Speaker 1: You cannot make this ship up this Keystone cops. And
Speaker 1: when when I when I first texted Norman, it wasn't
Speaker 1: like a gotcha. I really hadn't seen the video. I
Speaker 1: had no idea he was even there. And and then
Speaker 1: right when we were looking at the video, that's when
Speaker 1: he texted me back and said, I had no idea.
Speaker 1: It's like so absurd. There was there was dozens and
Speaker 1: dozens of people there, like who saw him standing there?
Speaker 1: I didn't because he was behind me, like lurking in
Speaker 1: the shadows like a snake. But everyone else saw it,
Speaker 1: Like it's just so ridiculous. Another log on the fire
Speaker 1: hears give it time. Welcome back to the fire Pit.
Speaker 1: I met Janella and on this episode of the fire Drill,
Speaker 1: which is quite hot, we hear from Alan Schipnuk on
Speaker 1: being live at the inaugural Live event in London, joining
Speaker 1: us is Ryan French and Michael Bamber, before we get
Speaker 1: to the specifics of a day in which Alan was
Speaker 1: ultimately escorted out of Phil Nicholson's press conference. A quick
Speaker 1: appreciation for the sponsors who make all of this possible.
Speaker 1: We want to thank Dormy Workshop for making the next
Speaker 1: set of merchandise will be dropping on Firepit Collective dot com.
Speaker 1: We're lucky to have our logos on some of the
Speaker 1: Bishop Famili's handmade leather goods such as head covers, stash bags,
Speaker 1: and glove caddies. Thanks to bag Boy for their support.
Speaker 1: Bag Boys Nitron Auto Open push Cart is the best
Speaker 1: in the business and for me, it's not even close.
Speaker 1: And thanks to Part Points, our friends Brandon Ebert and
Speaker 1: Kevin Quinley have created an app that changes the way
Speaker 1: you can score the game, which is especially good for beginners, kids,
Speaker 1: families and buddies trips. Looking for an alternate format, download
Speaker 1: the Today and go make part and now is Joe
Speaker 1: Horowitz likes to sing settle down and settle in. This
Speaker 1: story is about to begin, Alan Shipnuk. First of all,
Speaker 1: are you are you okay? Yeah? I mean, it's the
Speaker 1: whole thing has been so nutty. I mean I was
Speaker 1: literally just standing in the back of Phil's press conference.
Speaker 1: You know, I wasn't so when I got when You're
Speaker 1: just getting credential has been a journey. They finally credential
Speaker 1: to me today after it already bought tickets. I was
Speaker 1: just just gonna just go as a fan basically, they
Speaker 1: came through their credential that late this morning when I
Speaker 1: was already in London, and and but one of one
Speaker 1: of the very nice women working in the media center,
Speaker 1: she came out to meet me and she's like, Phil
Speaker 1: doesn't want you to talk to him. I was like, well, okay,
Speaker 1: let's just see how it plays out. I mean, I
Speaker 1: flew across the ocean to be here, Like he's the
Speaker 1: most important person in this tournament. I'm not going to
Speaker 1: commit to not asking him a question. But we just
Speaker 1: kind of let it go and I was just gonna
Speaker 1: feel it out. And so he was doing his scrum
Speaker 1: and I just kind of stood in the back and
Speaker 1: I hadn't even really decided how was it going to play.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to see what his energy was like
Speaker 1: and what the whole, the whole vibe was and and
Speaker 1: then the goods like descended on me and things just
Speaker 1: got really weird. So what's really weird? What's what? What's
Speaker 1: really weird? Me? Um? Well, they I mean the guy
Speaker 1: that grabbed my arm and was pulling me away and
Speaker 1: I just said, don't touch me, and he said you
Speaker 1: need to come with me. I said, no, I'm actually
Speaker 1: gonna watch this press conference. He's like, you need to
Speaker 1: come with me. I said why, He said, because we
Speaker 1: need to scan your bads. I said, I just got
Speaker 1: scanned five seconds ago. And so then he grabbed me again.
Speaker 1: I said, don't fucking touch me. And by now there
Speaker 1: was like some energy, you know, in in the little
Speaker 1: His other reporters are right there, and so his other
Speaker 1: buddy was like, kind of they were, they hadn't like
Speaker 1: boxed in. He was kind of nudging me. So I
Speaker 1: started walking and then my old high school basketball coach,
Speaker 1: Joe chap Will be so proud. It was like going
Speaker 1: for an offensive rebound. I kind of gave the swim move.
Speaker 1: I did little spin that I was back to where
Speaker 1: I was. I went around both of them. It's one
Speaker 1: of the greatest moments of my life. Unfortunately that no
Speaker 1: one got that on camera. Um. But then then there
Speaker 1: was a third dude. So now, like I didn't want
Speaker 1: us to be a whole side show, and it was
Speaker 1: already too, I mean, Phils already up there talking. I
Speaker 1: was like, okay, I'm just gonna like just walk away
Speaker 1: because this is not gonna end well for anybody. So
Speaker 1: so then we walked twenty feet. So there's like there's
Speaker 1: this little where the pen is to get into the
Speaker 1: the flash interview area and they scanted my badge, it
Speaker 1: comes up green. I said, see all good, and he's like, well, uh,
Speaker 1: we need to reassess your badge, you know. And this
Speaker 1: whole time like if I even, like, you know, change
Speaker 1: the weight of my foot, he was like, he's like
Speaker 1: shadow boxing. It was so ridiculous. But I'm standing out
Speaker 1: there and it's just a thing, Like there's all these
Speaker 1: security people. So if I could see an n wandered
Speaker 1: over the New York Times and everyone everyone's getting all
Speaker 1: fired up, and I was just like, I'm just gonna
Speaker 1: go very zen here, and I was, I was just
Speaker 1: on deep freeze. They kept changing their story why and
Speaker 1: then finally the guy said, well, um, I said, you know,
Speaker 1: my computers in the press room. I'd like to go
Speaker 1: do my work now. And he's like, wow, you can't
Speaker 1: go in there because there's somebody in there. He doesn't
Speaker 1: want you in there, which I guess it could have
Speaker 1: been Norman actually, but I'm assumed maybe it was Phil
Speaker 1: doing some postcrum interviews. I don't know. Um. And then
Speaker 1: and then finally one of the people who runs the
Speaker 1: pressroom came and got involved, and then they I think
Speaker 1: at that point, whether it was Norman or whether it
Speaker 1: was Phil, they exited the tent. So then everyone just
Speaker 1: kind of melled out. I just went back to my
Speaker 1: computer and started typing, which ironically I'm writing like a
Speaker 1: whole story, which I'm still gonna write and we'll still
Speaker 1: post on practical Collective dot com about like I thought,
Speaker 1: it was a super interesting day at and a big
Speaker 1: moment for the sport, and I was, you know, um,
Speaker 1: I'm not here. I came here with no agenda or
Speaker 1: no vendetta, Like I just was a curious observer house
Speaker 1: was going to play out. So it's just kind of
Speaker 1: my dispassionate. Um, you know, dispatch on on the first
Speaker 1: round at the live event. Um, you know, I guess
Speaker 1: I'm trying to help them out by by being here
Speaker 1: and writing about it in a serious manner. But it
Speaker 1: took a turn for the absurd to say the least,
Speaker 1: Wasn't it Isn't it also a little bit about the
Speaker 1: fact that the kind of the golden rule of journalism
Speaker 1: is is if you write something about somebody day, you
Speaker 1: show up the next day and face the music. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean for sure, like you know, this is this
Speaker 1: is why I'm here because Phil's here. You know, I
Speaker 1: hadn't really planned to cover the event. Um, but he's
Speaker 1: returning to public life obviously have been chronicling his whole journey.
Speaker 1: I've been part of it in some way. Um, and
Speaker 1: so yeah, I feel like I needed to be here.
Speaker 1: I would love to have a conversation with Phil, you know,
Speaker 1: whether he's out by the dais or we can have
Speaker 1: a private moment, like if he's got things what he
Speaker 1: wants to say to me. You know, I'm here to listen.
Speaker 1: And um, you know, I'm definitely not like avoiding the
Speaker 1: guy or Greg Norton for that matter, who I've had
Speaker 1: my own issues with lately. Um. So yeah, I mean yeah,
Speaker 1: came into the lions Den here and uh, I was
Speaker 1: just here to try and do some serious work and
Speaker 1: um it's turned into fucking clown show. But I'm still
Speaker 1: here to do work and that's my My goal has
Speaker 1: and changed from what you've heard of stil In in
Speaker 1: his indoor press Scotts the other day, and as we've
Speaker 1: observed over the years, these guys can sometimes be very
Speaker 1: different indoors and outdoors. Um, was he still automaton Phil
Speaker 1: the r E. Fleischer you know, stamp of approve of
Speaker 1: Phil like the other day, or was over there shades
Speaker 1: of like we're actually going to see the real film
Speaker 1: mikls him again. Yeah, he he loosened up a little bit. Um,
Speaker 1: I could see that. I think, Um, he was definitely
Speaker 1: over coached and that that first press conference and overrehearsed,
Speaker 1: and there was a stiffness and an awkwardness there and Um,
Speaker 1: but you know, I get it. It's there was a
Speaker 1: there was a lot of build up. There was a
Speaker 1: lot of things that he wanted to say, some things
Speaker 1: he couldn't say, some things he had to say. So
Speaker 1: that was kind of a fraud return to public life,
Speaker 1: and you know there's a challenging scenario for him or
Speaker 1: for anybody, and putting putting that position. Um, there was
Speaker 1: a little more levity this evening. I mean even when
Speaker 1: when they kind of went me out of this area,
Speaker 1: I could still hear Phil that you know, they amplified
Speaker 1: by speaker, so I got a little taste of his
Speaker 1: comments anyway, and he did he I think just getting
Speaker 1: back between the ropes and feeling the love from the crowd.
