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

[70sSanO]

23 minutes ago, BruceMGF said:

I must say, the LIV thing has given me a new appreciation for the Curtis Cup.  

On TV or in person?  Or both?

And why?

I do admit that it is on TV.  Then again, the only sport I'll go to watch in person these days is hockey.  And this is my favorite time of year regardless of how bad my team has (repeatedly) done.

As much as I might enjoy it, watching golf can become pretty boring, not at the level of baseball boring, but there are similarities.  Given the choice between hitting a shot and watching a shot, I'll take the former; except on Saturdays or Sundays.

John

[turtleback]

3 hours ago, Big Lex said:

I was about to write "the majors don't have to compete with that type of financing." But they do, at least to a point: At one time, prominent American pros skipped the (British) Open Championship because the prize money was just too little to make the trip worth it, even given the prestige of that event.  But the R&A recognized this and corrected it, and I think today all the majors are well-past the threshold of being financially "competitive" against any potential offerings by rival tours.

A re-writing of history.  The British Open was not revived by increasing the purse, it was revived when Arnold Palmer, having won the Masters and US Open in 1960 decided to go play it (for the first time) in a quest to match Hogan's 1953 feat of winning the Masters, USO, and BO, and possibly creating and winning a modern Grand Slam.  That year the purse was 7,000 pounds compared to a $60,720 US Open purse.  The US Open's winner got more than the whole BO purse.  The British Open purse started to increase in response to the renewed interest created by Palmer but slowly.    By 1965 it was up to 10,000 pounds while the USO purse was up to just under $124,000 and the winner's check was still more than the total BO purse.  The BO purse didn't reach 100,000 pounds until 1977.

[iacas]

4 hours ago, Big Lex said:

even given the prestige of that event.

Debatable. At best.

3 hours ago, 70sSanO said:

MLB, NBA, and NFL 100th highest salary is between $10M and $14M.  In 2021 Jason Day was number 100 at $942K!

Those leagues make a lot more money.

[iacas]

The Saudis have executed their first spectator:

[iacas]

Phil Mickelson, others in Saudi-backed LIV Golf ripped by 9/11 group

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PGA Tour players competing in this week's Saudi-backed LIV Golf Series tournament have been suspended from the tour. They've also drawn the ire of a prominent September 11 survivors group.

[iacas]

Oh brother.

[Double Mocha Man]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

The Saudis have executed their first spectator:

If you're at a golf tournament you should be watching the tournament.  Isn't that why you're there?  If you don't want to watch the tee shot and you want to socialize there are safer places for that... but it's not along a fairway.  I see this every week and it's a spectator who's not watching, but socializing.  Not that I'm not a socializing kind of guy.

[DewSweeper09]

They don’t even play Sundays and make a ton more money. This could get interesting

[Brock]

I don’t see LIV going away anytime soon. I’d really love for it to take a way back seat in coverage. I know it won’t for the first US event. 
 

Its  easy to judge these guys decisions from our seats. I have empathy for most of them as none of us were faced with that choice. There was an article about the LPGA ties to Saudi and sponsorship of players. I think that is an equally interesting topic. Although hush hush. 
 

Some of these LIV guys are viewed as villains of the Tour (and some rightfully earned). I still think there are a lot of hypocrites out there when our government and hundreds of corporations have much deeper dealings with Saudi but PGA players is where the moral line is drawn? Seems like a convenient argument to use when most want the Tour to prevail.

[70sSanO]

It is very true about weapon systems that have been provided, and will be provided, to the Saudis by the USG.

I’ve dealt with Foreign Military Sales, not to Saudi Arabia, and it can be very lucrative to both the USG and the contractor; especially as a program is winding down.

The millions these golfers get is easily eclipsed by the billions Saudi Arabia has paid for military weapons.

John

[Big Lex]

8 hours ago, iacas said:

12 hours ago, Big Lex said:

even given the prestige of that event.

Debatable. At best.

? What is debatable? 

[BruceMGF]

8 hours ago, Double Mocha Man said:

If you're at a golf tournament you should be watching the tournament. 

It's not just golf.  Watch when a foul ball sails into the seats at a baseball game, or a hockey puck goes over the plerxiglass at a hockey game.  More than half the people in the vicinity aren't paying attention.

[Friz]

Interesting bit from this article...apparently the teams for LIV were somewhat predetermined and the draft was not so authentic

 

Earlier in the week, during the first LIV Golf draft, captains were issued a list of 31 available players, not 36, as the draft implied. On stage, Oosthuizen looked down at a laminated sheet that read:

Round 1: Please pick any available player

Round 2: Please pick Charl Schwartzel

Round 3: Please pick Branden Grace

Yep, two of his “picks” were predetermined. Oosthuizen made just one selection

[iacas]

5 hours ago, Big Lex said:

? What is debatable? 

It had no prestige.

For decades.

[turtleback]

16 hours ago, DewSweeper09 said:

They don’t even play Sundays and make a ton more money. This could get interesting

On the PGA tour they get paid for playing golf.

On thr Bloody Hands tour they get paid for providing moral cover for some of the worst people in the world.

As Edmund Burke is reputed to have said (but probably didn't) : “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”.  And this case it's worse, because they are being paid handsomely for doing nothing, and have thereby forfeited the right to be considered good men.

[Abu3baid]

What’s interesting is that there is currently 0 coverage of the LIV tour in KSA… like nothing, as if it doesn’t exist.  When they have the tournament here in Jeddah I’m sure it will be a side note that there is a tournament, but no, there isn’t advertising of the millions being paid out..

[jbishop15]

16 hours ago, Brock said:

I don’t see LIV going away anytime soon. I’d really love for it to take a way back seat in coverage. I know it won’t for the first US event. 
 

Its  easy to judge these guys decisions from our seats. I have empathy for most of them as none of us were faced with that choice. There was an article about the LPGA ties to Saudi and sponsorship of players. I think that is an equally interesting topic. Although hush hush. 
 

Some of these LIV guys are viewed as villains of the Tour (and some rightfully earned). I still think there are a lot of hypocrites out there when our government and hundreds of corporations have much deeper dealings with Saudi but PGA players is where the moral line is drawn? Seems like a convenient argument to use when most want the Tour to prevail.

Empathy for what? They’re choosing between tens of millions on the PGA Tour and near-hundreds on LIV. They’re not victims of any stripe.

The Saudi’s sponsoring events on the LPGA Tour is bad, but they don’t own an entire other tour as they do with the mens tour. Also, it’s not hush-hush; it’s a pretty common topic when discussing this sort of thing.

I don’t want the Tour to succeed; the coverage sucks and the golf is often mediocre, and a lot of these guys get paid too much for shitty play. But I am very, very comfortable is rooting for the demise of a Tour that calcifies over-the-hill, moneyed interests in the interest of making a violent, repressive petro-state more attractive to the world at large. 

[PNW]

The hypocrisy during the interview Jim conducted with Jay today on CBS  reining moral, virtuous outrage is stunning, predictable, weak and unconvincing. When will Jim ask Jay about China? I am no fan of Saudi Arabia and would not choose to be associated with them in any way. More-so with China but that relationship will not be challenged.

"The PGA's China Problem"

https://www.realclearpolicy.com/articles/2022/04/06/the_pgas_china_problem_825582.html#