Something I've believed from the beginning that the Yasers are going to decide the future of Live and nobody else, and so I think they're gonna go. They're gonna all systems are go for twenty twenty four. It's partly to keep them in a position of strength in negotiating with the tour on this framework agreement, because if they just pull the plug right now on Live, they've lost all their leverage.
I got thoughts in my head. Can't get them out, ji, and not to think what I'm thinking about. I'm bouncing my head. Can't get them out, jih, not to think what I'm thinking about.
Hello, this is Alan Ship Knock back for another Fire Drill podcast. Another big day in the Gulf world, which has crashed Capitol Hill for the Senate sub Committee hearings about the front work agreement between the PGA Tour and Live Golf and all the related intrigue.
We want to unpack this.
I'm delighted to be joined once again by Matt Janella.
I'm at what a day.
Let's pay a few bills first, tell the listeners who are making this making this podcast possible.
Then we'll get into it.
Yeah, I can't wait. I can't wait to get your thoughts. But yes, thanks to Dormy Workshop. Obviously, if you've been listening to this podcast, you know this is a company and a brand and a family that I love that we're in partnership together. It literally is a family based business based in Halifax, Nova, Scotia, where all they do is make quality leather headcovers and accessories. I met them at the PGA Merchandise Show about ten years ago. Been promoting,
you know, playing golf with them ever since. Go to Dormy Workshop dot com and use promo code fire Pit fifteen for fifteen percent off your next purchase. They have an incredible array of goods and some of the most unique stuff you'll see in the world of golf headcovers leather goods. You can also go to the Firepit dot com Firepit Collective dot com and go to the Pit shop and order one of our Dormy headcovers or stash bags. All right, Alan, I mean you watched, you listened. I
would assume you learned a few things. What are your biggest takeaways.
Yeah, there's a lot to unpack.
It wasn't just the hearings which by themselves were quite interesting, but then the related document dump a lot of interesting material that you know, the when the Senate comes calling, people will give it up. I've been asking folks for some of these documents for a long time, and you know, it's easy to blow off reporters, but it's different when you've got the United States Senate in your business and the Department of Justice, and so it was it's been
a treasure trove. And there was this previous document dump, you know, a week or so ago, related to Larry Clayman's lawsuit. He's Patrick Reed's very eccentric lawyer, and so there's I mean, it's like it's like being archaeologists sifting through these documents. But yeah, speaking a bit more about the hearings, it was interesting.
You know, Jay Monahan was missed.
It was like they sent in Jimmy Dunn and Ron Price, and Jimmy Dunn is a legend in the golf world, but it seemed like he was struggling a little bit to articulate his thoughts and a couple of times he said, well, I'm not a lawyer. You know who's a lawyer is Ed Hurley, who's a chairman of the PGA Tour Board, who is also one of the architects of this framework agreement. I'm still puzzled why they didn't send Hurley. He's like
supposedly the leading lawyer in the United States. Like I think he might have been able to address some of these things with a little more nimbleness and.
Precise language.
But and you know Poort Ron Price, I mean, he's always been this background figure. He's been in the tour forever, and all of a sudden, with his boss on medical leave, which conveniently ends in a.
Few days, they said, they said, they said, Ron up there just to be fed to the lions.
And I've watched plenty of of hearings going all the way back to Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill, and it's always interesting to see our elected officials on display. And uh, there was some some departures, and we wound up talking a lot about China. You know, Josh Holly from from Missouri was obsessing about China. They're not really part of this deal. You didn't, Senator like.
It was it was random.
And then you know, uh, Senator Paul from Kentucky went on this whole riff about name image likeness and how it's destroying college sports, and these things are tangentially related to the issue at hand. But there was a lot of grand standing. There was a lot of politicking, which is always part of these these hearings, so that was expected.
But I thought Ron Johnson, he was from Wisconsin, it seemed like he was auditioning to become, you know, maybe maybe to fill Randall Stevens spot on the PG Tour policy board. You know, he was like, he was very gentle and very supportive of the tour. Blumenthal from Connecticut who kind of you know, he was a senator who's been the driving force and all this. I thought his questions were really sharp and penetrating, and he definitely had
had the tour guys on their heels. There were no bombshells that came out of this, other than potentially the language about Greg Norman's dismissal, which was always kind of expected. If Jay Monahan is going to become the commissioner of this, of the new co, there wasn't really a role for Norman, but that that's created a lot of headlines. I think that was that was somewhat obvious, but it is interesting if liv continues to stay on this parallel path even
even as the new code framework deal gets consummated. That if Norman has no role in that. So that was kind of that was kind of the bombshell, if if there was one, but I think.
It was a Norman.
It was about like, certainly the idea that Norman like, I don't know, I mean, it's not only a bombshell, but it's a bombs like to me, that was kind of part of the layer to the Norman factor.
