Apart from the PGA Tour events struggling to get viewership, even the major championship suffered the same fate. Well, different players had different justifications as to why this was happening. While the World No. 1 had no comments to make, many others did, and Max Homa was one of them. When asked about the situation at the RBC Heritage, he clearly stated that it was because of the players.

According to him, all the pros have only been fixating on themselves rather than the fans. “I think we hit this year-and-a-half- or two-year rut as both golfers and golf leagues that was just about making the players happy, and unfortunately and quite the fans were not benefited by that,” he said. How did the Tour make players happy? Well, more money. Be it a PIP bonus, increased purses, and or signature events. It was the golfers who pocketed bills, whereas fans were left to not enjoy the sport as much as they used to.

Now, once again at the ZOZO Championship, Homa shares his views about playing for the fans. Apart from sharing how much he loves to travel and is glad that his job lets him do that, he also highlighted the importance of playing golf in Japan.

Max Homa was asked about the importance of traveling outside the US and competing for him at the pre-tournament press conference in Japan. To this, he shared his experience from the inaugural edition of the tournament, when Tiger Woods won the trophy. He could not believe so many fans were there to witness the match. “We were on the range like a Tuesday, and it was pouring rain and it was filled,” he said. This is the only time the PGA Tour reached Japan, and that is what makes the fans all the more excited, not being able to witness the players live very often.

“So I think since then I’ve noticed the term “grow the game” comes up a lot. I do feel like we have a bit of a responsibility when we can come to play in a different market and in front of fans that would typically only see us on TV and put on some kind of show,” added Homa at the presser in Japan. He then went on to state how at the Monday practice round, there were millions of people excited to take autographs from the players. He confessed that despite traveling to so many places, he had never seen the fans so excited.

As per reports that flooded a few days ago, even in the $3 billion PIF-PGA Tour merger, the Tour professionals are not willing to travel outside of America for competitions, and this is an important aspect of the deal for the Saudis. This sure reflects that a few top-tier golfers are hesitant to play outside the continent. Maybe this is the reason LIV Golf’s Adelaide event gets this much attention because Australian fans do not have a loud PGA Tour event to rely on to enjoy the game? Could be.

Homa truly believes that players have a sense of responsibility to travel around and go to different places around the world for the expansion of the game. Homa knows that without fans watching them compete, they are “nothing.” He did the same when he won the trophy in South Africa.

Max Hom’s victory in South Africa demonstrated the importance of PGA Tour events worldwide

Last year in November, Max Homa defeated Nicolai Hojgaard at the Nedbank Championship by four strokes in South Africa. The DP World Tour event was a standing testament for the PGA Tour to understand the importance of going global around Africa, Australia, and Europe instead of just sticking to the states. Take LIV Golf, for example. Apart from their new deal to host a championship in India in the upcoming season, it is widely spread all across the world, giving it the popularity it has gained in just two years.

The South African fans rarely get to witness the pros live, and thus the importance of Max Homa taking the victory was a huge deal for them. “I’m very pleased, a little surprised, pleasantly surprised. It’s been nice; the body’s feeling better as the week’s gone on,” Homa said.

He further went on to add that when a golfer travels almost 20 hours to reach the destination, they would want to play good golf, and well, he was glad that he was putting up a good sight for the audience. 

What are your thoughts on Max Homa’s ideology? Let us know in the comments section below!