Fire Drill 079: LIV and Let Thrive

PGA Tour salvaging the best of a tough situation. I mean that the whole game was on this path of you know, mutually assured destruction. To use an old Cold War term. I mean it was it had become unsustainable that the tour was losing sponsors, a lot of the

tournaments were going to wither and die. Live was entrenched his own business model that was never going to make money, and they have not been able to track any kind of audience through streaming or television, and so it was it was kind of a question of who is going to blink first, and I think they blinked at the same time and just realized, uh, we've this is like trench warfare, like both sides are just shelling each other, but no one's moving anywhere, and it's just a lot

of casualties. And it made sense to to put this all back together. But you know, it's interesting that Jay Monahan is not going to be reporting to his excellency. You see all Roumayan, who's the chairman of the board of this new enterprise. You know, Jay's the CEO. But if there's any doubt about who who won this, this this war, I mean, yes, hers is the chairman of

the board. He's the guy. And uh so a lot of details still to be hashed out, but I think at first blush to me, it's a monumental victory for Live and I think for the tour it makes sense.

They've they've they've assured their long term future. I mean, they have now unlimited money that they can tap into, they can pay their players, they have this jazzy new product that they could slot in, and the weakest parts of the schedule on maybe some some tournaments that were struggling, the Live will just sort of take those over and and graft themselves on. And there's there's a there's there's an interesting analog to this, which is cricket. You know,

I've been studying this. Cricket was much like golf, this very slow, ponderous sport, hide bound by tradition. You know, that's that's golf, right, And twenty years ago they went to this thing called t twenty which is a much jazzier, shorter, more consumable version of the sport, and the popularity exploded not just for the new kind, but it also made people appreciate the old way, and cricket massively grew its audience and reinvented itself. And you know, live live could

be that. That's that sort of product which is is different. It's not for everyone. Michael's never going to watch those tournaments and that's okay. But you know, they have attracted a younger audience. I mean, according to Greg Norman. We don't have the receipts on this, but you know two thirds of the live audience is under forty five, which is massive. I mean, the PGA Tours audience is geriatric and they're always chasing those those younger, younger golf fans.

So you know, I think if you look at this as you know, Greg Norman's word from the very beginning was additive. I think live golf could be additive to what the PGA Tour is doing and it might be a better sport overall.

he's staked out such a tough position here. It'll be up to the players. They can play that or not. I mean, if if you want to play, if you're Rory and you just want to play all the old, same tournaments you've always enjoyed, then those will be available

to you. But there's gonna be this whole other tour within a tour that you know, all of his buddies are going to play, and so yeah, there's you know, ry Rory's and if if you had to make a list of winners and losers, you know Rory's probably at the top of the loser's list, and that he's staked his whole legacy on this battle and and they just kind of pulled the rug out from under him. So how he handles this will be interesting. You know, the

Tiger Woods of the world, the Brandal Chamblise. You know a lot of people have been so outspoken against Live and now they are part of They are part of the PGA Tour, So everyone's going to have to make peace with that. Nat.

to me. I talked to enough players who went to live Graham McDowell, Dustin Johnson, Pat Perez, Brooks, Koepka, Paul Casey, you know, Lee Westwood, on and on, and certainly understood how and why they would do what they did and how they did it. And I can see players like Rory uh and people like Tiger represented by Steinberg, who you know, corralled that that you know, collection of talent to protect the tour and protect legacy in history. You know,

I saw both sides. But you know, for me, I I shifted my focus to things like, you know, I'm working on the club pro crisis, you know, followed up with a crisis on Superintendent's you know, things like municipal renovations and restorations the game of golf. To me, this

is not about the game of golf. This is not about the golf that we play day in and day out, the game that we love that that you know plucks this the the you know, plucks our soul and and brings us to places like Bandon Dunes or the old course at Saint Andrew's. This is you know, quote new York Times New collectively owned for profit entity. This is

about business. This is about money. This is about something that probably should have happened thirty years ago when Norman was essentially, you know, made Darth Vader of the game of golf versus Fincham in his attempt to grow the game globally. This is about the tour, not sitting down from the word go and listening to what was being offered and the opportunities that they had in front of them. We could have avoided a lot of this, you know, bitchery and bullshitty and I.

on with it sorted out. I think it's better, you know, in a sense that there's going to be a ton of money. There was a ton of money being thrown around in the game of golf. There's gonna be more. And there's just no way in my mind that Jay Monahan is not in charge of this. I know what you're saying, Alan, it's a big win for Live and I know there is a role for us here, but there's no way that jaymon An's not in charge of this.

is going to have to ratify everything. So for sure, Monahan and Ed Hurley's and the Jimmy Dunns who are going to be part of this board, they will help protect the interests of their players and as they figure out where to slot the tournaments, how the fields get organized, the Tour still has a say for sure, and they will be the administrative voice without a doubt, and the saut he has already gotten what they want, you know,

