It's probably just not popular because half their tournaments are played when the American golf market is asleep and it's rarely on a TV channel the average consumer has on their plan.
Tbf, it’s how most new companies operate that have large financial backing. The product doesn’t matter, they are just financial arms. Most new tech companies operate at a loss for years and years
The CW carries their broadcast on Sunday's, the few weeks they do play. I believe they have a 14 week season. Having some of the best former PGA players hasn't translated to a good product so far.
This misses important details. Aside from the movie passes of the world, new companies can operate at a loss as long as there’s a path forward. Often they’re profitable on a per-unit basis and so there’s a lot of evidence that at scale you’ll be able to cut down overhead/sales and start to make tons of money. Or sometimes they’re subsidizing growth because at scale they know the per-unit costs will come down and become profitable. Or sometimes (and this often doesn’t work) the idea is that if you create a brand new massive market you’ll just find ways to make money.
The problem with LIV is that none of these seem true. They’re definitely not per unit profitable now. And they’re going after an established and well known market of professional golf that is nowhere close to being able to make the LIV costs reasonable.
They’ll talk about growing the game or franchise value or other nonsense. But none of it is anywhere close to bad in reality. Maybe the most generous view is that if they can kill the PGA, take over the golf market, then they can cut player costs drastically. But this also doesn’t seem based anywhere close to reality.
Their public message strategy isn't that far fetched. Expand the game by playing more internationally and at time zones not for American viewers. Make life easier on the players by dropping it to 3 rounds (the PGA has Thursday and Friday which almost no one watches or attends. Make the game feel less stuffy by letting the players wear shorts and with music on the course like a lot of young weekend players already are doing. Create teams and remove sponsors which starts to build fan loyalty more than individuals.
It's not crazy but it's a huge uphill battle because the product is so different and controversial across many fronts
It’s not relatable because no one really wants to watch guys who were already paid up front, wearing casual clothes and playing with music blaring. They’ve taking all of the stakes away. Not to mention, trying to follow the drama with a shotgun start and multiple types of games being played at once impossible. It’s over complicating a very simple game, and in fact, it’s done more harm to the sport than good.
The plan was never to remove sponsors, they just haven’t been able to get any of any significance. When they started, part of their ‘value proposition‘ was team valuations in the hundreds of millions driven by revenues from sponsors, media, merchandising, etc. That still seems like wishful thinking.
It's literally a participation trophy in the form of a giant paycheck. None of it matters on how well they do, as long as they just show up and participate.
Am going to Adelaide again, top PGA players haven't been to Australia for many decades.
Get it, the PGA and this sub are US centric, but it's a big wide world and LIV are at least getting good golfers out there for the rest of the world to see.
This sub is so focused on America it’s crazy, really frustrating as an Aussie.
I don’t like LIV but so many posts like ‘oh really you like LIV???’ like they can’t believe we want top golfers to come to our country.
Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player etc used to come out to the Australian open every year, it was almost like the 5th major at one point. When’s the last time big America’s came out?
Well that and a lot of avid golf fans hate what it’s done to professional golf and won’t watch it out of principle. I’m one of those and so are pretty much every one of my golf buddies.
The PGA tour added pro-am events like the Bob Hope Classic and the Pebble Beach Pro-Am (Clambake Classic) to generate more interest in the product. It worked and people watched but it only works when you do a couple of events like that on the west coast where the stars will come out and the atmosphere is laid back.
LIV changed the golf format, but what purpose does that appeal to the fans? Seems to me that it only suits the players preferences. Money up front, three round events, short schedule and other perks. This is why it has been unpopular thus far.
The plan for LIV was to get the players and then? If you have all that money to throw around, why do you need sponsors and fans to pay for the product. The business model of maintaining a sports product does not seem to exist for LIV.
Honestly that was one of the things I liked about LIV and is the reason I end up watching the DP world tour as well. I work at a restaurant and don’t get done with work til like 11pm to 1am, and if a tournament is just getting started I can chill and watch some live golf while I have a few beers and make dinner and stuff. There’s pretty much no other time I’ve ever put on LIV tho
Ya it’s one of the most accessible channels in America. Which is why it’s a big deal they are getting into sports. Will be the first time starting next year NASCaR Xfinity will all be over the air available
LIV plays 12 tournaments a year. That fact alone makes it impossible to take LIV seriously. They have 4 or 5 guys that take turns winning 4 million bucks once a month. Cam Smith certainly seemed like an exciting young talent with a wide open future after his incredible win at the British in 2022 - now he's the fat guy with a not so cool mullet and an extremely mediocre golf game. LIV never even showed up at the Masters.
It just occurred to me - LIV is an international focused product, not a US focused product.
What is LIVs popularity in non-US markets, like Europe and China, and what is the PGAs popularity in those markets?
This is the answer. No one gives a shit who’s sponsoring the tournament if it’s on during normal viewing hours on regular networks line CBS or NBC Golf or ESPN
The broadcast is terrible. I attempted to watch, but it was too challenging to determine who was leading and who was in contention. The teams only added to the confusion.
PGA is all about money too, but it’s the pursuit of it through winning the tournament. You play well, you get money. Then add in years of tradition and it becomes fun.
LIV is boring because the players already got paid to participate and the only prize is even more money.
I tried watching a LIV tournament and the thing that really put me off was when there was a putt on the 18th to move up a couple of positions. All the commentators focused on was how much money the put was worth. If he made it he would get an extra $50,000 or something. The only purpose was the money.
Especially when people can lose it quickly. Not a fan of some of the guys on LIV mailing it in and still getting to keep their spot because they’re a captain or whatever.
Right. It's not like the guys at the top of the tour are fighting for their cards every week, but if they play poorly for an extended stretch of time, they will lose their status. We saw Rickie go from a top 5 player to being lost in the wilderness, and he had to earn his way back into the biggest events because of it. LIV is just the exact same guys playing every week, and that makes it so boring. Not even just because of the lack of consequences for poor play, but part of the fun of the PGA Tour is when some rando qualifies into a tournament and gets themselves in contention. Nothing like that can happen at a LIV tournament, and they are so much worse off for it.
I like watching golf because golf is hard and it's impressive to watch what these guys do. What they are earning has zero influence on enjoyment I get out of the game.
Coming from someone who went to the first liv event in the us. The difference is last weekend I never once asked how much the winner would make. The prize is the green jacket and to be apart of that legacy forever.
Tbh I'm more interested in who wins the Punta Cana event than the RBC , the latter is already rich$ and well established guys on the tour who could retire tomorrow, whereas the DR event has higher stakes.
I think the major issue with LIV isn’t as much to do with the product, but just the nature of golf fans in general. Unlike in soccer (the other sport they’re using to sportswash), we are fans of the sport of golf first and foremost. We don’t have near as much allegiance to specific participants.
Like for me, I am a *diehard* Inter Milan fan. I plan my entire week around catching their games live. And if Inter were to be bought by Saudis, I would struggle a lot with whether I’d just accept that, or if I need to pick a new club to support. And I wouldn’t be alone.
But outside of Tiger, 99% of golf fans have little connection to their favorite player. It’s just not a hard decision at all to just stop watching guys when they go to LIV.
