In a statement, the circuits said the parties have signed an agreement that "combines PIF's golf-related commercial businesses and rights (including LIV Golf) with the commercial businessesand rights of the PGA Tour and DP World Tour into a new, collectively owned, for-profit entity to ensure that all stakeholders benefit from a model that delivers maximum excitement and competition among the game's best players."The circuits said the agreement ends all pending litigation between the parties.The three tours said they will work "cooperatively and in good faith to establish a fair and objective process for any players who desire to reapply for membership with the PGA Tour or DP World Tour following the completion of the 2023 season."
According to the release, a board of directors will oversee the new entity's golf-related commercial operations, businesses and investments. The groups will work to establish a cohesive schedule. The PIF will be the exclusive investor in the new entity and will have the "exclusive right to further invest in the new enterprise, including a right of first refusal on any capital invested.The PGA Tour will remain a 501(c)(6) tax-exempt organization, according to the release, and will retain oversight of the sanctioning of events, administration of competition and rules.Al-Rumayyan, the governor of Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund, will join the policy board of the PGA Tour, which continues to operate its tournaments. Al-Rumayyan will be chairman of the new commercial group, with Monahan as the CEO and the PGA Tour having a majority stake in the new venture. The PIF will invest in the commercial venture.
Are you familiar with the concept of a fig leaf? It's roots are Biblical, so by now it's probably a hate crime:
The expression "fig leaf" is widely used figuratively to convey the covering up of an act or an object that is embarrassing or distasteful with something of innocuous appearance, a metaphorical reference to the Biblical Book of Genesis in which Adam and Eve used fig leaves to cover their nudity after eating the forbidden fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.[2][3] Some paintings and statues have the genitals of their subjects covered by a representation of an actual fig leaf or similar object, either as part of the work or added afterward for perceived modesty.
It's a merger, guys, just take our word for it..... Except, do the Wahabis strike you as being content to be passive investors? Not to mention that niggling detail that precious little comfort is to be derived from the man that just betrayed us still having a job....
Frauds, all of them. But frauds now united in the only thing that actually matters to the world of professional golf: Making money.In the end, it didn’t actually matter to PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan that the money came from a country, Saudi Arabia, that treats human rights like an inconvenience. The tradition and history of the PGA Tour, in fact, didn’t matter all that much to those who argued that LIV Golf was an unworthy, unserious rival whose guaranteed money and 54-hole events were mocking competition.And as for the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) and Greg Norman, they did not, in fact, care all that much about growing the game. They wanted to own it. Now they do: The PGA Tour, brought to you by Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud.They sold out. Professional golf will never be the same.
The key bit to understand in all this relates to that right-of-first-refusal on future financing at the new corporate entity, combined with the financing at the Tour level. Jay and his cabal have just ceded global control of professional golf to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, without seemingly consulting with any of his members. A hero for our time, no?
We'll get to the hypocrisy angle for sure, but this is Jay at an earlier time:
A year ago, Monahan stood up in front of the world and argued that the way Saudi Arabia treats women, gay people and journalists should matter in a player’s decision whether to jump at the guaranteed payday that came with a LIV invitation.“I would ask any player that has left or any player that would consider leaving, have you ever had to apologize for being a member of the PGA Tour?”Today? Not so much.
Apparently he had his fingers crossed behind his back, because this is today's Jay:
And together, we’re going to move forward and we’re going to take efforts to grow and expand this great game and to take it to new heights. And so what’s happened today and to your earlier question, is we’ve recognized that together, we can have a far greater impact on this game than we can working apart. And I give Yasir, great credit for coming to the table coming to discussions with an open heart and an open mind. We did the same and the game of golf is better for what we’ve done here today.
Hey, he's not the first guy to confuse a heart with a checkbook....
You're probably curious that Eamon Lynch hasn't yet put in an appearance. Not to worry, he's in the building:
The statement announcing peace in our time was flush with the kind of boilerplate banalities that corporate ciphers usually hide behind. Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of the Saudi Public Investment Fund and the bag man for MBS, declared himself “proud to partner with the PGA Tour.”“A momentous day,” cheered Keith Pelley, whose European outfit could charitably be described as non-essential to the new alliance, but was brought along for appearances’ sake.PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan forgot his prior reservations about the source of LIV’s financing and praised Al-Rumayyan’s “vision and collaborative and forward-thinking approach.” The deal is “transformational,” he announced, though a cynic might suggest that his new partner’s bonesaw has proven itself pretty transformational too.
There was no chance that that infamous bonesaw would make an appearance, but these are the people we've just entrusted our professional game with.
