No Laying Up - Golf Podcast - NLU Podcast, Episode 590: Davis Love III

Episode Date: August 11, 2022

Davis Love III joins Soly to expand on his recent comments on the LIV-PGA Tour lawsuit, his recollection of the failed breakaway attempt by Greg Norman in 1994, the Tour's plan to combat the LIV lawsuit and more.  We also break down his work as a captain on US Ryder and Presidents Cup teams and the evolution of statistical analysis in captains picks, course setup and pairings for the team events. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm going to be the right club today. Yes. That is better than most. How about him? That is better than most. Better than most. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the No-Lang-Up podcast, Sally here. We have an interview coming up with Davis Love III. He's been speaking out quite a bit lately on all of the ongoing developments in the game of golf.

I wanted to bring him in as the president's cup captain and basically a spokesman for the PGA tour But we cannot get Jay Monhan on the podcast currently. There's not executives are not willing to speak on the record as it stands for a lot of reasons You can probably understand if you had if you tuned in at all to watch the hearing that went down We talk with Davis who's about as high up as I think you can get right now in terms of Representatives or spokesman for the tour that you know are not direct leaders of it that can talk basically about all this stuff. I asked him pretty much everything I could think of and we talked for about an hour just on all the ongoing live and his considerations and his roles.

Board member and all that stuff. So you will greatly enjoy that, I believe. I want to give a shout out to our friends at Roeback. I'm of course wearing a rowback hoodie right now. My wife, I think it's sick of me wearing these things almost pretty much every day around the house. Not only do they have great hoodies, but their performance pull is fits so much better than a boxy polo.

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I've got them just laying up in random spots all around the house just because I literally have them on pretty much every day. They're gaining traction. Big time I see rowback everywhere. You can use code NLU at rowback.com for a generous 20% off your first order that's rhoback.com, 20% off polos, quzips, hoodies, and teas with code NLU. I thought you'd further delay. Here is Davis Love III. Of all the crazy things that have happened over the last several weeks, months, years, if you will, were you expecting quotes of yours to immediately end up in a live complaint complaint from 11 plaintiffs against the PJ surprised to see that. I was surprised and the tour came back to me after and they

said, you know, sometimes you just ramble along and they can pull things out and it might be hurting you a little bit. That's kind of a nice way to say. But I do. Every time I'm a Marietta Cup captain or I'm in front of the media a lot, I do expose my feelings a little too much and I get myself in a little bit of trouble. But I went immediately to Jay Monahan and I get myself in a little bit of trouble, but I went immediately to Jay Monahan and I said, I've already reached out to the USGA, that's really not what I said about boycotton the US open. I didn't mean to single them out. He goes, no, I took it in a different way that you were saying that for the players holding the cards and supporting the tourists.

Do not worry about it. I did reach out to the USGA. And I back, not, I doubled down on them a little bit, not backtracked them. But yeah, I sat in a room with 30 tour players yesterday listening on Keith Mitchell's phone, listening to the hearing, and everybody kept jabbing at me going, oh yeah, great. Not going.

What was, what, what did you say? What did you mean? How was it interpreted? And how do they try to use it against you? Well, so what you and I and the golf world have heard a lot is, well, the majors hold all the cards. The majors can do this and that. The world golf rankings, people hold all the cards.

What I'm trying to say is what Jay said, the regulations are written by the players, for players and Jay and staff the tour enforce them. So if they had won yesterday and those three guys had showed up on property, the only remedy the players have and they were mad, a lot of them are really really mad upset. They could just say this is we know this is not right and that was a poor judgment. We're so mad about it that we're just going to go on strike just like baseball. We're just not going to play.

And sure, you can always play the FedEx, St. Jude, another week. You can always play the playoffs another time. It would be very, but it's the nuclear option. So I was trying to say to the world, to the court, to the players. That's when I say something. It's to the president's cup team, or it's to the players as much of this to you or the fans. But hey, you guys control this. Like Tim Vitchermolle said, the players' championship

is what we call it. If we say it's a major, it's a major. If you say it's a major, or Tim says it's a major, that's just talk. So anyway, but I still feel that way that we make the rules and we should be able to say what we want Jay to do. And he's doing what we ask him to defend these rules for us. And that's where yeah, it there's a lot of a lot of things to discuss, a lot of things, a lot of balls in the air, if you will, there's of course the legality of those

rules. Is it legal? And that's not something we're going to be able to settle here. That's going to get decided in the court, I think. But an element of this that I still think people are struggling with in some way is what I've heard you say a lot of too. And saying that I've said this a lot, the tour, and I'm using air quotes for those listening on the podcast, the tour has taken on a personality almost as if it's not the players, right? If it's this huge, enormous organization that is, I don't know,

hoarding money or making all the decisions unilaterally and not involving players and decisions at all, you have had the unique, and you can start this by saying how long you spent on the PGA tour board, but you have, I'm not sure if there's anyone that can speak to it more in terms of how the players have helped come up with what these regulations are and why it's such a slap in the face that so many of these guys want to fight this now. Well, I've served five terms on the PGA tour board as a player director, which means that's three years as a board member, one year as a player advisory council chairman where you observe the meetings

to learn how it works. So I did back-to-back terms so you can throw one of those five years out. So I had 19 years of observing board meetings. I watched him finish him get hired and I watched Jay Monahan get hired. I was on the ends both ends of it. So yeah, but there's a lot of Brad Faxons and Jeff Sloomans and you know, now Charlie Hoffman's that have spent a Kevin Kister spent more time, you know, is hurting his golf game, frankly, that he spent so much time on this as a board member recently. That's why we're adding a fifth player director that's going to serve a one-year term to kind of take the pressure off of the guys doing three years. But anyway, yeah, but unique perspective.

I think there's a stat, and I'm not gonna get the numbers, right? 270 rules changes under 10 Fentham, 255 of them came from player suggestions or from the player advisory council or from the player directors. So yes, we do make the rules. Now, as I've told Phil Mickelson and other players, yes, we do make mistakes. It's a as I've told Phil Mickelson and other players, yes, we do make mistakes.

