WEBVTT - Let’s Talk About the OWGR 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.800 I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. When 0:00:02.800 --> 0:00:04.920 I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. 0:00:05.000 --> 0:00:06.320 And when I find my ball. 0:00:06.120 --> 0:00:08.920 In a bride egg Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:11.880 Frida Egg, frid Egg Egg, fride Egg, bride Egg Lie, 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:13.320 I'm about ready to run off. 0:00:13.200 --> 0:00:13.680 Of the hump. 0:00:35.520 --> 0:00:38.199 Welcome to the Frida Egg Podcast. I'm Garrett Morrison, and 0:00:38.240 --> 0:00:40.919 today we are digging into the debates around the Official 0:00:41.000 --> 0:00:44.239 World Golf Ranking. The ow g R, which is the 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:49.000 dominant global ranking system in men's professional golf, has somewhat 0:00:49.040 --> 0:00:52.760 surprisingly become a lightning rod for controversy this year. There 0:00:52.800 --> 0:00:55.600 are two main reasons for that. One, a few months ago, 0:00:55.680 --> 0:00:59.400 the OWGR introduced a new formula that critics say, we'll 0:00:59.440 --> 0:01:03.440 do may damage to any tour not named the PGA Tour. 0:01:04.040 --> 0:01:07.120 And two, the Upstart League Live Golf has not yet 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:11.360 been approved by the OWGR and probably won't be anytime soon. 0:01:11.920 --> 0:01:15.240 LIV is desperate to change this because world ranking points 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:19.039 are an important way that players qualify for the four majors, 0:01:19.319 --> 0:01:22.240 and Live's advocates have pointed out that the OWGR is 0:01:22.280 --> 0:01:25.480 governed by a board that includes PGA Tour Commissioner j 0:01:25.640 --> 0:01:30.119 Monahan and others invested in golf's status quo. So it's 0:01:30.120 --> 0:01:33.600 a big conspiracy, except not really. It's more complicated than that. 0:01:33.760 --> 0:01:36.600 And to sort it all out, I'm talking to Joseph Lamanna. 0:01:37.000 --> 0:01:39.920 Joseph is the co founder of Optimal Approach Golf, which 0:01:39.959 --> 0:01:43.800 advises elite golfers on data and strategy. He's also the 0:01:43.800 --> 0:01:46.559 writer of the Finding the Edge newsletter, where he's done 0:01:46.560 --> 0:01:51.040 some excellent stuff recently about the OWGR issue. Joseph, how 0:01:51.080 --> 0:01:51.360 you doing. 0:01:51.960 --> 0:01:54.760 I'm great, thanks for having me. Garrett really excited to 0:01:55.160 --> 0:01:58.760 talk about OWGR. I think I was pretty slow to 0:01:59.440 --> 0:02:02.440 formalize my thoughts on it. I wanted to give it 0:02:02.480 --> 0:02:05.160 some time and see how the formula was shaking out. 0:02:05.200 --> 0:02:07.880 But this is the perfect forum to have a more 0:02:07.960 --> 0:02:10.680 nuanced conversation around it. There's probably a lot of topics 0:02:10.680 --> 0:02:14.120 that we get worked up around that aren't worth the conversation. 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:17.799 I think this one is an important topic and is 0:02:17.880 --> 0:02:21.440 worth a long conversation, so I'm really excited to do this. Cool. 0:02:21.520 --> 0:02:24.960 Yeah, this one actually does have an impact on the 0:02:25.040 --> 0:02:28.680 landscape of professional golf, and we've also been kind of 0:02:28.720 --> 0:02:32.200 slow to do a podcast about it. We've done a 0:02:32.200 --> 0:02:35.960 few newsletter pieces about it. But when this started to 0:02:36.000 --> 0:02:39.240 become controversial, when the OWGR started to become something that 0:02:39.280 --> 0:02:42.520 people were debating, I remember thinking to myself, I am 0:02:42.639 --> 0:02:46.960 so unprepared to have an opinion about this because I 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:49.720 just don't know how it works. And I think that 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:53.520 I might still not know really how it works, which 0:02:53.520 --> 0:02:54.919 is part of why I'm talking to you. I think 0:02:54.919 --> 0:02:57.680 you understand it a little bit better, but I'm starting 0:02:57.720 --> 0:03:01.600 to get there, and hopefully we can listeners there as well. 0:03:02.200 --> 0:03:06.519 I wanted to first talk about the new formula, right 0:03:07.120 --> 0:03:09.600 This is a big bone of contention right now. A 0:03:09.639 --> 0:03:12.720 lot of people are angry about it, some more performatively 0:03:12.800 --> 0:03:16.239 so than others. Shout out Lee Westwood. John Rahm has 0:03:16.320 --> 0:03:20.840 repeatedly called it laughable. Tiger Woods doesn't even seem sold 0:03:20.880 --> 0:03:23.920 on it. So maybe you could just describe to me 0:03:24.840 --> 0:03:29.480 what the perceived problem was with the old OWGR formula 0:03:29.919 --> 0:03:32.480 and then what the new one tries to do differently. 0:03:33.280 --> 0:03:36.800 Yep. I think that's the perfect starting point. So I 0:03:36.840 --> 0:03:40.320 think the best way to lay the framework for talking 0:03:40.320 --> 0:03:43.680 about the official World Golf Rankings, whether it's pre August 0:03:43.760 --> 0:03:45.800 of twenty twenty two, which is when the change went 0:03:45.840 --> 0:03:49.800 into effect or post August of twenty twenty two. It's 0:03:50.280 --> 0:03:54.680 important to always keep in mind that fundamental to calculating 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:58.120 an official World Golf ranking is evaluating strengths of field. 0:03:58.880 --> 0:04:03.040 That is the fundamental piece of assessing a ranking. Right, 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:06.240 there are golfers all around the world playing every weekend, 0:04:06.440 --> 0:04:10.760 not altogether, so you can't do an official World Golf 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:14.920 rankings based on their scoring average. Right, somebody shoots sixty eight, 0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:17.440 that could be a much better score than somebody who 0:04:17.520 --> 0:04:21.320 shot seventy one across the world, but not necessarily conditions change. 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:25.159 You have to have some way of standardizing performance, and 0:04:25.240 --> 0:04:29.920 what that relies upon is overlap and basically being able 0:04:29.920 --> 0:04:33.600 to link between tours. So you have some golfers playing 0:04:33.920 --> 0:04:37.480 European Tour events, you can compare their performance in European 0:04:37.520 --> 0:04:41.640 Tour events, DP World Tour events to their performance in 0:04:41.800 --> 0:04:44.800 PGA Tour events or to other tours around the world, 0:04:44.880 --> 0:04:48.040 and you can start to understand the relative strengths of field. 0:04:48.480 --> 0:04:51.080 The way the system used to work was that it 0:04:51.240 --> 0:04:55.000 determined the strengths of the field based on your official 0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:59.760 World Golf ranking. Specifically of top two hundred ranked players, 0:05:00.360 --> 0:05:03.000 and it gave out points to the field based on 0:05:03.320 --> 0:05:06.240 how many top two hundred Official World Golf ranked players 0:05:06.240 --> 0:05:09.279 there were in their rankings. The issue you can run 0:05:09.279 --> 0:05:14.479 into is if that system is biased, it becomes circular, 0:05:14.839 --> 0:05:20.480 where the issue with the ranking itself then perpetuates the 0:05:20.520 --> 0:05:22.920 issue of the official World Golf ranking because you are 0:05:23.120 --> 0:05:26.159 basing the strength of the field on the ranking. The 0:05:26.279 --> 0:05:29.560 change that happened in August of twenty twenty two was 0:05:29.560 --> 0:05:34.159 basically an attempt to abstract themselves from that issue. So 0:05:34.320 --> 0:05:38.240 now instead of deciding how strong a field is based 0:05:38.240 --> 0:05:41.520 on your official World Golf ranking, they're going to be 0:05:41.600 --> 0:05:44.719 they are deciding it based on their strokes gained, world 0:05:44.839 --> 0:05:48.200 rating a lot of words. Basically, what it means is 0:05:48.320 --> 0:05:52.160 a standardized way of assessing your performance over the last 0:05:52.240 --> 0:05:56.360 two years. I think proponents of the new system would 0:05:56.360 --> 0:06:00.279 say the biggest issue before was this circular issue basing 0:06:00.520 --> 0:06:02.960 strengths of field based on your official World Golf ranking 0:06:03.000 --> 0:06:04.920 itself and which. 0:06:04.720 --> 0:06:08.840 In turns which in turn determines your official World Golf ranking. Right, 0:06:08.920 --> 0:06:11.960 That's the circular piece of it. That was the problem. 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:15.800 So then it could you know, eventually over time result 0:06:15.920 --> 0:06:19.320 in some inaccuracy. So the new system is a way 0:06:19.360 --> 0:06:24.520 to get away from that by using this strokes gained rating. 0:06:25.000 --> 0:06:28.279 And so then what is that and why is that different? 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:32.720 Right? So your strokes gained rating is based on how 0:06:32.760 --> 0:06:36.040 you've played over the past two years, and they basically 0:06:36.080 --> 0:06:41.160 adjust your scores based on the it's called a fixed 0:06:41.160 --> 0:06:43.440 effects model. I don't know that people need to go 0:06:43.480 --> 0:06:45.080 two into the weeds of what that does, but it's 0:06:45.080 --> 0:06:48.520 basically saying, hey, if Garrett Morrison shot seventy one at 0:06:48.560 --> 0:06:51.839 the Players Championship in round one, how does that stack 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:56.560 up with a seventy four in the BMWPGA Championship based 0:06:56.560 --> 0:07:00.440 on this overlapping of players. Once you've standardized that for ormance, 0:07:00.880 --> 0:07:03.400 you can understand where a player stacks up globally and 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:06.640 use that to assess how strong a field is. And 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:09.520 instead of just doing the top two hundred ranked players, 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:12.880 it'll it'll do the entire field. It'll rank the entire field. 