I personally have always struggle with the sportswashing thing, just cynical that any actual benefit is derived. I've repeatedly made the case that with LIV all they've accomplished is to put Saudi human rights abuses on an endlessly looping mix tape. That said, I seem to have been tragically wrong about all of this:
Since its creation, LIV Golf has largely been viewed through four lenses, with some overlap. The most traditional and least significant prisms are whether its competition has integrity and if it is consistent with the values golf imagines itself to uphold. For me, and many others, the key lens is that of morality: should the sport allow itself to be leveraged for reputational repair by autocratic human rights abusers? But for plenty of folks – frankly, most everyone inside the sport – the only perspective that matters is commercial: is LIV good or bad for business? From that myopic viewpoint, if someone is offering them money, how can that not be good for business? No need for a little dismemberment to impede commerce.
That is the message that Jay has just delivered, putting our professional game at the beck and call of nice folks with open hearts...
I do think Eamon is painting with too broad a brush here, or at least he should wait to see how folks react:
For Monahan and Pelley – and for players, agents and assorted hangers on – the problem has always been where the money was going, not where it was coming from. The Saudis were eager to dump billions of dollars into golf, and no matter what disputes arose between the establishment and the upstart, there was a desire to ensure the money be redirected rather than rejected. Morality, like the families of September 11 victims and Jamal Khashoggi, was merely a convenient posture to adopt until the time arrived when space was cleared at the trough.
I think the players found themselves in a morally convoluted place. They're obviously competitive animals, and money can also be viewed as respect, so they want what others are getting. I think quite a few of them tried to do the right thing, they just find themselves sold down the river by their leaders.
Shall we trash a few souls? It is what we do....
Ownership, Devalued - One of the most aggravating memes is this:
PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan on 'owning his hypocrisy', lack of transparency, 9/11 family concerns
And exactly what does it mean to "own' it?
Monahan on 'owning his hypocrisy'“I understand the criticism I’m receiving around the hypocrisy and me being hypocritical given my commentary and my actions over the last couple of years. As we went forward and reached a compromise, that was one of my great considerations. Any hypocrisy I have to own, nobody else. That’s on me. It shouldn’t be directed at the membership, that’s on me. As we sit here today, I’m confident we did the best thing for the game and the best thing for all of our members.”
And hopw will you own it? Are there consequences? Are you going to make good to those that believed you and acted accordingly.... No, this is empty moral preening.....
And on the T-word?
Monahan on his lack of transparency“There’s no question that yesterday was a setback, and I’ve had setbacks before and in terms of rebuilding the trust it begins with having conversation like I had through the night last night and being here in the morning and talking to players and explaining to them this deal and how this is a great outcome for every PGA Tour member and the game. I don’t expect everybody to understand right off the bat. I think this is going to take some time but when you look out over the horizon I’m entirely confident when I talk to our players that this is where I’m going to take them. That’s essentially where we are right now.
Let me see if I have this right.... You're admitting that you lied to your players for two years, but now you commit to rebuilding trust.....for what purpose? So they'll believe this new set of lies? Wow, These Guys Are Good™.
Because the lies commence in the very next paragraph:
“The PGA Tour is in a control position. We have a lot of flexibility in our business. We have an opportunity through productive capital to reinvest in our Tour and our membership and reinvest in our game. When anyone looks 3, 5, 10 years down the road, I’m confident that those results will be delivered.”
Really, Jay? because my mother once told me the following:
he who pays the piper calls the tune
To believe Jay, you have to believe that the Saudis are passive investors..... Have you ever noticed anything passive about those Wahabis? What Jay is selling us can best be captured by a guy that died in 1950:
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”― George Orwell, 1984
Nailed it, George!
Monahan on rewarding 'loyalty' of PGA Tour players“Their loyalty will be rewarded. I will spend every single waking hour as we move forward here that the players that have created this PGA Tour, that have created this pro-competitive, legacy driven juggernaut, that have articulated and supported the direction that we are going in. Ultimately the decision we made I believe is going to make it better for all of our players. Loyalty ultimately in a leader is something that must be rewarded. How it manifests itself is something I’m going to spend a lot of time working on and when we’re having this conversation down the road that’s something I look forward to having more specifics about.”
Legacy, Jay? That was a good line a year ago, but has been superseded by events....
Maybe you could tell us it isn't about the money....
Rory McIlroy, Useful Idiot - My computer is jammed with browser tabs chronicling Rory's angst, shall we sample a few?
Oh, poor bubbeleh, this must be so hard for you. Though I can't help but notice that you're a bit of a feckless idiot, no? I hope you appreciate the wide range of sources quoted herein, because we'll now segue from Orwell to....checking notes, Otter:
Flounder, you can't spend your whole life worrying about your mistakes! You f***ed up. You trusted us! Hey, make the best of it! Maybe we can help.
Come to think of it, Flounder is the perfect nom de guerre for Rory, both in his anti-LIV leadership and his golf game.
Rory McIlroy: 'I still hate LIV Golf'
That's nice, though what you think doesn';t seem especially relevant in the current moment....
