The Saudi Arabia-backed LIV Golf series is throwing around some crazy money to attract top players from around the world. Their white whale apparently was the best-known golfer in the world: Tiger Woods. And they were willing to pay him a humongous amount of money to play in their league.
Greg Norman, who is the CEO of LIV Golf, spoke with The Washington Post for a feature published on Sunday. The feature captured and shared great insight regarding Norman’s background and personality, shedding light on why he got involved with LIV Golf. The feature also shared some details on offers from LIV Golf.
According to the story, Norman said Woods was offered a financial figure in the “high nine digits.”
From the story:
“Norman says Woods turned down a deal that was ‘mind-blowingly enormous; we’re talking about high nine digits.'”
It’s not hard to figure out why Woods would have turned down the deal. Tiger is one of the biggest names in all of sports across the world. His “brand” is among the most valuable in all of sports. He already is a billion-dollar brand.
Why would he risk his legacy and current earnings/status to join LIV Golf? The gains from LIV wouldn’t even offset Woods’ value from his current empire. Phil Mickelson got dragged for saying he was thinking of partnering with the Saudi league. There is no way Woods wanted that kind of publicity, even for the high nine digits.
More must-reads: