Weekend Wrap - Aerification Edition

There's nothing quite like aerated greens to remind your humble blogger that it's ski season....

But we'll cover a couple of bits until my mountain actually opens (though, amusingly, they're already reporting 13" of snow).  I know, numbers as suspicious as those from inner Philadelphia precincts.  Too soon?

Mexicali Blues - Anyone catch that Grateful Dead reference?  The event itself is little import or interest, but talk about finishing strong:

Behind a ridiculous 11 birdies, Austin Eckroat wins World Wide Technology

Eleven birdies is pretty good in mini-golf.

See if you can suss out the irony here:

Video-game numbers. From a video-game player. A day earlier, after he shot a six-under 66 during Saturday’s third round of the World Wide Technology Championship to move within a shot of the lead, Austin Eckroat was asked how he would ready for Sunday. Margs? They’re playing in Mexico this week, after all. Rest?

Neither, Eckroat said.

“Play some more video games, he said. “That’s how I kind of take my mind off things — you can’t think about anything else. I’ll get back, eat some food and play some video games.”

Any one in particular?

“They came out with a new ‘Call of Duty’ — that’s been my obsession of recent,” Eckroat said. “It always changes, but that’s the one right now.”

The only thing I remember about this event is that it's on a Tiger-designed golf course, ironic in that Tiger himself is a Call of Duty kind of guy....

A couple of minor bits.  I've been conscious of Eckroat since his Oklahoma State days, and he could well be poised for a breakout, though I do wish we could moderate the hyperbola:

The takeaway

Something special could be coming from Eckroat. On the Golf Channel broadcast, analyst Johnson Wagner said he wouldn’t be surprised if he made a Scottie Scheffler-like run going forward. Watch out.

In the last twenty-five years, the only players meeting that bar are Tiger and Scottie, so maybe dial it down to 8 Johnson?

The only other bit of note to this observer was the leaderboard of young talent in desperate need of a breakthrough:

Justin Lower, Nico Echavarria and Carson Young start the final round in a share of a one-stroke lead. Lower, Echavarria and Young are at 16-under, Joe Highsmith, Austin Eckroat and Max Greyserman are at 15-under, and Ben Griffin and Maverick McNealy are at 14-under.

Just my way of noting that, had I been watching, I'd have been rooting for any and all of those over Eckroat, for the simple reason that they need it more.  Specifically, we have follow-up on Lower and Greyserman, the latter being the subject of an epically silly Tour Confidential Q&A:

3. Austin Eckroat won the World Wide Technology Championship, besting Justin Lower and Carson Young by one and Max Greyserman by two in Mexico. Greyserman talked earlier in the week about his close calls, and with his third-place finish here, he’s now placed in the top five five times in his 27 career starts (including three 2nds) and still hasn’t won on Tour. Is he the best current PGA Tour player without a victory? Or does someone else hold that title?

Are you finished laughing yet?  Do we think they read the competition?  Because this is a piece that Golf Digest simply refuse to take down:

You won’t believe how many golfers have earned $10 million on the PGA Tour without winning an event

Now, there are some shockingly marginal names on that list, Briny Baird and Jeff Overton as examples, but nobody names Max.  Shall we see how they handle this silliness?

Piastowski: I’ll cheat here a bit and go with Tommy Fleetwood — the seven-time DP World Tour winner and multiple-time Ryder Cupper has stunningly never won on the PGA Tour. But if we’re playing things straight up, gimme Denny McCarthy, maybe the Tour’s best putter. Golf is a hard game. This all being said, Greyserman’s too talented not to win, and I’m thinking he jumps off this list quickly.

Zak: I think Greyserman needs to do it more than just one season to earn that title. It’s definitely Tommy lad, as Nick points out. And it might not be close? Cameron Young comes to mind, too.

Dethier: Let’s get more specific: He’s on the hottest current run of anyone without a Tour win. There’s no guarantee one will ever come, but Greyserman seems to be the total package. He’s high on every watch list for 2025.

As a reminder, Greyserman was the guy that Matt Kuchar tried to convince to wait until Monday morning to finish his final round when  birdie would have put him into a playoff.  That was an iffy decision, but five Top-5's doesn't doesn't require an Hall of Fame bust just yet.

