Name:   MartiniMan - Subject:   Golf fans...musings on the PGA/LIV/DP merger Date:   6/7/2023 2:22:19 PM

If you aren't a golf fan this may not interest you.  I have to admit I was very, very surprised that the PGA would agree to have blood on their hands getting into bed with the Saudis and insulting every 9/11 victim's family.  But then again, money talks and the PGA apparently is not so principled as they seemed to be when they were competing with and suing LIV.  Some additional observations:

• The players that went to LIV are looking pretty much like geniuses.  They exchanged a "lifetime" ban from the PGA for in some cases more than $100M to sign with LIV.  I believe Dustin Johnson got $125M.  Not only do they get to keep that money but they are back in the PGA.  The players that didn't get, well, nothing compared to the LIV defectors.  I can tell you they were all high fiving and popping the champaign corks.
• Those players who were outspoken critics...I'm talking about you Rory McIlroy....now look pretty much like chumps.  Not only that, but even Rory is now saying this merger is "good for golf".  When he says that let me translate...the tournaments will have more prize money for them to divvy up and it will make Rory even wealthier than he already is.  Many of the players were shocked at the news, one famously saying, "No f****ing way!"  Way!
• What attracted many of the players to LIV was pretty basic:  a signing bonus, $25M per tourney purse, only 54 holes instead of 72, no cut so they made money at every event, fewer tournaments to make the same or more money so less time away from family and less cost to participate.  There was also some animosity about how the PGA ran the tour and made billions on TV money, etc. while the players didn't get nearly what LIV was offering.
• Lest you think the cut is not tha big a deal....it is.  Half the players at the torunaments paid an entrance fee, incurred lots of costs to get there and play and if they didn't make the cut they got exactly $0 for their efforts.  Even the best players in the world often don't make the cut.  Not sure how the newly merged entity is going to handle that but I suspect that while there will still be a cut, there will be money paid to all participants, even if only enough to cover their costs.
• Greg Norman, the putative CEO of LIV golf, learned of the merger shortly before the formal announcement and one of the conditions is that he was out, gone, kaput.  There is that much animosity toward him withing the PGA and with many of the players.  Of course he was outspoken about how the PGA was run and the hypocrisy of their criticism of LIV.
• My final point is about the hypocrisy angle.....and it is so deep here that everyone is drowning in it.  It would have been one thing if the PGA had responded to the LIV for the simple business threat that it was.  Instead they decided to cloak themselves in the whole Saudi's have a terrible human rights record, they mistreat the alphabet people, the murder of the Saudi journalist and even using 9/11 families as props to explain why the defecting players have "blood on their hands" and are earning "blood money".  The problem here is that pretty much every major sponsor of PGA events have significant business interests in Saudi Arabia...in fact, one tourney is sponsored by Aramco, the Saudi national oil company.  Not to mention the fact that every President, including our current one, meet regularly with the Saudi Crown Prince and our country and theirs have deep ties, both economic and military.  And yet for some reason the PGA and the golf media chose this angle of attack, all because their economic interests were threatened.  Now they look like the hypocritics that they are.

Sorry for the digression from the usual political banter but I am a big golf fan and have found the whole thing to be both interesting and disgusting.  What really brought it home was that Brooks Koepka, one of the LIV defectors, recently won the PGA Chamionship and almost won the Masters (yes, they are for some reasons still allowed to play in the four majors).  So much for the PGA having the best players in the world....well, they do now anyway.