Who ever thought the quiet little polite game of golf could cause such a hailstorm of controversy?
But here we are today, a day after one of the most stunning days in recent sports history. That is not hyperbole. What happened Tuesday absolutely stunned the sports world when the PGA Tour announced it is merging with the Saudi-backed LIV Tour.
This is like fire and gasoline coming to a truce.
The details of the agreement — which also includes the Europe-based DP World Tour league — are still a bit fuzzy with a few more T’s to be crossed and I’s to be dotted. But The Washington Post’s Rick Maese and Matt Bonesteel wrote, “The three organizations will combine to create a new for-profit commercial entity and will continue operating distinct tours, at least for now. The PGA Tour will continue operating as a non-profit organization, and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund will become a major tour sponsor.”
And, of course, the sides are ending all pending litigation.
The New York Times’ Alan Blinder wrote, “The merger represented the most stunning success to date of Saudi Arabia’s ambition to become a player in global sports.”
For months, this has been one of the most heated rivalries in sports. Players from the PGA Tour defected to the LIV Tour, many for millions of dollars, and that set off a constant back-and-forth of biting insults, much of which centered on the horrendous human rights record of the government that is backing LIV. Families of the victims of 9/11 also condemned the “sportswashing” the Saudi government was attempting by funding the LIV tour.
In fact, it was just a year ago that PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan talked about the families of 9/11 victims, saying on a golf broadcast that his heart goes out to them and that he knows people who lost loved ones in 9/11. Then he said a quote that will haunt him for a long time: “I would ask any player who has left, or any player that would ever consider leaving — have you ever had to apologize for being a member of the PGA Tour?”
That’s just one of the statements Monahan made while standing on the moral high ground.
And yet it was Monahan who helped orchestrate the new deal.
New York Post sports media columnist Andrew Marchand tweeted, “It is so gross how Monahan and the PGA used the families of 9/11 victims.”
I’ll get back to all the reaction in a moment, but let’s start with one of the media angles in this story.
Who had the big scoop about the PGA-LIV Golf deal?
ESPN? The New York Times or The Washington Post? A golf publication?
Nope.
The Big Lead’s Liam McKeone astutely pointed out exactly what that said. McKeone wrote, “Given they immediately had interviews lined up with PGA commissioner Jay Monahan and head of the Saudi Arabia Public Fund Yasir Al-Rumayyan, they didn’t just get lucky and stumble upon a massive scoop. It was given to them by the parties involved. And it’s all you really need to know about how they wanted the rollout handled.”
He added, “Specifically, this news went to CNBC because it would be viewed through a business lens, not a sports lens. It’s two companies merging, not two sports leagues merging. As such the questions Monahan and Al-Rumayyan received had nothing to do with golf and everything to do with the financials behind the decision. CNBC anchors aren’t interested in how Tour players will receive this news. They want to know how the business will benefit.”
And, as McKeone noted, that’s exactly how the PGA and LIV wanted it.
The reaction
PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, shown here last July. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)
Reaction around the sports media world was swift and, mostly, extremely critical of Monahan, who seems to have cut this deal without speaking to the players. Mind you, many big-time PGA Tour players such as Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas turned down hundreds of millions to stick with the tour — all along, defending it and clashing with other golfers.
The Wall Street Journal’s Jason Gay wrote, “After shaming players for taking the money, the PGA Tour is … taking the money.”
The late TV executive Don Ohlmeyer famously used to say, “The answer to all your questions is money.” And that’s certainly what this came down to. Money.
Gay wrote, “The public, meanwhile, will be asked to forget that the past year ever happened. Golf’s conscience has driven straight off the high road and is doing doughnuts in the club parking lot. You’re going to hear the word ‘hypocrisy’ so much in the coming weeks you’re going to want to banish it like a belly putter.”
Speaking on ESPN’s “Around the Horn,” ESPN’s Mina Kimes said that Monahan managed to “sell out morally and also sell out his own constituency at the same time, which is truly remarkable.”
Kimes added, “Put yourselves in the shoes of a PGA golfer who turned down LIV money. Over the past year-plus, you believed you were taking a principled stand. You have watched your peers accept, in some cases, hundreds of millions of dollars to link arms with a regime with a terrible human rights record. You have spoken out against that record. And you have been told, yours is a player-run organization. Today, you wake up and you realize that was all a lie.”