Speaker 1: You know, got a big ovation on the first hole
Speaker 1: and people were were cheering for him all the way through.
Speaker 1: You know, he had a couple of recovery shots from
Speaker 1: the wrong side of the ropes and he's knuckle bumping
Speaker 1: folks and they're definitely it's definitely a pro Phil crowd. Um.
Speaker 1: Some of that made just because you know, he's validated
Speaker 1: this tournament and this this new enterprise. I think people
Speaker 1: are also just they like cheering, fulfill they like watching
Speaker 1: him play, and they're happy to see him back. So
Speaker 1: there was a lot of good energy out there for him.
Speaker 1: And as you're saying, Michael, I think I think he's
Speaker 1: kind of peeling back some of the artifice and I
Speaker 1: think he's gonna be a little more real. And you know,
Speaker 1: the US Open week next week is gonna be fascinating.
Speaker 1: Um uh. You know, he's already got his press conference
Speaker 1: set for Monday, and um, the British, the British boys
Speaker 1: are are are different. I mean they came strong this week.
Speaker 1: I mean they don't mess around in these press conferences,
Speaker 1: but a lot of them are aren't really on the
Speaker 1: golf beat. They're more generalists and they're just they're just
Speaker 1: here because it's a big tournament. You know, next next
Speaker 1: week will be the actual golf press and people feels
Speaker 1: known for a long time and has has a lot
Speaker 1: of relationships with UM, so I think there'll be a
Speaker 1: different level of intimacy and maybe emotion and how he
Speaker 1: handles that is going to be quite fascinating. So just
Speaker 1: take take us through it for a second here. So
Speaker 1: you you flew red eye landed this morning and and
Speaker 1: went directly to to the to the golf course. Yeah,
Speaker 1: pretty much. When I came to the hotel, took a
Speaker 1: shower and change clothes. But yeah, then just got still,
Speaker 1: you know, because of my daughter's high school graduation and
Speaker 1: other reasons. I mean, that was part of why I
Speaker 1: wasn't gonna be here, but ultimately I just felt like
Speaker 1: I had to be, so um. I probably it would
Speaker 1: have been great to be here even a day or
Speaker 1: two earlier, but this is like the earliest I could
Speaker 1: have I could have made it. So yeah, I'm going
Speaker 1: on about forty five minutes of sleep since I left
Speaker 1: California two days ago. But I've got some adrenaline, for sure,
Speaker 1: I mean, um, but yeah, so I mean it was
Speaker 1: a good day out there, like it was. My takeaway
Speaker 1: from this whole thing is it just felt like a
Speaker 1: golf tournament. You know. There was some of the pageantry
Speaker 1: with the beefeaters and the flyover and the trumpets and
Speaker 1: the black London taxis, but once they put they put
Speaker 1: a peg in the ground. I mean it was just
Speaker 1: really good golfers trying to shoot a low score. And um,
Speaker 1: it's not it's not a exceptionally artful course, but it's
Speaker 1: a tough test. I mean it's a narrow fairways and
Speaker 1: very fiddley and a lot of moving on the greens,
Speaker 1: and so guys were it was. It was a really
Speaker 1: good test. I mean you had to you had to,
Speaker 1: as Michael Bamber says, you had to golf your ball.
Speaker 1: So it was fun to watch. I think, Um, there
Speaker 1: was a cool energy. I mean it was the first
Speaker 1: few holes, it was it was total a key like
Speaker 1: hundreds of people were just ducking under the ropes like
Speaker 1: it was you know, Francis we met Um Brookline kind
Speaker 1: of thing, and he definitely they got things slightly more
Speaker 1: under control as it as a day we're on and
Speaker 1: people kind of chilled out. But the first few holes.
Speaker 1: I mean, it was just it was like it was
Speaker 1: kind of this cool energy, like uh, you know, football style,
Speaker 1: and I enjoyed it. It It was fun to be out there.
Speaker 1: Did did Dustin Johnson looked like his normal self or
Speaker 1: did he look different? Yeah, he looked like the same
Speaker 1: Dustin Johnson, which is to say, mildly disinterested. Um, but
Speaker 1: you know, he kuy knows how to play golf. I
Speaker 1: mean he he hit one of the worst drives I've
Speaker 1: ever seeing him, you know, slice ad ob when you
Speaker 1: have all the room in the world down the left
Speaker 1: side of that hole. But he fought back. He had
Speaker 1: a lot of great iron shots. And I think, you know,
Speaker 1: for Dustin, for Phil, those two guys, especially that this
Speaker 1: is kind of a new energy. It's a new start.
Speaker 1: It's it's not that they have anything to prove, per se,
Speaker 1: but I think they're more fired up for this event
Speaker 1: than they would just be the Canadian Open. You know
Speaker 1: that that's kind of old hat, but they're a little
Speaker 1: bit there's obviously a big spotlight on them. There's a
Speaker 1: certain amount of scrutiny, especially Phil. You know, he put
Speaker 1: his neck on the chopping block for this whole thing
Speaker 1: that might be the wrong metaphor um, given the geopolitical
Speaker 1: underlying currents here. But the you know, I think I
Speaker 1: think there's there's a certain amount of there's a certain
Speaker 1: amount of like I gotta prove myself here, you know. Uh,
Speaker 1: which that one thinks that there's just gonna be a
Speaker 1: lark for them and they're not gonna try hard because
Speaker 1: they already got their money and it's just an exhibition,
Speaker 1: but that it may evolve into that. But I think this,
Speaker 1: especially this week and maybe the first few, like Phil
Speaker 1: was grinding hard. I mean he was working really hard
Speaker 1: out there because his driver he hit some loose drives
Speaker 1: and he didn't look comfortable as part of pretty much
Speaker 1: the whole round, he fought really hard for a very
Speaker 1: good score. You know, shooting sixty nine puts them in
Speaker 1: the top ten. So um, I mean, nothing could be
Speaker 1: more film Nikles than if he just goes out and
Speaker 1: wins this thing. I mean, that would just be almost
Speaker 1: it's almost a feeling of inevitability, right like it's just
Speaker 1: the only thing to be even that would make more
Speaker 1: senses for him to go in next week at the
Speaker 1: US Open. But um, so yeah, I detected some energy
Speaker 1: out of both those guys. They weren't punching the clock.
Speaker 1: I mean, they were here to work, and uh, that
Speaker 1: was that was kind of a fun thing to watch too.
Speaker 1: What were there any signs of Saudi Royals in the
Speaker 1: gallery or elsewhere in the clubhouse. Yeah, yeah, a couple
Speaker 1: of guys. I don't know their names, but I've seen
Speaker 1: them in photos and I know they're very involved in
Speaker 1: the Public Investment Fund and um, I don't know if
Speaker 1: the royals, but they're definitely ruling class and they were
Speaker 1: they looked elated. They were hugging everybody like I think
Speaker 1: this was a big moment war for all the people
Speaker 1: in Saudi Arabia who have you know, kind of gone
Speaker 1: to the wall on this one. For Norman, who has
Speaker 1: made plenty of mistakes, but he has built this thing. Um,
Speaker 1: there was I mean, Norman was giddy out there on
Speaker 1: the first tea and it was just like, man, we did.
Speaker 1: It's it's not easy to build something from scratch, and
Speaker 1: there's they've taken a lot of shrapnel, there's been setbacks,
Speaker 1: but it's just to get this thing off the ground
Speaker 1: is a huge accomplishment. And you know, we now know
Speaker 1: that they're not here. This week. But we know Patrick
Speaker 1: Reed and Bryson de Shamber coming. I mean all of
Speaker 1: a sudden they have accumulated critical mass of major championship winners,
Speaker 1: future Hall of famers. Um. But but needle movers right,
Speaker 1: like surgery. Garcia is not really a a factor. We
Speaker 1: can we got on the PGA Tour, but he moves
Speaker 1: in the needle. He's a very polarizing Patrick Read, superpolarizing
Speaker 1: Bryson de Shambo, incredibly polarizing Ian Poulter, you know, very
Speaker 1: much love hate kind of personality. So they're not They're
Speaker 1: not the best golfers in the world anymore. But I
Speaker 1: mean you can say Patrick Reed might be, but um,
Speaker 1: they are. They are huge personalities. And then you throw
Speaker 1: pill into that mix. Um, you know, Dustin I don't
Speaker 1: think I think people mostly love Dustin. But if they
Speaker 1: get Ricky Fowler, I mean that's a lot of star
Speaker 1: power that that's a lot of personality the average fan
Speaker 1: connects with. I mean, like John Rom Colin Marikawa. They're
Speaker 1: better golfers anyone that's in this live field. But they
Speaker 1: don't don't they don't inspire any emotion, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: they're fun to watch play golf, but nobody really cares
Speaker 1: about them, even the way they do about Patrick Reid
Speaker 1: or Sergio Garcia or Bryson or any of these dudes.