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:18.120 So other point to call out is with this circular 0:07:18.200 --> 0:07:22.800 issue that I was mentioning before, if there's a bias 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:27.320 within the system, it perpetuates itself. Well, if was true 0:07:27.360 --> 0:07:30.240 there was a bias within the system, and there was 0:07:30.280 --> 0:07:33.080 a mechanism for that, which was minimum points given to 0:07:33.240 --> 0:07:36.040 particular events, which we can get more into. But Mark 0:07:36.080 --> 0:07:39.520 Brody had written a large study in twenty twelve on 0:07:39.600 --> 0:07:41.960 how there was bias within the system, so this was 0:07:42.000 --> 0:07:45.120 not hypothetical that they were solving for some issue that 0:07:45.200 --> 0:07:48.720 didn't exist. There was bias within the system, namely against 0:07:48.760 --> 0:07:51.240 PGA Tour players. They were not being ranked as high 0:07:51.360 --> 0:07:54.440 as they should have based on a true, accurate methodology. 0:07:54.800 --> 0:07:58.680 Mark Brody, being the inventor of Strokes Gain, Yeah, that 0:07:58.720 --> 0:08:01.640 was wonderfully clear, Joseph. I actually learned quite a bit 0:08:01.680 --> 0:08:05.400 from that myself, because this Strokes Gained piece of it. 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:09.320 I didn't properly understand before. One thing that I think 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:11.760 I did hear about before, and that has been discussed 0:08:11.800 --> 0:08:15.280 a lot, is this issue of the previous bias of 0:08:15.720 --> 0:08:19.880 the OWGR formula, which Mark Brody pointed out in that 0:08:20.000 --> 0:08:23.160 well known paper where he basically showed that players on 0:08:23.200 --> 0:08:28.400 the European Tour were somewhat overrated by the OWGR European 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:31.640 Tour and other tours in the world compared to the 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:34.840 PGA Tour, where the competition was quite a bit stronger. 0:08:35.360 --> 0:08:40.160 Because of these minimums that the OWGR had, players who 0:08:40.160 --> 0:08:44.679 were playing on weaker tours could kind of get gradually 0:08:44.880 --> 0:08:48.880 better and better world rankings, better and better starts, better 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:53.720 opportunities to get more OWGR points because they were kind 0:08:53.760 --> 0:08:57.199 of playing mainly on a tour that was being propped 0:08:57.280 --> 0:08:59.480 up somewhat by the old system. 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:03.440 That is true. And to reiterate that point, Okay, if 0:09:03.440 --> 0:09:06.319 a player is ranked fifty second in the world when 0:09:06.320 --> 0:09:09.720 they actually should be ranked closer to eightieth, well, now 0:09:09.800 --> 0:09:13.280 they're going the fields that they're going to enter, they're 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:16.800 being represented as the fifty second ranked player in the world. 0:09:16.880 --> 0:09:21.240 So and then that issue perpetuates itself. So that is 0:09:21.280 --> 0:09:25.000 the nature of the circular issue that I was describing, 0:09:25.160 --> 0:09:28.200 And I think anecdotally what would often happen is you'd 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:32.800 have these international players ranked somewhere around sixty to fifty, 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:36.400 you know, forty five, they'd get into a WGC and 0:09:36.440 --> 0:09:38.760 they'd finish at the bottom of the leader board. This 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:43.640 wasn't people's eyes betraying them. This was actually happening. And 0:09:43.679 --> 0:09:48.720 it's sometimes an inconvenient truth to call out that actually 0:09:48.800 --> 0:09:52.000 the strengths of field between different tours is pretty different. 0:09:52.520 --> 0:09:54.560 So it's not just that, you know, we think the 0:09:54.559 --> 0:09:58.000 margins are so so thin and that sixty fifth player 0:09:58.080 --> 0:10:01.000 actually is the sixty fifth best player the world. The 0:10:01.040 --> 0:10:03.480 margins are a bit wider than that, and that's sort 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:06.720 of an inconvenient truth that's necessary to the conversation and 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:09.480 addressing some of the issues around the official World Golf rankings. 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:12.800 The top ten players in the world aren't just a 0:10:12.920 --> 0:10:17.080 little bit better than you know, someone closer to one 0:10:17.200 --> 0:10:20.200 hundred in the world. There is a bigger gap there. 0:10:20.640 --> 0:10:24.760 Now players can move between those places in the world ranking, 0:10:24.840 --> 0:10:27.280 but the quality of play that gets you to the 0:10:27.280 --> 0:10:30.560 top ten in the world is quite different, and it's 0:10:30.600 --> 0:10:33.400 not just a it's not like a you know, a 0:10:33.520 --> 0:10:37.720 razor thin margin, and so these are meaningful differences now 0:10:37.960 --> 0:10:41.320 in that old system. I think that the WGCs really 0:10:41.880 --> 0:10:45.839 were the place that exposed this because the WGCs were 0:10:45.960 --> 0:10:50.280 no cut events right with small fields, and you'd see 0:10:50.320 --> 0:10:52.760 players get into the wgc's This is part of the 0:10:52.800 --> 0:10:56.320 idea of the WGC that players from these other tours 0:10:56.400 --> 0:10:59.679 other than the PGA Tour would get an opportunity like this. 0:11:00.200 --> 0:11:03.040 But they'd arrive at these events and often they would 0:11:03.080 --> 0:11:05.920 kind of get slaughtered, and so it seems like that's 0:11:06.000 --> 0:11:12.160 where this issue in the owgr really became legible in 0:11:12.200 --> 0:11:15.800 a specific way to golf fans and other people in 0:11:15.840 --> 0:11:16.400 the golf world. 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:18.839 I guess I agree, and the part I would kind 0:11:18.840 --> 0:11:22.120 of dig my heels in and this could spark a 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:25.040 little bit of tension. But some people would argue, well, 0:11:25.080 --> 0:11:26.719 it's not they're not finishing at the bottom of the 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:30.880 leaderboards necessarily because they aren't as strong with players. There 0:11:30.920 --> 0:11:33.719 could be other factors at play, like the style and 0:11:33.840 --> 0:11:37.079 golf course being different. Right, So they do well on 0:11:37.280 --> 0:11:39.319 the Japanese Golf Tour, but then when they go to 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:42.640 an American style course, their games don't translate as well. 0:11:42.760 --> 0:11:45.280 That's why they're finishing near the bottom of the leader board. 0:11:45.600 --> 0:11:48.880 I would vehemently disagree, and I would not attribute that 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:51.960 to differences in the golf course. You could sell me 0:11:51.960 --> 0:11:53.920 on there being a little bit of a travel component, 0:11:54.520 --> 0:11:56.959 you know. I know Padre Harrington on Twitter put out 0:11:56.960 --> 0:12:00.880 a couple reasons that he suspects for some of this underperformance. 0:12:01.240 --> 0:12:04.160 I would dig my heels in and say, this is almost, 0:12:04.360 --> 0:12:08.800 you know, ninety plus percent explained by differences in skill quality, 0:12:08.880 --> 0:12:10.319 not differences in the golf course. 0:12:10.880 --> 0:12:14.800 All right, So the new formula tries to take away 0:12:14.840 --> 0:12:20.560 some of those biases that elevated players on other tours. Now, 0:12:20.600 --> 0:12:24.400 what do you think the downstream effects of this new 0:12:24.400 --> 0:12:29.439 formula will be? What are you know, whether it's immediate, 0:12:29.559 --> 0:12:33.360 next year or a few years down the line, how 0:12:33.400 --> 0:12:36.240 do you think that the landscape of professional golf is 0:12:36.280 --> 0:12:38.599 going to start to look different in both good and 0:12:38.920 --> 0:12:40.320 potentially bad ways. 0:12:41.000 --> 0:12:43.800 Yeah, and this is where the conversation starts to get nuanced. 0:12:43.840 --> 0:12:47.400 So you know, I think a necessary part of this 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:51.800 conversation becomes the question of what is the role of 0:12:51.840 --> 0:12:55.600 the official World Golf rankings? And so there are people 0:12:55.640 --> 0:12:59.080 who would maintain that all the official World Golf Rankings 0:12:59.080 --> 0:13:02.200 should be doing is providing an accurate assessment of where 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:06.400 golfers stack up for the purpose of qualification into the 0:13:06.400 --> 0:13:09.120 majors or determining who the number one ranked golfer in 0:13:09.120 --> 0:13:12.640 the world is. So issues like, hey, well, now this 0:13:12.800 --> 0:13:17.240 might disincentivize top professionals from showing up in particular events. 0:13:18.080 --> 0:13:20.360 Somebody might make that argument, and then on the other 0:13:20.360 --> 0:13:22.599 side they'd say, but that's not the role of the 0:13:22.640 --> 0:13:26.439 official World Golf rankings to go and incentivize John Rahm 0:13:26.480 --> 0:13:29.120 to show up at a particular event. So I do 0:13:29.160 --> 0:13:31.319 think this is a question that we'll probably keep coming 0:13:31.400 --> 0:13:35.240 back to throughout the conversation. But to address directly your question, 0:13:36.040 --> 0:13:38.800 there is less of an incentive now for top players 0:13:38.840 --> 0:13:42.679 to show up in some weekly fielded, particularly international events. 