Whether it’s a gust of wind, a bad break or, say, an insurgent rival tour assailing the norms of the professional landscape, golfers don’t particularly like things out of their control. In a sport that is exceedingly individualistic, they don’t take kindly to disorder.
Perhaps that’s why, during last week’s Wyndham Championship, Davis Love III suggested that in the ongoing battle between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, it’s still the traditional tour players who carry the most sway. Why?
“(If) we don’t want those (LIV) guys playing, we don’t care what the courts say, our only option really, the nuclear option is to say, well, fine, if they have to play in our events , we just won’t play,” Love said.
Love is a statesman of sorts. He’s a 58-year-old with 21 career tour victories, multiple Ryder Cup captaincies and a current post as US Presidents Cup team captain. He’s sat on the PGA Tour’s Player Advisory Council. He was part of the tour’s counterstrike against Greg Norman’s incipient World Golf Tour in 1994. Love’s voice has weight.
So to hear Love speak openly of a strike or boycott in professional golf was, well, nothing short of jarring. The PGA Tour’s 175 card-carrying members are not members of a labor union. They are independent contractors with no collective bargaining. There has never been a labor-related work stoppage in tour history.
But, hey, if threatened, those players could indeed band together.
That is exactly what happened when Phil Mickelson, Bryson DeChambeau and eight other golfers suspended by the PGA Tour for joining LIV filed an antitrust lawsuit against the tour. A direct threat. As Justin Thomas told No Laying Up in June of the then-expected, now-actual lawsuit: “They’re suing me. They’re suing Rory. They’re suing Tiger. They’re suing every single one of us that they’ve looked in the face, looked in the eyes and played rounds of golf with, played on Cup teams with, shared moments with.”
Thus, as a united front, PGA Tour players can hit back.
Justin Thomas made it clear on a recent podcast what he thinks of LIV golfers suing the PGA Tour. (David Yeazell/USA Today)
Prior to Wyndham, in a separate interview with The AthleticLove expanded on the idea.
“If 200 players say, ‘All right, we’re not playing the majors and we’re not playing any PGA Tour events if these guys are allowed to play. We go on strike.’ That solves it. Then it’s over,” Love said. “Because that says to the FTC and the IRS and to the sponsors and to (PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan): ‘We support the PGA Tour’s rules and if you don’t enforce the rules, then we’re not playing.’”
That, the theory goes, is what makes the boycott option potentially enticing. As one current PGA Tour pro said in a text message: “I don’t think guys would actually do it but that would be the end of all this. Sit out a Masters and it’s all over.” Multiple players spoke to for this piece indicated the same, that if it should ever come to it, a strike serves as the ultimate checkmate.
Charley Hoffman, one of four current player directors on the PGA Tour’s Player Advisory Council, said: “I’d be lying if I said there’s been much conversation about that, but I think, hypothetically, it could happen.”
Except…
There also exists the reality that a boycott or strike is implausible or, at least, ill-advised.
One, a work stoppage could further bolster the LIV golfers’ claim of the PGA Tour as a monopoly.
Two, it could serve as a standalone add-on claim that itself is an anti-trust violation.
As part of the Mickelson et al v. PGA Tour suit, the plaintiffs are alleging, among other things, that the tour’s conduct behavior in trying to stifle LIV has been “patently exclusionary, anticompetitive and unlawful under the Sherman Act.” Nathaniel Grow, an associate professor of business law and ethics at the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University, points out that a group boycott of a tournament could only strengthen the LIV golfers’ case under Section 2 of the Sherman Act.
“The idea of a group boycott of something like the Masters or another tournament would be a potential data point that an illegal monopoly is maintained through unlawful means,” Grow said.
Moreover, just speaking aloud of the possibility of a boycott could find its way into the current suit.
“Love’s comments could eventually be used as additional proof that (the tour is) engaging in unlawful behavior,” said Grow, who specializes in federal antitrust and labor law in US professional sports. “Just floating the possibility could theoretically do as much damage as a boycott itself.”
So that’s one part to consider.
When it comes to the potential of a boycott being a standalone anti-trust violation, any potential strike would be conducted by players who would otherwise readily be doing business as normal, and could therefore amount to anti-competitive behavior aimed at collectively amassing influence to deprive another party of economic opportunity.
Marc Edelman, a professor of sports law and antitrust law at Baruch College’s Zicklin School of Business, points to two cases in particular.
In Anderson v. Shipowners Ass’n of Pacific Coast, a 1926 Supreme Court case, it was ruled that an association of ship owners could not legally collectively boycott a prospective worker who had not been granted a permit from the defendant ship-owners association. The court said it’s a violation of antitrust law for the members of an industry to collectively block any individual member from participating in that industry.
“The Supreme Court’s decision in Anderson would be a fairly close parallel to what Davis Love III is suggesting, in that it would be owners in an industry trying to exclude other owners from that industry,” Edelman said.
Another case of note is Radovich v. National Football League. In 1957, Bill Radovich alleged he was the victim of a group boycott of NFL teams intended to ruin the AAFC. The case ultimately reached the Supreme Court, where it was ruled that NFL teams are subject to antitrust laws and could not collectively boycott a player.
In the specific case of PGA Tour players potentially boycotting a tournament or tournaments in an effort to protest players from a rival tour, Edelman says such an act could be seen as “high red-flag behavior under the Sherman Act.”
Thus, on a legal basis alone, one has to wonder if a boycott is even feasible.
That said, no one can be certain that some sort of boycott would be illegal or detrimental. There could be strong arguments on both sides. Perhaps PGA Tour players could frame a boycott around the idea of this is necessary for the survival of the association and find a court that agrees. As Grow puts it: “Until all that gets hashed out and you kind of see the actual lay of the land — what tournament is (boycotted)?” How much of a burden does it create? — in the abstract, you can say it’s a potential problem, but until you get concrete facts, it’s hard to gauge how the court would be likely to rule.”
But it would also be hard to gauge how universal support for a boycott might be.
Will Zalatoris, speaking to The Athletic, said his priority in playing professional golf is winning majors. The implication was that he’d be unlikely to skip one to make a point. As for organizing a strike if LIV players are permitted to play in a PGA Tour event, Zalatoris agreed there would be “a massive uproar,” but shrugged and noted, “If you get 100 guys to sit out you’re going to get another hundred that are going (to say), ‘Hey, I’ll play!’ That’s how that’d go.”
So where does this leave tour players in trying to dictate the hand they’re playing? Hard to say. In many ways, it seems out of their control. It could be up to a judge or a jury. It could be held by those deciding whether LIV events are granted Official World Golf Ranking points.
All we know is that the “nuclear option” might not be an option at all.
(Top photo of Cameron Young, left, and Davis Love III: Ben Jared / PGA Tour via Getty Images)
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