In fact, though, he might need to send a Christmas card to one of his fellow competitors....

Upon Further Review - This story is just bizarre, given that we all know what's going on.

Maverick McNealy figured out the inequity of FedEx Cup points. Now his methodology is a vote away from being adopted

Yeah, many of us have figured it out....

A few months ago, he was perplexed at what appeared to him to be an inequity in the FedEx Cup

points given for majors, signature events, regular events and opposite field events. It was a topic that caused plenty of heartburn among players – particularly the rank and file trying to keep their card – and best exemplified by Lanto Griffin who told Golfweek last fall, “Give them all the money they want but when you start giving them the points, I’ve got a problem with that. Do you know what fifth in an elevated event next year makes in FedEx Cup points? 300. It’s 110 for a normal event. So I go play Torrey Pines with 156 players and a cut and Rory goes to L.A. the next week in a 78 players, no-cut field, and he gets nearly three times the points for the same finish. How is one going to compete with that?”

Griffin knew intuitively that something was out of whack; McNealy went a step further and did the math.

“It was a personal exploration,” McNealy called it. “I didn’t think the points were equitable and a bunch of guys felt the same way.”

I'm going  way out on a limb to take a wild stab at what happened.  As crazy as it might sound, I'm gonna guess that Cantlay and buddies kept all those FedEx Cup points for themselves....  Yeah, it's a gift.

What he found confirmed his beliefs and he eventually shared his findings with the PGA Tour and the Player Advisory Council, who proposed an adjustment to the FedEx Cup points distribution table that, if approved at the Tour’s upcoming board meeting on Nov. 18, would take effect in 2025.

The Tour’s focus in determining the points distribution across a variety of events was solely on creating a system that matched historical retention rates across the top 50, 70 and 125. It’s a small sample size but the system seemed to achieve that goal, but as McNealy illustrated, it simply wasn’t rewarding play uniformly.

McNealy, a 29-year-old Stanford graduate, said it was looking at the results of Canadian pro Corey Conners that initially sent him down this rabbit hole.

“In back-to-back weeks, he finished sixth at the RBC Canadian Open and had a two-way T-20 at the Memorial. So he earned 100 points at Canadian and he got 97.5 at the Memorial. I was like, ‘Hold on a sec. That doesn’t seem right,’” McNealy said.

The good news is that they actually listened and seem prepared to make an adjustment.  The bad news is that said adjustment will render the system only slightly less rigged.  The Tour Confidential panel took on the larger subject of those substantial changes to Tour membership:

1. Last week, the PGA Tour notified members of several proposed changes that could take place in the 2026 season, a couple of which would be handing out fewer Tour cards and reducing field sizes for some events. “I hate all the changes they’re making,” Justin Lower

said last week. “Seems like anytime I do something good they make a change.” Lower, due to his ranking, would be one of the players most likely affected if these changes go through, but with all the Signature Event tweaks, field-size adjustments and constant change in the men’s game lately, does he have a point about the Tour changing too much and even running the risk of confusing the average fan? Is the Tour’s constant change good, bad, or inevitable?

Nick Piastowski: From the fan’s perspective, I think it depends on what you like about the pro game. Do you enjoy watching the stars and mostly familiar names week in and week out? Or do you prefer the occasional underdog? In a sentence, then, the dark horses might get squeezed out — but there’s the strong possibility that the quality of play will improve, as it’ll be harder to keep a Tour card. As for me, I’m a fan of stories — and telling them! — and I think we’ll lose some here.

Let me see if I follow, Nick.  Play will improve by virtue of a smaller field?  Big, if true, but kind of cuts against the grain of our game. 

Sean Zak: Lower definitely has a point, but he’s gonna have to work pretty hard to earn a ton of sympathy. He’s just not one of the 40 or 60 or even top 100 golfers in the world. The truth these days is you need to be a top player to have the system always working in your favor. That is earned by really good golf.