Speaker 1: So it's it's interesting, well, I mean, Live is sort
Speaker 1: of O l I V. They've sort of corned the
Speaker 1: market on on the bad boys and and the contrarians
Speaker 1: and um, the people that get that really get social
Speaker 1: media fired up. So it's it's worth king. I think
Speaker 1: that's the bottom line that's working. I just think from
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously the longevity of it and is that
Speaker 1: but from a TV watching perspective, obviously on YouTube and
Speaker 1: on my computer. But I mean it was really good.
Speaker 1: It was really good. The shotguns start works. My wife,
Speaker 1: who never watches golf, is like, holy kaw, we just saw,
Speaker 1: you know, fifteen drives in a row. Like at the
Speaker 1: beginning of the event. It was like boom boom boom
Speaker 1: boom booh boomp. And you know, obviously some of that
Speaker 1: is because it's a new product and whatever, but like,
Speaker 1: I mean, I kind of explained it. I was just
Speaker 1: talking to Mark. It's like it's like starting a race
Speaker 1: and the cars are already going around right like it's
Speaker 1: it was like back to back to back every if
Speaker 1: they got bigger names and it was like, you know, Phil,
Speaker 1: I don't tell you it's not there, but like Phil
Speaker 1: Tiger Rory. If they got bigger names and that's how
Speaker 1: you opened a golf show. I think it was awesome.
Speaker 1: The leaderboard on the side was awesome. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: the constant action. Obviously they don't have any answers, so
Speaker 1: it's easy to give constant shots. But I think just
Speaker 1: from a TV watching perspective, I was really really impressed.
Speaker 1: I was. My expectations were, let's hope the cameras on
Speaker 1: and the MIC's work, and they were like pretty seasoned. Uh.
Speaker 1: In my opinion, yeah, they brought they brought in pros.
Speaker 1: I mean, they know what they're doing. It's also cool.
Speaker 1: It's an underrated thing is they've all played basically the
Speaker 1: same number of holes, So the leader board has a
Speaker 1: lot of meaning. You know, on a Thursday, one guy's
Speaker 1: in the clubhouse at minus three, someone Birdie's first two holes.
Speaker 1: But you can't compare those scores. There's so much such
Speaker 1: a disparity and how many how deep into their round
Speaker 1: they are. But pretty much you look at the board,
Speaker 1: you know everyone's played the same number of holes plus
Speaker 1: or minus one and so um, to me, the leaderboard
Speaker 1: takes on even more value. And but I agree, Ryan,
Speaker 1: I mean it was it was. It was neat to
Speaker 1: when you know you're on you're walking around out there
Speaker 1: and just there's golf everywhere. And you know, if you
Speaker 1: go out early on a Thursday morning at a tour event,
Speaker 1: or on a Friday morning or Saturday or Sunday for
Speaker 1: that matters lonely, you know, it takes a while to
Speaker 1: fill up the golf course. But it was just it
Speaker 1: was it was fans everywhere because they you know, some
Speaker 1: some people wanted to watch Phil, someone to watch the
Speaker 1: English lads. There was a South African contingent of fans
Speaker 1: out there are pretty boisterous and there's a there's a
Speaker 1: bunch of South Africans here. Um, so the crowd was
Speaker 1: was pretty big, pretty loud, and nicely spread out. I mean,
Speaker 1: they're the Phil Dustin group definitely had the biggest gallery.
Speaker 1: But I was impressed, you know, it was it was
Speaker 1: a pretty good coverage throughout the whole course. But right away,
Speaker 1: like you're saying, like you just you went from zero
Speaker 1: to a hundred really quickly, from from kind of the
Speaker 1: fan experience from the beginning to the end and again
Speaker 1: like everybody's finishing at the same time was really cool
Speaker 1: in my opinion. You know, like no one's ever watched
Speaker 1: eight straight hours of TV of golf, Like it's compacted.
Speaker 1: So if you know, like you know you're gonna watch
Speaker 1: the last two hours, you're gonna see everybody. I thought
Speaker 1: it was. I thought it was. I was very skeptical
Speaker 1: a that they could pull anything off that. I mean,
Speaker 1: they've had a lot of stumbles leading up to this.
Speaker 1: I was like, I didn't think they had a chance
Speaker 1: to pull off a good product, and I mean it
Speaker 1: was simple things like that a drone shot and I know, Ellen,
Speaker 1: you were on site, so you might not have saw it,
Speaker 1: but there was a drone shot of Phil and Dustin
Speaker 1: and Scott Vincent walking up the uh fairway when they
Speaker 1: had little bubbles over their head with their face and
Speaker 1: their score and like you know, pointing to who it
Speaker 1: is is very minor, but it was like b roll
Speaker 1: waiting for the next shot to start. And it was
Speaker 1: an added thing you know that the PGA Tour doesn't
Speaker 1: do or p J recoverage doesn't do. It kind of
Speaker 1: felt like XFL. Remember when XFL came out and they
Speaker 1: ran for the ball in the middle of the field
Speaker 1: and they had this sky cam over that the you know, like,
Speaker 1: there's there's some aspects to what's going on here at
Speaker 1: I think the traditional tour can I really learn from
Speaker 1: the way. I mean, if this wasn't four billion dollars
Speaker 1: worth of Saudi Arabian money, I think they're everybody on
Speaker 1: this call would be rooting for this, this kind of
Speaker 1: disruption and change to the old, stuffy, you know, presentation
Speaker 1: of what is golf that a big chunk of Twitter
Speaker 1: verse just rails on on a regular, regular basis. I mean,
Speaker 1: in so many ways, this answers so many issues and
Speaker 1: questions about how we can truly advance this old fuddy duddy,
Speaker 1: you know way of things. And yet it's run by
Speaker 1: Saudi Arabia at backed by Saudi Arabian, run by Greg Norman.
Speaker 1: We could just get Saudi Arabian Greg Norman out of
Speaker 1: the picture. This could be something really worth rooting for. Well.
Speaker 1: I mean it kind of makes me think about you
Speaker 1: know what we talk about the Firepit collective. It's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we and our long careers, all of us watched all
Speaker 1: the mistakes that are that our bosses and our companies made,
Speaker 1: and we've learned from those and we've tried to have
Speaker 1: a much leaner, more efficient, more extremeline model. And you
Speaker 1: know that's what these guys have that benefit. You know,
Speaker 1: they've all I got to do is is follow Twitter
Speaker 1: on Saturday or Sunday. And you know what everyone hates
Speaker 1: about the current TV covered, So there's there's a blueprint
Speaker 1: out there if you're paying attention, Like I think you're right.
Speaker 1: I mean, they've they have a chance, and I mean,
Speaker 1: I can't remember where I said this, but I like
Speaker 1: the idea of different formats and they should just keep going,
Speaker 1: like keep pushing it. And someone, um someone tweeter are
Speaker 1: they gonna introduce like Mulligan gimmes? I was like, why not?
Speaker 1: I mean, just keep going, like if you want to.
Speaker 1: We we know what traditional golf looks like that next
Speaker 1: week at the US Open. That's old school golf and
Speaker 1: that's great and we all love it and venerate it.
Speaker 1: They're not that so I mean a breakfast breakfast ball
Speaker 1: off the breakfast ball off the first would be amazing,
Speaker 1: wouldn't it. Just Like I don't want a lot of
Speaker 1: places in the UK doesn't have a driving range, so
Speaker 1: we are, you know, pretty standard rules, no driving range,
Speaker 1: breakfast ball didn't get Oh you're showing up a little late,
Speaker 1: all right, we'll give you a breakfast ball. Yeah. What
Speaker 1: was it like to say, some of the establishment people,
Speaker 1: they're like a Johns Hopkins or a slug or White.
Speaker 1: If you happen seeing either those guys or or anybody
Speaker 1: else and they look like fish out of water, what
Speaker 1: was it like just to see him? No, that that added, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good question. Like that added to my sense
Speaker 1: of it felt like kind of a mid level tour
Speaker 1: event on a Thursday, where you have some stars, you
Speaker 1: have some people you never heard of, and you have
Speaker 1: some holes have a lot of fans, some holes only
Speaker 1: have a half dozen. And um, I was struck more
Speaker 1: than anything by the normalcy. You know, once they really
Speaker 1: just started playing golf, it was just golf. And that's
Speaker 1: a compliment. I mean, that's a huge accomplishment for live.