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:48.760 I do think this will weaken the non PGA tours 0:13:49.640 --> 0:13:51.520 a bit because it just doesn't provide as much of 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:53.760 an incentive for you to go up and get as 0:13:53.760 --> 0:13:56.760 many points. A clear example of this is that if 0:13:56.760 --> 0:13:58.440 you win an event by one, or if you win 0:13:58.520 --> 0:14:02.400 an event by six, you're not getting a different number 0:14:02.400 --> 0:14:06.520 of official World Golf Rankings points. So for John Rahm 0:14:06.640 --> 0:14:10.640 to play really, really well in a strong fielded PGA 0:14:10.760 --> 0:14:13.880 Tour event, he might win by one and get all 0:14:13.920 --> 0:14:16.160 of those official World Golf Rankings points. But if he 0:14:16.200 --> 0:14:19.080 then goes and plays in the Australian Open, for example, 0:14:19.120 --> 0:14:23.360 and wins by six plays similarly, he doesn't get the 0:14:23.360 --> 0:14:25.200 same number of points that he would get on the 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:28.760 PGA Tour. So if you think about like an expected 0:14:28.840 --> 0:14:32.320 points per start, his expectations would be better in these 0:14:32.360 --> 0:14:36.200 strong fielded PGA tour events, which, if you follow the 0:14:36.280 --> 0:14:40.560 train of thought here, can destabilize some of these tours 0:14:40.560 --> 0:14:43.120 that have sort of been reduced down to feeder tours 0:14:43.320 --> 0:14:46.880 to the PGA Tour. So that's the main I would 0:14:46.880 --> 0:14:50.640 say downstream effect is how it incentivizes play across the world. 0:14:51.360 --> 0:14:55.680 You can easily see how this new formula will certainly 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:59.480 weaken tours across the world because one thing that these 0:14:59.520 --> 0:15:04.600 tours really rely on is big players occasionally showing up 0:15:05.160 --> 0:15:08.840 right and kind of making some of their bigger events 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:13.040 a bigger deal. Now, PGA tour players who were born 0:15:13.080 --> 0:15:17.600 in Europe, like John Rahm, are certainly less incentivized to 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:21.840 go support their national opens. John ram consistently goes back 0:15:21.840 --> 0:15:26.480 to Spain every year, plays in the Spanish Open, plays 0:15:26.480 --> 0:15:33.120 often in the Andalusian Masters, and makes those events a 0:15:33.680 --> 0:15:37.960 much higher profile deal than they would be if he 0:15:38.000 --> 0:15:40.560 didn't show up because he is a major, major star. 0:15:41.800 --> 0:15:44.400 I think that we want those players to do that. 0:15:45.120 --> 0:15:47.760 But the question is to go back to your point 0:15:47.920 --> 0:15:54.800 whether the OWGR should be in the business of promoting players. 0:15:54.480 --> 0:15:56.880 To do that. Yeah, and I will come back to 0:15:56.920 --> 0:15:58.720 that in a second. I want to address one thing 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:01.800 you said on the I should John Rahm go and 0:16:01.840 --> 0:16:04.240 play in some of these events that he supported over 0:16:04.280 --> 0:16:06.960 the years. I know I'm kind of annoying about this, 0:16:07.040 --> 0:16:10.640 but just to stay on brand here, part of the 0:16:10.680 --> 0:16:13.520 issue is that the FedEx Cup incentivizes you to play 0:16:13.560 --> 0:16:16.960 as much PGA Tour golf as possible. Right, Yes, And 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:20.160 so if you're already if John Ram has to deal 0:16:20.200 --> 0:16:22.680 with that, right that, if I want to win the 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:24.480 FedEx Cup, I need to be playing in as many 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:28.880 events as possible. And you're telling him we're already having 0:16:29.120 --> 0:16:31.840 an issue getting him to show up to the Spanish Open, 0:16:31.960 --> 0:16:35.480 or you could Australian Open. Now there's even less of 0:16:35.480 --> 0:16:39.640 an incentive to show up plus travel. Right, you can 0:16:39.680 --> 0:16:43.760 see how these changes would make it even more difficult 0:16:43.800 --> 0:16:45.320 to get some of these top players to show up 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:48.720 in some of those events. But to more directly answer 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:52.120 your question of do I think that's the role of 0:16:52.160 --> 0:16:55.920 the official World Golf rankings to promote golf globally in 0:16:55.960 --> 0:16:59.120 the health of all of these global tours, I don't 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:01.440 know that I have this strongest opinion on it, but 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:03.680 you could sell me that the answer is yes, Because 0:17:03.720 --> 0:17:07.399 if it's not them, who is it not saying that 0:17:07.400 --> 0:17:10.760 that's necessarily my opinion. I see both sides of this argument, 0:17:11.960 --> 0:17:15.480 but I do think it does drive the health of 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:18.680 these tours, and if there's not another governing body that's 0:17:18.720 --> 0:17:22.399 overseeing this, there has to be a cohesiveness to the 0:17:22.440 --> 0:17:25.160 tours and what incentives it's providing top players. Because we're 0:17:25.160 --> 0:17:26.960 telling John Ram, hey, we want you to stay on 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:29.160 the PGA Tour, we don't want you to join live, 0:17:29.680 --> 0:17:32.560 but you're also telling you're also not providing him a 0:17:32.600 --> 0:17:36.200 clean infrastructure to play in the events that he wants 0:17:36.240 --> 0:17:40.560 to play in and be rewarded appropriately. So personally, and 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:42.080 I could be wrong, I don't want to put words 0:17:42.080 --> 0:17:44.439 in John Ram's mouth. I think part of the reason 0:17:44.480 --> 0:17:46.640 he has such an issue with the new official World 0:17:46.640 --> 0:17:52.040 Golf rankings is less of a methodology tension and more 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:56.160 him not appreciating the golf landscape that's been laid out 0:17:56.160 --> 0:17:58.680 for him that has some flaws and the incentives it provides. 0:17:58.880 --> 0:18:02.800 That's my personal opinion, but that is sort of where 0:18:02.800 --> 0:18:03.600 I stand. 0:18:04.119 --> 0:18:08.080 And part of John Rahm's specific problem with all of 0:18:08.119 --> 0:18:12.320 this certainly must have to do with the new emerging 0:18:12.359 --> 0:18:16.359 PGA Tour requirements that top players play in a certain 0:18:16.440 --> 0:18:20.439 number of elevated PGA Tour events exactly, and so you know, 0:18:20.600 --> 0:18:24.320 his grievance is probably more broad than just what's going 0:18:24.320 --> 0:18:28.439 on with the OWGR, But the new OWGR formula and 0:18:28.480 --> 0:18:32.000 the effect that it has on secondary tours might have 0:18:32.200 --> 0:18:35.400 just been kind of a further twist of the knife. 0:18:35.800 --> 0:18:38.960 Now for John Rams specifically, and for European tour players 0:18:39.520 --> 0:18:44.439 European sorry born players as well. One of the issues 0:18:44.520 --> 0:18:46.479 is that they have to play in a certain number 0:18:46.560 --> 0:18:50.320 of dp World Tour only events in order to qualify 0:18:50.359 --> 0:18:52.360 for the Ryder Cup. So they have to do this anyway, 0:18:53.080 --> 0:18:56.080 and American players on the PGA Tour don't have the 0:18:56.119 --> 0:18:59.680 same requirement, and so really, you know, they're being kind 0:18:59.720 --> 0:19:04.679 of pushed in different ways. The new overall requirements of 0:19:04.720 --> 0:19:08.480 the PGA Tour, the OWGR formula, all of it seems 0:19:08.480 --> 0:19:13.120 to be affecting European born players in worse ways than 0:19:13.320 --> 0:19:17.280 American players, and arguably also affecting players who were born, 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:21.000 say in Australia or South Africa or Japan or in 0:19:21.080 --> 0:19:25.040 another Asian country worse than it affects American born players. 0:19:25.040 --> 0:19:27.720 It's all kind of part of the same change in 0:19:27.760 --> 0:19:30.960 the world of golf in this live era. Now. Uh. 0:19:31.760 --> 0:19:35.399 One point that I have always been confused about with 0:19:35.480 --> 0:19:40.040 this is that the OWGR governing Board consists of the 0:19:40.040 --> 0:19:44.760 following people. There's the chairman of it, Peter Dawson, There's 0:19:44.800 --> 0:19:49.479 a representative from Augusta National. There's Keith Pelley, the CEO 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:53.960 of the dp World Tour. There's Sethwah of the PGA 0:19:54.040 --> 0:19:57.399 of America. There's j Monahan of the PGA Tour, Martin 0:19:57.440 --> 0:20:00.719 Slumbers of the RNA, Mike Wan of the USGA, and 0:20:00.760 --> 0:20:05.440 a representative of the International Federation of PGA Tours. When 0:20:05.960 --> 0:20:10.160 coming up with this new formula, where in the world 0:20:10.760 --> 0:20:14.360 was Keith Pelly, Where was Martin Slumbers of the RNA. 0:20:14.960 --> 0:20:18.280 Where was the International Federation of the PGA Tours. Maybe 0:20:18.280 --> 0:20:20.520 I just don't understand the process very well, but I'm 0:20:20.560 --> 0:20:25.320 baffled as to why they Maybe they did raise an objection, 0:20:26.280 --> 0:20:28.440 but I'm a little confused as to how this new 0:20:28.480 --> 0:20:31.880 formula could get by this committee. I mean, JAYE. Monahan 0:20:31.960 --> 0:20:35.399 is on there, yes, and he benefits from this, but 0:20:35.480 --> 0:20:38.600 I'm not sure who else on the committee would have 0:20:38.640 --> 0:20:41.120 been like, yeah, this is this is a great idea. 0:20:41.880 --> 0:20:44.880 You know that they're supposed to be representing the interests 0:20:44.880 --> 0:20:47.880 of their tours and their organizations, and for a lot 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:51.720 of them, this new formula doesn't seem to serve those interests. 