John Kosner Spoke with Josh Carpenter of The SBJ About Pro Golf’s Media Deals

Original Article: Sports Business Journal, by Josh Carpenter, April 8th, 2024

As negotiations slog on between the PGA Tour and PIF on a potential agreement and PGA Tour Enterprises continues to be built out, one consistent talking point in golf has been how the product will be improved with an influx of capital. Specifically, when it comes to improving the product, much has been discussed about potential changes to it on TV or via other viewing avenues.

The PGA Tour’s media deals with CBS, NBC and ESPN run through 2030, but could new money lead to changes to those contracts before then? Might fans see fewer ads and more golf shots during broadcasts? SBJ caught up with a pair of media industry veterans -- Ed Desser and John Kosner (both regular SBJ contributors) -- to talk about what might be in store.

The below has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Q: With this influx of new capital, could the PGA Tour’s current media deals see changes? Or how might golf broadcasts look different going forward?

Desser: What's broken in golf is not their TV deals. Their TV deals to me are pretty good. They're heavily into broadcast. And so you at least have potential for wide availability, expanded hours over the course of years. People are accepting of a fairly robust level of inventory in telecasts. It's not really different in other sports. And so to me, while I can certainly appreciate the notion of lower commercial loads, I don't know that that has a meaningful impact on audience. It seems very unlikely to go to lower commercialization, which isn't to say that there couldn't be some premium options. A streaming service that is continuous coverage of holes. They do a little bit of that now, but if literally you could follow every group from beginning to end. That could be a very nice premium product that wouldn't generate huge audiences, but it could be incremental and satisfy part of the audience that would be willing to pay.

Kosner: I see streaming options coming, follow your group, limited commercials, the “Every Shot Live” product that they do with the Players. I could see those things happening. But in general, fans want to see the top golfers in action on Saturday and Sunday afternoons. LIV grew up in part because that wasn't really happening every weekend on the PGA Tour. And now golf's fragmented. So, this all kind of augers for some sort of broader partnership so that fans can get what they want, which is to see the best players playing every Saturday and Sunday. There’s been talk of the formation of a global golf tour, and while maybe that’s not really of interest to the U. S. media companies, it could be of interest to Apple, could be of interest to Netflix, could be of interest to Amazon.

Q: Should the PGA Tour’s decline in viewership this season on linear television be concerning? Or is it more cyclical and a sign of more households cutting the cord?

Desser: The broader perspective is better and one should be thinking about what were the numbers four or five years ago and to what extent has losing so many names (to LIV) negatively impacted the tour. It's enough guys that it's gotta hurt. These are, if not household names, they're certainly household names in golf households. And I think you've got to factor that in. But yes, audiences on television keep shrinking because there are more and more opportunities. The only real exception on an ongoing basis has been football and really NFL football.

Kosner: If you recall a year ago, you had the crusade, the tour was taking on LIV. They had brand new tournament structures. They had a lot of promotion, they had some exciting conclusions. There was a lot of energy into this a year ago that it's not quite the same thing this year. And these sports are cyclical. You have stars rise and fall, sometimes you have super dramatic games. Women's college basketball is having a sensational winter and spring, and we think it'll be strong next year, but Caitlin Clark will not be there.

Media consultants dish on improving the golf TV product

One consistent talking point in golf has been how the product will be improved with an influx of capital. When it comes to improving the product, much has been discussed about potential changes on TV or via other viewing platforms.

My colleague Josh Carpenter caught up with a pair of media industry vets -- Ed Desser and John Kosner (both regular SBJ contributors) -- to talk about what might be in store.

"All of sports has to focus on improving its product in a far more competitive environment," said Kosner. "The issue with over-commercialization, to the extent that that's a criticism, I kind of believe that's going to solve itself over time. The PGA Tour, the networks, the advertisers are going to conclude, 'We have to show more golf because we can't retain our audience.' ... It wouldn't surprise me at all to see more Mountain and West Coast locations for golf so that events could get scheduled into prime time and get better windows. It's great for the U.S. Open when they play at Olympic [in San Francisco]. ... By the same token, you may see with the influx of international dollars, more big events with big fields that are played in the Middle East, overseas and are airing at odd times."

"There's an interesting question whether there could be new products created that might appeal to younger audiences," noted Desser. "Clearly the tour is always looking for ways of attracting a younger demo because, let's face it, it's hard for younger people to afford the sport. And so they've got to figure out ways of introducing it and perpetuating it among younger people, or they'll be in the same mode as like horse racing where the average age is deceased."