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      An Ever-Changing Masters Course Changes Again

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      The course at Augusta National is like a living entity, growing and shifting regularly. The risky 13th hole, for example, is now 35 yards longer and even riskier.The golfer Brendon Todd takes comfort in the memories of practice rounds he played at Augusta National Golf Club with José Maria Olazábal, who won the Masters Tournament in 1994 and 1999.The course was shorter when Olazábal was dominant, and the difference between the longest hitters and everyone else wasn’t that large, Todd said Olazábal told him.“He said everyone hit the ball the same distance, and it was shorter back then,” said Todd, who has played in three Masters tournaments. “It was about accuracy. It was a second-shot golf course. That’s still the case today.”But there’s a big difference: The course is about 600 yards longer than it was 30 years ago and is now at 7,545 yards. And the big hitters absolutely bomb the ball today, which has the United States Golf Association considering changing how far golf balls fly. Todd, who ranks 203rd on driving distance on the PGA Tour this season, is not one of them.“On the hardest holes — 1, 5, 17, 18 — the big hitters hit driver and 8-iron,” Todd said. “I hit driver and a 5- or 6-iron. That’s not coming down soft enough on the greens.”The Masters lives in our imaginations as the only major venue that never changes. It’s an annual rite of spring to see azaleas bloom and pimento-cheese sandwiches in patrons’ hands, and anyone lucky enough to be invited to play — or even score a badge to watch — treats their time going around Augusta National with reverence.This is the course that Dr. Alister MacKenzie, among the best Golden Age architects, and Bobby Jones, the great amateur champion, created to host an invitational tournament that would bring together the best golfers.All of that is true, but the course itself is like a living entity, growing, shifting and changing regularly. It looks little today like it did when the first tournament was played in 1934.No fewer than 10 architects have made changes to the course, and even more players and designers have consulted on modifications. These have included Perry Maxwell, credited with significant early changes; Jack Nicklaus, the six-time champion; and Tom Fazio, the current architect.This year, all eyes are on the 35-yard-longer 13th hole, which over the years has had daring Sunday charges, like Phil Mickelson threading a shot through a stand of pine trees and on to the green as he mounted a charge to win his third Masters in 2010, as well as plenty of ignominious failures as balls dropped into Rae’s Creek in front of the green.The par-5 hole may be too long for such excitement this year, at least for a majority of the field, which doesn’t drive the ball as far and accurately as Rory McIlroy.“The length is a big thing,” said Matthew McClean, who received an invitation to play the Masters because he won the 2022 United States Mid-Amateur Golf Championship. “It’s long. The most underestimated thing about Augusta is how hard it is off the tee.”McClean, an accomplished player from Northern Ireland, said he hit his drives around 290 to 300 yards on average. And that isn’t enough. “There’s a myth that you can just hammer a driver around the course,” he said. “That’s not true. It’s as demanding a golf course as I’ve played anywhere.”The 13th hole has been lengthened to 545 yards. (It was 480 yards in the first playing of the tournament.) That doesn’t seem that long for the best players in the world, but it’s the angle of the hole that’s tricky. It bends around to the left with danger for the player who hits it too far to that side, but there is also trouble too far right.That angle and the added distance this year may have players going for something less than the heroic shot that Mickelson made in 2010, preferring instead to hit something short of the famous creek and then pitching it over.That’s strategic golf, and how Zach Johnson played Augusta’s par 5s en route to his Masters victory in 2007. His strategy was to hit wedges into every par 5 on the course. It was good enough for a two-shot victory over Tiger Woods, but it wasn’t the most exciting tournament in memory.Woods practiced on the 11th hole earlier this week. The course at Augusta National is about 600 yards longer than it was 30 years ago and is now at 7,545 yards.Doug Mills/The New York Times“I don’t think it’s better for the tournament,” said Jose Campra, a veteran caddie who has worked at the Masters for Ángel Cabrera, a past champion, and twice for Emiliano Grillo.“We’re going to see only 5 percent of the players going for the green on 13. The rest are going to lay up,” he said, meaning they will have the ball land short of the creek so they can hit over it with their next shot.That may be smart playing, but there’s also a feeling that it could reduce the excitement. Sundays at the Masters are known, after all, for the roars that ripple across the course, with every charge or failure.“There’s going to be less risk-reward,” Campra said. “Before, we’d see a lot of guys hit it into the water on 13. That was excitement on Sunday. You used to have a lot of guys take it over the trees on 13 and go for it in two. But not a lot anymore because they can’t cover the distance.”Bernhard Langer, a two-time Masters champion, called it his favorite hole.“One of my luckiest golf shots in my career was on 13,” he said. “It was Saturday in 1985, and I was trying to hook my tee shot around the corner. It went kind of straight and ended up on the right edge of the fairway. I didn’t have a good lie. But I was 6 behind. I asked my caddie, ‘What do you think?’ He said 3-wood, but look at that lie. I said I know it’s not easy to get a 3-wood up and over Rae’s Creek.”But Langer gave it a try. It didn’t look promising at first. “I hit it a little thin. It never got more than four feet off the ground. I said, no way it’s getting over. Back then, there used to be a little mound. It bounced over the creek onto the green. I made about a 60-footer for an eagle. I birdied the next hole and 15. I was only 2 behind going into Sunday.”That would be Langer’s first Masters victory. But one thing he also recalled: He was never overpowering the course.“When I used to be paired with Tiger, people said Tiger is intimidating, but I never felt that,” he said. “He was playing his game. I was playing my game. He out drove me by a huge number. I know I can’t hit it 325 yards.”Many shorter hitters this week know that playing their own game is the key.“Our game is our game, and our strengths are our strengths,” said Todd, who did not make it into this year’s tournament.In 2021, when he made the cut and finished tied for 46th, he said he stuck to his strengths.“I hit more fairways,” Todd said. “I put my long clubs in the center of the greens. I played the par 5s well with my wedges and made some birdies.”“When we’re fortunate to play a course like Augusta, its practice and experience,” he added. “At the Masters, there are 20 to 25 guys who have played the last eight to 10 majors, and they have an experienced edge on you. That’s why you see the same class of players who do well.” More

