In new court documents, LIV Golf alleges its troubles finding television deals in 2022 was due to a PGA Tour executive using “illegal means” to kill off potential partnerships.
LIV Golf and the PGA Tour’s battle for the sport’s supremacy has been going on for the last year. It has included suspensions, bans and litigation. While the Saudi Arabia-backed league has massive finances to combat the Tour’s prestige and reach, the upstart league has had a lot of trouble finding television partnerships around the world.
The entire first season of LIV Golf was mostly broadcast through streaming platforms like Facebook. It wasn’t until just before the new season that the tour scored a North American media rights deal with the CW Network. That was a problem for LIV abroad as well, and it alleges in an ongoing anti-trust suit against the PGA that Tour executive Thierry Pascal used his international influence to undercut the league's chances of securing broadcast contracts.
On Wednesday, Front Office Sports posted new documents from the current lawsuit between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, and it revealed some interesting allegations from the new kid on the golf block.
“Based on Tour documents and other sources, LIV believes Mr. Pascal used illegal means to dissuade numerous broadcasters in international markets from signing broadcast contracts with LIV and even from reporting about LIV events in their news content.
“Time and again, after the live meeting or phone call, the broadcaster did an about-face and informed LIV the negotiations (in one case, a signed contract) could not proceed. Because of his conduct and his efforts to conceal it, Mr. Pascal is a foundational witness whose testimony will inform later discovery in important ways.”
– LIV Golf
Pascal is the managing director of PGA Tour International U.K. and the senior VP of international media, but it is unclear what specific means he may have used to sink negotiations between LIV and interested broadcasters. He is set to be deposed by LIV attorneys on Monday, but the PGA Tour has sought it to be a remote deposition, as opposed to an-in person conversation in London.
The source that finances LIV is a department in the Saudi Arabian government, a government that has a long history of human rights violations and is likely a reason many major networks in the United States have stayed away from making deals with LIV.
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