 18 holes. 

More in the sense that, rightly or wrongly, they pushed the envelope for the PGA Tour to explore more limited field events to appease the Top 50 players that they perhaps would not have moved on.  

I am more interested in the evolvement of the PGA Tour in a vacuum.  As a viewer, the current limited field events hold no more interest for me than any of the regular tour events, I may watch some of it if I am channel surfing, so I am thinking it is a risk to introduce these events and the financial investment that goes with them, if they are not going to move the viewership needle. 

[boogielicious]

5 hours ago, Dinglegolf said:

More in the sense that, rightly or wrongly, they pushed the envelope for the PGA Tour to explore more limited field events to appease the Top 50 players that they perhaps would not have moved on.  

I am more interested in the evolvement of the PGA Tour in a vacuum.  As a viewer, the current limited field events hold no more interest for me than any of the regular tour events, I may watch some of it if I am channel surfing, so I am thinking it is a risk to introduce these events and the financial investment that goes with them, if they are not going to move the viewership needle. 

Good points. I think maybe we should give the PGA Tour the feedback. There must be a way to contact them about what we would like to see.

 

[Bucki1968]

Will the Saudis and Donald Trump Save Golf—or Wreck It? | The New Yorker

---

High-level defections! Tiger Woods and Jared Kushner! Lawsuits and blacklists! Is the new LIV league a way to reward players, or the vanity project of a despot, or something else?

Great article. I know more now than I did know. Not sure if that's good or bad?

[Elmer]

2 hours ago, Bucki1968 said:

Will the Saudis and Donald Trump Save Golf—or Wreck It? | The New Yorker

---

High-level defections! Tiger Woods and Jared Kushner! Lawsuits and blacklists! Is the new LIV league a way to reward players, or the vanity project of a despot, or something else?

Great article. I know more now than I did know. Not sure if that's good or bad?

Like you said "great article", not sure it made me think any better of LIV.
Lots of good points in the article:

The LIV tour looks much more relaxed - "For the players, it looked like a weekend outing among buddies."

However as the PGA indicated -“Our strategy is we always want the best. liv doesn’t rise to that level.” 

"The first reaction of his defeated opponents was to burst out in laughter. Everyone was rich, happy, and having fun"
I feel like LIV could be compared to any high paid star athlete playing on a bad team. they are just going through the motions, knowing they are getting paid anyway. 

I also dont get tying your league to such a politically polarizing individual who comes with the property.  Just look at the owner arranging for a microphone and addressing the crowd. Once again made it about himself and not the actual golf.
Keep feeding that ego and it will be on the first tee taking the spotlight from the game and the golfers
Then again these are some of the only courses that cant get PGA play, so guess the owner needs a consolation prize.

"Young women began tossing Budweisers into the crowd, prompting scuffles."

 

[iacas]

On 10/20/2022 at 7:03 AM, Dinglegolf said:

More in the sense that, rightly or wrongly, they pushed the envelope for the PGA Tour to explore more limited field events to appease the Top 50 players that they perhaps would not have moved on.  

I am more interested in the evolvement of the PGA Tour in a vacuum.  As a viewer, the current limited field events hold no more interest for me than any of the regular tour events, I may watch some of it if I am channel surfing, so I am thinking it is a risk to introduce these events and the financial investment that goes with them, if they are not going to move the viewership needle. 

I’m not sure what limited field events you’re talking about. They are elevating some events but they aren’t limited fields.

[70sSanO]

While it was the Champions Tour, this is probably more typical of the interest in "non-major" golf.  Neither LIV nor the PGA can change it.  A 20 year old Tiger could/did, but there are no names big enough anymore.

https://www.golfdigest.com/story/justin-thomas-tiger-woods-phone-call-fred-couples

John