I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset.
When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
And when I find my.
Ball in a brid Egg Frida Egg, the Friday Frida Egg.
Bride Egg Lie.
I'm about ready to run off the golf course.
Welcome back to another edition of the Friday Egg Podcast.
WHOA What a Day? What an announcement on Tuesday.
This is one of the biggest stories ever in the history of golf. The PGA Tour, the dp World Tour, and the Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund the p i F the PIFF Fund have announced a partnership. Let's get into some of the specifics. I have brought on a couple esteemed guests. I've got Joe Ogilvie, who was gracious enough to take some time out. We had him on earlier
this year. He was a member of the PGA Tourist Policy Board as a player as well as the pack so I'm excited for his insights into, you know, the deal and and kind of we can get into the nitty gritty there, as well as Joseph Lamania. We talk a lot about where we could see this thing going, where we would hope it would go on the back
half of this podcast, So big podcast. What I wanted to do was knock out some of the nuts and bolts of this Will Knights did a great little synopsis of the of the nuts and bolts for our newsletter on Wednesday morning. If you don't sign if you haven't signed up.
For our free newsletter, do that. You can do it at the Frida egg dot com.
But let's just go through some nuts of bolts so we don't have to go through that with our guests. What was announced so CNBC reported that the PGA Tour would combine with Live Golf. A taped interview with PGA Tour Commissioner j Monahan and PIFF Governor Yasir Al Ramayon was then shown where they explained the deal. Afterwards, humorously, J Monahan said he trusted Yasser after ten minutes, you know,
saying down with you know that's gotten battered around. Shortly afterwards, the PGA Tour sent out a press release that said the PGA Tour dep World Tour in Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund have formed a landmark agreement to unify the.
Game of golf.
So this was talked about as a merger. It's not exactly a merger obviously, This is a framework deal. The general consensus is that live players will fold back into the PGA Tour structure in some manner. J Monahan did say that he doesn't expect Live Golf to continue to exist in his current form. What does the new structure look like? According to a press release, the new structure will combine the commercial businesses and rights of all the
parties into one collectively owned, for profit organization. This is a big deal. PGA Tour will go to a for profit organization. PGA Tour Inc. Will continue to operate as a nonprofit separate from the new LLC that will include the PGA Tour, dep World Tour, and the PITH. This new entity will receive capital investment from the PITH. As to what the calendar will look like now and how much PIF funding will provide or Team Golf would be involved,
we don't know. We'll talk about that stuff in the POD. The press release states the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and PIF will work together to best feature and grow Team go Off going forward. But we have not heard a lot of details. Not a lot of people knew about this. It seems as though the group that was working on the deal was very, very small. It was Jay Monahan, Ed Harriley, and Jimmy Dunn from the PGA Tour side, obviously, then you have Keith Pelly and Yasser
from the PITH. The vast majority of PGA Tour players and Live players, including the likes of Tiger and Rory, were made aware of the deal Tuesday morning. Rory in his press conference talked about how he knew talks were going on, but he heard right when the rest of the world heard. Greg Norman from Live humorously did not know he was told just before this CNBC interview. The PGA Tour TV partners unaware of it, the sponsors unaware
of it. Nobody knew this was coming, and that leaves things just up in flux, which makes this such a compelling period of time. The PGA Tour players a wide range of reactions. A lot of them were not happy. There were reports they had a players only meeting with Jay Monahan that the temperature of the room was quite hot,
so they kind of feel betrayed and manipulated. I think that's a big piece of this puzzle is you know, the players that were loyal to the PGA Tour did not take the live money, are kind of out in the cold. And obviously, I think from you know, beyond the players, from a fan perspective, there is a lot of angst and anger. Obviously one of the things J
Monahan comes out of this looking terrible. I mean, he was a year ago pledging for people's support, reminding people of the nine to eleven families, using the you know, kind of inhumane things that Saudi Arabia has done, the human rights aspect as well as the nine to eleven aspect as his as his defense as to why players should stay, why fans should you know, be PGA Tour fans, And now a year later he is partnering with that same organization that he was condemning. I think it's a
it's a challenging day. It's a it's one of those days where you know, there's so many layers to this and different aspects of it. But from a J Monahan perspective, a certainly a legacy day for him, and the legacy is going to be this, uh, this idea of him backing himself into a corner where he had no out except for this and his the hypocrisy of his statements.
You know, we'll see where this goes.
But I think that in general, with this and UH and golf like, it puts golf in a very interesting space. I think golf professional golf could get a lot better because of this, but it will always be tainted with the involvement of the PIFF And I think there's so much left of this too to go. I think it's hard to make declarations of this is good, this is bad.
We don't know what this is going to be. There are things about it that are very unpalatable, that are disgusting, and you know that that are difficult to come to blows as somebody who covers professional golf. But it is a fascinating time it has, you know, it is very interesting to see where this goes from a business standpoint and you know the future of golf, and I think like one of the things that I appreciate about about golf is that there is life outside of professional golf.
And that's one of the things that you know, a day like today makes me feel happy about is that this podcast doesn't just cover professional golf, and that we we talk about a lot of other things that make the game of golf beautiful and why we love the game of golf. And you know, not everything is about the money in golf, and that's the beautiful thing about golf,
professional golf. What we learned yesterday is that it is all about the money, and I think it's you know, it's a business, and the idea of it being this romantic gentleman's game has all washed away yesterday, And you know, I think we need to start to look at that professional golf as that what it is. It is a for profit venture and they finally are going to be a for profit entity, which is refreshing because they've been a for profit venture operating as a nonprofit for far
too long. So we're going to get it more into all this, but I appreciate you guys. Let's and hopefully this lends a little bit of different perspective from Joe and Joseph here in this podcast. Thanks all Right, before we get to Joe Ogilvie, let's take a quick break to talk about our sponsor, Missit and Maine.
Listen.
I have had as a work from home human being, I've had lots of qualms about dress shirts. I was in the startup space. But my first job out of college, I wore dress shirts every day, and I remember how much of a pain in the ass it was.
I was.
I'd have to go to dry cleaners. They would wrinkle, they would stain. You know, it was just a pain in the ass. They were uncomfortable. I just remember, you know, at that time I was, I was.
In my early twenties.
I have some fun during the week every once in a while, and you know, you're just sitting uncomfortable work in a dress shirt. It's like, man, what a disaster. I got sent these dress shirts from Visit and Maine, among some other stuff, you know, great pullover they had. They have, you know, a wide range of clothes, but the dress shirts really stood out to me.
I put them on.
You know, even like a casual, short sleeve like kind of shirt that you can wear out like it just feels like a comfortable shirt. You might work out it. It's great. So this performance fabric dress shirt that they invented ten years ago, they've perfected as lightweight, breatheable, moisture wicking, wrinkal resistant, like everything that you used to dislike about dress shirts. They have solved for with their shirts. I love their casual shirts that you can wear around. Their
T shirts are super comfortable. This has been these clothes they sent me. I've been super happy with and definitely changed by perception and what I'm looking for and and like my appetite to wear a dress shirt.
So if you're looking.
For some new dress shirts, new clothes in general, Misson and Maine has a great offer for you. Use the code Frida egg and you'll get thirty five dollars off any purchase of one hundred and twenty five dollars or more. And you visit Mizzon and Maine that's m I zz E N and A N D Maine m AI N dot com and you'll get thirty five dollars off any purchase of one hundred and twenty five dollars or more with the.
Code Frida egg. Try it out.
I think you'll be very, very pleased with the quality and the comfort of the shirts.
Now to Joe Ogilvie.
Joe Landmark Day and golf yesterday, I think that would be an expression that's not hyperbolic curious off the bat overall. What were your big picture thoughts on yesterday?
Yeah, I mean, obviously, I think it's amazing that it didn't leak. Number one, It was very very close to the vest I don't think I think a merger was surprising. I don't think a partnership or an eventual I mean, I think a partnership was very very likely even a year ago, or we get to this point. I thought it might take eighteen months. I thought it made two twenty four months, but it was it was inevitable that they were going to get together and and kind of
hash things out. I think it was inevitable that. You know, some of the rhetoric last year when when Jay would say, these guys are never going to play the PGA Tour again, I mean, it was that was a that was a comment that I think he wished he had back because that that was never going to be the case. It was a very it just wasn't a very smart comment. But I think that what it does is it it PJ Tour is now in a very good position from
an economic standpoint. They were spending way too much money and now they have they have enough money to spend and to really maybe accomplish what they were trying to do in the long term.
I guess you know, I think you this, you're saying this was inevitable. How how do you think what are the key things that got us to where we are now? With with the with the Pith very involved with golf, and you know, effectively live the PGA Tour, European Tour under one umbrella.
Well, I think if you if you take a mental model, and the mental model is you know, there's an old saying show me the incentives and I'll show you the outcome. There's another one that says, you know, follow the money. If if I've got an entity that's going to spend two billion dollars in a sport or up to four billion dollars in a sport, eventually everybody's going to listen them.
And you know, it'd been easier to listen to them off the bat, but if they're going to keep spending, you're you're gonna you're gonna have to listen to them.
