LIV Tour Discussion Thread (*** NO POLITICS ***)

[tomjas]

1 hour ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

 

Exactly. There are players I am sad to see leave and go to LIV, players that I'm indifferent to see leave and go to LIV, and players that I say "good riddance" but I didn't like those guys when they were on Tour. I don't hate any of them though. 

 

I am a little angry at them for leaving, because the very existence of LIV fractures the sport of professional golf and dilutes the talent pool. I can't blame them personally for cashing those giant checks because for several of them it was probably a good decision, but I can be angry at the effects of those decisions. 

 

But beyond the effect on the sport, those players have largely just been out of sight, out of mind, for me. Really don't think about them, much less take the time "hate" anyone, other than when they show up in the news and it pops up in this thread. 

Dilutes the talent of the PGAT not professional golf

 

The PGAT offers tour membership to the top 10 finishers in the DPWT each season which obviously depletes the former but the overall talent pool remains the same 

[notsohard]

23 minutes ago, Archimedes65 said:

 

Except the framework agreement would have LIV become a subsidiary of the PGA Tour Enterprises, which would have “full decision-making authority with respect to all strategic and operational matters related to competition.”  Jimmy Dunne testified that this meant that the CEO of PGATE, Monahan, would have the final say on whether LIV kept operating or was shut down.

 

And I don’t agree with a blanket statement that SSG simply wants PIF in.  They want PIF in if the deal is the right deal for them, both in terms of valuation and strategy.  SSG agreed to invest up to $3 billion in the PGA Tour knowing full well that the PIF investment was uncertain.  I’m sure they’d like to negotiate a deal if it’s favorable to them, but the idea that they HAVE to do a deal is nonsense.  If that was the case, they would have waited and made their investment concurrent with the PIF.

Your 1st paragraph...No. The pgat will not control liv in any way, just like they have no control of the 4 majors. Dunne is gone. 

... and yes, SSG want PIF in, but PIF are not going to bow down to requests from a group of players who have no idea of international business dealings.

.... and then, yes you are right, there doesn't have to be a deal. Yasir will go to plan B.

[Archimedes65]

50 minutes ago, tomjas said:

SSG is not a white knight and will be looking to maximise its returns 

 

Yes, and one of the big problems with a PIF investment is that the PGA Tour doesn’t have the need for additional capital or the ability to profitably invest it.  If you can’t deploy the capital and earn a fair return for your investors, you return the capital to the investors.

 

The PGA Tour has all the assets and investment in place to run its business well.  The investment in increasing pursues was a one time thing, that needs to be funded on an ongoing basis by additional sponsor/tv revenue not investor dollars.  You don’t fund those operating expenses with capital.  They already have to figure out how they’re going to invest any cash SSG is actually investing.  I’m still at a loss as to how they plan to magically increase revenues just by taking what the have and putting new corporate names on it.

 

Pro golf is what it is.  It wasn’t an underinvested industry in need of capital. If it was, an economic actor would have made a play for it years ago.  The Tour is flailing tryin to react to a non-economic actor when it should be ignoring it and focusing on the best strategy in the face of that.  The answer might be that the Tour shrinks in order to remain viable, but it has enough going for it that it can survive and thrive if it isn’t mismanaged from within.

[betarhoalphadelta]

1 hour ago, notsohard said:

 

Do you really think PIF will handover money without benefits. Sure, the SSG have, but they'll soon see that their ROI is faltering. The SSG want PIF in. It's to their benefit. 

Remember, this is not about getting LIV to merge with the PGAT... they will both be stand alone tours. 2 different products. 

 

Disagree. There are only two outcomes here:

 

1. PIF gets into the PGATE investment alongside SSG, and as a result of that, LIV dies. 
2. PIF is excluded from PGATE, and they keep trying to fund LIV to keep the wedge and hope that their view of a global superstar tour actually has legs.

 

The PGAT will not accept PIF investment if LIV remains afterwards. 

[idrive]

2 hours ago, notsohard said:

 

Do you really think PIF will handover money without benefits.

 

Well... they handed out about 3 billion $'s so far without benefits, with zero return of investment with the potential of Millions/Billions more handed out.

 

So the answer is YES, they would/do/have.

