University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Women’s professional golf: beyond the pay gap

(USC Thesis Other)

Women’s professional golf: beyond the pay gap

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Content Copyright 2021 Kira Kazantsev

WOMEN’S PROFESSIONAL GOLF:

BEYOND THE PAY GAP

by

Kira Kazantsev

A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC ANNENBERG SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(SPECIALIZED JOURNALISM)

August 2021

ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Abstract . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iii

“I Played With the Men”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Golf and Gender- A History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Follow the Money. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

So How Much Are we Talking?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Break it Down Now. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Same Sport, Different Realities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

What Can be Done? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Bibliography. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

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Abstract

Since its inception, women’s golf has been often overlooked compared to its male counterpart. This
thesis takes a deeper look at the differences between the men’s and women’s professional golf games,
analyzes what has led to the current landscape and what could be done to create more parity in the
sport. Beyond the various differences between men’s and women’s golf, it details why now is the time
to invest in women’s sport and how to break the cyclical logic that has resulted in today’s golf
ecosystem.

1
“I Played With the Men.”

By 2004, a 14-year-old Michelle Wie had won everything in Hawaii that she could.

At 11, she won the Hawaii State Women's Stroke Play Championship, the Jennie K. Wilson Invitational –
Hawaii’s most prestigious women’s amateur tournament – and advanced to match play at the Women's
U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship.

At 12, she again won the Women’s Hawaii State Open, this time by 13 shots. For emphasis: as a 12-year-
old. That same year, she became the youngest player ever to qualify for an LPGA event, the Takefuji
Classic held in Hawaii. The record would eventually be broken by 11-year-old Ariya Jutanugarn.

At 13, Wie became the youngest player to make an LPGA cut with a third-round 66 at the Kraft Nabisco
Championship, tying the amateur record for a score at a women's major. That year she won the
Women's Amateur Public Links, the youngest person ever, male or female, to win a USGA adult event.
Later that summer, she made the cut at the U.S. Women's Open, still just 13, the youngest player ever
to do so.

Every year, the PGA Tour makes two tournament stops in Hawaii during what is referred to as the
“Hawaii swing.” One of those stops is the Sony Open in Honolulu, just down the road from Wie’s home
at the time. When the event was played in 2004, it had a very special addition to the field.

As luck or fate would have it, a friend of the Wie family happened to know Sony’s chief executive. The
company offered her a special exemption to play. Corporate sponsors are usually allowed to award a
few spots to players outside of the normal tour members at their discretion. With the invite, she
became the youngest female to play a PGA Tour event. And despite, in her words, feeling scared and
nervous, her second-round 68 was the lowest score ever by a woman in a PGA Tour event. Though she
would miss the cut by one stroke, she bested the 36-hole scores of 47 men, including four major
winners, and matched the scores of 15 more men, including three more major winners.

Looking back, it was really nothing different for Wie. She was playing in men’s tournaments all the time
in Hawaii, she was a tomboy who played on the boys’ baseball team and didn’t think anything of it. To
her, no tournament was off-limits, and she certainly didn’t do it for the eventual attention she would
get, something that she could have never foreseen.

Fast forward to today.

In an informal poll, I asked my friend group outside of golf and also my fellow students at USC in a sports
journalism class, about 20 people in all from different walks of life, if they could name a female golfer.

A few of my friends could name Michelle Wie. But then came the caveat: only because I had posted
about her on my Instagram.

My classmates could also only name Wie. But again, a caveat: We had just discussed her in class, in
particular her reaction to the lewd statements Rudy Giuliani made about her on a podcast. Not a single
person I asked could name a female golf professional other than Wie.

2
Could they name male golfers? Tiger Woods and Arnold Palmer and others came up, some classmates
even rattled off long lists of names. One actual quote from a friend: “Arnold Palmer is a guy.” Another:
“Jack Nicklaus and some Southern guy named Bubba,” who was likable because of his outfits and pink
driver.

I posed another question to these groups. Could they name a female tennis player?

Both friends and classmates could name several players, some even beyond Venus and Serena Williams:
Naomi Osaka, Coco Gauff, Maria Sharapova, Jennifer Brady, Anna Kournikova, Simona Halep and more
rushed through a text chain.

This polling is, let’s concede, the furthest thing from scientific. Further, extrapolating from anecdotal
information can prove nothing. Or, maybe, something. So:

Why is the female golfer such an elusive creature to the mainstream? Why can a random and diverse
group of people name male golfers and female tennis players but none can go beyond Michelle Wie –
now Michelle Wie West -- in golf?

Where is the disconnect?

And, perhaps more critically, why?

When I asked Wie West about the basis of her fame, she quickly said, “It’s because I played with the
men.”

Golf and Gender- A History

In order to understand why playing with men might have given Wie West access to a different platform
than her fellow female players, it’s important to understand the origins and history of the game.

There are records of many stick and ball games dating back to 13
th
-Century Netherlands, but the game
we know as golf today is widely accepted as having originated in 15
th
century Scotland.

It wasn’t always a welcome pastime for the Scots. King James II prohibited golf in the land as it
distracted his military recruits from their training. But by the early 1500s, golf was once again
considered a worthwhile pursuit.

Golf had an early female champion in Mary, Queen of Scots, who learned the game during her childhood
in France. In fact, she left an important mark on the game with the word “caddie.” It derives from the
military cadets that carried her golf clubs. Unfortunately, golf didn’t turn out too well for Mary. Only
days after her husband was assassinated, she was seen out and about hitting the links, which led to
speculation that she was not in mourning and was actually behind the plot. That speculation, among
other things, led to her execution, a rather dramatic outcome for a round of golf.

In the mid 1700s, a golf society (composed of all men) in Edinburgh authored the first official rules of
golf. And Scotland’s diaspora contributed to the early growth of the game. Traveling soldiers, merchants
and those looking for riches elsewhere spread the game to the rest of the United Kingdom, India, the
American colonies, Singapore, South Africa and beyond.
3

The modern father of the game is widely accepted as the Scot, Old Tom Morris, who played in the Open
Championship the year of its inception in 1860, and every year until 1895. He won four times. He was
also known as a club maker, golf course designer and greenskeeper. His son, Young Tom Morris (yes, the
names were very creative) also went on to win the Open Championship four times.

Early records of the game in the United States are found in North and South Carolina and in New York.
By 1894, the United States Golf Assn. (USGA) was formed. By 1910, the United States was home to 267
golf clubs.