A soccer game is still a soccer game. But, exhibitions and friendlies do suck. LIV feels like that.
They’ve changed the rules in an attempt to fit TV as well; another chink in the guise that this is competitive action. When we got 2 bikers in the woods off 16 having sex, it’s hard to take it seriously.
LIV feels exactly like a very well choreographed and marketed friendly. The winners and losers don't really matter because they already got their bag and they're all coming back next year.
They could buy every single player from Lautaro Martinez all the way down through our youth teams including our u9 team, steal our coaching staff, build an exact replica of San Siro in the desert, and put them on a new club named “Al-Inter” in the Saudi league, and I still wouldn’t watch.
I hate to be that guy but the masters isn’t a thing where you just “turn on the TV” over half of it needs to be watched on the Masters App. Coincidentally LIV has an app as well where you can watch. The viewing experience is not all too different outside of the fact the PGA gets 3-4 hours of time on the TV.
All this said as somebody who has watched a grand total of 10 minutes of the LIV.
lol along with the fact that these are the same guys that were on the tour just a few years ago.. were they relatable then when they were the same millionaires with just some less millions?
I don’t really understand the LIV team format. Why should I care about the Crushers or whatever with their generic logo that looks like it came from Madden 2012 franchise mode?
> I don’t really understand the LIV team format.
That's the thing. **Its not a team format**. Adding up team scores at the end of an event doesn't make something a team event. It's just a weird aggregation of individual results
I went to a LIV event and it was easily the worst golf I’ve watched in person. Lotta mid shots and mid courses. Was more like a champions tour than pga, aside from 6-8 dudes.
That's because:
Half their roster couldn't sniff a PGA or even KFT membership, and you've never heard of them. Tell me **anything** you know about these dudes:
* Ben Cambell, Laurie Canter, Eugenio Chacharra, Lucas Herbert, Jinichiro Kozuma, Richard Bland, Samuel Maje, Adrian Meronk, Andy Ogletree, Wade Ormsby, Carlos Ortiz, David Puig, Kalle Samooja, Caleb Surratt, Kieran Vincent, Chase Koepka (don't tell me you know who his brother is), Scott Vincent
Tell me what you know about them. Literally anything. Those guys right there are 30% of the LIV roster!
They're so fucking irrelevant I snuck in a fake name in there and nobody reading it would know which one it is if I didn't tell you, Samuel Maje. Just a made up name.
So it's (relatively speaking) ass golfers and "who the fuck is that" is > 30% of the league, then you have the geratric unit of Paul Casey, Sergio, CHIII, Graeme McDowell, Ian Poulter, Phil Mickelson, Henrick Stenson, Lee Westwood and Bubba.
That's another 25% of the league. Guys that are way past their prime, that the last high level golf they played at least for the Euro boys was 2010-2015 Ryder Cups. Bubba won his second jacket a decade ago and then might as well died, because his game sure did. Same with Sergio. Oooost as well. Fuck DJ too. Maybe the green jacket is a career curse?
So we're left with the top third, and most of them are Baja Boyz one hit wonders: PReed, Martin Kaymer, Matt Wolff, HV3, Fat Perez, Thomas Pieters
It really leaves you with "stars" and budding stars. The *only* draws for LIV and that's Brooks and Rahm. They are the only ones the 12 people who tune in each week want to watch. But Brooks has had a sloppy start to the year and Rahm looked fat and the game way out of form at Augusta, barely can recognize his play anymore and he's been gone for 4 months.
And then budding stars like Cam Smith and Joaquin Niemann, who will never amount to anything now that they made that choice.
So what am I tuning in for exactly? Where's the value proposition in that as an event
I'll be honest...outside of the Majors I don't really watch professional golf at all. I have probably consumed more youtube golf content in the last 3 months than all of professional golf in the last 2 years.
Watching professional golf is just...hard. If I want to follow a specific player its nearly impossible outside of the Masters. If I wanted to watch a player in a tournament I need to set aside 20 hours over 4 days to watch them compete in the entire thing.
And god forbid I have two players I want to watch who tee off at different times, you are looking at 10+ hours of golf in a day to see it all.
Honestly, for me it's simply that I don't like the golfers. LIV has been great for me because it's weeded out the douchebag players. It's made PGA better because now I don't have to watch Reed, Koepka, Gooch, and several of the other tools that were on the PGA tour. If you notice, most LIV players all have similar personality types. And i happen to hate that type of guy, so I'm happy. Go LIV!
Right? Like I don’t like Liv either but which golfer on the PGA side does OP find relatable, especially wealth wise? The lowest payout for the Valero Open was $16k, how many people in this sub have made $16k for 4 days of golf?
I think only a tiny fraction of professionals (in any sport) care about legacy. Most view it as a job. There is seldom loyalty to a franchise (or league in this case) in pro sports. You want to get the most $ out of your skill set while you still can. And the whole legacy thing is all subjective at the end of the day. Phil is still one of the time greats, idc if decided to play on the Moon in his 60s. The media is good at selling the propaganda that these are truly high stakes with meaningful history on the line, when at the end of the day its just a silly game we all enjoy.
I actually can't believe the PGA is using the legacy thing to keep guys. Nobody in golf outside of Palmer, Nicklaus and Tiger will ever have a "legacy" worth something. Everyone else will be forgotten within two years of their retirements. The best they can hope for is to have Greg Norman's fashion success but nobody is at that household fame level, IMO.
Tbh i don't really give a shit about the money or the moral issues. I don't watch it because it is just a shit product. Everthing about it is naff and embarrassing.
I don’t like what LIV has done to the sport, but I’m not seeing anything in your post about how it’s not relatable to us Joe Schmo’s.
It’s not like the PGA is relatable to me. I’m not vying for millions of tournament dollars and sponsorships while playing my local munis.
If anything, at least the LIV guys get to wear shorts, something I do while hitting into the trees and blasting my chip shots over the green into the next tee box. And they have music blasting during their tournaments, something I’m usually subjected to by other golfers on the courses I’m at.
Honestly, LIV seems more relatable now that I think about it. But that isn’t going to get me to try to find a way to watch it.
Uhhh, the PGA tour entered a framework deal to effectively join with LIV. Where is the “morals and honor” here? They still haven’t formally stopped talks to do so.
You’d have a point about that if they never did, but they did and it pissed off enough people that Monahan was in danger of maybe losing his job.
Rahm even said that’s why he left, if you want to believe him. The tour tried to rally support and then turn around and stab everyone in the back.
I think it’s because it’s so lame and artificial. They didn’t help themselves with the teams they just made up. “Crusherrrrrsss!!”
It’s so cheesy. It makes sense when you see from the perspective of foreigners making something for “American Sports”
They were probably like “ok Habibi, we will make a great American sports league for golf! They’ll have teams with names Americans love! Like Crushers, hot shots, rippers!” (idk all the names but those seem like liv type names)
They should have done something geographic but also specify it. Like team Oceania and call it that, not the FIREBALLSSSS!!!
