Tiger Woods, PGA Stars Hope Simulated League Adds Spark to Professional Golf

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Florida — An eight-time PGA Tour winner, Billy Horschel, is inside an indoor arena the size of a football field, steadying himself on a grass tee box. He is preparing to smash his drive into a massive simulator screen nearly five stories high.Mr. Horschel swings with all the force of the first hole at Augusta National, firing his ball into a digital fairway depicted on a 64-foot wide by 53-foot high screen, or 26 times a normal simulator.Mr. Horschel watches to see where the digital ball will land before contemplating a second shot with the help of a digital caddie. The green is behind him and revolving on a 360-degree turntable.Welcome to TGL, a new simulated golf league that might be the next big thing.“This isn’t a regular simulator,” six-time PGA winner Ricky Fowler said during a media day at SoFi Center at Palm Beach State College. “It’s going to be a new challenge for everyone. This is something that has never been done. We’ll see how the season goes, but I know we’re going to have a good time in here.”TGL, which begins January 7, is composed of six four-man teams. Tiger Woods will play on the Jupiter Links along with Tom Kim, Max Homa, and Kevin Kisner. Rory McIlroy will play for Boston Common Golf with Keegan Bradley, Hideki Matsuyama, and Adam Scott.Justin Thomas, Mr. Horschel, Patrick Cantlay, and Lucas Glover form the Atlanta Drive Club, while the Los Angeles Golf Club consists of Justin Rose, Collin Morikawa, Sahith Theegala, and Tommy Fleetwood.Xander Schauffele, Matt Fitzpatrick, and Cameron Young join Mr. Fowler on the New York Golf Club, while Mr. Clark is on the Bay Golf Club, along with Min Woo Lee, Ludvig Aberg, and Shane Lowry.Two teams will compete head-to-head each Monday or Tuesday, and each team will play five matches during the regular season with each win earning up to 2 points. The top four teams with the most points make the playoffs. A best-of-three final series to determine the winner of the SoFi Cup and $9 million top prize is set for March 24 and March 25.A television executive for more than 20 years, Mike McCarley, is the CEO of TMRW Sports Group and creator of TGL. He said he aimed to create a prime-time experience that blends traditional golf with technology and a team concept in an indoor stadium experience.“It was how do we accomplish primetime television; how do we make every shot be seen live; how do we get a lot of data on every shot and how do we do it as an additive to the best players in the world’s schedules,” Mr. McCarley said. “It ends up looking something like this.”TGL is something that hasn’t been seen before. All matches will be played at the SoFi Center, a 250,000-square-foot tech-heavy building with intimate seating for 1,500 fans. The massive simulator screen dominates one end along with two huge scoreboards.Two sets of three tee boxes — complete with sand, a fairway, and a real rough — are 35 yards and 21 yards each from the screen. One tee box is filled with sand, another with rough, and another with fairway grass. An estimated 18 radars and 8 top tracers are used to track shots.The other end of the building features the green zone for shots shorter than 50 yards, including chips and putts. The 22,475-foot square “green zone” is built on a 360-degree turntable. Made of synthetic turf, the green sits atop 563 hydraulic jacks that can manipulate the three-tiered green into different contortions and undulations.New York plays the Bay Golf Club in the opener on January 7. The Los Angeles Golf Club takes on Mr. Woods’ Jupiter Links squad on Jan. 14. Each match consists of two teams of three playing 15 holes across two sessions. The final five holes have each player playing two singles matches. Each hole has a value of one point and team wins are worth up to 2 points.Other features include a digital caddy, a 40-second shot clock, and the Hammer, which allows one team to challenge another and increase the value of the hole by one point. The league will be broadcast on ESPN.“I think the concept is cool,” a consultant during the early stages of TGL, Wendell Haskins, tells The New York Sun. “It just remains to be seen how it translates to television. There’s a lot of people behind it, so there’s no reason for it to fail unless the public says this isn’t something they want to see.”The players will wear microphones and golf influencer Roger Steele will serve as the venue’s master of ceremonies for what is expected to be an intimate but vocal crowd.“We want to make it different than what people are seeing on the golf course,” Mr. Horschel said. “This is supposed to be different. It’s supposed to be fast, engaging, in a two-hour window where you can see every golf shot.”As for the crowd at the venue. “I want it to be what you would experience in Mercedes Benz Stadium with the Atlanta Falcons,” Mr. Horschel said, “or the Florida Gators Stadium or an NBA arena. You want to be where you can feel the energy.”

Tiger Woods, PGA Stars Hope Simulated League Adds Spark to Professional Golf

Tiger Woods, PGA Stars Hope Simulated League Adds Spark to Professional Golf

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