LIV Golf Year One is complete. Let's review.
Whether you like it or not.
The inaugural year of LIV Golf is now complete and as much as I’m not a fan, it’s hard to not give it a decent amount of credit for it’s rookie season.
In it’s favor, LIV Golf:
Signed a LOT more name golfers than originally thought, including Cam Smith, Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau and rumors of a few other top golfers like Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele. Dustin Johnson was the best golfer before Cam joined, and his willingness to go seemed to open the floodgates for a lot of other golfers. And he was incredibly well compensated for this.
Apparently put on a pretty good televised product. It was only available on streaming (YouTube) — I never watched it, so I can’t say if it was good or bad, but reports said the limited field and the shotgun starts meant there was coverage across the course the entire time.
For those who don’t quite get this, a “shotgun start” means different golfers start at different holes on the course. This means that when the tournament starts, everyone is playing - as opposed to a traditional setup, where golfers all start on the first hole. This does mean in the beginning of a tournament, the coverage focuses on just a few golfers - regardless of whether they’re the most interesting groups to focus on.
Doled out a lot of money - some of it genuinely life-changing - to a lot of golfers who were okay with the funding source. Guys like Pat Perez, Harold Varner III and certainly some of the guys who jumped before even joining a professional tour like James Piot and Turk Petit made a ton of money, guaranteed.
Perhaps most importantly, they have created a real and viable threat to the PGA Tour and pressured that tour into making real changes, like larger purses and potentially less tournaments (though this latter change won’t happen until 2024 due to commitments already made).
So, that’s the highlights. Where has LIV fallen short?
They promised more than they could deliver, mostly to the golfers they signed. This seems obvious in terms of how much LIV has been working to get Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) points, which would help keep their players qualified for majors. The desperate moves the league has made to try and get these points for LIV events, as well as encouraging players to play more events on the Asian Tour, makes it clear that Greg Norman and others promised players they’d be eligible for majors - just on faith that it would “have” to happen.
Greg Norman is still in charge. This is mainly the same point as above, but Norman has had a vendetta against the PGA Tour for years, based on the same ego that has led to some of the LIV golfers joining his adventure. But worse, he’s an idiot. He’s done well in business, both in apparel and design, so I’m not saying he can’t tie his own shoes - but he is absolutely NOT someone you want as the public face of this league. He’s made stupid statement after stupid statement, and clearly promised things to golfers he had no business doing. For LIV to survive, they need to kick this jackass to the curb.
The “competition” in these events has been utterly lacking. Again, I haven’t watched but when you see who has won, and the quality of the field, it’s kind of laughable. Guys who are winning are players that often wouldn’t make the field in a regular season event. And to my mind, the most obvious signal of all of this is Pat Perez. Check out this article on golf.com about Perez, and read the money quote under the photo below.
“Yeah, all the push-back, all the negative comments, everything we’ve gotten, at this point I really don’t care,” he said. “I mean, I don’t care. I’m paid. I don’t give a damn.”
First, I implore you to click on the above link and then watch the video of Perez dancing. I can’t look away. And, it’s great that Perez has made $18MM this year, which is over half what he made on the PGA Tour. He’s never been a “top” golfer and that money is life changing for all but the richest people in the world (including some guys who also took even bigger bags from LIV). Taking that money is his decision and if he’s comfortable with it, great.
But what this is NOT is … sports. He got paid $18,000,000 and played in a way that would have had him finishing DFL (that’s Dead Fucking Last) in most competitive tournaments. I get why HE is excited about this, but why should we be? Rooting for people to get paid is … interesting. It’s also not competitive sports.
LIV has turned into politics. Two of the tournaments this year were held at Trump properties, and the former President showed up at both - and most tournaments featured many, many people in MAGA hats, doing political cheers and such. This is not the space to question how the farthest right-wing of the Republican party has become SO pro Saudi Arabia, but it’s a reality, and … again, it’s not what sports is supposed to be. The same folks yelling at progressive reporters to “stick to sports” are wearing red hats to these events and cheering the complete lack of competition. That’s weird, man. This quote from the Washington Post states it well:
Other major sports and leagues have political leanings, largely dictated by their target audiences and various centers of power. College football and the NFL tilt right, the NBA left, though this is often discussed in whispered tones so as to not divide the wider audience and scare off advertisers. LIV, still searching for its voice and a foothold in the overcrowded sports-entertainment space, may be emerging as something never before seen: America’s first explicitly right-wing sports league.
The limited fields are … limited. This is both a feature and a bug. As noted, the limited fields make it easier to follow all the golf, and for the golfers they are guaranteed spots in the tournaments. But when someone gets hurt, their bench is really not great. Even the starting 48 has many golfers that aren’t close to namebrand. The list of LIV Golfers is kind of hilarious - there are 69 (nice) names here, but some of them are not on tour anymore. There are strong rumors that Patrick Cantlay (who I’ve been stating for months seemed like a perfect LIV golfer) and his buddy Xander Schauffele are heading to LIV. That would be a massive loss for the PGA Tour. If we assume health, but no net new golfers, I generously count 29 golfers who could pass any “have you ever heard of this guy?’ test with all but the most rabid golf fans. Some of those names are utterly non-competitive but have name brand value. This is a problem, though potentially a short-term one. If LIV can grab four or five names each year for the next few years then … suddenly it’s not a problem.
If my life depended on it, I would not have been able to identify this guy as James Piot. Because I’ve barely heard of James Piot. At the end of the day, this is an exhibition. There are no cuts. Everyone is getting paid, regardless of their own performance (see: Perez, Pat). The teams seem random - players swap around without it being clear why or how - making the idea of rooting for a team super weird, if not impossible. Are you a “4 Aces” fan, or do you support the “Ironheads”…? How would you eve know? Exhibition matches happen for golf and are fun - because they’re fun. It’s just not … sports.
LIV Golf is here, whether we like it or not. (I think it’s clear that I very much do not.) How it moves forward and how the PGA Tour does or doesn’t respond will make for another interesting year in golf come 2023. For now, I’m glad much of the drama is on pause for at least a month or two.