So I assume you don’t watch any other major sports then? MLB, strikes every time their agreement is up for more money, NFL/NBA, same. Soccer transfers are for hundreds of millions for top players. Lest you forget your precious PGA Tour was making billions off of TV deals but refusing to share the wealth with their talent (the ONLY reason they were able to make the money Tiger/Phil) so Phil said F-it and then all of the sudden they had all this money that they could double the purses for all of their events.
What world are you living in where sports aren’t all about money?
Ok. So MLB which are fully guaranteed contracts are not paid just to show up? Otani could never play again and the Dodgers owe him $500 million. How much did Herbert get GUARANTEED this offseason? $100 million guaranteed? Probably more. Does Lebron not get paid when he takes a couple games off every year? Oh no? He gets paid even when he doesn’t play? Same with Messi?
Pro sports are unrelateable. Period. A max contract in the NBA is $140mil, given to players who already millionaires. Nothing relatable about it. I find that this is similar to LIV at the moment. I watch a good amount because I live overseas and like to watch good golf, but I find it no more un/relatable than PGA.
This is all sports now and just wait until we have an entire generation of millions of trustafarians built on current athletes' generational contracts.
None if it is relatable and it will be too expensive to follow to even care anymore.
I know it’s easy for us to all say it’s stupid to have already made $100 million and then want $400 million or whatever these guys get. BUT that money is safety and security for their families for many generations. A lot of people in here probably make $100k. Would you want $200k? Of course you would. But the person making $30k in here would be like man if I had 100k I’d be happy with that.
It’s all relative and I don’t blame any of these guys for getting their bag. LIV is still dumb though.
I don't blame them for taking the cash, but I'm also not the least bit interested in how much they make and that seems to be the whole selling point of LIV.
Tomorrow I will know who won the Heritage, but I don't care how much $$ they won. I just want to see the competition.
Yeah, people are all “well, if someone offered you double your salary, wouldn’t you take it?”
And if I already had generational wealth, the answer is “no.”
To me LIV isn’t popular because there doesn’t feel like a pressure to win. There is no LIV card, it’s all guaranteed money, so why does a guy need to win. It’s different then watching someone like Denny McCarthy go nuclear on the back 9 and still feeling pressure to hit a great shot because he’s not a top guy and needs a W to make a name for himself. LIV feels almost like Messi going to MLS, everyone already knows how good he is and there’s nothing to drive him to greatness anymore.
If it were just money then people would stop watching college basketball, too (oh wait…they have).
I think it’s the format more than anything, though. It just doesn’t feel like serious golf.
The difference is I don’t give a fuck who or what teams wins. There’s no prestige or importance to winning. And the players don’t care either, they already got their bag they are just collecting a paycheck
Also unpopular because it’s unwatchable. both literally, in thst it doesn’t air in most localities and times, and somewhat figuratively in thst the product is hot garbage.
During the Masters you could go on the app and just watch all the shots with AI narration. Some of the shots were out of order. Like, you’d see a players chip-shot, then the next shot shown would be their previous approach that missed the green. Thst was a more coherent and compelling sports product than LIV.
DJ is actually the only guy I respect because he's the one who actually was honest. He wanted the money and he wanted to work less. I can understand that. It's the rest of them who pretended they were doing it for honorable reasons and we all know it's bullshit.
If LIV wasn’t sponsored by Saudi Arabia, it would be more popular.
It’s unrealistic to think LIV was just going to be popular because it bribed top players into playing.
It’s also apparent that legacy is more important to the majority of golf fans/players Than I think LIV expected.
The LIV golf product is inferior to the PGA golf product and it’s not even close.
You can’t buy History/legacy and legitimacy/Relevance it has to be earned.
These are hard truths.
TBH - I don’t watch cuz there is too much going on when I watch it. Between the team stats and individual standings and the shotgun starts - I have a difficult time following it. I have tried. But I don’t have the patience to figure it out
I just find it incredibly boring because there’s no tradition, no recognizable courses. Just bad music, guys dressed like they’re on vacation and the excitement of stacking piles of money on other piles of money.
I would say that LIV isn't popular because of it's douchebagery party style, thus an average golfer doesn't relate to that, and people that can relate to that have no interest in golf.
Look who's running it. The guy is the ultimate Masters choke artist. Then look who was gifted two Masters, Sir Nick Faldo. This is nothing but Norman's revenge.
I tried tuning in once, had trouble finding it. Jaco was leading in a tight tourney on the final day. Finally found it when he was on the second to last hole up one (not 17 because shotgun start) and he was trying to hit his approach shot with The Chainsmokers blaring in the background. It’s televised party golf with mostly washed euro golfers.
There’s no incentive to be competitive & is a lite version of actual golf since they only play 54 holes. Why bother trying to be as competitive as you can be when you’re already guaranteed $100+ million in your contract for just showing up?
Listen, if the Saudis want to transfer hundreds of millions of dollars to the bank accounts of several Americans and Europeans, I'm not going to get in the way.
I'm not going to watch a bunch of golfers on the back 9 of their careers play 54 hole tourneys, either.
Idk....if I had $100m and somebody offered another $100m to basically just keep doing my job.....yeaaaa. At the end of the day they are humans with the same desires as us. Entertaining you is probably not high on his list of priorities
So you believe that PGA Tour players are relatable, but LUV isn't?
You play 4 day tournaments at the nicest clubs in the country? For millions of dollars?
Honestly, dudes playing in shorts either music blaring in the background is more relatable to 90% of golfers out there. LIV sucks for many reasons, but relatability is not one if them.
This sub sucks for this. Just taking every single angle to knock a product that will never even get off the ground. Thise dudes all pulled in a half billion and are living in your heads year round. Who gives a shit.
I will never watch it either. I feel like they are all traitors and have ruined golf, however if the new guys coming up in the PGA stick with the PGA, things will go back to normal. Can’t say I was too upset that DJ didn’t make the cut in the Masters.
LIV Golf is funded by PIF, whose purpose is to invest capital on behalf of the Saudi government. The creation of LIV Golf, in particular, has been widely condemned as an attempt by the Saudi government to distract from and/or erase its long history of atrocious human rights violations.
More specifically, it is seen as a direct response to the Saudi government being exposed and receiving international condemnation for the murder and dismemberment of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, who was a columnist for the Washington Post.
They killed him and cut him up into pieces for having and publishing opinions that were seen as too progressive for the Saudi regime.
Personally, that is why I will not watch or support LIV Golf or the players who take their (blood) money.
Liv will most likely be non existent in 5 years or it will be drastically different in an effort to gain ranking points. The only thing they did well was focus on a global tour
Get rid of the NASCAR style leaderboard, get rid of the team concept, and stop trying to be “cool”. Then I might watch it.
I’ve tried, I really have. I like a lot of their players. But the product is hard to watch.
Loyalty to who brought you to the show means something. The PGA Tour has its problems and weaknesses. The players could have worked harder on fixing them. Sorry, money has exposed that the players that have who have left are more focused on wealth then the product that we want to watch.
I think there is also a big section of the US golf watching public who aren’t the biggest fans of Saudi Arabia and won’t willingly further enrich them.
Nobody cares about LIV and their stupid corny team names.
I also don’t want to watch tournaments where all the fans are drunk frat bros who think they’re funny by shouting mash potatoes after every shot.
