Breakfast Ball #52: Virtual Golf is... Fun?

The 52nd Breakfast Ball is here! I have one request for the Breakfast Ball’s first birthday: tell one friend about the newsletter today. It would be extremely helpful. Thanks!

In This Week’s Newsletter:

TGL Review: What is it All About?

Last Tuesday marked the launch of TGL, a new indoor golf league that was the brainchild of sports executive Mike McCarley, Tiger Woods, and Rory McIlroy. The league consists of 6 teams that are all tied to cities across America: Atlanta, Boston, Jupiter (Florida), Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco, which is represented by The Bay Golf Club. Most of the top PGA Tour stars are in the league, with week one seeing the matchup of New York Golf Club featuring Xander Schauffele, Rickie Fowler and Matt Fitzpatrick up against The Bay Golf Club team of Ludvig Ãberg, Shane Lowry, and Wyndham Clark.

Going into the first event, I was quite skeptical. While I do enjoy playing golf on a simulator during the winter, I was not sure if watching pros play golf indoors would be interesting. However, this is not just any simulator. The players take their shots off real grass 35 yards away from a screen that is 30 times the size of a regular simulator. Then, once they are within 30 yards of the hole, there is a green complex built inside the arena that can rotate and change its contours based on the design of the hole.

While some hole designs are quite bland, others really take advantage of the fact that there are no limits when it comes to virtual hole design and present very unique challenges to the players.

The Bay Golf Club won the match quite easily, 9-2, with impressive performances from Europeans Ludvig Åberg and Shane Lowry. Despite the scoreline it was still a hit with viewers, drawing an average audience of almost 1 million in the US. That number is double the amount that watched the final round of The Sentry, the PGA Tour’s opening event.

There are still plenty of areas to improve. The match lost some steam when it transitioned from the alternate shot format of the first 9 holes to a singles format for the final 6. An interview with DJ Khaled while Wyndham Clark and Shane Lowry were hitting shots rightly drew criticism on social media. Some of the holes are still boring designs that don’t draw much interest. However, it was only night one, and as someone who watches an unhealthy amount of golf, it was much more interesting than a regular day on the PGA Tour.

Tiger Woods and his Jupiter Golf Links squad will be making their debut Tuesday night at 7pm ET/12am GMT against LA Golf Club, which includes Tommy Fleetwood and Justin Rose, fresh from a victory in the Team Cup in Abu Dhabi yesterday.

Great Britain & Ireland Comfortably Defeat Continental Europe to Win the Team Cup

Justin Rose led a GB&I team to a dominant victory in the Team Cup over Francesco Molinari’s Continental Europe, 17-8. This competition was formerly known as the Seve Trophy and serves as a warm up for the Ryder Cup in September. Players such as Aaron Rai, Matt Wallace, Matthieu Pavon, and Rasmus Højgaard were looking to impress captain Luke Donald as they strive to make their debut on the European team. It wasn’t just the players auditioning for future roles—Justin Rose is already being touted as a strong candidate for the 2027 Ryder Cup captaincy.

Great Britain & Ireland entered the final day’s singles matches needing just two points to secure victory. Fittingly, it was Tommy Fleetwood, echoing his heroics from Rome in 2023, who delivered the decisive point with a 3&1 win over Matthieu Pavon, capping off a flawless week with a perfect record. Pavon and Romain Langasque had maintained a 100% record through the first 3 sessions as a team, with Pavon in particular putting on a great display of golf. However, Fleetwood started their singles match 7-under through the first 7 holes and never looked back.

The DP World Tour kicks off in earnest this week with the Dubai Desert Classic. 7 of the 12 players from the 2023 Ryder Cup team will be playing including McIlroy, Rahm, and Hovland.

Other News and Results:

• 💰️ Tom McKibbin, who just secured a PGA Tour card through the DP World Tour, is rumored to have signed a contract to join Jon Rahm’s Legion XIII team on LIV Golf

  • The signing bonus is expected to be in the region of $8 million, a huge payday for the 22-year-old

  • McKibbin seemed to give up on the possibility of playing in the Ryder Cup next year in an interview, saying it is something he “would love to be a part of in the future”

• 🇨🇦 Nick Taylor won his third PGA Tour event in as many years with a win at the Sony Open in Hawaii

  • Taylor won the tournament on the second playoff hole after a chip-in eagle on the final hole of the tournament, which easily wins my shot of the week award

  • 🇩🇪 Stephan Jaeger struggled with an erratic driver on the final day but still fought valiantly, finishing just one stroke shy of forcing a playoff

  • 🇸🇪 Jesper Svensson impressed in his first PGA Tour start as a full-time member, finishing in T10

Evan’s Trivia Corner

The answer to last week’s question was Paul Lawrie, who won the 1999 Open and is Scotland’s only major winner in the last 35 years. He won the tournament after Frenchman Jean Van De Velde blew a three shot lead on the final hole.

The Trivia Corner will be back again in a couple of weeks!

Coming up on tour this week:

• 🌵 The Dubai Desert Classic is the first event of 2025 on the DP World Tour

• 💳️ The PGA Tour returns to the mainland for the American Express

If you have any feedback for the newsletter or would like to get in touch, I would love to hear from you! Email [email protected] or message us on Twitter/X at @BlueHorizonGolf. Thank you for reading!