Dylan Dethier: He definitely has a point. And there’s definitely a cost to these changes. But the PGA Tour — and its big-time new consultants — have made this decision with fans and with simplicity in mind. I think this adds clarity to a confusing system, which is a good thing. Still work to do, of course …

Fans and simplicity, Dylan?  The guys making the decisions are also the biggest beneficiaries, but nothing to see here....

2. Another one of the proposed changes was tweaking the pathway to the Tour, and 20 Korn Ferry Tour grads will now receive PGA Tour cards instead of 30. The DP World Tour will once again award 10 cards. In an interview last week following the Tour’s proposed changes, DP World Tour chief Guy Kinnings said it wouldn’t surprise him if more Americans started to consider joining the DP World Tour. Do you agree? And are there advantages and disadvantages to this scenario?

Piastowski: Yeah, I could potentially see that. On the DP World Tour, the purses are bigger, and the locations are more exotic. You can make a good living and travel the globe. But if your goal is the PGA Tour, 20 cards is still greater than 10. I’m questioning how much things change.

Zak: Totally agree, but it’ll be in reverse. As in those who finish outside the top 125 on the Tour first, then head to Europe, rather than those coming from college to Europe on their way to the Tour ranks. But as long as the purses on the KFT are somewhat comparable, the proximity to home is going to be a better fit for most.

Dethier: This week’s DP World Tour field was a reminder that it’s tough to put this circuit in a box — it’s an epic global tour that’s also a feeder tour, an outlet for LIV guys and a part-time stop for some of the biggest stars in the world. I’m all for incorporating it more fully in the PGA Tour system … but there are still big-picture identity questions it has to confront. But as Rory McIlroy said this week, it’s a tour with its options open.

What is to become of the Euro Tour is a bigger topic than can be covered today, but it is little more right now than a feeder tour for the Korn Ferry Tour.  But the larger picture from 30,000 feet is that the ability of young talent to rise in the game has been severely degraded.  Of course there are always ways to break through, take a bow Nick Dunlap, but what we see is the guild protecting its own.

Arnie and Jack were always focused on ensuring that those that came behinds them had greater opportunities.  Tiger and Rory, by way of contrast, seem only focused on ensuring that Patrick Cantlay makes bank.

Methuselah Lives:  All credit to him, but there's something significant missing in these answers:

4. Ageless wonder Bernhard Langer won the Charles Schwab Cup Championship on Sunday in Phoenix, extending his senior-circuit winning streak to 18 years and giving the 67-year-old pro his record-extending 47th win on PGA Tour Champions. Given Langer’s talent and longevity and the mass sums being made on the PGA Tour these days, is his PGA Tour Champions win record (which could still be added to) something that will ever be broken?

Piastowski: No. Unless that dude who wears red on Sunday — who turns 49 next month! — commits to a full Champions schedule.

Ummm, Nick, the guy never played a full schedule on the big Tour, so how many 54-hole events do you have him penciled in for?

Zak: It will not be broken. It’s ridiculous. I see that level of pro golf only developing more parity moving forward, too. Langer’s records are safe.

Dethier: The PGA Tour Champions is funny because your age works against you from the moment you make your debut. For everyone else, that is. Remarkable stuff and a testament to his discipline.

You know what other record was never going to be broken?  Yup, Hale Irwin's senior win total....

That irony aside, does anyone appreciate that this tour is on the Endangered Species List?   This round-belly tour exists and survives only because of large subsidies from the PGA Tour.....  Hmmm, anything change there recently?  Now on a for-profit model and with Vulture Capitalists requiring a return on their invested capital, one assumes that these subsidies should not be taken for granted.  Enough said?

Then again, if it were to be cancelled or curtailed, would anyone notice?  

That's it for today, kids.  Thanks for dropping by and, while a reduced blogging schedule is to be expected this time of year, we'll cover anything of interest that presents.  Have a great week.

Thursday Threads - Mourning In America Edition

So, how's your week going?  My own has been shockingly good, including playing Old Oaks yesterday in shorts with Employee No. 2.  Oh, and there was this:

America Unburdens Itself From What Has Been https://t.co/MElsQSK1sE pic.twitter.com/8OpkkqK9Jc

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) November 6, 2024

Although, given my slightly elevated A1C, I'm a little worried that the tears of liberals might be a little too heavy on the carbs....