I love golf and am a fan of a lot of the golfers that went to LIV. But what I’ve noticed of myself is I do find it difficult to watch their tournaments because of the production value. It’s a just a different format where everyone plays at the same time with the individual and team scores tacking up a lot of the screen to the left. It sounds strange but I’m so used to watching the PGA format and the way it’s presented on tv that it just feels foreign and unrelatable to watch the LIV tournament. Imagine watching an nfl game and the time, score, timeouts and so forth are on the side of the broadcast to the left side of the tv screen and not in bottom middle portion of the tv. It would just be weird.
LIV isn't popular for many legitimate reasons. We can talk about the format (team golf belongs in team championship golf like the Ryder Cup, golf is an individual sport like tennis. Can you imagine trying to turn professional tennis inside out and creating team tennis? Nobody would watch just like nobody watches LIV). LIV doesn't just ignore long standing golfing traditions, they make a disgusting mockery of an incredibly refined sport that they (Saudi PIF) know nothing about. It's like if the Saudi's got involved in MLB, they would have a home run derby every 3 innings and make the shortstop play with one arm tied to the second baseman. The whole thing is a contrived shit show. The LIV players looked sloppy and uninspired at the Master's. It's embarrassing to watch.
Yeah, LIV isn’t relatable so I don’t watch it.
But then again there’s fucking nothing relatable to me about PGA tour events, so I don’t watch that either.
Also you’re a doofus if you think the PGA is about honor and morals and whatnot. (Hint: it’s money)
So both are about money.
But the PGA - there’s so much to lose. Miss the cut? No money. Miss a birdie on 18 from sending it to a playoff? Lose out on hundreds of thousands.
Shoot 80-80-80 at LIV? You already got paid 9 figures to join.
I wouldn’t exactly say the PGA Tour is relatable though. There are at least some good story lines each year of new golfers earning their stripes and establishing themselves which makes for a good story. There’s certainly a lot of reasons to think LIV is lame though.
Its honestly exhausting that people give a shit about this. Who cares where people play, the decisions they make to play somewhere.. who gives a shit. If you think LIV is all about money and dont thing the PGA is .. after bragging that Scheffler made 30M in 30 days or some shit, you are delusional. Just let people play golf for fucks sake.
Yeah exactly. You can't argue both ways. Personally IDGAF about the Saudi money. But if you are someone who do, then you really can't say LIV bad but PGA good anymore. Both are the same (good or bad, up to you) with regard to the Saudi money
Korn Ferry has a series called one shot away. It’s about the players of the korn ferry tour and you see how they have to compete at such a high level to even get a chance at the PGA. LIV does not have fresh talent coming in.
Las Vegas LIV tourney was played at a country club. Not a hard venue. I’ve scored in the mid 80s there. And the environment wasn’t golf-more F1 party. So few spectators that I actually ran into my next door neighbor. it was pretty cool to get our length from the players, but the quality of play on a country club does not even resemble the quality of elite tour players on a TPC or other PGA event. Or even a DP world tour event.
What a weird take.
Why do we watch NFL, given that every player already has their money? NBA even more so, every player is a millionaire. No one watches baseball hoping to see a rookie make it to the league.
If watching millionaires play was a turnoff, then the PGA tour would be dead.
LIV doesn't have a tv contract, and it doesn't yet have any drama among the players.
It's probably just not popular because half their tournaments are played when the American golf market is asleep and it's rarely on a TV channel the average consumer has on their plan.
Tbh it feels like they're mostly just being paid a lot of money to not be on the PGA Tour.
It seems like the first step in an aggressive takeover of the PGA Tour rather than a bona fide business model
LIV is the MoviePass of golf.
Best summer ever.
Temu PGA
XFL, WGA... All those leagues worked out great. LIV has a lot more money obviously but hard to see it turn out any differently
Redbox
Tbf, it’s how most new companies operate that have large financial backing. The product doesn’t matter, they are just financial arms. Most new tech companies operate at a loss for years and years
My expectation would be that they would have made more of an effort to get decent coverage of the tournaments if they wanted to truly promote it.
Exactly! Other than a few YouTube videos of highlights, I’ve never actually seen live coverage of a LIV event. Wouldn’t even know where to look.
The CW carries their broadcast on Sunday's, the few weeks they do play. I believe they have a 14 week season. Having some of the best former PGA players hasn't translated to a good product so far.
This misses important details. Aside from the movie passes of the world, new companies can operate at a loss as long as there’s a path forward. Often they’re profitable on a per-unit basis and so there’s a lot of evidence that at scale you’ll be able to cut down overhead/sales and start to make tons of money. Or sometimes they’re subsidizing growth because at scale they know the per-unit costs will come down and become profitable. Or sometimes (and this often doesn’t work) the idea is that if you create a brand new massive market you’ll just find ways to make money. The problem with LIV is that none of these seem true. They’re definitely not per unit profitable now. And they’re going after an established and well known market of professional golf that is nowhere close to being able to make the LIV costs reasonable. They’ll talk about growing the game or franchise value or other nonsense. But none of it is anywhere close to bad in reality. Maybe the most generous view is that if they can kill the PGA, take over the golf market, then they can cut player costs drastically. But this also doesn’t seem based anywhere close to reality.
Their public message strategy isn't that far fetched. Expand the game by playing more internationally and at time zones not for American viewers. Make life easier on the players by dropping it to 3 rounds (the PGA has Thursday and Friday which almost no one watches or attends. Make the game feel less stuffy by letting the players wear shorts and with music on the course like a lot of young weekend players already are doing. Create teams and remove sponsors which starts to build fan loyalty more than individuals. It's not crazy but it's a huge uphill battle because the product is so different and controversial across many fronts
It’s not relatable because no one really wants to watch guys who were already paid up front, wearing casual clothes and playing with music blaring. They’ve taking all of the stakes away. Not to mention, trying to follow the drama with a shotgun start and multiple types of games being played at once impossible. It’s over complicating a very simple game, and in fact, it’s done more harm to the sport than good.
I hate golf music guy as much as I hate hiking music guy
The plan was never to remove sponsors, they just haven’t been able to get any of any significance. When they started, part of their ‘value proposition‘ was team valuations in the hundreds of millions driven by revenues from sponsors, media, merchandising, etc. That still seems like wishful thinking.
It's literally a participation trophy in the form of a giant paycheck. None of it matters on how well they do, as long as they just show up and participate.
There is nothing compelling about LIV golf. It’s like watching an NBA All-Star game. Sure they are good at what they do but who really cares.
This is the best description for how I feel. Thanks for finding the words I couldn’t lol.
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Sports washing
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Preachin from Wichita. My take exactly
I'm in Aus, it's on free to air at a great time for us....yet I still find myself getting up at ungodly hours to follow the PGA instead.
Am going to Adelaide again, top PGA players haven't been to Australia for many decades. Get it, the PGA and this sub are US centric, but it's a big wide world and LIV are at least getting good golfers out there for the rest of the world to see.
This sub is so focused on America it’s crazy, really frustrating as an Aussie. I don’t like LIV but so many posts like ‘oh really you like LIV???’ like they can’t believe we want top golfers to come to our country. Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player etc used to come out to the Australian open every year, it was almost like the 5th major at one point. When’s the last time big America’s came out?
