Golf’s ‘Silly Season’ Shows Growing Appetite for Made-for-TV Events

Professional golf’s “silly season” is drawing to a close after the inaugural edition of the Golf Channel Games drew a lively crowd Wednesday night in South Florida as fans watched Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler lead teams in an outside-the-box competition.

Roughly 2,000 fans were on-site at Trump National Golf Club Jupiter for the new event that aired in prime time on Golf Channel and USA Network. While there was no prize money on the line, both teams of four stayed engaged all night as Scheffler defeated McIlroy in a playoff, winning a closest-to-the-pin competition by one inch. 

There were five different skills competitions that the players participated in throughout the night: long-driving, short-game, team relay, 14-club challenge, and a captain’s challenge. Scheffler’s team included U.S. Ryder Cup captain Keegan Bradley, Sam Burns, and Luke Clanton. McIlroy’s team included European Ryder Cup captain Luke Donald, Shane Lowry, and Haotong Li.

It was the latest nontraditional golf event McIlroy and Scheffler headed up, after teaming together last December to face off against LIV Golf stars Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka in Las Vegas in a made-for-TV special that paid out a $10 million purse in cryptocurrency. TNT Sports drew 625,000 viewers for that primetime broadcast.

Outside the Box

The debut Golf Channel Games came three weeks after the revival of The Skins Game, which was part of Amazon Prime Video’s nearly 17-hour live sports marathon on Black Friday.

Bradley, who competed in both events, won the four-man skins competition, taking home $2.1 million of the $4 million that was up for grabs. Tommy Fleetwood was second with $1.7 million, Lowry third with $200,000, and Xander Schauffele last with no prize money. 

Amazon did not release viewership numbers for The Skins Game, but it did draw 16.33 million viewers for its NFL game that afternoon, as the Bears beat the Eagles 24–15.

Fairways and Greens

November and December annually feature several golf events that venture away from standard 72-hole stroke-play tournaments.

This past weekend, the PGA Tour’s Andrew Novak and the LPGA’s Lauren Coughlin won the Grant Thornton Invitational, splitting a $1 million first-place prize at the team event that pairs men’s and women’s golfers together.

This coming weekend, John Daly and his son, John Daly II, will headline the field at the PNC Championship, a parent-child tournament that has gained notable exposure in recent years from Tiger Woods playing alongside his son, Charlie. However, they are not playing this year as the elder Woods recovers from back surgery.

Season 2 of TGL begins Dec. 28, as the technology-focused indoor golf league cofounded by Woods and McIlroy looks to build on its successful debut campaign this past winter.