[PedronNiall]

10 hours ago, Archimedes65 said:

I was really happy to hear Lucas Glover’s comments yesterday ripping the player board members.  I’ve been wondering what a career journeyman who’s perennially in the bottom half of the PGA Tour rankings, save for one brief hot streak, was thinking…

 

I think a lot of the people ripping the players on the policy board have forgotten what the PGA Tour was/is.  The PGA Tour was a member owned non-profit, run for the benefit of the players.  The CEO and independent board members served at the DISCRETION of the players.  The CEO and board members like Dunne and Herlihy are not the owners of the PGA Tour.

 

What occurred last year was the equivalent of the following.  Imagine that you’re a part of a group of investors that own a company and are also key to producing the products it delivers.  A group of those investors are disgruntled, and are lured away by another investor to come a build a competing company.  The leave willingly and then turn around and sue your company.  Your company, your CEO, and the Board countersue and publicly assail the other company as immoral and treacherous.  A while thereafter YOUR CEO and Board, unbeknownst to you and in secret, negotiate a merger with said competitor.  You find out 30 minutes before they announce it to the press.  On top of that, they either directly lie to you, or are such bad deal makers that they don’t really understand the negotiations that they just completed, and tell you that ‘don’t worry, we’ll have control and be able to make them go away.”  How would you react?  Would you think that governance broke down and that you’d want changes to be made so that you had a say in the Company that YOU OWN and are responsible for creating all the value in?

 

This is akin to SpaceEx’s management and board negotiating a deal with Bezo’s to merge with Blue Origin and letting Musk know 30 minutes before the press release goes out.  Do you think he’d be cool with that or that he would fire everyone on the spot and move to replace the board?

 

The CEO and Board did a secret deal without consulting its own ownership group, a deal that their members overwhelmingly were against, and on top of that they botched the negotiations.  The question shouldn’t be; why do the players have so much power now?  It should be, why are any of the CEO and Board Members that were involved in that process still there?  Again, the only reason they are is because the players bought the lie/incorrect assumption that LIV was going away as a result of the deal.

 

And Lucas Glover?  Dude, nobody is paying to see you play golf.  Rather than criticizing the guys that are actually driving the eyeballs to golf and creating value, you should probably just thank the Lord (i.e., Tiger) that you’re making millions to play a game where you finish 75th in the rankings most years.

 

 

The issue with your comparison is that while the players do handle the product creation/delivery they are not the investors who put in the funds or the team who secures it in the first place. Players may have done that at the Tour's inception, but that was a long time and many billions of dollars ago. The CEO & board--as highlighted by the new capital sources they drummed up--are essential to the PGA being solvent and being run. For all intents & purposes the the players are the production team in the unusual spot of actually being paid a fair percentage of the full value their product brings to the company, but they have almost zero to do with managing any of the things that keep the "company" running. 

 

If the players all disappeared tomorrow the actual management of the Tour could replace them and keep going at a loss as fewer people watched. If the board and executives disappeared the Player Board and playing members don't have a wing or a prayer of handling the day-to-day essentials that keep the Tour solvent, them paid, and help sustain any semblance of normalcy. 

 

A backdoor deal with Bezos to partner with Space-X without Musk's knowledge isn't the same either because as above Musk has direct oversight & awareness of what his companies are doing daily and has and will continue to dictate policy, activity, and scope of the company at a macro & micro level. Tour players are the equivalent of the people who build & fly/write the code that flies the rockets. Fundamental as those roles are they aren't the ones bringing in the money or making sure the checks don't bounce. Whatever the Tour used to be it isn't any longer and all of what transpired makes it clear the players remain vastly removed from direct knowledge of what makes the machine keep moving.

 

Just as an many other ventures we're seeing a case of the powers that be making decisions they were given the authority to make regardless of how much they might upset the talent and the company's customers at large. 

[Golferpaul]

20 hours ago, Shilgy said:

Who said “hate”?  There is a wide difference between apathy and hate.  For most of us it’s just apathy.  

True, but read just a few pages of this thread and you will see lots of hate.  

[Cactus Jack]

15 hours ago, idrive said:

 

Well... they handed out about 3 billion $'s so far without benefits, with zero return of investment with the potential of Millions/Billions more handed out.

 

So the answer is YES, they would/do/have.

 

The same can be said for SSG. Although they didn't actually invest $3B to create a product, they subsidized a $1.5B equity pool. How are they going to generate a return? I hope their big bet isn't the TGL golf simulator TV show. Limited field, team-based, simulator golf...Just the thought of TGL makes me like professional golf less 🙂 .  

[Archimedes65]

18 hours ago, notsohard said:

Your 1st paragraph...No. The pgat will not control liv in any way, just like they have no control of the 4 majors.