It's a big organization that cannot do everything perfectly. Every company I invest in, I'm sure makes business decisions that are poor, makes mistakes. We're not perfect, but we are trying the best we can to create playing opportunities and give money to charity. And no, there's not, we've had three different top accounting firms while I've been on the BGA tour. They're not gonna take one client and hide a bunch of money for them and risk all their business with other top corporations

or the financials are the financials. You can open up the book and read them. There's not retirement plan, reserves, and a slush fund category. The players that believe that, now, sure, we're redirecting a lot of assets right now because we're in a battle. COVID with champions tour redirected a lot of their reserves

to COVID and then recouped them because golf took off and we get a lot of the money from the TPC networks. It's just a business. So we take in roughly 1.6 billion this year, we pay out over half of that 55 or 60 percent of that goes to the players and that's the profit and the rest of it is expenses. So it's a simple business, it's a big business, but it's a simple business. So has there ever been any confusion, hostility, discussion, or, you know, anything that's a bit unclear for these players as to why they can't, why the regulations say you can't play wherever you want whenever you want. I'm asking that in regards to the idea of collective pooling of media rights and almost kind of asking you as a player to describe what the tours role is and why the sum of all these parts together

is and has been beneficial to these players and why when you remove parts of it, it doesn't work the same way. Well, and to your player alert, yes, there's things that can be changed. Tiger, Rory, have agreed, yes, maybe the right, the media rights, maybe there's a better model going forward. But the model that Dean Beaman started back when he was commissioner is that if there's a tournament in the United States and you're a PGA tour player and you signed up for the league, there's a tournament in the United States.

We can't allow you to play another tournament in the United States up against that on TV, because we can't sell to FedEx, who's an umbrella sponsor of the PGA tour, we can't sell the fact that you are going to be possibly playing in their tournament because you're going to be playing in somebody else's tournament. Now we can release you to go play in Europe once or twice, maybe three times a year because that's not a direct competitor in the United States. Live really would not have as big a problem if they were playing around the world. But because they come to the United States and they play two weeks in between the torch championship

and the present scut against our tournaments, we just can't sell our product. And it's a complicated system, but it's really simple that now, the RSM classic, my terminate C.I. will not have Charles Howe a former champion, will not have Taylor Gooch the defending champion, and a lot of possible other players,

because they broke a rule that they're going to be playing against PGA Tour events, and now they can't play a mime it. So they're hurting the business of the PGA Tour. So if you're FedEx or your sponsor signing up again, you go, wait a minute, I don't have Bryson Dustin. Those guys have no chance of playing. And my tournament then becomes a problem business-wise. So it's um, we're not a monopoly. They've proven that we're not a live is proven that we're not a monopoly. They're playing golf tournaments. Those guys are welcome to play those golf tournaments. They just can't come back the next week and play a PGA Tour event. And you know,

Cherry picking her free ride is, I guess, is a legal term, but we're just protecting what we're trying to sell, which benefits not only the top players, but down to 200 on the money list. And the charities involved that and the share, not to mention, And the charities have all that. And the chair, not to mention 300 billion to charity. Well, and I don't, I'm not going to put you on the stand or ask you to be a lawyer in this regard, but in your role, have you, what has been the legal advice you've gotten from the, from tour lawyers or as a part of that conversation in terms of coming up that rule, making that a rule, I'm wondering what that discussion has been like over the years in terms of coming up that rule, making that a rule. I'm wondering what that discussion has been like

over the years in terms of, you know, I know there's been investigations in the FTC back in the 90s and things like that, but what has that conversation internally been like? Well, it's been challenged back in 94, like you said, because of Greg Norman, bringing this point up and trying to do the world tour. Comment the, it's been challenged now,

but it's also been challenged a couple times by the IRS or the federal government looking into us as a tax exempt organization. So we have, we were granted that a long time ago. We've had to defend that a couple of times on Capitol Hill. And the reason we end up, the IRS makes a judgment, yeah, your audit's fine and your business plan is fine, and you're giving so much money to charity, and you're growing your business every year exponentially. We're going to continue to sign off on that

because you are a unique entity, and so our lawyers and our accountants and the federal government have continued to sign off on this, because part of the independent contractor is kind of a weird term. We're a member-owned organization. If you sign up at the beginning of the year, you conform to these rules, you get the benefits of it, but we can't tell you when and where you have to play. Like Papua Sain, I had to play.

This is a complete, you know, farce where there's 40 tournaments, you have to play 15 to be able to vote next year and to get your benefits, insurance, retirement plan, all those kind of things. So it's, it's a very strange structure. It's not the Dallas Cowboys. We hire you to play on our team. You conform to these rules. We give you a whole bunch of money and if we get tired of you, we'll trade you to somebody else. No, we play in a member organization, and the rules have been signed off on now.

You and I and others can sit down and say, yeah, there's some changes probably need to be, maybe there's a better model, maybe there needs to be a for-profit, rather than a nonprofit. All those things can be discussed, but for right now, like Jay said yesterday to a player asking about rules, yeah, we can change the rules in the future.

But right now, we have to defend these rules that were written. And my only choice right now is to move forward and defend them until we change them. Trust me, there's always been 20 or 30 guys that complain and argue and fight. There's 20 or 30 guys, and I put myself in that camp that are supporting the tour, working on the board,

player advisory council, whatever. The rest of them just want to go play golf. They're Max Homa, and don't try to buy my dream. I'm trying to win on the PGA tour. Tom Kim is as excited as any person in the world around. He's living his dream. He always dreamed of playing on the PGA tour. He just won a PGA tour event.

