Rory McIlroy may no longer be a member of the PGA Tour Policy Board, but that hasn’t stopped the four-time major champion from game planning what the future of professional could look like with the help of the Strategic Sports Group and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund.
Ahead of his first start of 2024 at the DP World Tour’s Dubai Invitational, McIlroy told Golf Digest on Tuesday he has a “dream scenario” of a global golf tour that reaches across multiple continents but still features a heavy American influence and expanded on the idea with the media at large on Wednesday.
“My dream scenario is a world tour, with the proviso that corporate America has to remain a big part of it all. Saudi Arabia, too. That’s just basic economics,” McIlroy said to Golf Digest. “But there is an untapped commercial opportunity out there. Investors always want to make a return on their money. Revenues at the PGA Tour right now are about $2.3 billion. So how do we get that number up to four or six? To me, it is by looking outward. They need to think internationally and spread their wings a bit. I’ve been banging that drum for a while.”
“I think informally, we sort of have most of that global schedule, anyway,” McIlroy added Wednesday at Dubai Creek Resort. “We still need to make sure that the biggest tournaments are in America; obviously that’s the biggest place that we play. But also trying to elevate some of the other tournaments around the world: You know, trying to, Middle East, Continental Europe, U.K. and Ireland, the Far East, whether it be Japan, Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, South Africa. I mean, you’ve got a lot of different opportunities there.”
“I think everyone needs to start thinking more globally around it but globally in a holistic way but not really like this tour, that tour and another tour,” he continued. “What is the best structure for elite professional golf, the top 70 to 100 guys in the world and what would that look like, especially if the game is going to look different going forward and everything is on the table. I just think it’s worth having that conversation.”
McIlroy argued the importance of the United States’ involvement given the size and brand of the PGA Tour but admitted the Tour’s large market has kept others from thriving.
“If we can sort of all, start to work together a little bit more, I think a rising tide lifts all ships or all boats, and that’s the mindset that I would, I guess, come to that thinking of what the best thing is for professional golf,” he said.
In a recent interview, McIlroy noted how LIV Golf has “exposed flaws in the system” by taking advantage of players as independent contractors, making it impossible for the Tour to financially compete and difficult for companies to stomach the rising costs of tournament sponsorship. His solution is simple: player contracts.
“When you look at different sports and the media landscape and how much these media companies are paying for sporting events, I think you have to be able to guarantee them the product that they are paying for,” McIlroy explained. “So in my opinion, yeah, I would say that people would have to be contracted and sign up to a certain number of events every year; that the sponsors and media partners know that the guys they want to be there are going to be.”
The SparkNotes version of McIlroy’s plan would put a heavy emphasis on classic U.S. events and national opens, including the Australian Open, with stops in the likes of Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan as well as popular European countries. Maybe even the Middle East.
“Throw in the four majors and you have a brilliant schedule for the top 70-100 guys, whatever the number is,” he said. “We’d have, say a 22-event schedule. That would look pretty good to me.”