And then if you're the if you're the golf world, I mean the Majors kind of showed this, and the Masters and the and the PG Championship, US Open, Open Championship, they haven't incentive to have the best possible fields and the best possible product for the fans, for the television partners, and for you know, just to maintain them being majors. And you know, eventually the PGA Tour, the DP World Tour would get there as well. They were going to
have to figure out. I mean, Brooks Kepta winning certainly helped Michoelson finishing second, Brooks finishing second at the Masters, and then Brooks ultimately win in the PG Championship Rice and finished fourth. The PJ Tour is like, okay, how do I go to my sponsors and say, like, you know, we've got this great product, but we don't have you know, let's play this out live. Has two out of the
four major winners. Who knows they might have three out of the four major winners and two more months, and so you're eventually going to get to the point where the powers that be were like, we've got to have the best players because that's what our fans demand, and that's what our sponsors demand, and that's what our television sponsors demand, so our television partners demand. So you were going to get there. The question was, you know, how many how many tiers were shed, how many were how
many statements did you have to backtrack on? And how many people did you have to pay piss off in the meantime? And I think that, you know, I think I said maybe six months ago May, there was like four or five different lawsuits at once, and I'm like, pretty soon once you once you can no longer sue anyone else, that's when that's when the adults in the room kind of step in and say, okay, let's let's figure this out. And that was about six months ago.
I think I said that in a tweet. Maybe it was nine months ago, but this was this was this was definitely inevitable apart maybe a full merger was not but a but a but a partnership or some type of Dayton.
Was It's interesting, what do you think of it? That way?
Like the lawsuit if I you know, I have a toddler, so I deal with this on a daily base. That the lawsuits almost like the temper tantrum. And then once the temper tantrum kind of quells, you get resolution and like a cooling of heads of sources. When you can, once you get through that initial period of of you know, chaos, you're able to convey a message. But you can't convey a message until that has, you know, run its course a little bit.
Yeah, and it's it's gonna be really interesting. I am I am not sure if the lawsuits are necessarily over. I mean, they certainly are between Live and the PGA Tour. But there's this little entity called the Justice Department. It's got actually a bigger budget in Saudi Arabia that that may not that that they may not go as quietly as as the PGA Tour and the powers that be
with like they opened up a can of worms. Jay said something yesterday that I've still I don't know if it was intentional or if it was a slip or or what it was, but he said, we saw an opportunity to take out a competitor. If if you are in the middle of a Justice Department investigation on antitrust,
that comment is I don't know it. I'm wondering if it was purposeful, and if it was purposeful, what was the purpose behind it, Because it was a it was an incredibly brazen comment, and I mean after I heard that, I kind of like I stopped listening to the press confidence because I couldn't believe it. So we'll see what happens. But they you know, there's Justice Department is gonna I mean New York Times had an article on it today.
They are going to look at that and they are going to look at that that comment, and they are going to feed on that. I mean that is that is that is red meat for the Justice Department.
Yeah, That's been a lot of the discourse today is the idea that you know, this isn't this deal is not going to happen because of the you know, anti trust lawsuit and the anti trust events investigation. Like you know, how could you look at this and not think it's more of a monopoly with this in place than it was before? And uh, I mean that's that's a fascinating wrinkle to this is is that you know what what
actually you know this is a framework deal. And I'm curious from your perspective, especially with your with your experience on the policy board and the pack, what does a framework deal mean in PGA tour land.
Well, I think to be fair, no one's no one's ever dealt with this, you know, at least from a from a golf player standpoint, in a PGA Tour policy board standpoint, I mean up until you know at Hurley, he and Jimmy Dunn and Jay. So yeah, I don't think. I don't think we know. I think that's what's really interesting is is you know a few guys and I've read have said, oh, this isn't a deal between Live and the PGA Tour and the DP Tour. This is a deal between the p I F the PGA Tour,
the DP Tour. Like, okay, you know the transitive property would state that Live in the p if for kind of one of the same. I mean, not not really, but I mean sort of. But and then you talk to the some some people associated with Live, they're like, this is the greatest thing ever because this is going to make the franchises work more and everything else. I honestly, this is one of these it's really difficult to handicap on what those what those things are going to be.
There is now a for profit entity. I think that if I had to look to the tea leaves, I mean, I think the five O one seed six is is slowly going to atrophy. Maybe you know, I hope not, but I think that that's that's probably that probably happens. I don't think that that I think the tour will be fully full for profit soon. And you know, what's a framework look like. I think that that starts to
look like a framework. But we'll see, you know. And I think if you're if you're, if you're the p i F and you're yaes Er, you're looking at your guys that that made the jump to live and they made they took the risk. I mean people people will say that, no, they just got paid and it was great for them and they got to But let me, I've been to two events. I've talked to the players. I've talked to their wives. I know how their some of their kids have been I want to say ostracized,
but their kids haven't been invited to certain things. And and believe me, there was a lot of stress for the guys that went to Live and there was a lot of there's a lot of like they did get paid, but they they sacrificed in terms of you know, some status, some reputation, some captaincies, and you know, that was not
an easy thing. And I hope you know, the p i F and and they assert doesn't use this as saying like Okay, I got what I want, I'm gonna flush this other thing down the drain, because if you're those guys, you know, so there's a push and pull, right, the PGA tour is going to be like, well, anybody on the PGA tours are They're going to say why didn't take the money? I feel like I got screwed. And then the live guys are going to say, well, I did take the money. This is great for me.
But there's also a chance that the live thing atrophies and and and dies. I mean, I've heard, I've heard, I've heard two different things. So it's it's a it's gonna be it's gonna be a fascinating couple of months to see how this, see how this plays out, and it'll be months. It will not be it will not be weeks. It'll be months and probably six months.
That's the thing I keep sticking on as people are like, oh, well, you know, I saw that Rory today was talking about how Jay is now their boss, all right, like the live player's boss, Like you know that being said, he's got a partner that controls the per spring per strings
that he has to keep happy as well. And I just can't imagine that Yaser is going to be in the position with those players that literally made this new reality possible for him, is going to quickly stab them in the back and like allow Jay to put like a big sanction on them. You know, I don't foresee that being a realistic thing.
Well, in corporate governance terms, Yasser is the chairman of the board of the for profit So the chairman Jay is Jay reports to him. At least that's how governance work, right, So yeah, he he is going to or his excellent and you know, I call it yes or his excellency to his face, but he he he is the chairman of the board and Jay reports, Jay works for him.
He's the chairman and as a for profit entity. Now it's gonna be very So if you look in a crystal ball and you're like, Okay, how how could this play out? One version of this playing out is you you have this if Live let's say Live Live is is sticks around. You've got the guys that own the franchises, You've got potential to to have a couple more franchises that funnels up. They're gonna they're gonna get now get TV,
They're now gonna get sponsors. I mean, there was a lot of people hanging around the hoop, just waiting it for it to be legitimized. Major corporations kind of liked it. They like the young, they liked the demographic, they like the energy to those events. So I think that they I think the there is now a path that they can actually, by the way, I'm a fan of the of the Team Golf, I think i'd be, but it's
pretty compelling for me. But now you're the PGA Tour and you're looking at the Rory's and the John Rams and the Headekis and and the Jordan's space and the Justin Thomas and Rockey Fowlers, and you say, God, these guys didn't go in and they had they turned down, you know, seventy five to four hundred million dollars. How do we do this? Well, when you have a for profit entity, there is a thing called equity and our
issues and it can be phantom equity. And all of a sudden, you now have a vehicle that I can give such and such a person. By the way, James Monahan will be given equity in this new venture. He will make more money now than he has ever made. He will get a raise, and so so you now have equity that you're allowed that you can give players and and and basically say, look, we want to incentivize you to make this new thing grow, and we want you to buy in, and we want you to to
do this. And I think that's what will I think that that's what will happen. I think that I think that the the equity gifts will be will dole out and right rightly probably, And you know, but again, that's that's in that's in the details, that's in the details.
I think that's like, you know, and you talk about some of the things that hampered Live, you know, with the teams and the flow of players in. You know, that's you know, is there an expansion of the franchises, and like one of the things with the franchises is like teams, the name like teams didn't mean anything because
they didn't represent anything. And Live could you tweak that model now and create something that meant something with an idea that you you talked about on this podcast a few months ago with like a city you know.
Yeah, well, look I think that there was a first of all, we're not even well, I guess this week was we're one anniversary in now brands have let's called live a brand brands and teams. I mean they need they need time to kind of, you know, morph into whatever they're going to be. I mean, Coca Cola wasn't you know, the happiest drink on earth from the get go? Right? It that that that happened over time and we'll we'll
see what lives what live does. But I mean, look, and I think in a for profit world and a maybe a morphing out of the five toh one c six world, you will my my idea on franchises. You you' that that'll come a lot quicker than I than I thought. I thought that was like a fifteen year deal. That that that'll become, that'll become a lot quicker. And and you started to hear. I mean I was contacted by a bunch of journalists. Have you heard anything about live
buying the PGA? Uh? Well, PGA? What's it called? Where do we have the hanted classic? Uh? Did you hear anything about live buying? PG National? I heard another one. Do you hear anything out live buying? There was another course and I was like, no, I haven't heard anything, but they they wanted to eventually, and these teams wanted eventual home bases and to think about it like that, and and then they were going to have farm teams and they they I mean, it was kind of it
was going to take time. That Saudi's that if you look at their history, they are very patient. So you know, we'll see what ultimately happens with the PGA Tour and what they do. And if there's a team aspect, I think I think the team aspect would go very very good and very very well. You know, you got the Europeans, you got the Americans, you get the I mean, you could you could almost do it. My gosh, Oklahoma State
can have their own team. I have like four teams, and then you could have you know, different countries and you know, you've got the Japanese team or the Japanese Korean team, the Australia team that you had with Cam Smith. You've got the Irish, you know, I mean, you know Rory and Lowry and Fitzpatrick. I mean, it's there's there's a lot there that that that could be very very
compelling for golf fans. And I think that just because it just because you know, I'm getting to the to the age where I'm definitely older, but like the young, the young fan I think would embrace these teams. I think that it's going to be very interesting to see to see what that that can be. Maybe it goes away, but I think it could be extremely compelling if it's given a little bit of time to kind of see what it could be.
