The streaming service is copying the success of “The Match” celebrity series by fusing two of its programmes — the golf-centric “Full Swing” and F1 series “Drive to Survive” — for a made-for-TV (or second-screen) spectacle. “The Netflix Cup” will be the streamer’s first live sporting event, pitting the aforementioned golfers with four drivers in a match play tournament at the Wynn Golf Club in Las Vegas.

The Wynn — a Tom Fazio design in Nevada — has previously hosted three of the last four iterations of“The Match.”

“The PGA Tour is proud to participate in this significant milestone for Netflix and we look forward to showcasing our sport’s professional athletes to a live global audience,” said Norb Gambuzza, PGA Tour senior vice president of media and gaming. “New and diverse audiences have come to know more about both our sports and their athletes through ‘Full Swing’ and ‘Drive to Survive’, and we are excited to team up with Netflix, Formula 1 and the Las Vegas Grand Prix on this exciting concept.”

Netflix released the first season of “Full Swing” — a docudrama that takes viewers behind the scenes of professional golfers’ lives on and off the course — this past February. According to the tour, data indicates the show had a significant impact on TV ratings this past season. “Full Swing” was available in 190 countries and 32 languages and it reached Netflix Top 10 worldwide, including No. 2 in the US and UK, and No. 1 in Ireland.

The event will air on Tuesday, November 14.

Main image: Andrew Redington

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Keegan Bradley re-telling the story of receiving the call from Zach Johnson, who informed him he would not be on the Ryder Cup team, was painful enough to hear. We can only imagine how painful it would be to watch it all unfold live from Bradley’s home.

Well, according to Bradley, it won’t be left up to the imagination in Season 2 of Netflix’s “Full Swing”. In a recent appearance on Barstool Sports’ Foreplay podcast, Bradley told hosts that before the US captain gave him a ring, Netflix called him to let him know a camera crew was just a few minutes away from his house. Naturally, Bradley allowed himself to believe this meant he had made the team and the camera crew was coming to capture his live reaction.

As he came to find out, it was the exact opposite.

“I got a text from Zach [Johnson]: ‘Hey guys, I’m going to be calling everybody tomorrow morning,’” Bradley said. “I’m like: ‘Oh [expletive]. I’ve got another night of sweating this out.’ I wake up, I’m very tired, and I get a call from Netflix, and they say: ‘Keegan, we’ve got a camera crew five minutes from your house.’”

“Why would they be sending a camera crew if I’m not going to get picked?” Bradley asked himself. “For the first time, I let my brain think: ‘I did it.’ Why would they be rushing a camera crew to my house? And as soon as I picked up the phone, it was like a: ‘Hey Keegan …”

At this point, Bradley says he looked over to his wife Jillian and gave her the “no” signal. Pain.

“He [Johnson] was really nice, and he hung up the phone and, y’all are going to see this [on Netflix],” Bradley said. “This is real life, no one’s ever seen this call before. It was devastating.”

Man, just when you think this story couldn’t get any more brutal to hear, we, and Keegan, will now have to relive it on “Full Swing” whenever Season 2 drops. Good job by Netflix on acting fast and capturing such a real moment, but there’s no question Bradley would have preferred it going the other way. Making it all the more painful is the fact that the US team are reportedly keeping the Netflix out of the team room next week in Rome, but nobody had any issue with cameras capturing Bradley at what was probably his lowest point all season. Tip of the cap to Keegan for taking it in stride.

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When Season 2 of Netflix’s popular golf series “Full Swing” was announced this past June, there was no indication that the cameras would be rolling at the Ryder Cup in September. However, given the access they had at all four majors in Season 1, it was fair to assume they’d have similar access at the biennial event.

The good news? Netflix cameras will be at Marco Simone Country Club later this month. The bad news? Their access will be limited based on a vote the entire US team took at the request of US captain Zach Johnson. In a recent telephone interview, Johnson said he spoke to all 12 members of the team and they unanimously decided to deny Netflix full access.

“It was one of those where we all gathered, I talked to every individual and laid out scenarios,” Johnson said. “And they all felt like it was best to navigate that week of the tournament in a manner which the sanctity and sacredness of Team USA is preserved. We’re eliminating scenarios.”

Team rooms at the Ryder Cup have always been off limits to the media, historically. And that won’t be changing in 2023. Those hoping for a behind-the-scenes look at what goes down — the bonding, the rah-rah speeches, discussions about pairings and strategy — will not be getting their wish.

As PGA of America CEO Seth Waugh confirmed, though, the cameras will still be there. What they choose to use, if anything, remains to be seen.

“Netflix is going to be there,” said Waugh. “I would say all things involving the team we leave to the team and the captain. I think there’s a sanctity to the team room, and the experience is important to them. It’s part of being a team, right? Netflix has been great for the game. They’re doing great things. The team collectively decided there are areas of privacy that need to be respected.”

