Maybe the planned timing by the United States Golf Association to announce a massive new television deal during the PGA Championship was not as a classless jab at their "partners." But instead, a cynical ploy to mask what this deal really says: the business people have taken over the asylum and declared that the USGA must control the message in order to achieve the ultimate goal: to be loved.
And you know what that means?
No distance rollback.
No meaningful action on any other issues like slow play, cost or shrinking the footprint of golf.
Instead, as evidenced in the comments by the non-golf people authorized to speak for the USGA in three key stories from Bamberger, Schupak and Sirak--we learn that the real benefit of this deal is money, more feel-good ad campaigns and more control over the broadcast presentation.
With this announcement, hope of genuine reform of the way equipment has changed the game and altered the character of our sport, has been severely diminished.
[If you think this story is not for you, the scroll button is, as always, your friend. But for those who want to better understand why this was the darkest day in USGA history, come with me for a few hundred words as we read between the lines.]
Let's review what we know.
- The USGA is getting $20 million a year more from Fox Sports and yet, in the big three events that are the only ones watched by an audience of any size, Fox's 70 hours of coverage "is half that of what NBC/Golf Channel promised," writes Sirak.
Granted, extra hours by no means equals an improvement in fan experience, but if the USGA is about exposure of its championships, how do you pass up more hours on a proven network? Or, pass up something akin to the current arrangement involving weekday coverage from the almighty ESPN, which, if you saw the letter sent to USGA staff, is second to Fox Sports, which was labeled in Onionesque fashion by Glen Nager and Mike Davis as "the No.1 network for sports television in the country."
-The USGA wanted more control of the "product," earning the chance to have input on announcers and manipulating the broadcast message. "We also get the opportunity to create some distinctiveness about the role we play in the game through ancillary programming like previews of major events, wrap-ups of lesser events and documentaries that use our archival material," Hirshland told Sirak.
How could anyone other than those in Far Hills only seeing dollar signs and reaping bonuses think that such programming will be seen by more people and more of your core audience on Fox Sports than on NBC/Golf Channel/ESPN platforms? And then, who thinks this Total Information Control approach turns out well? Sports fans hate infomercial qualities to their broadcasts.
- If history is any indication, the extra TV money from Fox will go straight to the USGA coffers, ad men and money-management fees.
Sirak notes what was the initial reaction of many ignoring the USGA's lack of action to date and the newfound obsession with popularity:
The windfall from the FOX deal fattens what some in the USGA privately refer to as the war chest that might be needed if the governing body is sued in disputes over rules, especially equipment regulations.
Sorry, but nothing in this indicates the USGA, as it's constituted now, will put this money to fighting a fight that would make them unpopular. And we know any kind of distance rollback will face a fire storm of median and manufacturer pushback that the USGA would struggle to combat, especially without ESPN and/or Golf Channel as a partner.
And again...
- This is all about love. In the letter to the staff, signed by President Glen Nager and Executive Director Davis, they say Fox Sports will be "Transforming U.S. Open Week into a powerful showcase and entertaining celebration of the game of golf."
Can you say American Idol concert at Chambers Bay?
There was also this in the staff letter: "Fox Sports will work with the USGA to expand the audiences for the game of golf itself, by making the game compelling, dramatic and fun to as wide an array of current and potential players and fans as possible." This, even though The golf people know there is only so much you can do to appeal to a wider audience, and the people who advertise in golf have shown they are fine with the demographics already attracted to the sport.
- The business people really had no clue about the relationships developed by the golf people and that became obvious when Nager and Davis threw in this shot at NBC/Golf Channel/ESPN. This line will be remembered for the next decade while Fox is covering the USGA: "Rather, our partnership with FOX Sports reflects our strategic vision to deliver for the game in new ways that can only be achieved with a partner that has a fresh perspective on the game of golf."
The message: we want to be the cool guy on campus. With the money to charter a G5.
The cool guy doesn't take ten yards off your drive and 30 yards off Bubba's. He doesn't give out two-shot penalties that might confuse and upset the new fans Fox hopes to attract. And most of all, even with a few more millions in the bank account, this cool guy doesn't tell other people how to do their business.
Goodbye distance rollback, hello ad campaigns that tap the Fox vaults for cutesy movie clips!
The golf people who are at the USGA--and there are many of them--will have a miserable future ahead thanks to the business-side, the television committee and the army of communications consultants who made this move and so horribly timed this announcement. The business side people who, in the 48 hours between seeing an extra $20 million a year and pushing the deal through an Executive Committee vote, put so much of the organization's future at risk and yet won't be around to deal with the problems that come with having taken the money and run. The golf people at the USGA will be saddled with the burden of trying to make the USGA more likeable, skipping from one messaging campaign to the next while the short-sighted folks with dollar signs in their eyes move on to their next abomination.
Meaningful action will not happen.
Frank Hannigan has said it for years: the USGA just wants to be loved. Yet you always felt that during his successor David Fay's tenure there was an affinity for protecting the game that was above all else. Take the Russian Tea Room situation, which involved buying the fabled restaurant and turning it into a museum while set against the backdrop of having closed Golf Journal magazine. Though questionable in execution and association, that move was ultimately designed to showcase what the USGA and golf was all about. It looks like a fantastic idea in light of the current actions.
The USGA's business types, no doubt working with the USGA communications "messaging" and coverage "scrubbing," will counter with the anchoring ban as a sign this group is always looking out for the best interests of skill. But most believe that anchoring was an R&A initiative first and foremost, with the USGA going along for the ride.
And remember where they launched that successful campaign? From a sound stage at The Golf Channel.
This has left the Borrego Springs, California property parched and homeowners with a disastrous 70 percent decline in value, not to mention no golf course.
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