I mean, I think I'm kind of with you with the teams. I believe that there is something to team golf, and I think it. You know, the way I think if I zoom out is you know, if you think about professional golf and do you want it to be more going forward in the vein of F one where you have individual and team competition or you know, the Premier League, which is you know, obviously a team team sport, or do you want it more to be like tennis?
And to me, the team aspect adds like a whole different layer of interest into the sport, right, And that's where the big value jump is rather than especially from the PGA Tours standpoint, which is, you know, where the genuine interest in golf is the big where it transcends, you know, the golf the hardcore golf fan is that the Masters, the US Open, the PGA, the Open Championship, and the Ryder Cup, none of which are owned by this this entity.
Yeah, yeah, and I think this entity has an opportunity to you know, the PGA Tour went kind of they went a little bit bloated in their twenty twenty four schedule. I mean they I think they have five opposite field events.
Now it's going to be sort of what everybody thought needed to be done.
Yeah, so you thought you were going to get lean, mean and efficient and then you kind of went, you went blow. But it was it was interesting because you know, part of this deal I think it was a question of it was dollars. I think that the anti trust case was probably not going to go terrific, Discovery was
not going to go terrific. And you know, I think the Dosign eight events they were having a real problem filling all the holes, and economy starts to wobble a little bit, and you know, sponsorship is the first thing you go. So you know it it filled, it filled a little bit a hole, but they they man, they went,
they went, they went bloated. So I hope with this new event, the twenty twenty five schedule, they look at it and They're like, Okay, we're going to make We're going to make the Corn Fairy Tour as good as it could possibly be. We're going to make the DP Tour as good as it could possibly be. We are going to have the designated events going to seventy players.
Was anyone that is paying attention knew that that was not going to be a terrific idea and would work in the long term, especially when you're you know, you're in effect shrinking the schedule. I mean, the guy who's the guy who's you know, had a pretty darn good year seventieth on the money list is not not going to get into the anyway. It's it just if you're a player and you're looking at this, it's like, God, what do you just what are you doing? If you're
if you're pon a vidra? And I think that that that was an over arching It was just not going to It was just not going to work, and I think they went more and more down the designated event ramp is that it was. It was challenging because they're all going to look the same, and sameness doesn't work. I mean, you look at the majors. The majors are all different. That's what makes them great. Now they're one fifty six six and you know, ninety twoesday, but they
all have taken on their own personality. If you make if you make the designate events, seventy person no cut events, they all look the same and they're all kind of like Yeah, I.
Mean, honestly, it'd be you know, you get different courses, but it'd be like if F one race did the same track every every time. You know, they have the same drivers and everything, but I don't think the course is you know, especially you know, this is a whole other different candid worm. So with the bodder technology, you know, courses aren't as big of a you know, differentiator as a racetrack would be.
Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, look, if i'm if I'm J Monahan, I look at I look at Tiger Woods, I look at Jack Nicholas and you know Arnold when he was alive, and I say, you're the icons of our sport. What do you want your tournaments to be? Go?
Do it?
You want one fifty Arnold? You're you're at You're the everyman. You want you want you want it to be one hundred and forty four players, you know, double wave be just like you know, however, you want to set up your golf course and go do it? Jack Nicholas, you're you're the you know, the greatest player, one of the most majors. Do you you think outside the box? How do you want your tournament to look like? I don't want to I don't want to box those guys in
Tiger Woods? What do you what do you want Riviera to be? Do you want it to be eighty people? Do you want it to be one hundred and thirty two people? What do you what do you want to be a cut? You want not to be a cut? Those guys are those guys are the icons of the game, and they changed the Maybe look at the players that have changed the game the most. It's it's Tiger Woods, it's Jack Nicholas, it's Arnold Palmer. Got to put Greg Norman in there now, and you got to put dem
Beeman in there. I mean, those guys, those guys think, and the players have always made the big changes. The players have always driven, you know, really the out of box, out of the box thinking in golf, at least professional golf. And I mean, I don't want to say the players are always you know, right, but at the same time, they've always driven that change and they've always been that
change agent. And I think Pantovitra has to has to look at themselves in the eye and say, you know, we don't have a monopoly on great ideas, and you know, we got to put a little bit more power. If we put more power to the players, a lot of this stuff that we're talking about would have it wouldn't have gotten to the point where it did.
I mean, when do you think about the structural difference as well, going from a nonprofit to a for profit LLC. I think the identity of who the tour is and intrinsically, you know, I think the tour in a way it makes sense that the great ideas don't come from them because of the way the company set up, in the way it revolves around the players, and the way the structure of that, you know, just being a nonprofit versus
a for profit. All of a sudden, I think there is a little bit more I want to say, impetus, and part of the identity might breed actual innovation and ideas towards it because there are now you know, investors equity holders who have voice and want to see something built to the biggest thing it can be.
Yeah, I think that's I think that's probably right. I mean, I think that's that's why I kind of thought that the franchise model eventually would happen because you have you know, let's say you have thirty two or we have thirty thirty two weeks in a year now, or I'm a PGA tour schedule year maybe thirty maybe thirty one, I don't know where I talk of my head. But you also have the four majors, you got the players Championship,
so let's take those out of it. So maybe twenty twenty six or twenty seven weeks, and if you had that, maybe you sprinkle some team events in there somewhere. But you have a You've got a lot of incentive to create. I mean, who knows what these tournaments and these entrepreneurs in these cities and who knows. If you unleash the entrepreneurial zest of people, you never know what you're gonna get. I mean, the NFL had no idea. People. You look
back and what Jerry Jones did for the NFL. One guy that just had this Okay, I'm not going to play necessarily by the rules. I'm gonna make my own rules up. But I'm gonna show you the way that eventually everything will go. That that was a powerful thing for the NFL. I mean, Jerry Jones probably made the NFL and the owner's billions and billions, about tens of
billions of dollars. And I think that's what happens when you take the if, if if Pana Vidro went almost a decentralized model and let and let these cities and these entities kind of kind of grow. I think it. I think it's an interesting, interesting thing to think about because while we're while we're we have no idea what what the next two years are going to look like. But as you just kind of riff on the possibilities
and what may happen and what this. If you wanted to look at a for profitentity and you wanted to make that for profitentity grow as big and and and be as interesting as possible, that's certainly one of the ways that you do that. And by the way, golf's already in an international Golf's already in the international. It's
called a traveling circus. Some of those franchises could be in London, they could be in Germany, they could be in Spain, they could be in Australia, they could be in Tokyo, they can be in China, they can be in Singapore, they can be I mean, it is a very very big world, and it could be massively and it's going to be massively profitable. I mean, I think that we're we're in the era of By the way, PJ tour players are not all good. I mean, they're gonna make a lot of money. They're and they they
might be they might be contracted. I mean, who knows what purses look like. It might be you might have fifty guys that get paid a salary. But whoever owns these places and owns these we're getting way ahead of ourselves. But these these could be very very valuable cities. When you look at individual events and you look at what you would pay if each individual event where you could buy it, I mean it's well, the majors, you're in the billions, masters, you're you're over five or six billion.
They have an opportunity to be very very valuable intoit, sent very very.
Valuable into Yeah, there's so many places is that this could go, you know, and I think that's the the the the child like you can let your mind blander and I wonder, you know, if we go back, like you know, I think for fans one of the unpalatable aspects of this is the is the PIFF involvement, and if we go back, I think, like one of the things that I struggle with is like this was very clearly where the tour had to go in the last few years. They had to get rid of the nonprofit thing.
It was archaic, it was you know, and effectively, it feels like they got to a point where there was only one option of how they went about this versus a year ago there might have been you know, you play it out for a year and you might have had other opportunities, other options to achieve the same thing they got today you are yesterday.
Do you feel that way at all?
Yeah, Well, look, people hate change, and it's very it's it's very difficult too, and it's hard. It's hard to change, and it's hard to have the mental flexibility to be able to change. I mean when you have a pretty darn good system as is. I mean, the PGA Tour is a business is a wonderful business, and you have these each city that we go to their run. You know, you've got that five oh one c three on the other side, and they have the charitable organization and you're
touching a whole lot of lives. It's tough to go away from that because it fundamentally changes the whole you know, the whole thing. And I get that, and I'm I think you've got to You've got to You've got to be cognizant of that. I mean, you know, you think about the momentous institute in the in the in the red Pants in Dallas. I mean they started this whole model with with deem beam in and having the charitable component, and you know, for that to go away that that's
a very tough thing to get your arms around. So how do you how do you maintain thisructure and how do you evolve and keep some of the best things that made your tour great and differentiated, but also move into the twenty first century, in the in the digital century, in the as as the world is globalized, and that's that's a tough thing. That's a very tough thing to do. But I think that they're I think that they're going to be They're they're going to be endeavoring to do it right now.
So the PIF doesn't have majority board control, but they effectively have the the right to spend all the money. Are you know, appear to be in the position where they're going to be funding the majority of the new initiatives and they have this chairman spot what how would you break down how their power in the sport versus the PGA Tour retaining board control.