He became a member. We built a platform. And I just put me as a we small, small part. We built a platform, Jack Nicholson Arnold Palmer, to give these guys a chance. And Tiger and Rory and myself, we don't work for the PGA tour. We're working for the current players and the future players to give them that platform and you let them have the opportunity we had. But it's a very complicated system and the fans just have to understand that

live can do whatever they want. The players that go there can do whatever they want, but the PGA tour should not be hostily taken over and become a feeder system to live. And that's ultimately what they want. And I want you to correct me if I'm wrong on any of this part of this and that I, you know, putting on this up against all the greed that we're seeing in golf currently, my understanding, and I want to get clarification for what your specific role is, because my interpretation of this is, you seem quite appreciative of everything

the PGA Tour has given you both, you know, over the years, and you, even during your time of your prime years, you're dedicating your time to making the PGA Tour as great as it can be while being on the board. And you're, you don't seem to have a direct direct stake in this yet. I almost kind of like you're taking care of the golf course after you finished the round in a way. So the next guy up has a great has it as great or better than you did.

Is that is that kind of how you view your role in it? Why are you kind of why is everyone kind of turning to you now to be this outspoken? Why is everyone turning to you now to be this outspoken? My dad was a club pro. He idolized Harvey Peneck and Byron Nelson and connected me with Tom Kite, Ben Crenshaw and upstanding citizens in the game, Vinny Giles, right on down the list, the people that were influential in my life. And I had to fix the ball mark when I left the green.

Or my dad would send me back. I had to follow the ball mark when I left the green or my dad would send me back. I had to follow the rules of the game and the traditions and the honor and the integrity of the game have been instilled in me for so long. But my role now is I called Jay Monahan. I've said this several times in the last couple of weeks. I called him back in November, last November, when this was really starting to ramp up. And I said, we really need Arnold Palmer right now, don't we? And he goes, yeah. Because Arnold's the one that helped shoot this down back in 1994.

Somebody has to go out on a limb and speak out. And again, I'm not saying the PGA Tour does everything right, but somebody has to defend our rights and what's right for the game and good for the game is a great term. So am I sticking my neck out more than anybody's ever seen me? Yeah. Because you know, I want to Tiger can't say what he thinks sometimes and can't stick his neck out. I can stick my neck out. I can't I can't get hurt in this. But I'm yes, I'm giving back. I've been blessed. But look, I'm one of four players, Tiger, Jack, the Arnold Palmer family, and Davis love. We own and operate PGA Tourism. I'm not only defending for the tour, but for my own foundation, for my own tournament, for my own charities. I'm defending the process that I know works.

So if I overstep Jay will tell me I've overstepped. But that's what I, you know, it's kind of like being in the army or in the Marines, you know, I'm protecting my people as much as I can. And, you know, I hope I can talk myself into the lawsuit again. I'd love to be a witness. You know, they probably, they probably interrogate me and make me crap. That was a, that's a famous last word's there. I don't know if I had sight up for that.

Oh, you can go back and ask Andy Pazer. As soon as they named a day, I said, do you need witnesses? He said, no, not in this go around. This is a critical time in the PGH world. It's not a critical time in golf. You guys just went on a great trip, right? And that's gonna go on golf.

We're a minor blip in golf. We're just the professional end of it. We're 200 people at any one time point in history of guys that play professional golf for a lot of money. Golf will go on. It's a great sport. If Liv golf wins this and they take over the PGA tour

and crush it down, golf is still gonna be okay, but look what the damage could be done just a charity, just to kid's dreams. And again, I asked this to Greg Norman in 1994, where do your next 30 players come from? Is the PGA tour gonna be a feeder tour to you? Because we're going to get tired of watching the same 30 guys play all the time. And now that it's a drastically different system than he had back then, those are real

terms he was proposing back then. Now they're playing exhibitions. And you know, I don't know what what the ratings are, but people are going to get tired of watching the same guys over and over again That's why I forget where I saw this it was look They're starting to really accumulate some some really strong players not only big names That may be are kind of a little bit past their prime but some good young players that are rumored to be joining and it was just like man Why why is this not captivating me? Why is it not capturing it? I mean I it was kind of I saw this analogy somewhere I was like kind of like I don't like watching the pro ball. And that's like a great accumulation of all of,

because you know what? Because I don't care who wins that. And that's kind of how I felt watching the live event so far. And like, look, does every PGA Tour event captivate me? Do I care greatly who wins it? No, there's a lot of PGA Tour events. There's a lot of, we've said from entertainment aspect, there's a lot of flaws in how the PGA tour has been,

you know, structured and how that delivers entertainment. And I guess I just have had an issue with the connection between what the tour could have done to prevent this, which I still don't really know the answer to, and some of the gaps and the issues that we've seen in it. So if you look back, let's use perfect hindsight. You can use it for whatever, at any point, what could the tour have done realistically

to stop, slow this down or prevent this in any way? What could they've done differently? That's a great question. A lot of the players and a lot of people say whether the tours just reacted, they react to things. They don't see the future coming. And like COVID, we didn't see that coming. That was hard to predict.

And we had to react to it. Back last November, I called Jay Monahan and said, hey, what can I do to help? And he's like, well, we're doing all these things. And I go, I really don't think it's that big a deal. I don't see this happening. We've seen this movie before. And I underestimated completely the amount of money that was going to get thrown at it.

And back in 94, Greg Fawkes Network and 25 million behind him, and you know, guys were not getting offered guarantee they were just offered tournaments to play in. So I don't know that the tour could have done anything different. They've been preparing with lawyers for a lot longer than I thought. And here's what's been happening. And we saw it a lot in that hearing in San Francisco. The tour has been playing it close to the best because they know a lot of things that are in these contracts.

They know a lot of the mistruse that have been told to players and to the media. And they were just going gonna let live talk, let them kind of bury themselves once they got to court. So I think they've had a really good strategy, but it's been a strategy that's been quiet. But I don't know if anybody really expected billions of dollars to get thrown at tearing the PGA tour down. I would've been hard to predict that.

Oh yeah, that's what I think we were all kind of quick to dance on their grave when the statements came out in February and all that. But then we had a source conversation that was like, oh my gosh, they are still going to put up the money in these tournaments. And somebody who a lot of these guys probably don't think deserves that money is going to win it.

