The PGA Tour – Will You Watch This Year?
Will you even watch the PGA Tour this year? I get it, I follow the game closely. And I’m frustrated and worn out by what took place in the professional men’s game last year. If you’re a casual fan of the game, I can’t imagine what you’ve been thinking the last year or so.
It’s A New Year
So, as we get ready for the 2024 season to start let’s try and take stock and see where we are. The negotiations between the PGA tour and the Saudi PIF (Public Investment Fund) are continuing. The principals created a self-imposed deadline of the end of 2023. They were unable to come to an agreement by that date. So now, they’ve pushed the deadline out to the MASTERS.
Jay Monahan, the Commissioner of the PGA Tour sent a memo to the players over the New Years holiday just to fill them in on the progress of the talks. Because we live in the world we do, that memo was leaked to the press, and we all learned that the parties say they’re getting closer to a deal.
If you remember, along the way, I think that they wouldn’t be beholden to the PIF, the PGA tour started to entertain other sources of revenue. We seem to be marching down the path of the tour partnering with more than one company to help fund their enterprise. We’ll see how all of that pans out.
Let’s Just Play Golf
All that being said, there’s now golf to play, and we’ll do it now without Jon Rahm. It is a bit unfortunate that Jon will be the defending champion of three of the first seven events of the season, including this week at Kapalua. He will not be there or anywhere on tour to defend. He will defend his MASTERS win, here in April.
So that now leaves us a tour of Rory McIlroy, Jordan Speith, Justin Thomas, Rickie Fowler, Tony Finau, Ludwig Aberg and more to watch. Will we? Will you? Are you still interested in the PGA tour? Will you plop on the couch on a Sunday afternoon and tune in to the final round to see if Wyndham Clark beats Nick Taylor? I love the game and I will be watching it on Sunday afternoon. I just don’t know if I’ll be watching Thursday through Saturday.
So here we go, into the brave new world of the PGA Tour. You may not know the names of everyone you’re watching, but I bet you the tournaments will be exciting. Most of the finishes will be great. And hopefully, one day, this will all be behind us and things will get back to normal. Until then, though, let’s go see if Corey Conners can take down Adam Hadwin…