 

Have you read the terms of the framework agreement?  It’s proposes exactly what I said.  I agree that we all know that it was BS, but that’s what it said and that’s what Dunne testified to in front of Congress.  If that lie was not told, there would have been a rebellion by the Tour players immediately and Monahan and Dunne would have been gone shortly thereafter.

[Archimedes65]

10 hours ago, PedronNiall said:

 

The issue with your comparison is that while the players do handle the product creation/delivery they are not the investors who put in the funds or the team who secures it in the first place. Players may have done that at the Tour's inception, but that was a long time and many billions of dollars ago. The CEO & board--as highlighted by the new capital sources they drummed up--are essential to the PGA being solvent and being run. For all intents & purposes the the players are the production team in the unusual spot of actually being paid a fair percentage of the full value their product brings to the company, but they have almost zero to do with managing any of the things that keep the "company" running. 

 

If the players all disappeared tomorrow the actual management of the Tour could replace them and keep going at a loss as fewer people watched. If the board and executives disappeared the Player Board and playing members don't have a wing or a prayer of handling the day-to-day essentials that keep the Tour solvent, them paid, and help sustain any semblance of normalcy. 

 

A backdoor deal with Bezos to partner with Space-X without Musk's knowledge isn't the same either because as above Musk has direct oversight & awareness of what his companies are doing daily and has and will continue to dictate policy, activity, and scope of the company at a macro & micro level. Tour players are the equivalent of the people who build & fly/write the code that flies the rockets. Fundamental as those roles are they aren't the ones bringing in the money or making sure the checks don't bounce. Whatever the Tour used to be it isn't any longer and all of what transpired makes it clear the players remain vastly removed from direct knowledge of what makes the machine keep moving.

 

Just as an many other ventures we're seeing a case of the powers that be making decisions they were given the authority to make regardless of how much they might upset the talent and the company's customers at large. 

 

I don’t think you understand the bylaws/governance structure of the PGA Tour.  The CEO and Board serve at the discretion of the players and are given certain leeway to make decisions on their behalf, though they are bound by a fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of their members.  If the players deem those decisions bad, they have the power to remove and replace them.  They also have the power to change the governance structure, which they did by increasing player representation on the policy board.  Monahan could be removed tomorrow by the players, if they so desired.

 

And people keep saying Monahan and the Board landed SSG.  The player directors were the key to the SSG deal, not the suits.  Not only in the negotiations but in the design and acceptance of the equity plan, which is the core component of the strategy to retain talent and build a profitable, for-profit enterprise.  That’s what SSG is buying into and the only reason they were interested in investing.  They see that the PGA Tour has great potential for returns, if they’re able to retain talent with a competitive equity incentive.

 

And as regards the Musk analogy, you’re making a biased straw man argument.  In my example, I was saying assume the board and management went around him.  Feel free to just put company x and y in my example and make up names for the parties.  I was simply outlying a fact pattern representing exactly what went on here with the PGA Tour.  Management and the board negotiated and inked an agreement with the merger partner without disclosing it to its owners.  The only thing that prevented open rebellion was a lie that Monahan would have control over the future of LIV.  If you recall, a number of the players, in interviews shortly after the announcement said, ‘well at least we have clarity that LIV will be going away’, based on the lie told by Dunne and Monahan.

[Archimedes65]

17 minutes ago, Cactus Jack said:

 

The same can be said for SSG. Although they didn't actually invest $3B to create a product, they subsidized a $1.5B equity pool. How are they going to generate a return? I hope their big bet isn't the TGL golf simulator TV show. Limited field, team-based, simulator golf...Just the thought of TGL makes me like professional golf less 🙂 .  

 

SSG invested in a 100+ year old entity with massive assets and value, and likely did so at a favorable valuation.  PIF invested in a start up entity and overpaid for the assets that it contributed to the entity.  Further it set up an operating structure that loses money on an ongoing basis and that even its own consultants said would likely never be profitable.  So there’s that.

[Titleist99]

4 hours ago, Archimedes65 said:

 

I don’t think you understand the bylaws/governance structure of the PGA Tour.  The CEO and Board serve at the discretion of the players and are given certain leeway to make decisions on their behalf, though they are bound by a fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of their members.  If the players deem those decisions bad, they have the power to remove and replace them.  They also have the power to change the governance structure, which they did by increasing player representation on the policy board.  Monahan could be removed tomorrow by the players, if they so desired.