Speaker 1: You know, basically, in one year they've from scratch built
Speaker 1: what felt like a very legitimate, pretty big time professional
Speaker 1: golf tournament with some major championship winners and a good leaderboard,
Speaker 1: and you know, I kind of like the course. I've
Speaker 1: really never heard of it until a few months ago.
Speaker 1: But beautiful setting, rolling countryside outside of London, and narrow
Speaker 1: fairways and and kind of funky greens like this kind
Speaker 1: of course I would love playing. It doesn't strike me
Speaker 1: as a traditional venue form for a professional tournament. I
Speaker 1: mean it's really tight in some spots. Um, but that's great.
Speaker 1: I mean we know what Wingfold look looks like. You
Speaker 1: know what the country club looks like. I mean again,
Speaker 1: if they're if they're gonna, if they want to be
Speaker 1: different than then go to different places. And um, so
Speaker 1: I thought it was I thought it was a pretty
Speaker 1: good test. Did you have the sense more people were
Speaker 1: was the bulk of the gallery following Phil in DJ
Speaker 1: or did you have a sense that you know there
Speaker 1: was other people following other groups? Yeah, Polter had a
Speaker 1: good cry out. You know, West would had a good crowd.
Speaker 1: Obviously we're in England, so you know those guys, especially
Speaker 1: especially Polter, I mean even based in the US, they
Speaker 1: just they don't play at home that much. And um,
Speaker 1: you know I asked Poulter about that afterwards. He said, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was it was a delight to play in front
Speaker 1: of the home fans, and um, you know they had
Speaker 1: that had meaning for them. So um, definitely Phil. You know,
Speaker 1: I'd say Phil and DJ probably siphoned off half of
Speaker 1: the total gallery at least in the beginning. Um, but um,
Speaker 1: it's an interesting it's an interesting like nine doesn't come
Speaker 1: back to the clubhouse. In fact, nine is as far
Speaker 1: away as you can get really, So I think there's
Speaker 1: a nice three whole loop, and I think after the
Speaker 1: first three wholes some fans like I don't want to
Speaker 1: keep you know, marching out into the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 1: And so it felt felt like things got a little
Speaker 1: more dispersed to people's found some vantage points and um,
Speaker 1: but yeah, it was you know, Dustin and fills a
Speaker 1: lot of star power. If they're paired together any any
Speaker 1: tournament on tour, they would probably have the biggest gallery
Speaker 1: if Tigers not playing. So that that felt oprit and
Speaker 1: it just felt kind of normal. Um, you know, you've
Speaker 1: been following this so closely for so long and everything
Speaker 1: has seemed kind of unreal. Was there a moment today
Speaker 1: like Okay, we know where the PGA tour sins, we
Speaker 1: know these guys are gonna sue they're actually playing golf
Speaker 1: where people there are faces here I actually recognize. Was
Speaker 1: there ever, like, oh my god, they don't believe it
Speaker 1: for you, was there a moment of oh my god,
Speaker 1: I don't believe that this thing is actually happening, prior
Speaker 1: prior to being dragged out, prior to being how we
Speaker 1: know that it's unreal? No, it was when so all that,
Speaker 1: you know, I was walking out there with other other reporters,
Speaker 1: and I mean there's a there's a decent number of
Speaker 1: American reporters. I was walking with Sean Zac, you know,
Speaker 1: our old colleague Michael, and we were just chatting about
Speaker 1: this and that, and um, you know all the UK
Speaker 1: guys were friendly with, you know, Bob Harrigs here, Kevin
Speaker 1: van Waukeenberg. I mean, it's a pretty good turnout of
Speaker 1: you know, the golf beat. So yeah, that added to
Speaker 1: the normalcy of it all. But yeah, when when the
Speaker 1: email got leaked about all the players are suspended it,
Speaker 1: that was surreal because we all knew it, but the
Speaker 1: guys between the ropes did not. I mean, they're playing golf.
Speaker 1: No one's on their phone, they're not messing around, and
Speaker 1: so it was like like holy cow. Like it was
Speaker 1: kind of like, okay, the plot just thickened yet again.
Speaker 1: I kind of knew that that Monahan had to do something,
Speaker 1: but he came out hard right and um. And so
Speaker 1: then it kind of set up the surreal thing where
Speaker 1: everyone in the gallery knew that these guys were suspended.
Speaker 1: Their lines had just changed, their careers had just changed.
Speaker 1: They didn't know they're outher, you know, grinding or four
Speaker 1: footers and uh. And so then I'll come off the
Speaker 1: course at the same time, it's like bang bang bang
Speaker 1: and just um, um, you know, like the standard response
Speaker 1: as well, I need to think about it. Let me
Speaker 1: digest this. But then like Poulter talked about it, um,
Speaker 1: Schwartzel talked about it. You know, it wasn't a shock
Speaker 1: to them, but it was a little awkward that that
Speaker 1: was a surreal moment to answer your question, like, Wow,
Speaker 1: the whole future of the sport just changed, and these
Speaker 1: guys don't even know it while we're watching them play.
Speaker 1: That is weird. Did you get a chance to talk
Speaker 1: to any players? Yes, I mean so I was, I asked,
Speaker 1: I asked Poulter question and I asked schwarts little question. Um,
Speaker 1: I didn't get to I mean, I think that the
Speaker 1: filth thing never happened. Um, but that that's one of
Speaker 1: the that's honestly one of the challenges of the Shotgun
Speaker 1: is all the players are done all at once, and
Speaker 1: they're coming from a million different places, and it's hard
Speaker 1: to corral them. And um, professionally, it's much better whenever
Speaker 1: they come every twelve minutes. You can you can hit
Speaker 1: one guy after another, like you know, Michael and Ryan
Speaker 1: e too, Matt. I mean, you know how that goes.
Speaker 1: But all of a sudden, it's just a mad scramble.
Speaker 1: So and then I was dealing with all this other stuff,
Speaker 1: so I I really didn't get to do that kind
Speaker 1: of reporting. I would have liked to because I was
Speaker 1: to circle back to our original conversation to anybody, did
Speaker 1: you see anyone lost on what t they were supposed
Speaker 1: to start? Yeah, I mean I was hanging out by
Speaker 1: number one because that's where that's where Phil and Dustin were,
Speaker 1: and that was it was. I put a video up.
Speaker 1: I mean, it was a great crowd around the first
Speaker 1: he have hundreds of people and a lot of energy.
Speaker 1: But Schwartzel told the funny story he was on number
Speaker 1: three and he got there and there was no other
Speaker 1: players and he had like ten minutes he's all alone.
Speaker 1: Yeah you called it. It's like grahammar are you man?
Speaker 1: Like we gotta pag you? So your prediction was was
Speaker 1: bang on Ryan? Was there actually a shotgun that went off? Like?
Speaker 1: I mean, what so that was? I mean, it's actually
Speaker 1: it's hokey, but it was fun. They had um you know,
Speaker 1: they had like buglers like you know when you start
Speaker 1: a fox hunt, you know, the English countryside. So I
Speaker 1: was like, do do? Do? Do do do? And uh
Speaker 1: that's how that's how you knew. And uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I thought that was a nice touch. The black calves
Speaker 1: was kind of a cute touch. And that they did
Speaker 1: this flyover and you know we've all seen flyovers in
Speaker 1: the US. It's like the B fifty two stealth bomb
Speaker 1: or and like you go deaf when they roar over.
Speaker 1: These were like old They looked like World War two
Speaker 1: like dog fighting, like propeller planes, and there was the
Speaker 1: whole squadron like it was just there was kind of
Speaker 1: an of stealiness slash refinement that kind of made it fun.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's been easy to to roll our eyes
Speaker 1: and all this stuff. But they kind of got some
Speaker 1: of the details right and it kind of added to
Speaker 1: the whole celebratory feeling. What was the press tent food quality? Like,
Speaker 1: you know, that's a very important question, as you know, Michael, Um,
Speaker 1: I would say lunch was was a solid D minus.
Speaker 1: But then um, they actually had they brought in dinner,
Speaker 1: which doesn't always happened, and that was really good. So
Speaker 1: um that kind of redeemed the whole thing. So yeah,
Speaker 1: And if you like even the details of the press tent,
Speaker 1: I mean, if you if I blindfold you, Mike and
Speaker 1: I took you there, you you might think you're in
Speaker 1: an open championship, But just how's that look? You know,
Speaker 1: it might even be the same vendor, and uh so,
Speaker 1: um yeah, I mean it's it's funny they can't get
Speaker 1: ot their own way. I mean, part of the whole,
Speaker 1: the whole live. And I will say, like a very
Speaker 1: they're super liberal about what you can and can't do
Speaker 1: as a reporter. So I'm out there studing videos posting
Speaker 1: them to social media. Great, they like that because they
Speaker 1: get it. They want us to promote their product. And
Speaker 1: as you guys on this call and a lot of
Speaker 1: our listeners know the tours not that way, and we've
Speaker 1: had our battles. So that was liberating and fun, like, oh,
Speaker 1: I can just here's filling the trees. Let me just
Speaker 1: shoot like a cool little thirty second video and bang,
Speaker 1: like wow, that was that felt great And so that
Speaker 1: that's a that's a great leap forward for the fans
Speaker 1: because you know, you can't it's a two acre playing field,
Speaker 1: you can. They also don't have a network partnership, right,
Speaker 1: so they don't you know, they're not that in theory.
