NAPLES, Fla. – It’s tough to think about a greater yr contained in the ropes for the LPGA than what’s transpired to this point in 2024. Nelly Korda’s exceptional seven wins mixed with Lydia Ko’s self-described fairy-tale season – that put her into the LPGA Corridor of Fame – supplied the final word one-two punch for producing curiosity.
And but, many observers in and across the recreation query whether or not or not the LPGA has been in a position to capitalize on the second, particularly given what’s happening within the larger panorama of girls’s sports activities.
Is LPGA commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan delivering sufficient wins for the tour?
Terry Duffy, one of many largest supporters of the ladies’s recreation, didn’t hestitate to provide her excessive marks. The CME Group Chairman and Chief Government Officer just lately signed a two-year extension with the tour, taking the partnership for the year-long factors race and season-ending occasion by means of 2027. After Duffy and Marcoux Samaan hit a rocky patch two years in the past at this occasion, it’s been easy crusing since, with CME persevering with to lift the bar within the girls’s recreation.
As Duffy will get set handy out an historic $4 million winner’s examine on the season-ending CME Group Tour Championship, he sat down with Golfweek to debate the state of the tour and Marcoux Samaan’s job efficiency.
What follows are excerpts from that dialog:
We’re a bit of over three years into Mollie’s tenure. How would you assess the route of the tour and the way it’s going?
I don’t understand how you may not give A++ to the place the tour is at right this moment below her management. I run markets. I don’t care if you happen to’re working a enterprise at a ironmongery shop or an change or skilled golf, there’s ebbs and flows to all the pieces in life and all the pieces in enterprise. What you in the end wish to be certain that is you perceive there’s ebbs and flows however in the end up and to the proper is de facto good. It’s a development in enterprise. Should you’re price extra right this moment than you have been 10 years in the past or three years in the past, you’re doing the proper issues. ….
Once I take a look at Mollie Marcoux Samaan, I believe, and pay attention no one pays me to say s***, it’s worthwhile to put that in there, I say what I would like. And I take a look at my firm and the place we’re at, that is Friday afternoon. I guarantee you that three years in the past, Friday afternoon, this was not like this, an eighth of the folks have been right here. This was a Sunday [crowd] three years in the past. That’s progress for me. …
I signed that deal due to Mollie Marcoux Samaan. I’m going to be dead-ass sincere with you, that was a giant a part of it. I really like the trajectory of the tour. I really like the way in which the tempo has been going. If I might’ve noticed a extra radical sample the previous few years, I might say ‘Eh, not so sure I like what I see’, however I haven’t seen that. I’ve seen progress. … I believe she’s a beautiful particular person with a pleasant household and I hope that she’s on the helm for a lot of extra years right here. I believe it not solely encourages me, however different sponsors to proceed on with our alternative. …
LPGA commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan speaks to the media previous to the CME Group Tour Championship 2024 at Tiburon Golf Membership. (Michael Reaves/Getty Photographs)
I learn that one article about did [the LPGA] take sufficient benefit of what’s happening. OK, let’s speak about that. Let’s speak about girls basketball, what an explosive occasion. The place was girls basketball three years in the past? Two years in the past? Nowhere to be discovered.
The final match of [Caitlin’s] final yr was the largest occasion. The yr earlier than that it was not. It was solely the final yr. Why was that? It was due to different contributors that have been additionally rivals swiftly, proper? It wasn’t as a result of Caitlin was gunning 3s from in every single place on the court docket, which is thrilling in and of itself. However she had rivals within the sport and that made it thrilling for folks. …
All of us wish to say why isn’t Nelly Korda bringing extra to the tour? OK, she’s not Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods will not be Nelly Korda. They’re totally different. I believe Tiger actually did extra for the tour than any single particular person, no disrespect to Jack Nicklaus or Arnold Palmer. I believe these three folks did extra for golf than anyone on the planet, together with girls’s golf. … Tiger is a large fan of the LPGA and he’s completed so much for them, however they don’t speak about that. They’re speaking about Caitlin Clark … I’ve been coping with the media so much, I believe that’s unfair. After which we cling that on the chief.
I’m OK with that as a result of I’ve been by means of that my complete profession. You get slapped round eternally after which, as you swiftly flip round, you’ve created $80 billion of worth within the firm and eventually anyone will say, I assume he was doing an OK job. I’m telling you, by means of the entire course of, it’s a shit present.
My level is, with Mollie, I’ve talked to her over the past a number of weeks about what we’re doing, and I’ve informed her how a lot I recognize her management, her dedication to it.
Caitlin Clark and Nelly Korda on the pro-am prior forward of The Annika pushed by Gainbridge at Pelican 2024 at Pelican Golf Membership. (Picture by Douglas P. DeFelice/Getty Photographs)
What particularly is it about her management that you simply recognize?
Nothing specifically. I just like the trajectory. You recognize what folks hate most in enterprise? It’s uncertainly. You recognize what breeds uncertainty? Erratic habits, whether or not it’s regulatory habits, or it’s different habits, folks wish to have a path that they’ll perceive the place they’ll put money into.
They don’t wish to have a path the place it’s going to be nice right this moment and horrible tomorrow.
What’s your understanding of Mollie’s long-term imaginative and prescient?
I believe her long-term imaginative and prescient is to proceed on a path to construct this tour to proceed to go ahead, with the understanding that some issues are in your management and a few issues aren’t, and also you’ve set to work by means of it. And that’s no totally different than another CEO. That’s why I like the way in which her perspective is and she or he’s below an incredible quantity of stress and I do know this, as a result of I used to run a member-owned group. She runs a member-owned group. CME, earlier than I took it public, was owned by its members. It’s arduous to have a pair thousand bosses. She solely has a pair hundred, I had a pair thousand, so I perceive what she’s going by means of.
LPGA commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan presents the Rolex Participant of the Yr trophy to Lydia Ko after she received the CME Group Tour Championship at Tiburon Golf Membership. (Michael Reaves/Getty Photographs)
So, in your thoughts, the final word litmus take a look at is so long as purses are going up on the LPGA, that’s the final word report card?
No, not for me. The report card for me is younger girls having a path ahead to the LPGA, whether or not they go on tour or not is irrelevant. If it makes them higher folks in life, there’s extra to it than simply being a tour participant as a younger woman that’s rising up in a really tough world and giving them construction and a spot to have construction in order that they could be a extra well-rounded particular person, be a greater particular person in life. That’s what’s vital to me. Not the purse on the LPGA. In order that’s how I take a look at it, that’s how I choose it. I take a look at it within the larger image. Are folks benefitting from the sport and is the women recreation benefitting younger folks to make them higher folks for the longer term, whether or not they play golf or not? To me, that’s success.