0:20:52.000 --> 0:20:54.480 Well, I think you could spin it and you could say, well, 0:20:55.080 --> 0:20:59.560 we're removing bias from a system. We should all everyone 0:20:59.560 --> 0:21:02.320 at this table should agree that there shouldn't be bias 0:21:02.440 --> 0:21:06.600 baked into the system. Therefore, what is your objection? And 0:21:06.640 --> 0:21:09.760 that becomes a little bit of a difficult position to 0:21:09.800 --> 0:21:13.920 put somebody like Keith Pelly in to actually make him 0:21:14.040 --> 0:21:16.960 answer that question. But I think what you're bringing up 0:21:17.480 --> 0:21:20.600 is kind of a natural transition to one point that 0:21:20.680 --> 0:21:23.199 I had wanted to bring up, which I don't know 0:21:23.200 --> 0:21:27.840 how incendiary I want to be here. But if the 0:21:27.880 --> 0:21:31.399 official with golf rankings, the new methodology, if the point 0:21:31.400 --> 0:21:35.480 of it is purely to remove all bias and to 0:21:35.840 --> 0:21:39.560 just rank players how they should be ranked, why are 0:21:39.600 --> 0:21:43.720 there still minimum points given to the majors into the 0:21:43.720 --> 0:21:48.920 players Championship. I think that's an uncomfortable question for them 0:21:48.960 --> 0:21:50.520 to potentially have to defend. 0:21:50.920 --> 0:21:54.000 Hey, so Joseph wanted me to clarify something here. When 0:21:54.000 --> 0:21:57.520 he said minimum points, what he really meant was that 0:21:57.560 --> 0:22:02.440 the Majors and the Players now get fixed point allocations basically, 0:22:02.840 --> 0:22:07.040 which makes them unique. Because other events get points based 0:22:07.040 --> 0:22:09.399 on their strength of field. That's not the case with 0:22:09.480 --> 0:22:12.720 the Majors and the Players. That's all he was trying 0:22:12.720 --> 0:22:14.120 to say. There, all right, back to it. 0:22:14.720 --> 0:22:18.119 Why if we've tried to remove all of the bias 0:22:18.119 --> 0:22:21.119 from the system, why not just let the system exist 0:22:21.200 --> 0:22:23.359 on its own. Why do we have to give eighty 0:22:23.400 --> 0:22:26.560 first place points to the Players Championship and one hundred 0:22:26.600 --> 0:22:29.639 to the Majors. Why is that distinction being drawn? I 0:22:29.720 --> 0:22:32.280 think I know the answer, which is that they might 0:22:32.359 --> 0:22:35.439 even say, well, we don't want the Players Championship to 0:22:35.480 --> 0:22:40.120 get more points than the Masters, for example, because that. 0:22:40.040 --> 0:22:43.679 Could happen because the field is so much stronger and is. 0:22:43.680 --> 0:22:47.639 A bigger field. So we're actually doing this to prop 0:22:47.760 --> 0:22:51.639 up the majors, designate them explicitly as the pinnacle of golf, 0:22:52.000 --> 0:22:55.280 and make sure that, for example, the Players Championship doesn't 0:22:55.280 --> 0:22:59.040 exceed it. But my counter argument to that would be, 0:23:00.080 --> 0:23:04.360 and you are acknowledging that the Official World Golf Rankings 0:23:04.680 --> 0:23:07.880 is trying to do something beyond the scope of purely 0:23:07.960 --> 0:23:11.439 ranking the players so if you've already broken down that wall, 0:23:11.760 --> 0:23:13.560 then why can't we use it as a way to 0:23:13.560 --> 0:23:17.520 facilitate the growth of golf globally. That is the argument 0:23:17.560 --> 0:23:19.720 that I would start to bring up, and I think 0:23:19.760 --> 0:23:22.920 it's it gets into a lot of difficult conversations about 0:23:22.960 --> 0:23:25.000 what the purpose of the Official World Golf Rankings is. 0:23:25.080 --> 0:23:27.119 Does that make sense that I've done that? Absolutely, that 0:23:27.160 --> 0:23:30.240 makes sense. Well, basically you're using the logic, the new 0:23:30.280 --> 0:23:34.480 logic of the OWGR against itself by pointing out that, yes, 0:23:34.640 --> 0:23:38.000 it is actually doing something other than just purely ranking 0:23:38.040 --> 0:23:43.280 the players. Because clearly this policy of minimum points for 0:23:43.359 --> 0:23:47.120 the majors and the players is a way to pacify 0:23:47.760 --> 0:23:52.399 objections from Augusta National because the Masters would get hit 0:23:52.480 --> 0:23:56.879 pretty hard by the new formula. In relation to tournaments 0:23:56.920 --> 0:23:59.960 like the Players or the PGA Championship, which have tradition 0:24:00.440 --> 0:24:04.520 had big, very strong fields, the Masters, because of its 0:24:04.600 --> 0:24:08.760 various odd traditions, doesn't have a huge field and has 0:24:08.800 --> 0:24:10.600 a lot of players in that field who aren't the 0:24:10.640 --> 0:24:15.200 strongest players. And so clearly the od WJR Is making 0:24:15.240 --> 0:24:19.199 a compromise on that specific front, but doesn't seem to 0:24:19.200 --> 0:24:22.919 be giving the same consideration to some of the weaker 0:24:22.920 --> 0:24:26.119 tours around the world who might need some help as well. 0:24:26.240 --> 0:24:30.600 So yeah, it's tricky, I mean, and we're not privy 0:24:30.640 --> 0:24:33.320 to all the conversations that this governing board had. I'm 0:24:33.320 --> 0:24:36.320 sure there were many considerations that they went through that 0:24:36.359 --> 0:24:39.000 we haven't gone through. But on its face, it just 0:24:39.040 --> 0:24:42.000 seems like the ODEBJR is making a statement we are 0:24:42.119 --> 0:24:44.960 just a world ranking system except when it comes to 0:24:45.000 --> 0:24:47.520 the except when it comes to the Masters, and we 0:24:47.560 --> 0:24:49.480 don't want to piss those guys off because they'll they'll 0:24:49.520 --> 0:24:50.119 have us murdered. 0:24:50.160 --> 0:24:52.040 And that's where I want to be somewhat cautious with 0:24:52.080 --> 0:24:53.920 what I say, because I'm not privy to any of 0:24:53.960 --> 0:24:59.080 those conversations, and there could be considerations beyond the ones 0:24:59.080 --> 0:25:02.520 that I've come cross and doing independent research. But that 0:25:03.080 --> 0:25:05.239 being said, and this is where I want to be 0:25:05.320 --> 0:25:08.959 careful about how incendiary I want to be. If you 0:25:09.040 --> 0:25:12.080 were live golf and you were trying to build the 0:25:12.119 --> 0:25:14.960 case that there's collusion against you or that there's some 0:25:15.080 --> 0:25:19.119 cooperation between the tours, the PGA Tour specifically, and like 0:25:19.160 --> 0:25:23.000 the official World Golf rankings, this is probably a point 0:25:23.000 --> 0:25:24.960 that I would explore pretty thoroughly. 0:25:25.560 --> 0:25:29.600 Yeah, for sure. Why don't we make an example here 0:25:30.040 --> 0:25:31.920 to give people something to kind of hold on to 0:25:32.600 --> 0:25:35.920 going forward. So, you know, a few weeks ago, the 0:25:36.040 --> 0:25:40.080 DP World Tour Championship on the European Tour happened on 0:25:40.200 --> 0:25:43.000 the same week as the RSM Classic on the PGA Tour. 0:25:43.680 --> 0:25:46.879 The DP World Tour Championship had a fifty player field 0:25:47.520 --> 0:25:51.080 with seven of the top twenty five players in the OWGR. 0:25:51.800 --> 0:25:54.280 The RSM Classic had one hundred and fifty five player 0:25:54.280 --> 0:25:57.280 field with none of the top twenty five players. So 0:25:58.400 --> 0:26:01.840 the winner of the RSM Class got about thirty seven 0:26:02.160 --> 0:26:05.600 OWGR points, whereas the winner of the DP World Tour 0:26:05.680 --> 0:26:09.840 Championship got twenty two points or so. A lot of 0:26:09.840 --> 0:26:12.200 people said, this is unfair. Look at the DP World 0:26:12.240 --> 0:26:15.280 Tour Championship. That's a big event. It's the capstone event 0:26:15.680 --> 0:26:18.199 of the European Tour schedule. The RSM Classic is just 0:26:18.240 --> 0:26:22.199 a fall series, almost hitting Giggle Out on Sea Island. 0:26:22.840 --> 0:26:28.480 This is ridiculous, And on its face that might seem 0:26:28.560 --> 0:26:30.960 to be a legitimate point because just according to the 0:26:31.040 --> 0:26:35.680 eye test, the DP World Tour Championship is a bigger event. 0:26:35.800 --> 0:26:39.800 It's just that a win there is more meaningful than 0:26:39.880 --> 0:26:43.280 a win at the RSM Classic in terms of just 0:26:43.440 --> 0:26:46.360 like legacy and how good it looks on your resume. 0:26:47.240 --> 0:26:51.320 I think it's hard to argue otherwise, but the new 0:26:51.359 --> 0:26:54.880 OWGR system doesn't take those kinds of things into consideration. 0:26:56.000 --> 0:27:00.240 So why was the RSM Classic stronger and do you 0:27:00.280 --> 0:27:03.480 think it should have been or what should people understand 0:27:04.119 --> 0:27:09.280 better about why it was given more status on the OWTR. 0:27:10.240 --> 0:27:14.600 Yeah, so the main thing to understand is that the 0:27:14.600 --> 0:27:17.720 Official World Golf Ranking methodology is really trying to give 0:27:17.720 --> 0:27:23.200 out points based pretty purely on how hard a championship 0:27:23.240 --> 0:27:25.520 is to win. And when there are one hundred and 0:27:25.600 --> 0:27:30.280 fifty five players in an event, many of them you know, 0:27:30.400 --> 0:27:32.879 really strong PGA Tour players. They might not be the 0:27:32.920 --> 0:27:34.960 top ranked players in the world, but there you still 0:27:34.960 --> 0:27:38.240 get one hundred and fifty five really strong players together. 0:27:38.840 --> 0:27:42.640 It's extremely difficult to beat them over a four day period. 