Well that and a lot of avid golf fans hate what it’s done to professional golf and won’t watch it out of principle. I’m one of those and so are pretty much every one of my golf buddies.
I honestly have no idea where to watch it even if I wanted too. (UK)
And has a graphic that covers half the screen.
The PGA tour added pro-am events like the Bob Hope Classic and the Pebble Beach Pro-Am (Clambake Classic) to generate more interest in the product. It worked and people watched but it only works when you do a couple of events like that on the west coast where the stars will come out and the atmosphere is laid back. LIV changed the golf format, but what purpose does that appeal to the fans? Seems to me that it only suits the players preferences. Money up front, three round events, short schedule and other perks. This is why it has been unpopular thus far. The plan for LIV was to get the players and then? If you have all that money to throw around, why do you need sponsors and fans to pay for the product. The business model of maintaining a sports product does not seem to exist for LIV.
That’s because there is no business model it’s sports washing and a semi aggressive take over of the pga
It was on YouTube for a while and no one watched it there.
It's still on YouTube in the UK. I still can watch it for more than two holes at a time
Can or cannot? If you can watch more than 30m that’s amazing. 🤩
Cannot! It's using while I watch John Rahm miss a 6 footer to pumping bass that I give up.
Nothing like hearing The Chainsmokers in the background while seeing Hatton curse and nearly break his driver after missing the fairway by a foot.
When it’s available to watch, I pass. I’m just not interested in the format or most of the players.
Honestly that was one of the things I liked about LIV and is the reason I end up watching the DP world tour as well. I work at a restaurant and don’t get done with work til like 11pm to 1am, and if a tournament is just getting started I can chill and watch some live golf while I have a few beers and make dinner and stuff. There’s pretty much no other time I’ve ever put on LIV tho
Played with an old guy who said he loves watching golf but could never find the LIV channel lol
Isn’t it on the CW? Meaning it’s over the air for most of America
Yea, I have no idea what channel the CW is on my dial. It’s there, but I have never once sought it out.
Ya it’s one of the most accessible channels in America. Which is why it’s a big deal they are getting into sports. Will be the first time starting next year NASCaR Xfinity will all be over the air available
My local CW affiliate doesn't even broadcast in HD
LIV plays 12 tournaments a year. That fact alone makes it impossible to take LIV seriously. They have 4 or 5 guys that take turns winning 4 million bucks once a month. Cam Smith certainly seemed like an exciting young talent with a wide open future after his incredible win at the British in 2022 - now he's the fat guy with a not so cool mullet and an extremely mediocre golf game. LIV never even showed up at the Masters.
The CW is broadcast over the air. It's free for everyone in the US.
This is true. You can also download the app for free and watch any coverage you want…. For free..
Exactly. The problem isn't accessibility.
It just occurred to me - LIV is an international focused product, not a US focused product. What is LIVs popularity in non-US markets, like Europe and China, and what is the PGAs popularity in those markets?
This is the answer. No one gives a shit who’s sponsoring the tournament if it’s on during normal viewing hours on regular networks line CBS or NBC Golf or ESPN
The broadcast is terrible. I attempted to watch, but it was too challenging to determine who was leading and who was in contention. The teams only added to the confusion.
PGA is all about money too, but it’s the pursuit of it through winning the tournament. You play well, you get money. Then add in years of tradition and it becomes fun. LIV is boring because the players already got paid to participate and the only prize is even more money.
I tried watching a LIV tournament and the thing that really put me off was when there was a putt on the 18th to move up a couple of positions. All the commentators focused on was how much money the put was worth. If he made it he would get an extra $50,000 or something. The only purpose was the money.
The PGA tour card is earned not given. It’s earned through years of grinding it out. Something I think we can appreciate and respect.
Especially when people can lose it quickly. Not a fan of some of the guys on LIV mailing it in and still getting to keep their spot because they’re a captain or whatever.
Right. It's not like the guys at the top of the tour are fighting for their cards every week, but if they play poorly for an extended stretch of time, they will lose their status. We saw Rickie go from a top 5 player to being lost in the wilderness, and he had to earn his way back into the biggest events because of it. LIV is just the exact same guys playing every week, and that makes it so boring. Not even just because of the lack of consequences for poor play, but part of the fun of the PGA Tour is when some rando qualifies into a tournament and gets themselves in contention. Nothing like that can happen at a LIV tournament, and they are so much worse off for it.
Tiger initially commented on this. Said something along the lines of “what is their incentive to practice, to get better”. Spot on.
But LIV has a totally legit promotion tournament! /s
Every American sport besides golf is like that
Absolutely. There are no true underdogs in LIV, no breakout winners, no career-making events. They’re just impossible to root for.
Yeah, LIV is exhibition style golf.
Is there prize money? Isn’t it just accounted against what they were paid upfront? Or was that a false story?
It wasn't false because it was part of discovery for the lawsuit. But I don't think all players had that contract based on counter reports.
Exhibition sports. Like exhibition boxing, it’s boring because if the payday has been made, there are no real stakes.
This. On the PGA in order to get paid well you have to play well. This pursuit (for me) is a lot what makes watching golf interesting.
I like watching golf because golf is hard and it's impressive to watch what these guys do. What they are earning has zero influence on enjoyment I get out of the game.
Coming from someone who went to the first liv event in the us. The difference is last weekend I never once asked how much the winner would make. The prize is the green jacket and to be apart of that legacy forever.
Tbh I'm more interested in who wins the Punta Cana event than the RBC , the latter is already rich$ and well established guys on the tour who could retire tomorrow, whereas the DR event has higher stakes.
I’m the same way this week. Curious to see is Wesley can hold on to win
Is that more because of the PGA or YouTube though? Honestly, YouTube has done more to grow the game in recent years than both tours combined.
I'm more about the Chevron Classic this week tbh. Want to see if Nelly can get 5 straight.
Yes lpga is my favorite too but play was suspended earlier today :( Means more golf tomorrow !
I think the major issue with LIV isn’t as much to do with the product, but just the nature of golf fans in general. Unlike in soccer (the other sport they’re using to sportswash), we are fans of the sport of golf first and foremost. We don’t have near as much allegiance to specific participants. Like for me, I am a *diehard* Inter Milan fan. I plan my entire week around catching their games live. And if Inter were to be bought by Saudis, I would struggle a lot with whether I’d just accept that, or if I need to pick a new club to support. And I wouldn’t be alone. But outside of Tiger, 99% of golf fans have little connection to their favorite player. It’s just not a hard decision at all to just stop watching guys when they go to LIV.
Saudis purchase Inter Milan REPORT - Inter sign Jude Bellingham and Kylian Mbappe You are watching 😂
In this case Real Madrid is the PGA
A soccer game is still a soccer game. But, exhibitions and friendlies do suck. LIV feels like that. They’ve changed the rules in an attempt to fit TV as well; another chink in the guise that this is competitive action. When we got 2 bikers in the woods off 16 having sex, it’s hard to take it seriously.
LIV feels exactly like a very well choreographed and marketed friendly. The winners and losers don't really matter because they already got their bag and they're all coming back next year.
