24 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY february 2-8, 2023 www.montereycountyweekly.com Once again, the schism that’s broken apart the world of professional golf will be conspicuous at this year’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Some of the biggest names in the sport—including 2019 Pro-Am winner Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and Cameron Smith—won’t be on the Monterey Peninsula this weekend but rather on the other side of the world at the Saudi Invitational. While technically an event on the longstanding Asian Tour, the Saudi Invitational is inextricably linked to LIV Golf, the year-old Saudi-funded pro golf competition that has lured away many of the PGA’s stars with eye-watering sums of money. Not only is the Invitational sponsored by PIF, the same Saudi sovereign wealth fund that finances LIV, but its field features many of the same names (including the aforementioned foursome) that have departed the PGA Tour in favor of LIV’s riches. After initially banning its members from competing in the Saudi Invitational in 2021, the PGA Tour reversed course with a compromise: Tour members could be granted releases to play the Invitational—so long as they agreed to play the Pebble Beach Pro-Am in the following years. If a golfer had already played the Pro-Am in the previous five years, they would need to return to Pebble Beach once in the next two years; if they hadn’t, they would be required to compete in the Pro-Am twice in the next three years. The likes of Mickelson, Johnson and Smith all received releases to play in Saudi Arabia last year only to bolt the PGA Tour entirely in a matter of months, absolving themselves of any future obligations. That hasn’t stopped the Tour from continuing to grant releases as requested; Tour commissioner Jay Monahan told reporters in January that it had approved every request to play in this year’s Saudi Invitational, and that the ground rules set by the PGA Tour would continue to apply. “As communicated to the membership, players will be expected to play [the Pro-Am in the future],” PGA Tour spokesperson Joel Schuchmann tells the Weekly. “Players that do not comply would be subject to discipline.” Among those who were granted releases last year and will be in Pebble Beach this year include Jason Dufner—though others who played in Saudi Arabia then, like Xander Schauffele and Tony Finau, remain absent from the Pro-Am field. With the PGA Tour and its global rivals now in an escalating war over the time and talents of golf’s brightest stars, one could forgive the Tour organizers for being nervous about what the future may hold. After all, LIV’s seemingly endless riches have already proven a drain on the Tour’s once-enviably deep pool of world-class golfers, and there’s no telling how many more players choose to follow the money. “When the Tour lets me know that there are players who normally would play [Pebble Beach] who will not come this year, I’m obviously disappointed,” says Steve John, CEO of the Monterey Peninsula Foundation, which organizes the Pro-Am. “There’s nothing I can do about that, so my focus is on providing the best experience for every professional, every celebrity, every amateur golfer that comes to our tournament. We do everything we can to make sure that the pros who come here will leave here and want to come again.” For John, that includes making sure the players, their families and their caddies “are taken care of” and enjoy their time in Monterey County as much as possible. He cites not only the tournament itself but the weeklong parade of events and parties that surround it, as well as perks like cooking demonstrations staged by famed chef and restaurateur Thomas Keller, a regular Pro-Am participant. And then there’s the celebrity that has always come with the Pro-Am, dating back to when legendary Hollywood entertainer Bing Crosby helped launch the tournament in the late 1930s. “There’s nothing like it on the PGA Tour,” John says. “We know what we have as an asset, and we try to constantly raise the bar—so that when players come here, they experience something they’d never experience at another event.” He adds that he knows of instances in the past “where players thought about skipping [the Pro-Am], but their wives talked them out of it.” As far as attracting an audience to Pebble Beach, the Pro-Am appears to be hitting better than par for the course. After breaking $2 million in ticket sales last year—“a big number, but not our highest,” according to John—he says the tournament is on track to exceed that figure this year as tourism activity continues to ramp up in the wake of pandemic restrictions. “I can’t imagine why anyone wouldn’t want to come to Pebble Beach,” says John. “But to each his own.” Match Play Faced with moneyed global competition, Pro-Am organizers play to their strengths. By Rey Mashayekhi Despite the rift in professional golf, this year’s Pro-Am is expected to top last year’s mark of $2 million in ticket sales. Phil Mickelson in 2019, when he won the Pro-Am for the fifth time. Although he has family ties to Pebble Beach—his grandfather was a caddie at the golf links when it opened in 1919—Mickelson turned his back on the event and the PGA Tour in favor of Saudi money. “Players that do not comply would be subject to discipline." Matt Kohler Golf Daniel Dreifuss
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