The USGA did feature early inclusion of women in the game. The U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship
began the same year as the men’s amateur, 1895. The following clip ran in a New York paper:

“Thirteen ladies played 18 holes of golf at the Meadow Brook Club, in Hempstead, recently. Mrs.
Charles S. Brown, whose husband plays at the Shinnecock Hills Club, in Southampton, L.I., made
the best score and thus won the United States championship for lady golfers.”

When it comes to major championships, the U.S. Women’s Open began 76 years ago; the men’s
championship is celebrating 121 years.

Men’s professional golf as we know it today, or the PGA Tour, was established in 1968 when the
“Tournament Players Division” split from the PGA of America. The PGA of America is a governing body
for professional golfers, many of whom are teaching professionals that receive their qualifications
through the organization. The PGA Tour, a completely separate entity, exists to serve playing
professionals on the tour and execute tournaments.

In 1951, the LPGA (Ladies Professional Golf Association) was founded by 13 founding members,
including Babe Zaharias, considered one of the greatest golfers of all time.

They did it all themselves. They planned the tournaments, laid out the courses, managed logistics and
recruited players.

But long before there was ever an LPGA, women’s involvement in the sport was not entirely welcome.

Some of the early thoughts regarding women playing the game include this gem from the Scottish judge,
Lord Moncrieff in 1902, who apparently was offended by the idea of a lady in a dress swinging a club:
“Not because we doubt a lady’s power to make a longer drive but because that cannot well be done
without raising the club above the shoulder,” he wrote. “Now we do not presume to dictate but we
must observe that the posture and gestures requisite for a full swing are not particularly graceful when
the player is clad in female dress.”
In an attempt to appease the golf ladies of the Lord’s time, the members of the Royal and Ancient Club
of St. Andrews built a putting green for wives next to the Old Course. While something is better than
nothing, the ladies of the time wanted to, you know, actually play the game of golf in its entirety as
opposed to being contained to a single putting green.
4
That desire resulted in a letter written by Blanche Martin and sent to a prominent amateur in 1893,
Horace Hutchinson, to inquire about the possibility of starting a women’s golf organization.
His response was thus:
Dear Miss Martin,
I have read your letter about the proposed Ladies’ Golf Union with much interest. Let me give you the
famous advice of Mr Punch (since you honour me by asking for my opinion). DON’T. My reasons? Well?
1) Women never have and never can unite to push any scheme to success. They are bound to fall out and
quarrel on the smallest or no provocation; they are built that way!
2) They will never go through one Ladies’ Championship with credit. Tears will bedew, if wigs do not
bestrew the green.
Constitutionally and physically women are unfitted for golf. They will never last through two rounds of a
long course in a day. Nor can they ever hope to defy the wind and weather encountered on our best links
even in spring and summer. Temperamentally, the strain will be too great for them. THE FIRST LADIES’
CHAMPIONSHIP WILL BE THE LAST, unless I and others are greatly mistaken. The LGU seems scarcely
worthwhile.
What would poor Horace have thought of Michelle Wie West bashing it down the fairway as a 12-year-
old? One shudders at the thought.
Mr. Hutchinson’s letter ended up as a rallying cry for women’s golf in Britain, and the Ladies Golf Union
was founded on June 13, 1893. But just because there was a ladies’ organization did not mean the men
were now accepting. As the women’s game started to create its own stars at the playing of the annual
Women’s British Amateur, there remained many a golf institution limited to a male-only membership.
In 1946, the wife of three-time British Amateur Champion Sir Henry Cotton, Isabel-Maria Estanguet de
Moss, or “Toots,” was refused entry to Royal Liverpool. Though Cotton had just won the championship,
the club’s secretary famously told the press:

“No woman ever has entered the clubhouse and, praise God, no woman ever will.”

Those words have gone down in infamy, and just like those of his compatriot, Horace Hutchinson, have
for years served as a rallying cry.

Today, there are still many male-only clubs. Only recently have some of the more influential venues
changed their policies.

In 2002, the writer Martha Burk staged a protest at the Masters Tournament due to the club’s male-only
membership policy. The protest actually took place at a field near Augusta National Golf Club in Georgia.
Burk would go on to win a $120,000 lawsuit for a violation of her civil rights as the protestors were not
allowed to demonstrate outside of the club’s gates.

5
Burk wore a bulletproof vest as protestors of her protest drove by that field and threw trash and rocks
at the women gathered to object to Augusta National’s males-only membership.

During this controversy, a fax was sent from an anonymous source to Burk with a list of the members at
Augusta National. This list had been closely guarded. It read like a who’s who of power brokers of top
executives, university elites, government officials and beyond. The list ran in a front-page spread in the
sports section of USA Today on Sept. 27, 2002.

Eventually, the club’s membership acquiesced. The policy changed in 2012, and the club admitted
Condoleezza Rice and Darla Moore, an investor and philanthropist, as its first female members.

The Royal and Ancient Golf Club at St. Andrews followed in Augusta’s footsteps in 2014; Muirfield Club,
a historic Scottish institution, opened its doors to women in 2017; Pine Valley in New Jersey,
consistently rated as the No. 1 golf course in America, passed a vote in April 2021 to allow female
members to join by the end of this year.

In 2019, Augusta National established the Augusta National Women’s Amateur (ANWA), a competition
that invites the best female amateurs in the world to compete on Augusta’s hallowed grounds.

The event has been a huge success in terms of the visibility it’s brought to the women’s game according
to broadcasters and journalists alike, not to mention the power and might Augusta can contribute to
growing new female stars. But it is not perfect.

The ANWA takes place opposite the ANA Inspiration, one of the LPGA’s five majors. Traditionally, the
ANA has had a strong amateur presence. It is considered a great honor to be invited to play. Now,
amateurs must choose between competing at Augusta and competing at a women’s major.

The major is also forced to compete with the media coverage that a machine-like Augusta is able to
attract around an event.

While something is certainly better than nothing, many LPGA professionals took to Twitter to say,
“When will it be our turn?” It’s wonderful that those amateurs are given access to the Augusta platform.
Because of it the spotlight can shine on new young stars Augusta National brought us such as Jennifer
Kupcho and Maria Fassi.

But imagine what Augusta could do for women in golf if there was a female Masters Tournament.

Follow The Money

As with most things in life, the differences between the male and female games come down to money.
That money disproportionately finds itself in the male game.

Michelle Wie West was able to have a piece of the star power and exposure the PGA Tour and the
money behind it command at a very young age. And she still sees dividends from that, but it’s not
something that all players want or can take advantage of.

