Cameron Smith, 5 others leave PGA Tour for LIV Golf
Yahoo Finance's Josh Schafer discusses the latest wave of golfers leaving the PGA for LIV.
Video Transcript
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BRAD SMITH: PGA's rival tour LIV Golf scooping up more players with Open champion Cameron Smith and five others announcing their departure for the new circuit. Yahoo Finance's Josh Shafer joins us now with the details. Josh, what do we know about these new players making the jump?
JOSH SCHAFER: Yeah, so we knew it was coming, right? We talked about this a couple of weeks ago, guys. Cam Smith has been rumored to be leaving the PGA for a while now. So Cam Smith, the headliner there because he's the number two golfer in the world, of course.
But the other important names to point out were kind of right next to Cam Smith in that full screen we just showed-- Joaquin Niemann and Harold Varner. And I point out those two guys because Joaquin is 23 and he's Chilean, so he's a little bit of a different mix than what the PGA kind of has right now. And that's kind of what I'm getting at here when we talk about the PGA as an overall business.
They're a group entity, right? And that's their-- that's how they make money. They go together and they say, here's our hole Tour. Sponsor our whole Tour. Broadcast our whole Tour. Well, the PGA is losing some diversity when you look at who LIV Golf is taking.
BRAD SMITH: Right.
JOSH SCHAFER: They're not taking these people by accident. They want to be diverse, too. And so now, the PGA is kind of being left with some of their top players being the traditional white country club golfer. That's not a good brand move for the PGA moving forward. That's not a great product to present to someone.
And another thing I'll point out, because we love to talk about Jordan on here and we love to talk about Nike, Harold Varner is a Jordan golf athlete. There aren't a lot of Jordan golf athletes.
BRAD SMITH: I bought the shoes because he has them.
JOSH SCHAFER: Right. He's got the [INAUDIBLE].
BRAD SMITH: Can he still wear them on the LIV Tour?
JOSH SCHAFER: Is Jordan gonna do something about it because Brooks Koepka has been wearing Nike on the LIV Tour and we haven't seen a lot of these brands back out yet. These guys have been wearing that stuff. I'm curious what Jordan does, though, because Jordan-- as we know, Michael Jordan-- doesn't really like to be political.
BRIAN SOZZI: Yeah, no, that is it-- that's a very good point. And you know, Josh, I find it interesting, if Jay Monahan, head of the PGA Tour, if he was the CEO of a public company, he would be out on his rear end already. Because what we are seeing over the past month, month and a half from them, is almost comparable to a CEO delivering four terrible quarters in a row and they're board voting that they should get removed. Why does he still have this job?
JOSH SCHAFER: It's a great question, Brian. And I really don't know the answer. I think they need to do something different because they came out with this plan last week, right? They're gonna have 20 players now. They're gonna be able to split this $100 million. Players are gonna be able to make more money. But look at Harold's statement from yesterday. Harold came out and said, "I left for the money because I want to be financially secure."
BRAD SMITH: That was the best statement we'd seen by a player just transparent and saying, this is going to impact me, my family, my future grandkids--
JOSH SCHAFER: Right.
BRAD SMITH: --in an entirely different way.
JOSH SCHAFER: And it's because it's guaranteed money, guys, right?
BRAD SMITH: Yeah.
JOSH SCHAFER: There getting the real pro sports money where you sign a contract, it doesn't matter if you pull your back out the next day, you get that money, your family gets that money. It's hard to argue with what some of these guys are choosing when they choose that [INAUDIBLE].
BRIAN SOZZI: And this is a reflection of continued bad decisions. This does not happen overnight. This is continued under the watch of a Jay Monahan. You know, this is-- these players are not leaving because he said something a couple of weeks ago. I mean, this has been building up for, what, a decade.
JOSH SCHAFER: Right, and then waiting, and waiting, and you notice none of the changes really came until LIV came, right?
BRIAN SOZZI: Yup.
JOSH SCHAFER: And that's what Phil Mickelson told you months ago. And Phil's, obviously, been under a lot of scrutiny here. But they had a real point about the game of golf, I think, and there needing change. And that change did not come until LIV Golf came around. So I think that's a very fair point on Jay.
BRAD SMITH: We want to hear from the viewers here. Just tweet at us. Let us know--
BRIAN SOZZI: Very curious.
BRAD SMITH: --if there-- I'd love to hear kind of the spectrum of opinions. And even if anybody's going to a tournament-- I know you've gone to a LIV tournament as well.
JOSH SCHAFER: Yeah, I have.
BRAD SMITH: Just to see and sense the vibe, and you know, just see what it's all about.
JOSH SCHAFER: Does the momentum carry through football season is what I'm curious now, right? We talk about it all summer because there's nothing else on. Are people going to watch LIV Golf in October over the NFL?