They've gotten a seat at the table. This whole exercise was about being invited into the Western world and becoming legitimized and creating something that they can they can have a say in, a voice in they can bring home to Jetta as this big event, you know, kind of the super Bowl of the sport. And so they've already gotten that. So I'm sure they'll They're not going to put up a stink about whether the Kevin Struewans the world get access to these live events occasionally or the

nitty gritty Jamon handbill control. There's no doubt. But the big picture, you know, I mean put it this way, like Ricky Fowler turned down seventy five million dollar offer from Live Golf, and there was a many you know, there was tons of big offers on the table to

the guys who stayed loyal to the tour. And now not only did say, you know, Books got one hundred and thirty million, Dustin got one fifty, Bryson got one thirty five up front, they own these franchises, the values of which just skyrocketed because now they're going to be on network TV, these live events are going to become a big deal. They still own the franchises like that that live business model is intact.

Like now everyone's gonna want Xander Softly and a Patrick can't lay and uh, you know there's gonna be this build out of these of these teams.

equity of these franchises. But on the other hand, they're gonna, uh, you know, they're gonna be playing for twenty million dollars at least in these elevated events. I'm sure the live persons are going to go up. So it's not like any of the top players are going to be hurting. But you know, this is a whole thing in golf you had to pick aside and the guys who chose live today is a glorious day for them, and for the PGA Tour guys, it's it's a tough one. I think that's the bottom line.

sanctioned events. You know, there's still maybe a handful that are just the live product where they when they go over to Singapore or they go over to Australia, and maybe that's how they reward the loyalty of the guys who signed up early. They still have a place on their tour. But if you have these mega events where then you bring in these tour teams and they can align however they want, that's one way to do it.

Or you could just fully integrate the rosters and the tour guys will play and however many live events they're compelled to, whether it's six or eight or ten. But that's going to be a fundamental question they're going to have to answer is how do we let the players flow back and forth? You know, as part of the release this morning that was sent to the players, the tour players, I did say that all the guys who

renounce the PGA Tour can now reapply for membership. And there was a funny line in there that Mona had said, you know, this will be a complicated process. Yeah, no, kidding Jay, But so you know, I think you'll get to see Phil play at Pebble Beach again, and you'll you'll get to see you know, some of these guys can come back to their favorite events and what the what's the minimum they're going to have to play to

retain their membership. There's it's really complex how you put it all together, but you know that's what all these There's gonna be a lot of more secret meetings in the in the months ahead, but they will, they will sort it out. I think that, you know, there's gonna be a mandate from Monahan to try and try and get as many players as they can into these these live events. But it's it's by design a small limited series,

so there's gonna be a lot of tension there. You know, the the Journeymen have already been left out of the PGA Tours elevated events, and now they're going to get left out of the live events, and so you know, the class warfare and professional golf is going to accelerate.

mainstream American life. Not just have a seat on the board of any American company he wants to have, or at least, you know, be in the room if not he personally, but here or somebody else, but just become part of mainstream corporate life, which is kind of hard to do when you've had the attitudes you've had towards women,

towards gays, gay people, transgender people. And it's rough for me on a personal basis because golf has always had a certain separateness to it, anotherness to it, and now it just kind of looks like everything else, you know, chasing the dollar, chasing the dollar, and so it's kind of rough to look at it that way. But you know, anybody who's made a study of the Godfather knows that you know, this is always how play. It is all business in the end and not personal. But I would

say this AUDI is getting really into golf developments. Golf is part of a wellness life. People wanting people counting their steps and playing walking courses where you can count your steps and actually have fun at the same time. So I think they're going to I think this is a big, big, huge international golf Minor golf's a niche sport. But it's like, you know, why does FedEx make such a big bet on golf? It's you know, where's the NFL is the NFL and hundreds of millions of people

watch the Super Bowl. You never get never will get a number like that for an LA Open, Genesis Open, and Genesis Invitational. But you're getting the people that you want to get. I think the Saudis figured out a way that they can get to the people they want to get to.

They want to bring businesses to Saudi Arabia. Like that's become a change, is that if you want to do business in Saudi Arabia, you have to have a headquarters there. Your people have to live there, because they'd always live in Dubai or they live in somewhere else, and then they fly in and do their business. They leave because it wasn't that much fun to be in Saudi Arabia if you if you're a Western, right, and so part of the impetus to all this is to make it

more attractive. That's why they're building these new cities, That's why they want these big sporting events. It's like something to do. So, if you can get a couple PGA tour slash live events over in Saudi Arabia, that's a wonderful distraction for your people. And then you host the business community, you leverage all their relationships. So there's, as Michael suggests, there's some really powerful forces at play here. And it's never been really about live golf and making

money or breaking even. It was a way to remake the economy. Like Saudi Arabia has fifteen hundred miles of coast land and these incredible mountain ranges. You can put some of the best golf you know, destinations anywhere if you do it right. And so if they can open up a whole tourist sector through golf instead of you know, people from London fly to Dubai to play golf at the winter because it's sunny. But I mean d you buyas this flat, crowded city, there's there's no good golf