Very little golf to cover, but I do promise to stop gloating...notwithstanding the intersection involved below.  As you might recall, on Monday we featured a report for The Sun that a merger deal between the PGA and LIV was done, or at least doneish.  But what has followed is radio silence, excepting this from Front Page Sports:

Not So Fast: PGA Tour–LIV Merger Not Done Yet

Multiple sources say reports of professional golf’s unification are premature; heavy internal pressure remains to ink a peace treaty before the end of the year.

Well, to be fair, it's been almost 18 months since Neville Jay announced Peace in our Time.   

Alas, there's little there there, with no details on where the fault lines in the negotiations might be:

British tabloids reported Saturday that the two sides have a deal at last. But multiple industry sources say the reports are premature.

One of the few things you can say with absolute certainty about the PGA Tour–LIV deal is that everyone working on it is bogged down in the details—details that will allow them to quell antitrust concerns, prevent players who turned down the rebel tour from mutiny, and keep golf fans happy.

That is quite the needle to thread, and the lack of publicly available details speaks to the sensitivities and difficulties of piecing everything together to finalize a deal.

There has been heavy internal pressure, sources tell Front Office Sports, to ink a peace treaty before the end of the year to avoid making future scheduling more complicated than it already will be. The PGA Tour has already released its 2025 schedule, while LIV has released only four international tournament dates.

Though this 'graph might induce a spit-take:

Whether you believe pros wearing shorts and tournaments with no cuts is truly a radical development, players who defected to the team-based competition are largely happy with their decision based on reduced workloads, equity in the franchises they represent, and a novelty that is yet to wear off. The majority would, however, like the opportunity to play in majors as well as see an end to the fractured landscape.

Oh, sure, they're happy as clams, at least if you ignore all of Jon Rahm's whining.... That being on actual TV gets old, so I suppose it's a relief to them to not have witnesses to their desultory play.

Some of the background music is just plain hysterical.  For instance, apparently Norman père has made such a hash of things, that the fils is handling the clean-up in Aisle Six.  Here's the set-up, which itself is worth a chuckle:

As a result, both sides are continuing on their own separate paths. The PGA Tour, for example, is considering a bevy of changes to reduce the field sizes at tournaments to a more manageable size. The changes are currently before the Player Advisory Council, awaiting its decision.

Among the strategies to reach their goal of smaller tournaments is the elimination of Monday Qualifiers at some tournaments, and the reduction of spots available at Monday Qualifiers at other events.

Is their goal to make their events smaller?  Because I must admit, these guys are good!  

But what's the brainstorm?

But now that could largely be coming to an end. Enter the son of current LIV Golf CEO Greg

Norman, Greg Norman Jr.

Upon hearing of the potential changes to PGA Tour Monday Qualifiers, Norman Jr. took to X to share a wild idea for LIV that he has “been preaching for a while.”

The idea? Run weekly qualifiers at LIV events to make up a “People’s Team” that would compete against the pros like Brooks Koepka and Bryson DeChambeau.

“For what it’s worth… I’ve been preaching for awhile that LIV should absolutely open up weekly qualifiers for a People’s Team, a team that anyone can qualify for,” Norman Jr. wrote on X. “If you play well, you stay on the team, and the general public can participate in shared ownership and governance.”

Does he know that Dad is being kicked upstairs?  I didn't think LIV could be a bigger joke, but perhaps I need to be more unburdened by what has been.  Although my strongest reaction to attempts to make LIV appeal to actual golf fans is along the lines of, "Why start now?"

But now we get to the intersection of LIV/PGA Tour and the larger news cycle, as apparently the sock has fallen out of the mouth of a certain Ulsterman.  Though it's amusing to hear him admitting that he's out of the loop:

McIlroy, speaking Wednesday ahead of the DP World Tour's Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship, the tour's penultimate event of 2024, said he was unaware of the PGA Tour and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund having already come to a deal, reported last week by The Sun, calling it a surprise. “It’s the first that I’ve heard of it,” McIlroy said of the alleged pact. “I know [PGA Tour commissioner] Jay [Monahan] was in Saudi Arabia last week at the FII and was having some meetings. I think I would’ve heard if there was.

