Tour Update - We're in quite the interregnum, a concept not native to these shores:
An interregnum (plural interregna or interregnums) is a period of discontinuity or "gap" in a government, organization, or social order. Archetypally, it was the period of time between the reign of one monarch and the next (coming from Latin inter-, "between" and rēgnum, "reign" [from rex, rēgis, "king"]), and the concepts of interregnum and regency therefore overlap. Historically, longer and heavier interregna have been typically accompanied by widespread unrest, civil and succession wars between warlords, and power vacuums filled by foreign invasions or the emergence of a new power. A failed state is usually in interregnum.
Not hard to conceive of the PGA Tour as a failed state.... Just think of Patrick Cantlay as one of those warlords trying to fill a power vacuum, and it all kind of makes sense.
In no particular order, yesterday's Tour Confidential panel took some time to assess where we are:
1. In PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan’s first sit-down interview with reporters since he returned from a leave to address health issues brought on by anxiety (check out our NickPiastowski’s recap here), he revealed little detail about the status of the Tour’s ongoing negotiations with the Saudi Public Investment Fund other than to say: “We’re hopeful that we’re going to reach an agreement, but ultimately these conversations — we’re going to get to a place where we feel like we have something that we recommend [to the Tour policy board], and if we feel like we’re in that position, then I think you can assume that you think it’s going to get done.” He added: ‘I’m determined and inspired to get there on behalf and for our players and for our fans.” With Jan. 1 looming, do you suspect a deal will get done?
So, he's just going to babble on like that crazy Uncle up in the attic. If I follow, we can assume that we think it's going to get done, whatever that might mean when translated into English.
Zephyr Melton: I do think the deal will get pushed through ultimately. Monahan and Dunne have put all their eggs in one basket, and failure would be an unmitigated disaster. With both sides extremely motivated (although for different reasons), it feels like they’ll make the deal happen.Jessica Marksbury: I agree, Zephyr. It seems unfathomable that this would fall apart on the Tour side, given what has already transpired behind closed doors. And now with Tiger Woods in the mix, it seems like whatever is decided in the future will have the backing of the Tour membership. What still seems unclear is whether or not the Justice Department will pursue a block.Josh Sens: True that, Jessica. And among the things we learned about that initial framework agreement is that the parties involved either knew little to nothing about antitrust issues or opted to simply look past them as they rushed to put an end to the legal battle with a half-baked peace accord. The devil will be in the details, and those details will be looked at closely by regulators. I expect there to be an agreement by Jan. 1. But that agreement will still be a long way from a done deal.
Even Jay has admitted that the Framework wasn't a deal, but merely an agreement to try to find a deal. That said, they've pretty clearly crossed the Rubicon, so hard to see a way back.
More importantly, the deal they're trying to strike shouldn't be that hard to put to bed. What I mean by that is that the deal is premised on what seems to be a fairly substantial fraud, to wit, that the PGA Tour will retain control. The Saudis are prepared to play the long game, so they would seem likely to do what needs to be down, agree to any fig leaves that support the premise of continued Tour control, as well as pay off those needy souls requiring emotional support that comes with dollar signs attached.
But I've never seen much of a way that any deal could be operational in 2024, and DJ and Phil will need a place to play, so the guess is that LIV isn't going anywhere.
2. Did anything Monahan told reporters, on any topic, surprise you?Melton: While I have my reservations about some of Monahan’s recent moves, I did admire his candidness about his struggles with anxiety. It’s not always easy to be forthright about such a taboo topic, but Monahan didn’t beat around the bush. Here’s to hoping his mental health is in a better place.
I had been reliably informed that hope was not a strategy.... Mental health is a serious issue, but isn't the protocol for patients suffering debilitating reactions to stress to, yanno, reduce the stress they're facing? Am I the only one asking whether Jay should still hold the keys?