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The show has been billed as golf’s version of Netflix’s wildly popular “Formula 1: Drive to Survive” series, also produced by Vox Media Studios and Box To Box Films. And it appears Netflix’s timing for finding an interesting season to follow couldn’t have been better.

RELATED: Why Bryson declined to be part of Netflix show

“You picked a hell of a year to start following the PGA Tour,” Ian Poulter, one of the players to leave the tour for the LIV Golf in the middle of last season, says in the clip, which features a wide range of tour pros. Have a look and listen:

“You picked a hell of a year to start following the PGA Tour.”

Spieth, Thomas, Scheffler, Koepka, Morikawa, Poulter, Dahmen, Fitzpatrick, Johnson, Finau, Theegala, Pereira, Niemann, and McIlroy.

Full Swing premieres February 15. pic.twitter.com/jyxCb1Sgmk

— Netflix (@netflix) January 11, 2023

That’s quite a list of players (Nice work by Rory McIlroy getting the “AND” billing treatment, by the way). And quite a montage (All four men’s major championships participated so the entire golf calendar should be covered).

That trailer isn’t even a minute long, but you’ve got fist pumps, club throws, private jets, candid family moments, Rocky-like workout sequences, etc. February 15 can’t get here fast enough.

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Enjoy an alternate history of Augusta National Golf Club in the latest edition of Golf Digest Middle East, plus a deep-dive on the most famous greens in golf and learn the secret to defending champion Hideki Matsuyama’s swing – and no, it’s not that pause at the top. Jim ‘Bones’ McKay explains why the first major of the year is the hardest event on caddies and Jim Nantz recalls Tiger’s epic 1997 victory.

Looking for a new fairway wood/hybrid? We have you covered in the latest instalment of Golf Digest’s 2022 Hot List. We also recap Georgia Hall’s runaway Aramco Saudi Ladies International victory and get a sneak peek of the Kingdom’s Safaa Golf Club, a place where golf and education happily co-exist.

All this and much more in the April 2022 edition of Golf Digest Middle East.

The issue is again free to our loyal audience. You can scroll through the ISSUU link provided here or download to your favourite device for later. Alternatively, pick up a copy at your favourite club. Whatever option you take, we hope you enjoy the read.

See below for the second issue of the Arabic edition of Golf Digest Middle East.

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PGA and LPGA event marketing teams can get pretty creative with the hospitality goodies they give players, but this is hands down the weirdest one we’ve seen yet.

As seen on Danielle Kang’s Instagram story, players who arrived at the BMW Ladies Championship at LPGA International Busan in Busan, Korea this week received a metal tin with a traditional Korean dalgona cookie inside. The toffee-like desserts were featured in the third episode of ‘Squid Game,’ the viral Korean Netflix show that’s driving the internet bonkers.

Squid Game has officially reached 111 million fans — making it our biggest series launch ever! pic.twitter.com/SW3FJ42Qsn

— Netflix (@netflix) October 12, 2021

Without the nightmarish context of the dystopian show, the cookies would be a lighthearted and fitting welcome gift, considering the dessert originated in Korea. But when you’ve seen ‘Squid Game,’ the sight is not a pleasant one.

Danielle Kang’s cookie before …

Danielle Kang’s cookie after …

In the show, hundreds of people are invited to play a series of Korean children’s games to win millions of dollars, but the stakes are life and death. The dalgona cookies were the star of the second “game,” where players were tasked with carving intricate shapes out of the delicate honeycomb cookies with just a pin, in less than ten minutes. Each player is forced to choose a shape before hearing the premise of the game – leaving some with a simple triangle to carve, and others with the ridiculously challenging outline of an umbrella. Let’s just say that if a player failed to complete the challenge and broke even a fraction of their cookie, the results weren’t very pretty.

Despite the initial shock, several LPGA players tried their hand at the game and shared the results on social media.

Some were successful:

 

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Others…not so much. Ouch.

 

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The series is an R&A-led project that’s aired on the Golf Channel but now also lives on a number of streaming platforms, including Netflix and Sling. The first season kicked-off in 2016, and it’s a pretty simple format: Each 30-minute, documentary-style biography charts the golfing journey of a past British Open winner. It’s cleanly shot, understated and pouring with emotion. The series is, in a word, brilliant. Here’s why:

It’s Brutally Honest
Press conferences are useful for lots of things, but raw honesty isn’t one of them. Talk to players before big tournaments and they’re consumed with the task at hand and busy getting themselves into a certain mindset. Talk to them immediately after, and they usually either stewing or basking in the glory of whatever just happened. Players just aren’t in the mood to be reflective about their journey, and I get that.

It’s why the most candid moments come when players are more removed from competitive settings. You see them on David Feherty’s Golf Channel show, and they’re littered throughout this entire series. There’s Greg Norman talking about his relationship with Nick Faldo—“The rivalry was very real”—or Faldo himself, holding back tears, looking back on his British Open wins. I particularly enjoyed the new episode this year on Nick Price, in which he says at the start of his episode:

“I don’t think you can have good times without having really bad times. If life’s just a bed of roses for you, that’s great, but you’re never going to get anywhere.”