Well, I think that the p i F is going to look to the PGA Tour to say, like, look, you have all you have a lot of institutional knowledge of all the players in the game, of the history and everything else. That's what ultimately, that's what we wanted to buy into and and and they and they did so. I think a lot of it is is is an overseeing there. I may'd be crazy not to defer to the PGA Tour in some respects, but now the tour has the ability and they have the checkbook where they
can take they can take some risk. They've they've had they've had They've had a look at Live for the past year. You know, they saw what happened in Adelaide. They saw what happened in Miami last year. They I guarantee you they've had people on site very quietly and in observing this, and they have observed. I mean I went to the Pro Am party and Tulsa for live
and I counted. I counted the number of people who had gray hair as opposed to people who didn't have gray hair, and there were four people in the entire crowd that live. There was probably two hundred and fifty to three hundred people there that had gray hair. I mean, this was I was shocked at how young this party was. For the pro Am Party. It was at a BMX Bike Hall of Fame thing in Tulsa, and they they they have tapped into something, and they've tapped into this
youth that is real. I mean I've read that it's fifteen or sixteen years younger than the PGA tours. I think that's probably right. Certainly not as big a fan base as a tour, but I mean I think that that's that's kind of interesting. So I just think that you know, you can we'll see, we'll see what happens. But I think the PIF will listen to the PGA Tour. The PGA Tour has a chance to get a little riskier on the risk curve, and they have a chance
to experiment, and you know, I think they will. I think they will, and I think the players it'll be it'll be rough going in the players. The player's got to get their arms around. Okay, how do we welcome these guys back? May not be welcome, welcome, that may not be like extended. But Brooks Kepcha was gonna play on the PGA Tour whenever he wants, probably next year. Dustin Johnson, the same thing, Cam, Kevin Knabb, Cam Smith. I mean, they're all gonna they're all going to be
back on the PGA Tour next year. But how do you do it? So you know everybody can and people are going to be ticked off? I mean I have never bought Navidia and I'm ticked off about it, you know, And and you you know you've missed out and you feel like you've made a mistake, but you know that's that's that's business. It seems like how do you do it?
As as you alluded to, and just reading the tea leaves of j Monahan saying, you know, I'm gonna try. You know, the big players that have been loyal are going to reap some benefit. And as you mentioned the you know, one of the great things about going to this for profit model is equity, you know, and the
ability to award equity. And I think for a certain type of player, that seems like something that is going to be you know, maybe used, but some sort of bonus will be given to people that that helped the tour survive this onslaught that they faced last year, and it was very close to going the other way, it seemingly is it felt. What would your advice though, be to like the middle of the road guy that never had the live offer, that is that is frustrated with with a with the tour.
You know, that's that's the that's the tough one because at the end of the day, what the miss I don't know if it was a mistake, but what the communication lacked was. I mean, the middle of the road guy, here's what he cares about. He cares about having a chance, and don't shut off my dream. I work my ass. I got to the pinnacle, I got to the PGA tour. Now don't make it impossible for me to maintain and
keep my dream alive. And you know, I think when when when Panavidra came in, they had these designated events and they and they said, you know, we're going to a calendar year schedule January through you know, late August, and we're going to go to the designated event model where we're going to go from one hundred and twenty man Fields, well one hundred fifty six in terms of travelers down to you know, seventy five to eighty man
Fields with no cut. Century was the only one that was actually going to increase their person of the Disney events. The middle of the road guys were like, what the hell, man, I mean, all I've done is work my ass off. I've got a harder job than you. JM on a hand, I mean, depend on the PGA tour. I have a harder job than you. You had a hard job getting to the commissioner's job, but I've got a harder job than you because it's harder to stay on the PGA
tour than it is commissioner of the PGA Tour. And I think that's a state of fact. I don't think anyone would disagree with me on that. And so What you don't want to do is kill these guys dream. You've got to look them in the eye and say, look, you have this is what we're doing. This is you guys have a chance. You've got to play well. It's going to get harder because more money creates better athletes,
creates younger athletes, creates you know, our harder ecosystem. But we're going to invest in the in the corn Ferry Tour. You're going to have access to the DP World Tour. We're going to increase the purses to the Corn Fairy Tour. And we're not going to do stupid things with the designated events. We might you know, we're going to let them each have their own you know, uniqueness to them. But we're certainly not going to go to seventy five man no cut events. I mean, last time I checked,
Tiger Woods didn't miss a cut for ten years. So the best players, the majority of last majority, will be around in the weekend. They will not miss the cut. And if they do every now and again, are you really worried about missing a guy that he's off at seven thirty in the morning. I don't think so. But you cannot you cannot crush those guys dream You've got to give them hope. And I think that's the biggest thing if you were in the middle of the road guy, is that you know, you you sort of you sort
of crush their dreams there for a second. Hopefully hopefully this I mean, they still have not said what those days designated events are going to do. They still have not proclaimed that they're not going to be no cut events. They've hinted it, but they seem to be. In the last three or four weeks if you've noticed, they've they've kind of waffled on that. And so I I thought the ink was dry. I think the ink is it's still wet. And so that'll be. That'll be, that'll be interesting.
And I hope I hope the change it. I hope the change it because the middle of the road guy needs, you know, he needs a carrot. And I think will be We'll see, we'll see.
With this, you know.
I guess in a short like, what is what is your hope in terms of the dream scenario with this come coming together? What's the best resolution in terms once we get past say twenty twenty four, what's the best resolution for golf in your opinion.
Yeah, it's twenty twenty four is gonna be It's gonna be very difficult, it's gonna be well, it's gonna be weird for a lot of different reasons. But you know, I think the PGA Tour should have probably gone to one hundred and ten person, you know, exempt tour. I think they had a chance to do that, maybe one hundred and maybe one hundred, and that would have made
it a little bit easier. But now you've got, call it, twenty five guys coming from live that could possibly be playing on the PGA Tour next year, and probably in all likelihood will be playing on the PGA Tour at least in some form or function. Maybe they say they're not eligible for the for the designated events and they that helps boost the fields for the the other events, or they have to play in the designated events through
the other events or something. But so now you've got this, you've got almost what happened with college sports, where you had, you know, people were getting two and three years extra with COVID, and you could be played college sports for six years or if you can play for sports for six years. Now, all of a sudden, you've got a couple of people that were going to play college sports no longer have a position on the team because you've
got the older people coming in. So you've got this this accordion, and the eligibility that is a PGA tour now is way out here. I mean, you've got a lot of people that potentially have eligibility on the tour and that's going to be I mean, it's going to be it's going to be interesting to see what they do in twenty twenty four, twenty twenty five. I think I think they probably have to go down a little bit on the fully exempt status. I think that they they are going to they're going to invest in it
used to be called the McKenzie Tour. I don't know what it's called now, but.
The combination of the Latin American and the Canada they joined it together.
I'm assuming they're going to put more money to that. I'm assuming they're going to put more money in the corn Ferry Tour, which they need to do, and you know, I think eventually that they will. It's it's really too too early, Andy. I mean, I think that if the European Tour or the DP World Tour, you know, that's the conundrum that I still don't. I don't think anyone
understands yet. If let's say you've got Team Golf and you've got the PGA Tour and you've got the DP World Tour, what's the DP World Tour look.
Like they own They own half the Ryder Cup. Now that's something well.
But they've they've owned half the Rudder Cup since two thousand and ninety eight, right seven.
I'm saying the tour does with this right because the DP World Tour was the owner and they had a stake in it. But now with this, you know, effective murder of you know, everybody wants to call something else. The tour actually owns it owns half of it.
Well, they own half of it on the European side, so they don't own it, which is which a whole different conversation. They don't own it on the on the US side when they provide all the players for it, but they own fifty I don't know how that all works, but it's they'll they'll own the full thing eventually. But it you know, who knows it's that's where that's where it's it's it's you almost in the point of Padre.
Look when they when they when the PGA Tour informed Austin the Dell Matchplay that they were no longer going to have a tournament next year. I mean we started talking in October and they didn't kill it until the week before, which was in March. So what is that almost five months and you had a fully sponsored event. Top line revenue was twenty six million. I mean, it
took him five months to kill it. And this is going to take a long time for them to figure out the schedule, to figure out what it looks like, to figure out how Live can integrate. It's it's a it's a very very it's going to be a very arduous process, a very arduous process.
Given the current opinion seemingly of the players of Jay Monahan through this whole thing, do you, you know, just as a former player, do you do you feel like he can continue to operate as the commissioner effect?
Yeah? I mean, I mean, look, there's there's plenty of marriages that have lasted after the husband or wife cheats, and you know, there's counseling, and there's the ten step process,
and there's groveling, and there's everything else. I mean, I think that the at the end of the day, the players, they want to get on the field and compete, and they want to try to beat old man par and they want to try to beat each other, and they want to do it in a venue, on a venue and on a tour that provides the best possible competition and the best possible, you know, way to make a living. And that at the Hallmark is what they are at
the foundation, that's what they care about. And you know, I think a lot of this is they're sick of the noise. And so while they're disappointed, and I've only read the comments, I've talked to a couple, but you know, you know, I I guarantee you the board said to Jay, you need to go out there and you need to take every single arrow and there's gonna be a lot of arrows and we have your back and it's going to be painful, and that's just what's that's what's gonna happen.
So I think I think it's'll be difficult. Certainly, there's a lot of lack of trust. And you know, jer Rory mcilroyd, my gosh, I'd love to have a beer of Rory, you know, I would love to have a beer of Rory right now. But I think that it's you know, time time heels, and I think Jay will I think Jay will survive. I mean he's lost the trust of a lot of guys and they'll never you'll never get it back. But I mean Benschham, no one
trusted benshim or very few people trusted bench him. Just kind of the nature of the beast.
All right, final question, and this, uh, this stems from this weekend, which seemed like a a year ago.
This I felt like I was in.
I feel like the last four years, you know, from the start of COVID till now are are just like filled with moments that make you think back to like, you know, Michael Block Fever feels like two years ago at this point, and the LPGAs like that happened two months ago. Let's tay to go back to that. Ro Jang a huge moment for the LPGA tour.