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      The 5 Players to Watch at the Masters

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      An impressive Scottie Scheffler is in good position to repeat, and Tiger Woods is capable of making another run.The best players in the world will assemble again this week at Augusta National Golf Club for the first of the year’s four major championships.Will a marquee name come through and add to his legacy? Or will an unheralded player emerge? It’s happened before at the Masters Tournament and will likely happen again.Here are five players to watch.Scottie SchefflerScheffler, 26, the defending champion and No. 1 player in the world, is on quite a roll.He has ended up in the top four in four of his last five starts, including two victories. The one occasion he didn’t record a high finish was in February when he tied for 12th at the Genesis Invitational in Pacific Palisades, Calif.His performance in last month’s Players Championship was especially impressive. He seized a two-stroke advantage with a seven-under 65 on Saturday. On Sunday, Scheffler made five consecutive birdies starting at the eighth hole to pretty much put the tournament away.“I knew the conditions were going to get really hard late,” he said, “and I did a really good job of staying patient and not trying to force things.”Scheffler was in position for another win two weeks ago at the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play in Texas before he fell to Sam Burns. If he were to prevail again at Augusta, he would become the first consecutive champion since Tiger Woods in 2002.Tiger WoodsRyan Kang/Associated PressTiger WoodsSpeaking of Woods, how can he possibly not be someone to keep a close eye on?As he’s made clear, from here on we’re likely to see him at only the four major championships and perhaps another tournament here and there. Which is similar to the type of limited playing schedule Ben Hogan maintained after his car accident in 1949. Woods, 47, has played in only one event, the Genesis Invitational. He tied for 45th.It might be easy to assume Woods won’t be a factor this week.It might also be a mistake.In 2019, he surprised the golfing world by winning his fifth green jacket, second to the six won by Jack Nicklaus. And if there is anyone who knows Augusta National, it would be Woods.One of the keys will be how the leg he injured in a car accident in 2021 holds up. He started last year’s Masters with a more than respectable 71 before ending up in a tie for 47th.However he fares, it will be fascinating to watch.Rory McIlroyMike Mulholland/Getty ImagesRory McIlroyEvery year, it becomes more difficult to comprehend how McIlroy, one of the most talented players in the game, has failed to pick up a major title since the 2014 P.G.A. Championship.The Irish star was 25 when he prevailed that year by a stroke over Phil Mickelson. The victory gave him four majors.He is now 33.It looked like the drought might end in last year’s British Open.Heading into the final round, he was tied with Viktor Hovland, both up by four over Cameron Smith. Except McIlroy recorded only two birdies on Sunday, while Smith had eight in firing a 64. McIlroy, who could manage no better than a 70, finished third, two shots back.A victory at Augusta would make him the sixth player to capture the career grand slam (winning all four majors) the others being Ben Hogan, Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and Gene Sarazen. He would also atone for what happened in the final round of the 2011 Masters. Up by four strokes entering the day, he fell apart with an 80.With his talent, McIlroy is destined to win another major sooner or later.Jordan SpiethDustin Safranek/USA Today Sports, via ReutersJordan SpiethSpieth, 29, is another star who has experienced a drought in the majors that wasn’t expected.Go back to the summer of 2017 when Spieth, 23 at the time, rallied to win the British Open. That gave him three majors.He’s still stuck at three.Each round seems to provide an assortment of errant shots and magical recoveries. How he will fare from day to day, from shot to shot, remains a mystery.Spieth has played some of his finest golf at Augusta National. Since he captured the title in 2015 with a record-tying score of 18-under 270, he has finished three times in the top three (2016, 2018 and 2021).He will also have the calendar working in his favor. On Easter Sunday in 2021, Spieth won the Texas Open. On Easter Sunday last year, he won the RBC Heritage in South Carolina.The final round of the Masters this year falls on Easter.Jason DayRichard Heathcote/Getty ImagesJason DayDay, from Australia, is looking more and more like his old self, and now he’s coming back to a course where he has enjoyed success.A former No. 1 player in the world, Day, 35, has finished in the top 10 in five of his last six starts. At the match play event, he defeated four opponents before Scheffler rallied to knock him out in the quarterfinals.Still, it was another encouraging week.“It was a great step in the right direction,” Day said. “It opens my eyes to the fact that I have a few things I need to work on, short-game-wise, putting-wise.”Day has been plagued by health issues over the years, and he has won one major, the P.G.A. Championship, in 2015. At the Masters, he tied for second in 2011 and finished third two years later.He is trying to become the second player from his country — the other was the 2013 champion, Adam Scott — to win at Augusta National. More