Is well, yeah, I mean, Norman's had to know he's on thin ice ever since this deal became public and the fact that he wasn't even consulted in it, he had no role or voice in its negotiation, that was the first clear signal he's on the outside looking in. And given that the Norman and Monhan have been in bitter opposition to each other and now Mona Han's been elevated to the CEO of all of Golf, essentially if this deal gets done, that would leave Norman on, you know,
without a role. I mean, that's been clear, but it was interesting that it was actually put in writing and and sort of the cold bloodedness of it. And so yeah, my biggest takeaway, to go back to your original question, is how tenuous this framework agreement really is. And some of the documents as they've they've been laid out, show how much horse trading that was going on just to try and get to the framework agreement, which as presented has almost no specificity, no details. And the reason is
they couldn't agree on anything. I mean, there was like eight different drafts and all these fantastical things like you know, the piff asking Tiger Woods to play ten live events. I mean, Tiger's not going to play. He may not play ten turn as the rest of his career, and they certainly he's not going to burn any of his precious footsteps on a live golf event, right, Like some of it was was bizarre and wishful thinking. Maybe it's just posturing as part of any negotiation, but so why
was the framework agreement so unsatisfying and so vague. It's because they couldn't agree on a damn thing, and it's just like, okay, we got to put this out. And even even there was all this choreography about how how we would the messaging behind it, what steps would come before the announcement, that all got tossed aside too. I mean in our previous podcast with Jeff Ogilvie, you know, he speculated that it had been leaked and it was going.
To go public, and somebody knew or somebody was going.
To take it public, and that's why they hit fast forward on the announcement that has more of the ring of truth now and when you look at it didn't play out the.
Way it was. It was scripted in all the correspondent, So.
You know, Jimmy Dunn was pretty honest about that. We have a long way to go on this deal, and the tour is vulnerable if if they can't consummate the deal, because every every tour player who turned down the Saudi money and remained loyal to the tour now to have their bosses come in and say, listen, it's fine, it's all good. We love the Saudis, we love the money.
We're all one big, happy family. And if this deal blows up, there's absolutely no incentive for any of these guys to stay loyal to the tour anymore because the tour was not loyal to them. So the the stakes have been raised here in negotiating this this framework deal. In some ways the stat he's already gotten what they wanted.
They've been they've gotten the official stamp of approval from the powers that be in golf, and so I think they're like, Okay, if we can, if we can get this done, great, and if not, we'll just we'll take We'll take John Rahm, and we'll take every other player we want, and we'll just make Live a bigger.
Thing so you can.
And there was a moment where where one of the senators asked, Jimmy Dunn, has this whole process made it harder to consummate the frameworkgreement?
He said, yeah, obviously it has. And so.
The next you know, five months become really fascinating as to if they can get across the finish line and what it's actually going to look like.
This is, I mean, the idea that we are having this conversation and having covered the game for as long as we have, whether you're just coming to the game or you've been covering the game, like if you're Ben Crenshaw or if you're like, you know, I don't know, you know, Charlie Woods, like the the the whole thing is just truly remarkable to me that this is the state of professional golf and just shows you how I
don't know if you saw Riggs. Riggs is sort of you know, social post on which he goes on and sort of does his big takeaways and talks about the way that the reason why we're here and why the tour and how poorly they treated the players, the sponsors, the ego they've had for so long, which is why
I've always said I'm just rooting for the disruption. I just just the tour's attitude and ego, you know, sort of ran a muck right, and Tim fincham Oh, by the way, left this steamy pile of shit on the front doorstep or the of of of the office of his successor and said.
I rode Tiger.
I'm not only did I ride Tiger into sort of this new world era of professional golf, I wrote it right into the Hall of Fame with Tiger shoulder to shoulder, which the irony of that, all of that is not lost on me. And now Jay has had to deal with all of this and the vulnerability of this sport in which it just took a big pile of money. You know, you had the Premier Golf League, Saudi stole their playbook had Greg Norman as a guy who was able to get enough players to make this a relevant
and a real thing. That that led to like more money here, and then a push to the sponsors to bring up the money that they're going to spend on a watered down, you know, product, and the sponsors going, none of this is making much sense. You're talking at us, not with us. Not only are we out in twenty twelve, but let's try to get out in twenty twenty three. Oh my god, we're screwed. We better meet with these guys, we better bring them like we got to do a
deal with them. Let's just at least do a deal to do a deal, and let's figure this out later in the middle of the season of twenty twenty three, in the middle of the four Majors leading into a Ryder Cup.
I mean, this is absolute mayhem.
It is, as I've said many times, it's just a gift from the content gods. As I was watching this, hearing play out was I kind of had to jog my memory. I was googling what were the biggest golf stories of twenty twenty one. You know, that was really the last year before Live arrived. Number two on this list I saw was the USGA capping driver link at forty six inches instead of forty eight.
That was the number two story twenty twenty one. Like it was a much simpler time.
And I'm sure when the USGA was the bad guy, yeah, Jesus even.
And that's what been one of the ironies along as you were alluding to that the monopolistic PGA tour has been couched as the good guy underdog and all this because we know from our own dealings that's not necessarily the case. But so yeah, it's these are just as as many people have said, these are unparalleled times, and it's we're all just kind of riding these waves of news breaks and energy around this and this again, this
isn't even over. At the end of the hearings, they you know, they kind of said, well, this is not the end. We look forward to hearing from the people that we have previously invited. We want to still want to get their thoughts on this. That's Monahan, Norman and
the most important guy, Yaser al Ramayan. So you know, mister Smith goes to Washington part too, like that these guys are going to be testifying again and a bluemin thought and Holly and some of the other senators were pretty effective at boxing in uh, you know, Jimmy Dunn and Ron Price and getting them to commit we want they want certain things in writing. One of the interesting bits was Price was questioned about pushback from the players and he said, you know, he said, of course, yeah,
they're upset. We've been we've been having to you know, kind of smooth things over, and there's been a lot of conversation. And he said, have there been any communications in writing and Price just him and how do you
want answer the question? And finally at the end he extracted a promise and if there's anything in writing, we want to see it so that that now becomes interesting, you know, if they can get Rory and Tiger and those guys as text messages to Monaghan or to Jimmy Dunn, email correspondence between the agents like So this is not over even from from the standpoint of the federal government's involvement, and looming in the background of all this is a
Department of Justice that that's a totally separate issue and a different body with with with much stronger powers of investigation. And so there there's they're still looking at anti trusts as it goes back to the original battle between the tour and live and now what this you know, quote unquote merger might mean it's not really a merger, but people using that word is interesting because it kind of
captures the feeling. And so this is this is not over, and I'm sure there's there's plenty of golf fans who wish it was. And then we could go back to when the most important thing in golf was the lengthier driver or whether you're wearing a hoodie or not. You know, those were just much simpler times. But you know, it's akin to I mean, the biggest scandal of the Obama administrations was you know, him putting mustard on a hot
dog or wearing a tan suit. You know, is so his quote, his scandals were so tame compared to Trump, which had, you know, been so impactful and NonStop. And that's kind of golf is following that that that traject you know, what used to be a big deal doesn't seem like such a big deal anymore.
