While the golf world mostly appears to have moved past the point of comparing how the PGA Tour and LIV Golf tournaments perform against each other each week, it was difficult not to think that the latter had a great opportunity this past week with their event in Dallas.
The signature events on the PGA Tour are done for the year. The Rocket Classic boasted a considerably weaker field than fans have become accustomed to in recent weeks, with just a handful of top 30 players in the FedEx Cup standings teeing it up at Detroit Golf Club.
Meanwhile, LIV Golf delivered a good event at Maridoe, with Patrick Reed emerging victorious in a four-man playoff. A number of other players flirted with the lead over the final day in Dallas.
It was a tough test, with six under par proving to be the winning score. Reed shot 75 in the last round to initially throw away a five shot lead.
Dan Rapaport thinks Scott O’Neil should be furious about what happened at LIV Golf Dallas
It felt like a good week for LIV Golf. It is particularly beneficial that they always have their star players involved when the PGA Tour stops off at events like the Rocket Classic.
But it seems that LIV were given at least one reason for disappointment over the weekend. Speaking on Dan on Golf, Dan Rapaport suggested that he was baffled to see what channel the event was on.
Photo by Al Chang/ISI Photos/ISI Photos via Getty Images
“So speaking of LIV, I was floored that LIV Dallas was on FS2. If I’m Scott O’Neil, I’d be p—-d. You do this FOX deal, it’s all about distribution, it’s a major network, it’s sort of the dead part of the sport calendar,” he said.
“There’s the Club World Cup going on – that was what was on FS1 – baseball’s going on, but it’s not football season, it’s not basketball season. You’ve got Bryson, this is his home event, he’s really going all out trying to draw attention to this and it gets buried on FS2? They’ve got to be upset about that.”
Why the final round of LIV Golf Dallas was shown on FS2
Rapaport was speaking with journalist Josh Carpenter about the situation.
Carpenter explained that LIV were probably impacted by how late in the day their deal with FOX came about ahead of the 2025 season.
“I think one thing you see, you see this with the LPGA too and how their rights deals are set up, these television windows are set up long in advance, way far in advance, so FOX has a deal with the NHRA, I’m guessing it was signed before FOX’s deal with LIV,” he said.
“And so, the NHRA, the drag racing series was on FOX yesterday afternoon at 2. And I’m assuming that was locked in long before this LIV deal was locked in, so it’s not like LIV can come in and say, ‘well, we’re a better property than you’, or FOX can say, ‘LIV’s a better property than the NHRA, so NHRA take a hike, we want to put LIV on there’.”
FOX have reportedly paid a nominal amount to broadcast LIV events, so they may feel that it does not hurt them to put the league on a less popular channel.
Having said that, if LIV was performing at the level they would like to be, FOX would surely find a way to move things around to maximise their potential.