 

And people keep saying Monahan and the Board landed SSG.  The player directors were the key to the SSG deal, not the suits.  Not only in the negotiations but in the design and acceptance of the equity plan, which is the core component of the strategy to retain talent and build a profitable, for-profit enterprise.  That’s what SSG is buying into and the only reason they were interested in investing.  They see that the PGA Tour has great potential for returns, if they’re able to retain talent with a competitive equity incentive.

 

And as regards the Musk analogy, you’re making a biased straw man argument.  In my example, I was saying assume the board and management went around him.  Feel free to just put company x and y in my example and make up names for the parties.  I was simply outlying a fact pattern representing exactly what went on here with the PGA Tour.  Management and the board negotiated and inked an agreement with the merger partner without disclosing it to its owners.  The only thing that prevented open rebellion was a lie that Monahan would have control over the future of LIV.  If you recall, a number of the players, in interviews shortly after the announcement said, ‘well at least we have clarity that LIV will be going away’, based on the lie told by Dunne and Monahan.

which player directors secured the SSG deal?

[Archimedes65]

1 hour ago, Titleist99 said:

which player directors secured the SSG deal?

 

Nobody secured the deal.  But Tiger, Spieth, and Rory were intimately involved in those negotiations.

 

Do people really think that the guys at SSG said ‘Wilson! I really like this Monahan guy.  We gotta get in business with him.  What’s he doing these days?’  This was deal between SSG and the Tour, the latter of which is the players.  You could replace any of the suits at the PGA with 100 different business people.   You can’t replace Tiger, Rory, Jordan, etc. with just anybody.  This deal doesn’t get done without them heavily involved.

[PedronNiall]

13 hours ago, Archimedes65 said:

 

I don’t think you understand the bylaws/governance structure of the PGA Tour.  The CEO and Board serve at the discretion of the players and are given certain leeway to make decisions on their behalf, though they are bound by a fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of their members.  If the players deem those decisions bad, they have the power to remove and replace them.  They also have the power to change the governance structure, which they did by increasing player representation on the policy board.  Monahan could be removed tomorrow by the players, if they so desired.

 

And people keep saying Monahan and the Board landed SSG.  The player directors were the key to the SSG deal, not the suits.  Not only in the negotiations but in the design and acceptance of the equity plan, which is the core component of the strategy to retain talent and build a profitable, for-profit enterprise.  That’s what SSG is buying into and the only reason they were interested in investing.  They see that the PGA Tour has great potential for returns, if they’re able to retain talent with a competitive equity incentive.

 

And as regards the Musk analogy, you’re making a biased straw man argument.  In my example, I was saying assume the board and management went around him.  Feel free to just put company x and y in my example and make up names for the parties.  I was simply outlying a fact pattern representing exactly what went on here with the PGA Tour.  Management and the board negotiated and inked an agreement with the merger partner without disclosing it to its owners.  The only thing that prevented open rebellion was a lie that Monahan would have control over the future of LIV.  If you recall, a number of the players, in interviews shortly after the announcement said, ‘well at least we have clarity that LIV will be going away’, based on the lie told by Dunne and Monahan.

 

I pointed to the specifics of where your comparison missed. What you stated doesn't align with what happened at all in this case. One of the most glaring issues is that again, any company head wouldn't have been caught blindsided in the way you mention because in any traditional instance the person or people akin to Musk would be integral in doing the things that keep the company alive. You can't compare the talent to those who set everything in motion and maintain it. Once more, however much involvement players had in truly handling the Tour's operations early on, those days are gone.

 

It indeed does suck for the players that they find themselves feeling betrayed but I in no way see your comparisons lining up with what occurred nor do I see any fiduciary or other legal obligations breached by the board, etc. Had that been the case the players would have grounds for legal action, no? That certainly would have been an agreeable course for those who wanted no part of LIV players returning and with all the money at their disposal and lawyers connected to them via their agents & teams I'm sure they would have gone that route if it were viable.

 

The execs should have called in every favor they needed to as soon as SA started sniffing around, and in that they failed, but they in no way failed to continue operating the PGA Tour in a way that ensured its solvency. The further managed to secure additional funds to meet the players' new found levels of want & greed while keeping the Tour out of litigation that would have eventually bankrupted it. Whatever moral issues some would find with all of this from the deal itself to how much wasn't openly disclosed while it was being discussed I don't see merit in your argument regarding a failure by the board to honor their obligations nor do I see corollaries to titans of industry having a partnership foist upon them.

