Jay Monahan Says A Whole Lot Of Nothing In First Press Conference Since August
PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan addressed the media at TPC Sawgrass ahead of this week's Players championship for the first time since August 2023. Despite there being a seemingly infinite number of questions surrounding the future of the Tour and professional golf as a whole, Monahan took the predictable route of offering up a lot of nothing.
June will mark the one-year anniversary of when Monahan sat beside Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan on national television to announce a framework agreement. A self-appointed deadline to come to terms was set for December 31. That date passed, we're now eight or so months into negotiations, and still, nobody knows where things stand.
Five questions were posed by the media inside the press building at TPC Sawgrass before the PIF was finally mentioned, and given Monahan's answer, questions about the PIF may as well not even have been asked at all.
"Like I said, we've made and continue to make real progress in our negotiations and our discussions with the PIF. I recognize that this is frustrating for all of you, but it really is not in the best interest of the PGA TOUR and our membership and for PIF for me to be talking about where we are with specific elements of our discussions," Monahan said.
"I, again, I would just stress the fact that we're engaged, we're making progress, but I'm really not at liberty to share any of the details on that front."
(Photo by Keyur Khamar/PGA TOUR via Getty Images)
It's the same message Monahan and the Tour have been sharing for months through press releases. ‘We’re still in communication with the PIF, but we can't go into detail about it.'
While that was a non-answer from the commissioner, his most notable deflection came when he was directly asked if any player directors on the Tour Policy Board had called for his resignation from his post.
"You know, there's been a lot of good-spirited debate amongst our board. I don't think that would be a surprise to anybody, you know, given the events of last summer. But we are a unified front," Monahan said. "Our Policy Board continues to perform and function at a very high level with great support of our player directors, and the formation of PGA TOUR Enterprises, with a new board, a new board comprised of four members of SSG, seven players, or six player directors and Joe Ogilvie, who is a liaison director, myself and Jo Gorder, who is the independent director serving on that board."
‘No’ is the keyword missing from that long-winded answer.
The only somewhat meaningful note Monahan offered up about negotiations with the Saudis is that he met with Al-Rumayyan in January and claimed that the Tour's new investment agreement with the Strategic Sports Group did not make ongoing talks with PIF representatives more difficult.
Monahan also stated that coming to terms with the PIF "is the best outcome" possible for the PGA Tour.
Given that this was the first time Monahan had met with the media since August of last year, he had not been given (or was perhaps avoiding) the topic of Jon Rahm leaving the PGA Tour for LIV Golf at the end of 2023.
He completely tip-toed around the question when initially asked, but was asked a follow-up, which led to the one second of excitement during the presser.
"I'm focused on every single member of the PGA TOUR. I'm focused on The Players Championship this week," Monahan said when asked specifically about Rahm's departure. "I'm focused on the great season that we have ahead, and we have made tremendous progress with the SSG agreement that we have, putting ourselves in a position to invest back in our TOUR, invest back in our fans, and I'm going to focus on the things that I control and we are as an organization and we are as a leadership team and we are as a board, so that's when I'm focused on."
"Are you concerned that more players are going while the negotiations are going on," Monahan was asked.
"I just answered your question about what my focus is," he said before immediately looking elsewhere in the room.
So, there you have it really, the Tour is still talking with the Saudi PIF about some form of an agreement and Monahan doesn't want to talk about players leaving his organization for another, one that is funded by the same PIF he'd like to get involved with.