When the “playing with the men” comment kept coming up in interviews for this thesis, it seemed like a
no-brainer. So why then, to ask the obvious question, don’t more women play in men’s tournaments?
6
Turns out, it’s not that easy and there are several reasons that hold female players back.

First, you have to be invited to play and usually given a sponsor’s exemption. That was the case for
Brittany Lincicome, who in July 2018 accepted an invite to play in the Barbasol tournament, a PGA Tour
event. She missed the cut but spoke fondly of her experience and gained increased media recognition.

But for a female player to take on the same length course as a male player, despite the dividends a
grand stage like that can bring you, the player must accept the possibility of failure.

The nerves that Annika Sorenstam says she felt were quite high when she took on the men at a PGA
Tour event in 2003 at Colonial Country Club in Dallas, Texas.

Many male players were vocal about not wanting her there. Vijay Singh said she had no business being
there and that he would withdraw if paired with her. Sorenstam also missed the cut. A female player
hasn’t made the cut at a PGA Tour event since Babe Zaharias in 1945.

Playing in the event, however, did contribute to cementing Sorenstam’s legacy as one of the greatest
female players to ever play the game.

Beth Ann Nichols, a Golfweek senior writer who was recently announced as the first female president of
the Golf Writers Association of America, said there has to be a certain confidence level. “You have to be
really secure,” she said, adding that a female golfer has to be able to handle the pressure and the
potential fallout if it doesn’t go well.

For many players, the follow-up thought is thus: “What can this do for me if I fall flat on my face and it's
a disaster?”

In the case of Wie West, she was an anomaly. She had a once-in-a-generation talent, and she had a
charisma that naturally brought her fans and attention.

LPGA player Marina Alex said if she was given a sponsor’s exemption for a PGA Tour event and had to
play from the same tees – that is, the same length course the men play – she probably wouldn’t take it.

“I do not hit the ball nearly far enough to compete,” she said. “But I do believe there’s a handful of girls
on the LPGA with the natural length that could be competitive if given the chance.”

If there were a discussion of playing proportional courses in a co-ed event, Alex said, “That’s a
completely different story.”

A successful example of this took place in June 2021. The Scandinavian Mixed is a new event on the
European and Ladies European Tours. Swedish professional golfers, and major champions, Annika
Sorenstam and Henrik Stenson hosted the event comprised of 78 men and 78 women.

There was one trophy and one prize money pool. In the first two rounds, mixed groups of men and
ladies play in a stroke play format. Men play from the men’s tees and ladies play from the ladies’ tees.
After two rounds, the top 65 players and ties irrespective of gender make the cut and the format
remains the same.

7
For a woman, having the secret sauce combination – length on the course and natural magnetism – to
be successful at a regular PGA Tour event is extremely rare.

The question for Roberta Bowman, the LPGA’s chief brand and communications officer, was clear: What
did she see as the No. 1 factor limiting the creation of bona fide superstars on the LPGA, the one factor
or element that could transcend the game?

Her answer came in a single word:

“Exposure.”

She explained:

“Exposure is everything. We are constantly asking, ‘How do we get more exposure?’ It is often the
missing ingredient with the value proposition.”

The LPGA operates on a fraction of the budget of the PGA Tour. That means less TV coverage, less
money for advertising, fewer opportunities to bring in journalists and, separately, an overall experience
for the players that, compared to the men, is poorer.

Golf’s ecosystem skews toward the male golfer. The men make more money, have better basic
amenities at tournaments, have more earning power with their sponsors, get more brand deals and
have much more mainstream recognition.

Even the golf courses themselves are not designed with the female golfer in mind. And they are certainly
not built with the elite female golfer in mind, according to Nichols.

Female tennis players play at the same time as and at the same venues as their male counterparts.
Which might have something to do with why friends and classmates were able to name a number of
female tennis players.

At Grand Slam events, male and female tennis players are awarded equal prize money. At World Tennis
Association events, female tennis players earn about eighty cents to every male dollar. And there are
some deeper pay disparities within other tennis organizations. Yet on the whole, the tennis earnings for
female players are far closer to what the men make in their sport when compared to golf’s gender pay
gap.

The LPGA awarded about $70.55 million in prize money in 2019. The PGA Tour awarded about $376
million in prize money, plus another $70 million in bonus money that is awarded after the Fedex Cup
playoffs.

Simple math: $70 million is roughly 18% of $376 million.

It’s about 16% of $446 million.

The PGA Tour also recently established the Players Impact Program Fund, which is a $40 million pot
divvied up among the top 10 players who are considered to have the greatest impact on the game.

8
All of the players are ranked according to an impact score determined by an algorithm. The metrics that
go into the algorithm include:

• Popularity on Google search
• Nielsen Brand Exposure rating, which measures the value a player delivers to sponsors via his
total time featured on broadcasts
• Q-rating, a metric of the familiarity and appeal of player’s brand
• MVP rating, a measure of how much engagement a player’s social media and digital channels
drive
• Meltwater mentions, or the frequency with which a player is mentioned across a range of media
channels

Female golfers are not eligible for this sort of incentive.

Even those who are well-meaning can – if unwittingly – point out the discrepancies between the men’s
and women’s games.

Ted Yeschin, vice president of talent marketing at Los Angeles-based Wasserman, one of the world’s
largest and most influential talent agencies, said the biggest challenge he sees with the LPGA is there are
no stories being told across large platforms.

Exposure, exposure, exposure.

For example, when Wasserman signed Matthew Wolff, the Oklahoma State standout and now PGA Tour
winner, and his unique golf swing back in 2019, their inhouse creative agency produced a killer
promotional video before Wolf announced his debut as a professional on the PGA Tour. It was picked up
by all major golf media. Wolff made a splash before he even reached an event as a professional.

But telling those stories takes money, manpower, and most importantly, time.

Even if you don’t have access to such resources, social media offers the opportunity to write your own
story. With the right strategy behind you, you can do just that, something Yeschin highly recommends as
players consider brand deals and growing their star.

But, again, compare – a third party did that work, while Wolff went about his very extensive practice
schedule.

Most female golfers, who also have grueling practice schedules, simply don’t have access to such an
agency, some do, but most don’t – are they supposed to be social-media managers and grow their
brands all the while getting better day after day at, you know, the golf itself?

9
In today’s world, social-media numbers are used as benchmarks for fan engagement and total worth in
terms of what sponsors may want to pay a player.

For Alex, “As a 30-year-old, in my eighth year, I can see how much more important social media has
become to my own brand. To be honest, I don’t love it. It’s definitely not simple to create a professional
page with high-quality content, and I want to see players continue to be valued for their skills over the
social.”