You you tweeted disappointment in the fact that she wasn't being promoted. You know, the LPGA seemingly has a uh potential uh game changer on its hand. What what do you think they need to do in order to maximize their opportunity that has fallen on their doorstep seemingly.
Well, I think they need to put a lot of resources to media. But I also think if i'm if I'm the commission of the LPGA Tour, I wait, and I mean I think it's that. I think she is the Eddie Murphy character at the end of trading places where they've cornered the frozen frozen constant, what is the frozen orange Joe consent trade market, and he's just taking you know, he's just picking which traders he wants to trade with. Because the LPGA Tour, for the first time
in its history, is in the cupboard scene. Every single person wants to get into live entertainment. The LPGA Tour has a massive amount of potential. I mean, I am wildly bullish on women's golf, and I probably wouldn't have said that fifteen years Well, I wouldn't have said that fifteen years ago. But I mean, I am wildly bullish on women's golf, and she is. She has an opportunity
to pick her partner. And you know, you've got this potential to have a generational talent named Roseang and unlike, unlike you, know, maybe Michelle Wee when she came through. Roseang has won everything. I mean, she has won every tournament there is. Michelle was a terrific marketer in a sense that she played against men, and she competed very well against men, I mean a lot better than everybody thought that she would. But but she didn't really win much.
I mean Roseang has won everything. And she is I mean she is. She just wait till she has a little she'll get a little bit more demonstrative on the golf course, I think. And as she gains confidence or whatever, and then you've got it'll push. It'll push Lexi, and it'll push the Court of Sisters, and it'll push Lydia, Coe Jin Young Co you know Young Co and yes
uh Lee. It'll push them all and and it is I mean, these these these women have a chance to really really I mean it's the LPGA Tour could pick their partner. Now they need a partner. I mean, if the PGA Tour needs a financial partner, the OLPGA Tour really needs a financial partner. And I would if I am, if I am Molly, I call a guy named Greg Mfay who runs Liberty Media, who also owns who also owns Formula one, and I ask Greg to lunch and I just see what he has to say, because they
have an enormous opportunity. It is it is right there. I mean, just think about it. We're talking about you know, the usg rollback of the ball was like I don't know, four or five weeks ago, and they're talking about it. The women can play the best tournament's, best golf courses in the world, and the best course golf courses that have been the best for hundreds of years. They don't have to change him. I mean, you can play Cypress Point and you don't have to change it. But the
PJ Tour can't play Cypress Point. PJ Tour can't play a lot of courses that the women can play. And it's a it is a huge opportunity. And I think that these these women are very good. They are they're fun to watch. They're going to get They're going to realize the opportunity and if they buy into it, takes it takes player buy in. But if they buy into it, they they have an opportunity to be well. They have the opportunity to be the best women's sports league in the world.
I think the other opportunity, the other aspect of women's golf is that one of the things that hasn't happened seemingly, and Rose is a perfect example of this, is that power hasn't become the predominant skill. And when power is the you know, obviously there's other skills in golf, but powers become a prerequisite of men's golf in a way. And when power is a prerequisite, it becomes a game of youth and speed, which shortens careers and shortens windows.
And I think one of the thing with the with the PGA Tour and men's golf, you will see there are always going to be a few bonafide superstars, but there will be a lot of sliding doors, a lot of like turnstile guys. In and out of that topic of are they a star player. With the women's game, you have a unique set of star players that play different styles. And that to me is like you have Lexi,
who's very a power player. Rose is completely different than Lexi, and there are you know lydia Coe is a completely different player than Lexi. If you put Rory and Brooks next to each other, they kind of play the same type of game, right, you could say there are some small differences, but for the most part, the PGA Tour superstar plays a similar style. That's one of the most fascinating things to me about women's golf is that you
have styles that are different and there's juxtaposition. You might see in a major championship at a great course Lexi Thompson driving at sixty yards past the other superstar contender that she's playing against, and you know, and that shorter hitter might win with other skills.
Yeah, I mean, it's I mean, the single greatest round that I ever saw on the PGA Tour was playing with Corey paven at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. He finished fourth and go finished seventh or eight or sixth or something like that. But Corey, Corey had fifteen hybrids or three woods into holes the last round and shot seventy and beat me. It was the greatest display of golf I've ever seen, and I was out driving him by fifty yards and it was that you can see, You're right,
you can see that on the LPGA Tour. There are no Corey Pavins anymore on the PGA Tour. I mean, it's Uh, that's you know, it's it's it's past. But it's that type of golf. Not everybody's gonna love it, right, I mean yeah, but that type of golf is really beautiful to watch. And I mean I don't remember anybody that shot sixty four that was out driving them by thirty yards and like, you know, okay, that was great.
I remember Corey Paven shooting seventy the last round of bay Hill and thinking it was the greatest round of golf I've ever seen. So there's a there's a way to market that, and there's a way to there's a way to showcase that. And I think the I am just massively, massively bullish on the LPGA tour and and believe me, I would not have said that fifteen years ago, but I think it's Uh. I think it's just everything
has come in line. And if you if you're there, if you're them, and you're the board, you have the you literally have the pick of a global sponsor whatever you want, you have the pick. And it's it's gonna be interesting to see what that looks like in ten years, because it's going to be it's it's it's I'm excited for these these women because they they're going to be rewarded because they work every bit as hard as the guys and they're they're going to be rewarded for that work.
One last question, I promise this is the last one, and and it kind of ties both of this together. One of reading kind of the tea leaves I felt like yesterday was about more than just men's professional golf with the tour, and there might be a bigger play into a you know, a bigger movement into more than just men's professional golf. Do you feel that way at all if they're you know, with this new money partner and could it be something like the LPGA Tour being wrapped into this maybe maybe?
And I think that that's that's an interesting thing that if you're on the board of the LPGA Tour, do you want to do you want? Do you want that? You got to really be careful on who you pick your partners, on what partnership you want. I think the PGA Tours maybe called, maybe not called, but I I think the bigger the bigger thing is I think there's a real state component to that, to the announcement yesterday.
I think that there's a eventually, like we said, a franchise component, I think there's going to be there's going to be an ownership group throughout the whole world. It was a very big announcement, but I think it we're just at the beginning of that announcement. It's we're an inning, you know. I think that if if liv starting was the first inning, I think we're at the bottom half of the second. In terms of baseball, I think we're right at the beginning. And there's no there's no telling
where this could go. But it's certainly an exciting time and it's an exciting time for the guys who are part of it. I just hope you, like I said, the mental model that if you're in Panovidra Beach is you've got to give guys hope and you can't crush the dream. Because that's what everybody on the Vega tour, and that was the message that Jay said that that resonated and should have been his message the entire time.
I get rid of the moral stuff. I know I had to do the moral stuff, but or that's what the pr people were toning to do. But the key thing is is that everybody has grown up wanting to be on the PGA Tour. And that's everybody that went to live. They grew up wanting to be on the PGA Tour. And once you get there, you can't crush that dream. You've got to get people hope. And if you if you stay with that, men's professional golf will be very very good long term and I think everybody
will be happy, most people. Most people will be happy.
We'll end on that.
People can find you on Twitter, and uh, thank you for coming on and uh, you know I said to thirty minutes and here we are an hour, and uh, well, I'm sure we'll talk again on this subject that is going to be developing by the week, by the month, by the day, by the year, you know, early on in the light in the life of this new development and Profess Golfs Thank you.
Joe Hey, thanks any I appreciate it all.
Right, before we get to Joseph LaMagna for the second part of this podcast, let's talk about our sponsor of this episode, the USGA. USGA members help fund initiatives that ensure a strong future for golf, from programs that encourage juniors to pick up the game to research that reduces courses reliance on water to providing golfers of all levels a platform to showcase their abilities through the USGA's fifteen championships. Listen, I love the USGA membership.
They do.
They've done so much for me as somebody who's been, you know, part of golf for their entire life. One of the greatest experiences of my personal golf life was playing in a USGA championship that it was world class experience. You know, when I think back to it, I wouldn't trade that experience for life. Like of me, especially with us on the eve of the US Open, whenever US big USGA event rolls around, gives me just great memories
of that. But now when you start to think about it for future generations, the things they're doing.
I think about it.
My daughters started to like hit putts in the shed here when she comes in here, and it's starting to give me warm and fuzzy feelings of maybe she'll play golf.
I don't know, it's too early to tell.
But when I think about that and I think about where the game's going, I'm I'm very happy with them being you know, the stewards of the game and the best way to support them and ensure the long term success of the game is to join them as a member. So if you visit USGA dot org slash Fried Egg, you can join.
The u s g A.
It's a it's forty five dollars and you can be a member, a bad much a bag tag carrying member. You get an lacc hat, all kinds of good stuff, and most importantly, you are helping move the game forward for future generations. Now to Joseph Lemangna on a little bit more about a crazy time in golf. Joseph, we have talked on a number of occasions over the last couple of year, a couple of years really year about
live the PGA tour, different facets of this. Obviously, the news on Tuesday morning coming out, I think probably took everybody a little bit by surprise, and here we are. What was your reaction, what were you doing? And kind of I think one of the interesting things is more information comes out, I think your reaction probably changes, But it took us to the moment you found out.
I mean, it was just like everybody else. I saw it on Twitter. It was shocking to me. I don't know that I remember what my initial reaction was which which is crazy, but I was shocked. But I think I pretty quickly started to connect the dots and I'm sure we'll get more into this, but I think the PGA Tour's financial and legal situation was clearly pretty dire, and as soon as you start to put those pieces together, like the agreement makes sense to me.
Still shocking.
I didn't expect to see it, but it's it's amusing to me too, Like I think it's going to be interesting to see how things unfold. What was your reaction, Yeah, I think it was shocked.