terrain there. If they can get everyone to go to to Saudi Arabia instead and stay at the resorts, and that's that's that was always worth it to lose a billion dollars on live if if they if they could turn Saudi Arabia into this golfing destination. So there's there's been this larger play here. It wasn't just about these little golf tournaments with music in the background, and so this just accelerates it. Now there now, now the PIFF has access to all of the PG Tour sponsors, to

all of the relationships. I mean, this is a monumental victory for them as they're trying to reshape their economy and they're trying to become ingrained in these these these new sectors. So yeah, you have to have kind of a big picture of perspective on what's really happening here. Part of Jay's problem, you know, his messaging throughout this has been very muddled. You know, it started out with

it's it's legacy, not leverage. You know, he was trying to appeal to the better angels of his golfers and say, forget the money, it's it's just all about the PG Tours are place and we'd give to charity and of course you want to be part of us. That didn't really work. All the guys went to live. So then he's his new message was, you know, you've never had to apologize for being a PGA to our member. You know, he kind of went into this business of demonizing the

Saudi's that didn't really work. I just kept going to live. I mean, he finally he realized, Okay, the only way is to to he said, we're not it's arms race. We can't win it. But he tried to try to get into the arms race where he just became about money. We're you gonna try and match the dollars and through these elevated events and the PIP and all these things. But then I think he realized that's not going to work because they just have more money than we do.

So there was an air of defeat I thought from Monahan, and he was trying to play nice. Uh but you know his his new boss is sitting right next to him. You know, there's there's the chairman of this new entity, Yacht's year, his excellency, who's you know. Jay would never take the phone call from, never never take the meeting from, and all of a sudden everything's flipped on him. So it's that was that was my my read. There's some funny backstory to that, is that nobody knew this was coming.

I mean, I've been talking to highest level people at Live for weeks, there was no hint this was coming. And right before Yah Sir went on on that uh interview, he called Brooks, he called Dustin and he said, hey, guys,

this has happening. Like there was there's no there still hasn't been any internal communication with the Live folks, at least as of half an hour ago when we started taping this podcast, Like I was, I called one of their top executives and they were saying they were watching that that that that interview with Jay and yes seriously next to other and this person said, did I take an edible this morning? Like what is happening? Like this is just impossible and so uh this this was done

at the highest levels cloak and dagger diplomacy. It's amazing they managed to pull it off. I mean, I think there was probably four people knew what was happening. Yea year, jaymon An, Jimmy Dunn and Ed Hurley.

here and at the Canadian Open. That's going to be wild and rowdy and things will start leaking out after that. But can't emphasize enough that this this was a highly secretive endeavor and it was it was basically done between Monahan and yes Year, And you know Greg Norman didn't know this was happening, even when right before that CNBC spot,

yes Year are called called Greg to tell him. So it's it's in the annals of of big time, you know sports thunderbolts like this is near the top, Like this came out of nowhere for even the players involved and the key people on the ground.

wealthy people who are getting wealthier. And I think there was a general sense of disconnect from day to day, shot to shot, you know, tournament to tournament, trophy to trophy, check to check, you know, I just I don't think the game was was looking very good by having you know, a right and a wrong and who was right and who was wrong could be debated over and over, and it was playing out social media, was playing out around you know, fire pits or on first tees or you know,

twelve greens. It just was happening, and I think people are just tired of it. It seemed very obvious to me neither model, you know, neither model was sustainable. We know, we've heard from tournament directors about the tour actually kicking in the extra money to make elevated events elevated, So where was that money going to come from? Down the road. We've heard from tournament directors and sponsors that they were you know, the the return on an investment wasn't going

to match, you know, the sort of the numbers. It was a numbers game was not coming out the right way. Tiger's gone, you know, the game Phil is essentially gone, you know, to a certain degree or close to it at the age of you know, fifty two, fifty three

years going on fifty three years old. So I mean something had to give here, and we were going to come to some court cases in which a lot of ugly, you know, details and information were going to come out that a lot of people probably didn't want to have, a lot of important people were being deposed. And the fact is Jay didn't take the meeting and he represents the players, and that's that from the very get go,

was a big, big problem. So I mean, you know, one plus one equals two, and this is a numbers game. And I'm just I think what people are mostly shocked about is that it happened as fast as it did the way it did. Right now in the middle, we're into the season, we got two majors to go in, a Ryder Cup coming, and it just it just happened.

Luke Donald's gonna have to sort out that stuff. What's gonna are they going to give Heiner extension? Is captain c back in two years but they took away?

