Weekend Wrap: Murray Headed To Masters And PGA
Also, Fleetwood and Griffin record wins. Plus Simpson talks greed and state of private equity negotiations in a refreshing manner, more Pelley departure fallout, and Sergio pushes back at Rory.
For a change the golf produced more excitement than the NFL!
Not that many people saw the wild Sony Open conclusion given the annual insanity that is the PGA Tour taking on the American sports juggernaut that is the NFL wildcard weekend. Though it was not the NFL’s best effort given the Buffalo snow-out and predictable Peacock pain, only to be salvaged by the Rams and Lions playing a fantastic game in between a brutal NBC commercial load. At least the Peacock experiment put golf on pub big screens as patrons watched the NFL on phones.
Maybe it’s best sports fans did not see Grayson Murray sink a 38-footer in sudden death to win the 2024 Sony. This is the golfer who once made himself famous on Twitter for hitting on teenagers, who made inappropriate comments about Ben An (who he faced in Sunday’s playoff), lobbying against the PGA of America for yanking the PGA Championship from Trump Bedminster, canning countless caddies, WD’ing with as much regularity, telling McIlroy to “&^%$ off” in a players meeting last year, and even offering supermodel Lindsey Pelas his bag if he made the Masters.
Now sober and a Korn Ferry graduate with all of his teeth having grown back, the ogre is a Sony Open champion headed to The Masters and PGA Championship.
The PGA Tour just can’t buy a break.
Even more astounding, Murray won after hitting a quick hook from the 18th tee to commence the playoff featuring An and Keegan Bradley. There was—naturally—no tracer on such an important hole to capture just how shocking the shot was or how lucky Murray turned out to be after palm trees gently deflected his ball to a decent enough spot.
Similar budgetary relentlessness prevented NBC from having a rules official in the booth to rationalize the inexplicably terrible-looking decision to grant early contender Carl Yuan a free drop. Tied for the lead at the time, Yuan blew his 18th hole second shot from a fairway bunker over the hospitality tents and toward out-of-bounds. Replays led commentators to assume the outcome was fairly obvious. Then we were told by the rules staff that it wasn’t what we saw. Because the ball was never found, the issue was essentially dropped with only a “virtual certainty” declaration and free drop.
These incidents seem particularly problematic given how the PGA Tour wants folks to bet on its “product” without full Rules of Golf disclosures. This leaves the officials and players open to hostility without a clear explanation that could easily be posted on YouTube or Twitter should the broadcast run out of time. These situations are also pretty lousy given that we know careers can be changed by just a few bucks (here’s who lost money as a result according to No Laying Up).
The lame 18th hole scene continued what’s become an annual Sony tradition: tournament hospitality is too close to action and too much free relief for horrendous shots. Players subsequently bring the free-drop mindset to non-PGA Tour events and are often shocked when their preferred options are not provided. Regardless, it was a nice week for Yuan, an ex-U. of Washington golfer from China who, as Dylan Dethier writes, can thank Jon Rahm for his early season PGA Tour access after finishing No. 126 on the 2023 money list.
To cap off this strange Sunday with a moldy, half-eaten cherry, the Champion Golfer of the Year took rude slow play and mashing behind the ball to a new level.
Have I mentioned the money people want us to bet on this sport?
The full Sony highlights:
Elsewhere…
Tommy Fleetwood finished birdie-birdie, holding off Rory McIlroy and Thriston Lawrence to win the inaugural Dubai Invitational by a stroke. The 54-hole leader after a third round 63, Fleetwood fell behind McIlroy Sunday but birdied the last two holes for his seventh DP World Tour victory and first since the 2022 Nedbank Challenge.
“It's always very special when you play with one of your friends, one of the best players in the world,” Fleetwood said. “Challenging yourself against those guys, like I said just before, Rory's been a very, very supportive influence on me. I've watched him do amazing things down the stretch in golf tournaments, and today was my turn.”
The win also helped him clear Ken Weyand by 72 strokes. The President/GM/Director of Golf at Michael Jordan’s Grove GC received a sponsor invite and finished 39 behind second to last after rounds of 87-82-82-86.
McIlroy three-putted from two feet at No. 14 and pulled his 18th tee shot into the water, but chalked up the last day issues to opening week kinks. “First week back out, I think you're going to expect some of those sloppy mistakes, and unfortunately for me, those mistakes came at the wrong time today,” he said. “But I'll reflect on it and learn from today, and there's still a lot of good stuff in there.”
Matt Griffin dominated Australia’s Heritage Classic with a 24-under-par, six-stroke victory over amateur Quinnton Croker and Jak Carter. More here on an emotional win from Patrick Taylor’s game story.
Those Dreaded Narratives
As noted in Friday’s News & Notes, downbeat narratives surrounding pro golf have the potential to fester, draw in innocent suspects and lead to bizarre conclusions.
That was on display with a Front Office Sports story by David Rumsey where he was explaining the end-of-2024 retirement plans by R&A CEO Martin Slumbers and the forthcoming departure of European Tour Chief Keith Pelley leaving to take his dream job. While the story accurately points out how the exits will mean two key seats on the OWGR board will be changing hands, things spiraled from there.
The OWGR has so far resisted efforts by LIV to receive rankings points. Notably, the fallout from some top players joining LIV—and no longer receiving ranking points—is leading to what could be the smallest Masters field in decades.
Financially, the commercial operations of the DP World Tour, which will pay out nearly $150 million in prize money this year, could soon end up under the control of PGA Tour Enterprises, the new for-profit entity that would also control the PGA Tour and LIV Golf’s business dealings if an agreement with the PIF and other investors is finalized. If the R&A were to strike any sort of deal with the PIF, it would open the door for golf’s other three majors to take Saudi money and potentially create an easier path for some LIV golfers to qualify for majors.
That escalated quickly.
Somehow we went from news of two executives exiting in very deliberate fashion (by C-suite world standards), to the Masters finally getting much needed purse help from the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia.
Pelley’s Surprising Update On Framework Ne-gosh
Speaking to James Corrigan during his Dubai Invitational pro-am appearance after word leaked of his pending April DP World Tour departure, Keith Pelley provided a surprising negotiation update.