“He’s briefing the transaction committee tonight, so maybe some news comes out of that. But as far as I’m aware, I haven’t heard a thing.”

Oh sure, Rory, you'll be the first to know....

But here's his hot take:

However, McIlroy pointed to Trump’s victory over Kamala Harris as potentially facilitating peace between the two sides.

“Given today’s news with what’s happened in America, I think that clears the way a little bit,” McIlroy said. “So we’ll see.”

Trump is heavily involved with LIV Golf, with the Saudi-backed circuit hosting several of its events at Trump properties.

In a separate interview, McIlroy was asked about Trump’s previous claim that he could end the game’s civil war “in 15 minutes.”

“He might be able to,” McIlroy told Sky Sports. “He’s got Elon Musk, who I think is the smartest man in the world, beside him. We might be able to do something if we can get Musk involved, too.

“Yeah, I think from the outside looking in, it’s probably a little less complicated than it actually is. But obviously Trump has a great relationship with Saudi Arabia. He’s got a great relationship with golf. He’s a lover of golf. So, maybe. Who knows?"

Yeah, that would be enemy of The People Elon Musk?  Have they locked him up yet?  We can't be able to express our opinions in public, can we?  I had been reliably informed that Free Speech and Democracy were mutually exclusive.

Please do bear in mind that I've been hoping for Rory to shut his pie hole for some time now, as he's become quite pathetic in his need to be relevant.  So, I think as always he should duck such questions, but I also believe that this Eamon Lynch piece will include some howlers:

Lynch: Rory McIlroy should have answered the Donald Trump question with a shrug. But he didn’t

But Eamon is always interesting and amusing, so let's allow him to beclown himself:

The first Wednesday of November during leap years is a perilous time for public commentary as U.S. Presidential election results are debated in a manner just as partisan as the campaign that preceded it. This one is no different. Depending on whom you ask, one political party peddled faux populism and racism while displaying an astonishing appetite for conspiracy theories, while the other is woefully incapacitated by its indulgence of identity ideologues, Hamas groupies and gender jihadists. Which is to say there was already plenty to pick over without wondering if the election of Donald Trump would help professional golfers get paid more.

During a Wednesday press conference at a tournament in Abu Dhabi, Rory McIlroy was asked about progress in talks between the PGA Tour and the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia. “Given today’s news with what has happened in America, I think that clears the way a little bit. So we’ll see,” he offered, before adding that it would be “a huge moment” if the Department of Justice under Trump was more amenable to green-lighting a deal than Biden’s DOJ might have been.

It's not even clear to me that we fully understand what a Biden Justice Department would do,  as this is a bizarre application of antitrust law.  

In our hyper-polarized moment, even comments that are both bland and obvious can be construed as endorsing the election outcome, something McIlroy didn’t actually do. But those three words — “clears the way” — earned a pointedly sour reception. McIlroy gave the impression of welcoming the prospect of Trump interfering with a regulatory process to benefit a coddled group of golfers who’ve already alienated legions of fans weary of their entitlement and greed.

Eamon, are you suggesting that the Biden Justice Department isn't politicized?  Really, do you know Merrick Garland?  More importantly, did you see yesterday's announcement?

Justice Department and special counsel in talks about how to wind down Trump prosecutions

Gee, Eamon, any thoughts on why they would do this if they were strong, righteous cases?   But Eamon wants us to believe that the "regulatory process" under Trumps predecessor was somehow unsullied by temporal life.

But here's where Eamon reveals what a profound buffoon he can be:

Even leaving aside the generous encomium for Musk, who has spent months amplifying racists and antisemites in his social media sewer, McIlroy knows better — a fact he quickly admitted. “I think from the outside looking in, it’s probably a little less complicated than it actually is. But obviously, Trump has a great relationship with Saudi Arabia. He’s got a great relationship with golf. He’s a lover of golf. So, maybe. Who knows? But I think as the president of the United States again, he’s probably got bigger things to focus on than golf.”