Here's what we know.
There will be four majors in twenty twenty four, you know what I mean, Like like the majors, and you know, I'm just so disenchanted by all of this, just all all of it as it relates to professional golf. I have a hard time, you know, I have a hard time firing for the week to week, you know, Thursday through Sunday, stroke play, who won this week? Good shot, bad shot, good score, bad score.
Finished strong?
We're choked, Like unless it's relating to a major, you know, I none of this is really at all compelling to me, and I feel like the only thing we know compelling in a way that makes me more intrigued by sort of you know, following the world of professional golff. It's like, good God, there never was a really good a good guy in the room. I don't think there is a
good guy in the room still to this day. I'm just rooting for, at some point down the road that they will get it all sorted and will be presented with some sort of a product that actually, you know, has value from a from a fans standpoint. I mean, the fans are so far down on this list at this point in terms of what matters.
It's like it's you know, it's the.
Top players, it's the top sponsors, and brands that are related to those top players. Then it's like, you know, some sort of legacy as it relates to the PGA Tour and the people you know are.
In charge of that.
Then there's like the other players you know that beyond the top thirty or beyond the top twenty five, and then it's you know, I keep going, like the priority list just keeps going. You know, God only knows where a DP World Tour, corn Ferry Tour, I mean, where do where does all that? And but then there's the fan the way down this list is like, we'll figure that out at some other point, but we got a
lot of shit to you know this. This individual mindset that it takes to be a player is well documented. It's an individualistic sport. It takes a lot of you know, you know, a tunnel vision, uh, sort of narcissistic approach to sort of life in general, because you're it's you
versus the world. And I think there's something to that that has led to sort of this that has blown up in sort of the world of professional golf'space, and I just don't see any real clear and and uh an understandable solution in any way shape or form.
Yeah, it's interesting. Mark Brooks texted me out of the blue yesterday. You know, for were a tour player, PGA championship winner, all that stuff, and he was involved in this effort to create a player union back in the nineties. He was intimately involved, and they were basically shouted down. No top players would support them, with the notable exception of Greg Norman, which is interesting. Norman was on the few guys who actually paid his thousand dollars membership fee and was.
Vocal about supporting the union.
But all the other top guys that were dismissive and they never got traction. And you know that was a talking point in the Senate hearings is they kept coming back to this point, why were the players not involved? You know, the whether it was price or done. They kept saying there were a players organization, and so the senators kept coming back to this point, if you're a player organization, how could the players not have a voice
in this process? And this is not a new issue, I mean, this is going this is going on three decades now where and even longer really, I mean, but there was that strong push in the nineties to create a real, workable union. And you see in other sports, h how how important the union is that protecting the player's interests. But those are team sports, and like you said, golf is just this this game that celebrates the rugged individual.
But it's it's a problematic moment for for all these lone wolves right now, who all of a sudden they want the safety of the pack. But they they've always rejected it until now. So it's there's there's the structural questions, and neither Price nor Done came up with a satisfactory answer.
You know. They they made the point that uh, and this this was kind of funny.
Basically, if the lawyers on neither side had heard about this, they would have tried to killed the deal. Well yeah, because the lawyers are making tens of millions of dollars a month, so of course they would have tried to kill the deal. But but they never were able to fully explain why they couldn't have let Rory in or Tiger or you know, even Peter mal not use on the board of directors.
You know that they they they.
Talked around it, but they never answered the question. And so I'm sure some any players who were paying attention that that was that left him with a hollow feeling because that that's that's been one of the primary critiques of this entire process is that you've got uh and and this was also interesting Jimmy Dunn, you know, they he said something to the fact like, well, I just came on the board, you know, end of last year, and I don't I don't really know all the personalities.
And you know, he kind of admitted that he was this this this newcomer who didn't have a full understanding of the landscape, and yet he was the guy because of his charisma and because of his business background he was sent out there to represent all the interests of the tour and it just it just made for some
very awkward testimony. As you know, the senators were pretty effective at times in in kind of laying these traps verbally and done, and Price walked into a few of them, and they didn't I don't think they there were no fatal blows, but I feel like collectively, you know, taking taking CEO the PGA tour, Ron Price, and you take Jimmy Dunn, they didn't quite help the cause I got I feel like they were evasive those times that they didn't they didn't have the goods, and those things they
couldn't totally explain away, and so there there were there were no there were no like gotcha moments where you felt like we'd really uncovered something nefarious or or or some element of of of reckless disregard for the process.