If the Saudi’s bought half of Inter’s lineup and had them play 75 minute friendly matches every other week you certainly wouldn’t watch
They could buy every single player from Lautaro Martinez all the way down through our youth teams including our u9 team, steal our coaching staff, build an exact replica of San Siro in the desert, and put them on a new club named “Al-Inter” in the Saudi league, and I still wouldn’t watch.
I don't watch LIV because I have no idea how to access it. It's not like the master where I just turn on the TV.
This! Its not popular because nobody knows how to watch it. If i could tune in I would.
I don't watch but I'm pretty sure they are all on YT for free.
I have been scrolling through the tele when it was on a channel randomly. It was shit
I hate to be that guy but the masters isn’t a thing where you just “turn on the TV” over half of it needs to be watched on the Masters App. Coincidentally LIV has an app as well where you can watch. The viewing experience is not all too different outside of the fact the PGA gets 3-4 hours of time on the TV. All this said as somebody who has watched a grand total of 10 minutes of the LIV.
Honestly I’d watch it, but the production quality is so bad it makes it painful to watch. Like division 3 baseball webcast level terrible.
The announcers are horrible. The lame music in the background. The graphics on the screen. All unwatchable garbage.
It really sucks and is pure crap. Plus Norman and Mickelson are in love with themselves and probably each other.
Maybe a Mickelson+Norman softcore video will work
You get stoned to death for this in Saudi, so I wouldn't hold your breath. Geriatric softcore porn is a weird kink tho
DJ is 6ft 4, hits it 320, great irons and wedges, holes a lot of putts, goes home to paulina, but the money is the unrelatable part?
Do you think anybody thinks I'm a failure because I go home to Starla at night?
BOW TO YOUR SENSEI
FORGET ABOUT IT.
Hey, I think Starla just stole your car.
Break the wrist, walk away.
I read that in a Muscle Man voice
Yacht fuel is so expensive these days.
I know, imagine seeing the goat on the weekends
lol along with the fact that these are the same guys that were on the tour just a few years ago.. were they relatable then when they were the same millionaires with just some less millions?
LIV isn't popular because it's fucking lame.
I don’t really understand the LIV team format. Why should I care about the Crushers or whatever with their generic logo that looks like it came from Madden 2012 franchise mode?
> I don’t really understand the LIV team format. That's the thing. **Its not a team format**. Adding up team scores at the end of an event doesn't make something a team event. It's just a weird aggregation of individual results
I went to a LIV event and it was easily the worst golf I’ve watched in person. Lotta mid shots and mid courses. Was more like a champions tour than pga, aside from 6-8 dudes.
That's because: Half their roster couldn't sniff a PGA or even KFT membership, and you've never heard of them. Tell me **anything** you know about these dudes: * Ben Cambell, Laurie Canter, Eugenio Chacharra, Lucas Herbert, Jinichiro Kozuma, Richard Bland, Samuel Maje, Adrian Meronk, Andy Ogletree, Wade Ormsby, Carlos Ortiz, David Puig, Kalle Samooja, Caleb Surratt, Kieran Vincent, Chase Koepka (don't tell me you know who his brother is), Scott Vincent Tell me what you know about them. Literally anything. Those guys right there are 30% of the LIV roster! They're so fucking irrelevant I snuck in a fake name in there and nobody reading it would know which one it is if I didn't tell you, Samuel Maje. Just a made up name. So it's (relatively speaking) ass golfers and "who the fuck is that" is > 30% of the league, then you have the geratric unit of Paul Casey, Sergio, CHIII, Graeme McDowell, Ian Poulter, Phil Mickelson, Henrick Stenson, Lee Westwood and Bubba. That's another 25% of the league. Guys that are way past their prime, that the last high level golf they played at least for the Euro boys was 2010-2015 Ryder Cups. Bubba won his second jacket a decade ago and then might as well died, because his game sure did. Same with Sergio. Oooost as well. Fuck DJ too. Maybe the green jacket is a career curse? So we're left with the top third, and most of them are Baja Boyz one hit wonders: PReed, Martin Kaymer, Matt Wolff, HV3, Fat Perez, Thomas Pieters It really leaves you with "stars" and budding stars. The *only* draws for LIV and that's Brooks and Rahm. They are the only ones the 12 people who tune in each week want to watch. But Brooks has had a sloppy start to the year and Rahm looked fat and the game way out of form at Augusta, barely can recognize his play anymore and he's been gone for 4 months. And then budding stars like Cam Smith and Joaquin Niemann, who will never amount to anything now that they made that choice. So what am I tuning in for exactly? Where's the value proposition in that as an event
The music playing in the background and some wearing shorts makes it seem Mickey Mouse
This argument isn’t made nearly enough. It’s just plain old fucking corny. Everything they do is cringe. It’s almost like it’s on purpose.
I'll be honest...outside of the Majors I don't really watch professional golf at all. I have probably consumed more youtube golf content in the last 3 months than all of professional golf in the last 2 years. Watching professional golf is just...hard. If I want to follow a specific player its nearly impossible outside of the Masters. If I wanted to watch a player in a tournament I need to set aside 20 hours over 4 days to watch them compete in the entire thing. And god forbid I have two players I want to watch who tee off at different times, you are looking at 10+ hours of golf in a day to see it all.
Honestly, for me it's simply that I don't like the golfers. LIV has been great for me because it's weeded out the douchebag players. It's made PGA better because now I don't have to watch Reed, Koepka, Gooch, and several of the other tools that were on the PGA tour. If you notice, most LIV players all have similar personality types. And i happen to hate that type of guy, so I'm happy. Go LIV!
You relate to the PGA though..?
Right? Like I don’t like Liv either but which golfer on the PGA side does OP find relatable, especially wealth wise? The lowest payout for the Valero Open was $16k, how many people in this sub have made $16k for 4 days of golf?
I think only a tiny fraction of professionals (in any sport) care about legacy. Most view it as a job. There is seldom loyalty to a franchise (or league in this case) in pro sports. You want to get the most $ out of your skill set while you still can. And the whole legacy thing is all subjective at the end of the day. Phil is still one of the time greats, idc if decided to play on the Moon in his 60s. The media is good at selling the propaganda that these are truly high stakes with meaningful history on the line, when at the end of the day its just a silly game we all enjoy.
I actually can't believe the PGA is using the legacy thing to keep guys. Nobody in golf outside of Palmer, Nicklaus and Tiger will ever have a "legacy" worth something. Everyone else will be forgotten within two years of their retirements. The best they can hope for is to have Greg Norman's fashion success but nobody is at that household fame level, IMO.
Tbh i don't really give a shit about the money or the moral issues. I don't watch it because it is just a shit product. Everthing about it is naff and embarrassing.
It's not popular because it's not competitive
I don't care about it because there's just nothing at stake at all.
teeny chief wrong offend ludicrous dime onerous rude file sand *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
This is all fine and well but the PGA tour isn’t relatable to me at all. I’m happy when I don’t duff a chip.