Speaker 1: They need everything they can get at this. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so all that stuff is great, but then it's like
Speaker 1: to have to have Norman come and like personally tossed
Speaker 1: me out of this this press commerce and turn into
Speaker 1: this whole like ridiculous side show. Like they just they
Speaker 1: take two steps forwards and they take like they take
Speaker 1: like a step and a half backwards. A um, there's
Speaker 1: a there's a level of sophistication there, and they do
Speaker 1: get a lot of the details, right, But I mean, Norman,
Speaker 1: this would be probably hard on for you to gauge.
Speaker 1: But I'm sorry, yeah, no, no, I'm just saying, when
Speaker 1: when if you make a list of like the cock
Speaker 1: ups and the things that go sideways. He was like
Speaker 1: Norman's always involved, But go ahead, Michael. But the tickets
Speaker 1: were so expensive and the Brits are not a customed
Speaker 1: paying a lot of money to watch golf. Um, do
Speaker 1: you think these are actually paying fans? Could you? Did
Speaker 1: you get a sense of it one way or the other? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So they they did. Um, they had discounts that are
Speaker 1: floating around the players put out. It was very easy
Speaker 1: to find off discount code and for a while you could,
Speaker 1: I think for a short period of time, and they
Speaker 1: were you could get them for free. I kind of
Speaker 1: missed the boat on that, Like I actually bought tickets.
Speaker 1: I paid you know, my fire Pit credit card because
Speaker 1: they did not initially credential me. Um. How much it
Speaker 1: was was like I think about a hundred pounds. I
Speaker 1: used the not twent discount. I went with him because
Speaker 1: the fewest number of letters. It's a lot easier than
Speaker 1: spelling Nicholson and and so. Um. That was just for
Speaker 1: Thursday and Friday. They were showing on the website that
Speaker 1: Saturday was sold out. Um now sold out is is
Speaker 1: kind of a funny term because they were given to
Speaker 1: they were literally giving them away for free. But um,
Speaker 1: I mean there was definitely some super golfy dudes, like
Speaker 1: you know, you could tell from eaves dropping on the conversations,
Speaker 1: from the logos they were wearing, like these guys looked
Speaker 1: like serious golf fans. It was also definitely some folks
Speaker 1: who've probably never been a golf term before. And um,
Speaker 1: they were kind of wandering around a little lost, and
Speaker 1: um that was cute. I mean that that's actually fun energy.
Speaker 1: I always like when there's new fans. I saw that
Speaker 1: at um Southern Hills, you know, like that's okay, we
Speaker 1: we want those people to come and have a good time. Um.
Speaker 1: But um, I don't have a sense of who paid what,
Speaker 1: but um, I would say it was it was a
Speaker 1: pretty overall pretty golfy crowd. So I think they got
Speaker 1: the demographic they wanted. And you know, in the parking
Speaker 1: lot there was a lot of nice cars. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of range Rovers and there was Bentley's and all
Speaker 1: that stuff. So I mean, I think they kind of
Speaker 1: penetrated the the upper crust London sports fan and that
Speaker 1: obviously it was a goal of theirs. It is it,
Speaker 1: I mean, is live golf literally buying professional golf. I
Speaker 1: mean with four hundred billion dollars and in the tour
Speaker 1: with eight hundred million to try to like go up again.
Speaker 1: I mean other than major championships. What's stopping them from
Speaker 1: literally just buying one player at a time. That's their
Speaker 1: business model. Nothing stopping them is working. I mean they've
Speaker 1: now amassed enough good slash great players or notable players
Speaker 1: they can't be ignored. Like you know, Monaghan had said
Speaker 1: he was gonna suspend guys, so we had to follow
Speaker 1: through on the threat. Or he looked like he's even
Speaker 1: more lost at seed than he already is. But that's
Speaker 1: just an opening gambit. I mean, this is all going
Speaker 1: to get litigated and or negotiated, and I'm not I
Speaker 1: think those suspensions may not hold. I mean, um, I
Speaker 1: feel like the tour at this point they don't want
Speaker 1: to get they don't want to concede defeat. But they
Speaker 1: might just have to hold their nose and and make
Speaker 1: another strategic alliance and just bring the Saudis into the fold,
Speaker 1: because the European PGA tour is getting killed, you know,
Speaker 1: all at all these top Europeans and South Africans, they're
Speaker 1: just gonna bandon the European Tour to play the Saudis,
Speaker 1: and the tour is already kind of floating. The PATO
Speaker 1: is already floating the European Tour. So the European Tour
Speaker 1: is taking the biggest hit in all of this um
Speaker 1: and the tour, the PGA Tour is now bound together
Speaker 1: with them. So to me, it doesn't serve the interests
Speaker 1: of the tour or its fans or its sponsors to
Speaker 1: ban very popular golfers who have you know who are
Speaker 1: and be in the Hall of Fame, like Dustin feels
Speaker 1: already there guys like Ricky who we all kind of
Speaker 1: roll our eyes, but Ricky Poyler is still very popular golfer.
Speaker 1: Um Like, how do how does it serve the interests
Speaker 1: of those tournaments if if those guys never play on
Speaker 1: the PGA Tour again, it just doesn't. And well, the
Speaker 1: other thing is like if we are we silly to
Speaker 1: think that brooks kept is not right behind him at
Speaker 1: some point, I mean, his brothers playing all of his
Speaker 1: buddy I mean, I just I don't think there's any
Speaker 1: way that Brooke doesn't go as well at some point
Speaker 1: and and and at some point these pg we saw
Speaker 1: a T and T got you know, undermined by the
Speaker 1: guys going and playing the actual Saudi event, and that
Speaker 1: couldn't have felt good for a T and T polling
Speaker 1: up all this money and then you know, having all
Speaker 1: these guys just go, At what point do all the
Speaker 1: big money sponsors who are paying all this money to
Speaker 1: get this, you know, this field of notables and needle
Speaker 1: movers push back on the tour and say whoa, whoa,
Speaker 1: whoa and how at what point do the do the
Speaker 1: broadcast partners say, uh, our ratings are dropping because the
Speaker 1: needle movers aren't showing up, and like, at some point
Speaker 1: this is gonna be there's gonna be more of a
Speaker 1: push to the tour than just the Patrick Reid's and
Speaker 1: the Bryson Deshambo's. I mean, this is going to keep
Speaker 1: going in a direction that doesn't bode well for for
Speaker 1: j and the PGA tour. Well. I mean, look at
Speaker 1: look at the top five at the Canadian Opening has
Speaker 1: been played this week. Wyndham Clark, Matt Fitzpatrick, Doug Gim,
Speaker 1: Harold Varner, Patrick Rodgers Like um, I like the leaderboard
Speaker 1: at the live event a lot better. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: you have three guys who won Masters at the top
Speaker 1: of the board with with Micholson and Dustin and and
Speaker 1: and schwartzell Um, you know Rory's lurking in Canada. I
Speaker 1: mean he's obviously a star, but Um Lee Hodges, Carlos Ortiz,
Speaker 1: Jim Canos, like, um, Mark Hubbard, Alex Smalley, like, that's
Speaker 1: the leaderboard in in Canada. So I mean, I'm on
Speaker 1: this call. Let's not disparage the lesser known players. I mean,
Speaker 1: they're great human beings, They're fantastic. Jim Jim's one of
Speaker 1: the best guys. I know. I love Jimmy hard Kay.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying the executive RBC sit around and talk
Speaker 1: about the return on their investment for the tens of
Speaker 1: millions of dollars they're plowing into this event. They're not
Speaker 1: thinking about don gim like come on, so um so yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean, honestly, and this brings up a
Speaker 1: conversation that Mark and I had today is you know,
Speaker 1: every a lot of people are saying that some of
Speaker 1: these people leave and it creates more opportunities for players
Speaker 1: like Mark and Marcus. Like I think eventually, in the
Speaker 1: long run, it's going to create less opportunities because they're
Speaker 1: gonna look at that model and go like, that's what
Speaker 1: we need to go to, right, And it's gonna be
Speaker 1: like who has the most stars packed on the board?