“So, if that means practice more and a little less time dedicated to generating quality content,” she said,
“I am OK with that outcome.”

She admits she may be “old school” in her approach, and it could be a generational outlook versus, say,
a player currently in her rookie season who has grown up using social media, but Alex wants her golf
results to be what defines her sense of accomplishment and worth.

That and the time it takes to create content that will actually provide returns could impede on an
already jam-packed travel and practice schedule. What happens then? You have created a revenue
stream and name recognition via social, but your dream of winning on the LPGA tour could suffer as a
result. Is it possible to do both well on one’s own?

Marisa Messana, 25, of Fort Lauderdale, who plays on what’s called the Symetra Tour, aiming to break
into the LPGA show, is one of a small group of players who is consistently active on social media in an
attempt to market herself and create fun, unique content to drive fan interest in her game.

A scroll through her Instagram features a mix of instructional content, personal moments and insights
into life on tour, all of which make her relatable and interesting to a new generation of golf fans.

She sees social media as an easy way for her to make money while pursuing her LPGA dream. But what
happens when that pursuit eats into your practice time?

Like many others, Messana struggles with the financial aspects of the game and the time it takes to
invest in social media and brand growth has a clear reciprocal effect on her ability to focus on playing.

So How Much Are We Talking?

Back to that essential, the central truism about golf.
Everything about it comes back to money.
So to have to think about content creation to fund your practice schedule after years and years of
shelling out to become very, very good can be a tough pill to swallow.
Because – and this is no secret – becoming good at golf takes considerable investment not just of time.
But money.
10
What kind of money are we talking? Well, first you have to get good at the golf itself. Alex has parents
who sacrificed greatly to put her in tournaments, fly her to see coaches and – as opposed to lessons at a
public course – join a country club.

All of that allowed her to become good enough to get a college scholarship at Vanderbilt, an excellent
college golf program, which over the course of four years, is valued at approximately $200,000. But she
estimates that to get to that point in the first place, her parents invested at least that amount over the
seven to 10 years before ever stepping foot on Vandy’s campus.

What about when you actually make it out on the LPGA? Yearly budgets vary depending on what players
can afford. In the beginning of Alex’s career, her average yearly expenses were about $80,000 to
$100,000.

And, she said, “I was saving in every way I could.”

Now, 10 years into her career, she considers herself lucky to afford things such as physical therapy and
coaching on a consistent basis. All of that costs more money. Plus, the better you play, the better your
support staff is paid. Her expenses now range from $150,000 to $200,000 annually.

In golf, these sorts of expenses, for even the most talented players, are often uniquely American.

Many other countries with large numbers of competitive players – the likes of Spain, China, Sweden and,
perhaps most notably due to its dominance, South Korea – have national teams that help create
pipelines for the future stars of the game. Those national teams come with resources and democratize
access to the game.

In the U.S., there is no such program. Funding an ascent in golf takes not just time but an incredible
investment of money. That typically comes down to the player themselves and their families.

Wie West remembers this well.

“Coming to the mainland,” she said of growing up in Hawaii, “is not cheap.”

For such a rising star, playing in the major junior and amateur tournaments was imperative, but only so
many of those events are in Hawaii.

Wie’s parents, BJ and Bo, scraped together every cent they could for their daughter’s future in golf. But
not all parents are able to cobble such an opportunity together or don’t even know where to start.

The American pipeline to professional golf often depends on personal wealth and connections and is
potentially leaving a ton of talent on the table. In turn, the lack of American talent has a direct impact on
the game.

A large part of the golf audience, the U.S. television viewing audience, wants to tune in to watch
American stars. Of course, there should be stars from all over the world, but more American stars could
only help the television product.

11
Without an abundance of such players, it is harder to sell the LPGA product in U.S. markets, according to
Craig Annis, chief brand officer of the USGA.

The U.S. Women’s National Soccer team has had dramatic success in the American public sphere and
even outperforms the men in revenue generation. Perhaps the luxury of a national team has something
to do with this.

For American fans, the majority of the TV-watching golf audience, building connections with American
stars from a younger age could be a path toward success.

When it comes to the idea of a women’s national team, Nichols has been wanting this for a long time:

“Look at Sweden, South Korea, and what they’ve been able to do.”

If you’re an exceptional player and you don’t have the pieces to the puzzle, you might not reach your
potential. The Swedish team helps players with apartments and offsets living expenses. Taking away the
financial burden when a player starts out frees her up to focus on reaching her potential.

So why has this not happened in the United States?

A key reason, perhaps, is structural. In other countries, sport is the arm of a federal ministry. That is not
the case in the United States. The USGA, like the U.S. Olympic Committee – just to take one example
among many – is a private entity. Those entities must fund themselves.

A governing body like the USGA would have to see a need and take ownership of any program aimed at
developing young golfers. That would take significant funding. The counterargument: Many
organizations already exist with the mission of getting young women into golf or providing coaching to
young women who might not otherwise afford it.

Nichols asserted that such organizations are great for getting people into the game but not into major
championships.

She laid it out like this:

Mom and Dad set out to help Suzie get a scholarship. They put everything they have into it. Suzie gets
that scholarship. She goes to a decent school. Now she still needs her own swing coach. By and large,
the college isn’t providing that. To get on tour, she still needs to train in the summer; she still needs a
boatload of cash for that training.

So, Suzie is back to square one in trying to fund her development. A national team could usher Suzie
through.

Break It Down Now

Virtually every sport has its own ecosystem.
Basketball? The NCAA serves as a proving ground for the NBA and WNBA.
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Baseball has a farm system – a system of minor league teams that feed to the majors.
Golf, too, has its way up and into the LPGA and PGA Tours.
It’s common for a promising player, female or male, to go first to college.
Then what?
Then, just as in baseball, there’s something of a farm system, separate minor-league tours – or, in golf
parlance, developmental tours.
Even here, from the get-go of the professional world, the experiential differences between the women
and the men are vivid.
The women play on what’s called the Symetra Tour, the men’s the Korn Ferry.
The Symetra Tour will play 20 events in 2021, the Korn Ferry Tour 23. The Korn Ferry Tour season
generally runs from September of one year to September of the next, culminating in the Tour
Championship. The Symetra Tour season usually runs from February or March through October of the
same year.
During that time, for the women, the goal is to finish within the top 10 on the money list to graduate
with an LPGA Tour card. For the men, their stock is calculated by points; the top 25 advance to the PGA
Tour. These events take place all over the country, in Kansas, Utah, Indiana, Illinois and many southern
states. Both the men and women on these tours don’t necessarily get to play prestigious golf courses on
a consistent basis.
Preceding the developmental tours is Qualifying School, or “Q-School.”
Q-School is an annual process through which LPGA hopefuls must filter through. After three stages of
play that are scheduled throughout the year, the top 45 and ties will graduate to the LPGA; the others
who make it through all of the stages but do not finish in the top 45 receive Symetra Tour status.
Those who do not make it through all three stages receive conditional status based on where they
finished in the various stages. This means that they are essentially relegated until a spot becomes
available at a tournament.
Let’s say there are 100 spots at a Symetra tournament and only 80 fully eligible players commit, those
20 spots are released to the next eligible groups depending on where they rank on the conditional status
list. Doing well or not doing well in Q-School determines how the rest of a player’s year will play out, so
it is an extremely imperative process to go through. The men also have a Q-School process.
If you're not one of those lucky few who shoot to the top quickly in Q-School or get sponsor exemptions
or invites into majors based on your amateur play, you're slogging it out on a developmental tour in
hopes of one day making it.