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      2023 Masters: Fred Couples Talks About Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy

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      Jordan Spieth is looking for his first major victory since 2017, and the weather forecast for the Masters Tournament is becoming less encouraging.AUGUSTA, Ga. — One of the pleasures of the Masters Tournament can be finding Fred Couples, the 1992 winner, in an expansive mood.And so it was on a particularly brisk Monday, after he had played part of the course with Tom Kim, Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods. Few players have had as many close looks at Woods in recent years: The men routinely play practice rounds together, with Couples filling a role approximating that of court jester. And even if his analyses sometimes prove off the mark, they can be telling glimpses of Woods’s potential.“He’s strong enough to hit it a mile,” Couples said of Woods. “He’s not hitting it as far as Rory — I don’t think many people are — but he’s hitting it really strong and solid, and he looks good.”Woods has played only four rounds of tournament golf this year, logging an average driving distance of 306.3 yards, about 20 yards behind McIlroy. But the challenge for Woods, as ever these days after the car wreck that nearly cost him a leg in February 2021, is walking 72 holes over four days of competition. Asked Monday whether Woods was moving differently from the way he had around this time last year, Couples replied, “Probably not.”“The leg — I guess this is what it is,” he continued. “I don’t know how much better it’s ever going to get.”Woods and Couples talk as they walk along the 14th fairway.Doug Mills/The New York TimesBut Couples did not talk exclusively about Woods. In McIlroy, who is seeking a victory at Augusta to complete a career Grand Slam, he sees a player with all of the potential in the world to capture a green jacket.“Is it surprising he’s never won this?” he said. “Of course it is, the way he plays and the way he putts and how high he hits it and how far he hits it. But it’s not that easy.”And not long after he had drawn headlines for bashing LIV players — Phil Mickelson was a “nut bag” and Sergio García a “clown” — Couples said he had merely wanted them to avoid criticizing the PGA Tour.“They don’t bother me,” he said. “They really don’t. They’re golfers. I’m a golfer. I respect them all. On my show, I’ve told everyone Sergio is one of the top 10 players I’ve ever seen hit a ball, but if he’s going to make comments about the tour that I play, I’m going to make a comment back — and if it’s offensive, I apologize, but they’re on another tour. Go play and have a good time.”Jabs aside, he was not bothered by their invitations to the Masters: “I think they deserve to be here.”— Blinder‘It’s definitely not going to be on any nutritionist’s plan.’Scottie Scheffler, the defending Masters champion and the world No. 1.Doug Mills/The New York TimesNearly all of the living Masters winners (as well as Fred S. Ridley, Augusta National’s chairman) are expected to convene Tuesday evening for their annual dinner. Scottie Scheffler, the reigning champion, picked the menu and will pick up the tab.The appetizers include cheeseburger sliders and firecracker shrimp. A tortilla soup will be on offer, and guests can pick between a Texas rib-eye steak — Scheffler, after all, is essentially a product of Dallas — and blackened redfish. Side items include macaroni and cheese, jalapeño creamed corn and brussels sprouts, and the dessert will be chocolate-chip skillet cookies topped with milk-and-cookies ice cream.The menu’s development began with a conversation among Scheffler; his wife, Meredith; and Blake Smith, his agent. The trio kicked around Scheffler’s favorite foods and narrowed the list before consulting with an Augusta National chef to nail down the menu.“It’s definitely not going to be on any nutritionist’s plan,” Scheffler said last month. “But we’re going to have fun. We’re going to eat some good food.”The menu should appeal to plenty of former winners, a traditional bunch that has sometimes been alarmed by selections like haggis (Sandy Lyle) and kidney pie (Nick Faldo). Some were skeptical in 2001, when they arrived to a Vijay Singh-commissioned menu of Thai delicacies.“I’m sure Charlie Coody didn’t try anything,” Tommy Aaron, the 1973 winner, recalled of the 1971 victor. “I had never had Thai food, and it was fantastic.”But the dinners, Aaron said a few years ago, always feature one practice: “They pour that wine like it’s going out of style.”