Jay Monahan continued to be coy on the negations between the PGA Tour and Saudi PIF.
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Not a lot.
On Wednesday, as PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, gave his annual end-of-the-season press convention on the Tour Championship from Atlanta, he touched on quite a few subjects together with the way forward for the PGA Tour schedule, to the brand new pathways which can be being taken benefit of to hitch the PGA Tour, to the Tour’s new PGA Tour Studios and the way forward for golf on TV.
However one topic Monahan gave little or no readability on, regardless of being requested 4 questions on the matter, was the standing of the negotiations between the PGA Tour and the Saudi Public Funding Fund.
“We’re on the desk and actively engaged with the Public Funding Fund,” Monahan stated in his opening assertion, echoing earlier hesitancy to replace on the talks instantly. “We stay hopeful about that end result. However on the similar time, we’re shifting ahead at velocity and centered on what we are able to management, as a result of that’s what we owe to our followers.”
The PGA Tour and the PIF, the father or mother of PGA Tour rival LIV Golf, initially got here to a framework settlement final June to merge their industrial golf operations, surprising the golf world after almost two years of battle between the 2 leagues. That framework settlement had a deadline of December thirty first, 2023, however that deadline got here and went with no full settlement and with out one in clear sight.
In January, the PGA Tour accepted an enormous funding from a consortium of sports activities homeowners referred to as the Strategic Sports activities Group, however continued to say talks with the PIF had been ongoing and remained agency that the purpose was coming to an settlement.
On Wednesday, Monahan affirmed that the Tour was in a “common dialogue” with the PIF, however didn’t get into specifics about what that meant. He additionally claimed the precedence to get a deal accomplished on each side “has been enhanced.”
A yr later, no PGA Tour-PIF deal. Was it ever shut? Is it coming quickly?
“That’s a direct results of dialogue and dialog and actually beginning to discuss concerning the future, future product imaginative and prescient and the place we are able to take our sport,” he stated. “I believe whenever you get into productive conversations, that enhances the probability of constructive outcomes, and that enhances the spirit of these very conversations.”
As of now, Monahan stated there isn’t any deadline to return to an settlement or drop the framework altogether.
“I don’t assume we need to prohibit ourselves in that method. We need to obtain one of the best and proper end result on the proper time.”
Monahan has been coy for particulars on the negotiations for months saying the Tour wouldn’t “negotiate particulars in public.”
He reiterated that stance on Wednesday.
“These conversations are advanced. They’re going to take time. They’ve taken time, and they’ll proceed to take time,” he stated. “As I sit right here right now, I believe a very powerful factor for us and our obligations to our followers, our gamers and our companions is to deal with what we management, which we’re doing, as I outlined, and to proceed to hold this momentum ahead.
“However I’m not going to barter particulars in public or disclose particulars or specifics. All I can say is that conversations proceed, and so they’re productive.”