Reality check: A player's shelf life on a mini-tour is generally a few years. Bluntly: Once the money runs
out.

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Which, given the figures involved, the question is clear: how does a woman make it even a few years?

Will Zalatoris was the No. 1-ranked player on the Korn Ferry tour in 2020, earning more than $400,000.
That’s almost nine times as much as Anna Belac, the 2020 Symetra No. 1. She made just over $49,000.

Due to Zalatoris’ status on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2020, he qualified for that year’s U.S. Open at Winged
Foot in Westchester, NY where he finished in a tie for 6
th
. That finish alone earned him about $424,000.
In all, his more than $800,000 in prize money that year as a developmental tour player eclipsed anything
that a Symetra player made.

The highest finish by a non-LPGA member at the U.S. Women’s Open went to Hinako Shibuno, a player
on the Japanese LPGA. She finished in solo fourth earning about $260,000.

In 2020, 156 Korn Ferry Tour players made over $20,000. Just 24 women on the Symetra Tour did. Why
are things so much different on the Korn Ferry universe? It’s still, after all, the minor leagues.

Exposure, exposure, exposure. And the tour is owned by its parent company: the PGA Tour.

The men get more exposure; therefore, bringing in sponsors is easier. Most are able to secure at least
equipment and clothing for free according to professional golfer turned broadcaster, Colt Knost. He says
about half are also paid by sponsors to use their gear or place their company’s logo on their shirt, hat or
golf bag.

Though, he does point out that in today’s changing landscape, it is harder and harder even for the men
in the lower golf ranks to attain sponsorships.

Korn Ferry tournament sponsors often provide breakfast and lunch at the course. Generally, this is in a
country club banquet room, often boasting options like salad bars, sandwich bars and sometimes even a
chef carving fresh, steaming roast beef and honeyed ham right onto the plate.

It's a small detail, but that player isn't building extra time into his schedule to go to the grocery store, to
wake up early to cook and pack food for the round. Many players do do their own grocery shopping on
the road for health reasons and to save money, but it’s not always a necessity. Which is one less thing
that takes focus away from his game.

For the women, the Symetra Tour clubhouse offerings are often limited to snacks like Oreos and Ritz
crackers. Not exactly the diet of an elite athlete who needs to stay focused and energized through 18
holes of competitive golf. But what can they do on such a limited budget?

All Korn Ferry tour members and Symetra Tour members are required to pay entry fees. Tournament
entry fees are generally lower for Korn Ferry Tour players because the tour depends less on revenue
from the players. And of course, the not insignificant prize money Korn Ferry tour players win allows
them to more easily afford the travel costs that come with being a professional golfer.

This is not to say that male developmental tour players don’t struggle. Many of them do. That struggle is
just often disproportionately placed on the female game.

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Since Korn Ferry is a product of the PGA Tour, the PGA Tour puts its own resources behind it. The Tour
often provides a touring truck for Korn Ferry players that goes from stop to stop with, say, clubs, baby
strollers, luggage and more. That helps cut down on airline fees.

If a Korn Ferry Tour (KFT) player is not winning meaningful prize money, he might still struggle
financially, but many have an easier time finding a corporate sponsor to help – due to the built-in
exposure. Simmons bank announced the sponsorship of four Korn Ferry Tour players in May 2020. Logos
featuring lawncare companies, hospital systems, insurance providers, accounting firms, etc. can be seen
on KFT players.

Because the prize money is not insignificant, many have a private individual or group of individuals who
invest in the player as if they were a startup and help cover all the startup costs. If he wins, dividends
pay out to shareholders.

Each week on the Symetra Tour, Messana – the golfer and Instagrammer on the side – budgets between
$2,000 to $3,000.

That covers the $500 event entry fee, housing, rental car, flights, gas money, food and the potential cost
of a caddy.

Players also budget in the yearly breakdown for what it costs to practice at a club, a coach, trainer, cart
fees, yardage books (which are like course maps), clothes, balls and equipment.

There are weekly variables: Is she staying with a local host family for free, or at an Airbnb with friends or
in her own hotel room; driving or flying; will a course comp her to play practice holes or not, and more.

When all is said and done, a Symetra player, as Alex can relate to, is typically spending anywhere from
$80,000 to $100,000 a year – minimum – to finance her dream.

Some players have the help of family and friends. Others have jobs in the offseason. On rare occasions,
and usually due to personal connections, some players have a corporate financial sponsor.

What can you win as a player on the Symetra Tour?

If you don't make the cut at an event, you make zero dollars. If you barely make the cut and finish last,
your prize money generally will not be enough to cover your entry fee.

“This is not life-changing money,” said Messana. “If you’re breaking even, you’re doing well.”

As opposed to the men’s side.

“You can make a comfortable living on Korn Ferry,” she said.

The records show that 520 players took part in 2020 Symetra Tour fields.

Of those, 177 players made the money list – placing high enough to earn something.

Of these 177, 153 players made less than $20,000 for the year.
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In 177th: Emily Gilbreth. She played in four events. She won $385.

Jeehae Lee remembers the grind of touring so vividly.

Now the chief executive of a technology startup aiming to teach golf through artificial intelligence called
Sportsbox AI, Lee also spent a year on the Symetra Tour, crisscrossing the country in an old, gas-guzzling
Lexus SUV before making it to the LPGA.

For players today, Lee said, there are three imperatives to success: a support network, a financial
sponsor who fully understands the challenges and, moreover, the notion that success may never come.

“Without that,” she said, “you may never make it. The dream is unattainable.”