I mean, I feel like if I if I go back to the beginning of this whole saga, I think that was certainly, like you you could have foreseen something like this happening, with how bad the blood got between the two, you know, you it felt like it was unlikely.
But at the end of the day, you know, it's I think the thing that everybody is realizing from this is is always about the money, you know, and I think that's the thing that probably has gotten j Monahan in the most trouble with how he how he you know, handled the the the drama during you know, the last year, this time where he's talking about nine to eleven, and
now you know he's partnered with the organization. You know, I think that's the thing that that crystallizes from all this is that you know, we like to romanticize golf as a gentleman's game, and you know, people in professional golf have romanticized professional golf despite you know a number of different controversies as this gentleman's game, and nothing about the PGA Tour at this point, uh is a gentleman's game.
I don't disagree with any of what you said. I think the only.
Not really a counter but maybe additional opinion that I I would put in I think it's all money, yes, but also eyeballs.
And that's where I just.
Don't agree with the notion that there's nothing the PGA Tour could have done. When you're fighting against somebody with deeper pockets, they're always going to win. Like I think, if the PGA Tour had implemented a lot of the changes you and I have discussed years ago, it would have been much harder to threaten their business model.
So I don't.
Agree with the people who who might throw out there that no matter what, this was inevitable I think this could have been avoided. I'm sure we'll get into this, but I think the PGA Tour's leadership has been terrible over the last decade, and there's some serious egg on their face.
Yeah, I mean, I don't want to take this off course, but you know, the PGA Tour is operated under or the if it's not broke, don't fix it mentality. And if you think about or any organization really in the world, for the most part, it's adapt or die. That's that's the way that you always have to be looking at constantly improving your product, improving your company, you know, changing
with the times. And I think like a great example of this is like Monahan's comments a couple of weeks ago about slow play, like and you know, filling up TV broadcast windows, and it's like, well, you're missing the boat here. Every other sport is trying to speed up their product because they realize that is where they need to go. With the times, attention spans are shorter. You need to make these games quicker, have more pace to them.
Monahan doesn't even think that way. He's thinking about his TV partners and filling a broadcast window when you could just move tea times back if all of a sudden players were playing faster and you still fill the broadcast window.
So with that, like that.
Kind of embodies the mentality of this leadership. And you know, with this news, and we'll get into some of the details, but with this news, like I have no faith, no confidence, and Jay Monahan leading this organization, leading this new regime, I doubt I don't really think that he is leading it. I think a lawyer Ed Harriley and a banker Jimmy Dunn are leading the organization and Monahan is just a
figurative and literal punching bag sitting at the top. But like you know, in terms of how we got here, I don't I agree with you. This was ineptitude at the corporate level for a decade. This was not the last year. What happened the you know, it wasn't the the Saudi has just poured billions of dollars into the sport.
They were allowed to pour billions of dollars into the sport because of the you know, reluctance to do anything to change what the PGA tour was, even though for years I think everybody knew it couldn't be a nonprofit and here we are. It is now not a nonprofit. This is you know, I think this is the biggest news of it is that they are shifting to a for profit model. The PGA Tour is wrapped under this
for profit LLC. It's a partnership with the PIF that will be the you know, main funder of this LLC. I think they have the right of first refusal to any new investment in the PGA Tour. So you're looking at a sports league that will be you know, the majority money interest in it will be the PIF. Obviously we have lots of things to shake out with sponsorships. But you know, twenty two four is probably going to
look like the calendar that they planned it. But I think beyond twenty twenty four is where you begin to see could see massive changes with the way this organization, the tour as we know it is structured.
I agree.
I don't have a whole lot. I think that's well said. I'm interested in the details some of the stuff around, like what does it mean to be a for profit versus the current existing structure, Like I'm interested in learning more about that. What kind of policy changes are still going to have to get ratified by PJ Tour players
like in the board. Like I still have a lot of questions around those details, but ultimately we'll get some of those answers, whether or not they're explained concisely by j Monahan or not.
I think, you know, just from like a rudimentary business sense, if you think about the PGA Tour and the benefits of being for profit things they could do sign players to contracts. I do not think that this is unreasonable. I think that Live was on something like that. It is very beneficial if you're for profit entity like liv was, to have your players contracted. It gives you a lot of flexibility freedom. It's very attractive for the PGA for
players as well, you know, guaranteed money. I do not I foresee a a contracting of players eventually.
H it allows them to award equity to players.
You know, that's another interesting wrinkle of this, right when you start to talk about the players, like Rory McElroy. I saw Jay Monahan was just on Golf Channel. You know they they asked a great question, George Severy, because I believe asked a question about the players that remained loyal, you know, you're Rory McElroy's, your Colin morcow is Justin Thomas's,
you're Hitdeckie Matsiamas. These people that turned down John Rahm, who turned down hundreds of millions of dollars and offers, you know, working tirelessly to make them whole, is effectively what Monahan like reward them handsomely. Maybe it's equity, maybe it's a contract. At some point they can structure incentive contracts. You know, I think, like you think about the PIP, right and how just how much of a disaster the
PIP was. But this was all an attempt to incentivize their top players aroundabout way in a membership organization, to incentivize players like they they won't have to do that silliness. You know, they can say here's a bonus, here's a bonus, here's a bonus to the guys they want to give bonuses to. And you know, so I think, like, you know, the thing is like, what does the tour look like in twenty twenty five and beyond? Is really one of
my big big questions. Are they going to some team event like what happens with liv But I think twenty twenty four will probably be twenty twenty four. That calendar that's been floated out there with designated events, that's going to be that.
But it's a crazy, crazy kind of situation.
Another bridge here. Eventually the product will get good. I think on that your points about some of the flexibility with compensating top stars. That's going to be interesting because I have mixed feelings about what guaranteed contracts could look like in professional golf. I mean, does that perpetuate some of the issues that I know you already feel strongly about. I feel strongly about, like players who there should be
mobility among the tours. Are players going to lock up spots for five years even if they're not playing well because that's in the best interest of the player. And like, yeah, I understand that they can't give players guaranteed money now, but they had the stipend, and like there already were some mechanisms in place to get compensation to top players. I don't agree with the PIP. I think the PIP was ridiculous obviously, as we've talked about before. But we'll
see the implementation that this flexibility affords them. I'm skeptical that things like guaranteed contracts could be implemented in a way that's beneficial to the product.
We'll see.
A question I have and I'm interested in is with Live, you know, would you like to see a team component to golf in say twenty twenty five and beyond if we just operate under the assumption that twenty twenty four is locked it, I.
Don't think so. Frankly, I don't think team golf is the most compelling unless it's true team golf. The product Live had is not true team golf, at least in my opinion, when you're playing individually and just taking like best three of four scores. To me, that's not even really team golf. I think there was some kind of
alternate shot series something that the team's had identities. Maybe there's a franchise component, potentially fans being able to invest in the franchises, like I could see a path to it being compelling. But at face value, I think the best brand of golf from an entertainment perspective is individual golf, unless it's something like the Ryder Cup. So I'm a little bit out on team golf unless I hear a fresh proposal that sounds compelling.
But yeah, that's just my opinion. What do you think?
Uh?
I mean, I really enjoy like college golf, which is effectively you know, the five players count four, right, So it's a similar thing to Live. But the reason I enjoy college golf is that there's like an inherent fan interest, right, you have alumni of college. You went to Texas, like you're a Texas fan. I went to Illinois. I'm an Illinois fan. I think the struggle with Live was like always going to be establishing, like you know, and it is such a fun thing to make fun of. Is
like I'm a clique fan, like what you know. But if you could if you could create a franchise model where it's city based, right, and they have stadiums right where it's shook the Chicago golf team or the San Francisco golf team, and they play at this golf course and they host an event every year at this golf course.
And that's the way the circuit works, and there's a you know, I think you could make it work a lot better with with the PGA Tour because then all of a sudden, you have you control all the feeder tours.
In and you can can you can consistently.
Have the better players, who's playing best be rewarded, and there would be general fan interest in free agency player moves. Like I think that the Live Tour failed because of how contrived and everybody could see that this was just
for the money. If you reshaped professional golf and tried to attempt to make it, you know, build it around cities, build it maybe maybe there's a worldwide component of it with Melbourne and and London and and different cities, like maybe all of all of a sudden, then you know there's an identity and a reason to root for teams. Right. The problem with the existing model was that the team stood for nothing outside of just like I came over
here because I got paid a lot of money. Right, Like that is how I think team golf could work. You have to have a mechanism of like that's the way every other sport works. I'm a Bulls, Bears, Cubs fan, Blackhawks fan because I'm from Chicago. Right, is there a way that the fireballs are all of a sudden, you know, Austin's team because of Sergio Garcia, the honorary ut along.
I'm not going to touch that in on that kind of a concept where there's an actual identity. I think one thing you're bringing up that one of my favorite five minute segments on a fried Egg podcast was when you had Joe oglebyond a couple months ago, and I think he's on this podcast as well, but he talked about how the PGA Tour doesn't own many of the
most valuable properties in golf. Obviously the majors it doesn't own, but also not owning a lot of the golf courses, for example, like Austin Country Club, you have to go back and start negotiating every few years to get a new contract. If the PGA Tour actually owned those golf courses and owned those properties, I could see a world where you have a Chicago headquarters and that's where the Chicago team plays out of maybe a London team, maybe
an Australian team. Events are hosted there, the golfers are familiar with the course, like you're going on to enemy turf. I could see that being compelling. So I'd be in on a concept like that as long as there's an identity to the teams and it's not this contrived like wait, why is Rory McElroy playing with Trey mullenax? Right, Like it has to have an identity.