But they just they were not that impressive between the two of them, and they were playing defense the whole time, and they never were really able to articulate effectively how this deal came about, what it means for the consumers and the players and the fans, as you say, Matt. And strangely it was Ron Johnson, the Center from Wisconsin,
who I thought did the best job. You know, he kind of went near the end of the of of the hearing, he went on a couple of monologues talking about the tour and you know, defending the tour and explaining their position, and he actually I thought he did a good job of stating.
What could have been the tour's position all along. So it was an interesting choice.
I mean, I think, of course none of these mon Han does not want to get up there and go through this, but after watching this performance, it might be hope him to do so. And to try and really sell this a little more effectively to the people who are watching at home, who are his consumers.
The way you summarize the whole sort of the heat, you know, the hearing, the sort of the way you encapsulated the they didn't have any good answers. They didn't they didn't have any good specifics. There wasn't good communication, There wasn't any really like it kind of summarizes that, Like if we go back and listen to that summarizes the PGA tour from the very beginning of this whole process.
At the start, they've never had good communication, They've in they feel like they look like they've just they're just chasing their tail. There's you know what has what was the actual vision they they they whatever they pretended to stand for that caved in. You know, we're not going to compete with money, but then they try to compete with It's just been this ongoing contradiction, hypocritical sort of confusion from the very beginning. It's just has been NonStop.
And so why why would today be any different? Why is tomorrow going to be any different? What is Jay Monaghan going to is he going to on his break did he actually form some cognitive thoughts in a way that we can all process and you know and and understand. Is there going to ever be a solution in which, you know, uh, like the idea of like telling Tiger what he is and isn't going to do play or
not play? Play These events are not play events to your point, Like the idea that he will play even ten events total, let alone play ten live events live events is absolutely that's hysterical. The idea that yah Seer is going to actually get a membership to Augustin like, you know, who doesn't like it told what to do more than Tiger Woods Augusta National. You think he's going to walk it like and the RNA like, oh so we got we got everybody, let's welcome our new member.
You know, this is like.
This is a clown This is a clown car, and every time the door opens, more clowns just keep walking out of the car.
How many clowns are involved in this process?
That was my exact thought about yoa, Sir and Augusta National is maybe it had he had a chance until that went public and that no, no, the guy's.
Gonna be rolling around in a green jacket.
Yeah, you know, it's funny because this is there's I have this whole riff in my book about this is part of the reason I think Jimmy Dunn was sent over to meet with the Yoscer is Jimmy Dunn represents everything that Yoser wants in golf. I mean, Jimmy Dunn is famously the first guy to become a member at simultaneously at Augusta National, Cypress Point, Pine Valley in Seminole.
Right, those are the inner sanctums.
And oil money can buy you a jet and a yacht, it can buy you politicians, it can even buy you golfers. The one thing that cannot buy you directly is a locker at Augusta National or at Cypress Point. And you know, so Yostter's been on that, He's been desperate to get into the golf world.
He's been on the outside looking in.
They said, over Jimmy, who's like the emissary of of.
Of the elite.
You know, he's the he's the ring master of all these private clubs. And I think that's a tangible thing, you know, for for Yoser, that was that's part of this this whole thing. If he could get into one of those places, he would have arrived in a way that no Saudi public figure ever had. Because there's there's things you can buy and there's things you can't buy.
And Augusta National is the ultimate symbol of your You've been vetted, you know, I mean you've you've been there Matt as a guest, and I've been lucky to play at some of these other places, and there is this weird sense like I don't know who you are, but you're here in this grill room with me at the same time, and so you're one of your You're one of us, You're one of me, and and so that
that is like the ultimate carrot. Would would you also spend four billion dollars of the public Investment Fund money from Augusta National membership?
I think the answer is yes, gladly.
And so it was just funny to see that in the harsh black and white of a document dump, right, it speaks to these the motivations here and that that's been that's been a question from the beginning, you know what, what is Saudi Arabia.
Trying to accomplish here?
And some of that was was really revealed in a in a profound way. And you know, sports watching, you could say, as as an exercise in sports watching, live golf has been a colossal failure because a lot of golf fans never really thought about Saudi Arabia's role in world affairs or how it's treated its dissident citizens. Now it's in aes capable topic.
Right.
I'm not sure how effective it's been at at at laundering the reputation of MBS and the regime, but as an exercise of getting you know, the seat of the proverbial table, about being accepted in the quarters of power, about building relationships with powerful Western businessmen and public figures, it's been massively effective.
And so you know, all these things exist.
On multiple levels, and so it's just funny that it got someone actually typed it up and put it in a memo about y'alls are getting augusta national membership. WICH guarantees will never get one. But that that really tells you what they're thinking, was.
What if okay, let's just say Tiger would takes a step back here for a second. And you know, and when I say Tiger, you know that comes with Mark Steinberg. Obviously they're like they're there they've always been one and the same, or at least since you know, post Hughes Norton. You know, yeah, Steinberg and Tiger are you know, they are that they are.
That business right.
And let's say Tiger were to say, all right, let's let's start, let's start a tour, and let's let's form a tour the.
Right way with you with a unionized approach to this.
Let's let's learn from the last you know, let's learn from the last two years. But let's let's let's also learn from the last you know, twenty years. Let's learn from you know, sort of from the day that I came on the scene and golf went to a whole the stratosphere, just like Arnie and Jack kind of learned from what they had gone through and Gary and you know and McCormick and they formed, you know, the PGA Tour.