Yahoo Sports columnist Dan Wetzel blasted the PGA, writing, “The PGA Tour — the pure, pure, ethically-minded PGA Tour — was about freedom and human rights. It was completely against torture and abuses and certainly sportswashing, which is when bad people use the positives of competition to make themselves seem less bad. The PGA Tour — the pure, pure, ethically-minded PGA Tour — were the supposed heroes on the front line, maybe the last honest and upstanding enterprise on earth, as it tried to fend off the Saudi-funded LIV Golf tour. That’s how they told it. Well, at least, until the money got good enough to sell out.”
Even Monahan seems to know he’s in for plenty of criticism. He met with the players in a meeting he called “intense” and “heated.” One player, Geoff Ogilvy, told the Golf Channel, “I’m glad I wasn’t Jay today.”
Monahan told reporters, “I recognize everything I’ve said in the past in my past positions. I recognize that people are going to call me a hypocrite. Anytime I said anything I said it with the information I had in the moment.”
To say LIV Golf was barely making a ripple on TV is to overstate the impact of a ripple. It has a deal with the CW, but only a few hundred thousand people were tuning in each week. It got so bad that LIV stopped announcing its TV numbers.
So why did Monahan look to merge? He said he is looking at the long-term future of golf. What he didn’t say is he might have gotten nervous about litigation. And, again, the answer to all your questions is money.
But two things now remain to be seen from a media aspect: How dogged, persistent and inquisitive will golf journalists be moving forward, particularly on this story? And how will the networks, which didn’t hesitate to take little potshots at LIV, handle things from now on?
CNN’s messy leftovers
The leftovers from Tim Alberta’s big profile of CNN boss Chris Licht in The Atlantic continue to get messier. Licht apologized to CNN staff on Monday and said he is going to “fight like hell” to gain their trust.
But is it too late for Licht? This isn’t just about The Atlantic article (although that didn’t help) but about several things: poor ratings, low morale and that disastrous Donald Trump town hall.
In his “Reliable Sources” newsletter, CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy wrote, “In the wake of The Atlantic’s explosive story, I’ve spoken with dozens of staffers across the company. There are a wide range of emotions coursing through the halls of CNN. Some staffers are frustrated. Others are angry. Many are sad about the awful state of affairs that has taken hold of an organization they love. There is one near-universal sentiment, however, that has been communicated to me: Licht has lost the room.”
Based on their sourcing, The Wall Street Journal’s Isabella Simonetti and Joe Flint wrote, “Jake Tapper, Erin Burnett and Anderson Cooper are among the CNN personalities who have voiced their concerns about Licht’s leadership, some explaining their views during conversations with incoming CNN Chief Operating Officer David Leavy.”
However, Darcy did note that Licht struck the right tone in his mea culpa to staff during his Monday editorial call.
Meanwhile, Axios’ Sara Fischer wrote, “The network was already under enormous stress following years of corporate mergers, product pivots and evaporating cable viewership. The latest saga calls into question how prepared the network will be to cover the 2024 elections — typically its most lucrative programming opportunity — and whether it’s prepared for the eventual collapse of the cable bundle.”
But as far as staff? Darcy wrote, “In the eyes of so many at CNN, there isn’t anything Licht can do at this point to win over their support. They’ve hit the wall with him.”
And even though it appears, at the moment, that Licht has the support of his boss, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav, Darcy wrote, “Zaslav, I’m told, understands the dire state of affairs at his news network. He wouldn’t have dispatched his top lieutenant before the publication of The Atlantic piece if he did not believe there was a problem. And the publication of the magazine’s article added gasoline to the raging fire. … Whether CNN’s corporate ownership will force a change remains to be seen. Several media executives that I have spoken with in recent days have all said that it is hard to see how Zaslav doesn’t do something.”
A small town hall
In case you didn’t notice — and based on the numbers, most of you didn’t — CNN had a town hall with another Republican presidential candidate over the weekend. On Sunday night, it hosted former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. It was much less controversial than the town hall CNN did with Donald Trump. And it had way fewer viewers, as well — about 83% fewer, in fact.