And that is going to be their strategy. They are going to drive a jealousy phase or a, I don't know. There's gonna, this money's gonna get paid out one way or another and guys are going to line up and play for it. And I guess, I don't know, the whole thing still just feels so unbelievable to me that every time I flip it on, I just can't believe that this is the reality.

Well, if somebody, if somebody's telling you something and you're unsure if this could be true or not, you have your doubts and you say, well, I don't know, maybe I'll look into that. But if a guy says, here's what is going to happen. And I'm going to give you a hundred million dollars to believe me. You believe him a lot easier, right? But look, Greg Norman is a hall of fame golfer. He's a very famous person, supposed to be a really smart

businessman. He walks up to some kid and says, trust me, they can't ban you for one day, much less a year. Let me show you why, and let me give you 20 million to come play in my tournaments. It's hard to imagine that the guy could be lying to you. But that's the reality. And then they see a guy get $150 million and go over there and play and fly

around on the party plane. And they go, well, wait a minute, it's actually happening. So another guy signs up, but it just boils down to, it's making a choice between playing by the rules that, the rules of golf that we have some guys over there that have been questionable, even on the rules of golf, questioning your morals or it's just flat out, I'm taking the money. At least Dustin has been the most quiet and forthright. He's a lot of money and I may be risking all of this,

but I'm gonna go play over here and I'm not gonna resign from the tour and I'm not gonna put my name on the lawsuit. Now, as a proxy, he is suing the tour because he's in that league, but it just boils down to simply that they got paid so much money that they're just making bad decisions or going with their their brain rather than their heart.

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Back to Dave's love. Is it weird to be, we mentioned that we started the show talking about you sighted, being sighted in a complaint, a legal complaint. It's titled, Michelson at all. And with all the history that you've had with Phil Michelson over the years, as competitors, teammates,

he's a player on two of your Ryder Cup teams. I mean, what is that like? I mean, I was going to ask, could you see this coming, but I can't imagine that you possibly could have. Well, we're not a bunch of players celebrating that we won a court hearing yesterday. It's a sad day for the PGA tour. I mean, we're fighting amongst ourselves.

Phil Mukerson has been a long time teammate and friend. My wife and his wife, great buddies, on so many things over the years. It's hard to, that, that money and perspective on rules has broken up a lot of friendships. But yeah, Phil has always challenged the system. Phil has always seen things a different way. So it makes him a great player. He goes for it when we lay up and he won 40 and I won 20. You know, that's, that's Phil. He has always and Greg always has felt like that they knew a better way that was better than anybody else and they're, they're obviously willing to fight for it. And frankly, I tried for a long time, December, January, February, March,

to try to help Phil and talk him out of this and got no traction on it. And unfortunately, a lot of the things that I've said, and I'm just parroting the PGA tour in history, a lot of the things I've said to these guys has happened. I was just on a flight back from Memphis with Hudson's Wofford. He was on the plane coming back home.

He thought he was gonna play this week. Well, I had a conversation with him before London. Here's what's gonna happen. You're gonna get either banned or suspended. You're not gonna play PGA Tour events for a long time. And he goes, oh, it'll never happen. I'll be playing Hartford. I got no. You won't be playing Hartford.

Trust me, Taylor Gooch, the same thing. Oh, I'm gonna play Hartford. I'm gonna play the playoffs. No, you're not. And they got paid a lot of money to believe that. And unfortunately, the great thing about that hearing is live we see behind the curtain now. So many things that they've been telling players, telling the public are just frankly not

true. It's just going to get more interesting because now we in the discovery phase of a trial when all this stuff is going to get aired. More text messages from players and more contract shown. And the real truth, the tour has been playing it like quietly, but it's all going to get compounded in the public over the next, you know, as that judge said, either real quick before next April are in 25.

It's going to be a lot of contentious to still to come. And for those listening that maybe didn't follow the news yesterday or what happened with the Taylor Gooch Hudson Swofford and Matt Jones took as part of temporary restraining order to try to get their forced their way basically into the field for the FedEx Cup playoffs. That particular part of the complaint that was filed by the 11 plaintiffs, including Phil Mickelson, Bryson and others.

That particular part was the only thing ruled on yesterday, and that was ruled in favor of the PGA tour to say that those three will not be able to play. And it does not rule on the overall anti-trust, anti-competitive claim that they're making at this time. But I kind of view this as a teeny, tiny up and down par save on the first for the PGA tour. And there's 71 more holes to go.

Better analogy than mine I was sending out to friends yesterday I said we had a home run in the first. It's a long game. We're up one nothing in the first inning. It's a long way to go. Anything can happen in court. You know I was not sitting there yesterday watching that in Memphis going, this is a slam dunk. It really could, you know, in court these days, you know, to live golf people, whether or not they didn't just fall off the turn-up truck. They knew what they were doing going to San Francisco. Now they might not have gotten the exact judge they wanted, but they put it in that in that court in California for a reason. They didn't file in Pontavigia or Florida. We've got an uphill battle. Jay didn't celebrate yesterday. He said,

all right, we're off to work on the rest of this. It's going to be a long haul. And yeah, there are some questions. We've been questioned, as I said, and you said, by the IRS, by the FTC, by the DOJ, by Congressman and senators, is this really a legitimate business? But when you break it down into that charitable organizations own the majority of the PGA Tor events, not the PGA tour, we give all the money either to the players or to charity, it's a nonprofit organization, and look at the growth every 10 years or every 20 years or every The history of the PGA tour the model does work and if you don't like it. Yes, Roy You can stay over in Europe and play or Billy Horshaw is a PGA tour member and a European tour member

He can manage to play enough on both Sets of rules to to be on both tours. It's worked for Monty. We changed the rules for Sevy, Bernard Langer, guys like that, to get them to come play the PGA tour and be able to play their tour at the same time. So, we've coexisted and sure, the United States dominates, but they also dominate in football, in basketball, and hockey, and a lot of other sports. Obviously soccer is big everywhere else in the world. It's growing in the United States, but we're the biggest market really in the world for sports entertainment and the tour has a platform to compete for that.