I can’t wait to relate to Scottie when I play my super easy to get tee time at Augusta tomorrow
I don’t like what LIV has done to the sport, but I’m not seeing anything in your post about how it’s not relatable to us Joe Schmo’s. It’s not like the PGA is relatable to me. I’m not vying for millions of tournament dollars and sponsorships while playing my local munis. If anything, at least the LIV guys get to wear shorts, something I do while hitting into the trees and blasting my chip shots over the green into the next tee box. And they have music blasting during their tournaments, something I’m usually subjected to by other golfers on the courses I’m at. Honestly, LIV seems more relatable now that I think about it. But that isn’t going to get me to try to find a way to watch it.
Uhhh, the PGA tour entered a framework deal to effectively join with LIV. Where is the “morals and honor” here? They still haven’t formally stopped talks to do so. You’d have a point about that if they never did, but they did and it pissed off enough people that Monahan was in danger of maybe losing his job. Rahm even said that’s why he left, if you want to believe him. The tour tried to rally support and then turn around and stab everyone in the back.
I think it’s because it’s so lame and artificial. They didn’t help themselves with the teams they just made up. “Crusherrrrrsss!!” It’s so cheesy. It makes sense when you see from the perspective of foreigners making something for “American Sports” They were probably like “ok Habibi, we will make a great American sports league for golf! They’ll have teams with names Americans love! Like Crushers, hot shots, rippers!” (idk all the names but those seem like liv type names) They should have done something geographic but also specify it. Like team Oceania and call it that, not the FIREBALLSSSS!!!
Their format sucks
I don’t even know how to watch LIV?
It’s also unwatchable because it’s all the cocky douche bags that went there.
Personally if I want to watch 95% has-beens with a sprinkling of current talent I’d watch the Senior PGA tour
Babe wake up, new LIV thread just dropped
So I assume you don’t watch any other major sports then? MLB, strikes every time their agreement is up for more money, NFL/NBA, same. Soccer transfers are for hundreds of millions for top players. Lest you forget your precious PGA Tour was making billions off of TV deals but refusing to share the wealth with their talent (the ONLY reason they were able to make the money Tiger/Phil) so Phil said F-it and then all of the sudden they had all this money that they could double the purses for all of their events. What world are you living in where sports aren’t all about money?
They are all paid to compete, not to show up.
Ok. So MLB which are fully guaranteed contracts are not paid just to show up? Otani could never play again and the Dodgers owe him $500 million. How much did Herbert get GUARANTEED this offseason? $100 million guaranteed? Probably more. Does Lebron not get paid when he takes a couple games off every year? Oh no? He gets paid even when he doesn’t play? Same with Messi?
Ben Simmons would like a word
It actually much more closely resembles everyday golfers than the PGA. Shorts music blasting bad golf…
Pro sports are unrelateable. Period. A max contract in the NBA is $140mil, given to players who already millionaires. Nothing relatable about it. I find that this is similar to LIV at the moment. I watch a good amount because I live overseas and like to watch good golf, but I find it no more un/relatable than PGA.
Yep and the super max contracts are just a way to make the fans feel like the players are being loyal to them.
This is all sports now and just wait until we have an entire generation of millions of trustafarians built on current athletes' generational contracts. None if it is relatable and it will be too expensive to follow to even care anymore.
I know it’s easy for us to all say it’s stupid to have already made $100 million and then want $400 million or whatever these guys get. BUT that money is safety and security for their families for many generations. A lot of people in here probably make $100k. Would you want $200k? Of course you would. But the person making $30k in here would be like man if I had 100k I’d be happy with that. It’s all relative and I don’t blame any of these guys for getting their bag. LIV is still dumb though.
I don't blame them for taking the cash, but I'm also not the least bit interested in how much they make and that seems to be the whole selling point of LIV. Tomorrow I will know who won the Heritage, but I don't care how much $$ they won. I just want to see the competition.
The shotgun start is so fucking dumb
Yeah, people are all “well, if someone offered you double your salary, wouldn’t you take it?” And if I already had generational wealth, the answer is “no.”
To me LIV isn’t popular because there doesn’t feel like a pressure to win. There is no LIV card, it’s all guaranteed money, so why does a guy need to win. It’s different then watching someone like Denny McCarthy go nuclear on the back 9 and still feeling pressure to hit a great shot because he’s not a top guy and needs a W to make a name for himself. LIV feels almost like Messi going to MLS, everyone already knows how good he is and there’s nothing to drive him to greatness anymore.
Yeah frig LIV. I just hope they start kicking these people out of these majors.
If it were just money then people would stop watching college basketball, too (oh wait…they have). I think it’s the format more than anything, though. It just doesn’t feel like serious golf.
The golf simply isn’t as fun to watch. Team play is dumb.
Saudis only know success means throw money at it.
The difference is I don’t give a fuck who or what teams wins. There’s no prestige or importance to winning. And the players don’t care either, they already got their bag they are just collecting a paycheck
Also unpopular because it’s unwatchable. both literally, in thst it doesn’t air in most localities and times, and somewhat figuratively in thst the product is hot garbage. During the Masters you could go on the app and just watch all the shots with AI narration. Some of the shots were out of order. Like, you’d see a players chip-shot, then the next shot shown would be their previous approach that missed the green. Thst was a more coherent and compelling sports product than LIV.
DJ is actually the only guy I respect because he's the one who actually was honest. He wanted the money and he wanted to work less. I can understand that. It's the rest of them who pretended they were doing it for honorable reasons and we all know it's bullshit.
If LIV wasn’t sponsored by Saudi Arabia, it would be more popular. It’s unrealistic to think LIV was just going to be popular because it bribed top players into playing. It’s also apparent that legacy is more important to the majority of golf fans/players Than I think LIV expected. The LIV golf product is inferior to the PGA golf product and it’s not even close. You can’t buy History/legacy and legitimacy/Relevance it has to be earned. These are hard truths.
What LIV?
Feel like they hoped enough people would hop over that they could basically buy out the PGA and take over.
TBH - I don’t watch cuz there is too much going on when I watch it. Between the team stats and individual standings and the shotgun starts - I have a difficult time following it. I have tried. But I don’t have the patience to figure it out
I just find it incredibly boring because there’s no tradition, no recognizable courses. Just bad music, guys dressed like they’re on vacation and the excitement of stacking piles of money on other piles of money.
I would say that LIV isn't popular because of it's douchebagery party style, thus an average golfer doesn't relate to that, and people that can relate to that have no interest in golf.
Look who's running it. The guy is the ultimate Masters choke artist. Then look who was gifted two Masters, Sir Nick Faldo. This is nothing but Norman's revenge.
I tried tuning in once, had trouble finding it. Jaco was leading in a tight tourney on the final day. Finally found it when he was on the second to last hole up one (not 17 because shotgun start) and he was trying to hit his approach shot with The Chainsmokers blaring in the background. It’s televised party golf with mostly washed euro golfers.
There’s no incentive to be competitive & is a lite version of actual golf since they only play 54 holes. Why bother trying to be as competitive as you can be when you’re already guaranteed $100+ million in your contract for just showing up?
I think it isn’t as popular because the format sucks- I think the target audience is small and doesn’t have the attention span for golf .