European tour is withered without any of their stars. It's like, does he need you know, Paul Casey and Ian Poulter at Lee Westward when they when they're playing in England? Obviously? Does he? Does he need Martin Kaimer for the German Open? Of course? Does does he need Sergeio with the Spanish Open?

their own schedule. I think it'll probably help them, because you know it was if you looked at who at their fields this year, there's been nobody of consequence playing in their tournaments, and I think this gives them a

way back. pH Nominally, I don't think they're going to be a huge player in this, but they'd already kind of hitched their wagon to the PGA Tour just to survive during this turbulent period, and now the tours is going to continue to look after their interests with more Saudi money with these new tournaments, and I think it's a small win for for Europe, but we'll see how it plays out.

They now have. They now have the public Investment Fund, which is gonna be worth a trillion dollars by twenty twenty five, floating the whole thing. So, I mean, there's the last chapter of my book. I was kind of forecasting what was going to happen, and there's a great line from Pat Perez. He said to me, you know that the PGA tours fucked because their whole model is about squeezing more and more money out of these corporations

that are getting tired of being squeezed. He said, yeah, our money comes out of the ground.

He's on the board of directors like he's the guy unless there's some major shakeup, you know, uh from his patron, the Crown Prince Mohammad ben Salmon, Like you know, they're committed there. They're going to be committed in writing to these things. So and that was always a talking point from tour loyalists is oh, the PIFF could just lose interest and the whole thing could go away. But that's live. Live Golf has been hiring fifteen people a month, like

they've been ramping up this whole time. There's the there was this move to become a little more fiscally responsible and to keep track of the money. But they've never wavered. You know, the PIFF has never wavered in its commitment and so they're not going anywhere and they have the purse strings. And you know, now, now it becomes an easier sell for jam on hand because he was trying to sell a diminished product. Like you know, I come

back to Pebble Beats. You know, we'd get three stars every year, Phil, Dustin and Jordan Speith and and Pebble Beats lost two out of those three. Now how happy was at and t you know, not very but now you can you can sell the game. It's like we're getting Cam Smith back, We're getting Dustin, We're getting Brooks, who's the dominant player in the sport. We're getting all these guys back. And I think that'll make you know,

the approach to corporate America a little bit easier. And again, the tour was not going to be able to keep getting twenty twenty five million dollars from corporations every year to fund these elevated events. It just wasn't going to happen. Now they can go back to it, say hey, give us ten or fifteen like you used to do. The PIF will fill on the rest. You get the energy of the elevated event and all the activations and so it becomes easier to sell the corporate America, not harder.

you know, very true signaling by the commissioner. Well, now all these companies that have always wanted to do business in Saudi Arabia, but maybe they were they were squeamish, Like now they want they're going to start sponsoring tour events because that's how they can they can bridge that gap like they want to. They want to get into the Saudi markets. Sponsor, sponsor one of these events, take

all your people over there, meet everyone. The amount of business is going to get done in these corporate chalets is monumental and uh so it's ironic because the tour had made Saudi money so toxic. But that's what's gonna that's the whole calculus just changed.

talk about bifurcating the game. This is the ultimate bifurcation to me, in that it's very clear that the professional game is now the professional game, and it is money because it has been and needed to be more and there was a disruption that undermined the model. But in the meantime, like we still have the game. We still have the game that we know and love. We still have opportunities to take the buddy's trips and do what we do and play municipal golf, and you know, you know,

you know what I mean. In my mind, it's like I'm just glad it's over with, get on with it, do your money thing, and I'll watch when I want to watch, or don't watch when i want to watch, and I'll always have that choice. But the game is my game. The game we love my game, which is you know, the one that I try to play and perfect and get better at, is still here.

of this legal process. Uh and that may have of course tipped the PG two it realizing that we don't have the cards here Jay already said from day one, don't have the money. All right, Then if you don't have the money, do you have the court system? Maybe maybe not? Uh So, then you've got to do you know the calculus of modern life, the legal system, money, public opinion. And then you know, if if the if the cost for that is talking back. What does that

phrase people say they take? They take, you know, they walk back, walk apart, they walk back something. Well, there they're going to be walking back for the rest of their lives, but they don't have a choice.

was headed to the Supreme Court. Like you know, they were fighting about whether whether ya here could be deposed and there was some thinking that you know, Live kept losing all these all these battles that that at some point they were just going to pull the plug on the whole lawsuit because they they don't want to open the books the public Investment Fund and get into the have that come to light a day. So that was

a big thing. But then the Department of Justice separately was doing its own anti trust investigation and that last summer that was that was going gangbusters. And then the lawsuits began and the Department of Justice kind of stepped back said, Okay, we'll let the courts decide this. But as as all these procedural matters kept playing out, and the date of the lawsuit got bumped from you know, twenty twenty three, you know it was gonna be in September of twenty three, that it was going to be

in January twenty four. Then it was of May twenty four, it became clear these lawsuits were years and years away. The Department of Justice re engaged and they they they were doing a lot of interviews with players, agents, officials, and like Carlos Muno is one of the live players. He told me like they took his phone and I'm sorry, Carlos Otz, excuse me. At Carlo Sotiz, they took his phone and they asked the passwords and they say before

before they they say, don't delete anything. We find it anyway, and then he just looked guilty, and he's like they take it for five or six hours, and they extract everything you've ever thought or said or written, and they know your whole life. And that's obviously uncomfortable. If you're if you're Phil Nicholson, if you're if you're a J. Monahan, Which phone did they take a filled?