And we've done a great job. It's not a monopoly. It's just a really good business model that everyone around the world wants to play in our model. It's just a really good business model that everyone around the world wants to play in our model. I see a lot of this notion on Twitter and that as soon as the tour kind of came out with some announcements of some changes they were making there was a sentiment of Phil was right. They've had all this money sitting there and blah blah blah. And if I if I may say it does seem like the tour has it was poor timing for the tour from a parent's perspective to all of a sudden as soon as live has an event to announce a bunch of changes, right? So I want to know where the, let's just say there is blake for the sake of this conversation. There's, let's say there is blame to lie

somewhere in terms of the timing of some of these changes. Who does that rest with? Is that the players? Is that on tour leadership? Is that, you know, why would it have taken them being pushed to the edge before, you know, the money goes way up in these select certain events? The FedEx Cup playoffs are going to change. The season is basically going to end in August. Why did it take being pushed to the brink of where they were before that, you know, was put into action? Well, luckily it's a podcast and not a quick interview. But so the history of it is 94 Greg Norman.

Yes, Greg Norman and a group of players. He wasn't the only one, but he was the ringleader. Challenge the tour system. So we came up with, oh, that's what the players want. They want shorter field big money events. Let's organize those. That's where we got the World Golf Championships. So it was a roundabout way of a player suggestion.

It was a challenge outside, you know, Greg tried it in, run. And yes, the tour reacted and gave the players what they wanted. The player said, we want a bigger end to the season. We don't want to play all the way through November and then turn around and start again in January. So we came up with the FedEx playoffs and the tour championship and all these things. We've made a bunch of changes over the years.

After this wrap around season has gone on for three or four years, the players haven't liked it. So believe it or not, the tour has been working on this schedule change for a while, and the timing of it is a couple years ago kicked in a huge new TV contract. And so that money has just really hit the system. Plus, we do have reserves, any business, the tour challenges my little tournament to keep millions of dollars in reserve in case we lose a sponsor or something bad happens like COVID. The tour has 250, I'm just making up a number 250 or 350 million in reserves for problems coming up.

So there is money that can be redirected. If we can sell, you know, these new tournaments for the next few years, we may have to pull out of reserves a little bit to get them up and running. We've had to finance the champions tour here and there over the years, out of money from the PGA tour. There is money there, but yes, I would say,

I don't represent the PGA tour, I'm not on the board. I would say yes, we're reacting to a hostile takeover, just like Twitter. We're trying to a hostile takeover. Just like Twitter, we're trying to change our model to make sure that somebody doesn't take us over. So your question is great and the challenge is great. Yes, while all of a sudden, with the players are asking for a change, some players ask for a change. They left because they didn't like it. They saw a better model. So yes, we have to change. Guys behind the scenes, not only the player directors, but veteran players are guys behind the scenes, not only the player directors, but veteran players are talking to the commissioner about change for the future.

But we're going to make those changes, not some outside entity. Do you think there's any wiggle room for negotiation with live at this point? Does it, what would the benefit of that be? What would that realistically look like if there would be? I have my thoughts look like if there would be? I have my thoughts on that, but yours I think, but I believe carry more weight. Can I hear yours first? Because I've been asked this a lot, and I just say,

so when this first came was just fill basically, and you explain to fill what we can't do that, because you can't play an event opposite here. Here's Phil's example I had a $15 million made for TV and event on a Monday and the tour made me pay a million dollars rights fee To the tour I could have made 15 million, but I only made 14 million because I had to pay them a rights fee to put it on TV Well, yeah, Phil so then there for Brooks Keppka or Thrice and Deshianbo or Scotty Shuffler didn't have an event the same day and compete with you.

You bought for a million dollars the exclusivity of the PGA tour rights and you sold them and made 14 million dollars. That's what the tour is protecting. So we as a PGA tour, we're protecting those rights and everything we do right now. So we can't sit down with guys that are wanting to compete against our model because they don't want. If they were saying, hey, we just want to get along. We'll play outside the US. How can we make this a system work? Greg Norman, flat out, we'll say it in the me. We want to shake up the golf world. We want to take over. And behind the scenes, they're saying two players,

we are going to own the PGA tour. You will see going forward in this court case, their strategy is not to coexist. So to your question before, could the tour see it coming? Yeah, they've seen the real intentions coming for a long time, a lot clearer than me. When I talk to Tiger, when I talk to Rory, I go,

oh, I didn't see that part of it. So there's a lot more going on behind the scenes and reasons why, believe the Saudis out of it. So there's a lot more going on behind the scenes and reasons why believe the Saudis out of it. It doesn't matter who's three billion dollars it is. If they want to take over the PGA tour and have us be a feeder system, we'll pick guys out of college, we'll pick guys off the PGA tour, and then we'll have the best golf product in the world. Well, why wouldn't we defend it? I don't think? I don't think we should sit down with them, especially not with Greg Norman. Yeah, that's, there is no way that they would negotiate

or act in good faith at this point. And one, they're gaining ground and any concession from the tour as a sign of weakness, more signals to them that they can put their foot down, you know, even harder on the gas pedal in terms of this takeover. And I just don't think that they are out to squash the PGA tour. And you can see it in his Instagram posts and all of that.

It's just, it's not, it's not a group that you wanted to go shake with. Well, look, I, I really, as I said a year ago, I would have said, don't worry about it. Now I, if you say, what do you get what's next? I have no idea. This is I haven't seen this movie before. You know we don't know what's gonna happen. And it's frightening, it's disheartening. But the worst thing about it is for me right now Tiger tells me

your job is to protect and get the president's cup team ready. I just got off the phone with Trevor Emblem. We don't know how to pick a team when we don't know if more guys are gonna leave. I'm still disappointed and hurt or sad that I don't have those guys we talked about earlier. I don't have Dustin Johnson. He was my favorite guy to watch at these events.