[stinger_gc]

If Burmester wins this weekend it should also count as a win for stinger GC 

[Cactus Jack]

21 hours ago, Archimedes65 said:

 

SSG invested in a 100+ year old entity with massive assets and value, and likely did so at a favorable valuation.  PIF invested in a start up entity and overpaid for the assets that it contributed to the entity.  Further it set up an operating structure that loses money on an ongoing basis and that even its own consultants said would likely never be profitable.  So there’s that.

 

Your first sentence is factually untrue. In no way did SSG invest in a 100+ year old entity with massive assets and value. SSG provided a $1.5B cash infusion and helped establish an equity pool in PGATE. They did not invest in the PGAT. There is no publicly shared business model, revenue growth/expansion plan, product improvement plan, ROI strategy, new product...nothing. Simply put, the initial SSG tranche was a stabilizing capital transaction to largely limit player movement to LIV and cover mounting operating expenses. All of this has been documented with pages of supporting links, articles, new stories earlier in this thread. 

Edited May 18 by Cactus Jack

[Titleist99]

17 hours ago, Archimedes65 said:

 

Nobody secured the deal.  But Tiger, Spieth, and Rory were intimately involved in those negotiations.

 

Do people really think that the guys at SSG said ‘Wilson! I really like this Monahan guy.  We gotta get in business with him.  What’s he doing these days?’  This was deal between SSG and the Tour, the latter of which is the players.  You could replace any of the suits at the PGA with 100 different business people.   You can’t replace Tiger, Rory, Jordan, etc. with just anybody.  This deal doesn’t get done without them heavily involved.

"Nobody secured the deal.  But Tiger, Spieth, and Rory were intimately involved in those negotiations."

 

The deal just happened? There's a big difference in being involved and negotiating Billion dollar deals.

--------------------------------

PS/ All players on the PGAT are replaceable, but you'd be hard press to find just anybody to negotiate multi-billion dollar deals. IMO

[golfortennis]

4 hours ago, Titleist99 said:

"Nobody secured the deal.  But Tiger, Spieth, and Rory were intimately involved in those negotiations."

 

The deal just happened? There's a big difference in being involved and negotiating Billion dollar deals.

--------------------------------

PS/ All players on the PGAT are replaceable, but you'd be hard press to find just anybody to negotiate multi-billion dollar deals. IMO

 

Not all players are replaceable, and there are far more people who can negotiate those types of deals than you think.  I play golf weekly with someone who negotiated deals with foreign governments, and I am far from someone who travels in those types of circles.  I would argue there are more of those people than golfers who can really drive TV ratings/interest.  

[Hawkeye77]

On 5/17/2024 at 5:58 PM, Archimedes65 said:

 

Nobody secured the deal.  But Tiger, Spieth, and Rory were intimately involved in those negotiations.

 

LOL, it was a multi million dollar business deal and three guys who spend a lot of money on people to handle their business interests weren't negotiating anything.  Way out of their league.  

 

 

[Archimedes65]

 

35 minutes ago, Hawkeye77 said:

 

LOL, it was a multi million dollar business deal and three guys who spend a lot of money on people to handle their business interests weren't negotiating anything.  Way out of their league.  

 

 

 

LOL, I spent 30 years in M&A finance and the key people to many of the negotiations where the value creators, not the business nerds in suits.  If you don’t think that Tiger, Rory and Jordan were key to that deal and the entire process, you’re just not paying attention.

 

And, seriously, you think that, after the outcry from the players about the secret PIF negotiations, that SSG would negotiate primarily with Monahan and Herlihy, versus involving the players?  Post PIF fiasco, the players made sure that that governance problem was fixed.

 

Edited May 18 by Archimedes65

[Archimedes65]

Another Major and LIV’s players performance is proving again that they have 15-20% of the top talent and the PGA Tour still has 80-85%.  Two players in the top 10, three in the top 18, nobody else through top 37.  One in five chance in the Majors, which is what they have tomorrow.  All their big guns, save Bryson, either didn’t make the cut, barely made the cut, or shot themselves out of the tournament today.

 

[fowlerscousin]

Some people spend all their waking minutes thinking about liv, it is wierd

[Hawkeye77]

2 hours ago, Archimedes65 said:

 

 

LOL, I spent 30 years in M&A finance and the key people to many of the negotiations where the value creators, not the business nerds in suits.  If you don’t think that Tiger, Rory and Jordan were key to that deal and the entire process, you’re just not paying attention.

