Thoughts On The First TGL Show – Golf, But Not As We Know It
I tuned into the first TGL Golf League match thinking that I was going to hate it, and came away entertained.
My overriding takeaway is that TGL is golf, but not golf as we know it. And to TGL’s credit, it does not in any way pretend to be golf as we know it.
The TGL show (and I think of it as a show, not a tournament) was fast-paced and entertaining. The shot clock keeps it moving. For this traditional golf fan, it even felt a bit rushed. Again, TGL is not golf, but it also is not pretending to be.
Audience numbers were extremely favorable. TGL drew a reported average audience of 919,000, with more than one million tuning in between 9:15 and 10:15.
In comparison, the PGA Tour averaged 2.2 million viewers on Sunday in 2024. LIV golf has struggled to get to 300,000. Indeed, their championship last fall averaged just 89, 000 viewers.
SoFi Center
SoFi Center is something out of a science fiction, cyberpunk universe. It glows, with advertisements gliding on lcd tracks in the background. Spotlights dance. Patrons sit in elevated suites sipping beverages and watching the gladiators golfers exhibit their skills. If you do a Google image search for “science fiction arena” you’ll come up with a bunch of similar looking stadiums.
At the center is a five-story tall screen, two hitting areas, and a large putting green. The bunkers in the hitting areas have adjustable lips; the greens change from hole to hole via a series of hundreds of jacks beneath the surface. The cool factor is off the charts.
The virtual holes on the course were imaginative. They reminded me of the fantasy holes I used to design in some of the old PC golf video games. A couple, like the double diamond one surrounded by water were a bit over the top. I liked, however, that they leaned into golf fantasy, rather than playing video replicas of famous holes.
Different is good.
Fun For Players And Crowd?
My impression was that the players were having fun. They were relaxed and smiling. We don’t see enough smiling on the regular PGA TOUR. So many serious and unhappy faces. You’re playing golf for a living guys! A single top ten earns you more money than the average American can earn in ten years.
It was good to see them lighten up a bit.
The crowd seemed to be having fun as well, but perhaps were a bit more reserved than I would have thought. There seemed to be some good-spirited catcalls for laying up. A few more roars for a great shot would have been appropriate. But you can’t control the crowd. They could encourage it, though. Maybe some kind of college style touchdown celebration. The WVU Mountaineer mascot shooting off his musket after a score comes to mind.
But no cheerleaders. Just no.
I’d like to see an opportunity for some random spectator to come out to the playing field to attempt a hole in one shot for a Genesis car (a sponsor whose name was plastered all over the arena). It would be the TGL equivalent of having a person come out to try thow footballs into a hoop or kick a field goal that you see at some games.
At the very least, it would more interesting than than long winded interviews with minor stars sitting in the stands.
Again, golf, but not as we know it.
The Teams
TGL, I think, understands something that LIV missed: All sports teams have a geographic home: The Detroit Lions. The New York Yankees. The Los Angeles Lakers (ok, that one is weird unless you know they were the Minnesota Lakers). The West Virginia Mountaineers. Tottenham. And so forth.
Why do we care about the Ryder Cup? Because they’re playing for us – our home. Our tribe.
In TGL, you had the New York Golf Club vs The Bay Golf Club. There’s also Boston Common (the best of the names and logos), Jupiter Links, LA Golf Club and the Atlanta Drive (not so good).
Announcers leaned into this. Here’s one of the hype intros that led back into play after a commercial break:
New York Golf Club vs The Bay Golf Club in the inaugural night of stadium golf. It’s East Coast v West Coast. Taxis vs Tesla … coming in hot representing the Big Apple with pride because if you can make it there you can definitely make lots of birdies. Meanwhile … the boys from the Bay are playing it cool and calculated, probably powered by some Silicon Valley startup’s secret algorithm … so grab the top corner folded slice of New York pizza or maybe some gluten free sourdough and get ready. This East-West rivalry is about to go …
That is not all of it, but you get the idea.
Are there actual rivalries? No. At least not yet. Properly marketed, there could be.
I don’t want to beat up on LIV, but they completely whiffed on this. Aside from Legion XIII, which I remember because they’re named after a fascist Franco-led, war-crimes committing, military unit that overthrew a Republic, I can’t put a peg on any of the LIV teams. I’ve tried. I honestly have. But who are the Range Goats? What do they represent? What is at their center? Who are their people? If a person declares themself a Range Goats fan, what does that say about them?
I have thought since the beginning that LIV needed to have teams pegged to geography: The Pretoria Lions (the South African Team); The Adelade Auks (The Australian Team); The Florida Manatees, and so forth. With such names, we know who they are and who they are representing. Then you could have Australia v Europe; South Africa v SE Asia, and so forth.
People like to have players representing them. That’s why fans become fanatics.
TGL needs to diversify, however. They need a Texas team, a western team that is not coastal (Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah) and at least one from the golf-mad Midwest. How about the Great Lakes Golf Club? That would encompass Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania and Western New York. Stock it with a couple of Midwest guys and you’re good to go. With a cool logo, their merch would sell.
The TGL Broadcast
I was surprised the broadcast appeared to be glitch free. I fully expected something to go wrong.
The announcers — Scott Van Pelt and Matt Barrie — were fine but could have more zip. They need a Gary McCord or a David Feherety. Someone with a knife in their teeth. The league needs to light a fire. Irreverance should be the name of the game.
