A Kindler, Gentler PGA Tour? One Pro Thinks LIV Golf Took All the ‘A-Holes’

Individual sports like golf thrive on rivalries. People for the public to love and hate.

Aside from the overarching PGA Tour vs. LIV Golf rivalry, the sport seems to be devoid of this aspect at the moment.

PGA Tour pro Harry Higgs has a theory.

Higgs told Golfweek:

“They took all the a**holes.” 

Harry Higgs is worried about the PGA Tour as a TV product, partly because LIV ‘took all the a–holes … the villians’ https://t.co/C1EoFxzvJv

— Golfweek (@golfweek) January 7, 2023

“They took all the villians, and that’s a problem. They took some of the ones who would have stories written about them maybe in a negative light with kind of negative connotations… That’s kind of a driving force for people to read your story or for people to turn their television on.”

Higgs said that the broadcasts need to do a better job of telling golfers’ stories in order to get more people invested in them and develop rooting interests.

But he also said the golfers have to do their part to market themselves.

“Freaking 98% of the guys out on Tour are pretty boring. Or it seems that way. But they’re really not. They certainly go dive into their boring hole where they’re not going to say any bad things about anybody when the camera goes on, or when somebody has a microphone in their hand. They’re just not going to do it because it won’t serve them. So it is certainly a commitment from even us players to be more open, and you know, let more people in to tell our stories.”

After making the FedEx Cup playoffs in 2021, Higgs struggled last season and lost his Tour card. In the fall, he made two of five cuts with a best finish of T21 at The RSM Classic—an event he led at the halfway point.

Cover Image Via TheMirror