Marksbury: If there’s anything this merger situation has taught us, it’s that there’s a heck of a lot going on behind the scenes that we aren’t privy to. So, in saying that, while there wasn’t anything that Monahan said recently that surprised me, I did think it was interesting when he said the Tour would still be sustainable in the event the PIF deal collapses. I’d love to hear more on that. Sustainable in what way? The current model, or a skeleton version? I imagine there’s a contingent of players out there who may find such an avenue more attractive than the current framework agreement.Sens: Talk of sustainability even if the PIF deal collapses made me wonder if there’s anything to one of the theories I’ve heard knocked around: that Monahan and Co. are hoping that the deal falls apart under federal review, leaving the Tour to then go seek a partnership with non-Saudi, private equity money. But all of that is getting into the realm of spy-novel-like speculation, in a financial world so opaque to most of us that we’d have more luck gazing with our naked eyes into the depth of a black hole.
I've got whiplash. The deal had to be done because the Tour was suddenly unsustainable, yet now it's hitting on all cylinders. Of course, Jay told us previously that the Tour was economically viable for a period of years, so perhaps we should acknowledge that Jay's relationship to the truth is no less transactional than Phil's.
I do find it interesting that Josh finds the financial issues opaque, whereas to me they're really quite simple. There's an ecosystem of TV contracts and other revenue sources, and we're being told that our terrific peni will simply not show up for what that system can support. Therefore, an economically irrational subsidy is required, and fortunately Jay just happens to have a buddy named Yasir willing to do just that....
We often feature Dylan Dethier's Monday Finish column on Tuesday's here, and this week's edition is of interest. Dylan is young and credulous, but see what you think of his reaction to Jay's, mea culpa:
WHAT WE’RE HEARINGJay speaks.PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan met with the media for the first time since his five-week medical leave earlier this summer. My colleague Nick Piastowski broke down that meeting here,and I wrote more about the Tour’s whirlwind of leadership changes here. But I was struck by what Monahan said was his biggest regret. Some leaders seem to double down on their mistakes by insisting they weren’t mistakes at all. Monahan seems to lean the other way; he’s been eager to acknowledge missteps, particularly in the wake of the Tour’s surprise June 6th announcement.“My biggest regret was not being more patient on the night of June 5th,” he said. “I think moving to make this announcement the next day, if I could do it over again — we don’t get do‑over‑agains in this sport, but I would have flown up to Toronto [site of that week’s PGA Tour event] and would have communicated directly to the players that day before anything was said publicly.“It wouldn’t change my belief and my determination for what we had accomplished. But I put our players on their back foot, and that’s something that I regret and will not do again and will learn from.”Monahan has always taken pride in his relationships with Tour pros. My understanding is that of all the fallout from the announcement, some Tour pros turning on him has hurt the most. He reiterated his reasons for keeping things quiet — sensitivities on both sides, concerns about leaks, etc. — but still counted it as a clear regret and something he wishes he’d communicated differently.“Yeah, I think making certain that every constituent is tied to our membership fully understood it that day before anything was said publicly, yeah, that’s what I’m saying. But primarily the players,” he concluded.
Let me see if I have this right.... For almost two years, you encouraged the players to turn down massive riches and assured them that you would never capitulate to the enemy. Then you sign the Ribbentrop-Molotov Non-Aggression Pact, but your only regret is that you didn't look them in the eye as you pulled the rug out from under them?
And how is he reacting to these allegations of betrayal? He's so devastated by it that he's continuing to lie to the players about how this deal might play out. Sure, the Saudis will continue to fund the billions required to keep Patrick happy without wanting anything for it..... But Dylan puts this in the category of taking ownership, whereas to me it's just the opposite. He rhetorically recognizes the betrayal, but then gets back to his ore responsibility of further betraying his players.
