Indiana Golf Journal December

and 1970’s to become golf winningest major champion. In 1968, Nicklaus and Palmer authored a successful break from the PGA of America and formed the PGA Tour, which led us to the current PGA Tour. In 1996, along came Tiger Woods and escalated the sport even farther. Television networks were eager to throw millions of dollars at the tour for the broadcast rights. Arnold Palmer even helped create a new network, The Golf Channel, to deliver even more golf content to avid golfers 24/7/365. Now that entity is owned by Comcast NBC and it has not been delivering the profits corporate bosses would like to see. Golf fans around the world benefitted from the additional coverage and over time more and more air-time became dedicated to LPGA Tour events, helping to raise their purses for women’s golf. Tournaments on the Korn Ferry Tour are regularly aired. It seemed golfers could not get enough golf to satisfy their ever-growing demand for coverage. But something has changed. Television ratings for professional golf tournaments have slipped by over 30% and that trend does not seem to be changing any time soon. We keep hearing rumors that a deal is getting done, but with the defections declining, a $1.5 billion infusion of cash from outside investors to the PGA Tour and increased purses in America, thus keeping the players happy, I don’t see any impetus for the PGA Tour to settle for any kind of deal the Saudi’s could offer. The real question is, How long will the Arabs want to continue to subsidize a losing proposition?

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