0:27:42.960 --> 0:27:47.120 And so the RSM Classic, even if it seems at 0:27:47.160 --> 0:27:51.600 its face easier to win than the DP World Tour Championship, 0:27:51.960 --> 0:27:54.919 it's not necessarily I had the RSM as slightly harder 0:27:54.920 --> 0:27:57.000 to win. I do think that you can make a 0:27:57.000 --> 0:28:00.720 pretty compelling argument that the thirty seven versus the twenty 0:28:00.720 --> 0:28:03.159 two was a little bit wide in terms of how 0:28:03.160 --> 0:28:06.240 those points were given to the winner. So potentially the 0:28:06.240 --> 0:28:10.879 official World Golf Rankings you maybe have could play around 0:28:10.960 --> 0:28:13.240 with their distributions a little bit and shouldn't have given 0:28:13.720 --> 0:28:16.720 the difference between a winning RSM versus winning the DP 0:28:16.840 --> 0:28:19.159 World Tour shouldn't have been as wide as it was. 0:28:19.800 --> 0:28:23.520 But on its face, you have to appreciate that when 0:28:23.520 --> 0:28:27.400 there's a large field, it's going to be rewarded more 0:28:27.440 --> 0:28:30.200 heavily in this new system of the ficial World Golf 0:28:30.280 --> 0:28:35.240 Rankings than the previous And I would say to John 0:28:35.359 --> 0:28:37.120 Rahm and to the others who played in the DP 0:28:37.280 --> 0:28:41.200 World Championship, the system kind of vindicated itself with the 0:28:41.280 --> 0:28:44.760 leader board. Jhon rom Won and the other top players 0:28:44.800 --> 0:28:46.960 in the world. I think five of the seven of 0:28:47.000 --> 0:28:48.520 them finished like in the top six. 0:28:49.080 --> 0:28:53.200 They romped, They beat the rest of the field pretty handily. 0:28:53.600 --> 0:28:55.400 And that's what I'm saying where that there actually are 0:28:55.480 --> 0:28:58.560 these pretty big differences in quality of play between the 0:28:58.640 --> 0:29:01.320 thirtieth best player in that field and the thirtieth best 0:29:01.320 --> 0:29:05.000 player in the RSM Classic. So I actually think the 0:29:05.040 --> 0:29:07.800 Official Golf Rankings didn't end up looking like a bad 0:29:07.840 --> 0:29:11.840 methodology here, contrary to some of the outrage around. 0:29:11.600 --> 0:29:17.640 It, if the OWGR were a completely independent organization, so 0:29:17.800 --> 0:29:21.520 if its governing board did not consist of representatives from 0:29:21.560 --> 0:29:25.880 the various tours that constitute the status quo in the 0:29:25.880 --> 0:29:29.080 golf world right now, if it were instead an utterly 0:29:29.240 --> 0:29:37.320 independent organization, what differences between the new formula and this invented, 0:29:37.560 --> 0:29:40.640 completely independent one do you think there would be? 0:29:41.280 --> 0:29:43.360 I think it would look almost identical to how it 0:29:43.360 --> 0:29:45.880 looks now. The main difference would be that you would 0:29:45.880 --> 0:29:49.160 not have those minimum points given to the majors and 0:29:49.160 --> 0:29:52.720 given to the players championship. Frankly, I think it's pretty 0:29:52.720 --> 0:29:55.000 hard to defend why those exist. 0:29:57.600 --> 0:30:01.080 Now for a quick word from our sponsor, this is 0:30:01.080 --> 0:30:04.240 all about hygiene. Men's hygiene, you know, making sure you're 0:30:04.240 --> 0:30:06.960 a groomed man and below the belt. Trimming tends to 0:30:06.960 --> 0:30:10.160 be a taboo topic, but Meridian is breaking the stigma 0:30:10.280 --> 0:30:13.520 and helping everyone take better care of their bodies. They 0:30:13.520 --> 0:30:16.320 have a new trimmer's the Trimmer Plus. It's got a 0:30:16.400 --> 0:30:19.080 lot of new bells and whistles, features that are uh, 0:30:19.240 --> 0:30:23.240 They're gonna make trimming easier six thousand rpm motor that's 0:30:23.400 --> 0:30:28.400 very fast, flexible ceramic blade anti Nick shavidguard that seems 0:30:28.480 --> 0:30:32.760 really important. It is waterproof also, which which is nice, 0:30:32.880 --> 0:30:35.160 and cordless and ninety minutes a charge, so if you're 0:30:35.560 --> 0:30:39.080 traveling whatever, you can bring it with you and you 0:30:39.120 --> 0:30:41.480 don't have to worry about it it dying on you 0:30:41.520 --> 0:30:43.959 while you're out on the road without the charger. They 0:30:43.960 --> 0:30:46.560 have a nice travel case that I actually use when 0:30:46.600 --> 0:30:50.200 I travel, so I would check it out. Meridian Grooming 0:30:50.400 --> 0:30:52.920 dot com is where you go, and if you use 0:30:52.960 --> 0:30:56.000 the promo code fried Egg, you'll get ten percent off. 0:30:56.440 --> 0:30:59.920 Thank you for Meridian coming back and supporting the show again. 0:31:00.400 --> 0:31:02.840 You could go to Meridian Grooming dot com and check 0:31:02.840 --> 0:31:06.600 out their wide array of grooming products, including their world 0:31:06.600 --> 0:31:08.040 class trimmers. 0:31:09.280 --> 0:31:12.240 All right, let's get into the live stuff. The reason 0:31:12.840 --> 0:31:16.840 Live doesn't have OWGR points right now is that the 0:31:16.880 --> 0:31:20.840 OWGR has certain criteria for membership. Right First of all, 0:31:21.520 --> 0:31:25.400 there's a waiting period before a new tour's application gets approved. 0:31:26.000 --> 0:31:29.240 There are also requirements like the majority of a tour's 0:31:29.280 --> 0:31:32.640 events need to have seventy two holes thirty six hole 0:31:32.720 --> 0:31:36.320 cut field sizes of seventy five or above and so on. 0:31:37.240 --> 0:31:39.560 A tour needs to have an open qualifying process. That's 0:31:39.560 --> 0:31:43.480 another thing. All of these things are, you know, these 0:31:43.480 --> 0:31:46.719 are things that Live doesn't have right now. But before 0:31:46.760 --> 0:31:51.960 we get into like specific criteria, why does the OWGR 0:31:52.120 --> 0:31:56.120 need to have criteria for admission at all? What's the 0:31:56.120 --> 0:31:56.920 logic behind that? 0:31:57.520 --> 0:31:59.720 Yeah, it's a great question, and I think with all 0:31:59.760 --> 0:32:03.560 of these type questions it is often useful to go 0:32:03.600 --> 0:32:07.440 to a logical extreme. So the extreme I would present 0:32:07.520 --> 0:32:09.800 you with is if you have a group of fifty 0:32:09.800 --> 0:32:13.880 golfers and they all sign a ten year contract guaranteed 0:32:14.840 --> 0:32:16.760 it's gonna be the same fifty golfers for each of 0:32:16.800 --> 0:32:19.880 the next ten years in these events, how would you 0:32:19.960 --> 0:32:23.520 evaluate the strength of that field in year one? Well, 0:32:24.440 --> 0:32:28.600 you kind of know, based on their current official golf 0:32:28.640 --> 0:32:31.360 ranking and how they've been playing on other tours where 0:32:31.360 --> 0:32:33.320 they should stack up, So doing it in year one 0:32:33.800 --> 0:32:36.120 probably not that big of an issue. But let's say 0:32:36.440 --> 0:32:39.600 this tour is isolated and those players are never going 0:32:39.880 --> 0:32:43.240 and playing any other events, how would you evaluate the 0:32:43.280 --> 0:32:46.240 strength of that field in year five? Because now they've 0:32:46.240 --> 0:32:48.760 just been playing against each other for five straight years 0:32:48.800 --> 0:32:52.520 and never participating in another event, there's no overlap between 0:32:52.560 --> 0:32:54.960 them and other tours of the players getting older and 0:32:55.000 --> 0:32:57.760 their performance is starting to drop off, how would we know? 0:32:58.640 --> 0:33:03.080 So the point I'm making is that overlap between tours 0:33:03.360 --> 0:33:06.960 is an integral part of assessing strengths of field, which 0:33:06.960 --> 0:33:09.240 is kind of why we started the discussion there. And 0:33:09.280 --> 0:33:12.600 so there needs to be some adherence to standards so 0:33:12.640 --> 0:33:15.200 that we can rank these players properly. Now, is all 0:33:15.240 --> 0:33:21.240 the criteria necessary? I think reasonable minds can argue that point, 0:33:21.400 --> 0:33:23.320 But I think it's hard to argue that there doesn't 0:33:23.360 --> 0:33:25.880 need to be adherence to any criteria at. 0:33:25.800 --> 0:33:29.880 All, because you just let chaos in and so you're 0:33:29.960 --> 0:33:33.080 essentially forced as a world ranking system to come up 0:33:33.120 --> 0:33:38.040 with criteria of some kind. Otherwise it would just be 0:33:38.120 --> 0:33:42.400 a free for all and it would be absurd. And 0:33:42.440 --> 0:33:45.520 so the folks who are saying why are these criteria 0:33:45.840 --> 0:33:49.360 there in the first place, Well, there seems to be 0:33:49.600 --> 0:33:53.920 a pretty solid reason why certain criteria need to exist. 0:33:53.920 --> 0:33:58.600 And these criteria need to define what a real golf 0:33:58.600 --> 0:34:05.880 event looks like. So which requirements along those lines FORWGR 0:34:05.920 --> 0:34:09.640 points do you think are actually important? You know, in 0:34:09.760 --> 0:34:12.440 defining a legitimate golf event. 0:34:13.400 --> 0:34:14.840 It's a good question. I mean, to be honest, I 0:34:14.840 --> 0:34:18.160 think the only the spirit of the only requirement that 0:34:18.320 --> 0:34:20.840 I may have would have to do with overlap. So 0:34:21.239 --> 0:34:23.080 we need a way for new players to get onto 0:34:23.080 --> 0:34:26.239 your tour and for your players to be participating in 0:34:26.280 --> 0:34:32.719 other tours. I think other parts like field size could 0:34:32.760 --> 0:34:35.239 be important. You don't have three person tour like that 0:34:35.280 --> 0:34:40.239 wouldn't make any sense. But could you rank players even 0:34:40.239 --> 0:34:43.520 if you didn't adhere to all this criteria? Yes, So 0:34:43.640 --> 0:34:47.040 for example, like having a cut, I don't think is necessary. 0:34:47.160 --> 0:34:49.680 I don't see why to rank players you need to 0:34:49.719 --> 0:34:53.879 have a cut personally, right, there's nothing preventing you from 0:34:53.960 --> 0:34:56.600 rating players performance in a no cut event. 0:34:57.320 --> 0:34:57.560 Yeah. 0:34:57.640 --> 0:35:00.120 So the only criteria that I would say is necessary 0:35:00.200 --> 0:35:03.319 is has to do with the flow of players and 0:35:03.440 --> 0:35:04.840 having an interconnected system. 