in the best interest of both sides. You can't underrate how important that was because that was this giant stink cloud and it was like the storm on the horizon. But it was getting closer. Now the Department of Justice was re engaging. Those are not people you want to mess with. So to your point, Michael about why now, I think I think the Department of Justice getting more

aggressive and more active. That's part of it. I think having a losing Honda and losing AT and T as sponsors and some of these other corporations pushing back with Monahan and him realizing, you know what, this is not sustainable, Like we've tapped our reserves to get through this this wartime era of twenty twenty three. What are we going to do in twenty four If we're losing sponsors and we've made these commitments, where's the money going to come from.

I think Live Golf was realizing like, okay, we launched. That was a monumental achievement, and they've gotten some traction. You know, they had big crowds in Australia. They had big crowds in Tulsa, they had really nice crowds in Singapore. I think it was catching on as this kind of fun, different, in person experiential event. But their ratings were so bad on the CW that they stopped reporting them because it was embarrassing, and they were just not able to scale

their audience whatsoever. And so how you know it was it was seemed like a big deal to get a t to get a TV contract on a decent network, but it was it was failing miserably. So I think it was just this confluence of events where both sides realized, they looked around and said, we just can't keep going like this. It just doesn't make sense. And once they actually got in a room or at least got on

a zoom, clearly it happened very quickly. But you know, there there's this letter that I reproduced in my book that goes back to the spring of to April of twenty twenty one when the Saudis first approached Monahan and to try and forge some kind of compromise. That was that was their aim, although there was a sort of built in threat about they were going to launch anyway with or without you. But you know, Monahan never acknowledged it.

And you know, he went to his ensuing board meeting and said, we're at war, you know, we're at war with these guys, and and that was he he kind of escalated it. And in the end he didn't have the artillery to keep it going. You know, it became a war of attrition, and it was clear that that the tour was not gonna be able to keep going. And I think that as soon as they realized that, as soon as they were honest with themselves, that the need for a compromise accelerated.

Fincham Phil Mickelson over Tiger Woods. Like John Ram, you know, it comes out looking good in that he he he didn't take the money, but he also sort of, you know, played the role of like I'm you know, I'm just I'm just focused on on my game and what i want to do, and I picked this tour and I'm not bad mouthing or being bitchy to anybody. Rory gets absolutely rode a tiled here, uh and again and again for being for being a good, you know, loyal and

willing to be the face. I mean, if I'm Rory, I am pissed, pissed, and sure.

now knows a lot more about the real Phil. And I think that always bothered Tiger is that Tiger took the heat for being who he was and Phil got skated on sort of being who he was. But that that's definitely out now. However, this is a win for Phil Well.

whether you like it or don't like it. That's another thing, you know, for those of us who are you know, idealists about life and golf, the whole thing doesn't really it doesn't set right. But if you think the fight is bad for golf, then at least this means the end of fighting. Well that's good. I mean, you know, Japan was our sworn enemy what seventy years ago. Now they're one of our best friends in the world, so you know, things can change over time.

Everything again, everything led to this. It was gonna come to this, and Alan, you know, per what you were saying, you had sort of reported and had foreshadow like it was coming. I think the bigger shock is that it just happened. That it happened right now?

an important milestone. It's like, clearly these guys their games were not going to degrade. As if people had feared they they were, they were not. They had not stopped trying because they they'd gotten some some guaranteed money like the best players in every sport get, and so that that's another brick in the wall. If uh, you know, Brooks kept me winning the PGA Championship is looking even more impactful than it did a few weeks ago.

doubt that both Tiger and Rory will be offered a franchise. Now, whether they're gonna want it or not, they both have plenty of money in the bank. But it becomes it becomes a very interesting subplot, and in some ways it's it's the best thing that could have happened for them because they could have never benefited from from live golf the way they'd stake their whole legacies. Now they can say, hey, this is the this is the PGA Tour event. I'm just part of of the PGA Tour. I want to

support these new events. It's good for golf. There's a little wiggle room that can bring them back, and they can. They can cash in. And so I don't think the I don't think. I don't think we know yet. I mean they're both businessmen, right like they and I think so are they.

like Rom has a presence. Rom has elevated himself through all of this with his play and with his diplomacy. But you know Scotty Scheffler, like incredible golfer, but you know, boring his heck like and he's probably even said heck because it's too strong a word for him. Like, you know, the tour badly needed an infusion of personality and pizzazz and they just they just got it. I mean they they just did. And if you look at this from the perspective of a fan, I think this is this

is gonna be great for fans. Are getting all players back. This this this weirdness of this period is going to dissipate. They're going to get these these new events that could be fun. Like I've been in in the very small minority here I really like the team component on LIV. I've been. I've enjoyed following it. I think at the tournaments it looks cool, all the guys in their uniforms. When you're out there, you can feel it's a palpable thing.