What if there's a revamped professional golf tour that Tiger sort of embraces becomes kind of the commissioner de facto commissioner of the leader of they actually create something that has the framework of a greater good, in which then brands now have something they are willing to you know, the big money brands that could fund something like this twenty tour events that you get, they're all sort of elevated, so to speak from up from a money standpoint, players
do have a voice and a role. There is a it is it is a tour. You know that that the commissioner Tiger essentially works for the players.
Like what if.
There is something that like isn't the PIFF and it isn't the PGA Tour, but it is something that actually makes sense in addition to the four Majors and the Ryder Cup and you come up with you know, is that is that like so far fetched or outrageous?
Well, I mean I think that's what this this this new code, this framework agreement could be. Yeah, but come on, but if I've read this, I think Sally Jenkins wrote this column in the Washington Post a few weeks ago, like Tiger and Rory and Jordan should just start their own tour.
And the the problem is how do you pay for it?
Because the Premier Golf League was trying to do that for years and they had a lot of smart people, and they had a lot of traction, but ultimately they couldn't attract enough money.
Well, they needed the player they needed the players to the players. You know, if you with Tiger then everything falls.
Then you get Rory, And if you got Tiger and Rory, then you potentially get rom If you get to Tiger, Rory and Rahm, Like, I don't know, you.
Know, but this would We're just coming. This has been This has been basically five years to get to this moment, from the from when the Premier Golf League first became public in twenty eighteen. So it's five years to get from there to hear and it's been obviously a colossal pain in the ass for everyone, and it's still not settled to trying to reinvent the wheel one more time.
I don't think anyone has the appetite for that.
But I mean, this is all going backwards. If you ask me, I mean who who Who's Like if if Y'ah Sir is actually the one in charge and if the Piff Fund is the answer, and if that is going to be the future of professional golf.
Really yeah, it's I mean, he's not going to get.
His membership, Tiger's not going to play those ten events. The you know, the other players are just going to still be just as pissed. I mean, this is a hornet's nest of anxiety and and and and pissed off agents, players, sponsors. This is going backwards. There is no what is the actual steps to something that resembles a solution.
Well, so what's interesting is Andy Gardner, who's the driving force by the Premiere Golf League. He's been completely silent to all of this, and there are some folks in golf who think that he is waiting in the wings in cases whole thing falls apart and the Premier Golf League could be re animated and save the day because it would not have the association with the Saudis. But what this whole exercise has shown is the tour is willing to change its model and it's willing to bring
an outside investment. And so you could go to all these private equity behemoths that are love to invest in other sports. Of course they they would be happy to invest in golf as well, and you could essentially have outside investment and reimagine PG Tour. You take away all the objections to the Saudi involvement, and the Premiere Golf League could be that vehicle. So it's an interesting Tiger Woods.
And Mark Steinberg need Andy Gardner, do they need that play? But like, if I'm like Tiger Woods, Tiger Woods, hat is in a unique position in which he is Tiger fucking Woods. Like he he trumps everybody in every one of these situations. And he's been you know, he's he's sat back, he's distanced himself from all the you know, the little shenanigans that are going on, and he's going to protect his eighty two wins. And you know, certainly, you know, fifteen majors is that ain't go, that's not
going anywhere. And he's Tiger Woods and it's his time. Like if if did he do all of this and commit to all of that and build up all of this equity to sort of, you know, play a secondary role to some guy from Saudi Arabia wants it, you know, a green.
Jacket by his way to a green jacket. Like it's comical.
This is Tiger Woods is the best in the game. You know, he is Michael Jordan, He's Wayne Gretzky, He's he's Kelly Slater. If they go, if they go to try to do something or people are going to follow.
Well, Tiger Woods is as a player moves the needle like no other. But as a bureaucrat, I'm not not so sure. And if you look at Michael Jordan, he was a failure as an NBA owner, you know these, but he.
Didn't But he could have, you know, you know, but the NBA is a league and full of teams and has a player's union, and and he couldn't have started
his own league. But Tiger, at this moment, professional golf is as vulnerable as it's ever been ever, right, like, certainly in modern in this in this modern times, if he were to like actually commit to starting something that makes sense to not only the players who play the game, but also the brands who support the game beyond some pif fund that's going out, you know, going around trying to to sportswash, you know, a real you know, gnarly reputation. I just if Tiger, if the PGA Tours up against
the pit Fund, it's losing. If Tiger Woods is up against the pit Fun, I think he could win.
Yeah, it's a interesting thought exercise, for sure. I mean, of course, you're you're you're not giving proper due to the tech infused golf league that Tiger and Rory are going to debut, which that's.
What that was three years in the making. They're they're super proud of it.
So but that's that's what professional golf is good.
That's the answer.
But no, I mean it's actually that is probably that was a good, uh test balloon, right, Like they've it's given Tiger and Rory a sense of ownership and a taste of power, and and that's put him in the boardroom and they're having to recruit investors and sponsors. So to your point, I mean that that's sort of like you know, playing on the corn ferry to get to the to get to the PGA tour, like they've paid some dues now in that in that managerial role, So
it's not at the realm of possibility. And it's again as we were talking about earlier, this framework agreement expires on December thirty first, and so it's it they're the pressure's on to get it consummated. If not, then anything's possible. And I do think that you know, part of the live events over in Spain and in London the last couple of weeks as words leaking out, and it was a big deal that Yasser went and played in the pro am at Valderrama because he was a ubiquitous presence
on Live Golf last year. He was at every pro am, he was at every party, and he had stepped back this year and he was he had not he had not been to a single tournament. And you know his lieutenant, this guy Magic al Sor, he'd been he'd been moved out of the day to day and he he was also he was he was a big part of the whole social fabric of Live and his first season, and so those two guys have just been completely gone this year, and that led to a little bit of jitters on
Live like what does it mean? Like these are our patriarchs, these are our biggest boosters, and they're the bridge to all the PIF money and having them step back created some angst.
