The billion-dollar tour, accused of being a smear operation for Saudi Arabia, offered Tiger Woods a $700 million reward and is scrapping the traditional structures of top golf.
700 million A dollar is so much money that it makes even winning the lottery sound like pocket change.
There are hardly many people in the world who would refuse such an amount.
However, one is known. He’s a golf star Tiger Woodswho was one of the most famous athletes in the world twenty years ago during the most glorious times of his career.
Woods, 46, may still be in that position, although he is now the elder statesman of a sport that is rarely competitive, weighed down by back and knee problems and a dangerous car accident a year and a half ago.
That 700 million was roughly the amount with which the new LIV tour, officially called the LIV Golf Invitational Series, financed by Saudi Arabia, lured Woods into their ranks. However, Woods, who earned more than a billion dollars in sponsorship income and prize money in his career, rejected LIV’s offer.
LIV Tour COO, Australian who was one of the star players of the pre-Woods era Greg Norman has confirmed this information according to several media sources.
Read more: Tiger Woods turned down more than $700 million because he didn’t want to go on a Saudi-funded tour
After his refusal, Woods has strongly supported the world’s highest professional tour, the PGA Tour, with which he has mainly earned his success and millions.
Woods’ support has been of paramount importance to the PGA Tour, from whose perspective the LIV Tour has become something of a market disruptor.
Of course the LIV tour, which has been in preparation for several years, started its activities in June by organizing its first competition in London. Since then, there have been two races in the United States.
According to the tour’s website, five more competitions are planned to be played during the fall.
The LIV in the tour’s name is the Roman numeral 54. This refers to the tour’s competitions being played over only three rounds (54 holes) instead of the normal four rounds (72 holes).
There is no cut in the competitions, but everyone plays a full three rounds. In addition, a team competition is held at the same time.
In normal major tour stroke play competitions, only about half of the players make it to the final two rounds and the prize money.
Competitions on the LIV tour distribute significantly more prize money than major competitions and the most lucrative competitions on the PGA tour and the European tour, although many experts believe that the LIV competitions are of a poor competitive level, mainly events of a show nature.
For example, in the tournament in Portland, 25 million dollars were distributed, of which the winner’s share was 4 million.
In addition to the prize money, the LIV tour has paid huge sums as contract fees to its players.
The first ones among the big-name players, a big audience favorite from the past years moved to the LIV tour Phil Mickelsonwho is a multiple major winner and one of the most successful players of recent decades, right after Woods.
In recent years, however, it has been seen that the peak of Mickelson’s career, in his fifties, is already behind him.
Another notable early stage recruit was the former world number one Dustin Johnsona major winner himself.
Mickelson was reportedly paid about 200 million dollars to become a LIV player, and Johnson was also paid 150 million, says, among others, the editor of the Golf Digest magazine Dan Rapaport on Twitter.
This one according to current information, there are 48 players on the LIV tour. Many of them, like Phil Mickelson, are united by a successful career, which is solidly on the evening tan side.
This group can include, for example, the European Ryder Cup conkers Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter, Sergio García, Paul Casey and Swedish Henrik Stensonwho was fired as Ryder Cup captain after falling for LIV’s million-dollar lure.
There are also a dozen names in the group that hardly anyone has heard of at the main tour level.
The operational director of the tour, Greg Norman, has hired, among other things, a player from his home country Jediah Morganwho has finished last twice in the three tournaments he has played and has played nine rounds of 46 over par.
Morgan, who is ranked 286th in the world this week, has done a poor job and played poorly, but despite that, he has earned almost $400,000 in prize money in these three races.
Of the top 15 players in the world rankings, no one has moved to the LIV tour so far, but the second Australian winner of The Open Championship Cameron Smith is believed to have already struck a $100 million deal with LIV.
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“The sportswashing aspect is its own thing, which is not unique in golf, but it is now on a large scale.”
The LIV tour the origin of the millions it uses has been considered a major moral problem.
The money comes from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, and blaming it on golf has been seen as one of the so-called of sports washing as a shape. In other words, it is an attempt to clean up the reputation tarnished by human rights violations.
Along with tennis and motor sports, golf is known to be the most lucrative individual sport at the top level, where hundreds of current players, especially men, are millionaires.
It is of course every player’s own choice to start earning even bigger cash prizes if the opportunity presents itself and tens or even hundreds of millions are paid before the first hit.
For the LIV tour none of the transferred players have directly admitted that the main reason for joining the LIV bandwagon is to make more money on top of the former millions.
Instead, time and time again we have heard stories made up by media consultants about helping golf to grow even bigger and the like.
For example, Dustin Johnson, who earned tens of millions in his career, justified his move to LIV by saying that he wants to financially secure the future of his family.
The PGA Tour quickly retaliated as its players began moving to LIV. Some of them resigned from the PGA Tour immediately, and others were suspended by the tour.
The European tour (now under the sponsor name DP World Tour) also announced smaller penalties.
The old tours can’t match LIV’s billion pot, but they have had to do something. Both the PGA Tour and the European Tour have already increased their prize money.
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“For women, the money that LIV might offer would be much more important than for men.”
Finland Editor-in-chief of Golflehti and Golfpiste.com online media Jere Jaakkola estimates that the launch of the LIV tour will shake up the structures of men’s competitive golf with an unprecedented force, and it is possible that a similar development is ahead in top women’s golf as well.
“This is a historically big deal for golf. Nothing similar has been seen. Its own thing is the sportswashing perspective, which is not unique in golf, but it is now on a large scale,” Jaakkola tells HS.
For example, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and China, accused of human rights violations, have organized European tour competitions for years.
Saudi Arabia became a stop on the tour a few years ago and attracted the world’s top names with exceptionally large starting money. At that time, Tiger Woods reportedly turned his back on the starting money of three million dollars.
In recent years, Saudi money has also been poured into the women’s European tour, where several tournaments bearing the name of the Saudi Arabian oil company Saudi Aramco are played.
“The big thing is how LIV gets involved in women’s golf. The commissioner of the LPGA tour seems to be very receptive, and the communication seems to be there. For women, the money that LIV might offer would be much more important than for men.”
Jaakkola sees that the biggest threat to top golf is that LIV invests heavily in women’s golf and sets up a tour for them as well.
“If that happens, there will possibly be a division in two like boxing, where we have LIV series and the old traditional tours. “
Golf piste run by Jaakkola already decided in June, that it will not make competition news regarding the LIV tour for the time being.
“For us, the decision is above all a matter of choosing values. The LIV tour is a Saudi Arabian sportswashing operation unprecedented in golf and ruthless in nature. If we report on it before competitive golf, forgetting the other dimensions of the issue, we are neutralizing the tour as a media and thus part of the operation,” Jaakkola reasoned at the time.
According to Jaakkola’s findings, the LIV tour has been widely questioned and criticized in the media.
Bridge last week it was announced that the results of the LIV Games will not be taken into account in the world rankings for the time being. This means that when no new points are accumulated, players who have moved to LIV will gradually lose their positions in the world rankings and with it access to major competitions.
In a recent twist in the growth of the LIV Tour, a dozen players who switched to the LIV sued the PGA Tour, alleging that it violates competition laws.
This included an attempt by three players to qualify despite suspensions to play in the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup finals, which began on Thursday.
This case ended on Tuesday with the victory of the PGA Tour, but there will probably be new lawsuits later.
Sources used in the story: The New York Times, golfdigest.com, golf.com, The Guardian, Golfpiste.com
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