February 29, 2024

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We break down why LIV Golf is signing a 38-year-old who hasn’t played professionally in 12 years. … It’s the last call for George Kliavkoff’s time with the Pac-12. … A-Rod has yet another sports media project. … And, on this leap day, we look back on a record-breaking contract signed decades ago.

— David Rumsey [[link removed]]

Can LIV Golf’s Bid to Bring Back a Retired PGA Tour Star Succeed? [[link removed]]

LIV Golf

There will be yet another trick up LIV Golf’s sleeve when the controversial league tees it up in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, this weekend for its third tournament of the year.

After a nearly 12-year absence from the sport, Anthony Kim, once seen as the brightest young star in American golf, is joining LIV as a wild-card player for the rest of the season. The 38-year-old will compete for a guaranteed portion of the $20 million individual purse but not the $5 million up for grabs for the top three teams.

The financial figures are key for Kim, who last played in 2012 after sustaining multiple career-threatening injuries. He has long been reported to have a $10 million–plus insurance policy with the PGA Tour that would be voided if he returned to professional competition. “I’ll tell my story when it’s the right time, but right now I’m focused on golf,” Kim said in a video [[link removed]] posted by LIV’s social media accounts. “I’ve missed the competitive part of the game.”

It’s unknown how much LIV is paying Kim, but the league reportedly dished out $10 million signing bonuses to Belgian player Thomas Pieters [[link removed]] and American Pat Perez [[link removed]] (who was 45 at the time), so a similar fee for Kim doesn’t seem unreasonable.

Big Game, Bigger Persona

With a cocky attitude and flashy style of play, Kim was ranked as high as No. 6 in the world in September 2008, at the ripe age of 23. After two wins on the PGA Tour that year, he was a key part of Team USA’s Ryder Cup victory that fall. He made the ’09 President’s Cup team and was a star athlete on Nike’s golf roster ( Sports Illustrated reported [[link removed]] he made $6 million in endorsement income in ’09).

“His persona was perhaps bigger than his game, and his game was quite good,” golf analyst Peter Kostis, who worked for CBS during Kim’s prime, tells Front Office Sports. “He was a personality that the Tour hadn’t seen before.”

The 2010 season started out hot with yet another PGA Tour victory and a third-place finish at the Masters. Then the injuries started. He missed several months of play in ’10 and was left off that year’s Ryder Cup squad. In ’11 he finished 79th in the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup standings. By spring ’12 he had made $12,206,409 in career earnings but didn’t look like his former self on the course. After withdrawing from the Wells Fargo Championship that May, he left the game—until now.

Too Little, Too Late?

Golf fans of yesteryear will no doubt be interested in simply seeing Kim swing a club in a competitive environment. “For people on the inside of golf, it’s pretty much going to be must-see golf,” says Kostis, who still coaches LIV’s Paul Casey and cohosts a podcast with fellow former CBS analyst Gary McCord.

But with an eight-hour time difference between Saudi Arabia and the Eastern time zone, can that translate to a larger audience? LIV is streaming Friday morning beginning at 3 a.m. ET, and on tape delay Saturday and Sunday afternoon on The CW.

Then there’s the question of how much cachet Kim actually still holds. “There’s a whole generation of golfers that have come and gone since he’s been gone,” Kostis says. “There are a lot of people that don’t even know who Anthony Kim was.” If Kim ultimately starts contending at LIV events, it certainly wouldn’t hurt the league’s momentum. But how much impact his return can really have is the big unknown. Only time will tell.

The George Kliavkoff Era in the Pac-12 Comes to an End: How It Fell Apart [[link removed]]

Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

Thursday marks the final day of George Kliavkoff’s short and tumultuous tenure as commissioner of the Pac-12. He will be remembered as the commissioner who presided over the conference’s demise.

Kliavkoff took up the position in the spring of 2021. An outsider to college sports but an experienced marketer with MGM Sports and Entertainment, the conference had hoped he would inject modernity into the Pac-12 after commissioner Larry Scott departed. Kliavkoff inherited a conference in turmoil: Its once-great football reputation had sunk, and its once-innovative TV deal had proved a money-loser. The conference’s bright spot: powerful Olympic sports programs—though Kliavkoff largely eschewed them during his early days.

Costly Mistakes

Kliavkoff suffered an early blow in the summer of 2021, when USC and UCLA made a surprise move to the Big Ten. Though the conference would lose two of its biggest brands, Kliavkoff wasn’t concerned—fast-forward to the summer of ’22, and he was talking a big game about an innovative media deal, calling the Pac-12’s position enviable.

But it took him too long to negotiate. He was leapfrogged by the ever-aggressive Brett Yormark and the Big 12. His constituents grew increasingly impatient as rumors of more realignment flew. Their conference still lacked a media deal by July 2023. The best he could deliver: an exclusive Apple TV+ deal with a base of $20 million per school and escalator fees—not even equivalent to what the conference’s schools were currently making, let alone their competitors in other leagues. The Pac-12 crumbled before Kliavkoff’s eyes, leaving none but Washington State and Oregon State.

Missing in Action

Kliavkoff could’ve taken control as the crusader of the new Pac-2 but instead disappeared into the shadows. He was not part of phone calls between Oregon State and Washington State administrators about next steps. Court documents stated he violated conference bylaws to appease department members. When the schools sued for control of the conference’s assets, he wasn’t even present in the courtroom.

Moving On

Kliavkoff will be succeeded by deputy commissioner Teresa Gould, who officially begins her role Friday as the first female power conference commissioner. She’ll be tasked with rebuilding the conference or steering its current members to permanent new homes, as well as handling conference legal liabilities and presiding over football media deals.

“We look forward to her leadership as we write the next chapter in the Pac-12’s storied history,” Washington State president Kirk Schulz said.

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TIME CAPSULE Feb. 29, 1972: Leaping Into New Territory

Malcolm Emmons-USA TODAY Sports

On this leap day 52 years ago: Henry “Hank” Aaron became the first MLB player to earn an annual salary of $200,000 when he signed a new three-year contract with the Braves. After Aaron’s deal expired, he finished his career in Milwaukee, making $240,000 annually for the next two seasons with the Brewers. The slugger finished with career earnings of $2.14 million in MLB. Aaron’s contract record has of course been broken dozens of times, more recently by Shohei Ohtani, who will be making $70 million per year with the Dodgers.

FRONT OFFICE SPORTS TODAY They Said What?

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“[Alex Rodriguez and I] started to talk about what a show would be, it was an almost Seinfeldian moment of, well, this is the show.”

—Jason Kelly, a chief correspondent with Bloomberg, on the origin story of the business-of-sports podcast and video series, “The Deal,” which he’s cohosting with A-Rod. The show launches today. To hear more about the deal with “The Deal,” check out the latest episode of Front Office Sports Today.

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