And so for.
Y'astro to go into Valderama, play the pro am with Phil Press a lot of flesh, have this meeting with the captains that Norman was part of and some of the other top executives and express his bullishness on Live's future.
That meant a lot.
So I think, to me, there's no doubt that there's going to be a Live schedule in twenty twenty four. This has been there's been a question from the moment the framework agreement was announced, is what's going to happen to Live? And you know, Jay Monahan and Jimmy Dunn were selling hard this idea that we control the board,
therefore we control the decision on Live. But this was another little sentence that was tucked in that into one of these memos that got releasedast was that in fact I don't have in front of you, but it said, while the new coboard will will make the ultimate decision on golf, it's likely to be handled by the Executive Committee of the Board. That's you know, a smaller group, and that's where and it said where the piff has
more control and more more weights, that's Yasers. So that was an acknowledgment something I've believed from the beginning that the Yasers are going to decide the future of Live and nobody else. And so if I think they're going to go, they're going to all systems are go for twenty twenty four. It's partly to keep them in a position of strength in negotiating with the tour on this framework agreement, because if they just pull the plug right
now on Live, they've lost all their leverage. But you know, Jimmy Dunn was very clear today in his testimony that you know, we're in a tough spot if this framework agreement goes away because there will be no impediments for Live to take more of a our players and they have already been elevated in the.
Eyes of sponsors.
And you know, that was another thing that when when honorbon Lahiri signed with Live, he got dropped by Hero Motor Corporation. You know, that's that's the guys who who sponsored Tiger's tournament, and it's it's like basically the General Motors of India and the guy who runs that, the founder. He played in the pro am in London and the Live pro am, and so that was like a very interesting reapproachment. It's like the walls are down. Now it's
okay for the corporations to come back to Live. It's it's okay to cut the deals.
And so.
It's this game of chicken, right and and what's they're they're It's kind of like when you're you're playing golf with your best friend. It's like when it's like when me and you go out and play a match together, Matt. It's like we're we're having fun and it's good natured, but we're also trying to like tear each other's heart out, and so there's a we're like for four hours like frenemies where where that's kind of this situation now between the Tour and the Piff as they try to negotiate
this framework. It's like, Okay, we're on the same team, let's do something for the for the good of golf. But it doesn't work out, you know, outcome, we're going to be competing again, and there's this sort of low grade threat beneath all of that, and it's it's pretty clear now that if the framework agreement goes away, that
lives in a much stronger position than it was. And so I think I think that they're going to they're going to to maintain that, they're gonna announce a twenty twenty four schedule and they're just going to kind of keep going. Now that could very well be the last live season at the end of twenty four if they consummate this agreement, If if y'alls are and the Piff want to go all in on the tour by then Live will fulfilled most of its contracts.
They will have paid out all the signing bonuses.
It would be a lot easier for it to fold up after twenty four than after twenty three. But that's another foundational question that isn't really answered today in the in the in the Senate hearings, but in the document release there was a little more clarity and just that one sentence that kind of acknowledge that you know, yosers and the executive community of the board and they're going to have more say in this than had previously been kind of sold to the public.
I thought that was really meaningful.
It just comes back to the tour has been exposed for being a tour supposedly you know, you know, a player's tour run by a commissioner who's not consulting with the player. I mean, this just whole that that's the vulnerability, and that's why that's why this is, that's why PIFF you know and.
Live worked because you had you had.
A splintered system in which they were pretending to care about the players, but they didn't really care about the players. They they pretended to listen to players, but didn't actually listen to players. They were they had their own agenda from a business standpoint and a money standpoint. A lot of the points in phil has always been been making and was actually.
Right about uh.
And that's why and and that's why there and now there is no there's no good leader or leadership. It's a deal to make a deal, and you're dealing with the devil. So you know, if you deal with the devil, you better. You better like the temperature of hell.
Yeah, I mean.
The less than all of this. The bottom line to me from this, this, this whole chapter in professional golf is that and it's taken right out of the business world. In the absence of competition, the products suffers. And we saw the pg throw had a monopoly on big time golf this century. You know that you could you could argue in the ninety the European Tour was almost the equal of the PGA Tour. They were winning the Ryder Cup.
All their players are winning majors. They you know, especially in the late eighties when Sevey was still in his prime, they had all these stars, they had all this charisma. The money still wasn't quite commensurate, but they were a real viable competitor. And then Tiger Woods arrived in nineteen ninety six and changed everything and the balance of power flipped, you know, strongly to the PGA Tour and there was
more money and there's more world ranking points. And the last top European guy who stayed home was really called Montgomery in the nineties and since then all the top Europeans have come over to the PGA Tour. And so the PGA Tour has had this monopoly on big time golf and it led to very little innovation, right, I mean in the telecasts, they're like the telecasts were better forty years ago when you watch them. The social media, the rise of social media, like we all know the
PGA Tour. Social media is terrible, just all the ways they tried to they try to present the game.
Hold the game, and control the around the game. It's like without publishing, publishing you know, the penalties and why people are being punted like the.
Yeah.