— BlinderEvery day is like Sunday.Jordan Spieth, a PGA Tour golfer who won the Masters in 2015.Doug Mills/The New York TimesFirst-time visitors at the Masters tournament are always obvious. For starters, they tend to walk slowly with their eyes wide. As famed as Augusta National Golf Club is, to a newcomer parading around the grounds, the landscape is a bevy of surprises that no television broadcast — however technologically advanced and exhaustingly thorough — can grasp.For example, every Masters first-timer is stunned that the vertical drop from the 10th tee to the 10th green is a stunning, and difficult to traverse, 85 feet. It’s one of many discoveries. And as Jordan Spieth, the 2015 Masters champion, said on Monday, even veteran players know that there may be another revelation awaiting them each time they arrive at the site of the tournament.Players fret and worry that their games may not be ready for the exacting test that awaits.Taking note of a packed practice range on Monday, Spieth waved a hand toward the scene and said: “Have you ever seen this many people practicing this hard on a Monday? Typically, you take Monday off.”Annual tweaks to the course, like the substantial lengthening of the 13th hole this year, only add to the tension. As Spieth added: “You know, you’re just anxious. More anxious than nervous.”Asked if the mental preparation for the tee shot on the pivotal first hole tended to change considerably from Thursday’s welcoming opening round to Sunday’s tense final, Spieth shook his head side to side. “I don’t feel that it changes,” he answered.He continued: “It’s one of the only places it doesn’t change for me, regardless of the position I’m in. It feels like it’s a Sunday — a first tee shot in contention each day.”— PenningtonCameron Smith arrived with trepidation.Cameron Smith, a LIV golfer and the 2022 British Open champion.Andrew Redington/Getty ImagesIt’s not just golf fans and reporters who have been wondering how the stalwarts of the PGA Tour and the renegade LIV golfers would get along when having to mingle at the Masters tournament for the first time this week. Cameron Smith, who bolted for the Saudi-backed LIV circuit a month after winning last year’s British Open, conceded on Monday that he had approached the Augusta National Golf Club practice area with trepidation.“I really wasn’t sure what to expect walking onto the range, but it was good to see some familiar faces and a lot of smiles,” Smith said with a wide grin. “It was just a really nice experience.”But Smith, who is hardly known for pointed remarks, also insisted that the 18 LIV golfers in the 88-player 2023 Masters field were intent on having a visible presence at the top of the leaderboard when at the tournament’s conclusion. And, he said, the LIV cohort is aware of the shade that has been thrown its way by its one-time colleagues on the PGA Tour.“It’s just important for LIV guys to be up there, because I think we need to be up there,” Smith said on Monday. Referring to the occasional derisive comments directed at the LIV circuit by PGA Tour players, officials or members of the golf media, he added: “I think there’s a lot of chatter about how these guys don’t play real golf; these guys don’t play real golf courses. For sure, I’ll be the first one to say, the fields aren’t as strong. But we’ve still got a lot of guys up there that can play some really serious golf.“I think we just need a good, strong finish.”Smith was also asked about whether the LIV golfers had discussed having a joint celebration on the 18th green if one of them were to win this year’s Masters, which was suggested recently by Greg Norman, the LIV Golf Commissioner.“There definitely hasn’t been a conversation with me — I definitely got left out of that one,” he said, laughing. “I guess we’ll see how the week unfolds. For sure, I’d love to see one of us guys get up to the top of the leaderboard and really give it a nice shot.”Lastly, Smith, whose world golf ranking has slipped to sixth from second at the end of the 2022, reiterated that he had no regrets about joining LIV Golf.“I’ve made my bed, and I’m very, very happy where I am,” he said.— PenningtonKeep an eye on the weather.There’s a good chance for rain at Augusta National on the weekend.Doug Mills/The New York TimesYes, it is early in the week. Yes, weather forecasts can change. But no, the outlook for this week is not great. The team assembling forecasts for Augusta National has pegged the chances of rain at 60 percent or higher on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.“Shower and thunderstorm chances increase Thursday afternoon as a weak frontal boundary approaches,” the tournament said in one of its official forecasts on Monday. “The front is expected to stall to the south Friday into Saturday with a northeast wind pushing much colder air into Georgia. Waves of upper-level energy moving along the front are forecast to produce periods of rain that could be heavy at times through Sunday.”All of that scientific speak could make this Masters a delight for Rory McIlroy, who has sometimes thrived in abysmal weather at major tournaments, and a nightmare for the organizers.The Masters last had a Monday finish in 1983, when Seve Ballesteros won his second green jacket. That year, the second round — the Friday round — did not end until 8:30 a.m. on Sunday.But Augusta National is accustomed to dealing with poor weather more recently. If a round is upended in the coming days because of inclement conditions, this will be the fifth consecutive year in which tournament organizers have had to grapple so explicitly with meteorological misfortune.— Blinder More