Speaker 1: You know? And and I don't I don't think it's
Speaker 1: out of the question. If Live succeeds that that one day,
Speaker 1: a lot of tournaments on the PGA Tour are back
Speaker 1: to you know, w G C s or whatever you
Speaker 1: want to call him marks Like I think in the
Speaker 1: long run, short term, obviously it's creating more opportunities for
Speaker 1: players like myself. But in the long run, I can
Speaker 1: see this being the corn Ferry is gonna replace the
Speaker 1: ten bottom players on you know, the PGA Tour, and
Speaker 1: that's it. And every because the PGA Tour is notoriously
Speaker 1: not cared about that vacuum that is constantly filled, right,
Speaker 1: They just want the top players to be at the board. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: if you know, if remember Joe Ogilvie, the tour player
Speaker 1: went to Duke. Now he's like a money manager. He
Speaker 1: probably should be the next commissioner the PGA Tour. He's
Speaker 1: such a smart guy. He did a little Twitter threat
Speaker 1: he was making that point Ryan that um the is
Speaker 1: already so bloated, and when you peel off some of
Speaker 1: the stars, they're gonna have to trim the fat. And
Speaker 1: he said, you know, instead of Hunt Top Hunter twenty
Speaker 1: five keeping their card and might go down to eighty
Speaker 1: or ninety, like, just you have to shrink the whole
Speaker 1: model so it gets less expensive for the sponsors and
Speaker 1: less overhead for the tour itself. And um, you know,
Speaker 1: fewer tournaments, smaller fields, like fewer exempt players, like yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that that could be that that could be
Speaker 1: the future of the PG threat met That's that's why
Speaker 1: Jay Monahan like, it's more than just a short term thing,
Speaker 1: like this is an existential threat too to the PG
Speaker 1: eight tours. It serves you know, it's gonna survive, but
Speaker 1: is it going to prosper Like that's really the question.
Speaker 1: And we talked about this previously, but you know, the
Speaker 1: Saudis are very cleverly going after these young amateurs and
Speaker 1: trying to take the next generation of players away as well. So, um,
Speaker 1: it was all you you guys haven't seen it obviously
Speaker 1: unless you saw my tweet, but of all days, of
Speaker 1: all days, to release Q school registration and increase it
Speaker 1: for the tenth consecutive year they picked this day. You
Speaker 1: can't get to the PGA Tour and Q school now
Speaker 1: costs sixty five dollars it is in two thousand and
Speaker 1: twelve it was three thousand dollars and you can get
Speaker 1: to the PGA Tour. And Mark had a great tweet.
Speaker 1: He highlighted uh Jay's letter to all the players and said,
Speaker 1: it's all about money, money, money with the Saudis, and
Speaker 1: here's here's the p G a tour taking from people
Speaker 1: who have no money. You know, for the most part,
Speaker 1: obviously there's plenty of players that have money to charge
Speaker 1: six to Q School, you know, like it. It's look
Speaker 1: in the mirror at some point of part of this
Speaker 1: that that is a great That is a great point. Ryan, Um,
Speaker 1: do you have any sense to Ryan's point earlier about,
Speaker 1: you know, would there be more world golf events? And
Speaker 1: my own sense is at the majors if this thing
Speaker 1: takes off, which it would definitely appear that that it
Speaker 1: will that over time the majors have become only more
Speaker 1: important because to be fewer times that we're really an
Speaker 1: old timey courses with big trophies and you know, the
Speaker 1: world's best players. But that only works if you actually
Speaker 1: have the best players in the world playing in the majors,
Speaker 1: and you need world ranking points for that to happen,
Speaker 1: among many other ways of getting in. Do you have
Speaker 1: any further sense of what might happen in terms of
Speaker 1: getting world ranking points by playing these livaments? I mean
Speaker 1: it has to happen. How can you not give out
Speaker 1: were ranking points to this event, which is better? You
Speaker 1: know they give it to Hero which is twenty guys
Speaker 1: with no cut um. And if you're gonna, you're gonna
Speaker 1: have situations where the live field is clearly superior to
Speaker 1: the PGA Tour. It makes a mockery of the world
Speaker 1: rankings if they don't assign points. Now, Peter Dawson is
Speaker 1: is the chair of the you know, the independent body
Speaker 1: that oversees the world ranking. We know he's died in
Speaker 1: the woold traditionalists, but um it, it's really gonna the
Speaker 1: change will come from from the majors. I mean there,
Speaker 1: and people say, oh, there, they're gonna. The majors are gonna,
Speaker 1: especially Augusta there. They don't want to live rebellion. They're
Speaker 1: they're they're they're gonna freeze out the players that makes
Speaker 1: no sense to me. I mean Augusta National, like the
Speaker 1: PG of America, like the U s g A, like
Speaker 1: the RNA. They want the best possible tournament. They get
Speaker 1: to do it once a year. They want all the
Speaker 1: stars there, they want all the contenders, They want the
Speaker 1: deepest field. Like why do they care about some turf
Speaker 1: war between the PG Tour and Live Golf? That's it's
Speaker 1: not their fight. They care about having an incredible showcase.
Speaker 1: They get to do it one week every year. So
Speaker 1: like does the Master's. They don't want Phil Mickelson and
Speaker 1: Dustin Johnson to their most popular champions. I mean, give
Speaker 1: me a break, why why would why would they ban
Speaker 1: them just because Jay Monahan's batted his job? Like, it
Speaker 1: makes no sense, And they don't want and to your
Speaker 1: point in the last podcast, they don't want a bunch
Speaker 1: of research done on how many members at Augusta National
Speaker 1: have business in Saudi Arabia. I mean, I truly think
Speaker 1: that I was thinking about this at a T and
Speaker 1: T when the guys went and played that Saudi event.
Speaker 1: At that point, why wouldn't Is this going to become
Speaker 1: a bunch of invitationals where a company puts up x
Speaker 1: amount of dollars and invites the players they want to invite,
Speaker 1: and has the people there that want to be there, Like,
Speaker 1: is this just because like, does the West Coast Swing
Speaker 1: become like its own little mini tour? And does the
Speaker 1: Florida like Swing become its own mini tour in which
Speaker 1: players play that chunk of of courses in preparation for
Speaker 1: something a little more meaningful. I mean, this could literally
Speaker 1: potentially be a series of smaller breakaway leagues formed by
Speaker 1: you know again, follow the dollar. The money is what matters.
Speaker 1: They are playing for money, with the exception of the
Speaker 1: big major championships. Why doesn't this just become a bunch
Speaker 1: of Live like tours. I mean, there's the whole I can't.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how quickly Live abandons the whole team
Speaker 1: concept because that just seems like pretty ridiculous. I mean,
Speaker 1: the problem, well, just about the team thing. First, this
Speaker 1: is such a transitional year and they're trying to get
Speaker 1: players and they're trying to sort it out. So the
Speaker 1: team things kind of a turkey because they're gonna have
Speaker 1: different teams every event. It's not carried through. It potentially
Speaker 1: gets more interesting when you have the same team together
Speaker 1: for the whole year, and then you can't have a
Speaker 1: rooting interest and more commonly embetting interest, and then you
Speaker 1: start caring more. You could do trades in the middle
Speaker 1: of the season. That would be super interesting. Well, if
Speaker 1: you could have a roster, if you can have a
Speaker 1: deeper roster, if you could have a starting four at
Speaker 1: a at a four people on the bench. Yeah, if
Speaker 1: it was if it was like Graham mcdowald being traded
Speaker 1: for Kevin nah in the middle of the season and
Speaker 1: that meant that team was in the tour change. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's just it's different, and I know it's fun, like
Speaker 1: old old crowd of casual golf fans, but that's like
Speaker 1: try something, we bitch and bitch and bitch that golf
Speaker 1: doesn't do anything new, and then when we try something new,
Speaker 1: we all bitched that it sucks. I think I think
Speaker 1: it can well, like you, I mean, I think it's
Speaker 1: just this is a compromise, Like, Okay, we're gonna do
Speaker 1: have some team element because we promised it. We just
Speaker 1: gotta get through this season and then we'll have firmer
Speaker 1: commitments and and they'll lock it in next year and
Speaker 1: it'll be more fun. But the players like the team element.
Speaker 1: Like Schwartzel was saying he had a five foot or
Speaker 1: for bogey and he was thinking, like all he was
Speaker 1: thinking about was his He knew his ball was going
Speaker 1: to count because whatever going on was his teammates and
Speaker 1: he's like, I gotta make this put. These guys are
Speaker 1: gonna really piste off at me, and this guy has
Speaker 1: a chance to win the tournament. And he said, I
Speaker 1: honestly cared more about coming through for the team than
Speaker 1: what it meant from my own score and the individual,
Speaker 1: which is saying something because four million dollars to the winner,
Speaker 1: but you know, Poulter talked about that because he played
Speaker 1: poorly and he's like, oh, man, I left the team
Speaker 1: down and I'm I'm so you know, so we're not
Speaker 1: focused on it, but they are. And oh, by the way,
Speaker 1: it's like real money. The winning team gets three million
Speaker 1: dollars split four ways like that on top of the
Speaker 1: individual and and then they carry it out throughout the
Speaker 1: year and there's more bonuses coming. So like, these guys
Speaker 1: care about the team event way more than than any
Speaker 1: of us could imagine, for interpersonal reasons but also for
Speaker 1: financial So I think it has a tance to be fun.