So, where does this leave us? I've no clue, but Mike Bamberger has long been an astute observer of the game, so this might be of interest:
LIV Golf and the PGA Tour appear here to stay, which makes it a good time to assess the future of the pro game
Obviously he agrees about LIV being here at least for now, but to me he way over-interprets this guy's involvement:
Enter Tiger Woods, about 18 months after Mickelson’s move, and Tiger’s decision to join the PGA Tour’s policy board. Woods might seem like the coldest and most calculating warrior-athleteyou could ever imagine, and he most likely is. But on a more basic level than even that, everything is personal to him. Michael Corleone had it only half correct when he said, “It’s not personal. It’s strictly business.” To the greatest of the greats, it’s both.Woods’s golfing life is rooted in the racism his father endured in these United States. It is his jet fuel. Tiger has understandable and immense pride in his career on the PGA Tour, an American sporting and corporate institution, one that is a pure meritocracy. Now he will look to bury Phil’s get-richer-now dreams, bury Greg Norman’s global-golf-village aspirations, bury the PIF’s we-own-golf ambitions. I wouldn’t bet against him.Woods, like Arnold and Jack—and Sam Snead and Byron Nelson and Ben Hogan before them—is about as Buy American as a person can be. The PGA Tour is American. It just is. Seve came to America and didn’t like it, save for one week a year. Norman came to America and did. But both were here on passports in every sense of the word. Tiger’s goal, as a Tour board member, will be to preserve the Tour’s status as an American institution to which the best golfers in the world aspire. Thereby his records will endure.
Where the heck did that come from?
So, sovereignty is an issue I've raised here once or twice, one whose absence has surprised me. There's the American institution issue as Mike presents, but also just the issue of the Tour remaining independent and controlling its own fate, none of which seems terribly important to those in the C-Suite. Of course, most of our political class thinks the U.S. is a country conceived in original sin, so it makes perfect sense that Jay would align with the cool kids.
But what supports Mike's premise that Tiger is "about as Buy American as a person can be"? I'm sorry, but that last 'graph seems wildly inconsistent with the preceding one, no? That Tiger's experience through the eyes of his father would render him rather more suspicious of his country, even justifiably so. More importantly, what evidence is there that Tiger much cares about anything but himself?
Mike does hit on the disconnect, though I think he draws the wrong conclusion:
It’s clear, through little crystal-ball statements here and there, that both LIV Golf and the PGA Tour are not going anywhere. They cannot co-exist in a partnership. In other words, this framework agreement, about which we have heard so much? Between the politics and the legal framework and the public-relations optics and the rest, I don’t see it happening. It may not die on the vine, but I just don’t see how this partnership flies. Hostile takeovers are one thing. One group owns the other, and the conquered party has no choice. Hostile partnerships are another.As a starting point the inherent issue of co-existence, there are not enough weeks in the year to accommodate both LIV Golf and the PGA Tour schedule. And even more to the point, there just isn’t enough global interest in golf. Cam Smith, native Aussie, can draw in Adelaide, in South Australia, but not at the Greenbrier, the West Virginia resort where the LIVsters gathered last week.
Mike's logic seems to be the following:
- The agreement is presented as n hostile partnership, which of course can't be sustainable, therefore;
- The deal will not be completed.
Quick note 1: It hurts to see golf shoot itself in its FootJoys over this golf-ball debate. Yes, themodern golf ball, in conjunction with modern equipment, goes ridiculous distances when struck by superb athletes, who threaten Golden Age course design and have upended the notion of the par-5. But for now, all the governing bodies need to do is come up with a ball for exclusive use at the four men’s majors, so that Augusta National and Merion and the Old Course and Medinah and the East Course at PGA Frisco don’t have to grow longer and longer each time the show comes to town. The MGB ball. The Major Golf Ball ball. Yes, repetition for emphasis.If the PGA Tour wants to come in, to use the MGB for the Players, then come on in and watch your status rise. TPC Sawgrass can stay right where it is at 7,200 yards. Elite golfers will aspire to using the MGB ball, just as elite amateur baseball players aspire to stepping into the batter’s box with a wooden bat.Nobody cares how far the players hit it week in and week out on the PGA Tour, in college events or in men’s match-play USGA amateur events. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t threaten anything. Just start with the MGB ball for four or five events a year. All the manufacturers can make them, if they like, and if they don’t the tournaments can hand out balls to the competitors, just as the tennis events do. No biggie. A ball that maxes out at 300 yards. In other words, a radically shorter ball. Yes, the players will have to adjust. Part of the challenge. May the best man win.