Yeah, and I think, like you know, this is kind of the half the glasses half full thing. I think we could get into the other things. But as I've started to think about this big picture, what this does is, you know, it does reshape how you could structure the golf professional golf as we know it with this new LLC.
One of the things that the tour has been stuck in, and a lot of it's their own doing, is that they have been stuck with sponsor X, sponsors of this event, and we host it here because that's where the sponsor who wrote this, you know, fifteen million dollar check wants it and they want this format, and we have to have a pro am on Tuesday or on Wednesday because of the sponsor X. Joe Schmoe gets into the field
because we got to give it to the sponsor. All of a sudden, when you shift this, it begins to look at look more like other sports leagues where there are sponsors, but they do not have undue influence into the actual competition. I think, now I do I have I want to I want to be clear here. I can foresee this being a really good thing for golf. Do I have any faith in the man running the professional golf Tour? No, I have none. I think he's
a dipshit. I think he should have been fired a year and a half ago when he even allowed this to happen, when he didn't take meetings with far less, you know, far more palatable options, such as the PGL who effectively offered the same exact deal and they didn't get leveraged, burn a bunch of cash on fire with lawyer fees, and ostracize you know, say what you will. Phil Mickelson's an asshole, all right, he is a bad human might I think he's a bad human being? That's my opinion, all right?
He has he is.
But at the same time, I blame j Monahan a lot for allowing one of the legends of the game to get to this point to where he has such a polarizing place in the sport. Like that shouldn't happen to one of the ten most popular players of all time. That should never have been allowed to happen, and Monahan that's his fault, right, Phil is difficult to deal with, like, but you don't allow superstars to get to the state of public opinion that he got to and Monahan is
completely wrong on that. So do I have any faith in Like, when you start to think about the the what professional golf could be, do I have any faith in j. Monahan getting us there?
No?
And what probably is going to happen is some you know, half in, half out, you know, need to make some players happy formula, you know, mediocre product that just continues to stifle golf. And I think, like the other aspect that we haven't really talked about is what the piff involvement in golf is going to do as for the greater I guess perception of golf in the greater sports world.
Lots of unpack there. You're preaching to the choir with the Monahan talk. I do think I think he's feckless. I don't think he understands some of the necessary ingredients of leadership of a modern sports product. Again, I'm not a phill fan, but I think he's been right about a lot of things, including players ownership of their own
media rights. Very interested to see if that is something that may change and if some of the walls around other people, people who are popular on Twitter are being able to start to share native content like we'll see on all of that. I think one thing, there are a lot of cross sport comparisons made to golf, many of which I think are appropriate. I think the UFC is an interesting comparison because those are independent contractors. One element of UFC that I'm interested in if you think
golf could even follow this model. But UFC mostly operates under a pay per view model. Right the big events pay per view. Dana White and the rest of the UFC organization has every incentive to make those as exciting as possible, sell those pay per view to as many people as possible. Then they have their lower tier events that are free. You can watch them on a service like ESPN Plus, So as long as you have access to ESPN Plus, you can watch them.
I wonder if.
Golf would be well suited to fit into some kind of model like that, where you have your events in Chicago, and you've got PGA Tour event London, Australia pay per view. There's every incentive to make it as exciting as possible.
I wonder if that would be feasible because one of my main concerns with the new model, and obviously there are a lot of details that we don't know yet is there going to be an incentive to make the product as exciting as possible, because Jay Monahan and others have demonstrated that if that incentive does not exist, they will not do it and things will have to get cleared by PGA tour players that are not necessarily within
the best interest of the entertainment product. If you were in a pay per view model, you don't have that luxury you've got to sell. So I think it's something interesting to consider. Don't know how feasible that would be, but I'd almost love to see that idea tested and how that would kind of incentivize it would align incentives with what fans actually want to experience.
That I mean, I think that's you know, gets to the heart of you know where this might go maybe or could go all of a sudden, you know, a big question. What's FedEx's involvement right when you start? But then also the television contracts, right, those are big long
term contracts, tons of money involved. But one of the advantages of bringing a pif the piff and involvement one of the advantage, Like there was a report the other day about the group that is behind USC looking into an investment to live that didn't go, you know, a billion dollars that that did not do it because of their relationship with the tour and j Monaghan.
So you start to look at all, right, maybe.
Now that we're a for profit entity, maybe now that we can award equity, now that we can have investors. The way this whole thing operates is not around well, you know, we just got a billion dollars from FedEx and we have to do this right because this is we have. They are our you know, it's around investors putting money in and it probably will be the piff, which is the unpalatable thing. They have the first right
of refusal on everything. But they are investing in ideas that actually improve the product of the golf, as opposed to a company investing money in order to get access to the product and to control the way the product is presented, such as a FedEx Cup update the first round of the first tournament of the year of the season, when it when literally nothing matters.
So through line, I think the through line that you're hitting on is the extent to which you're beholden to sponsors and some of the rigidity.
Or the members the members also.
Absolutely absolutely, And I think when you look, when you zoom out a little bit and maybe look at some other sports, right Like I think the NBA is experimenting with some like last two minute broadcasts where if a game is exciting, you can tune in for the last two minutes, and just ways in which fans can engage with the product directly. There's every incentive to make the
broadcast as palatable as possible. That that infrastructure doesn't really exist in golf, and so I'm hopeful that with this new for profit entity, whether it's pay per view, whether it's just less stringent contracts with broadcasting partners and other sponsors,
hopefully that goes away. I think you've also made a great point with courses like Riviera, you had you had tweeted about this, like how many great golf courses are there that are willing to give their course over, stop member play for a few weeks and then have a PGA Tour event. You're constantly, unless you own the properties, constantly having to negotiate with those courses and sponsors. If you act, if you own that top to bottom, you
don't have to worry about that as much. So I'm hopeful that that's where we're going.
I mean, if you wanted to just zoom in on this golf course stadium type idea for a second, you know, yeah, I mean, these talent these cities are putting forth, you know, you know, billions of dollars for sports stadiums, a golf stadium, you know, a golf course with a stadium setting.
You're talking about a fifty.
Million dollar investment. Maybe maybe it's seventy five million for some added infrastructure, as opposed to these billions of dollars, And it could be you know, it's just a credit and you know, you think about it long term, it's like maybe it's used once week, one week a year as a as a stadium, but for the rest of the time it could actually be a public asset. Now again, going back, this is the glass half full perspective right there, where you could have like an influx of cool golf
courses built. The pessimistic view is TPC design services, the tourist design services have never built anything interesting whatsoever.
In fact, they've built a bunch of shit.
And I wouldn't trust them to, you know, to draw a plan, let alone build a.
Golf course if I was a in charge.
So with that said, like these are all I think this is the balancing act here, right, is that this was an organization that got effectively backed into a corner because they could not foresee what was happening. And that's why we're here as opposed to them getting here on their own free will. Like, are they in a better situation than they were a week ago? If you take the moral aspect out of it, absolutely they are in a better situation.
But they could have gotten here two years ago without having to make a deal with the you know, for all intense purposes, quote unquote devil.
Look another thing you're hitting on that I think it's thing's important to not understate. I'm waiting into some dangerous waters here, and I don't really mean this in a legal sense, but how anti competitive the golf world was in its existing structure. I think it's it's hard to overstate so many examples the official World Golf rankings, in the way that that system worked and funneled everybody onto
one tour. Just it is blatantly anti competitive. The way that you know, to get into the PGA Championship, which is not sanctioned by the PGA Tour. Some of the main criteria are things like official World Golf ranking and money earned in PGA Tour events. Like how entangled everything was and maybe still will be. It's hard to overstate.
So I firmly believe that if Discovery had happened, there would have been some ugly, ugly details to emerge that showed some of the collusive behavior between some of these entities. And now my concern, I mean, the natural thought would be, well, now we just merged into one bigger conglomerate, so those anti competitive of concerns should still exist. Don't necessarily mean legally, like I don't know enough to get into those waters.
But in terms of the pressure to innovate on your product, I don't know that the structure now is any more competitive than it was before. If anything, it's less.
Yeah, I mean I think you hit on something.
And from everything I've heard is that the discovery aspect of the collusion case that was about depositions were about to start, really provided the impetus for this move right. That was, you know, all of a sudden, everything was going to become open, open books for the world, and you would have seen, you know it would have gone down to augusta national who I'm sure really didn't want to be a part of this. I think you saw Real's Realley's comments about this being like a great you know,
very good that we aren't fighting anymore. There's a big part of like, you know, I'm sure this club in Georgia that hosts it one tournament a year didn't really want everything to be you know, underpinned, and everything was collusive, you know it was. And the question I have is like, isn't it still an anti there's an anti trust investigation by the dj after after yesterday, does this feel like more of a of a monopoly?
Brandle made this point on Golf Channel yesterday. If if this deal goes through, it's beneficial for the Saudist right because they they got what they wanted. They have a seat at the table. If it gets blocked, I think the PGA Tours in a much much worse position because they've shown their hand that either legally they were dead
or financially they were in serious trouble. But b they've got no leg to stand on now that this this whole moral high ground and we're building a better product and you don't have to worry about the source of money. They compromised that. So if this were to fall apart, what stops players from just hopping over to live and saying like that, that's all out now, like you've abandoned that principle, or as you mentioned on the shotguns, start starting some kind of other league. I have no idea
how hard that would be to do. But if some of those top players banded together and said, hey, we're not playing on this new combined entity.
Either, what would that do. So there's a lot.
That's unsettled here and I'm pretty interested in sitting back and watching it unfold.