While Trump’s town hall attracted around 3.3 million viewers, Haley’s town hall had only 562,000. But, for what it’s worth, CNN won the night against other cable news networks in the key 25-54 demographic.
Speaking of which …
(Courtesy: CNN)
CNN announced another town hall with a Republican presidential candidate. It will do one with former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie next Monday at 8 p.m. Eastern. Anderson Cooper will moderate.
Even hockey journalists are tough
Maybe the Florida Panthers, who are down 2-0 in the Stanley Cup finals after being blown out in Game 2 in Las Vegas on Monday, should think about signing one of the reporters who is covering the team. After all, she has put up more fight in this series than they have.
CBS Miami reporter Samantha Rivera was doing a live shot in the arena following the game when a Vegas fan tried to jump into her shot. She wasn’t having it. A stiff arm, a barrage of “nope, nope, nope” and one last shove shooed away the fan. Then, without missing a beat, she kept right on doing her job. Here’s the awesome video.
After the game, she tweeted, “Listen, I don’t give a damn what team you’re rooting for – get the hell out of my face when I’m working and respect that I’m here to do my job. Excited to get back home to some classy #Panthers fans for game 3!!”
In an interview with Sports Illustrated’s Jimmy Traina, Rivera said she saw the guy out of the corner of her eye just before she went live and kept an eye on him.
“And then,” Rivera said, “I don’t know if I heard him or felt him, but I sensed him, and the second I did, my arm just came out. It’s not gonna happen! I was annoyed.”
It’s not the first time someone walked into her shot. Once, a dog did. But that was a playful moment. While all turned out OK Monday night, Rivera admitted after the fact that she was scared for a moment and nervous because “you didn’t know what that guy was gonna do.”
When Traina asked what it’s like to go viral like this, Rivera said, “I don’t think I ever saw myself going viral for something like this, but it’s nice to see all the positive comments. Getting random calls, texts from old friends, even exes. It’s like, ‘I haven’t talked to you in years. Why do you think I’m gonna talk to you now?’ It’s quite an experience, for sure.”
Media tidbits
- “Tucker on Twitter” is the name of Tucker Carlson’s Twitter show. Here’s the 10-minute first episode that was posted on Tuesday.
- The Associated Press has named Maria Sherman as its music writer. According to the AP, Sherman has previously worked as a culture writer at Netflix, senior writer at Jezebel, managing editor at Gizmodo Media Group, senior correspondent at Fuse TV and contributor at BuzzFeed Music. She will be based in Los Angeles.
- Originally published on Northwestern University’s Medill Local News Initiative website and up on Poynter’s website now, it’s Mark Caro with “Fewer than a third of Americans believe local news holds public officials accountable, poll finds.”
- For New York Focus, Chris Gelardi with “A New Prison Policy Blocks Incarcerated Journalists and Artists From Publishing Their Work.”
- Fox News’ Harris Faulkner, supposedly one of the network’s news hosts, talked on air about her faith and encouraged others to believe in theirs and then claimed she was once asked to leave a restaurant for bowing her head to pray. Here’s the clip.
Hot type
- The New York Times’ David Enrich with “A Reporter Investigated Sexual Misconduct. Then the Attacks Began.”
- Politico’s Michael Hirsh with “Daniel Ellsberg Is Dying. And He Has Some Final Things to Say.”
- The Atlantic’s Mark Leibovich with “Money Broke Baseball.”
More resources for journalists
- Time for a new job? Your future employer is looking for you on The Media Job Board — Powered by Poynter, Editor & Publisher and America’s Newspapers. Search now!
- Subscribe to Poynter’s Friday newsletter, Open Tabs with Poynter managing editor Ren LaForme, and get behind-the-scenes stories only available to subscribers.
- Executive Leadership Summit (Oct.) (Seminar) — Apply by Aug. 14.
- Level Up: Critical Skills for Local Reporters (Oct. 3-Nov. 14) (Seminar) — Apply by Aug. 31.
Have feedback or a tip? Email Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones at tjones@poynter.org.
The Poynter Report is our daily media newsletter. To have it delivered to your inbox Monday-Friday, sign up here.