Rory McIlroy believes LIV Golf players should face punishment despite new Saudi partnership: 'There still has to be consequences to actions'
Good luck with that.... there will be a, what's that expression, a fig leaf, but there will be no punishment, unless you consider cashing large checks such. Having cited Orwell and Otter, you had to have known this guy would pop up:
“The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them.”― Vladimir Ilich Lenin
The Saudis are now long on hemp....
I just want to lay a couple of markers as I'm already eyeing the clock. There are a series of comments that appear quite curious in hindsight, leading me to believe that this has been on the table for some time.
First, a while ago both Tiger and Rory started musing about a potential deal, when the part line was that this was a war to the death. The terms they threw out included the elimination of Mr. Norman and the withdrawal of the lawsuits. It seemed strange at the time that these moral arbiters in our game would punch down to Norman, but now it feels like they were negotiating the terms of their surrender.
The second bit that mystifies me were Rory's comments about players potentially skipping majors if those purses aren't dramatically increased. Rory maintains that he fond out about the deal with a call from Jimmy Dunne this Monday, but I simply refuse to accept that those comments could have been coincidental. To me, they can only mean that, having ensured the flow of riches through the PGA Tour (with Saudi money), as direct threat against the legacy events in our game.
One last bit about Rory. Not only is he a dupe, but he's quite the a*****e as well:
And per a report, it did get heated between two players: Rory McIlroy and Grayson Murray.Per Golf Channel, a player said when Murray yelled at PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan — something like, “We don’t trust you, Jay! You should resign right now! You lied to our face!” — McIlroy responded with a dig.“Just play better, Grayson,” he reportedly said. That led to Murray telling McIlroy to “[expletive] off.”
Rory, F**k Off! I have little use for Grayson Murray, but he sure nailed this one.
This is the go-to response whenever anyone complains about anything, and is Rory telling Grayson that he should know his place. Rory, shut the Ef up, because you helped create this mess, redirected Tour riches to an increasingly elite group of players and it is time for you to withdraw from the public and concentrate on your core responsibilities of flying greens with wedges.
Jimmy Dunne - Do you know this man's history?
A Long Island native and Notre Dame graduate, Dunne got his foothold on Wall Street by working at Bear Stearns before leaving to co-found the investment banking firm Sandler O’Neill& Partners in 1988. The firm later took up residence on the 104th floor of the south tower of the World Trade Center, where 83 of its employees reported to work on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001.Dunne would have been among them, but he had traveled to Bedford, New York that day in an attempt to qualify for the U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship. Sixty-six of his coworkers, including his longtime friend Christopher Quackenbush, died in the attack on the south tower. Golf, quite literally, may have saved his life.In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, Dunne and his firm were repeatedly profiled by media outlets who spotlighted their resolve as they began to rebuild. “(Osama) Bin Laden set out to kill me and my colleagues,” he told Newsday in 2002. “What would he like us to do: Build a new business, or to quit and run?”In the years since, Dunne has drawn the letter “Q” on his golf balls to honor Quackenbush, whom he met when they were both teenagers working as caddies at a Long Island golf course.
That sound you hear is Christopher Quackenbush spinning in his grave....
Personally, I don't see what the big deal is, because only 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi.....
Nothing to see here:
Strada and 9/11 Families United have long been among the loudest critics of LIV Golf, which has become a source of controversy and division in the golfing world since its emergence last year.The 9/11 families group has pointed to LIV as a blatant example of sportswashing – an attempt by the Saudis to use golf to deflect attention from their wide-ranging record of human rights abuses, including the government’s involvement in the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. Strada has also repeatedly cited Saudi Arabia’s role in the 9/11 attacks, including that Osama Bin Laden and 15 of the 19 hijackers involved in the attacks were Saudi citizens.“The President’s declassification order uncovered new evidence – which was not available to the 9/11 Commission – that officials in the Saudi government provided material and financial support for a U.S.-based network of assistance that the hijackers relied upon in order to carry out the murder of nearly 3,000 Americans on U.S soil,” she wrote to Augusta National chairman Fred Ridley earlier this year, in a letter urging the course to exclude LIV golfers from the Masters.
At least the Saudi government isn't involved in LIV.... What? That might prove a little awkward.
I'm going to leave this here, mostly because I don't have enough time to dive into the many assessments of winners and losers in this. Needless to say, those are a target-rich environment.
I certainly don't think the rancid aroma of this deal has dissipated in the 48 hours since it became public, though we will see folks accepting it to our horror. We've already seen that from most of the Golf Channel talking heads, Chamblee and Lynch excepted.
I hope to be back tomorrow, although I do have some work starting at our house in the morning. The larger issue is whether your humble blogger will have any interest in professional golf. My Magic 8-Ball says, "Outlook Cloudy", though that seems quite optimistic.
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