Like I've been. I've been in scoring tent plenty of times now where everyone's looking for their teammate, which you shoot, you know, what's your number. It's like when you're it's like when you're playing at a you know a member guest, and you're you're following the scores of your buddies. Like so, I think this team thing could could really help golf because the last thing we need is more seventy two hole stroke play. It's just it's so tedious, I I said.

I said alone. Why wouldn't Why wouldn't all the lower level events create a similar team event type feel so that the guys like Xander and Kenttley who like playing together could always play together in a series of four to six team events, and you have a simultaneous sort of team event running, you know, a parallel to the PGA Tour season. So there's something else to be following

while these team events are unfolding. Well again, you know, how about Andy Gardner from the Premier Golf League, who came up with this whole kind of concept that the Saudi's then stole that now is in line now with the poor how about poor Andy Gardner's got to be going like, uh, you know, I did kind of come up with this whole plan and they never met with Poor Andy. Poor Andy has got nothing.

gone big time. But you know what Live tried to do, and they've had some successes building these team identities regionally, you have the All Ossi team, you have you know, a Spanish speaking team, you have you have an all South African team, and now that the volume just gets turned way up on that. You know, Hadeki had a

huge offer from Live he turned down. But if you can, if you can anchor an all Asian team, like how much how much appeal could that have if you take one of these events and you play it in Japan like you saw him and Live went to Australia, it was a big deal. And the Ousti guy is worth the center of all of it, Like, there is an idea there that can work.

So you could still have Tiger and Phil competing against each other through these teams. I mean, there, it could actually be fun.

I mean, all of this comes to a screeching halt.

they were pro tour, anti live. But the team stuff's fun and it could really work. And the event at at DAL last year was the best event of the year. And if you followed it closely, it was cool. I mean you had they were playing individuals and teams at the same time. You had you had Phil versus Cam Smith. That had a lot of meaning. You know, in the end, the whole thing came down to Dustin and Cam Smith on the last hole. Doesn't had to make this putt to win the team event, and.

elevated events were gonna have no cut. That was just a nod to reality that people want the stars to be there and if you're asking companies to put this money in, you don't want Rory or whomever to miss the cut and be gone on the weekend. And so like like Andy Gardner slashed the PGL slash the golf and figure this stuff out, and it incorporated it and and now that you know, now it's just going to become codified and what the PGA Tour is and it just makes sense. All the stuff makes.

end up with a better product. That was the hope that at the end of the day, there's going to be a week where we might actually be able to watch a broadcast of what we call the PGA Tour or Professional Golf without having to hear this non stop complaint noise about what it is that we're being served as a weekly product.

be there. And you know this, this this resolution just eliminates, like the world ranking it was was to become a joke. It'd become it become totally irrelevant. And yet they were fighting tooth and nail to keep live out just because they felt like they had to and they were trying to be loyal to these other interests. Like now the

world ranking can just make sense again. You know it's there was so much tortured thinking because everyone had to pick a side and they had to they had to somehow defend it, and it was it was it was getting in the way of common sense and what's good for golf fans and what's good for the sport. So that's the best part of all of this is now things can just make sense again, and players can play where they can play golf, and and all the other

pieces fall into place. So it is it is as a fan, as an observer, it's a relief that we can we can get away from some of the nonsense. I agree with that for sure.

I'm not saying he's wrong or right. I think what what he said is has been has been on point. In a lot of ways, but there's been so much of it and same same with Emon. I mean, they've just come back to it over and over. It's become it's become the defining part of their professional lives in some way, and definitely the landscape has changed. But you know, they're interesting characters in you know, they're both in the

book as well. It's like, I don't begrudge them for having a strong point of view, but they it turns out that you know that the money interests are have overwhelmed any talk of morality, and so it doesn't make them wrong, but it means that that they chose the wrong side and it's gonna be a little complex to work their way back.

did and how he did it. But you know, the business of golf and the business of professional golf a you know one out. I mean you can't, you can't. This is not about morality. It never was. This is not about actually being true right versus wrong. This is business and that's what just transpired.

