The Card – Volume XIX
18 thoughts, observations and predictions…
- The next player to leave for LIV should get an extra 10 million in the bonus if he says “I’m looking to shrink the game.” Enough of the lame “grow the game” talking point. Its professional sports, you took the best offer. Its OK.
- Beyond Tiger and Rory, who are non-starters to leave for LIV, Jon Rahm is the most valuable piece on the chess board. Global, provocative, insistent on always being in the hunt and will likely be on the doorstep of a career grand slam in the next couple years. He’s a massive loss for the PGA Tour.
- One of the most valuable traits of a star in any sport for the league they represent is reliability. Stars are generally not injury prone. Stars show up every night and are never described as inconsistent and stars deliver beyond the physical performance. Accepting the responsibility of being a leading voice and taking positions on issues. Rahm was all that and his absence from all facets of tour life is a profound VOID.
- This is not virtue signaling in saying Rahm went for the money. It’s just the facts. It always starts with the money, but he was nudged toward the money by other real factors. One, believing he will have access back to tour events soon enough, the clumsy and turbulent leadership of the tour, his relationships with Phil and Sergio, a sense of feeling like he wasn’t as valuable as Rory, but it starts and ends with the money. Like it does with most everything.
- The exodus of players to LIV will continue as early as this week and what will also continue is a louder and louder drumbeat from the PGA Tour membership to remove Jay Monahan. The grumbling privately from tour players about new leadership is going to get very public with each passing day and with each and every departure of another top player.
- The flirtation with a handful of American based private equity groups has not pleased the PIF (Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia) and the Rahm signing was an emphatic message of dissatisfaction with the ongoing process of resolving the framework agreement.
- The number of reporters, pundits, hosts and players, who have periodically declared the demise of LIV, including Rory McIlroy, need to understand that those with the most are the ones who last the longest. A billion-dollar investment from any of the PE groups bidding is chump change for the PIF. They are in control of what happens next.
- Rory McIlroy has popped up on twitter this past week to comment on the rollback and to take a Saturday night swipe at Henrik Stenson. Responding to a snarky post from a self-described performance coach and Titleist ambassador, Lou Stagner, Rory displayed the petulant streak that he’s flashed on rare occasions. Showing support for Luke Donald is fantastic but simultaneously dump-trucking Stenson was beneath Rory. When you punch down you usually land the punch but never score with the judges.
- The only person we didn’t hear from after the Rahm departure was the commissioner of the PGA Tour. Tiger Woods social post on behalf of the player board expressing solidarity makes it clear who is in charge.
- Does LIV sell the old school fake leather sleeve letterman jacket being modeled by Jon Rahm on Fox News? If they don’t it’s a BIG miss.
- The LIV hot stove was scolding this past week. Lost in the Rahm news was the trading of Matt Wolff straight up for Taylor Gooch. Who is Smash’s GM, Howie Roseman?
- The USGA/R&A universal rollback announcement was met with equal parts pragmatism, hysteria, misinformation, and sensibility. Many of the same people who said this will ruin the game and drive millions away from it said out of the other side of their mouths that the changes are so small why do it in the first place. Which is it?
- Comparing sports is a dicey proposition but one thing that all sports must try to do is protect themselves from themselves. Rules changes in sports can be made for entertainment, safety, monetary and sustainability purposes. Governance is not a frivolous exercise, and this is about 2060 as much as it is about 2030.
- Played Old Town in Winston Salem, North Carolina again this past week. The routing by Perry Maxwell and the restoration of the original intent by Coore/Crenshaw make it one of the finest courses in America. The tilt of the land and the stream system is so, so good.
- The No Laying Up conversation between Chris Solomon and Lee Trevino is what the platform of podcasts can be. Free flowing story telling where the listener gets lost in the conversation. Outstanding content as the kids like to say.
- Wells Fargo didn’t decide to not renew their sponsorship with the PGA Tour because Jon Rahm left. This was the culmination of a long evaluation conducted by Wells Fargo that determined that the investment couldn’t produce the necessary return. They won’t be the last title sponsor to make that determination. The house of the PGA Tour is not in order.
- Kieran Vincent, Kalle Samooja, and Jinichiro Kozuma qualified onto the LIV tour through their qualifier in Abu Dhabi this past weekend. Combined they’ve earned less than $5 million dollars on the Asian Tour, DP World Tour and Japan Tour respectively. They are now playing for somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 to $25 million for every event. As Robert De Niro said at the end of “Midnight Run”, “That’s a very respectable neighborhood.
- The animated renderings of the new 21 golf club being built outside Aiken, South Carolina signal several things. The greater Aiken area is officially on fire with next level golf. King/Collins are as provocative as any designers in the marketplace, and finally, 18 holes is simply not enough anymore for the private retreat offering. Whiskey routes, 2nd courses, short courses, putting courses, and hunting and fishing are all on the table for new developers.
