Tiger Woods said the PGA Tour is in a good position with the recent investment made by the Strategic Sports Group, but that the goal ultimately remains to have the Public Investment Fund “part of our tour.”
Speaking ahead of this week’s Genesis Invitational, where he is the tournament host while also making his first start in an official PGA Tour event since last year’s Masters, Woods made his first public comments since the SSG deal was announced just more than two weeks ago.
The deal that could pump more than $3 billion into the for-profit PGA Tour Enterprises has put into question the future of the framework deal agreed to with the Saudi-backed PIF last summer. Woods took a distinctly different stance than fellow players advisory council member Jordan Spieth, who said recently that investment from PIF is no longer needed.
“Ultimately, we would like to have PIF be a part of our tour and a part of our product,” said Woods, who serves as a director on the council. “Financially, we don’t right now, and the monies that they have come to the table with and what we initially had agreed to in the framework agreement, those are all the same numbers.
“Anything beyond this is going to be obviously over and above. We’re in a position right now, hopefully we can make our product better in the short term and long term.”
Woods said that discussions with PIF remain ongoing and “fluid.” Also ongoing are daily emails and conversations about pathways back to competing on the PGA Tour for those who have signed with LIV Golf.
It has been a hot-button debate among the players, whose opinions range from allowing LIV players back with no repercussions to those who believe there needs to be some sort of punishment involved.
“We’re looking into all the different models for pathways back,” Woods said. “What that looks like, what the impact is for the players who have stayed and who have not left and how we make our product better going forward, there is no answer to that right now.
“We’re looking at varying degrees of ideas and what that looks like in the short term, we don’t know. We don’t even know in the longer term what that looks like. Trust me, there’s daily, weekly emails and talks about this and what this looks like for our tour going forward.”
Among the many disruptive aspects that LIV has introduced to the professional game is the aspect of team golf. Once reserved for biennial events such as the Ryder and Presidents Cups, LIV is the first tour to embrace team golf as its core.
Woods believes the PGA Tour will also infuse an element of team golf in the future. That could be in the form of one-off events such as the TMRW golf league started by himself and Rory McIlroy set to debut in 2025 to potential adding official tournaments.
What shape and form that ultimately takes will be part of what SSG brings to the table, as the group is a consortium of American sports team owners and investors.
“(Team golf is) one of the reasons we have SSG to be a part of what that can possibly look like or how does that even look like or how does that even look like with our PIF negotiations as well,” Woods said.
“They’re unbelievable leaders. At the time that we need great leadership going forward, I think this elicits that. The amazing brains of ideas that can make this tour better and we’re looking forward to that.”
With the professional golf landscape still fractured and with no clear end to that in sight, Woods was asked why fans should be excited about what lies ahead.
“At the end of the day, we’re trying to provide the best entertainment, and in order to do that you have to have the best players play,” he said. “We want to have the history, involve the history and the traditions of the history of our tour and have the pathways, accessibility, have all of the intangibles that have made the PGA Tour what it is right now and what has been, and hopefully what it will continue to be even better.
“And how do we do that? That’s the whole idea of why we have a group like SSG to provide us with information and help and trying to create the best tour we could possibly have.”
–Field Level Media