The Stories Are Fascinating
The series’ ability to draw such honesty from its subjects lets it highlight so many truly wonderful stories.

The Rory McIlroy episode provids an astute example. When you look back on his 2014 Open Championship victory and think about “game-changing” moments, you may think of Sergio Garcia’s bunker-induced collapse. McIlroy, in his episode, explains in fascinating detail that his most important shot of the week was his “perfect” approach into the second hole on Thursday.

To most of us, it was little more than a great shot early in the tournament. To Rory, it was defining moment. And the series is packed with gold like that. When Norman talks about his first Open win in 1986, he describes the “positive energy” that surrounded him all week. When Lee Trevino recounts being struck by lightning early in his career, he talks of moving towards bright light, surrounded by faces of people he loves.

You simply don’t hear golfers speak like this very often. When they do, it pulls you in, and it’s utterly riveting.

It Brings You On A Journey
The best part of this entire series is the brief but wonderful journey it brings viewers on. The archived footage is key to it all: Video of young Rory opening presents on Christmas Day, rejoicing over a new Game Boy, as the voice of the man today thanks his parents for their sacrifices. Or of Faldo recounting life at the lowest ebb of his career as sensational old tabloid press clips fly by.

The series is relentlessly single-minded, but it couldn’t work any other way. Victories in other majors barely warrant a passing mention, because the series simply isn’t about that. It’s about the highs and lows, the hopes and dreams. Battling the press, the course, your own demons. It is, simply, players’ journey to becoming the champion golfer of the year.

SEASON 1
Tiger Woods
Greg Norman
Jack Nicklaus
Ernie Els
Darren Clarke
Tom Watson

SEASON 2
Nick Faldo
Lee Trevino
Gary Player
Padraig Harrington
Henrik Stenson
Rory McIlroy

SEASON 3 (airing this summer on Golf Channel)
Nick Price
Paul Lawrie

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By Joel Beall
NEW YORK CITY — The PGA Tour announced plans on Monday to form a partnership with Discovery to create a global, multi-platform home for the sport. The deal, beginning in 2019, will include live rights outside the United States to 150 tournaments that operate under the PGA Tour’s jurisdiction, including the Players Championship, FedEx Cup Playoffs and the Presidents Cup.

“This partnership aligns very well with the opening of PGA Tour offices in London, Tokyo and Beijing in recent years and will support our long-term objectives of growing the game of golf,” said PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan in a statement. “It also will deliver more value to our sponsors as it presents a tremendous opportunity to engage new and diverse audiences around the world.”

The streaming service will reach more than 220 markets and territories and will act as a Netflix-style direct-to-consumer streaming experience. The platform, which doesn’t have a name at this time, will premiere in markets like Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Russia and Spain starting on Jan. 1, 2019. Other countries will have to wait for their airing dates, including South Korea (2020), China (2021) and the United Kingdom (2022). Despite this delay, Monahan and David Zaslav, president and CEO of Discovery, singled out Asia has a major target for the product.

Discovery expects to invest more than $2 billion over the 12-year deal, including licensing of the tour’s international media rights. Though the Maryland-based company is known for its cable channels like the Food Network, Animal Planet and HGTV, it has been successful in expanding its global sport footprint through the Olympics, securing the IOC’s European media rights through 2024 on its EuroSport channel.

“There’s no sport more global than golf, and none more local,” said Zaslav in a Monday meeting in New York. “The PGA Tour gives us live content for 43 weeks. We will build an ecosystem of golf that will nourish and excite every fan in the world.”

Discovery will broadcast the various tour packages on its portfolio of pay-TV and free-to-air channels, digital and short-form networks, while also helping the tour build a platform for non-live and library rights. According to Zaslav, what will constitute non-live product is still being determined, and will ultimately helped shape by consumers.

The announcement comes at an interesting time for the PGA Tour. While the deal does not immediately impact its media rights in the United States with CBS and NBC/GolfChannel, the current contracts end in 2021. The alliance with Discovery constructs a framework with multiple options for the tour to explore when the time arrives.

Regarding future endeavors, Monahan initially downplayed the idea of the tour creating its own network similar to other American sporting entities such as Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association and the National Football League.

“Discovery has the largest international experience that no one else has,” Monahan said. “What they can do for golf, no one can do. We are always seeking how the fan consumes the PGA Tour, and that’s where David and his team come in.”

Conversely, Discovery also recently struck a deal with BAMTech, the streaming business of Major League Baseball, for a European venture. And as Monahan was quick to point out, this is not strictly a rights agreement.

“This is coming together as partners,” Monahan said. “We’re going to go out and address our shared needs by a market-to-market basis.”

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