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      LIV Golf Talks a Big Game to the Global Elite. Now Come the Majors.

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      Despite setbacks, LIV’s executives insist the Saudi-backed league is soaring. For many fans, the rhetoric is less important than results at events like the Masters Tournament.MIAMI BEACH — On Thursday afternoon, one week before the Masters Tournament, Greg Norman sat not at a golf course, but in a building populated that day by billionaires, royals and former prime ministers.He had a case to make: that LIV Golf, the insurgent circuit that he has built with a 10-figure pot of money from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, has made itself into a muscular, undaunted rival to the PGA Tour.Norman might have been too sanguine at times — in court documents, LIV’s own lawyers said the league had been relegated to a “secondary” television network and that it had faced revenues of “virtually zero” — but it may matter only so much. For many casual fans, LIV’s legitimacy, if the league lasts, is most likely to be settled at places like Augusta National Golf Club, not at meetings of the global elite or in a thicket of antitrust case filings.LIV players have competed in major tournaments since their defections from the PGA Tour with varied results: Bryson DeChambeau and Dustin Johnson finished in the top 10 at last July’s British Open, where Brooks Koepka and Phil Mickelson missed the cut. This year, though, offers a more formidable test because it will be the first time some of the Saudi-backed league’s golfers will play the full cycle of the Masters, the P.G.A. Championship, the U.S. Open and the British Open, after months of reveling in a slimmer competition schedule.If one of the players can break through and claim a green jacket or a claret jug or one of golf’s other great prizes, LIV will have achieved its mightiest measure of vindication to date.A major championship would not solve LIV’s myriad troubles, including executive upheaval, exclusion from the Official World Golf Ranking and a product often drowned out by a PGA Tour loath to acknowledge that it has maybe taken a few recent cues from a new rival. Such a victory would certainly not extinguish the perception among critics that the league is tarnished by its association with Saudi Arabia.But it could enchant fans and encourage at least some of them to keep tabs on a league that has, so far, largely been marked by bravado. It could intensify the pressure on the organizers of the major tournaments to find ways to keep LIV golfers more easily in the qualifying mix, and it would curb the notion that 54-hole tournaments are no way to prepare for golf’s most pressurized tests.“Anytime you win the Masters or the Open, that’s usually a pretty big statement,” Koepka, who won two P.G.A. Championships and two U.S. Opens before he switched to LIV, said ahead of the circuit’s pre-Masters competition near Orlando, Fla. Even PGA Tour stalwarts have begrudgingly acknowledged that a LIV victory in a major, especially an early one like the Masters, would unleash a shower of athletic attention on a league that has frequently drawn more headlines for its finances.Cameron Smith, who won the 2022 British Open, may have the best chance of being LIV Golf’s first major winner.Mike Ehrmann/Getty ImagesThe league’s best chance may come in Cameron Smith, whose thrilling Sunday showing at last year’s British Open earned him his first major title less than two months before he moved to LIV. But Johnson, who won the 2020 Masters with the lowest score in the event’s history, lurks. LIV will have five other past Masters champions in Augusta and an array of past major winners, such as Koepka and DeChambeau, looking to prove that they can contend again.“At least for myself, it’s going to be business as usual going out and playing,” said Patrick Reed, who won the 2018 Masters. “Would I like to have LIV be up at the top? Of course. But really at the end of the day, it’s all of us going in there and just trying to play the best golf we can and be ready for the four biggest weeks of the year.”Mickelson, who has six major tournament victories over his long career, the most of any LIV golfer, recently shrugged off the chatter about whether the league’s players will be prepared as “tongue in cheek.” Johnson has done much the same.“Doesn’t make a bit of difference, no sir, not to me,” he said in an interview last month. “It’s golf. You play how many ever days you can.”The results will bear out whether that talking point has any staying power, the evidence available for anyone to evaluate. LIV may not require an outright victory at Augusta, where PGA Tour stars such as Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy and Jon Rahm are arriving after months of generally excellent outings. But if the league’s players are well clear of the top of the leaderboard, the snickers will grow as much as some of the golfers’ bank accounts have.LIV executives and Saudi officials have known for years that for a league to prove viable, it would have to include the biggest names in golf. LIV has attracted some, but relevancy is fleeting, and the majors represent the league’s best opportunity to dazzle people into interest in a new product. But if players such as Smith and Johnson are unable to recreate their past magic sooner than later, the league’s prospects could diminish into a circuit of also-rans.Yasir al-Rumayyan, left, the governor of the Public Investment Fund in Saudi Arabia, with Majed Al Sorour, then the chief executive of Golf Saudi, and Norman at the Bedminster Invitational in Bedminster, N.J., in 2022.Seth Wenig/Associated PressNorman did not mention that possibility during his appearance on Thursday in Florida. Instead, he talked of administrative and operational “headwinds,” which he blamed on the PGA Tour, such as the challenge of securing vendors and sponsors.But Norman’s presence on the stage in Miami Beach was somewhat remarkable, following months of a lower profile after he provoked broad condemnations for statements that downplayed Saudi Arabia’s record of human rights abuses. (In perhaps the gravest conflagration, he appeared to diminish the gravity of the murder of the Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, saying, “Look, we’ve all made mistakes.”)Norman’s appearance on Thursday carried the imprimatur of Yasir al-Rumayyan, the wealth fund’s governor who took the stage hours before Norman declared that “our partnership and our investor is 100 percent sustainable — we are not going to go anywhere.”LIV’s star turn at the event in Florida could be seen as a vote of confidence in Norman, who has defied months of speculation that his ouster as LIV’s commissioner was imminent. It was also a signal that Saudi Arabia’s interest in global sports has not vanished amid plentiful turbulence, not least in an American court system that has dealt the kingdom a series of blows.Al-Rumayyan, who in addition to being LIV’s patron and the chairman of the English soccer team Newcastle United, said nothing in public about whether he intends to steer the wealth fund toward new sports investments. Before the audience of tastemakers and sought-after investors, though, Norman appeared to suggest that some in the Saudi orbit regard LIV much like a test drive.“We know as we look at our platform and our business model, that can be replicated in other sports as well,” said Norman, a three-time runner-up at Augusta National. “Our first proof point is proving out what we’re doing.”For the people who ultimately dictate a product’s significance — fans, not investors — the majors would be a good place to start. More

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      PGA Tour-LIV Golf Rivalry Could Make for a Tense Masters Dinner

