The PGA Tour, LIV Golf, and the DP World Tour have agreed on a merger.
What this means. The LIV Golfers can now apply for reinstatement to the PGA Tour to play in their events again.
The merger allows various different styles of golf tournaments to be promoted in the competitive platform from team competitions and individual competitions to 54 and 72 hole events for all involved.
The skill levels of golfers that compete in said events will have a more accurate calculation in how competitive the competition will be week in and week out.
What possibly could have caused the accelerated deal to get done. LIV Golf tournament players couldn’t previously play in events hosted by the PGA Tour.
When the majors came around the LIV players proved that the competition was strong as ever. At the Masters you have 3 of the top 4 finishers LIV golfers, and at the PGA Championship you have Brooks Koepka a fellow LIV golfer win to showcase how strong that LIV really is.
All parties assessed how competition will be impacted, and felt the merger would be the best move.
Let’s explore the winners and the losers of this series of events.
Winner- LIV Tour golfers. The players that jumped to LIV during the inaugural year got millions in bonuses to join the competitive tour.
Jumping into something like that is similar to getting in at Apple when it was young in the 80’s, saying yes to Mark Zuckerberg in his Harvard dorm room to assist with launching Facebook, or buying Bitcoin when it was a couple bucks.
Winner – Donald Trump. LIV gave Donald Trump the opportunity to showcase his properties to top competition. With top competition playing his golf courses, Donald Trump gains more publicity.
With Trump calling the merger happening in the summer of 2022, it continues to prove his credibility as a businessman. Now that the merger has officially happened it proves Trump right.
Could he use this as a stepping stone for a 2024 run at President?
Winner – Golf. With the merger of the tours. The game of golf is starting to get the global respect that it deserves. Many have overlooked golf about not being very popular.
LIV Golf created an atmosphere to generate interest to the young fan from loud music, to more interaction overall with the players on the course.
With the merger the young crowd that LIV Golf created, the PGA Tour can get some of that fanbase that the LIV Tour created.
Now golf can compete with soccer as being the one of the most popular sport globally behind soccer, as LIV helped get golf on the global stage with more events in international markets.
Winner – Competition. With the LIV players getting the opportunity to apply for reinstatement, competition will continue to be more star studded in the future as players from both tours can attempt different styles of competition going forward.
Winner – Phil Mickelson. Mickelson was a big ambassador for LIV with the idea that golf would grow. His fellow competitors criticized him, questioned his ethics, and simply ignored him as he made the switch to LIV.
Now that the merger has happened Lefty ultimately gets the last laugh.
Winner – Gary Player. Gary Player has been the global ambassador for golf for decades.
Loser – Loyalty and trust of the PGA Tour Players. The PGA Tour players stayed on the PGA with a promise that their tour would stay independent from LIV as their tour would remain exclusive for PGA Tour players only.
However, most players are disgruntled that they found out via Twitter about the merger from Collin Morikawa to Mackenzie Hughes. Seems like Monahen and company dropped the ball here.
Making a decision without getting ideas from the people that market the product is a big red flag, maybe they thought they were always in the front who knows.
Loser – The Wallet of Tiger Woods. Granted Tiger isn’t struggling with money by any means, however his wallet could be $800 million richer if he accepted the offer knowing that the tours would merge down the road.
Loser – The legacy of the legends that made the PGA Tour what it is. Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Sam Snead, Ben Hogan, among others must feel like everything they worked for, was nothing but greed by the future generations. When they played they had the respect of the game that may be appeared as lost in the eyes of some of those folks.
Loser – Golf Purists. When golf purists think competitive golf of the worlds best, they think of the PGA Tour only for the most part.
When the LIV Tour was formed golf purists were not happy because they thought the launch destroyed the integrity of the game.
After the news of the two tours joining forces, golf purists were again not happy with the outcome that was announced.