Women on the Symetra Tour say it is often impossible to make this ride last longer than a few years.

So why persist, when it’s so hard and the odds so long?

Messana, for one, can't imagine her life without competitive golf. She's yet to make a cut in a
professional event, but she’s just coming off her rookie season, and it's been an odd time to start a
professional golf career amid a pandemic.

Messana holds guaranteed status to play on the Symetra Tour in 2021, and aims to finish in the top 10
on the money list and qualify for her LPGA tour card.

If not, she will go back to Qualifying School.

And her feelings on the men's game? It's hard not to look across the chasm and see so much more
opportunity, financially and otherwise.

But she’s not one to complain.

"I get it…we don't bring in money to television viewership. But how can we earn that opportunity? How
can we increase the value of our craft to earn compensation?"

Same Sport, Different Realities

The differences between the men and women begin at the developmental tour level. They continue,
and perhaps become even more glaring, at the PGA and LPGA level.

There are contrasting experiences on the tours, and it often goes unnoticed because the two tours are
not in comparison week to week.

“We’re so used to the environment that we don't notice the difference,” a player said.

Beyond food and amenities there are many other glaring differences.

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On the LPGA tour, tournament locations are a major grievance. Most of the courses don’t crack the top
100 ranked courses in America and often are not able to present the female golf product in an
interesting way to the television audience.

Thus, the television product that comes from playing lackluster golf courses suffers and the prestige of
the tour suffers.

To be fair, major championship venues in women’s golf are better than ever. They are finally going to
Pebble Beach, Muirfield, Carnoustie, Olympic and other prestigious sites. It’s so important for the
product to have the best women in the world playing on courses that people recognize.

People will tune in just to see these courses. Outside of playing with the men, this is the most important
piece. It shows a respect level. They deserve to play the best courses in the world

Where the women play matters.

When they play matters, too.

The U.S. Women’s Open goes up – typically, late May to early June – against the Memorial, one of the
higher profile men’s stops on the PGA Tour because of its host, the legendary Jack Nicklaus.

For protocol, political and business reasons, the USGA’s chief executive, Mike Davis, soon to be
succeeded by Mike Whan, is usually obliged to make an appearance at the Memorial instead of the
women’s major for the first few days because everyone from all the major governing bodies is at the
Memorial. Because it’s Jack.

“We can’t go head-to-head with big men’s tournaments like that,” said Annis.

For Annis, courses, scheduling, broadcast hours, purse parity, the experience at the championship the
players have – it all matters. They have to feel loved and respected and supported, he said.

Exposure, exposure, exposure.

Taking it further:

Often the call is for more network coverage. In Alex’s view, the one actionable thing that could have an
immediate impact would be more visibility on television. That means more primetime slots, fewer tape
delays, more live golf on regular slotted networks like CBS, ESPN and NBC. But she recognized that even
more network coverage would not be an overnight fix to the myriad problems the tour faces.

Part of the problem with the broadcasts is not just when they are broadcast but how they are broadcast.

“The biggest gap right now between the men's and women’s games is a lack of data,” said Nichols.

It’s difficult for television commentators to tell you anything about the players and their storylines
without detailed stats. There are virtually no stats when the LPGA goes overseas.

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One needs to just look over at the men’s side and you will see a never-ending stream of data via a
system called Shotlink. This data helps to tell a story.

“The stats don't lie,” said Nichols.

Unless you have your eyes on every shot, you wouldn’t be able to quantify how a player consistently
performs with wedges from a certain distance. You could take that player’s stats and say for example,
“Let’s compare this performance to Rory McIlroy” and really tell a story.

They do have a data system on the KLPGA (Korean LPGA), but the system is not unilateral across the
LPGA Tour. Once again, it comes down to money.

“How do you fund Shotlink?” said Nichols. Shotlink is a detailed system that the PGA Tour uses to keep
virtually every stat imaginable on players. To her, at this point anything would be better than what they
have now to help tell a story.

“I get frustrated when people criticize commentators. Unless you're the analyst looking at that shot, it’s
hard to break down how that player generally is from this range.”

Viewers end up hearing a lot more storytelling or “fluff” about players because the numbers aren’t
available. They generally cannot even flash how many yards a player has left into a green on the screen.
Combine that with fewer cameras available on the course, which leads to fewer golf shots being shown
and less interesting angles and ways to engage the viewer on an uninteresting golf course – which all
leads to a less than ideal product.

While getting networks to commit to more equal coverage is important, for Annis it’s not the most
important thing. If the events have more hours, then viewership is being spread out and ratings will be
down. Companies will have less value for their investment, and fewer people are watching.

Broadcast rights are a ratings game.

“We can push for more coverage, but we have to be careful what we wish for,” Annis said.

Ratings going down would have very negative consequences for tournaments. Sponsors, on paper,
would receive less return on investment, which could lead to their halting any investment in women’s
events. The first step is not to deliver more broadcast hours, he said, but to get more people to tune in
for the product.

Annis says players need to be talking about their product, driving tune-in themselves through advocacy
and leaning in to sponsors as much as possible.

Consider a NASCAR driver. Each is typically adept at his own marketing. Stick a microphone in his face
after a win to ask what the win meant, and before he gets there, the driver will usually first thank his
sponsors.

In golf, traditionally this has been thought of as rude. Bryson DeChambeau thanked all of his sponsors
after winning the men’s 2020 U.S. Open – before getting to the rest of his winning answer – and got a
barrage of criticism.
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But the joke is on those critics.

DeChambeau’s sponsors know that he drives eyeballs, and he’s pretty much a sure thing for a post-win
shoutout in the moment with the most eyeballs. He’s a sponsor’s dream. They will continue to invest,
and DeChambeau will laugh all the way to the bank.

What Can Be Done?

Organizations such as the USGA, PGA of America and the British governing body, the R&A (Royal and
Ancient), tend to have large endowments, deep-pocketed board members and lucrative sponsor
relationships and TV deals.

The obvious question when it comes to purse parity in golf’s major events: why do the women make
less?

Annis said the economics simply are just not there.

Every year, he said, the USGA loses $10 to $11 million putting on the U.S. Women’s Open. The revenue
it makes off the men’s open funds 75% of the USGA budget for the entire year, including all its other
championships. At the women’s championship, infrastructure and media costs when measured against
what comes in from ticket sales, sponsorships and the broadcast do not even come close to break-even.