0:35:05.400 --> 0:35:08.840 Well, and if you had an eighteen hole tour event 0:35:09.520 --> 0:35:13.200 with a four player field, then it just wouldn't get 0:35:13.200 --> 0:35:16.200 many points, right, Maybe it could get o WGR points, 0:35:16.640 --> 0:35:19.040 but it would get so few that it would be 0:35:19.120 --> 0:35:23.319 totally insignificant. That's kind of an extreme example, but that's 0:35:23.360 --> 0:35:26.399 sort of what the new system allows to happen. Right, 0:35:26.440 --> 0:35:30.400 You can have a sliding scale of you know, different 0:35:30.480 --> 0:35:35.360 quality events, and if it's not a fairly big field 0:35:35.840 --> 0:35:38.360 seventy two hole event, then it's just not going to 0:35:38.440 --> 0:35:43.000 get significant world ranking points in a way that's going 0:35:43.040 --> 0:35:45.040 to upset the world order of golf. 0:35:45.600 --> 0:35:48.440 Right, And you're saying that's an extreme example, eighteen holes 0:35:48.480 --> 0:35:50.400 four players, But I actually think that's the way you 0:35:50.440 --> 0:35:52.759 should go about this thought exercise is taking it to 0:35:52.800 --> 0:35:56.880 extremes to understand why the criteria is in place. I 0:35:56.920 --> 0:35:59.640 think it's reasonable for them to insist that a tournament 0:35:59.640 --> 0:36:02.040 needs to be of a certain length. I don't think 0:36:02.120 --> 0:36:05.560 eighteen holes it's so noisy that I don't think eighteen 0:36:05.560 --> 0:36:09.320 holes gives you the best representation of how performance happened, 0:36:09.400 --> 0:36:13.239 especially if, like something there's a weird weather phenomenon that 0:36:13.280 --> 0:36:16.719 has a bigger impact on an eighteen hole sample than 0:36:16.760 --> 0:36:18.919 over seventy two holes. So I think having some length 0:36:18.920 --> 0:36:22.880 of a tournament requirement is reasonable. But some of the 0:36:22.880 --> 0:36:25.640 other requirement, like having a cut, I don't think needs 0:36:25.680 --> 0:36:26.560 to exist. 0:36:26.880 --> 0:36:28.920 And we can talk about cut in a second, but 0:36:29.560 --> 0:36:32.560 fifty four holes, is there anything about that that you 0:36:32.640 --> 0:36:37.080 think is illegitimate or that shouldn't be admissible for the 0:36:37.080 --> 0:36:41.440 OWGR criteria. So you know, just to be clear, fifty 0:36:41.480 --> 0:36:45.879 four hole events do exist on OWGR tours. Events get 0:36:45.920 --> 0:36:48.760 OWGR points that have fifty four holes, but in general 0:36:49.160 --> 0:36:52.040 a tour needs to have kind of an average of 0:36:52.120 --> 0:36:55.280 seventy two holes or a majority of its events being 0:36:55.360 --> 0:36:59.000 seventy two holes in order to be admitted to the 0:36:59.040 --> 0:37:04.000 OWGR and so Live currently because it holds only fifty 0:37:04.000 --> 0:37:07.799 four whole events does not meet that criterion. So do 0:37:07.840 --> 0:37:11.040 you think fifty four holes is too noisy in order 0:37:11.120 --> 0:37:13.440 to get ob JR points or is that enough? 0:37:14.000 --> 0:37:16.120 If it were so impermissible, then I don't think we'd 0:37:16.120 --> 0:37:19.560 count fifty four hole tournaments that were shortened due to 0:37:19.600 --> 0:37:23.200 weather as wins, right, And I think there are some 0:37:23.239 --> 0:37:26.680 instances where they haven't counted as official wins. But my 0:37:26.719 --> 0:37:28.560 point would be, I think you can rank players based 0:37:28.600 --> 0:37:31.040 on fifty four holes. If you said it had to 0:37:31.080 --> 0:37:33.040 be seventy two, well why is it seventy two? Why 0:37:33.080 --> 0:37:36.120 isn't it ninety or one hundred and eight? Like obviously, 0:37:36.160 --> 0:37:40.080 the more holes you have, the higher quality of a 0:37:40.120 --> 0:37:42.200 winner you should expect to rise to the top, But 0:37:42.920 --> 0:37:46.440 why seventy two versus ninety versus one hundred and eighth 0:37:46.520 --> 0:37:48.279 versus fifty four. I think you could do it with 0:37:48.320 --> 0:37:51.200 fifty four, even if it's a little bit noisier. You 0:37:51.200 --> 0:37:53.880 could just penalize that by giving fewer points. So I 0:37:53.880 --> 0:37:57.600 think it's possible. There are other things live is not 0:37:57.640 --> 0:38:01.360 adhering to that are bigger issues. But I think there's 0:38:01.480 --> 0:38:03.719 a world where you could give points to a tour 0:38:03.760 --> 0:38:05.320 that only has fifty four whole events. 0:38:05.680 --> 0:38:08.680 Okay, the cut issue, why do you think it is 0:38:09.680 --> 0:38:14.399 that a cut is required in the criteria. I find 0:38:14.400 --> 0:38:15.279 that to be an odd one. 0:38:16.239 --> 0:38:18.319 I'm honestly not sure, and I know that you pose 0:38:18.360 --> 0:38:21.520 this question before, like what benefit does a cut provide 0:38:21.840 --> 0:38:23.959 to a golf tournament? I think there are reasons why 0:38:24.000 --> 0:38:28.359 a cut is a cool feature of a tournament, but 0:38:28.400 --> 0:38:32.560 in terms of that being an obstacle to ranking players objectively, 0:38:33.080 --> 0:38:35.480 I don't think that a cut is necessary. So I 0:38:35.520 --> 0:38:39.240 can't speak exactly to what the rationale is behind requiring 0:38:39.280 --> 0:38:41.680 a cut. Maybe it's just that it's within the spirit 0:38:41.719 --> 0:38:45.359 of golf to have something like that, but I don't 0:38:45.360 --> 0:38:47.879 think it's necessary personally. I could be somebody could present 0:38:47.920 --> 0:38:51.120 account your argument that I'm open minded about accepting, so 0:38:51.800 --> 0:38:55.040 would be happy to hear from from the proponents of 0:38:55.320 --> 0:38:57.040 having a cut to rank players, But no, you can 0:38:57.120 --> 0:38:58.760 rank a player without having a cut. 0:38:59.440 --> 0:39:01.560 It does seem like a spirit of the game thing, 0:39:02.280 --> 0:39:05.440 which I kind of endorse. I think I've come to 0:39:05.480 --> 0:39:08.480 think that cuts are a pretty good part of a 0:39:08.520 --> 0:39:13.080 golf tournament. But like you, I don't really see why 0:39:13.760 --> 0:39:16.960 having a cut would facilitate ranking players. If the purpose 0:39:16.960 --> 0:39:20.040 of the OWGR is just to rank players and not 0:39:20.080 --> 0:39:22.799 to defend the spirit of the game, then I'm not 0:39:22.840 --> 0:39:25.160 sure why a cut is there now. The reason that 0:39:25.239 --> 0:39:27.799 I think cuts can be good is that they do 0:39:28.000 --> 0:39:32.359 introduce a little bit of intensity and demand. It just 0:39:32.520 --> 0:39:36.000 makes a tournament more of a challenge, and it makes 0:39:36.000 --> 0:39:39.759 it so that players who are not bringing it immediately 0:39:41.080 --> 0:39:44.360 just get ejected from the tournament, don't get any money, 0:39:44.400 --> 0:39:48.000 don't get any points. And there's like a kind of 0:39:48.040 --> 0:39:51.239 fairness to that because it facilitates getting those players who 0:39:51.280 --> 0:39:54.880 are just missing cut after cut after cut off the tour. 0:39:55.520 --> 0:39:58.040 Because if you aren't making cuts, then you shouldn't be 0:39:58.080 --> 0:40:00.360 on the tour. There should be other people on there 0:40:00.719 --> 0:40:04.759 who are making cuts, right and who are competing at 0:40:04.760 --> 0:40:08.239 a high level in every round. So I like the 0:40:08.320 --> 0:40:11.280 fact that cuts are there in a majority of big 0:40:11.320 --> 0:40:16.920 time events, But again, I don't really see why it's 0:40:16.960 --> 0:40:20.360 necessary for ranking players, and so the fact that the 0:40:20.400 --> 0:40:24.440 ODWGR has it as one of its criteria is a 0:40:24.480 --> 0:40:25.400 little bit confusing. 0:40:25.440 --> 0:40:28.200 I guess yeah, And look from an entertainment perspective, I 0:40:28.239 --> 0:40:31.440 think there's a huge benefit to having players sitting on 0:40:31.480 --> 0:40:35.680 the couch while their fellow PGA Tour players are hoisting 0:40:35.719 --> 0:40:37.719 a trophy on Sunday because they missed the cut. Like, 0:40:38.000 --> 0:40:39.880 you don't have to sell me on that being of 0:40:39.960 --> 0:40:42.399 benefit to the game of golf. But it goes back 0:40:42.400 --> 0:40:44.960 to the central question of what is the role of 0:40:45.000 --> 0:40:48.560 the Official World Golf Rankings Because they're not it's not 0:40:48.760 --> 0:40:52.960 explicitly mentioned that part of their mission is to facilitate 0:40:53.000 --> 0:40:56.480 the entertainment of golf worldwide, it's to rank players. So 0:40:56.640 --> 0:40:58.480 it just everything we're going to talk about is going 0:40:58.520 --> 0:41:00.520 to go back to that question. That's the role of 0:41:00.520 --> 0:41:02.279 the Official World Golf Rankings, and that's why it's such 0:41:02.320 --> 0:41:03.880 an important question to answer. 0:41:04.840 --> 0:41:08.400 Do you think if Live stays in its current form 0:41:08.600 --> 0:41:14.640 an invitational fifty four holes, no cut, fields of forty 0:41:14.680 --> 0:41:19.480 eight team golf. If it sticks with that, do you 0:41:19.480 --> 0:41:22.239 think it should ever get OWGR points. 0:41:22.719 --> 0:41:26.239 If it's an isolated entity. No. If there is this 0:41:27.000 --> 0:41:31.239 constant players are locked into contracts. Therefore they're getting a 0:41:31.239 --> 0:41:33.520 bunch of guaranteed starts, and it's hard for somebody to 0:41:33.640 --> 0:41:36.839 enter the system. There's no guarantees that those players are 0:41:36.840 --> 0:41:39.320 going to be playing a significant number of non live events, 0:41:39.760 --> 0:41:41.800 then no, I do not believe Live should get Official 0:41:41.800 --> 0:41:44.960 World Golf Ranking points. If it's a much more open 0:41:45.080 --> 0:41:47.680 qualification and you have those players playing a lot of 0:41:47.719 --> 0:41:50.520 other tournaments worldwide so that there's enough overlap you can 0:41:50.560 --> 0:41:53.279 consistently rank the strengths of field even if they don't 0:41:53.280 --> 0:41:55.480 have a cut, then yes, I would be fine on 0:41:55.960 --> 0:41:58.840 Live receiving Official World Golf Rankings points. There needs to 0:41:58.880 --> 0:42:04.040 be in sured encoded some level of interconnectedness between Live 0:42:04.120 --> 0:42:06.280 and other golf tours, and that kind of runs against 0:42:06.280 --> 0:42:08.320 the spirit of the entity that they're trying to create. 