the lif golf have said as much. But I mean, so so was what what the US government did at Abu grab And you know, the extra judicial drone bombings from Barack Obama, Like our American foreign policy is not pure, it's not clean, and so when and that's you know, Keith Pelly said this to me, like when the europe the European Tour would have gone out of business a

long time ago. The European Tour would have gone out of business a long time ago if if they didn't they didn't play in in China and Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and Turkey and Qatar and and all these places that have very questionable human rights records, and so it's always been a business It's always been a business decision for golf, and we got into this very tortured debate that kind of overwhelmed all the conversation around Live. But it's you know, sports has has voted

on this a long time ago. I mean that's why we you know, Russia hosts the Olympics, that's why the Olympics go to China. Like sports has been okay with going to these parts of the world for a very long time. I mean the Olympic Games in Berlin in nineteen thirty six. Like this, this is an old debate that it's always come back to the same answer is that, you know, sports can be a force that opens up

the world. That's always what the Live guys said. People roll their eyes, but you know, if Saudi Arabia does want to modernize, if it does want to change, if they are actively trying to to become a different place, it's more more incorporated the Western world. I mean, the PGA Tours is cann be part of that, whether whether

people like it or not. And so it's it's definitely a very interesting subtext to all of this but I just feel like the debate was settled a long time and if we're gonna, if we're gonna host Olympic games in Russia while they're invading Crimea, Like you know, sports fans have kind of they've they've said all along, we don't care. We just want our sports, we want to watch, we want to watch, and we're not going to get bogged down by the details. And again, is that right

or wrong, that's for someone else to decide. But that's just it just is, like that's it just is. And so this is just another step in that direction. But I mean half of the English Premier soccer teams are owned by Middle Eastern countries now, and you know, the fans, they if your team is not owned by one of by one of those interests, you're upset because you don't

have the war chest to sign players. And like, I think sports fans voted a long time ago that that they just want sports to keep going and all these other things. They don't want to get bogged down.

of things. It was it was probably an outdated model that had to change, and it just took it just too a thunderbolt like this. And so it gives a tour a lot more flexibility going forward business wise and how they can, how they can sorry, sorry you. By getting out of that charitable model. They can still give all the money they want to charity, but they do become much more flexible as a business.

Is the whole umbrell a thing now a for profit business or is there this separate thing, the PJ tour events that sort of goes down it's old path.

that's going to become a for profit business. And so it sounds like it's kind of the best both worlds for the tour where they they can still keep the local control of their old traditional events, but now as they embark down this new road, this parallel organization will have a lot more flexibility and how it runs its business, you know.

time and see competitive golf. As Allan is seventy times. It's still a guy over at golf off plan a shot, you know, and it's still a very difficult thing to do well. So maybe that was part of the tea in addition to the court system and other things that play here, that might have been a very big reality

check for the for the PGA Tour. Along the same lines of the part of me when Callaway bought Top Golf, who would have expect to glorify driving rangers would become the engine of your business, this big business that made golf clubs. But that's what's happened, because you know, that's what young people want.

And that's been very eye opening for me to realize, like they they've bought into what's being sold and they they they it resonates with them and Live has done a good job catering to that market. And again Live has never really shown the receipts. We don't know where the data is derived from, but but they always say that two thirds of their audience is forty five and under it. You can't underestimate how important that is and even if it's not a huge audience, that's what everyone's

been chasing forever. And if they can, if they can continue to grow that that becomes that was. That's a powerful force. And now the tour can tap into that. I mean that it's like people our as are always going to watch golf or older. But if you can get people that like my kids' aides, that that's the whole business right there. And Live Live was making inroads and I think the tour recognized that the.

of ranking the best. We get to root you know, we get to see Patrick Reid versus Jordan Spieth on a regular but we get to see good guys versus bad guys kind of stuff again on a regular basis. Instead of what was going to be four times a year. I mean, oh, it's like one big sort of ayahuasca, you know, purgeon of all of this stuff. And let's move on.

that's the separate issue. But he's he's gonna he's going to be loving this, and he did. You know, we've talked about this. Trump has a he has this some kind of genius where he can predict the future right, like he said it, I could I could shoot a guy on Fifth Avenue and my supporters wouldn't care. I mean, he was right about that. Well, you remember his tweet about he said all these PG tour guys. They should go to live and take the money now because when

the merger comes, they're not going to get anything. I mean, he tweeted that months ago. He was right, So he's gonna he's going to be delighted by this whole thing. Let me let me just address I've art. I mean, my social media has been hilarious this morning. Is this the most important question all this is it's good or bad for my book? Right, Like, let's let's get down to the real core issue here. But it's so funny. I turned it in two nights ago, and uh, it

was a monumental f to get to the finish line. Clearly, there's gonna be some there's gonna be some new stuff on the last chapters out the window. But I I'm happy it happened when it did, because if if all this stuff came down is after the book was printed, that would be really sad. So I will be reporting my bottom off here and get the inside scoop on how all this played out and everything that led to

this moment is so germane. I mean that there's there's there's so much backstory and what was really happening by in the scenes. It's in the page to the book. So I'm choosing to look on the bright side that the timing it wasn't too late, and it kind of puts a bow on the whole thing, and this will be the definitive account of how it all played out. So the comments on my Twitter have been been quite funny. I'm not sad, I'm not curled up in the feudal position.

