“I honestly really do think that’s wrong” -Callum Tarren highlights potential impact of PGA Tour's $3,000,000,000 deal with SSG on TV coverage quality
The PGA Tour just got a massive $3 billion investment from Strategic Sports Group, and Callum Tarren has hopes that it will make a big difference in the sport. The money to keep players around and from leaving for LIV Golf is important, but they can impact more than just that with this money.
First and foremost, Tarren believes that improving fan engagement is a high priority, and he thinks there's a pretty straightforward way of doing it: show more players.
Via Golf Monthly, the golfer said:
"The majority of the time they show a handful of players, which are obviously your top guys, the Schefflers, your Homas, your Tigers. They don’t show the field, and I think that’s a huge part of fan engagement and a fan experience."
He believes that the world's best such as Tiger Woods or Scottie Scheffler, get all the coverage and no one else gets shown. He added that he had some first-hand experience with it:
"There was actually an example, not that I’m directly saying that I should have been on the TV but the US Open at Brookline, I think I had the lead after maybe 22 holes through 35 holes and I was hardly shown on TV."
Callum Tarren also revealed that another player had provided an even better example by saying:
"There’s a prime example, there’s a guy in this room that was leading the US Open the other week and there was maybe five golf shots shown from him."
Callum Tarren believes that's the right mindset to have. He says there might be an "unknown name" that's surging up the leaderboard, but fans don't see him on television because he's not being shown with the same frequency as others.
He went on to say:
"And I think that’s wrong. I honestly really do think that’s wrong, and I think that’s one way that SSG will look to improve fan engagement."
There are always upset bidders at PGA Tour events, and especially at Majors like the US Open, Open Championship, etc. These players are doing well and deserve to be shown on screen rather than just watching a top player who's not currently on top of the leaderboard anyway.
Callum Tarren discusses financial power of SSG investment
The PGA Tour's investment by SSG wasn't just so they could improve the fan experience. In fact, it was largely an infusion of money for the sake of giving them more money to work with.
LIV Golf is a major player thanks to the money they have. The added funds relieve some of the stress from that, but Callum Tarren isn't sure how any of it can be made back.
He sees it as a potentially costly investment in terms of ROI, but he's not too concerned about that himself. Tarren said via Golf Monthly:
"In regards to return on investment, I have no idea. That’s such large sums of money that I honestly don’t know how they would reap any of that back, I mean there’s obviously ways of doing it but I’ll leave that to the business experts."
Callum Tarren mentioned the proposed PIF merger as well, but he, like many, doesn't have much intel on the status of that.