The biggest chunk of revenue from the U.S. men’s open is the broadcast rights. FOX Sports won the bid
to broadcast USGA championships in 2014 for reportedly around $1 billion. Though financial details
were not disclosed, NBC acquired the rest of the contract in 2020 when FOX decided to divest itself of
golf coverage amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

So the USGA simply does not have the leverage to go to the broadcast partner and say – that is, demand
– you must do XYZ with our women’s coverage.

Compare the difference between the men’s and women’s purses at the U.S. Open: $12.5 million for the
men, $5.5 million for the women.

The women’s purse is the largest purse in women’s major championship golf. All the same, that is a $7
million gap.

Add that to the as-much-as $11 million loss in putting on the event and you’re looking at running the
event at an $18 million loss.

That is not a sustainable business model.

What can be done?

The USGA could find a title sponsor or presenting sponsor, similar to what other majors have done: the
AIG Women’s Open, KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, etc.

But for the USGA, there is a certain value in just being the U.S. Women’s Open. By itself.
19

The USGA could also look at it from the perspective of first-mover advantage – that is, earn significant
reputational and brand value worth that $18 million from being the first to make the purses equal. It
would fundamentally change everything. Perhaps more companies would step up and match their men’s
and women’s golf investments?

Or not.

This is the gamble.

Or the reality.

Because golf is also a culture unto itself.

On Annis’ opinion that more female players need to be advocates, there seems to be an overwhelming
feeling of staying away from making a “statement,” in the golf space.

Golfers have consistently shown they would rather avoid political advocacy or making major waves with
the governing bodies. They just want to play their game, understandably so, it is their lifeblood. But golf
as a whole has a complicated relationship with advocacy. For example, golf was one of the least vocal
sports in the midst of the George Floyd murder and subsequent protests.

Golf as a whole has a checkered past when it comes to diversity and inclusion.

There are only four Black players with status on the PGA Tour. There is only one Black female with full
time status on the LPGA tour, Mariah Stackhouse. The dearth of BIPOC individuals in the game is,
frankly, an embarrassment and serves as a stark reminder of the lack of access most people have to this
game.

When it comes to advocacy in sports, Billie Jean King has been speaking out since the 1970s and shows
that it can be done, especially in women’s sports. Her advocacy led to equal payouts at Grand Slam
events.

Any number of the World Cup-winning women’s U.S. soccer team players have emerged as high-profile
activists. Megan Rapinoe has transcended sport and is active in her fight for LGBTQ+ rights and
advocating for equal pay. In March 2019, 28 members of the USWNT filed a lawsuit against the US
Soccer Federation claiming the USSF is in violation of the Equal Pay Act. The lawsuit was spearheaded by
Rapinoe, Alex Morgan, Carli Lloyd and others.

Female golfers?

Not as much as one would think. Julie Inkster has made public stands. Marina Alex, Michelle Wie, Stacey
Lewis, Mariah Stackhouse, Cheyenne Woods, Mel Reid and many others have often gone on the record
calling for parity and inclusion, but that is a limited list of names out of hundreds of possible voices.
There are plenty of players that are working constantly behind the scenes to make change and using
their networks internally to change the system, but could a difference be made if public messaging was
added to the everyday dialogue in the golf twitter-sphere and constantly on the minds of those who
make decisions at the highest levels?
20

When faced with the U.S. women’s soccer example, Bowman said it’s important to remember that
golfers are individual contractors. They are not a part of an overarching team or organization. Within a
team environment, it might feel safer to make these sorts of stands. Players are often careful and lean
heavily on managers and agents to craft their messaging.

“Being advocates for your sport is hard,” said Alex.

In the last few years, Alex has been vocal about some of the misconceptions of women’s golf. In her
experience, with every fan having direct access to players via Twitter and Instagram, there’s a lot of
dialogue about what people think of golf and specifically women’s golf. Sometimes she chooses to
engage in hopes to have people understand the product better.

While she doesn’t love doing it as it exposes her to a world of misogynistic insults on social media, she
wants to do what generations before her have done to try and provide an even stronger LPGA to the
next generation.

“I have to push the conversations,” she said, “to get us to the next level.”

When it comes to advocacy, Nichols is all for women pushing for more, but for the players there is a fine
line of “we have to be grateful and everything feels like it’s on a tipping point.”

If you demand more, the question goes, are you going to lose who you have?

Players have had a hard time finding the balance between being grateful and pushing the boundary. The
thinking goes – All this, even if it’s flawed and could be improved, could be gone tomorrow.

And it did almost go away a decade ago. When the economy crashed, partners left the LPGA in droves,
and the commissioner was pushing at the wrong time, which led to losing even more financial support.

“Players who lived through that era, they realized that nothing is guaranteed,” said Nichols.

And what many people don’t realize is the tour’s existence is based on a string of individual events that
each have a balancing act of making things work financially within each of their tournament
microcosms. The tour goes from Kingsmill in Virginia to the Match Play event in Las Vegas to the US
Women’s Open to the Mediheal Championship at Lake Merced, and so on. Each of those events is run
by a different tournament director, different title sponsors and different marketing and management
firms.

Many of the female players do not relish becoming “ambassadors” for the game, according to Nichols –
they just want to play. The promotion and the personalities the Tour needs often don’t come naturally.
The hope is that the big players such as the USGA push the majors to another level.

Why don’t more male players speak up on behalf of the women’s game?

Golf is inherently a selfish sport due to its solo nature. Your success is solely up to you, and you must
focus on yourself to be successful. Players have spent lifetimes depending only on themselves for their
success. You cannot pass the ball to another teammate. There are coaches, trainers and supporters, but
21
the buck stops with you. So it isn’t necessarily surprising, either, that male golfers rarely break out of
their personal journeys to contribute to the greater good of the women’s game.

Part of the change in how the women’s game is perceived will need to be a generational shift. The
decision-makers and influential members of clubs will change ranks eventually, and the hope is that the
next generation will see things differently. They’ll fall in love with the women’s game. They’ll want to
share it with the masses because it will help everyone’s bottom line. They’ll want to tell their daughters
that they can earn the right to compete at certain golf courses no matter their gender.

Measuring value also needs to see a generational shift. Is the way we measure value outdated? Bowman
seems to think so. The way marketing executives look at making investments in the game is based solely
on raw impressions and social analytics, which they “know in their hearts is just madness,” Bowman
says. There is an element of meaningful engagement that hasn’t yet been quantified.

Cathy Engelbert, commissioner of the WNBA, has a similar stance. She recently wrote an op-ed on the
outdated metrics that are used by corporations and networks when it comes to investing in women’s
sports. According to Engelbert, “Current media rights fee gaps and underinvestment in, and dearth of
marketing for, women’s sports is just generally accepted by the sports ecosystem.”