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      Players from the competing tours will be shoulder to shoulder at the traditional Champions Dinner. Feelings about that are mixed.This might get awkward.Forget the menu of cheeseburgers, firecracker shrimp, rib-eyes and redfish. This year’s Masters Champions Dinner on Tuesday night will have PGA Tour players meeting face-to-face with six former colleagues who have defected to LIV Golf, the Saudi-financed league.The LIV golfers Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Bubba Watson, Patrick Reed, Sergio Garcia and Charl Schwartzel will be close together for drinks and dinner with Tiger Woods, Justin Thomas and Jordan Spieth, all outspoken critics of the former PGA players who left for LIV Golf.There have already been heated public exchanges between the players. And while some players downplay the interaction at the dinner, others say it’s impossible to ignore the rift.Scottie Scheffler, who won the Masters Tournament last year and is hosting the traditional event at which past Masters winners are invited, recently joked that Watson should have a separate table. Watson took the comment in stride.“Hey, as long as I’m at the Champions Dinner, I’m fine,” Watson said at a recent news conference. “I’ll sit wherever he tells me. It’s fine. As long as I’m allowed back, I’ll sit wherever he wants me to. I’ll sit outside and just stare in the window.”As the winner of last year’s Masters, Scottie Scheffler is allowed to choose the menu for the Champions Dinner.Doug Mills/The New York TimesScheffler later put the evening in perspective.“With Augusta National being such a special place and with the history of the game and whatnot,” he said. “I think we can put all our stuff aside and just get together for a fun meal, all in a room together and just kind of celebrate the game of golf and Augusta National and just hang out.”Johnson, the 2020 Masters champion, said recently that he didn’t expect any problems at the dinner.“I heard what was said about possible tension at the dinner, but there will not be any tension from me.” he said. “Besides, I still have a great relationship with all my fellow Masters champions,”The two-time winner José Olazábal of Spain told the golf writer Bernie McGuire that “if Bubba Watson asks me to pass the salt or whatever, I will be happy to pass him whatever Bubba or any other of the fellow Masters winners wish for.“Each one of us who sit down at the Champions Dinner are in the room that night as we have won at Augusta National and, as I said, I respect each and everyone in the room as they are fellow Masters winners, and also what they have achieved in their careers,” Olazábal said.Patrick Reed, who won the Masters in 2018 and now plays for LIV Golf, said the dinner should focus on Scheffler, not the ongoing drama.“The thing is, the Champions Dinner has nothing to do with myself or any other person in that room except for Scottie Scheffler,” Reed told Golf Digest. “That’s his dinner. My experiences during those dinners have been amazing. We’re always talking about past experiences at Augusta, how the other guys have won the [Masters], what obstacles they had to overcome, the shots they pulled off in their experiences.”The 1960 Masters Champions Dinner.Augusta NationalSergio Garcia, another LIV Golf player who won the Masters in 2017, said he didn’t expect any problems.“I’m going to feel fine,” Garcia said in March. “I don’t have any problems with anyone, and I try not to make a big deal out of it. I’m going to be there because I earned it, because I deserve it, and I’m going to enjoy it. I hope the rest of the guys do the same.”Tom Clavin, who wrote “One for the Ages: Jack Nicklaus and the 1986 Masters,” said in an interview that the dinner would be interesting because it mixes young LIV golfers with the elder statesmen.“It is fascinating that the Champions Dinner must be the first time since the schism that several of the prime players are breaking bread together,” Clavin said. “But there’s also the generational aspect. At other tourneys there is nothing like the presence of older players like at the Masters. Imagine [Ben] Crenshaw sitting next to a young LIV player, or [Jack] Nicklaus and Mickelson. Yet Masters tradition also demands civility. I would love to be a fly on that wall.”Phil Mickelson, second from left, is one of the former Masters winners who have joined LIV Golf.Chris Thelen/The Augusta Chronicle, via Associated PressAt a recent LIV event in Tucson, Ariz., Mickelson, the three-time Masters champion, did not address the dinner specifically, but spoke about reuniting with friends from the PGA Tour.“No expectations,” he said. “We are grateful to just be able to play and compete and be a part of it. A lot of the people there that are playing and competing in the Masters are friends for decades, and I’m looking forward to seeing them again.”During a news conference at the Genesis Invitational in Los Angeles in February, Tiger Woods was asked what his demeanor would be at the dinner and if the dinner would be uncomfortable.“That’s a great question because I don’t know because I haven’t been around them,” Woods said about the LIV Golf players. “I don’t know what that reaction’s going to be. I know that some of our friendships have certainly taken a different path, but we’ll see when all that transpires.”Woods agreed that any spat shouldn’t take away from honoring Scheffler.“The Champions Dinner is going to be obviously something that’s talked about,” Woods said. “We as a whole need to honor Scottie, Scottie’s the winner, it’s his dinner. So making sure that Scottie gets honored correctly but also realizing the nature of what has transpired and the people that have left, just where our situations are either legally, emotionally. There’s a lot there.” More

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      Masters Tournament Will Let LIV Golf Players Compete in 2023

