How LIV lost its ‘pulse’ in golf’s ugly civil war as Norman faces truth he can’t escape

The sport of golf was rocked to its very core when LIV Golf burst onto the scene in 2022.

The Saudi-backed tour promised to be loud upon arrival and they did just that, poaching some of the PGA Tour’s biggest stars, including Open champion Cameron Smith, by throwing even bigger sums of money at their feet.

The format of what LIV Golf offered also proved a point of difference to the PGA Tour, complete with shotgun starts, no cuts and players divided into teams.

The brash entry into the sport may not have gained admirers, but it certainly gained onlookers and generated heated debate across the sporting world as to the benefits and detractions of LIV Golf’s disruptive presence.

Going into the second season of LIV, the schedule was expanded to 14 tournaments and purses increased from $AUD222 million to a staggering $600m.

Despite the upgrades, many feel LIV’s promise of “golf but louder” is running out of gas.

Or, as USA Today’s Dan Wolken put it, the rival competition has quickly become something “you’d need a stethoscope to determine if this tour even has a pulse.”

Norman's promise falls flat as LIV fails to gain 'needle movers'

LIV poached some serious talent at significant cost in its infancy.

Six former Masters winners — Phil Mickelson, Bubba Watson, Dustin Johnson, Patrick Reed, Sergio Garcia and Charl Schwartzel — all signed on the dotted line.

So too did Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau and Smith to name three to add further star power to the breakaway tour.

Making such a large splash was the only way LIV could prove itself as an immediate disruptive influence.

The PGA’s response was swift and strong, banning every defector from the tour when the ink was barely dry on their LIV contracts.

As The Independent’s Ben Fleming wrote, creating such a storm was the perfect way for LIV to throw its elbows out and gain a seat at the table in golf.

“Last season thrived off that controversy,” Fleming wrote.

“The brash marketing of CEO Greg Norman, the Donald Trump appearances and talk of golf’s great civil war.”

Norman promised more star power for LIV’s sophomore season, with the Australian golfing great hoping to snap up seven of the world’s top 20.

Whispers of American duo Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay joining the breakaway tour were the loudest of the lot.

However, the recruitment drive ultimately fell well short of the desired outcome.

Schauffele and Cantlay stayed put with the PGA Tour while LIV’s premier signing, if one could call it that, was 31-year-old Belgian star Thomas Pieters, ranked 34th in the world.

Mito Pereira, Sebastian Munoz, Dean Burmester, Brendan Steele and Danny Lee rounded out LIV’s class of 2023 to little fanfare, if any at all.

Fleming noted the six recruits “are perfectly sound tour professionals” but there was no disputing they were not “the needle movers that LIV would have hoped for ahead of their crucial second year.”

Furthermore, the team rosters weren’t finalised until just over a week before the LIV season commenced at Mayakoba in Mexico in February 25.

It wasn’t just the players, or lack of, that LIV gained which raised eyebrows.

Departing LIV’s front office was former COO and president Atul Khosla, chief communications officer Jonathan Grella, president of franchises Matt Goodman and chief marketing officer Kerry Taylor.

All of the exits “weren’t voluntary”, with Norman and three executives from Performance 54, an international golf marketing and consulting group based in England, calling the shots.

There’s also murmurs doing the rounds some of the LIV crop have grown disenfranchised with the tour despite the dizzying money on offer and it could lead to even more PR warfare between the rival tours.

“I know there’s lots of rumours, Brooks Koepka seems to be the name that keeps getting thrown around that he’s not particularly enjoying it,” Rick Shiels said on The Rick Shiels Golf Show.

“There’s no fact to this, it’s just rumours.

“But, I’m pretty sure the PGA Tour would take at least the first player like that. A million per cent.

“Imagine the PR piece on that, a LIV player has gone back to the PGA Tour?”

Whether LIV can flip more players with greater star power than its class of 2023 remains to be seen, but Norman and co. cannot afford another off-season of roster moves falling flat.

A certain TV network deal could ultimately play a significant role in that too.

TV Network dead secured, but leads to humiliating new low

Despite LIV’s shiny new roster, the competition didn’t have a TV network to broadcast its first season.

Instead, they streamed it all live and free on YouTube, a simple way for fans to tune in wherever they were in the world.

Despite the easy access, it meant LIV had to fund all production costs themselves.

Granted, LIV can call on its deep pockets to front the production costs for a lengthy period of time, but it is not a successful business model.

LIV shopped its product to various TV networks across America and the reply was largely, ‘Thanks, but no thanks.’

All but one: the CW Network.

A channel known for its dramas such as Riverdale and Nancy Drew, CW entered into a multiyear deal with LIV to broadcast its live tournaments.

Fans wanting to watch the opening rounds of LIV tournaments could do so via the CW app, with second and third rounds of weekend tournaments broadcast on the app as well as the CW channel.

