Damn, man. That’s an unfair comp for Frederic Weis.
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Ha ha, no. And oy.
Is that a fact or an opinion?
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hey
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I think you have to pay for my nest subscription now.
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Is that the new “jinx, you owe me a coke”?
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@dril gets more viewers than an LPGA Tour event. And most PGA Tour events, too. 
The parallels to women’s tennis are there for sure. However, if women’s tennis is the goal, then you can only expect LPGA golfer to make as much as the men 4-6 times per year (the majors/a couple select tournaments). For tennis, a couple of the larger events (non-majors) feature both men and women, and the women make about 50% of the men actually (ex. Roger’s Cup 2019).
However, just even have that amount would be a huge step for LPGA golfers. Unless one sponsor really comes in and just says, “Here’s $10 million…let’s do this”, I think the only way LPGA players would get a purse equal to the men would be in where the tournament host both men and women, like we saw in Australia. That’s why the best chance I see of this happening would have to be one of the 4 bodies who run the men’s majors putting it on.
I completely disagree with this. We’ve seen what happens when the women are supposed to have the stage (USWO, #womenworthwatching,QBE Shootout). A large reason why WTA players get so much exposure is because they are at events combined with the men. This isn’t to say that they owe the men for their popularity, but it’s more that men and women playing together becomes this huge gathering where the focus of the whole tennis world is on one single event. (Big difference between tennis and golf is majors are two weeks long vs. four days). If anything, the men would probably balk at sharing the spotlight with the women as they could see it as a threat to their popularity.
Logistically, it might be challenging to run essentially two tournaments concurrently at the same course. However, taking a page from tennis, have the majors run longer like 6 days instead of 4.
Potential Schedule:
Friday-Monday before the tournament (practice rounds)
Tuesday - Women’s 1st Round
Wednesday - Men’s 1st Round
Thursday - Women’s 2nd Round
Friday - Men’s 2nd Round
Saturday/Sunday - Combined 3rd and Final Rounds
Also, Whan seemed to confirm that combining men and women helps the women when he described the situation of when the men and women are playing at the same time. You’ve committed to watching golf during that window, so you’ll go back and forth between the men and the women.
The one organization who could really change this whole dynamic is Augusta, because if they ran a Women’s Masters with a $10 million purse, I think the other majors would for sure follow (except I don’t know if Evian would shell that out 
). It’d be great if the USGA or R&A led the way on this, but it all happens so much quicker if Augusta does it. I won’t hold my breath though.
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This is such a good example of how concerted, repeated exposure can turn fairly mundane talent into a ratings driver. You’ve managed to answer yourself and I’m afraid you haven’t realized it.
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@Randy (tagging as I don’t think I hit “reply” properly on your post), I chose Rickie for a reason… part of the reason he’s so “marketable” is that the PGA Tour has enough eyeballs to make it possible to air 52 Rickie commercials during the Farmers Sunday coverage. The LPGA Tour doesn’t currently have the eyeballs, and this discussion was ideally going to be about the timetable for getting them. (I think eyeballs, viewers, are the predominant factor in getting equal purse sizes.)
In many ways the LPGA Tour puts out a superior product, particularly when spectating live and in person… and yet their spectator counts don’t come close to matching what the PGA Tour does. Even the “big” events like the U.S. Open, as I noted earlier, see a fraction of the attendance, despite readily available and less expensive tickets. (Of course, attendance is affected by the coverage in the years that preceded it, as that affects the general level of interest. But still… if there was some pent up demand for women’s golf, one might think they’d see more live spectators?)
Americans, by and large, don’t watch women’s sports very much. They watch a few — tennis a few times a year, figure skating, gymnastics maybe? It’s changing in the right direction for the LPGA, but this topic I’d hoped could be about discussing how quickly it’s changing relative to how quickly Mike Whan seems to think it’s changing and how to accelerate that change.
I appreciate that NLU supports the women’s game. I watch as much women’s golf as men’s golf, and that ratio may very well continue to shift in favor of the LPGA now that Tiger’s just about done. Many of the other people in this topic and on The Refuge are fans of women’s golf. But we’re not representative of the golf viewing audience at large. So, yeah, I think the Rickie example point out just how far behind the LPGA is currently. It doesn’t really answer the question, IMO, it’s closer to being the question.
@iacas as usual you have made a conversation that could have been extremely productive and thought provoking much less productive by being a dick. It’s pretty impressive.
Since I feel like I would actually like to have productive conversation about this. In terms of the women’s game I think that obviously the biggest issue is the amount of exposure they get but I feel like in the time they do get the coverage chooses not to highlight what makes LPGA players so amazing.
All everyone talks about on PGA tour coverage is how far the men hit it. Obviously men and women are built differently and the men hit it further. Cool. But it’s the same game still and the women are just amazingly talented in different ways. The leader in driving accuracy on the PGA Tour wouldn’t have made the top 50 in that stat in 2020. That’s insane. Multiple women with over 80% Fwys Hit. That’s just as elite as hitting it 330 but all the media ever wants to market is how far make tour pros hit it.
Brooke Henderson hit 77% of GIR last year. Jim Furyk led the PGA and hit 74%.
I would love an in your face marketing campaign with something like “Better than the Boys” to really draw attention to the fact it’s the same game but the parts of golf where the women really excel are different.
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Ha ha. Sure thing man. Y’all keep going ad hominem while telling me I’m the dick. It’s funny. Or just read what’s there and respond to it? Nah. That doesn’t garner likes from the usual bunch.
The guys would hit a bunch of fairways if they teed off with a 4-iron too. Shorter distances improve accuracy if you measure by fairway percentage.
Just curious and could look this up myself but i know someone has the general info already…
How do the LPGA purses compare to the Champions Tour purses?
It’s not the same job so the data is irrelevant
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If you run into assholes all day…
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Good thing the ladies aren’t hitting 4-irons off the tee.
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