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I don't know much about pro golf and haven't been following this story closely. Since it seems like at least the PGA side is appealing to fair play and morals a

I don't know much about pro golf and haven't been following this story closely. Since it seems like at least the PGA side is appealing to fair play and morals and accusing the LIV players of chasing money, I'm curious: how much of the money generated on the PGA tour is actually paid out to players in the form of prizes, appearance fees, etc. In short, is this a situation where the PGA tour organization is capturing billions generated by the players and blowing it all on executive projects and phony "charities"? Or are player payouts pretty large already, and the LIV tour's ability to pay more just down to the sovereign wealth fund and the "innovations" just a nicer way to say "better monetization of events, more ads, wringing more money from TV networks"?

theluketaylor 4y ago
Bit of both. The PGA Tour pays most of the money out to players in the form of the weekly prize purse, but due to their structure are required to treat everyone the same, from world #1 to the guy barely holding onto his tour card. You have to win to earn the big prize money and even for the best in the world winning a golf tournament is really, really hard. Rory has been ranked in the top 10 for 15+ years and just got his 21st win, for example. Most players make way more from endorsements than they do from tournament winnings. LIV also has truly obscene amount of money to throw around. They are paying guys more than their career earnings to join. LIV doesn't have to worry about revenue sources or a sustainable business model because there isn't any chance they have either.
- cool_dude85 4y ago
  Thanks for the info. I actually looked up their financial statements and it's a lot smaller operation than I would have guessed. Just 1.5B in revenue on their last filing. For reference to other American sports, that's just around 3 times the revenue for the Green Bay Packers alone.
  - theluketaylor 4y ago
    Their financial structure is pretty interesting. I think each tournament is run as it's own charitable organization, so the 1.5B PGA Tour books is far from all the money in the system. Plus a ton of the money is direct sponsorships to players and there are rules how big and how many logos players can have. Even caddies make money wearing sponsored hats and shoes. Tour cards are limited to about 250 as well, with each field being about 150 (it varies), so the money is split by a much smaller pool of players than any team sport, where an NFL team alone might have 90 rostered guys.
shkkmo 4y ago
> the PGA side is appealing to fair play and morals I don't see how the Tour that is excluding people from participating gets to position themselves as the bastion of "fair play", especially when the motivation for that exclusion is explicitly to maintain a monopoly. Not that I support the LIV tour, but this seems hypocritical coming from the PGA side.

theluketaylor 4y ago

Bit of both. The PGA Tour pays most of the money out to players in the form of the weekly prize purse, but due to their structure are required to treat everyone the same, from world #1 to the guy barely holding onto his tour card. You have to win to earn the big prize money and even for the best in the world winning a golf tournament is really, really hard. Rory has been ranked in the top 10 for 15+ years and just got his 21st win, for example. Most players make way more from endorsements than they do from tournament winnings. LIV also has truly obscene amount of money to throw around. They are paying guys more than their career earnings to join. LIV doesn't have to worry about revenue sources or a sustainable business model because there isn't any chance they have either.

cool_dude85 4y ago
Thanks for the info. I actually looked up their financial statements and it's a lot smaller operation than I would have guessed. Just 1.5B in revenue on their last filing. For reference to other American sports, that's just around 3 times the revenue for the Green Bay Packers alone.
- theluketaylor 4y ago
  Their financial structure is pretty interesting. I think each tournament is run as it's own charitable organization, so the 1.5B PGA Tour books is far from all the money in the system. Plus a ton of the money is direct sponsorships to players and there are rules how big and how many logos players can have. Even caddies make money wearing sponsored hats and shoes. Tour cards are limited to about 250 as well, with each field being about 150 (it varies), so the money is split by a much smaller pool of players than any team sport, where an NFL team alone might have 90 rostered guys.

shkkmo 4y ago

> the PGA side is appealing to fair play and morals I don't see how the Tour that is excluding people from participating gets to position themselves as the bastion of "fair play", especially when the motivation for that exclusion is explicitly to maintain a monopoly. Not that I support the LIV tour, but this seems hypocritical coming from the PGA side.