DORAL, Fla. — Greg Norman has “zero” concerns. In fact, the figurehead of LIV Golf is so confident in its future he dismisses any complications from the deal between Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and the PGA Tour.
Phil Mickelson’s phone is blowing up from players interested in joining the Saudi-backed league. When asked whether he thinks there will be another round of defections from the PGA Tour, Mickelson didn’t hesitate: “Do I think that? No, I know that’s going to happen.”
Potential investors interested in buying Bubba Watson’s LIV team, RangeGoats GC, are lining up. He has been contacted by “anywhere from 10 to 20” candidates, meeting with some of those recently, before this weekend’s season-ending event at Doral.
Gary Davidson, acting COO of LIV Golf, is hinting toward the league adding to its current 12-team, 48-player format. Davidson said the max number of teams would be 15, and although he does not envision adding three, he did say one or two more teams is possible for 2024.
For a league that many believed was on life support four months ago and PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan was ready to pull the plug, the optimism and confidence within LIV’s headquarters is brimming.
“The main conversation from our side is business as usual,” Davidson said. “The focus is on LIV, it’s on what next year and beyond looks like.”
The storylines that came out of the framework agreement between the PIF (LIV’s financial backers), PGA Tour and DP World Tour painted a bleak picture for LIV. If it passes the U.S. Justice Department sniff test, the deal will combine commercial businesses and rights into a new for-profit company majority-owned by the PGA Tour, and Monahan making the decisions.
The presumption was one of those would be to dismantle LIV, or at least crush whatever relevancy it has now.
And that meant Norman, 68, taking his bag filled by the PIF off into retirement. At least that is how PGA Tour officials painted it during a Senate hearing on the deal.
Apparently, that memo did not make it to the LIV offices that overlook the intracoastal waterway and Atlantic Ocean in downtown West Palm Beach. LIV has showed no signed of slowing down since.
Team and league sponsorships are being signed at a steady pace. The league is finalizing its 2024 schedule. Norman, Davidson and several players continue to insist the league is in a position of strength and will be expanding.
“Everywhere we go, we grow value, we…
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