Speaker 1: But it's a little it's a little wonky this year.
Speaker 1: Did they did they use golf genius? Was their long drive?
Speaker 1: Who got the closest the pins? And who won the skins?
Speaker 1: I know? Right? I mean literally, like they shouldn't incorporate
Speaker 1: some of that stuff, like, um, like why not? Why
Speaker 1: not have have some closest de pens on the part three,
Speaker 1: He's like, just go for it. Okay, I'm I'm through
Speaker 1: over the day. I'm not playing great. There's here's a
Speaker 1: tough flag. Normally I hit them all the green. But
Speaker 1: you know what, music, I can win half a million
Speaker 1: dollars in one swing. Like That's what I'm saying, Like
Speaker 1: they live should instead of trying to be you know,
Speaker 1: traditional respectable golf, they should lean into all this stuff
Speaker 1: and just make it super fun music. People can ride
Speaker 1: around with speakers, you know, speakers, you know, play a
Speaker 1: little What are you saying, Michael, did you send any
Speaker 1: encorese scambling on the on the players amongst the fans? Um?
Speaker 1: I did not. That's a good question. I mean you
Speaker 1: do hear that more and more now here to tour event, Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, come on, come on, kept I got you
Speaker 1: on my in my parlay or whatever it is. You
Speaker 1: know people, it gets verbalized more and more. But I
Speaker 1: didn't pick that up British open so yeah, yeah, for sure, Um,
Speaker 1: I really didn't. But I'll try and tune into that
Speaker 1: a little bit more tomorrow. Well let's let's let's let's
Speaker 1: let you get to actually writing the story that I
Speaker 1: can't wait to read. I will end with this, this,
Speaker 1: this exchange, I mean, coming back all good narratives, come
Speaker 1: back to the beginning. So you're escorted out. Um, we
Speaker 1: get h Alex from CNN, who Alex Thomas from CNN,
Speaker 1: who shares the video of you. Uh, you send a
Speaker 1: text message to Greg Norman, tell us tell us more
Speaker 1: about sort of what what you ultimately tweeted out after
Speaker 1: this the scuffle. It's so ridiculous. So I I I
Speaker 1: texted Norman sort of shortly after this whole confrontation because
Speaker 1: I'm like, are they gonna are they gonna keep sucking
Speaker 1: with me this whole week? Like they didn't get me
Speaker 1: inside the Ropes lanyard, which is not that big deal.
Speaker 1: The crowds aren't that big. I mean I was inside
Speaker 1: the ropes for a few holes anyway because everybody's inside
Speaker 1: the ropes. But then, um, you know, every other reporter
Speaker 1: has an inside the ropes land heard there. I mean,
Speaker 1: I guess they don't want me to make eye contact
Speaker 1: with Phil on the golf course. Like okay, whatever, I
Speaker 1: don't that's not a big deal. But like after this,
Speaker 1: like I came a long way, like I wanted to
Speaker 1: be able to do my job, so I wanted to
Speaker 1: have a conversation with Norman, like what the fuck? And
Speaker 1: so I texted him right away and he didn't respond. Um,
Speaker 1: and then we got ahold of this tape. And the
Speaker 1: first time I watched the tape, I didn't even noticed
Speaker 1: Norman in the background. It was you, Matt, who was like,
Speaker 1: look at Norman. I was like, oh my god, there
Speaker 1: is so while I was like looking at this state,
Speaker 1: Norman texts me and I gotta get the wording because
Speaker 1: it's so funny, like I wrote to him, let me
Speaker 1: call this up. I got it. Yeah, oh yeah, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll read it. Yeah. So yourman, Yeah, your your text
Speaker 1: to Norman. Are you aware that I just got muscled
Speaker 1: out of Phil's press conference by a couple of your goons?
Speaker 1: Question Mark Luckily for you guys. I kept my cool
Speaker 1: and de de escalated the situation. Please call me to
Speaker 1: discuss uh Norman's respect happens by rightn't half yet? I
Speaker 1: don't have was by did not hear. Thanks for letting
Speaker 1: me know you responded back. That's funny because Colin and
Speaker 1: you screenshot a picture of you talking to goon one
Speaker 1: and Norman is right off your shoulder, staring right at
Speaker 1: you had this situation. You cannot make this ship up
Speaker 1: his keystone cops. And when when I when I first
Speaker 1: texted Norman, it wasn't like a gotcha. I really hadn't
Speaker 1: seen the video. I had no idea he was even there.
Speaker 1: And and then right when we were looking at the video,
Speaker 1: that's when he texted me back and said, I had
Speaker 1: no idea. It's like so absurd, like there was there
Speaker 1: was dozens and dozens of people there, Like who saw
Speaker 1: him standing there? I didn't because he was behind me
Speaker 1: like lurking in the shadows like a snake, but everyone
Speaker 1: else saw it. Like it's just so ridiculous, Like Greg
Speaker 1: Norman has got to go. Greg Norman has got to go,
Speaker 1: Like I mean, uh, Saudi's not going anywhere. Saudi Arabia
Speaker 1: is they're they're here to stay. But what is do
Speaker 1: they see in Greg Norman? They say, this is our guy. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, yes, he's made he's made some colossal, you know,
Speaker 1: foot and mouth mistakes. But I don't think the Saudi's
Speaker 1: care about that. He's delivered. He got the players, like
Speaker 1: it was not easy and it was messy, and but
Speaker 1: he delivered like he's you. You gotta give him his due,
Speaker 1: like um, Now, maybe maybe people signed in spite of him,
Speaker 1: but not because of him. But the fact is, it's like,
Speaker 1: you know, you knew the coach and the team's winning,
Speaker 1: you're a great coach, and when they lose and you're
Speaker 1: a bad coach. But he got the players here. They
Speaker 1: they're playing, their playing a live tournament. So I think
Speaker 1: the Saudis they're clearly not worried about public relations based
Speaker 1: on what they do, uh as you know, So I
Speaker 1: think that stuff is just noise to them. The fact is,
Speaker 1: you know, they're top guys from the public investment funder.
Speaker 1: They played the program with Phil, they had a great
Speaker 1: old time. They you know, they're out there hugging people,
Speaker 1: are they're living large on the first team. This is
Speaker 1: a great day for them. It's a great moment for them.
Speaker 1: Sports Washing totally totally agree with that, Alan because everything
Speaker 1: that Greg Norman represents he got now. With all due respect,
Speaker 1: Norman is the key key player here. They're not getting
Speaker 1: rid Enrman. Norman's charisman outside personality and the wine drinking
Speaker 1: and the dating life and the and the swashbut thing
Speaker 1: is everything that that repressed Saudi regime is not. So
Speaker 1: they love Norman, There's no question. I don't think there's
Speaker 1: any question about that. I've seen it with my with
Speaker 1: my own eyes. He's got this thing. Can I ask
Speaker 1: you a quick business question? I believe that. Tell me
Speaker 1: if I have this wrong. I think Callaway temporarily at
Speaker 1: least dropped Nicholson. And yet I thought I saw Nicholson
Speaker 1: wearing Callaway, Ryan, you seem to know the answer you
Speaker 1: already They put it on pause. So, okay, is he
Speaker 1: is he off the bus already or was he not
Speaker 1: wearing He hasn't, yeah, I mean, he hasn't wanted to
Speaker 1: talk about any of those questions. He hasn't wanted to
Speaker 1: answer them. But it was interesting. He was wearing an
Speaker 1: Augusta national vest, but it looked like he'd sharpeat it
Speaker 1: out because it was very monochromatic, which I've never seen
Speaker 1: from them. It was like kind of black on black,
Speaker 1: like I get Sharpie's and I sometimes do that on
Speaker 1: on labels, and so it had that look. Um. But
Speaker 1: his clothing he didn't have any Callaway as His hat
Speaker 1: was just his own personal logo and the rest of
Speaker 1: his clothes was pretty clean. But he's still using Callaway
Speaker 1: golf clubs. And and then his golf bag was that
Speaker 1: just a plain bag or you know, I didn't notice
Speaker 1: the bag that it was big. It was his own
Speaker 1: logo bag. Yeah, hat was on logo. He was playing
Speaker 1: Callawe Orange ten guys under par McDowell four over Westwood,
Speaker 1: five over Poulter, five of over Wisberger seven over. Uh.
Speaker 1: It's a I mean, I guess he got the players.
Speaker 1: He got just enough, like he got the bare minimum
Speaker 1: to make this thing work. And and I think, Okay,
Speaker 1: so you know, they's they've had to answer some uncomfortable
Speaker 1: questions this week from but that'll wear off. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't think they're gonna get asked those questions week
Speaker 1: after week. I just it becomes tedious for the reporters.
Speaker 1: And the fans. I mean that that's that's the sad
Speaker 1: thing about sports watching is it works because we get
Speaker 1: tired of repeating ourselves and people just tune it out.