Yeah, and then we have the Canadian Open this week, then we have the US Open, and once again, this was the general theme of last year I felt, and it was it was exhausting. You get to these majors and it wasn't about the major and the lead up. It was about what's going on in golf. Next week's going to be no different than that. The golf starts, it becomes about the golf for four days and it's
like your sanctuary. So I would say for people that are a little worn out about this, think that there's a you know, a general fatigue about this little war. You know, it's it's extremely rich people fighting with other extremely rich people, which is usually the least captivating argument and slash fight that you could have. You know, we're going to get to next week. It is going to
be magical once the golf starts because of that. But in the meantime, with everybody together, it's going to be really fascinating to see how the cards fall.
I mean, what are your thoughts for the Live players? What do you think the future of Live is? Because that I think is one of the really big questions out there.
I think Live is dead. It seemed to me like it was already on life support. And if the Saudi's got what they wanted, which is a seat at the table, I don't see why they have any rooting interests in Live surviving. I don't think the concept of Live worked. People weren't very engaged with it outside of maybe turning up for the Austria Billion event and being really.
Excited about that.
But I don't see if the future of Live being very bright. What's gonna happen to the players is going to be interesting. I think there's gonna be some negotiations between top players on Live, top players on the PGA Tour figuring out what a reasonable compromise will be. Wouldn't be surprised if some of these middle of the road PGA Tour players get completely shafted. If you were thinking about taking a twenty million dollar deal to join Live and you stayed, I don't think there's gonna be any
compensation for you waiting on the other end. But if you're Rory, John, Rahm, Morikawa, maybe even somebody like Ricky Fowler, I think they'll have a voice in what that reconciliation process looks like. Are the live golfers fined? Are they suspended for a year?
What are they going to find them? Two hundred thousand dollars? Like the PGA Tour is just spineless when it comes to find.
I don't know if I mean, aren't the players going to have to weigh in on that? Or you don't think their voice is going to be don't think Roy kicklroy'svoice would be heard on that?
Well.
I think the other aspect of this is like Yaser, you know Yoster's involvement now and effectively the the guys that that joined him there. This is all about money. This was all about money and power. This was all about the Saudi Arabian government getting their hooks into golf. They did that because of a the ineptitude of the PGA tour, but b because people like Phil Micholson, Bryson de Shamba, Brooke to Kopka, Dustin Johnson took took a chance. I do not think, you know, Rory McElroy made the
point that chased their boss. I do not think that Yasser is going to sit by and allow those players to be absolutely hammered forgetting him what he wanted.
But it's a cold world. It's about money and power.
Maybe that is what happens, but I just don't see a world where, you know, I think if you were if this was and this is the thing, is that if this, if the tour wasn't so leveraged, if they were able to have operated, if Jay had taken this seriously from day one, right, and they get Phil and DJ to go right off the bat, maybe you act quickly and go with another you know, you put together a group and you do this right away. This was clearly they had to go for profit. That was the
from the onset of this. If you go back and listen to the podcast. That's what we talked about from the onset. This was the resolution that had to happen if they had been able to do this without the involvement of the piff and the involvement of the of the person who coerced these players to come play for him and get him this seat at the table, and who knows what the ten year outlook of being at this table is. You know how that power gradually increases.
He's not gonna have a ton of power right off the bat.
But I can't.
Imagine that person is gonna let all those those players, especially the big names that came be really hammered by j Monahan.
We'll see, it's gonna be fascinating.
Not everybody can be happy, right And I think ultimately the PGA Tour players will probably get the short end of the stick here in the middle.
I think the middle of the road.
I think you're right, like, is is John rom gonna get three hundred four hundred million dollars because of this?
No? But I think he's going to get something. He's going to get a carrot.
I think maybe what it could look like is some massive fund, some prize pool put together for like twenty twenty four, Like if the Tour Championship is like just given an enormous purse and then live players are ineligible for it or something like that, like some kind of indirect way of funneling or they just cut him checks. But that's gonna get really hairy if that's the solution.
Yeah, And then like as anything, and this is like one of the things with the PIP that was always like a head scratcher, is like where's the drawing line? Where do you so eleven gets nothing, ten gets something and eleven gets nothing? Like you know at that point when you if you're talking about just cutting these guys checks,
where do you draw the line? Like does will zal tours Who's you know, this is not a shot at will Zale Torris who's played a year and a half of good golf in his career, maybe two years of great golf in his career. Does he deserve a check even though he turned down one hundred million dollars.
I don't know on the other side of this, just to not play both sides, but I think we can sometimes maybe over glorify the reasons that some of.
The PGA Tour players stayed.
Personally, I think everybody was acting within their own self interest and betting on The people who stayed were mostly betting on the future of the PGA Tour. The people who left were taking a huge pay cut. I don't think this was like a good versus evil situation, and so to some extent, the cards fell where they did, and some people are gonna lose out, and it was it didn't go as well for some people as it
went for others. Like they're gonna be some PGA Tour players who get shafted here and that's just how it's gonna play out.
But we'll see.
I've I've been wondering, like you know, I jmon, hand he kind of signed off, like you're gonna hear from me at early in Travelers where if not sooner.
I wonder if like live is just over after the US Open.
Yeah, I would think they'll let them play the rest of the season out, but I don't I don't see why. I mean, if they're contractually obligated, then maybe they will, but no one's watching live.
I think it's over.
Yeah, I don't know.
I think like maybe I you know, if I think about it, it's a utopian, you know thought, But maybe it's a you know, not live but a team concept in twenty twenty five and you already have the guys signed.
I don't know. I don't know how that an individual Yeah, I think I could see that. I don't know.
I think I think individual and team tournaments work. That's how college college golf works. That's how every college golf tournament is. That's how every high school golf tournament is. You know, it is a you know, is a is a format when you do stroke play like it works.
I don't know.
I think that when you start to think about a for profit entity, how how do you build value? You know, especially with sponsors. Right, would you rather have a sponsor sponsor a team or a tournament and have undue influence on a tournament?
Which would you rather have team?
If that can be a compelling product. I don't know at the professional level, if the team concept works, But I guess there's just gonna have to be some experimentation.
Yeah, I mean it's you know, do you want the.
Golf to look more like the Premier League and like uh F one in its formatting, or do you want it to look more like tennis? I think that's like, you know, that's the question, that's it, and I don't. I don't know the answer. I think it it can work either way. I think that that the intrinsic value the the general fan interests that you I think when you look at general fan interest, teams are something that
they that that general fan interest galvanizes. And we've heard the absurd things about Yasser bryceon on CNN, all about growing the game, but when you think about the fundamental of growing the game, I think the team format does have a much higher ceiling in doing that he heard.
But I think I don't follow that one particularly closely.
But I know that part of the compelling storylines with f one like how is this team investing in its technology? And like this engineer made a mistake. There's there's this these components of the team that people are drawn to. And so I think the only way that works in golf as if the teams have a true identity, if it's sort of a free agency where captains are picking golfers from all over the world and just kind of putting together three of their friends to be on a team.
I don't think that works.
I think there's got to be a regional element, something that ties these guys together.
Well, I think that first part, you know, where Live succeeded. Where was the highest interest in Live And it was just unfolding just this week about Matt Wolf and you know, again like interesting aspects of Live were always when player signed and it was unfolding with Matt Wolf and you know, not wanting to play and effectively, you know, being kicked off the team.
That was interesting to me.
I think where where golf has some interest ability, it would be the team's trades. You know, guy player X goes in a slump as he benched, you know, like the idea of that, like, you know, it is a that would be I think compelling. But you know, crazy day in golf. I think we've hit on kind of where this could go a lot. Do you have any parting thoughts on what happened yesterday?
Yeah, a lot. I mean I'm excited.
I actually do think this is I think we landed in a much better place than we could have a year ago. I was pretty pessimistic about the prospect of defections and then Live running the entire professional golf landscape. I think the fact that the PGA tour still has control is beneficial for the fans. Getting all the same the best players in the world back under the same roof beneficial for the fans. I'd like to see j Monahan go, and I don't think it's just Jay Monahan.
I think there need to be a lot of fresh faces. Sorry, wholesale change, Yes, I think there need to be wholesale changes. We need to get some fresh perspectives, open things up a little bit, change the way the PGA Tour has viewed itself, and I'm optimistic about the future.
All right, Joseph, thanks for your time, and well I'm sure talk about this many more times as it continues to develop.
Sounds good, Thanks for having me.
Thank you for listening to another edition of the Friday Podcast. Today's episode was produced by Matt Russ's.
Thank you Matt. This was a big episode.
I think this story obviously is going to change by the hour, by the day, and I wanted to make this podcast a little bit focused on where it might go. You know, some basics, but then you know where it might go. So thanks for listening. As a quick reminder, we got.
The US open next week.
We will be on site a lot of us will be there from our team. We've got a bunch of stuff cooked up, free content on the on the YouTube channel, social media. The newsletter will be humming every day of the week, but we will also have daily content on Club TFE. So if you have it yet, this is the best way to support us. It keeps it helps keep us independent and helps us grow and and really
do more. That's what we want, you know, it's we want to do more free content, more podcasts, more videos, but also more really cool stuff that we like doing, like in clubtf that has nothing to do with this, you know, PGA Tour, Pith of Merger really for the most part. So if you're into golf courses, that's probably a great place for you to be. If you go to the Frida egg dot com slash membership you can
see all the basics. It's one hundred and twenty dollars a year and that really helps us build our business and you know.
Continue to do what we love to do.
So thank you for everybody that's supported us this year, whether it's merchandise anything, and this has really been an awesome year and can't wait for next week's US Open, especially we get to the golf and we don't have to talk about this crazy stuff, so thank you. And we will be back on Sunday with a US Open preview with Jeff Shackelford, so that's coming soon.
So thank you guys. We'll talk soon.