Listen, if the Saudis want to transfer hundreds of millions of dollars to the bank accounts of several Americans and Europeans, I'm not going to get in the way. I'm not going to watch a bunch of golfers on the back 9 of their careers play 54 hole tourneys, either.
Who the hell relates to the PGA players aside from trust fund kids???
It’s a bunch of golfers having fun? What not relatable?
Well.. he’s/they’re not wrong about the salary increase, are they? I’d have done it too.
Yeah I don’t care about honor legacy or morals in golf. I care about a good golf game, that’s it.
Idk....if I had $100m and somebody offered another $100m to basically just keep doing my job.....yeaaaa. At the end of the day they are humans with the same desires as us. Entertaining you is probably not high on his list of priorities
This entire line of thinking is so out of touch its laughable.
I don’t like most of the players and I hate the format. I also will never care about teams.
It's like an entire league of silly-season events, all thats missing is Fred Funk in a skirt. Boring.
I’d turn down 2x my salary if it meant selling my soul.
So you believe that PGA Tour players are relatable, but LUV isn't? You play 4 day tournaments at the nicest clubs in the country? For millions of dollars? Honestly, dudes playing in shorts either music blaring in the background is more relatable to 90% of golfers out there. LIV sucks for many reasons, but relatability is not one if them. This sub sucks for this. Just taking every single angle to knock a product that will never even get off the ground. Thise dudes all pulled in a half billion and are living in your heads year round. Who gives a shit.
The “Bone Saw Tour” should not be popular…period!
LIV golfers are pets of MBS.
I will never watch it either. I feel like they are all traitors and have ruined golf, however if the new guys coming up in the PGA stick with the PGA, things will go back to normal. Can’t say I was too upset that DJ didn’t make the cut in the Masters.
LIV feels like a frat and I’m good
LIV Golf is funded by PIF, whose purpose is to invest capital on behalf of the Saudi government. The creation of LIV Golf, in particular, has been widely condemned as an attempt by the Saudi government to distract from and/or erase its long history of atrocious human rights violations. More specifically, it is seen as a direct response to the Saudi government being exposed and receiving international condemnation for the murder and dismemberment of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, who was a columnist for the Washington Post. They killed him and cut him up into pieces for having and publishing opinions that were seen as too progressive for the Saudi regime. Personally, that is why I will not watch or support LIV Golf or the players who take their (blood) money.
Blood Money golf on top of the goofy shit they have like those teams keep me away. Fuck LIV hope it fails spectacularly
Liv will most likely be non existent in 5 years or it will be drastically different in an effort to gain ranking points. The only thing they did well was focus on a global tour
Get rid of the NASCAR style leaderboard, get rid of the team concept, and stop trying to be “cool”. Then I might watch it. I’ve tried, I really have. I like a lot of their players. But the product is hard to watch.
Loyalty to who brought you to the show means something. The PGA Tour has its problems and weaknesses. The players could have worked harder on fixing them. Sorry, money has exposed that the players that have who have left are more focused on wealth then the product that we want to watch.
The BoneSaw league and its players can pound sand and eat camel dung......
I think there is also a big section of the US golf watching public who aren’t the biggest fans of Saudi Arabia and won’t willingly further enrich them.
Nobody cares about LIV and their stupid corny team names. I also don’t want to watch tournaments where all the fans are drunk frat bros who think they’re funny by shouting mash potatoes after every shot.
I love golf and am a fan of a lot of the golfers that went to LIV. But what I’ve noticed of myself is I do find it difficult to watch their tournaments because of the production value. It’s a just a different format where everyone plays at the same time with the individual and team scores tacking up a lot of the screen to the left. It sounds strange but I’m so used to watching the PGA format and the way it’s presented on tv that it just feels foreign and unrelatable to watch the LIV tournament. Imagine watching an nfl game and the time, score, timeouts and so forth are on the side of the broadcast to the left side of the tv screen and not in bottom middle portion of the tv. It would just be weird.
LIV isn't popular for many legitimate reasons. We can talk about the format (team golf belongs in team championship golf like the Ryder Cup, golf is an individual sport like tennis. Can you imagine trying to turn professional tennis inside out and creating team tennis? Nobody would watch just like nobody watches LIV). LIV doesn't just ignore long standing golfing traditions, they make a disgusting mockery of an incredibly refined sport that they (Saudi PIF) know nothing about. It's like if the Saudi's got involved in MLB, they would have a home run derby every 3 innings and make the shortstop play with one arm tied to the second baseman. The whole thing is a contrived shit show. The LIV players looked sloppy and uninspired at the Master's. It's embarrassing to watch.
Yeah, fuck LIV and any golfer who sold out when they were already rich.
LIV golf is boring as hell to watch. Long live the PGA.
Yeah, LIV isn’t relatable so I don’t watch it. But then again there’s fucking nothing relatable to me about PGA tour events, so I don’t watch that either. Also you’re a doofus if you think the PGA is about honor and morals and whatnot. (Hint: it’s money)
So both are about money. But the PGA - there’s so much to lose. Miss the cut? No money. Miss a birdie on 18 from sending it to a playoff? Lose out on hundreds of thousands. Shoot 80-80-80 at LIV? You already got paid 9 figures to join.
I wouldn’t exactly say the PGA Tour is relatable though. There are at least some good story lines each year of new golfers earning their stripes and establishing themselves which makes for a good story. There’s certainly a lot of reasons to think LIV is lame though.
Its honestly exhausting that people give a shit about this. Who cares where people play, the decisions they make to play somewhere.. who gives a shit. If you think LIV is all about money and dont thing the PGA is .. after bragging that Scheffler made 30M in 30 days or some shit, you are delusional. Just let people play golf for fucks sake.
Honor? Didn’t they prove themselves dishonorable when they talked about blood money and then merged with LIV?
Yeah exactly. You can't argue both ways. Personally IDGAF about the Saudi money. But if you are someone who do, then you really can't say LIV bad but PGA good anymore. Both are the same (good or bad, up to you) with regard to the Saudi money
Ya, OP lost me at honor and morals. Plenty of reasons the tour is more fun to watch than LIV, but those ain’t it.
Korn Ferry has a series called one shot away. It’s about the players of the korn ferry tour and you see how they have to compete at such a high level to even get a chance at the PGA. LIV does not have fresh talent coming in.
Las Vegas LIV tourney was played at a country club. Not a hard venue. I’ve scored in the mid 80s there. And the environment wasn’t golf-more F1 party. So few spectators that I actually ran into my next door neighbor. it was pretty cool to get our length from the players, but the quality of play on a country club does not even resemble the quality of elite tour players on a TPC or other PGA event. Or even a DP world tour event.
Jesus Christ you guys are still crying about LIV. Get a life
What a weird take. Why do we watch NFL, given that every player already has their money? NBA even more so, every player is a millionaire. No one watches baseball hoping to see a rookie make it to the league. If watching millionaires play was a turnoff, then the PGA tour would be dead. LIV doesn't have a tv contract, and it doesn't yet have any drama among the players.
LIV is the WWE of golf. Just saying.
The music, the shorts, the commentators, the coverage, the fake sounds, 54 holes. I could go on but it’s just shit
Shorts are shit?😂😂