However, LIV would still have to pay all of the production costs and would not receive any rights fees from the CW, with financial details about the deal scarce.

Up against the PGA Tour’s Honda Classic, considered a secondary event in which most of the big names would miss ahead of the Arnold Palmer Invitational, Mayakoba was seen as the perfect litmus test to gauge interest in the league.

It flopped spectacularly.

Overnight ratings showed just 0.2 per cent of households surveyed tuned in to watch, but that isn’t even the most humiliating part of it.

According to Golf Digest, more people watched World’s Funniest Animals on the CW than Charles Howell III duke it out against Peter Uihlein to win the opening LIV tournament in Mexico.

With LIV’s failure to edge out the PGA Tour in viewership on a weekend when the opportunity was prime for the taking, Wolken believed it’s yet another nail in the coffin for the rebel competition.

“Not only did LIV seemingly fail to take any market share away from the PGA Tour, its weekend broadcasts were a perfect representation of why it’s not going to,” Wolken wrote.

“In the end, from the standpoint of the viewer, LIV is a solution in search of a problem that never really existed in the first place.”

There’s plenty more LIV events to come and there’s every chance the ratings could increase.

But, given it was the first tournament of the season, it’s a concerning figure that does not bode well for the remainder of LIV’s sophomore campaign.

Nor do the recently announced changes to the PGA Tour.

PGA's $30M LIV 'imitation' as superstar makes timely return

Despite the ratings victories the PGA Tour will likely enjoy this year and beyond, it doesn’t mean they can rest on their laurels.

LIV’s willingness to innovate, even if it means rankling more golf traditionalists at every turn, prompted the PGA to rethink how they go about their business to retain its talent.

That arrived in the form of what were defined as elevated events, with each tournament to have a staggering minimum purse of $30m, a dramatic increase on the prize money previously on offer.

Part of it is to ensure the best constantly compete against the best as well as the players most in form, generating an engaging product and a high level of golf.

The elevated events will also have the removal of traditional 36-hole cuts as well as reduced fields.

If it sounds similar to what LIV offers, that’s because it is.

And the rival tour wasted no time in roasting the PGA over the changes.

“Imitation is the greatest form of flattery,” LIV’s official Twitter account wrote.

“Congratulations PGA Tour. Welcome to the future.”

Even if the PGA Tour wishes to downplay the role LIV played in pushing for these types of events, it’s only served to help the longstanding competition preserve its future.

“The ultimate legacy of LIV, beyond the mind-blowing amounts of money the Saudis are going to light on fire, is that it absolutely pushed the PGA Tour into action,” Wolken wrote.

“The initial wave of players who took the LIV payday was concerning enough for the PGA Tour to make some dramatic changes to its schedule, amp up the purses for its biggest events and ensure more money landed in the pockets of top players.”

So far, there has been five elevated events this year out of a scheduled 17, the most recent being the Arnold Palmer Invitational which Kurt Kitayama won.

But none generated as much buzz — and perhaps proved why the PGA’s concept is a winner — as the Genesis Invitation in mid-February.

It wasn’t to do with the prize money on offer, nor was it the fact it took place in Los Angeles.

Rather, it was Tiger Woods’ appearance in his first PGA Tour event outside of the majors since 2020.

Woods’ appearances have been rather limited due to horrific injuries suffered in a car accident in July 2021.

The golf legend played in a handful of tournaments in 2022, but battled to find form amid the visible pain he was in.

The timing of Woods’ return cannot be understated.

For those playing at home, the Genesis Invitational began on February 16, nine days before LIV’s second season commenced.

Crowds flocked to the Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles to catch a glimpse of Woods, even if his golfing ability is no longer what it once was.

He ultimately finished T45 with one-under par,

It reminded the sport just how much of a drawcard he is and also why LIV threw a contract reportedly worth $1.2 billion his way when forming its initial roster.

Quite simply, LIV does not have a player who brings in those crowds, gets fans on the edge of their couches at home and gets the sporting narrative flowing quite like Woods.

After just one year of competition, LIV did exactly what it intended to do: rock the steady boat of golf.

It plucked several of the PGA Tour’s biggest stars with dizzying cheques and delivered something different, even if the changes rankled most traditionalists.

But the off-season ahead of LIV’s second campaign proved the sugar hit doesn’t quite last forever and the ratings on the CW were alarming, especially if LIV and the Saudi backers want to turn a profit.

And, as Wolken noted, LIV’s mere existence has kicked the PGA Tour into gear after several years of dormancy due to a serious lack of competitors.

Now that the PGA Tour is alive and kicking once more, with boosted prize packets for winners and its drastic schedule changes next year, LIV must unearth yet another different way to up its game if it wants to truly sit on the throne of golf.