He just slurred Trump voters as anti-Semites.  Obviously, according to Eamon, we can't have democracy with free speech rights, because some of those folks use spe4ech of which Eamon doesn't approve.  Of course, he'll call those Twitter posters conspiracy nutjobs, ignoring that the difference between a conspiracy theory and the truth is, checking notes, fifteen minutes.

Eamon is having a bad morning, as liberals will when their ability to control outcomes by calling normies racist is taken away from him.  Eamon, there are all sorts of allegedly serious organizations offering milk and cookies for those distraught by Tuesday's results, I suggest you go find a safe space.  I's gonna be a long four years for you...

But here's where he appeals to the broader intifada:

Instead, what McIlroy inadvertently did was reinforce a widespread perception of myopic entitlement among Tour players. Millions of people awoke this morning with leaden uncertainty about things that actually matter — economic stability, support in times of war, global alliances, civil rights, basic healthcare, immigration status. That environment is sufficiently fraught without a golfer idly speculating on whether the election might be a treat for those impatient to get their hands on some Saudi riyal.

Notice that buried "Immigration status"?  Eamon, let me explain the world to you, using this from your sainted Beeb:

The Republican presidential nominee has repeatedly criticised the government's record on the border, claiming - without providing evidence - that "Kamala Harris has allowed 21 million illegals to pour in from all over the world.”

Do you see that number, Eamon?  We're not talking about a few folks' immigration status, we're talking about an invasion force.

Two quotes that Eamon might want to consider, first from David Horowitz:

“An SDS radical once wrote, “The issue is never the issue. The issue is always the revolution.” In other words the cause - whether inner city blacks or women - is never the real cause, but only an occasion to advance the real cause which is the accumulation of power to make the revolution.”

It's hardly about immigration status, Eamon, the revolution took a hit with Tuesday's results, so I understand that Eamon is in mourning.

The second might be the most frequently utilized quote in this blog:

“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

― George Orwell, 1984

I'll exit on the meme, which I do hope Eamon sees:

 Have a great weekend and perhaps we can pic k up other golf news beginning Monday.

Weekend Wrap - Peace In Our Time Edition

Always a sad time on the golf calendar as we segue into ski season.  This weekend was our last with pristine greens, as the crews are descending upon Greenwich, CT and the punching will commence at daybreak.  

I spare you most details of my own games, though yesterdays round, played in cold, blustery conditions, began in amusing fashion.  I walked off our sixth green realizing that my card included five bogeys and an eagle....  Yeah, it's a funny game.  But there was a pure 8-iron to 3 1/2 feet whose memory will keep me warm all winter.

Shall we get to business.  I awoke thinking this would be a cobbled-together post with items of marginal interest.  On the contrary, it seems that our world is about to be rocked, but you wouldn't know it from any of three major golf websites/magazines.  Seriously, the lede is a photo of Charlie Hull and a camel:

I believe that's Charlie in the blue top....

Golf Digest has an item on using the rules to lower your scores, and Golf.com uses their Tour Confidential feature as the lede, but their writers are amusingly out of the loop these days.

You've seen the HE-Jay pairing (don't know what that "HE" means?  Stay tuned) at the Dunhill.  There apparently was another such pairing in Saudi Arabia, and this as well:

Another meeting between the PGA Tour and PIF leaders? Both just attended the same conference in Saudi Arabia

I shan't leave you in suspense any longer, per The Sun our long national nightmare is apparently about to end:

ON PAR: Golf’s civil war OVER as Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods help negotiate £1BILLION peace deal between PGA Tour and LIV Golf

LIV put on 14 events this year but their tournaments will now come under the PGA umbrella

Phil hardest hit?  If only....

Rebel tour LIV’s Saudi Arabian backers are poised to cough up the staggering fee to become part of the PGA Tour circuit.

The money will give Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, who bankroll the breakaway LIV Golf, an 11 per cent share in the Tour.

In return they will get two places on the PGA Tour board — including the post of chairman.

Superstars Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy have played key roles in the peace talks.

The deal still has to be approved by PGA players but they are expected to agree.

Only $1 billion?  Kind of a distressed deal, no?