So simple, eh? It is mostly where we stand, except for the fact that one of those four organizations, the Frisco kids, have refused to play along. But, for now, three of the four are going down this path with the Tour's consent, although I'm not reading too much into that. It's just that in the present moment Jay isn't saying No to his top players about anything...
Here he makes the important point, though then sees a shiny object:
The PIF money is funny money. The new, elevated PGA Tour events, with their elevated purses, an effort to stem the tide of defections, is funny money, and is not sustainable. Golf isn’t big enough to support $25 million purses a dozen or so times a year. If Patrick Cantlay wanted to go LIV, the Tour should have just said bye-bye. He’s a smart person and he has a beautiful putting stroke but nobody is paying good money to watch him play golf. But people will pay good money to see what player can emerge from the 144 or so assembled in any given week. Martin Kaymer has won two majors. He was once one of the best golfers in the world. He plays LIV Golf now. He’s the captain of the Cleeks. Do you know anybody who cares? When was the last time his name came up in one of your golf chats?
Focus, Mike! You've just said the important part out loud, that the Tour is committed to an unsustainable business model. Forget the Cleeks, what are the implication of that revelation you just tripped over? It's insane or disingenuous, but all you can do is look back and say they should have let the terrific penis go..... I agree, but it doesn't help all that much right now.
But this is his only solution?
Tiger became Tiger because he beat everybody, sometimes with a scowl on his face. Phil became Phil because he beat almost everybody, and had a good time doing it.So now Tiger Woods has a chance to try to beat Phil Mickelson one more time, and Greg Norman and the PIF threat while he’s at it. He will play a significant role in attracting new investors to the PGA Tour. How they will make money from such an investment is not at all obvious. As a starting point, the PGA Tour will most likely need to give up its not-for-profit status, just as Major League Baseball and the NFL have done.My friend Neil Oxman, a political consultant who caddied for Tom Watson after the death of Bruce Edwards, offered up a wish-list of potential investors in the PGA Tour. That is, American saviors of an American institution: Michael Bloomberg, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates.
Yowzer, we have truly entered a house of mirrors.
Here's a crazy idea, Mike. Instead of Tiger convincing Mike Bloomberg to piss away billions, did you ever consider having him convince Patrick Cantlay to play for what the golf world can support?
But Mike just keeps going with htis nonsense on stilts:
“It’s easy to suggest to other people what to do with their money and even three guys as wealthy as Bloomberg, Buffett and Gates might have to pause for a few minutes before they ponied up $500 million-plus apiece,” Neil wrote in an email. “But they would look like heroes, underwrite the Tour’s financial stability for probably a couple of decades and [table] the backlash that has emerged since the announcement of the merger.”Ownership of baseball teams works not because owners make money year after year, in good times and bad. It works because the franchises increase in value over time and when owners sell they cash out and before they sell they can borrow against the value of their teams.The franchises of the PGA Tour could be the long-standing tournaments: Hawaii I, Hawaii II; Torrey Pines and L.A. and Pebble; Bay Hill and Memorial; Colonial and Hilton Head and the old Western Open. The bidding starts at $100 million. You want to be the big person on campus? Raise your hand.
Mike, did you happen so notice how the Tour treated Honda? After 42 years of sponsorship, they destroyed their franchise in a nanosecond. Just to keep Cantlay on the reservation.... So, yanno, good luck with that.
I had far more ambitious plans for today's post, but I'm pretty depressed after blogging the above. I'll just leave you with this amusing editorial comment on Tour leadership:
This video is a good analogy for Jay Monahan’s leadership of the pga tour 😂😂 https://t.co/pzGqpWNXYT
— Tron Carter (@TronCarterNLU) August 13, 2023
Catch you Friday, as I've got morning golf the next two days.
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