The interviews with Tiger and Rory were expected. TGL is, after all, their brainchild, and it was the first TGL event. In the future, I think they should replace those with some canned interviews from the players, as in “We caught up with Tom Kim before the match to find out how his year’s going.” That would create some nice synergy with the PGA TOUR. People could tune into TGL to catch up with their favorite players, and then perhaps would adopt that team. Or, having adopted a team for geographic reasons, might tune into a regular golf broadcast to see how “their guys” are doing.
Or how about leaning even more into the team geography thing and spotlighting a local course or local flavor that the team has picked out? Other sports broadcasts — particularly college football — do that sort of thing. The Boston team could have a bit about local Irish bars, or New York about what makes NY pizza distinctive and a visit to the Chelsea Piers.
I don’t know anything about the guy in the fancy jacket. He was useless. Ditto whomever that Kahlid guy was. Stick to the golf and the players. If you’ve got to interview someone, interview one of the team members who is standing around.
Why was there a halftime?
Also, I think it took way too long to get to the golf. It reminded me of a Superbowl pregame. Way too much before getting to the action.
Finally, they should put the metrics along the bottom of the screen after every shot. The data is collected instantly for the simulator. There’s no reason we can’t see it onscreen. Just a bar, with the data on it.
The TGL Format
I love match play, and the speed at which TGL is played seems to have distilled it to its essence.
Match play does have the problem of occasionally being over much too quicky for television. This opening show proved that. The New York Golf Club was out of it early. TGL tried to address that by having total holes won as a tiebreaker at the end. It at least gave a rational for finishing the fifteen holes.
Fifteen holes. The math on that comes down to nine holes of 3-on-3 alternate shot, known as Triples. After halftime, there are six head-to-head matches, with each player completing two holes.
The shot clock is set to forty seconds, with a violation incurring a one-shot penalty.
That last is something the PGAT should implement. Fines for slow play are meaningless to guys playing for millions. A one shot penalty would get them moving. One warning. The next time and each additional time, it’s a one shot penalty.
TGL has what I think is a good format for television. The triples gets every player screen time in a short period. Then the singles allows individual players to shine.
The rules also have a hammer, which one player can throw to double the value of a hole. I think they need to figure out a way to use it more. Maybe a “use it or lose it” rule. The Bay Golf Club had no incentive to throw it because they were up, and thus New York had zero chance of using it to catch up.
Does TGL Have A Future?
Is there a place for TGL in the golf-verse? I think so. Tuesdays are a dead spot in the golf schedule (so are Mondays and Wednesdays, for that matter). Two hours in prime time is not a big commitment. TGL starts, entertains, and then it’s over.
With the teams, there is a space for people to become fans, rather than just having a favorite player or two. That may also have synergies for the PGA TOUR, if players become associated with certain cities. On Florida swing events, the Jupiter Club should have a fan tent with merchandise and so forth. Ditto the Boston Commons team at The Travelers, and so forth.
One last thought: I think there’s room for an LPGA TGL.
Live Thoughts On TGL
Below are my thoughts as they came to me while watching the matches.
Thoughts On The First TGL Golf League Matches
It’s not “golf as we know it”
It doesn’t pretend to be. And that, I think is what makes it work.
Rickie wears glasses now?
It’s fast and energetic. Again. Not golf. But not pretending to be.
There’s a lot of space here to hype the individual players.
They need to add a “use it or lose it” rule with the hammer.
The “stadium” is crazy
The holes are imaginative. They remind me a bit of the holes I would design in the old golf video games where you could build your own courses.
The technology is absolute wizardry.
I should think the video game generation would like this. I’ll have to draft one of my kids into watching it so see how they react.
Match play is SO fantastic.
It’s nice that the teams represent actual places. Maybe that’s just me and my generation with our attachments to other pro sports teams based in cities. I find it hard to imagine the Lions without Detroit or the Cowboys without Dallas. It takes me several years to get adjusted every time a team changes cities. The Cardinals might be in Arizona, but I still think of St. Louis.
The producers of the show leaned into the geographic rivalry, even if the players didn’t. At one intro after a break, the announcer said: New York Golf Club vs The Bay Golf Club in the inaugural night of stadium golf. It’s East Coast v West Coast. Taxis vs Tesla … coming in hot representing the Big Apple with pride because if you can make it there you can definitely make lots of birdies. Meanwhile … the boys from the Bay are playing it cool and calculated, probably powered by some Silicon Valley startup’s secret algorithm … so grab the top corner folded slice of New York pizza or maybe some gluten free sourdough and get ready. This East-West rivalry is about to go …
Tiger seemed genuinely excited. Rory less so.
They have a lava hole!
A triple island green into a stadium green!
They should hold a contest for fans to submit holes.
I like the data they can throw up. They should do that at the bottom of the screen after every shot.
The camera on the robot is neat.
Rickie giving the putt and then tossing the flag down was a bit of low comedy.
Bay wins handily. Not much drama down the stretch. That’s always the danger with match play.
Tiebreaker at the end of the season is total holes won, so there’s a reason to continue after the match is won.
The green has 600 jacks that adjust the breaks.
The bunker has an adjustable lip!
They should bring “one lucky fan” down at the break to hit a shot for a prize. Maybe a Genesis. The car company’s name was all over the stadium.
They need an announcer with more pizzaz.
No more interviews with the peanut gallery, please. I don’t know who that Khalid guy is and don’t care.
Photo Credit For Top: PALM BEACH GARDENS, FLORIDA – JANUARY 07: Rickie Fowler of New York Golf Club plays a shot on the seventh hole during their TGL presented by SoFi match against The Bay Golf Club at SoFi Center on January 07, 2025 in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. (Photo by Mike Ehrmann/TGL/TGL Golf via Getty Images)
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