Greg Norman’s LIV Golf Fails Before Jay Monahan Strategic Alliance; But Wins Before Fans

The debate between LIV and the PGA Tour-DP World Tour has never gone out of style. This included their tussle with viewership. However, at present, when The Scottish Open is live from The Renaissance Club, LIV Andalucía is being played at Valderrama with much thrill of its own. While the players in each of the tournaments are desperate for a breakthrough, the internet is torn apart by viewership comparisons. The sad reality is that it’s a single group vs. the whole event.

The official X handle of Flushing It recently made a comparison between DP World Tour’s live-streaming views on YouTube and those of LIV Andalucía. And that’s where all the trouble began.

The X post was captioned, “On YouTube right now, the DP World Tour is streaming every shot live of Viktor Hovland and Wyndham Clark’s group at the PGA Tour co-sanctioned Scottish Open and there are 6.2K people watching.”

While only a single group’s viewership number is 6.2K, Greg Norman’s Saudi-backed league has gotten an even smaller audience while streaming the whole event.

The X post declared, “LIV Golf is streaming LIV Golf Andalucia and there’s 5.5K watching. There’s a lot of debate about viewership numbers, and this is a good comparison with the Scottish not yet being broadcast on the main Sky channel. There is probably a much more similar interest in the events than people on here think?”

Both events get streamed on several other streaming services, including popular TV channels internationally. Thus, when the community saw the comparisons being made based on viewership, they had to speak up against the unfairness.

Does the golf community prefer the PGA Tour over LIV Golf?

One of the fans wrote, “Not necessarily the most fair comparison considering LIV Golf isn’t visible on YouTube in the United States.” To prove his point, the fan posted a screenshot of the same streaming link in the comments. Along with the US, even Australia does not stream LIV’s YouTube broadcast. Hence many fans found it an unfair comparison. It’s because a major section of golf fans from these two major parts of the world are not counted in the audience quite naturally.

Another fan claimed, “I watch Liv on the Liv Golf Plus app No commercials.” Due to a visible distinction in availability, many fans turn to other streaming services where they can enjoy LIV Golf. The comparison that was made did not take into account any of the other viewers. This made the fan come out clearly by stating how many golf fans who watch the event on the LIV Golf App will not be counted. Hence, the comparison, according to them, is not quite balanced.

Yet another fan wrote, “@livgolf_league needs a TV deal, even when I consider traditional TV as a dying species. LIV had a big plus with free streaming, but they choked it by putting geo-restrictions on YT. Never restrict streaming, it’s lame. #PGATour #LIVGolf.” The fan bluntly stated the reality of the comparison. They claimed that LIV Golf needs to have common rights with their TV broadcast deals. While the PGA Tour in the US gets paid more than $6 Billion collectively from NBC, CBS, and ESPN, LIV Golf does not get any streaming advantages from these major organizations.

“Not a fair comparison. LIV has pretty much been blackballed from regular TV by the Golf elites. If they were both on regular TV at the same time I’d like to see the numbers. Scottish Open winner will be about -30, yeah that is great television.” said another fan. According to brand equity, LIV has not been restricted by most media companies by any means of a contract. It is more so that these media organizations tend to think that if they telecast LIV events, they will be diverting from the major league for which they pay so much.

One fan went ahead to say that the comparison proves only one thing: the decline of pro golf. They said, “And both numbers SUCK! So congrats for confirming pro golf is dying quickly.” A great many people claim that they prefer to watch their preferred league on other streaming apps or TV channels. However, from the YouTube stats alone, the numbers are underwhelming. especially for any fan who has known the glory of golf in the golden days. Only a mere thousand for each team clearly does not show the same golf craze. With a division of leagues in the game, the viewership was also divided at the same time.

Do you think LIV Golf would do better if they were not restricted in the US and Australia? Let us know in the comments below.