I watched more holes of Dustin Johnson play international team competition than anybody over over the last five or six teams. I watched him all but four holes of whistling straights. I stuck with him every step of the way. I carried his umbrella. I carried his reindeer in my back back, dusting that everything I ever asked him as a captain or assistant captain. I loved him as a teammate and we had a great conversation before he went to live and I have no hard feelings about his decision, but I'm sad that he's not going to be on this team and be a leader like he was at Wistling Strengths. That's the disappointing part of it and And the thing that's really hard to swallow is, you know, we've got a guy on our island of sea island guys that have stuck

together and done so many things together that we're worried about if he's ever going to play again. I mean, that's just sad. I got a kind of a weird question here. You're honestly one of the few people in the world I think could ask that. And I know it's not normal kosher social behavior to talk about money, but I would characterize it to say like you've made a lot of money in your professional golf career. What would more money get you? Because that is the question that is being asked

a lot of these dudes that already have a lot of money and are taking a lot more. It's double triple what they've made, but I'm wondering, and obviously you're only answering for yourself, what would a ton of more money do for you? Well, money can't buy happiness. You know, I've made a lot of money in my life. My dad was a club pro.

I literally hung out in the backroom until it was four o'clock and I was allowed on the golf course. I didn't, you know, they said about Cam Young. He grew up on the streets of New York. No, he grew up at Sleepy Hollow playing really nice golf courses. But he was still the pro's son, you know. He still wasn't a member of the club. He dug it out of the dirt like Tyre and so many people have said.

So I made more money than I ever dreamed of. I came out to try to, I thought maybe I could play on the tour and maybe I could win a couple golf tournaments when I was a teenager or in college. I never dreamed that title, and this is public, would pay me, you know, $40 something million contract or that I would make, you know, $50 million in prize money. I never dreamed of that.

So money, money can't buy happiness. I've had a lot of tragedy in my life as well. You know, my family, my faith, my friends, if I had twice as much money, that's not gonna change. My three little granddaughters, they have a nice pool to swim in when they come to my house, but that's not why my family is so close, is because of money.

I'm becoming fans of so many new people like Max Homa or Sam Burns or even more Justin Thomas and Jordan Spieth. Scotty Sheffler is just one of the all-time great people I've ever met. We're seeing people's true colors. But what Max said, I think it was back in February or was around, maybe was that Tigers tournament. You can't buy my dream. I'm grindin', and I probably, they may kick me out after the last couple of PGA tournaments I played,

but I'm grindin' to try to play the most PGA tournaments anybody's ever played, like 804 or something. I'm gettin' close. I still want to try to figure out how to win a champion's tour of it before my body gives up. I just love playing. So more money, I'm like the Tom Kim,

I don't know how much money I make in a tournament. I'm just trying to win it. I'm embarrassed that I haven't won on the champion's tour. So no, money is gonna change my life. The tour is paying me my retirement now because I didn't play 15 last year. You can't imagine, they're paying me so much money. I don't have to play golf anymore,

but I love to play golf. So no, it wouldn't change me. The live tour can't buy. They don't have enough money to buy my loyalty to the PGA tour. Or frankly, my loyalty to Tim Finchham and Jay Monahan, because I've watched them grind it out the last, you know, 25 years to make the tour what it is. And yeah, you can't, I'm with Max, you can't buy my dream or my loyalty. I think I know the answer to this question, but I think is the last one for this topic

in particular. But how safe is the commissioners job? I've been asked that a few times and I actually asked that by one player and I said, I don't think his job could be any more safe. You know, he has a player meeting a couple of them at a recent tournament and there were some I heard, oh, it was realious. And then I get the details and it's two or three guys that, you know, we're basically added to the field and they're complaining about things that, I think he's got a ton of support right now. I think yesterday, not the winning of the judgment, but seeing how our lawyers presented

what the PGA tour is doing and how dishonest and how unorganized the live presentation was, it just showed that we have a great strategy. And, you know, I think he's very safe. I haven't heard any. There's a groundswell to support the commissioner rather than a groundswell to hey, we got to do something this end going well. Well, I appreciate. I think I think that's all I could possibly throw at you on those topics, but there's, you know, another, we've talked a little bit of presidents, cup, writer, cup stuff, and you've been, you know, pretty a key, you know, part of a big transition in

how American team golf has been played over the last, you know, I don't know. I don't know if it traces back to the 2014 press conference or not, but it seems to be from there. But I want to know is the six picks, six captains picks. Is that here to stay for all of us golf for the, for the foreseeable future? I don't think so. No. No, it was a reaction to COVID, because going back, we didn't know, and it actually happened, we didn't know if the Ryder Cup would get delayed or not. We didn't know how many terms would get played.

If it got played on its original date in 2020, how many terms would have counted for the points for that year? So that was the reaction to our stats, guys, or money ball guys saying, hey, we need to do something. They actually, they wanted more picks than six and steep that I can't do more than six picks. So we had to decide our strategy before they even played the Ryder Cup last year. So we just said, hey, we're going with the system this year. We'll probably have a lot of the same guys involved in the process for President's Cup. Let's just keep the same

system for next year. And then the next Ryder Cup captain can make his decision to go back to two or four. You know, it's changed around two, three, four, now six. So no, it's nothing's written in stone for sure on fixed. I'm surprised to hear that because I felt like that that was a positive trend, if you will. I was thinking more along the terms of that the more control the players slash captain have over the team room and who makes it in. Because in reality, if you think about it, you, let's say it's four captains picks instead of six. The risk there is that you end up a guy at seven or eight that you wouldn't take with a captain's pick for any, any recent Patrick Reed or something along those lines. And that is kind of the only real downside

I would say in that. And yeah, we didn't take Bob at eight. He was number seven in the world and number eight. He was nine in 2016. That's what you're thinking of, yeah. Seven and nine. And we took eight on points, seven and nine. And we didn't take him. And he was assistant captain that year. He was a little bit mad and then he was a little bit excited.