But, lest you be worried about how this will affect Patrick, no need to fret:

The sweetener for golfers who stayed loyal to the PGA Tour is likely to be another massive cash injection into the £1.2bn fund created this year to reward those players.

The DP World Tour will also benefit, as their ‘strategic alliance’ with the PGA Tour will be reinforced, with extra cash diverted for prize money.

Yeah, I'm guessing they'll get Patrick's vote.

This is as good a time as any to allow the stenographers at Golf Magazine to show how out of the loop they are, from this week's Tour Confidential panel:

Amid golf’s continued divide, there was another reported meeting last week between PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan and PIF boss Yasir Al-Rumayyan. How significant is this news in the interest of a deal being completed? A little? Or a lot?

Berhow: I’m bored with this. They have jets and can meet whenever they want.

Sens: Word is they were just trading casserole recipes. I read that on social media, so it must be true. Come to think of it, maybe they should try sharing a potluck meal. None of these other meetings seem to be leading anywhere

Bastable: Right. I think we’re all at or well past the point at which only an official announcement about the PGA Tour and PIF’s path forward together will get our attention. Fans are frustrated, jaded, disenchanted. Even when a deal is hammered out and presented, it’s going to take a long time to re-engage those fans who have walked over the past couple of years. I, for one, remain hopeful, though. There are too many smart people in the room — and the stakes are far too high — to screw this up.

So much for shoe-leather journalism....

To this observer, the $1 billion large is a yawn, but the most interesting bit is the one about turning LIV over to the PGA Tour, which would seem to invite Justice Department scrutiny, although they can't force HE to continue to fund LIV.  At least, I don't think they can, though after tomorrow all bets are off.

The only U.S.-based golf writer that has this story is our Geoff Shackelford, and he comes at it from a weird angle.  Geoff has always liked the ponies, but see how you take to this take:

The Pro Golf Horse Race 

With a deal close between the PGA Tour and PIF, can the two sides learn from the decline of another sport that put off-course business above the competition?

Happy Melbourne Cup to all QuadrilateralDownUnderians!

Last Saturday, America’s horse racing Super Bowl wrapped up two-days of races at Del Mar. Those who watched saw Kentucky Derby runner-up Sierra Leone capturing the $7 million Breeders Cup Classic. This traditionally well-run November gathering is played out in ever-more anonymity despite bringing together the best on a beautiful stage. And the once-wildly popular American version of horse racing continues to toil in anonymity on all but Kentucky Derby day.

The list of self-induced problems starts with an inability to jettison cheaters who maniacally sent out unsound horses, only to see some die while their jockeys broke collar bones (if they were lucky). The year-round sport also races too many days compared to other parts of the world. Beyond the bizarre inability to weed out twisted trainers and low-level claiming races where stuff happens, the sport revolves around the wildly lucrative breeding business over the actual racing.

This unhealthy prioritization of what happens off the track started when Middle Eastern interests took an interest in the sport a few decades ago. Since gambling is forbidden in places like Dubai and Saudi Arabia, the push into horse racing was primarily designed to westernize images. And now, to profit off the breeding business. But silly money on the breeding side has made the sport less relatable or competitive. American stakes races now seem to exist only to build a resume for peak stud fees or eye-popping auction sales of unproven horses.

Race purses are comically low, disincentivizing longer racing careers that would let fans get to know the sometimes-wild, often-heartwarming backstories of horses and their connections. As a result of the misplaced priorities, general sports fans have largely abandoned the sport and left it to bettors and the breeding industry. The average American sports nut could not give two, three, four, or five hoots if Into Mischief sired a winner. Or that he now commands $250,000 every time he hooks up with a chosen mare. 

Those prioritizing the breeding business think it’s all wildly fascinating. Even as the sport is dying after prioritizing commerce over safety and while waiting too long to reassure fans that integrity mattered.

Readers under forty will be sending me a TL:DR on that, and justifiably so.  But I think he's trying to hint that certain folks in the golf ecosystem might be overly focused on commerce....  Any thoughts, Patrick?