Speaker 1: I mean it just it just that's how it is.
Speaker 1: And so, um, I think they're gonna get more players.
Speaker 1: I really do, like, um, they've seen Wow, that looks
Speaker 1: like kind of like fun. There's not that much blowback.
Speaker 1: You know, most of these guys are still wearing their logos,
Speaker 1: like you know Ups obviously that that was a high
Speaker 1: profile thing that they draw up, Um Westwood, but everyone
Speaker 1: else's logoed out here. I mean there they look normal.
Speaker 1: So how that gets Maybe maybe they have to get
Speaker 1: to the end of the year and things will start
Speaker 1: dropping off next year, who knows. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: you know, if you're you're at Callaway, you want to
Speaker 1: sell clubs in England, you want to sell clubs in
Speaker 1: Thailand where this this circuit is going, you want to
Speaker 1: sell them in the Middle East. So equipment companies, I
Speaker 1: don't think they're that bothered, you know, they're I think
Speaker 1: they'll they'll stay that. Um, some publicly traded companies there
Speaker 1: may be some pressure, but you know, as discussed. The
Speaker 1: Public Investment Fund is a shareholder in a lot of
Speaker 1: companies already. People have been doing business over there for
Speaker 1: you know, seventy years. Many fortunes in this country have
Speaker 1: been made through Saudi Arabia, So um it. I think
Speaker 1: that I think that a lot of these corporations. I
Speaker 1: can stick by the players because it's just a big
Speaker 1: platform and they're playing a lot in the US, They're
Speaker 1: playing all around the world. Like it might be attracted
Speaker 1: to some people, So watching the logos will be interesting
Speaker 1: a little from this year to next. And on June
Speaker 1: nine through eleven, backed by Saudi Money, Live Golf is underway. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's happening. It's it's undeniable. I mean, there's been a
Speaker 1: few people on social media be like, oh, you're over
Speaker 1: there glorifying it. It's like it's aid. It's a bona
Speaker 1: fide news event. It's a big deal for the sport.
Speaker 1: We've all registered our our disdain and our our our
Speaker 1: our outrage, and we've we've asked the hard questions and
Speaker 1: now it's like the playing golf tournament. I'm here, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna write about the golf tournament, and I'm gonna write
Speaker 1: about the players, and um, you know, I don't think
Speaker 1: it's cheerleading to just give an honest account of what
Speaker 1: it felt like on the grounds, and so, um, it's not.
Speaker 1: It's not that we're not by being here myself and
Speaker 1: the whole collective, we're not all of a sudden pro
Speaker 1: Saudi Arabia. We're just saying, this is a big moment
Speaker 1: for the sport and it demands to be taken seriously.
Speaker 1: So that's why I'm here. Your game story and more
Speaker 1: fire drills to come, Ryan, any final comments. I mean, wow,
Speaker 1: just what a what a cool time to be in
Speaker 1: golf media. I mean, what a what a crazy time
Speaker 1: to be in golf media. It is uh a wild,
Speaker 1: wild time. I would have guess obviously I've only been
Speaker 1: in a little bit, but Michael and Alan and Matt,
Speaker 1: for you guys to think about what is happening over
Speaker 1: the last two weeks, let alone just today, you would
Speaker 1: have I would assume, I guess I'm asking, would never
Speaker 1: would have ever thought to see any of this, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Remember Michael, when it was you know, the Ryder Cup
Speaker 1: team really wanted to get paid to play in the
Speaker 1: Ryder Cup. That was a big deal. Michael final comments, Well,
Speaker 1: if Alan wouldn't mind, if this might be two persons
Speaker 1: more than Alan once, this might be more than what
Speaker 1: Alan wants to give away. But to borrow from that's
Speaker 1: question the other day, if you had a chance to
Speaker 1: ask Philip question, what would you want to ask from
Speaker 1: at this point? Like good stuff? I know I know
Speaker 1: that one stuff because but it's us the other day
Speaker 1: of the stuff, I mean, well this point, I say,
Speaker 1: what are you afraid of? I mean, I sent you
Speaker 1: the book a month ago. I'm presuming you've at least
Speaker 1: flipped through it like it's all out there, like, what
Speaker 1: are you afraid of? I'm I'm not, I'm not. I
Speaker 1: wasn't gonna ask him some gotcha question. I mean really,
Speaker 1: you know what I wanted to ask him was did
Speaker 1: you have fun out there? Like did you feel like
Speaker 1: a rookie again? Like that was gonna be my question
Speaker 1: is not exactly chin music, you know, like I'm I'm
Speaker 1: fucking tired of being the story Like I'm really no
Speaker 1: one is more tired of Alan ship like that. I
Speaker 1: am like this fucking guy off the stage. But um,
Speaker 1: you know, like I just don't want what are He's
Speaker 1: so paranoid about that he's gonna be whispering in Greg's
Speaker 1: year to have these goons like prevent me from asking
Speaker 1: some just boring golf question, Like I would think that, um,
Speaker 1: it would be healthy for Phil an you want I was,
Speaker 1: I wasn't sure if was gonna be his press conference
Speaker 1: at the US Open. I'm gonna go and sit in
Speaker 1: the front row. At this point, like this is like
Speaker 1: that become ridiculous, Like, um, I mean, what are you
Speaker 1: afraid of? Phil Is? I think he's gonna be very
Speaker 1: popular in Boston because I mean, we all know Boston
Speaker 1: sportsman's they're like stick it to the man. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean the same the same Bostonians who stood for
Speaker 1: New York City after nine eleven and and and all
Speaker 1: that took place for going now rah rah rad For Phil.
Speaker 1: Sports fans are compartmentalized. I mean I think they're just like, um,
Speaker 1: I think I think you're right, Mike. I mean, there
Speaker 1: will be a few hecklers. But Phil did his time.
Speaker 1: You know, he was out of the game for four months.
Speaker 1: He he's come back, and even even though his comments
Speaker 1: were a little, um, we're a little coached, I mean,
Speaker 1: it was a big deal. For him to admit he
Speaker 1: has a gambling addiction. He's never gone that far. We
Speaker 1: we you know, there was a lot of anecdotal evidence
Speaker 1: in my can elsewhere, like we kind of knew he
Speaker 1: had a problem. But to actually use the word addiction,
Speaker 1: say he's done hundreds of hours of therapies, you have
Speaker 1: to battle this the rest of his life, Like that's
Speaker 1: very humanizing and that that takes a level of humility
Speaker 1: and even courage to like put it out there like that.
Speaker 1: And I think, you know, if he's just real like that,
Speaker 1: it makes me even more attractive and so um, you know,
Speaker 1: I think I think you're right. I think people are
Speaker 1: gonna be pulling for him. Just a very sorry man.
Speaker 1: If I could just make a very quick point about that,
Speaker 1: he has a very clever I think Ari Fleischer uh
Speaker 1: coached policy of if it relates to the PJ two
Speaker 1: ur he's not going to talk about it. This is
Speaker 1: totally speculation. I want to make that really clear. But
Speaker 1: if he gambled on himself, if if, if, if he
Speaker 1: gambled on himself in a p J two or event,
Speaker 1: and if others know about that, that would be a
Speaker 1: big deal, and that would be costly, and that would
Speaker 1: explain why, since he's already public about the gamble, he
Speaker 1: doesn't want to do about anything related to the pj T.
Speaker 1: Does that make any sense? O? Yeah, yeah, No. I
Speaker 1: kind of feel like all this public talk about the
Speaker 1: gambling is a preemptive strike against Billy Walter's book, not mine.
Speaker 1: That like that's already out there. And um, I mean
Speaker 1: I've just told some things off the record they're not
Speaker 1: in the book, and I'm just gonna leave it at that.
Speaker 1: But I think, you know, Billy Walters may have some
Speaker 1: stories to tell on the gambling front that it's useful
Speaker 1: for Phil to get out in front of. And I
Speaker 1: think that you know, we all know people who have
Speaker 1: addiction and and gambling addiction is a real thing. I mean,
Speaker 1: many lives have been destroyed, and so when you couch
Speaker 1: it like that, uh it, you become more sympathetic. And
Speaker 1: it really was something that took over his life and
Speaker 1: was out of control. And so, um, I think it's genuine,
Speaker 1: but I think it's also strategic. Well, Alan, you showed
Speaker 1: great courage to get on a plane, get out there,
Speaker 1: do what you do. I'm proud to call you a colleague.
Speaker 1: I appreciate your pre st the effort and energy, and
Speaker 1: I can't wait, you can't wait to read the story
Speaker 1: of my friends. Yeah, well, let's not overstate it. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is not a national signal, I guess. I mean
Speaker 1: it starts to bleed into it a little bit. It's
Speaker 1: just golf, it is, it's it's just golf. It's not
Speaker 1: that important, none of this is. But it's fascinating and
Speaker 1: it's goodding. It's getting moreesting by the day. Put another
Speaker 1: log on the fire? Are we here? Is? Get the
Speaker 1: time