These gaps are largely based on “circular logic.”

“Media companies and agencies that advise corporations on their sponsorship dollars say there are not
enough ‘eyes’ on the women’s game, yet if those companies don’t step up to give exposure to the game,
how can we make progress? One solution to narrow the disparities is to transform the valuation models
that are spreadsheet driven, are based on decades-old quantitative metrics, and that rarely yield a
favorable answer for women,” Engelbert says.

According to Engelbert, while less than 5% of media coverage is allocated toward women’s sports, and
corporate dollars invested in women’s sports are an even smaller percentage, due to a proper forum
and adequate promotion of the WNBA, the league saw an increase in viewership of 68% year over year,
so clearly there is a significant return on investment. Clearly, if more pushes were made to highlight
women’s sports, we would see a positive result.

Engelbert has several solutions for networks, teams, players and possible sponsors when it comes to
these problems:

-More mainstream media featuring and telling the stories of female athletes more prominently
-More companies partnering with players, leagues, tours and teams
-Agencies and the sports ecosystem changing the way women’s sports assets are valued

Nichols agrees with this estimation: “Why are title sponsors not stepping up?”

In her view, there are stars in waiting. Consider the Korda sisters. Jess and Nelly Korda are two of the
most successful players in today’s game. They hail from golf’s “most athletic family” with famous tennis
players for parents and a brother who just won his first ATP title.

“You would think,” Nichols said, “they [the Korda sisters] could take them [sponsors] to another level.

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“Companies have value statements but are they living out those values if title sponsors don’t cross over
to the women’s side?”

But it’s not just about values. According to a report conducted by The Fan Project, companies are losing
money and opportunity by not investing in women’s sports. The report combed through over 10 million
data points provided by social media users on Facebook and Twitter and found that while traditional
monetization in sports is based on “audiences, events, reach and impressions,” a new way to monetize
called the “Community-Based Monetization Model” unlocks the potential of the impact that women’s
sports can have by leaning into behaviors of those already paying attention to women’s sports.

Those users are called “Fluid Fans.”

Translation: Fluid Fans are Fans that have been using technology to engage with women’s sports for at
least the last five years. They are used to seeking out the women’s sports content they want online
because that is often the only way to watch women’s sports and they are buying related merchandise
via e-commerce. They can jump from one screen to the next and engage in a way that differs from the
traditional appointment viewing experience.

They are fluent in “smartphones, social media, streaming, and other technologies.” They like second
screen experiences, they like controlling what their broadcast looks like with the use of stats and they
want to “own a piece of the action” by spending money on merchandise.

The WNBA recently had massive success with the sale of the now iconic orange hoodie, which the LPGA
and Michelle Wie West took inspiration from in their own iteration to promote women’s golf with the
sale of the #HoodieForGolf. The golf version, unsurprisingly, saw huge success, earning hundreds of
thousands of dollars. A portion of the sales went to two organizations whose missions are to promote
diversity and inclusion in the game of golf, especially for young women of color.

When one considers Fluid Fans, it’s no wonder that when Sedona Prince, a member of the University of
Oregon’s Women’s Basketball team posted a TikTok video showing the disparities between the men’s
and women’s weight rooms at the NCAA basketball tournament in March 2021, it went viral and the
rebuke was brutal.

Sedona Prince is an “athlete-entertainer”, a term used to describe athletes who perform in their sport
and also entertain off their respective fields, most often via social media. With access to hundreds of
thousands of Fluid Fans in the form of followers, a direct impact was made and justice was swiftly
served. This example should be a case study for why the current monetization models are broken, or at
least don’t match this evolving fan base, and is proof positive that this is unchartered territory and
opportunity yet to be tapped into.

When it comes to golf, CEOs, green jackets (Augusta National members) and decision makers at
governing bodies might not have paid attention to the impact women in golf could make before, but
now there are more women than ever at the table and in these high-ranking positions. Their eyes are
open to the product.

We’ve already seen the effects that just Augusta can have. AT&T emerged after Maria Fassi’s solo
second place finish at the ANWA and sponsored Fassi in a bag deal, marking the first time they have
taken on a female athlete.
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When I brought the “Why is Michelle famous?” question to Nichols, she said it’s not necessarily about
playing with the men but being associated together. The 2014 U.S. Open at Pinehurst in North Carolina
was a perfect example of how this can be successful. First the men played and the week after, the
women played. Because Pinehurst is such a famous venue, fans were tuned in to see how the women
would take on the course. It was only fitting that Wie West claimed her major victory on such a stage.

“On the LPGA’s part, it’s not for lack of trying,” Nichols said. “There have been many co-ed events on the
table, but none make it to the finish line for various reasons”

So what will it take to get things off the table and into action? There are many pathways forward:
Whether it’s the founding of a national team; the playing of a female Masters Tournament; purse parity
in majors; the enhancements of broadcasts via statistics, a higher standard for venues and more
interesting broadcast presentation; the shifting of valuation models; higher prizes at the developmental
levels; coed events or more advocacy, someone or something is surely going to take a leap of faith.

While they should leap because women’s sports are worth fighting for, to not leap means they’re
leaving money on the table. If it’s the financial incentive that finally ushers someone into action, so be it,
but the early adopters stand to cash in on a goldmine.

Now more than ever, our world needs the inspiration and economic impact of more Michelle Wie
Wests. So who will leap? And – if not now, when?

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Bibliography

“Ariya Jutanugarn: ‘I Wanted to Be the Best Golfer I Could Be.’” Olympics.com, September 22, 2020.
https://olympics.com/tokyo-2020/en/news/ariya-jutanugarn-i-wanted-to-be-the-best-golfer-i-
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26
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Asset Metadata

Creator Kazantsev, Kira (author)

Core Title Women’s professional golf: beyond the pay gap

School Annenberg School for Communication

Degree Master of Arts

Degree Program Specialized Journalism

Degree Conferral Date 2021-08

Publication Date 08/07/2023

Defense Date 08/07/2021

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag disparity,Golf,OAI-PMH Harvest,pay gap,Women,women's sports

Format application/pdf (imt)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Abrahamson, Alan (committee chair), Daglas, Cristina (committee member), Fellenzer, Jeffrey (committee member)

Creator Email kira.kazant@gmail.com,kkazants@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-oUC15719909

Unique identifier UC15719909

Legacy Identifier etd-KazantsevK-10000

Document Type Thesis

Format application/pdf (imt)

Rights Kazantsev, Kira

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

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Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

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