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      The decision by Augusta National Golf Club is an interim victory for the upstart circuit, but other troubles loom.Augusta National Golf Club will allow members of the breakaway LIV Golf league to compete in the Masters Tournament, the first men’s golf major of 2023.The decision by the private club, which organizes the invitational tournament and has exclusive authority over who walks its hilly, pristine course each April, is an interim victory for LIV, the upstart operation bankrolled by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund to much of the golf establishment’s fury.“Regrettably, recent actions have divided men’s professional golf by diminishing the virtues of the game and the meaningful legacies of those who built it,” Fred S. Ridley, Augusta National’s chairman, said in a Tuesday statement. “Although we are disappointed in these developments, our focus is to honor the tradition of bringing together a pre-eminent field of golfers this coming April.”But the approach announced by the club on Tuesday — continuing to rely on qualifying categories that often hinge on performances in PGA Tour competitions or other majors, or on certain thresholds in the Official World Golf Ranking — threatens to limit access for LIV players as more years pass, which could ultimately make it more difficult for LIV to attract new golfers.Ridley said Augusta National evaluates “every aspect of the tournament each year, and any modifications or changes to invitation criteria for future tournaments will be announced in April.”LIV declined to comment on Tuesday.The organizers of the British Open, the P.G.A. Championship and the U.S. Open have not said how or whether they will adjust their 2023 entry standards in the wake of LIV Golf’s emergence this year. Augusta National, though, has now offered what could be a template for LIV’s short-term relationships with the major tournaments.Augusta National, for instance, did not abandon its tradition of offering past winners lifetime entry into the tournament, a reprieve for the six LIV players who have already earned green jackets: Sergio Garcia, Dustin Johnson, Phil Mickelson, Patrick Reed, Charl Schwartzel and Bubba Watson. Recent winners of other majors will still qualify for the 2023 Masters, clearing the way, for at least a little longer, for players like Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka and Cameron Smith.And Augusta, which has become entangled in the Justice Department’s antitrust inquiry into men’s professional golf, will continue to admit players who are in the top 50 in the world rankings at certain times.The world ranking system is a weapon that is as subtle and technical (and disputed) as it is consequential and, for some golfers, determinative. LIV players do not currently earn ranking points for their 54-hole, no-cut events, and they have fallen in the rankings as other golfers have kept playing tournaments on eligible tours. In July, LIV applied to be included in the rankings, and more recently, it partnered with the MENA Tour, which is a part of the system, to try to keep its players in the mix.But the board that oversees the rankings includes golf executives whose reactions to the breakaway series have ranged from skeptical to hostile, and the group has not embraced LIV’s requests. If major tournaments like the Masters continue to use world ranking points as a qualifying method, at least some players will see their entry prospects evaporate. A sustained reliance on PGA Tour events as other qualifying avenues will also stanch access for LIV players.Whether LIV golfers can play the majors may be crucial to the upstart’s prospects in the years ahead. Beyond golfing glory, major championship winners earn heightened public profiles, and they are more likely to attract lucrative sponsorship arrangements. If LIV’s players face extraordinary constraints on their chances simply to reach a major tournament field, much less to win the competition, the league may have trouble recruiting new players.The possibility of exclusion from the majors was enough to warrant a brief legal spat over the summer, when the LIV players Talor Gooch, Matt Jones and Hudson Swafford asked a federal judge to order their participation in the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup playoffs. Gooch, Jones and Swafford had all failed to qualify for the 2023 majors through other means, and their lawyers warned that keeping them from the playoffs would probably end their chances at doing so. Heeding the arguments of the PGA Tour, which said that “antitrust laws do not allow plaintiffs to have their cake and eat it too,” the judge turned back their request.Augusta National’s decision on Tuesday, fleeting as it might ultimately prove, is still a milestone for LIV, which has not signed a television contract or attracted marquee sponsors. Those symptoms of trouble have only deepened concerns about the long-term viability of the new tour, which many critics regard largely as a means for Saudi Arabia to sanitize its reputation as a human rights abuser. Last week, the circuit acknowledged that its chief operating officer, who was widely seen as integral to its business ambitions, had resigned.In recent months, Greg Norman, LIV’s chief executive, urged major tournaments to “stay Switzerland” and allow his circuit’s players to participate.“The majors need the strength of field,” Norman, a two-time British Open victor and three-time runner-up at the Masters, said last month. “They need the best players in the business. They want the best competition for their broadcasting, for their sponsors, all the other things that come with it.”But LIV stands to benefit, too. A victory in a major by one of its players, LIV supporters have said, would give the circuit greater legitimacy.“If it is a LIV player who wins a major next year,” Norman said, “that goes to show you how we work within the ecosystem.” More

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      Augusta National and U.S.G.A. Drawn Into Justice Department Antitrust Inquiry

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      The Justice Department is investigating the PGA Tour for anticompetitive behavior in its dealings with LIV Golf, the breakaway Saudi-backed league.DORAL, Fla. — The Justice Department’s antitrust inquiry into men’s professional golf — a sport splintered this year by the emergence of a lucrative circuit financed by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund — has in recent months come to include the organizers of some of the most hallowed and influential tournaments in the world, according to people familiar with the matter.The United States Golf Association, which administers the U.S. Open, acknowledged on Wednesday that the Justice Department had contacted it in connection with an investigation. Augusta National Golf Club, which organizes the Masters Tournament, and the P.G.A. of America, which oversees the P.G.A. Championship, have also drawn the gaze of antitrust officials.The federal inquiry is unfolding in parallel with a separate civil suit filed in California by LIV Golf, the new Saudi-backed series, accusing the PGA Tour, which organizes most of the week-to-week events in professional golf, of trying to muscle it out of the marketplace. Moreover, LIV has contended that major tournament administrators, such as Augusta National and the P.G.A. of America, aided in the PGA Tour’s urgent efforts to preserve its long standing as the premier circuit in men’s golf.LIV, for instance, has accused the leaders of the R&A, which runs the British Open, and Augusta National of pressuring the Asian Tour’s chief executive over support for the new series. LIV also said that Fred S. Ridley, the Augusta National chairman, had “personally instructed a number of participants in the 2022 Masters not to play in the LIV Golf Invitational Series” and that the club’s representatives had “threatened to disinvite players from the Masters if they joined LIV Golf.” (A handful of golfers, including Phil Mickelson, joined the lawsuit but later withdrew their names from it, content to let LIV Golf wage the courtroom fight.)LIV executives have also fumed over perceived stalling by Official World Golf Ranking administrators to award ranking points to LIV players, who include Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and Cameron Smith. The ranking system’s governing board includes executives from each of the major tournament organizers, as well as the PGA Tour.A Quick Guide to the LIV Golf SeriesCard 1 of 6A new series. More