Here's where he ties it together:

I point this out because professional golf is veering toward the same lack of popularity as horse racing. The men’s pro game is struggling to uphold the integrity of its competitions after years of not enforcing slow play policies. The PGA Tour continues to resist regulations to keep golf's footprint from growing to unsustainable sizes. And now, tournament fields are shrinking to accommodate the bloat.

The pro game is solidifying a Middle East partnership with a government looking to replenish a sordid reputation. Saudi Arabia wants to use golf to open up new communication lines with business leaders and sell stakes in golf team franchises.

For the love of the game, this is not.

Fair enough, although horse racing at least was once popular..... I know the appeal of professional golf is becoming, in the immortal words of Ian Faith, increasingly selective, but perhaps we might also acknowledge that, at its peak, no one was watching.

Since Geoff is mostly sole source at this juncture, I'm going to spit at the fair use doctrine and pretty much excerpt the whole damn thing:

The Sun’s David Facey reported Saturday that “Golf’s civil war is on the brink of a £1 billion peace deal,” with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund finally ready to hand over the lightly-watched, rarely-taken-seriously LIV Golf to the PGA Tour. This should not come as a surprise since it’s been well over a year since the “events of June 6th” rollout of a “framework agreement.” Comments from well-connected players in recent weeks predicted an impending deal between the adversaries—with the usual caveats about possible detours caused by the Department of Justice, Lina Khan, the Presidential election outcome, or if Mercury is in retrograde. We also know from reports by Bunkered and Golf Digest that PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan was in resplendent Riyadh last week and joined by select minions. All of this comes just weeks after October’s olive branch pro-am round at the Alfred Dunhill Links featuring Andrew Waterman Yasir Al-Rumayyan His Excellency H.E. and Monahan.

I know. You’re getting emotional thinking about those two hacking it around Carnoustie and brainstorming how to bring some Steamboat to the future slopes of Neom.

H.E. His Ownself confirmed last week that PIF was cutting back on international investments to focus on domestic stuff like the disastrously expensive and deadly Neom. But before cutting back, PIF is still going to cut a large check to the PGA Tour and, according to The Sun, let them figure out what to do with LIV Golf while having cash to possibly buy some stuff. Who knows what? But they can now afford the Ryder Cup or Pebble Beach.

For the headache and agony of figuring out how to assimilate the two tours, PIF will reportedly take an 11% share in the Tour. According to Facey, H.E. will get a “Chairman” title entitling him to tedious conference calls about slow play. The Tour will reportedly throw in an additional board seat since they do this a lot these days and have two bloated boards to prove it. But it’s not clear from Facey’s report if the Saudi seats will be on the for-profit or non-profit boards.

Who cares?

Yes, but what's also unclear is whether the for-profit entity can actually make a profit, rather a non-trivial query given that we'll now be at $2.5 billion of invested capital theoretically interested in a return above and beyond the pleasure of smelling Tiger's jockstrap.

Eventually the non-profit model will get swallowed up by the money maker. Arthur Blank already said the quiet part out loud back in February.

So it’s only a matter of time before the still-non-profit PGA Tour is touting its multi-billion valuation and sending more checks to players for (still) being in the right place at the right time. Emboldened golfers armed with a Tour card will continue to insist on TIO relief from every wire, imaginary fishing line, leaf, branch or plume of gassy air interfering with a direct line at the flagstick. But at least the rule-bending in golf is not nearly as grim as what happens when horse racing looks the other way. People and animals get hurt. Fans can’t flee fast enough.

Golf’s flaunting of the rules goes over almost as poorly with core fans who still value displays of sportsmanship and integrity. Casual fans are not turned on by much of anything other than major championship weeks.

I think we can agree on some core principals, most importantly that the game of golf is unable to grow until Patrick Cantlay gets paid.  That is the essence of the Brave New Golf World, and we've seen golf fans voting with their eyeballs.  Cornhole is drawing larger viewership, but nothing to see here....

I will leave you on that depressing note.  I just ask that everyone remember the involvement of Tiger and Rory in creating this effed up world, and their abandonment of the larger Tour membership.  At least that's my primary takeaway from the last three years.

I'll catch you later in the week as the story develops.