0:42:08.760 --> 0:42:12.239 So there are some philosophical differences between how Live views 0:42:12.280 --> 0:42:16.000 itself and how another tour that's a participant within the 0:42:16.040 --> 0:42:19.040 Official World Golf Rankings views itself, and that's what needs 0:42:19.080 --> 0:42:19.600 to change. 0:42:20.160 --> 0:42:23.960 So this interconnectedness between live and other tours, what are 0:42:24.000 --> 0:42:29.240 the main institutions through which that can be made to happen. 0:42:29.960 --> 0:42:32.440 Yeah, it has to be some form of open qualification, 0:42:32.520 --> 0:42:35.359 and I think you'd almost have to have. Ideally you'd 0:42:35.360 --> 0:42:38.359 have non live players playing in live tour events so 0:42:38.440 --> 0:42:41.319 you could get a feel for how people are stacking up, 0:42:41.320 --> 0:42:46.640 but that's not necessarily practical. But yes, the answer here 0:42:46.680 --> 0:42:49.680 is that it's some form of open qualification and ensuring 0:42:49.680 --> 0:42:53.040 that there's overlap between those players and the players on 0:42:53.080 --> 0:42:55.279 live and the players that are on every other tour 0:42:55.320 --> 0:42:55.760 in the world. 0:42:56.719 --> 0:42:59.040 Do you see that happening with live. I've tried to 0:42:59.040 --> 0:43:02.719 figure this out where I've been trying to think, like 0:43:03.280 --> 0:43:06.280 what would open qualifying look like for a live event. 0:43:06.520 --> 0:43:10.280 Would it be something ridiculous like there are four spots 0:43:10.320 --> 0:43:12.880 and you can qualify for those, or maybe that wouldn't 0:43:12.880 --> 0:43:16.080 be ridiculous. I don't know. How do you think they 0:43:16.120 --> 0:43:20.320 could actually facilitate this given their current structure. 0:43:20.600 --> 0:43:22.760 I think it's difficult because the PGA Tour is imposing 0:43:22.800 --> 0:43:24.839 a ban on players who participate in a live event. 0:43:24.920 --> 0:43:28.280 So even if you have open qualification, if a player 0:43:28.360 --> 0:43:31.239 is on an Asian Tour and they end up qualifying 0:43:31.239 --> 0:43:33.560 and playing. It's not like they'd be bringing a lot 0:43:33.560 --> 0:43:36.200 of points into that live event for live players to 0:43:36.239 --> 0:43:39.399 consume anyway. So it's hard to get to a point 0:43:39.440 --> 0:43:43.440 where live players, by entering the official World Golf Ranking 0:43:43.480 --> 0:43:46.600 ecosystem could start to kind of work their way back up. 0:43:46.680 --> 0:43:49.839 That's very unlikely. So if you're thinking about this from 0:43:49.880 --> 0:43:53.840 like the PGA Tours perspective, the savvy move is to 0:43:53.960 --> 0:43:55.960 just stall this thing as long as possible and then 0:43:56.000 --> 0:43:58.760 give them points because they won't be getting many points anyway, 0:43:58.800 --> 0:44:02.399 So I just thinking of game theory wise, or however 0:44:02.400 --> 0:44:04.319 you want to think about it, that's kind of the 0:44:04.360 --> 0:44:07.520 savvy strategy is just hey, we're reviewing the application and 0:44:07.520 --> 0:44:09.279 then you approve it like a year from now, and 0:44:09.400 --> 0:44:11.680 all their Official World Golf rankings will be down pretty 0:44:11.680 --> 0:44:15.120 far and they're locked into guaranteed contracts, so there aren't 0:44:15.120 --> 0:44:16.720 a lot of new points entering the system. 0:44:17.280 --> 0:44:19.440 Yeah, I mean that was going to be my next question. 0:44:19.600 --> 0:44:22.919 If Live were to get points, how many points would 0:44:22.920 --> 0:44:27.360 it get and would Live still be a viable pathway 0:44:27.400 --> 0:44:30.520 to the majors, Because that's the big question about OWR points. 0:44:30.520 --> 0:44:33.600 I think that's what players care about. Can I earn 0:44:33.840 --> 0:44:37.120 enough OWGR points at this event or on this tour 0:44:37.920 --> 0:44:45.520 to continue to qualify for majors through the OWGR. Will Live, ever, 0:44:46.640 --> 0:44:51.640 especially under the new formula, be able to offer that pathway. 0:44:51.719 --> 0:44:54.200 It's not likely right now. But one of the ways 0:44:54.239 --> 0:44:56.600 you do that is you bring players. You sign players 0:44:56.640 --> 0:45:00.480 who have a strong stroke skiined world rating to your 0:45:00.480 --> 0:45:04.040 tour once you've become approved, which is part of why 0:45:04.080 --> 0:45:05.920 I thought, like, maybe they'll wait on cam Smith a 0:45:05.960 --> 0:45:08.320 little bit before bringing him over, like, go let him 0:45:08.719 --> 0:45:11.839 keep getting his keeping his official World Golf ranking up. 0:45:12.520 --> 0:45:14.520 I think the other thing this does is it really 0:45:14.600 --> 0:45:17.399 raises the stakes out of major championship. Now, if you're Live, 0:45:17.920 --> 0:45:20.120 you need your guys to go play well in the majors, 0:45:20.160 --> 0:45:22.480 not just from an optics perspective on how strong your 0:45:22.480 --> 0:45:25.320 tour is, but you need them bringing those that strokes 0:45:25.320 --> 0:45:29.160 gained world rating back into your fields. So I don't 0:45:29.880 --> 0:45:33.319 I don't really anticipate a world where Live gets accredited 0:45:33.560 --> 0:45:35.920 and has enough points in their system for players to 0:45:35.960 --> 0:45:40.560 gain entrance into the majors unless they bring When that happens, 0:45:40.560 --> 0:45:43.640 they bring like four really highly rated players over and 0:45:43.680 --> 0:45:46.760 then their own players have decent strokes, gained world ratings 0:45:46.760 --> 0:45:49.479 from majors, and the can kind of start to get 0:45:49.480 --> 0:45:52.120 points that way. But it's going to be an uphill battle. 0:45:52.680 --> 0:45:55.520 Yeah, what do you think the endgame here is for Live? 0:45:55.600 --> 0:45:59.879 If you were making decisions about the future of Live 0:46:00.120 --> 0:46:03.800 as a viable world golf tour where players could play 0:46:04.040 --> 0:46:07.719 on Live full time and also participate in the majors. 0:46:08.680 --> 0:46:11.440 What is the goal, right, Is it to get the 0:46:11.440 --> 0:46:14.120 forty eight best players in the world on the tour 0:46:14.239 --> 0:46:17.279 so that even if they are small field events and 0:46:17.320 --> 0:46:21.279 are getting docked by THEWGR formula, that the fields are 0:46:21.320 --> 0:46:24.200 so strong that players will still get enough points to 0:46:24.239 --> 0:46:27.640 qualify for the majors. Or is the goal to negotiate 0:46:27.680 --> 0:46:32.719 with the majors and establish a non OWGR pathway from 0:46:32.840 --> 0:46:36.040 Live to the Masters, to the PGA Championship to the 0:46:36.120 --> 0:46:41.440 US Open. Do you think that's a more likely outcome 0:46:41.880 --> 0:46:46.320 or strategy for Live to get its players into the majors. 0:46:46.560 --> 0:46:48.960 I mean, you're asking me to put my self in 0:46:49.000 --> 0:46:52.000 the shoes of people that live in those boardrooms, and 0:46:52.160 --> 0:46:54.400 I'm comfortable doing that. Like that is sort of the 0:46:54.719 --> 0:46:57.720 question here. I think and I feel pretty high conviction 0:46:57.800 --> 0:47:00.960 about this without having any knowledge of I've never been 0:47:00.960 --> 0:47:03.880 in contact with Live once. I believe that they are 0:47:03.920 --> 0:47:06.640 saying to themselves, we're going to shift the balance of 0:47:06.680 --> 0:47:08.880 power to where we have the players, or they need 0:47:08.880 --> 0:47:12.839 to negotiate with us, because I don't think they've gone 0:47:12.920 --> 0:47:16.000 too far down the scenarios of how are we an 0:47:16.040 --> 0:47:21.040 integrated body with other tours and what happens if our 0:47:21.080 --> 0:47:23.160 players are playing in their events. I think they're just 0:47:23.239 --> 0:47:25.640 thinking about this as once we have enough top players, 0:47:26.080 --> 0:47:29.200 they have to accommodate us because we are the biggest 0:47:29.200 --> 0:47:32.160 show in town and all of golf can go ahead 0:47:32.160 --> 0:47:34.319 and die. That's fine. People are still going to be 0:47:34.360 --> 0:47:38.160 watching our events. So personally, I think that's what the 0:47:38.200 --> 0:47:41.000 strategy is. I don't think there's any math happening in 0:47:41.000 --> 0:47:44.279 those boardrooms around the new methodology and how what it 0:47:44.360 --> 0:47:46.680 means for when Cam Smith goes up and plays shows 0:47:46.719 --> 0:47:49.160 up and plays the RBC Heritage, if he's ever allowed again. 0:47:49.239 --> 0:47:50.600 I don't think they're worrying about that. 0:47:51.360 --> 0:47:54.480 Yeah. Yeah, they just want to be the center of 0:47:54.520 --> 0:47:57.719 power in the golf world so that if there's a 0:47:57.800 --> 0:48:02.400 new owgr it forms it self around Live instead of 0:48:02.440 --> 0:48:05.080 forming itself around the PGA Tour, which seems to be 0:48:05.200 --> 0:48:07.359 kind of the shape of it right now. 0:48:07.719 --> 0:48:09.399 I think they're trying to say to the official Golf 0:48:09.440 --> 0:48:14.200 rankings like it's it's us or it's obsolescence, right like 0:48:14.239 --> 0:48:18.000 that is I think the ultimately what the card that 0:48:18.040 --> 0:48:21.080 they're trying to play, which makes sense. I mean, that's 0:48:21.120 --> 0:48:24.160 that's a reasonable route to go. But you have to 0:48:24.160 --> 0:48:27.120 be pretty dismissive of a lot of their comments around 0:48:27.160 --> 0:48:31.120 them wanting to be growing the game and a cooperative 0:48:31.160 --> 0:48:33.960 actor if you believe what I believe about what their 0:48:34.000 --> 0:48:34.680 intentions are. 0:48:35.040 --> 0:48:41.520 Yeah, now that raises my last question. You mentioned obsolescence 0:48:41.520 --> 0:48:44.040 for the OWGR, which is which seems to be kind 0:48:44.080 --> 0:48:48.160 of a possibility if you believe in the potential of 0:48:48.239 --> 0:48:50.960 Live to kind of spend its way to the very 0:48:51.000 --> 0:48:53.880 top of the golf world. The OWGR could get really 0:48:53.920 --> 0:48:57.239 marginalized if it doesn't work with Live in that situation. 