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      Why You Can’t Watch LIV Golf on American Television

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      The human rights record of its funder, Saudi Arabia, may be the least of the new tour’s challenges when it comes to getting on American television.For the Saudi-backed upstart LIV Golf tour, the strategy for luring top golfers like Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson away from the prestige and stability of the PGA Tour was simple: Offer cash, and lots of it.The arrival of the new tour and the defection of PGA Tour stars were major disruptions in what has been a stable and even staid sport. But when the first LIV event was finally held outside London last weekend after months of anticipation, it was not shown on television in the United States. And it’s unlikely that any American network will be broadcasting LIV events anytime soon.The reason boils down to this: The networks are happy airing the PGA Tour.“We are positioned as the home of golf in this country,” said Pete Bevacqua, the chairman of the NBC Sports, which shows by far the most golf in the United States. “We are not only satisfied where we are, but unbelievably pleased where we are.”Some golfers couldn’t resist the pull of the new tour, whose events are shorter than the PGA Tour’s (three days instead of four) and offer huge payouts, with individual winners receiving $4 million and the members of winning teams sharing $3 million, far more than most PGA Tour events. Even last-place finishers get $120,000; PGA Tour players who don’t make the cut after two rounds get nothing.Charl Schwartzel of South Africa won $4 million for winning the inaugural LIV Golf tournament. He pocketed another $750,000 because his team won the team competition.Alastair Grant/Associated PressBut the LIV tour got nowhere with those who might have aired its events in the United States. Representatives for LIV Golf spoke with most American broadcasters, but did not have substantive discussions about a media rights agreement with any of them, according to people familiar with those discussions. LIV broached the idea of buying time to show the London tournament on Fox — an inversion of the normal business relationship, where the media company pays the sports organization to show its event — but discussions did not go far.In the end, the London tournament was not on American broadcast TV or popular sports streaming platforms such as Peacock and ESPN+. Instead, golf fans could watch it on the streaming service DAZN, YouTube, Facebook or LIV Golf’s website, without commercials.Limited viewership numbers suggest not many of them did. The final round of the London event attracted an average of 68,761 viewers on YouTube and fewer than 5,000 on Facebook, according to Apex Marketing, a sports and entertainment analytics firm. On the same weekend, 812,000 viewers watched the final round of the PGA Tour’s Canadian Open on Golf Channel, and 2.78 million watched when coverage switched over to CBS.The absence of a media rights agreement would normally threaten the survival of a new sports league. But LIV Golf is not a commercial entity with a profit imperative. It is bankrolled by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund and part of a larger effort by the kingdom to improve its image around the world. Players who have joined the LIV tour have been accused of helping to “sportswash” Saudi Arabia’s record of human rights abuses, including the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi.LIV did not respond to a request for comment.But NBC and other broadcast networks have a long list of reasons other than reputational damage to steer clear of the new venture.LIV’s main barrier to entry in the United States is that most major media companies are deeply invested in the success of its competitor, the PGA Tour. NBC, CBS and ESPN are collectively in the first year of a nine-year, $6 billion-plus agreement to show the PGA Tour in the United States, while Warner Bros. Discovery (which owns TNT and TBS) is paying the PGA Tour $2 billion to show the tour worldwide.The media companies are not contractually restricted from showing LIV, according to the people familiar with the deals, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private agreements. But they believe that doing so would draw attention away from the tour on which they are spending billions.Fox, which has a history of risk-taking in sports (it is currently investing in spring football), might seem like a good candidate to team up with LIV, but Fox does not televise any golf, and that is by design. The network had the rights to broadcast the U.S. Open through 2026, but paid money to give up those rights to NBC.Even if networks wanted to take a chance on LIV Golf, the logistical challenges would be significant. Golf monopolizes entire weekends throughout the year and is more expensive to produce than arena- and stadium-based sports. (Golf presents a particularly difficult hurdle for Fox, which rarely puts sports on its streaming service, Tubi, meaning it is difficult to show golf when schedules collide.)Phil Mickelson at the LIV Golf tournament near London. The winner of 45 PGA Tour events, he was suspended by the PGA Tour after announcing he would play on the LIV tour.Paul Childs/ReutersLIV Golf also did not have any stars on board until recently, and it is not clear whether it will attract enough top golfers to make its events attractive to fans. Questions about the tour’s backing have been uncomfortable for those who have joined.“I would ask any player who has left or any player who would ever consider leaving, ‘Have you ever had to apologize for being a member of the PGA Tour?’” Jay Monahan, the commissioner of the PGA Tour, said in a televised interview Sunday.Players who have signed contracts with LIV have been booted from the PGA Tour, though that could soon become the subject of litigation. Players have also been dropped by sponsors, either because of the association with Saudi Arabia or because companies don’t want to support golfers competing on a tour few are watching.A Quick Guide to the LIV Golf SeriesCard 1 of 6A new series. More