Yeah, you're right. And that's for Zach and whoever his Assistance are for them to kind of Decide I like right now I like Jack Nicholas's Theory one year in presence cup because why don't we just take 12 on points and then I don't have to call anybody The Jack you're pretty smart. I got it. That was hard for him at that stage of his career He was I, he did it three years in a row, three cups in a row. It was hard for him, the greatest player ever,

to have to call guys and tell them they're not on the team. That's one thing we've gotten really good at since 2014 is as a group, you know, Tiger on down of everybody getting together and going, okay, how did that work last year? What should we do differently? And the reason, like Max said, he doesn't get a whole lot of chances to stand up in front of the media and say what he thinks. I'm getting the chance because I'm president of Scott Captain this year. Zach will get a year of it the next year as being kind of the spokesman for the players and for the team. And Zach will have to make a decision how he wants to pick it and how far down he wants to go.

Right now, leaving Liv defectors out of it, I really like the top 12. So you're right, this time I might go all the way down, past eight or nine, as you say, you guys are in. And let's all talk about who we're going to pick for the last couple of spots. Hmm. What, how is the process for evaluating captain's picks evolved over the

years? How do stats factor in course fit, team fit? How does that work now? And I'm wondering if that has changed in your time, both as a player and your first time being captain, head captain in 2012. A dramatic change again. Jack Nicholas just asked Jeff Sloom and he said, Hey, you know all these guys want you to come be my assistant and help me figure out, you know, what I'm doing and who to pick and how to make pairings. One year, I think it was Jack's first year. He said, Oh, Dave and Fred, you guys helped me with the pairings because I don't know who likes who and who plays well together. Now it's, it's statisticians. We have four assistants and plus we have Tiger. we have a lot of input

into the captain's selections and into the stats. And obviously your gut has to, when you come down to two guys in the stats, say one thing and you go, well, wait a minute, this is a great partner for this guy and I know this guy's putter better than the stats. And so a lot of times it's just a combination of factors, but it's completely changed.

I mean, Kim Venturi's just winging it when he was captain. And now we have a system that we've been running since 2015 in Korea of doing the same thing over and over again year after year. Yeah, it seems like, you know, you go, I guess if you go back to 2015, the only US team to lose was 2018 in France, right? Like every, every other president's cup team has been successful and all the Ryder cup teams have been successful.

Yeah, well, that's what Phil was a big part of the process of getting us. He started the pot over there in 2014 and then we took it from there and he was a big part of the plan for the future and he said we just want to give them the best chance to succeed in every Ryder Cup or Presence Cup and we have to have consistency and continuity. I think that's what we've done is the preparation, we have the same, we've just added our stats guys from the Ryder Cup, we've brought them on for the Presence Cup team. We're kind of like, I compare to Team USA basketball. It's a year round thing we're doing to get the international teams ready to play. And sure, Ryder Cup's different than Presence Cup. It's a different match. Different team we're playing. But it's the same preparation. Our stats guys went to Quailha, they're breaking down the course. We were talking

today about green speed and you know how's it going to play compared to in in September versus playing in in May. How is that going to favor our team versus their team. There's a lot more that goes into it. So we're picking for golf course, for pairings, for statistics, strokes game, T-degree, things that are hard to understand. And the stats guys help us break it all down and put it into a manageable package where us just average golfers can understand it. Is that Jason Aquino that you're talking to there?

It's Jason. Yeah, it's about, yes. That's what I dinner with him a couple of months ago and talked about the understanding that the link between they're giving you information. They're not making decisions for you, right? And I found that distinction to be important in regards to giving you what you need to make the most in four decisions. Is that a fair characterization?

Yeah. what you need to make the most in four decisions. Is that a fair characterization? Yeah, yeah. Aston and his team have gotten to know us, because I'll put a lot of the same guys. And he understands that when he says, all right, well, these two guys are 98%ile. If you put them two together, we go, whoa, whoa, whoa. Let us tell you the family history of this. Why they can't play together. And then you go, okay, we'll run a different model. So he understands golf, all those guys love to play golf,

like all your group, they love to play golf together and they're golf geeks. And so they understand that there's intangibles. And so yeah, they're giving us this information. And then we say, no, okay, they're giving us this information and then we say no, okay, we'd rather do it this way, run it the models this way and tell us, we trust them implicitly. They come to us and say, we found this out, this is something we really need to look at, we take a hard look at it. And we've had to learn that process too. The PJ of America didn't say, had to learn that process too. The PGA of America didn't say, do you want stats? They said, we're giving you stats. Pick from these groups. So we interviewed the different groups and they've been a huge asset to us. And yeah, they're a part of our team now. And it's fun to work with them. And I can't wait for the first big reports getting ready to hit off the work we've been

doing. They've been doing for the last month. I may need you to sneakily send that over my way if you don't mind me pouring over. If you need any input on decisions, you can send them my way as well. I don't just consult on the number of capnets picks. My services are very vast what I'm willing to offer up. We'll take you. We'll take any. You ride down your parings and take a picture of them and send them to I just like. Helby is there any way I'm based on the competition we've had. I think the answer to this is no, but any way that the way the international players qualify for the president's cup is through

a global official world golf ranking. Is there any way that they will be able, the ones that have left for live will be able to compete under any grounds like that? I've not heard rumblings of that. I've heard that several months ago, but what is the, as the official stance, I guess, of the PGA tour that if you are suspended from the tour or no longer a member, you will not be participating in this. Yeah, that's the official stance. Okay. You know, before I called players before London event and talk to them, I, I, I, I, I, I, remember you will not be participating in this. Yeah, that's the official stance.

You know, before I called players, before London event and talked to them, I double triple checked with Jay Monahan and Andy Pazner, the leaders of the tour. And my tell them these guys are right, they go, yeah, if they play and they continue to play, they just keep doubling down on their suspensions and they're not gonna be eligible for the presence cup.