I'm not in a dark room like Aaron Rodgers for three days like it's all good. This is this puts an exclamation point on this whole crazy project. So I just carry on.

the next couple of months anyway. But yeah, that was always the great anxiety. You know, what could what could happen? It seemed like, you know, the court cases could have gotten settled, that could have changed the structure of golf, you know. I A merger always made sense. It always seemed inevitable the way things were going. But I think it's way sooner than anyone ever imagined. So I wasn't

totally worried about that. I thought that was you know, that might happen in December, January, February, but the book could already have been out by then. So yeah, it's it's wild that it happened when it did, but it's advantageous, I think, is now now it's changed. This was always going to be the definitive account of how we got to this moment, but it was a little bit of a cliffhanger. Is how is it going to end? Well, now we know the ending, so I'm happy. I think.

I think this is kind of a best case scenario. But even though it's going to be to have a lot more work, it's okay. I'll power through well while we're.

more oversight. Last year they were they were just trying to launch. It was very chaotic in the wake of Phil's comments. Everything. Everything was happening really fast, and they were spending like crazy because they just had to get off the ground and the start of this year it was edgy. I mean, someone who's really dialed into what's happened and out there on Live said to me coming out of out of Tuson, He's like, I'm worried about this whole thing. Like it's we're on the edge right now.

There's the players, we're we're feeling the anxiety because they basically Live accelerated scheduled by a full year. You know that the team build that wasn't supposed to happen until twenty twenty four, but they very smartly said, this is the best thing we have going, let's accelerate it. And so you know there's only originally there's only gonna be

ten events this year and fourteen next year. They moved that up and so there was this this feeling of the ground was shifting beneath their feet, and there was there were a lot of jitters. And then then they went to Australia and that was a huge shot of adrenaline for the whole organization and confidence and people kind of said, Okay, I can see what what Live Golf

is going to be. You know, we're gonna go to these markets, We're gonna we're gonna go to places where they haven't seen big time golf, And coming out of that there was a whole totally different feeling like, Okay, we've kind of found our footing. You know, the Tulsa event was by far the biggest crowd they never had domestically, you had the Masters, you had Brooks win the PGA,

Like there was a real momentum out there. So I've never I never felt like LIVE was gonna I've always talking to the people at the top like they they they've had ten year models, financial models like they have they have commitments going way out into the future. So I was never worried that Live was gonna was going to go away, but it felt like there was There was there was. It was tense internally as it was

sort of this battle for supremacy. Part of that was, you know, this guy Magie els Roar, he'd been the day to day shot caller. He got pushed out, like there was a lot happening behind the scenes, and so I feel like this is the best thing that could have happened to Live clearly, like their future is now defined, their their mission is clear.

burden has shifted. You know, Live had to prove it was viable. It had to, it had to launch. It did had enough success that the tour had to had to you know, it was a reckoning for the tour. And so now now that the burden of proof is on the PGA tour to make this work. And so it's it's incredible how fast this is all flipped.

think I'm different than anybody else. I'm always trying to learn something about how the world really works.

understand how the world really works. And you know this our twenty ment Solve Been Together has been a discourse for me in it. Watching Jay Monahan's body language with Yair, you know, has been part of it. Seeing as we've you know, you guys have have lined up the you know, the the raith Yon common and the judicial process and how that comes together the crowds that where do they really have the big crowds? Was it in the two

side event in Australia and Australia as well? Yeah, yeah, excuse me, and so you know, it's it's both, Matt, it's uh, you know, we're It is another illustration of everything that you learn from reading you know, Shakespeare and Mario Puzo and everything else. How the world really works. You can't put your head in the sand and ignore it.

And life's interesting and it's I don't know, I think it's kind of I feel kind I feel personally queasy about this thing because I think money is corrupting in general. I mean, I know Alan only said this innocently, but Alan's question is it good for the book? I mean that there's a question of commerce behind that. You know, the book should be the book. If people get drawn to the book or not, well that's sort of like

out of your control. But in fact, but the world, the real world is yeah, This is good for the book, more people interested in how this whole Live thing got to where it is. So I think money is corrupting. It troubles me on every level, and I think we're seeing it here. You know, Monahan had a stand, Rory

had a stand, and in money collapsed those stands. But also, okay, now, what are you going to learn from that that you're going to apply it to your own life and how you think about life and how you vote and how you read and everything else.

Michelson comments, but even beyond that, the whole issue. My cat's on the keyboard here, cat, you know all the uh it started with the PGL. I mean, this has been a background issue at the highest levels of professional golf for five years, six years. I mean that the first news break about the about the PGL in twenty eighteen, and this is hovered over the sport and so we finally know how the story ends. Some details to be sorted, but a quite a thunderbolt here on Tuesday morning, June sixth.

We will continue to make sense of all this year at the Firepit Collective. I'm sure there'll be some typing done in the coming days and probably some more podcasting, but I think this was a great opening salvo to understand what just happened. So Michael Bamberger, Matt Janella, appreciate all your thoughts here. We're gonna wrap up this podcast, but we'll be back in your year soon, so thanks for listening. That's the end.