So in the in the absence of competition, the products suffered and it made it was an old, tired industry that was very ripe for disruption and pre golf Ley tried it, they couldn't They couldn't quite launch the Saudis came in, took their idea, had the money and and they created this This product now is live a perfect product obviously not. I mean the marketplace has said that
there they're struggling still to attract the sizeable audience. But at least it was competition that forced the PGA towards to innovate and to change, and the elevated events have been a huge success. They were all of a sudden finding ways to pay their top players what they're worth.
And so if it's just it's.
They're going to be teaching this in business classes, you know, for for a long time. Like this is the classic case study where the PGA tour was just a little too content and a little too comfortable, and it made them vulnerable and the you know, Hamanahan said, well, there was an irrational threat we never could have seen coming.
But I mean this Oudis were involved in golf since since twenty eighteen, and they had a relationship with the European Tour, with the Ladies' European Tour, with the LPGA, which allowed his top players to play in the Ramco series.
So you could see them coming. It wasn't that hard to see them.
Coming, and then they were they were working with the PGL. You know, they plaged five million dollars for the PGL. It's not widely known, but and so like this has been an incremental arrival and then all of a sudden, they just they pushed their chips in the middle of the table and the tour was completely unprepared.
So and as I saying, it.
Was because the tour refused to meet and it was like, oh, okay, you don't even want to meet.
With us, all right, well then screw you.
Let's let's let's let's let's go crazy.
Yeah.
Yeah, So I think that it was sort of crystallized. You know, Monahan loomed very large in his absence today, and that the two guys who sent tried their best, but.
They they couldn't.
Quite fend off the attacks from the centers because they didn't really have the answers, like they don't know what's in the framework agreement. They didn't have a good reason
why they didn't involve the players. They couldn't really explain why the tour had been made so vulnerable to this threat, because that would they would have to therefore point the finger back at themselves and their boss j and so it kind of laid bare some of these things that we've known but and have been discussed but in a
very graphic public forum. And that was one of my takeaways was that even though a lot of these senators are sort of like Inspector cluseau Vibes and they've got their own agendas and they go off on these weird tangents across almost three hours, they did hammer down on some of these points that made it very clear that the tour just there was an element of mismanagement that brought them to this moment and they're still trying to fight their way out of it.
It's so funny what happens in golf when things are laid out in a very graphic, truthful forum. No one knows it better than you because you've made a living doing it, not you know, not afraid to write what you've written about Tiger off course, or write what you've written about Phil you know.
Off course or or like.
But every time it happens, Oh, it's you know, the whole, the whole collective, you know, world of golf gasps at the idea.
That there's actual truth coming.
You know that Tiger's actually not that great of a guy, or Phil's not that great of a guy, or you know, Arnold's you know transgression like oh, don't well talk about you know, scaoid or the idea that maybe there's some players who have you know, cheating, Oh got gret don't talk about it well.
And it runs even deeper on social issues. I mean the PG of America's Caucasian only clause. I mean, fourteen years after Jackie Robinson, they still had a Caucasian only clause.
Don't do don't, don't, don't talk about that, right.
And then then thirty years later, Shoal Creek blows up and it's like, oh wow, we had no idea there was so much racism in the country clubs. Really it's and then and then you know, Martha Burke brings to the issue of of you know, all these all male.
Memberships and the Old Boys.
Network, and and it's like it just golf is always behind the times, and it's that that outdated mentality is what made the PG Tour.
Vulnerable for disruption.
And you know, you if you look at what the other sports leagues do on their social media compared to the PGA Tour, it's like it's night and day and all all these things. It's how every Sunday golf. Twitter for ten years been bitching about the TV coverage and it's still just as bad as it was, Like like golf, and we just saw this this last weekend where you know you're watching I was watching the playoff over on the European Tour.
They cut out so they can go to the pregame. With the US Women's Open, you.
Gotta scramble for different apps and different streaming services just.
To watch golf.
And it happens every week where you can't find the golf you want to watch Ricky Fowler winning, you know, first time in forever.
It's a huge story. People had to watch it not.
Streaming on their phones because they couldn't get on TV. And like golf still can't get the little things or the big They can't get anything right, but as an institution and then even the thing that seems like the simplest stuff, And.
So that was that was you know, this goes back to your first question. What was my takeaway?
One of my takeaways was, man, this this sport is just it remains behind the times and it's so reactionary and when we're all in our little bubbles. You take it out into the big world where people are not part of the golf ecosystem, they can see it more clearly. And like, you know, Center Blumenthal could see it pretty clearly, and some of these other guys, like the their questioning
was tough and it was on point. And because it takes sometimes an outsider to see what gets obscured by all of us in our own little silos, and.
It comes back to me, like again we throw around this term golf golf, I think it's important to note that what we're talking about is professional golf because the golf that we know isn't going anywhere you know, my my community and the camaraderie that exists at goat Hill Park or or you know, Winter Park nine or Lions Muni or the clubs that you're a member of or like that's the good news is like we still have that, we still have travel, we still have golf destination, we
still have our Buddies trip, we still have our annual like and we have our we have the four Majors and whatever. This is when we reference sort of this golf and professional golf and the fight for you know, a big trophy in a big check.
I'm just it's like, let me know when.
You guys figure it out, and let me know when you like feel good about something that you're presenting as something that we should tune into on a regular basis, because it actually makes some sort of sense from a start to a finish of a season in which a player is player of the year or a.
You know, I don't know.
I mean, you know, get back to me when you when you actually decide to like come up with something that's worth you know, investing in from my you know, away from my family.
