LIV Golf (Saudi PIF), "Mergers," and More

[iacas]

4 hours ago, mdl said:

It wouldn't be that hard to hire someone like Broadie to leverage majors – where players from PGA, Euro, and LIV all compete – to estimate a strength and depth of field and the effects of tour and tournament structure to weight and structure WGR points per finishing position per tournament on each tour accordingly in a fair way.

Yes, it would. There's not much overlap, and since it's been two years now, there's going to be even less overlap, as many of the lesser LIV players not named Brooks, Bryson, or Dustin are even eligible to play in many majors anymore.

3 hours ago, mdl said:

 

To Erik's point, for sure the overlapping data – majors with only a few LIV players in each and only since LIV players started competing in majors – is not extensive.

Exactly.

3 hours ago, mdl said:

But IMO it wouldn't be that hard to overcome those issues and estimate a fair set of relative points.

This stuff isn't really a matter of opinion, though. It's a matter of the mathematics. There's not a lot of overlap, and there's already stuff like the Sagarin rankings.

The thing is… other tours have:

• Relegation and promotion/qualifying.
• 72 holes
• Constant intermixing of players.

The LIV Tour has none of those things, and so how do you rank a player on LIV who doesn't play much of anything outside of LIV events.

3 hours ago, mdl said:

Off the top of my head you could anchor on the world rankings distribution of LIV players when they joined versus that on other tours.

No, you can't. DJ isn't the player he was when he joined. Cam Smith is not the player he was when he joined. Heck, neither is Brooks (potentially toward the positive).

3 hours ago, mdl said:

You might estimate the total strength of field on LIV is 1/10 that of the PGA. But instead of giving the above points * 0.1, because of the week depth of field and tournament format, you give 2.5, 1.7, 1.4, 0.8, 0.7, 0.4, 0.4, 0.3, 0.2, 0.2. IOW, almost all the points go to the top finishers.

But… that's not really a formula. That's just making things up.

3 hours ago, mdl said:

To Dave's point, I guess what I'm saying is that feels political.

I don't think so. They don't meet the well established criteria. Occam's Razor.

3 hours ago, mdl said:

It feels like a technical cop out to say that a new tour with some truly top tier players doesn't fit the specs designed to fit existing tours from the time of conception.

But which came first? The criteria has been established.

3 hours ago, DaveP043 said:

But this goes back to the first point, without some level of intermingling of players, it must be nearly impossible to develop meaningful statistical models.

Yep.

3 hours ago, DaveP043 said:

I'm not saying you can't develop some type of model, just that by developing a model without data to test it against, the model isn't very likely to be meaningful or appropriate.  Its just guesswork.  And of course, LIV will complain that their tournaments get WAY too few points, just because.

Yeah. You won't satisfy anyone, and yet… you're going out of your way to ignore your own criteria just to accommodate a Tour that's tried five different ways of circumventing your criteria, lied about whether they'd get points, and all sorts of things.

[mdl]

3 hours ago, DaveP043 said:

But this goes back to the first point, without some level of intermingling of players, it must be nearly impossible to develop meaningful statistical models.  LIV isn't planning to open up to players beyond the 48 they've chosen, and LIV players aren't planning to commit to the number of tournaments required to be members of other tours.  I'm not saying you can't develop some type of model, just that by developing a model without data to test it against, the model isn't very likely to be meaningful or appropriate.  Its just guesswork.  And of course, LIV will complain that their tournaments get WAY too few points, just because.

Ha. Fair. As a professional in data science and machine learning with my grad work in statistics, you're right I should probably be more circumspect about how confident we could be in any model estimates given how thin the overlap is without having looked at the data, simulated for sensitivity, etc...  But what's the internet for if not for being wildly more confident online than you would be in a professional capacity

[iacas]

1 hour ago, mdl said:

Ha. Fair. As a professional in data science and machine learning with my grad work in statistics, you're right I should probably be more circumspect about how confident we could be in any model estimates given how thin the overlap is without having looked at the data, simulated for sensitivity, etc...  But what's the internet for if not for being wildly more confident online than you would be in a professional capacity

The fear is of course that if you don't get the ratings right, they'll either continue to escalate too highly or to fall too low. The bad rating will propagate throughout.

[turtleback]

23 hours ago, mdl said:

Ha. Fair. As a professional in data science and machine learning with my grad work in statistics, you're right I should probably be more circumspect about how confident we could be in any model estimates given how thin the overlap is without having looked at the data, simulated for sensitivity, etc...  But what's the internet for if not for being wildly more confident online than you would be in a professional capacity

Ah, the argument from authority fallacy.

