PGA Tour purses are growing, but his ratings are not. It’s a tough conundrum for the tour and commissioner Jay Monahan, who spoke (vaguely) about the issue during year-end press conference in the tournament championship last month.
“I think when you look at 2024, it’s important to note, and I will note, that the overall consumption on our platforms in total has increased,” Monahan said. “This bodes really well for the PGA Tour and the engagement we have with our fans.” (As our own James Colgan notes, however, there are layers to this answer.)
Bulging sports purses and low TV ratings were a major theme on the latest episode of “Kostis & McCord: Off Their Rockers,” a GOLF production — and golf’s current split is tied to both.
What Monahan didn’t say (and what Rory did): Sights, sounds, rumors from the Tour Championship
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Sean Zak
Peter Kostis brought up the fact that world number 1 Scottie Scheffler earned more than $62 million in 2024which (adjusted for inflation) was about double Jack Nicklaus’ career earnings. And today’s rising purses are largely due to the tournament’s need to compete with the mega money of LIV Golf. Kostis wondered if everything was stable.
“Everything has been thrown out and I think that’s partly one of the things that made people lose interest in watching the game,” Kostis said. “It’s lost a bit of its specialty.”
Kostis added that the different levels of the sport are also a problem.
“We have a tournament with the ‘A’ league and the ‘B’ league,” he said. “We have the top 50 playing in their Signature Events and then the B league trying to do whatever. It’s complete chaos now; we have to find our way out of this and we have to do it soon. I think Rory was right when he said that we need a solution to this sooner rather than later, because I don’t think the public is going to put up with it much longer. In my opinion, under the category of believe it or not, it will happen or it won’t happen, I think (merging with LIV) will never happen now. I think we are heading towards two leagues. I think we’re moving toward a league that’s mostly internationally focused and then obviously we have the PGA Tour, which is domestically focused. Maybe they will find a way for them to play in the main categories and some other events. I don’t see this being resolved anytime soon.”
Added McCord: “I wish someone would come and ring the bell and say, ‘OK, here’s what we’re going to do. In six months we will merge, we will do this, or we will not merge, whatever. But this uncertainty going on right now in the sport completely overshadowed Scottie Scheffler’s year; he had one of the best years in golf history.”
For more on the topic, or to watch the entire episode, click on the video below.