You know, I know the game of golf is worth my time, I know, but right now the world of professional golf just isn't.
Yeah, that's valid. I mean you almost have to separate it. Like all this these tour wars and all this stuff. It's like its own spectator sport. You know, it's become more interesting.
Than the actual sport. And that's the problem.
But you know, if you go if I was running around Oak Hill on Sunday and it was pretty electric, like if you go to golf tournament and it's especially now, I mean it's you'll catch a few strays from the crowd. But it's still such a great theater.
You know, this this.
Mind body battle that the top players are all alone out there between the ropes, like the inherent tension and greatness of tournament golf. If you can separate these things, it's still really fun to be part of. But for two years now, all the other stuff has overwhelmed the conversation and that's going to be the rest of this year, and it's going to continue into you know, twenty four, no matter what happens. So I look at it as a totally different sport and it's I mean, it's fun
to follow in its own right. You know, the golf is golf. I hate they're playing in Scotland this week. It's always fun to get up early and watch that telecast. We got the Open Championship next week. Someone's gonna become the champion golf for the year. In spite of all
of this. So I hear what you're saying, Maddie. I think on some level, and this is modern life, right like you have to you have to be able to just sort of compartmentalize your thinking because if you go out and you want to eat a steak, you can feel really guilty about how much water it took to, you know, to feed that cow, and what's happening to the rainforest for they can they can graze cattle and is it even humane? Sometimes you just want a steak.
You know what I mean?
So like you can overthink everything, and it's I'm not taking away the validity of the other arguments, and I'm no one more than me has been tuned into all the intrigue and the drama around professional golf the last couple of years. It's fascinating in its own way. But you know, Thursday of next week when they're playing the first round of the Open Championship, Like, I think a lot of that stuffill melt away and we can still
enjoy the golf. But it's harder and harder. And I think that's everything in life, I mean, as a consumer, as a as a citizen, Like it's it's problematic we know too much and we're exposed to too much, and and you never meet your heroes, Like that's never been more true. Like it's all complex and and this this was another day to reflect on that.
Well, we gotta we got to wrap this up because you've got to do additional additional amendments to this, this ongoing book that you're still that you're still writing. I I I'm I'm marvel at and I know probably only only your family knows more, uh more than I do in terms of how hard you're you're trying to uh get this as current as possibly for it. Send, send, send, So so keep going on. Almost feel like it's almost become two books.
Now.
It's the one prior.
To yeah, two weeks ago or three weeks ago, and then there's there's this whole other Like I feel like you're going to be writing this is just one ongoing giant novel.
God help me.
No, I mean it's yeah, it's like it's like writing a bucking bronco. I mean this whole this whole process has.
Been haucking bronco.
Yeah.
I mean, anytime you write a book, the publishers a lawyer that vets it usually is pretty benign. I was on the phone this morning with Simon Chuse or lawyer, for two hours, and I said, I said, you're not done yet. Man, like this this I'm going to refile the last chapter again and probably one more time, and so it's still coming.
But it's cool.
I mean, it's it's going to be a cliffinger, and none of us know how this story is going to end, and it's it's not going to get it's not going to get adjudicated for a while. But the book is going to be up to the moment current as as much as you can do if something has to be into it and distributed like that, like Simon Schuster is
letting me take this down to the wire. I've never seen a publishing schedule that is this aggressive, and so I'm appreciative of that and certainly everything that's happened today in the Senate, and I'll keep I'll spend the rest of this week reporting it, and I'll keep updating it and going.
Back in and adding things, and it's kind of fun.
I mean, it's been a hell of a challenge. I thought I was done. That's not nearly the case. But I'm enjoying the process. But at some point it's going to have to end.
Maybe, Yeah.
I mean, in some ways, you know, the Mickelson book and all the revelations of that helped kick off.
This whole story.
This is the definitive account of everything that people don't know about how we got to this moment. I suppose there could be a third part into trilogy, but I don't know.
I don't want to think about that right now.
Let's end this podcast and I'll go take a nap and then i'll come I'll come back with an answer on the next one.
But thanks again for your thoughts and commentary. And I know a lot like others looking to you to actually bring some sense of of you know, middle ground information, you know, bipartisan reporting and a better understanding and levity to sort of you know, what's just transpired and what might transpire in the future. I mean, so thanks for all this and and yeah, pleasure, I wouldn't want to be your keyboard.
It's tickless.
I just use my fingertips so lightly. But yeah, I know, it's fun. It's fun to talk about this stuff. I appreciate what you said, like I do enjoy the role of trying to help people make sense of all this because it's a lot to synthesize, and there's there's new stuff every day. So anyway, Yeah, it's always a good conversation. Definitely not the last one, so we will we will end this podcast for now. The people at home, Thanks for sticking with US. More fire drills on the way.
Michael Bamberger will be over at the Open Championship for US next week and we'll be podcasting with him naturally. Anytime there's a big news break, we'll be back back at this, probably Matt and I and Sundry others. So for mat Chanella, this is Alan Shipnik. That was a fire droll podcast. Thanks for listening, and this is the end.
I'm bed big again.
I played the wind, made a fortune when my ship came man.
I ran the table, never thought I could fall down.
The winter time hit made lack a canon the ball, and now I can't shake this losing streak. Every road I take is a dead end street. I got thoughts in my head, can't get him. Trying not to think what I'm thinking about, not going thoughts in my head, I can't get him. Now, try and not think what I'm thinking about. H