DoglegDave
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So the PGA Tour finally released the details on the new equity program and I've been digging through it all morning. The headline number is $930 million in total shares, with Tiger and Rory each getting around $100M. Then you've got a handful of other top guys in the $30-50M range. And it trickles down from there. The rest of the membership gets basically scraps, if anything at all.
I get it. This is a retention play. LIV was offering stupid money and the Tour had to respond. But the way this is structured feels like a pure bribe to the top 1%. The shares vest over eight years, so you have to stick around. Fine. But what about the guys grinding on the Korn Ferry or the Monday qualifiers? They see nothing. And the players who actually built the Tour's popularity in the 90s and 2000s? Most of them aren't getting a dime.
I was talking to a buddy who caddies on Tour and he said half the locker room is pissed. Not because they expected a windfall, but because the Tour sold this as 'player equity' and then handed the keys to the same ten guys who already get all the sponsor invites. It's the rich getting richer. I don't blame Tiger or Rory for taking it, but let's not pretend this is about growing the game.
Maybe I'm being too cynical. Maybe this is just how big business works now. But when you see a guy like Nick Taylor or Adam Hadwin getting a fraction of what a guy like Jordan Spieth gets, and Spieth hasn't won in years, it makes you wonder what the criteria actually are.
Anybody else read the breakdown? Am I off base here?