0:48:58.239 --> 0:49:02.000 But I want to go like a different another counterfactual, 0:49:02.400 --> 0:49:06.319 very speculative. What would happen. What would the world of 0:49:06.360 --> 0:49:09.160 golf look like if we just did away with the 0:49:09.160 --> 0:49:12.839 OWGR tomorrow, if we dissolved it and didn't have World 0:49:12.920 --> 0:49:16.400 ranking points anymore, Would things be worse? Would things be better? 0:49:17.040 --> 0:49:19.080 Well? Yeah, and I think the Official World Golf Rankings 0:49:19.120 --> 0:49:21.200 is pretty safe for now and as long as you 0:49:21.200 --> 0:49:23.600 live doesn't sign too many more top players, right, that's 0:49:23.640 --> 0:49:27.839 the domino that kind of shatters every other domino if 0:49:28.080 --> 0:49:31.160 if that were to happen. I have thought about, like, well, 0:49:31.200 --> 0:49:34.360 what is an alternative to the official World Golf Rankings, 0:49:34.400 --> 0:49:36.520 which is sort of the question you're asking kind of 0:49:36.920 --> 0:49:38.919 like what would it look like? What would the world 0:49:38.920 --> 0:49:41.680 without Official World Golf Rankings look like. I think there's 0:49:41.680 --> 0:49:46.360 a world where you reframe what entrance into the majors 0:49:46.400 --> 0:49:48.799 looks like, and you start to give points based off 0:49:48.840 --> 0:49:52.440 of the tour and maybe instead of staying points like 0:49:52.560 --> 0:49:57.440 spots like hey, Japan tour, historical analysis shows that you 0:49:57.560 --> 0:50:00.839 have one player per year that's of quality to play 0:50:00.880 --> 0:50:03.799 in the Masters. We want to facilitate the growth of 0:50:03.840 --> 0:50:05.960 golf worldwide, so we're going to give you three spots, 0:50:06.520 --> 0:50:08.759 and so you can start to think about entrance into 0:50:08.760 --> 0:50:11.120 the majors based on like how many spots are being 0:50:11.600 --> 0:50:14.480 designated throughout the world, and that kind of props up 0:50:14.520 --> 0:50:19.040 the tours. I think that's possible. I'm not advocating for it, 0:50:19.400 --> 0:50:21.759 but if you're asking me to do the thought exercise 0:50:21.800 --> 0:50:25.000 and what the world could look like without official wood 0:50:25.000 --> 0:50:26.959 golf rankings, that's kind of where my head goes. 0:50:27.680 --> 0:50:30.520 Yeah, I mean, I just think of the majors kind 0:50:30.560 --> 0:50:34.880 of revising their criteria not to include OWGR points. 0:50:35.200 --> 0:50:37.120 But then what purpose is the ficial wood golf rankings 0:50:37.120 --> 0:50:37.720 even serving? 0:50:37.760 --> 0:50:41.759 That's yeah, none, right, I guess that's sort of the point. 0:50:42.200 --> 0:50:45.400 Is that right now the relevance of the OWGR beyond 0:50:45.440 --> 0:50:49.080 just kind of like symbolic. I'm ranked this in the OWGR. 0:50:49.160 --> 0:50:52.760 Maybe it's tied to certain incentives with my sponsors getting 0:50:52.920 --> 0:50:56.920 a particular ranking. Being number one is a really meaningful 0:50:56.960 --> 0:50:59.439 thing that players seem to be bought into. But all 0:50:59.480 --> 0:51:03.439 of that is symbolic stuff, right The main thing right 0:51:03.480 --> 0:51:09.120 now is the interface between the tours, the OWGR, and 0:51:09.200 --> 0:51:13.080 the majors. That's what it is really doing right now, 0:51:13.600 --> 0:51:16.759 and so if you cut that off, then you know, 0:51:17.480 --> 0:51:19.760 why do we have this system in the first place, 0:51:20.200 --> 0:51:23.080 and is it doing any good for the golf world? 0:51:23.239 --> 0:51:24.879 I guess that's the real question I want to ask. 0:51:25.120 --> 0:51:27.600 Do you think the OWGR is good for the golf world. 0:51:27.960 --> 0:51:32.080 I think it serves an important purpose in the golf world. Yes, do. 0:51:32.160 --> 0:51:35.319 I think that those point minimums may have ended up 0:51:35.360 --> 0:51:38.120 serving some benefit on net to the golf world too, 0:51:38.160 --> 0:51:40.640 like maybe to the flagship events so that you get 0:51:41.080 --> 0:51:43.799 some more players into the majors. But that's not really 0:51:43.840 --> 0:51:46.840 the purpose of the Official Golf Rankings. So it's a 0:51:46.920 --> 0:51:51.200 nuanced conversation. I think it's difficult to figure out exactly 0:51:51.239 --> 0:51:55.160 what the optimal system is. But to your point of like, well, 0:51:55.440 --> 0:51:58.160 maybe the Masters then is just going to let create 0:51:58.160 --> 0:52:01.359 some other avenue for live players to get in. Live 0:52:01.400 --> 0:52:04.799 is at to get the Masters, Like I fully believe it, 0:52:04.800 --> 0:52:08.440 Live is trying to disrupt golf in such meaningful ways 0:52:08.440 --> 0:52:10.399 that I'm not sure it's in the Master's best interest 0:52:10.480 --> 0:52:15.400 to cooperate. So that the question, but the Masters was involved. 0:52:15.560 --> 0:52:18.000 They're on the board of the Official World Golf Rankings Committee. 0:52:18.000 --> 0:52:22.600 They none of these changes, these downstream effects of the 0:52:22.640 --> 0:52:25.719 Official with Golf Rankings should be of any surprise to them. 0:52:25.880 --> 0:52:29.720 So personally, I think it's beneficial for all of those 0:52:29.920 --> 0:52:33.799 people in that room to be aligned. And yeah, whether 0:52:33.880 --> 0:52:36.640 or not the Fficial World Golf Rankings is of benefit 0:52:36.640 --> 0:52:38.600 to the world. I think depends on your perspective. I 0:52:38.640 --> 0:52:40.840 would say yes, it is mostly a benefit. 0:52:41.640 --> 0:52:43.840 Yeah, I mean, and I'm just poking at it because 0:52:43.880 --> 0:52:46.600 I'm trying to figure out what are the ways in 0:52:46.640 --> 0:52:50.560 which the OWGR has kind of enmeshed itself in the 0:52:50.560 --> 0:52:54.880 professional golf world. And what I'm finding here is that 0:52:54.920 --> 0:52:58.760 it's like deeply, deeply enmeshed. It's got its tentacles way 0:52:58.840 --> 0:53:01.799 in there. You know, you mentioned the Masters. Why would 0:53:01.840 --> 0:53:04.080 the Masters open up a pathway to live given that 0:53:04.800 --> 0:53:07.799 Augusta National sits on the OWGR board, And that's a 0:53:07.840 --> 0:53:13.480 great point because the OWGR has enmeshed itself with the 0:53:13.520 --> 0:53:16.680 majors in this way, and so it's like this really 0:53:17.400 --> 0:53:20.720 established institution in golf. But the thing is, it didn't 0:53:20.760 --> 0:53:24.200 exist until the eighties, right, It hasn't been around forever. 0:53:24.800 --> 0:53:30.480 And I don't think that the majors had OWGR criteria 0:53:30.520 --> 0:53:34.319 available until even more recently than that. I think it 0:53:34.440 --> 0:53:37.920 happened sometime around the late nineties and early two thousands 0:53:38.360 --> 0:53:44.560 when the majors began to include OWGR qualification as an option, 0:53:45.160 --> 0:53:47.759 and so all of this is pretty recent. But at 0:53:47.800 --> 0:53:51.680 the same time, to disentangle the OWGR from the golf 0:53:51.719 --> 0:53:55.200 world would be really, really difficult at this point, and 0:53:55.239 --> 0:53:57.560 that is kind of what LIVE is trying to do. 0:53:58.280 --> 0:54:01.239 And the only way that it seems like LIV can 0:54:01.320 --> 0:54:04.799 do that is just the brute force of we're going 0:54:04.880 --> 0:54:07.200 to recruit all the best players in the world and 0:54:07.239 --> 0:54:10.400 we're going to start staging our own majors, and the 0:54:10.440 --> 0:54:13.440 rest of the tours, along with the OWGR, which is 0:54:13.440 --> 0:54:17.640 so connected with those tours, would be marginalized. That seems 0:54:17.640 --> 0:54:18.839 to be liv's play here. 0:54:19.400 --> 0:54:21.400 And I guess I'd like to revise my answer to 0:54:21.719 --> 0:54:23.880 what benefit is the Official World Golf Rankings? And I 0:54:23.880 --> 0:54:26.359 don't know how profound this is, but I think the 0:54:26.400 --> 0:54:29.920 benefit of the Official World Golf Rankings is it's providing context, 0:54:30.480 --> 0:54:34.959 and that is across the world, what does this event mean? 0:54:35.760 --> 0:54:38.439 How good are the guys who are playing here? That's 0:54:38.480 --> 0:54:41.480 the question that it's answering. And so when you have 0:54:41.560 --> 0:54:43.959 a major and you say why is this player here, Well, 0:54:44.000 --> 0:54:47.719 that's because he was ranked forty eighth at the end 0:54:47.719 --> 0:54:50.439 of the year. That's why he's here. The Official World 0:54:50.480 --> 0:54:53.080 Golf Rankings are providing context, and I think what you're 0:54:53.160 --> 0:54:56.600 hitting on and why this conversation is difficult and nuanced 0:54:57.040 --> 0:55:00.240 is that by having players on live that aren't ranked, 0:55:00.680 --> 0:55:04.480 we are starting to lose context, and ultimately, context is 0:55:04.600 --> 0:55:07.720 probably the answer to what the official of golf rankings 0:55:07.800 --> 0:55:08.320 is providing. 0:55:08.800 --> 0:55:12.279 All right, Joseph, this was really interesting. Your company is 0:55:12.320 --> 0:55:15.680 called Optimal Approach Golf. Your newsletter is called Finding the Edge. 0:55:15.719 --> 0:55:18.319 I'd highly recommend Finding the Edge. I read every edition 0:55:18.360 --> 0:55:21.040 when it comes out. Thanks for coming on the podcast 0:55:21.040 --> 0:55:22.279 and talk to you again soon. 0:55:22.600 --> 0:55:24.000 Thanks so much for having me us respond. 0:55:35.280 --> 0:55:38.040 This episode of the Frida Egg podcast was edited by 0:55:38.120 --> 0:55:40.920 Meg Atkins. So the big thing going on at the 0:55:40.920 --> 0:55:43.960 Frida Egg right now is that we're launching a membership. 0:55:44.080 --> 0:55:47.760 It's called Club TFE and it's going to involve course 0:55:47.800 --> 0:55:51.640 reviews and ratings. It's going to involve the Club TFE blog. 0:55:52.000 --> 0:55:54.280 There's going to be all sorts of perks to the membership, 0:55:54.400 --> 0:55:58.480 like early access to events and much much more. Check 0:55:58.480 --> 0:56:01.400 out all the details in side up at the fridagg 0:56:01.600 --> 0:56:05.560 dot com slash membership. We're really excited about Club TFE 0:56:05.800 --> 0:56:08.520 and we hope you join us. All right, thanks for listening, 0:56:08.760 --> 0:56:09.839 and we'll see you again soon.