 

And, seriously, you think that, after the outcry from the players about the secret PIF negotiations, that SSG would negotiate primarily with Monahan and Herlihy, versus involving the players?  Post PIF fiasco, the players made sure that that governance problem was fixed.

 

Of course they are valuable and no doubt were involved - but serious negotiations? Nah. 
 

Big difference between “key” players and having the experience and depth of knowledge of all things Tour and finance that were necessary to put details together. 
 

In the end, why does it matter? 
 

 

[bcjim]

20 hours ago, stinger_gc said:

If Burmester wins this weekend it should also count as a win for stinger GC 

Count it.  Nobody will notice,  but go ahead. 🤣

[Shilgy]

On 5/18/2024 at 8:06 AM, Cactus Jack said:

 

Your first sentence is factually untrue. In no way did SSG invest in a 100+ year old entity with massive assets and value. SSG provided a $1.5B cash infusion and helped establish an equity pool in PGATE. They did not invest in the PGAT. There is no publicly shared business model, revenue growth/expansion plan, product improvement plan, ROI strategy, new product...nothing. Simply put, the initial SSG tranche was a stabilizing capital transaction to largely limit player movement to LIV and cover mounting operating expenses. All of this has been documented with pages of supporting links, articles, new stories earlier in this thread. 

So in your opinion it’s all a bunch of BS that they are creating PGA Tour Enterprises that is a for profit to run the TPC’s and merchandising and other for profit income streams?  All of the documentation pointing to that is bs instead?

[Chopper Dave]

21 hours ago, fowlerscousin said:

Some people spend all their waking minutes thinking about liv, it is wierd

They wont celebrate Xander’s win without relating it back to LIV somehow

[pingbling23]

Bryson T6 at the masters and second at the pga.  US open win incoming.

[Archimedes65]

On 5/18/2024 at 8:06 AM, Cactus Jack said:

 

Your first sentence is factually untrue. In no way did SSG invest in a 100+ year old entity with massive assets and value. SSG provided a $1.5B cash infusion and helped establish an equity pool in PGATE. They did not invest in the PGAT.

 

This is 100% wrong.  I don’t think you understand the nature of the restructuring of the Tour activities under the framework agreement.  The only thing staying in the non profit are tournament operations and the charitable work.  The revenue/profit generating elements of the PGA Tour (tournaments, tv contracts, sponsor contracts, player contracts), ie. everything that comprises the Tour as we know it, have all been transferred into the for-profit entity, into which SSG has invested.  SSG has invested in what we knew as the ‘PGA Tour’ prior to the restructuring.  It is now all in the PGATE entity, and, at least per below, it appears to have ‘massive assets and value’, like I said.

 

From the press release: 

 

The Strategic Sports Group (SSG) agreed to invest up to $3 billion in the PGA Tour’s business. The SSG investment — the first chunk of which will be $1.5 billion — will give the investment group an ownership stake in a new, for-profit entity called PGA Tour Enterprises, which will consist of most of the Tour’s moneymaking assets (tournaments, media rights contracts, etc.). The SSG guaranteed $1.5 billion to the Tour upon the finalization of the agreement Wednesday, and the deal values PGA Tour Enterprises at $12.3 billion, people with knowledge of the agreement said.

Edited May 20 by Archimedes65

[idrive]

Xander's dad:

 

THERE HAS BEEN SOME SPECULATION that PGA Tour players who win majors and gain long-term exemptions would be at greater risk to leave for LIV. Stefan was dismissive of that idea.

“The opposite would probably be closer to the truth,” he said. “No chance. Xander is not chasing the money. Xander is about legacy. And as my opinion - just as his father - there was never a chance.

“What we told LIV in Saudi Arabia, with Xander beside me, was that if there is no path back to the PGA Tour and if there is no chance at World Ranking points we do not have anything to talk about. Even if you throw hundreds of millions of dollars at him. That word still stands.

 

 

Me:

 

This is why I enjoy watching the PGAT. The guys that are there are playing for more than just the money.

This is why I don't care about watching liv. Don't care anymore about the guys who jumped. They only play for money. It's exhibition golf. They are bought and paid for. It's all meaningless outside of being a party animal.

 

And... seems (most of) the liv guys didn't fare as well at the PGA as one would have thought. They're good players but the drive to be the best player(s) is not the same as before. Just showing up isn't good enough anymore.

 

 

[Hawkeye77]

Bryson really is the exception to most of those guys. He’s found a niche for himself other than LIV and he is one (looking at you DJ and just about every other one of the LIV players) who will always work relentlessly on his game because he’s wired that way.