And, you know, I would refer you to the BJA tour for an answer, but no, my understanding is that they are not eligible to play on either team. Do you think that we will see players play in the presence cup and then leave for live directly after that? we will see players play in the presence cup and then leave for live directly after that? You know, I'm, I'm, again, I'm in, I'm in the dark so much that there are two terms between the tour championship and the presence cup, one to week after the tour championship

and one to week before. And then there's some talk about that if they don't play those two, they can't qualify for the finals, which I guess in a made up exhibition tour that they probably could let them do whatever they want if they join late. But I don't know. I don't know why, one, I don't know why I'd leave the PGA tour and take a risk. Two, I don't know why you'd hang around for one president's cup and then take the money and take a chance on not playing the next one. I don't know why you'd hang around for one president's cup and then take the money and take a chance on not playing the next one. I don't know. That was the rumor was that the Aussies were going to go after the president's cup and

now we're here and it's after tour championship. That's disappointing to say the least in terms of, I mean, there's not a lot of team golf competitions and the has a question. Here's the question for you and for me and for the tour and for Trevor, the fans, guys on the team. If there's a guy that that's saying in the paper is gonna go after the tour championship and you have to look at that guy in the locker room for three weeks and then there's a guy on your team of 12

that's reported to be going after the presence cup. Do you want him on your team of 12 that is reported to be going after the presence cup. Do you want him on your team? Do you want to be his partner? If he's going to turn his back on the PGA tour and join a lawsuit against you the next week after the presence cup, I don't know how all this, you know, as a friend of my Lance Berra from CBS Sports, this has grown up stuff. I don't, I don sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm, I'm sorry, I'm, I'm, I'm sorry, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm imagine the lawsuit and from talking to some of the guys that I've talked to, the lawsuit has really rubbed a lot of the guys on the PJ tour the wrong way in terms of you can go play live like you can go and take it, but you just can't do both and to actively sue is hurting the value for all the guys

that aren't trying to double dip right now. And that is added an extra layer of a little bit of an FU, I guess, to those guys. Yeah, I think, like your question before, could the tour of seeing this coming? Will the players, certainly, are now getting the full grass, but wait a minute, they sued our organization to come play after they just made tens of millions of dollars with another competitor, and they're hurting us. And they want to sue our whole structure.

They're trying to break down and say we're a monopoly and it's anti-trust and we're going in a court battle possibly for years. Now they're getting the reality is hitting these guys and they're getting matter and matter. I'm with them. I don't know what to do other than support the tour, support the commissioner. Like Tyre says, get the presents, Cup team ready. I don't know what 12 I'm going to have. I know six or eight of the guys. And I know some guys that are down the list that are dying to play.

I don't have a problem with that. You know, I'm Trevor knows he has some guys that are excited to play. I don't have a problem with that. You know, and Trevor knows he has some guys that are excited to play, but that's going to be the story though. Unfortunately, when you get there, is where's this guy? Where's that guy? You know, it's it's a sad day for golf all the way around. And it's interesting and it's great talking points and great conversation, but it's a sad day for golf. Because in the end, somebody's going to win in court, but everybody's going to end up losing, but the lawyers in the long run.

Yeah, no, it's a great short term. I've been saying it's great for short term interest and content and discussion, and we've been no shortings of stuff to talk about on this show, but gosh, at the end of the day, I can't imagine looking up in two years and being like, wow, this was a great thing for ProGolf and it made it a lot more interesting. And I just think that I, I mean, I've made this point a lot.

They're playing pretty fast and loose with what was already, in my opinion, something that's, for most weeks at the edge of providing the minimum amount of entertainment as it is, you know, it's not must see TV every Thursday, Friday, Saturday that you tune into watch PGA tour golf. And now they've taken so much, you know, of what made the tour interest. It was interesting to watch the villains alongside the guys that you're rooting for.

It was interesting to watch Bryce and Deschambos playing style out on the sixth hole at Bay Hill over that water. That was very interesting. I just don't care what he does in a live event. Like you've taken away what has made Bryce an interesting and I just can't see that being a sustainable enjoyable thing for golf fans at home. That's the sad thing.

If they win, the tour goes downhill. If the tour wins against Liv, what do you do with Bryson? I mean, can you ever let a guy like Bryson or Brooks back? It's, you know, just had a big article about Pete Rose, you know, are all those guys gonna be Pete Rose or are they gonna own the PGA tour? It's it's crazy It's crazy. It is literally crazy and it and it's sad and stir things that it best we're hitting balls

Because I just keep thinking we're gonna wake up and this is all gonna go away. It's a bad dream and it is a bad dream for It just makes us makes us all look like You know, we always had the silver spoon Oh, they're pro golfers with their white pants Fancy car attitude Perception, but now it makes us look just greedy, you know, and that's that sad Yeah, I think I can find no better way to leave it than that because I tend to agree with a lot of what you said and I I greatly appreciate your time

and willingness to speak on this. We'd love to have somebody directly from the tour on. We love to have the commissioner on to do this but for a lot of reasons that can't happen. I think you're as somebody that can speak on this as clearly and as openly as possible from your perspective and that's greatly appreciated. Davis. Well, thank you. I've enjoyed getting to know you guys through the, the social media and your podcast lately and hopefully on one day, I'll get to go on one of these cool golf trips with it. That looks like a lot of fun. I need to get back up and play plantation again.

I absolutely was up there. We we we got to chat a little bit when you guys opened it. I think fall 2019 and try to make it up there once a year to play it because I absolutely love that place. That come back up, Ben Griffith, that just played well at Windom, just shot 59 out there. So it must be getting easier.

It's, it's, it's gettable. It's doable out there, but it's, but it's very fair. So I appreciate your time. I'll be sending over my, my captain's picks to you, and I'll be looking for that, that stats info from you as well, but we'll do it again sometime.

Okay, yeah. I'm gonna use something fun. Alright, cheers. Get a right club. Be the right club today. That is better than most. How about in? That is better than most.

Better than most.