But why should they change their whole system to accomodate some little backwater tour?

[Flipped]

Phil Mickelson

@PhilMickelson

Trevor, LIV was NEVER going to get points. Why? 1)it’s a monopoly run by all the governing bodies 2) the PGA Tour tv contract is based on owgr criteria for them to get all their money 3) they would lose leverage in negotiations if LIV got points4) last but not least, Tour has BORROWED against the tv deal! If they don’t hit their bench marks and don’t get all their tv money(from CBS 🙂 they will have an immediate capital call. Don’t believe me? Ask Sean McManus

[Vinsk]

Poor Phil. He’s showing again that he’s not near as smart as he thinks he is. And I do feel he’s really struggling with his irrelevancy.

[Vinsk]

39,000 Steps At A LIV Golf Party In Trumpland | Defector

---

DORAL — Airplanes scream overhead, low and loud, landing gear deployed, casting darting shadows over the...

Pretty good read. I think LIV supporters, including Phil, still think that people who don’t like LIV are just influenced by the PIF involvement. They can’t seem to accept that the product, regardless of the PIF funding, sucks. I don’t wanna see professional golf presented in the way they do it. Period.

[Vinsk]

$600M. In this really gonna happen?

[iacas]

20 minutes ago, Vinsk said:

$600M. In this really gonna happen?

"Even though it's a rumor I'm 99.9% sure…"

Okay buddy.

I think there are a few things holding Jon back from this.

• Nobody watches.
• Ryder Cup?
• Legacy/etc.
• Their schedule kinda stinks, too, and you HAVE to play when they say you do.

$600M is a lot, though. I'm pretty sure that number is just made up, but… He could play inconsequential golf and basically play out the contract (three years?) and if he got the money up front, or will get at least $400M of it… retire really easily by 2026.

So, whatever. If he leaves, I won't see him play much golf anymore.

Cam Smith just missed the cut at his dinky Australian tournament by NINE.

[Yukari]

Wow!  For $600M, I think Rahm would be really tempted.

After what PGA tour has done in June, I wouldn't be surprised if Rahm does decide to join LIV.

[boogielicious]

6 hours ago, Yukari said:

Wow!  For $600M, I think Rahm would be really tempted.

After what PGA tour has done in June, I wouldn't be surprised if Rahm does decide to join LIV.

Why? There’s no guarantee that LIV will be here due to the deal that was made. Their future is very murky.

[iacas]

7 hours ago, Yukari said:

Wow!  For $600M, I think Rahm would be really tempted.

After what PGA tour has done in June, I wouldn't be surprised if Rahm does decide to join LIV.

There have always been Rahm rumors. The accounts pushing it are 0 for 20 or something in their predictions.

[phillyk]

Seeing more and more that Rahm is a LIVer now. I’m thinking if it isn’t a done deal, that it will be very soon. 

I don’t see LIV golf updates twitter as a legitimate source but they have interestingly specific numbers. Idk. There’s certainly a lot of talk. I can’t see it being based on nothing. 

 

[iacas]

12 minutes ago, phillyk said:

Seeing more and more that Rahm is a LIVer now. I’m thinking if it isn’t a done deal, that it will be very soon. 

I don't think so. It's all the troll accounts who are wrong ALL. THE. TIME.

He'd have to play about 19+ events a year, but without the flexibility to make his own schedule. He'd likely be out of the Ryder Cup.

[JetFan1983]

I say maybe since he hasn't denied the rumors yet. Seems like he would've by now if he was staying on the PGAT/DPWT. This was his most recent tweet, Nov 10. Seems like a long time to say nothing. 

Seems ominous. 

Edited December 1, 2023 by JetFan1983

[iacas]

There have been rumors about Rahm to LIV for years though. Heck, Cantlay too. Has he gone? Why would they even want him? (It wouldn't be much of a loss if he did go IMO.)

I picked a good time to not really care much at all about the PGA Tour, and Tiger picked a good time to be a broken 48-year-old.

[jxdama]

I hope Rahm moves  on and  puts an end to the PGA tour.

[iacas]

51 minutes ago, jxdama said:

I hope Rahm moves  on and  puts an end to the PGA tour.

Curious how you square comments like this with your constant whining about how easy the PGA Tour sets up courses for their tournaments…