PIF Gov. Yasir Al-Rumayyan will meet with PGA Tour player board members in the BahamasGetty Images
Today "could mark the cornerstone of an agreement" between the PGA Tour and the PIF, as PIF Gov. Yasir Al-Rumayyan will meet with PGA Tour player board members in the Bahamas in a “chance for both sides to meet for the first time and take a measure of each other,” according to Alex Miceli of SI. Miceli noted it “seems most of the board will be in attendance” and will get their first real look at the man who has “forced the PGA Tour to change the way it does business.” At the same time, Al-Rumayyan will “finally get a meeting with an influential group of PGA Tour players and try to convince them that neither he nor his country are monsters,” and that PIF is just “interested in working together to grow the game.” Miceli: “If Monday is successful it could be the beginning of path that leads to a definitive agreement and a new era in golf” (SI, 3/16). SI’s Bob Harig wrote “nobody is quite sure what Al-Rumayyan wants,” but it has “often been suggested it’s a seat at the table amid the bigger world of golf” (SI, 3/17).
ABOUT TIME: GOLF’s Rex Hoggard noted PGA Tour player Rory McIlroy said that the meeting is a “long overdue step toward a deal that would reunite golf.” McIlroy, who met with Al-Rumayyan in late 2022, was “eager for the players to gain a better understanding of the fund and its leader” (GOLF, 3/17).
CHAOS THEORY: In Jacksonville, Gene Frenette wrote all this chaos about whether the Tour is going to finalize its partnership with LIV Golf or how all that influx of $1.5B cash from Tour partner Strategic Sports Group might be dispersed to the players is “no way to grow the game.” Golf observers -- be they casual, ardent supporters or on the fence -- have “little interest in how multi-millionaires are going to add to their bottom line.” Frenette noted those negotiations are “still in limbo.” Frenette: “It’s a mystery if a deal will come about at all, with the SSG cash input adding to the uncertainty.” For now, players are “reluctant to sugarcoat the present environment.” They find it “hard to deny” that golf “feels a bit stagnant.” But so long as the Tour “struggles to reach a finish line in its PIF negotiations” off-the-course issues are “going to garner headlines almost as much as player accomplishments between the ropes” (FLORIDA TIMES-UNION, 3/16).
KNOW YOUR ROLE: In N.Y., Mike Lupica wrote it continues to “astound me how out of touch the PGA Tour is with where it actually fits in sports’ ecosystem.” Lupica: “Listen, I love golf. I have my whole life and still love playing it. But the people in charge of the Tour -- and they know who they are -- and the players themselves continue to act like they’re the NFL” (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 3/16).
