Future of Tour on display in BMW's renewal

Writing from Chicago

Monday, November 22, 2021 

There are several nuggets to take from Monday’s five-year sponsorship renewal by BMW of North America with the Western Golf Association for the BMW Championship, one that will extend the deal that began in 2007 through 2027.

First and foremost, this time, the renewal was swift and lengthy. At five years, this deal, beginning in 2023, comes 10 months before the 2022 deal that is the third in the current extension. In contrast, the three-year pact from 2020 to 2022 was only announced in the middle of the 2019 tournament at Medinah Country Club.

The prompt renewal, and the length, indicates more than any words in a news release that BMW NA finds it worthwhile to spend real money on a premier golf tournament. Sebastian Mackensen, the president and CEO of BMW’s North American division, called it “a great way to showcase our brand and engage customers.” He continued by noting the money raised for the Evans Scholars Foundation (over $40 million since 2007), but rest assured, if the BMW accountants and sales department couldn’t find a link between cars and SUVs moving off showroom floors and slapping the BMW logo on the Western Open, it wouldn’t be happening.

That it continues to is testament to the leadership of the WGA, starting with president and CEO John Kaczkowski, who has taken a somewhat sleepy golf association that did splendid work getting caddies, most of them in the Midwest, into and through college into a organization with a national outlook. As painful as it is for the loyal Chicago golf fan to see the tournament they call their own played in Denver and Philadelphia – and next year in Wilmington, Del. – taking the circus to places it’s not often seen has not only boosted fundraising, it’s broadened the reach of the Evans program. Chick would be pleased.

Second, Olympia Fields Country Club is getting a do-over. The 2020 BMW was played on Olympia’s testing North Course, where Jon Rahm and Dustin Johnson traded outrageous long birdie putts down the stretch with Rahm sinking a 66-footer to win on the first hole of sudden death.

In a normal year, thousands would have said they were there, but 2020 was not a normal year. The COVID-19 pandemic pre-vaccine meant only a handful of volunteers were on hand, and spectators were along Vollmer Road, on the outside looking in. That reduced the fee Olympia received and the income of the Evans program, but at least it was played.

In 2023, the BMW will return to Olympia, and so will all of us.

Third, and it wasn’t mentioned in the PGA Tour’s release, the players will get richer than ever. Beginning in 2022, the BMW will be one of the first examples of the future of the game, at least financially. The Tour, rarely challenged as the leading week-in, week-out top tour in existence, is trying to fend off the Saudi-backed Super Golf League, which has yet to put a tee in the ground but has Greg Norman as its front man. He and the Saudis envision a series of $20 million tournaments played around the world. (A second European group, the Premier Golf League, has an idea of their own big weeks, but somehow played under the PGA Tour umbrella. At least, that’s the latest version.)

The PGA Tour is countering in two ways. First, by threatening their players with banishment – from a voluntary non-profit organization – if anyone dares play in Norman’s sandbox, and second, by showering their members with heretofore unseen millions of dollars.

The 2022-23 season starts a lucrative new television package – CBS will get the entire playoff series in odd-numbered years, so expect to hear Jim Nantz say hello to his friends from Olympia Fields – worth a ridiculous amount of money.

How ridiculous? The 70 players at Olympia (and in 2022, at Wilmington) will be playing for $15 million, up from the $9.5 million this year, according to a memo PGA Tour boss Jay Monahan sent to the players on Monday. If the usual 18 percent take of the loot goes to the winner, he’ll walk away with $2.7 million, or 4.35 times Sam Snead’s career earnings.

Playing for that kind of money should encourage loyalty to the kids in Ponte Vedra Beach. If not, well, oil’s well that ends well.

– Tim Cronin