Now that the Fedex Cup has been completed (how did that handicap to Scottie Scheffler work out, by the way?)and the hubbub surrounding the Saudi Golf League a/k/a LIV Golf, has ridden a flop shot over to the judicial system, it’s worth assessing the damage so far. What damage, you say. As LIVer-in-chief Phil Mickelson generally observed in a recent Sports Illustrated phone interview, the upstart league has been good for both the Saudi golfers and the PGA. In response to the massive swag offered their members to defect to the Saudi League, the PGA has committed north of $160 million dollars to the coming year’s purses on the PGA Tour, as well as doubling the kitty of the ludicrous Player Impact Program (PIP), which will award $100 million to the top 20 players who help generate interest in the game. (Hilarious. Are there even 20 golfers who generate interest in the game? Not for me.) The PGA’s new Earnings Assurance Program will also create a league minimum salary of $500,000 for fully exempt members, while also helping with travel expenses. As mentioned in the prior post on this subject, Gordon Gekko is smiling somewhere.
So the burning questions remains, what does the name “LIV Golf “ represent? Well, the "LIV" in the LIV Golf Tour's name isn't an acronym. It is the Roman numeral for the Arabic numeral 54.
What does that mean in the context of the LIV Golf Tour? Greg Norman, LIV's CEO and commissioner, explained in a recent interview with Sports Illustrated, “54 is the lowest score you could shoot if you were to birdie every hole on a par-72 course, so there is an aspirational aspect to the thinking. It is also the number of holes to be played in each LIV event.” (One might be forgiven if she thought that 54 is also the average age of LIV golfers so far, although Champion of the Year Cameron Smith’s defection does bring the average LIV golfer’s age down a tad.) Indeed, LIV Golf players will play just 54 holes in total, as the start-up's tournaments are only three days long. Of course, most events and tournaments on the PGA Tour last four days and 72 holes. (and no, there will be no jokes about the LIVers allowed to use walkers on the course in their upcoming tournaments, not in this blog.) So, while the LIV Golf Tour may look like a strange name on paper, there sappers, at least on paper, to be a somewhat defensible reason they chose it. And it's less revealing than the descriptive (and off-putting to many golf fans and others) "Saudi Golf League" moniker.
The term “54” serves as another reference for us more mature linksters. Growing up, there was an American sitcom that aired on NBC from September 1961 to April 1963 called Car 54, Where Are You? The Wikipedia article describes the show as follows:
Filmed in black-and-white, the series starred Joe E. Ross and Fred Gwynne as Gunther Toody and Francis Muldoon, two mismatched New York City police officers who patrol the fictional 53rd precinct in the Bronx. Car 54 was their patrol car. Much of the series is set in the station house, with commanding officer Captain Block ordering his men to answer neighborhood police calls, or investigate baffling cases that have stymied the force at large. Toody and Muldoon often blunder into these cases, encountering the criminals accidentally and proceeding on a wrong assumption. By sheer perseverance, inadvertence, and luck, Toody and Muldoon bring each case to a successful conclusion.
The lyrics to the Car 54 theme song provides some perspective to the uninitiated (no need to parody these lyrics, by the way; their silliness - and outdated references (Khruschev? Idlewild?), speaks for themselves):
There's a holdup in the Bronx,
Brooklyn's broken out in
fights;
There's a traffic jam in Harlem
That's backed up to Jackson Heights;
There's a Scout troop short a child,
Khruschev's due at Idlewild;
Car 54, Where Are You??
The term Mutt and Jeff might be the way to describe Toody and Muldoon, who were the odd couple before The Odd Couple. Toody was short, stocky, nosy, and not very bright. College-educated Muldoon, on the other hand, is quite tall, quiet, and more intellectual. These opposite qualities between Toody and Muldoon were the basis of the comedic structure of the show. To this young viewer, the show was hilarious. Fred Gwynn went on to star in stage, television and cinema. His last, and perhaps most memorable movie role was Judge Chamberlain Haller in the classic movie My Cousin Vinny (his attempts to comprehend the New York accent of Joe Pesci, as recently-graduated lawyer Vinny Gambini, are the stuff of which cinematic masterpieces are made.)
I think of LIV golf as the equivalent of Car 54. Putting aside the Toody and Muldoon comparisons (you figure it out), the Saudi Golf League appears to be stumbling to limited success due to perseverance, inadvertence, and luck, with a heavy dose of chutzpah and moolah (and now, lawyers.) Certainly, LIV CEO Greg Norman has been pursuing his dream of establishing a competing golf tour for decades, and, as luck would have it, the Saudis have ample means to engage in sportswashing with a sport that has interest to golf fans around the world. However, two clouds appear on the immediate horizon: Rory says no to LIV golfers representing Europe in the next Ryder Cup, and the WGHOF is not counting LIV results in its player rankings. Both stances, if maintained, could deal a stinging blow to the perceived success of the Saudi Golf Tour. In fact, if it’s luck runs out, the Saudi Golf Tour could end up being backed up to Jackson Heights.
© 2012-22 R.E. Kelly
AMDG
