Anybody who has worked in the private sector or taken a business class in college knows the term “market disruptor.” For those unfamiliar, a market disruptor, defined by WGU.com, is “any person, product, or idea that radically and permanently changes the way an industry operates,” making LIV the first market disruptor in golf…history?
In an effort to level set, everything I’m about to say from here on down in this blog doesn’t apply to the top 10 or so players in the world like Justin Thomas, Rory McIlroy, or John Rahm, or the high-profile legacy players like Tiger Woods. Those guys make far more money off the course than they ever did/will on the course. This blog is about the rest of the guys fighting to make a living playing golf.
For years, the PGA Tour had a monopoly on professional golf. They exploited their players in the name of profit in almost every way possible including 1. Players are independent contractors with no guaranteed money. 2. Tournaments are every week, all over the place, with tournaments on consecutive weeks often thousands of miles apart which means huge travel costs for the players (which is all out of pocket for them with no guaranteed money…see Point 1). 3. Purses haven’t grown at anywhere near the rate their revenue has. All of those “arrangements” favor the PGA Tour (a private, for-profit business) over the players.
Players have grumbled and groaned on and of about this “arrangement” for years but had little recourse without a viable, alternative tour. It was a classic ”take it or leave it” situation and the players, for the most part, took it.
Then, one day, LIV golf entered the group chat and in the next 6-8 months the PGA tour *magically* makes a ton of changes that benefit the players? Things like a guaranteed $500K minimum salary for any players who play a full schedule, MASSIVELY inflated purses, and identifying a series of 20 tournaments that are the “premiere events” allowing players to play a full schedule (qualifying them for the $500K minimum) while not having to play (and travel) every week just to get by.
Politics aside, and I’m not here to defend the Saudi’s historical actions and track record (obviously terrible), but LIV golf has proven itself to be, at the least, a massive market disruptor. Moreover, it sure seems like the LIV players are having a ton of fun. They are embracing the team-style nature of these tournaments and have been very outspoken about the vastly improved work-life balance the reduced LIV schedule allows them.
Ultimately I don’t think the LIV tour will ever truly compete with the PGA tour, at least not for a long time. The aforementioned legacy players like Tiger Woods are on the record against it, and the overwhelming majority of the best players in the world right now have also pledged their allegiance to the PGA Tour. The LIV tour, I’d assume, is banking on the young players, like Cam Smith, achieving some early success on the PGA tour (winning a major in Cam’s case) and then defecting for the guaranteed payday and less stressful schedule. The million billion dollar question, ultimately, is whether LIV golf and their seemingly unlimited pile of money can continue to pay players 9 figures to jump ship while not bringing in even a fraction of the revenue needed to cover their costs. If they can, who knows? My bet is that the PGA Tour continues to make the tour-player arrangement incrementally better for the players to the point where the draw of LIV golf isn’t so appealing.
Right now, though it’s a damn shame that the PGA Tour players benefiting directly from the obviously forced changes the PGA Tour has made can’t get themselves to admit that their work lives have improved massively because the LIV tour entered the group chat.
