Roberto Castro on the TGL and the Direction of the PGA Tour

00:00:00
Speaker 1: I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.

00:00:05
Speaker 2: And when I find my ball in a bride egg Friday egg, the dreaded Friday Friday, Frida Fridagg bride Egg Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the hump. Welcome back to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast. I am Andy Johnson, and we're we're here. I was excited. I actually reached out to Roberto Castro last week, and that was a day or a couple of days before the announcement and the Wired article that he was involved with the TGL. I thought Roberto would bring a really interesting person expective on everything going on in golf, and I also wanted to hear him and talk about his foray into the persimmon retro golf club world that he's jumped into in the last couple of months. So I was excited. Roberto then, obviously being a part of the TGL, a lot more stuff to talk about.

00:01:21
Speaker 1: With that.

00:01:22
Speaker 2: He was instrumental in the formatting of the TGL, figuring out what format they'd play when they kick things off in January. So this new enterprise, this new golf league that will be much more. I think it'll be innovative. It's still golf, which I think anything that is a golf league needs to be golf, so it will bring some innovation. I'm particularly excited about the golf design aspects and potential for golf design. I don't know how much they're gonna get into that in year one, but assuming there are multiple years of this venture, I think they could really do some neat stuff with the golf design component of this startup. And I'm also really excited about the shot clock. So you know, that's something I think we all want in professional golf. We want something that moves the pace of the game along a little bit faster, and maybe, just maybe this could be something that really gets that going. So, without further ado, here's Roberto Castro on a myriad of subjects, and thank you for his time. Be sure to check out his podcast, The Course Record Show. He covers a lot of interesting topics from the business perspective in golf. So thanks again, and here's Roberto Castro. Roberto, welcome back on the pod. You know you've been in the news lately. I didn't, I asked you to come on this podcast, and then you know a day later, you're You're in the news. You're involved with TGL. I didn't even know that was coming, and you know, all of a sudden, then we had to jump through some pr hoops to get you on.

00:03:09
Speaker 1: I'm a consultant now, Andy. You know, it's like it's a secretive world of you know, expense account dinners and not being able to say who your clients are.

00:03:18
Speaker 2: That's uh, that's exciting. I've I've changed the lens of this conversation. We're probably going to talk a little bit more about TGL, but I I wanted to talk about the most important thing development in your life in the last you know, couple of months. You You've got You've got retro golf club, fever House Life, playing some retro clubs.

00:03:39
Speaker 1: I've got the Vintage set a couple of months in the persimmis. You were kind enough to send them to me. Uh, it's been super fun. I mean, honestly, it's been really like people light up when they see them, when they watch me hit them, they want to hit them. It's been a whole thing, man, and I've really had fun with it. It's been really cool.

00:03:59
Speaker 2: What a and the big takeaways for you, you know, former PGA Tour player made it to East Lake a few times, you know, a very very good career. What are the big takeaways from going from what is now modern equipment to the clubs that you probably hit a little bit as a kid exactly.

00:04:19
Speaker 1: I probably had persimmit like wood Woods until I was like eight or ten years old, maybe, but really it was I kind of was interested in it for a couple of reasons. One, the course I play at most of the time in Atlanta is a nine hole course. It's probably, you know, thirty three hundred yards, so if you play it twice, and we do sometimes, it's sixty five sixty six hundred yard golf course. It's awesome right in the middle of midtown. But it's a relatively short, pure greens. You know, it's Atlanta. It's not really windy. It's hot in the summers, like you can kind of go around and play kind of driver Sandwidge hit a bunch of green shoot kind of the same score every time. And then the other part, I play a decent amount of Monday charity golf and a decent amount of business golf, and I want to be social and play with like my you know, play the same teas. And I'm not a long hitter at all, Like I was the shortest hitter on the tour. He it's not on the tour anymore. But I was like, hey, maybe if I played the same teas with some older clubs, It'll be a little bit more social and I won't be hitting driver sixty five yards from the green all the time. So that was that was the reason I did the experiment.

00:05:28
Speaker 2: That is one of the amazing things about about the clubs I was. I played a hickory driver once at at National Golf Links, and I played with three guys that were handicap levels of like eight to fifteen. Yeah, and we we played the same tees and we were hitting from generally the same spot. And it was an amazing, you know experience in the sense of it keeps you close together with people.

00:05:54
Speaker 1: Yep, yep, it definitely does. And the I mean I played, so I've had them for about eight eight weeks and I play like once a week, right, And a couple of things. One you have to hit them pure and you have to swing at them correctly. So I've got a Persimmon woods, and then I have a set of nineteen I think they're nineteen eighty two nineteen eighty three tour model titleist blades, and I fit up the lines and lofts. I like put modern grips on them. They have good shafts and they're like they're super pure.

00:06:23
Speaker 2: They those are those are formerly Labron Harris USAM winners clubs. Really yeah, that's well.

00:06:31
Speaker 1: I don't think they've been hit since he won the USAM because they're in perfect condition.

00:06:35
Speaker 2: I don't think he ever hit them. My friend got them. He just dropped off a couple bags of big tour bags full of old clubs, and my friend sent them to me, and that's how they got to you by way.

00:06:46
Speaker 1: That's awesome.

00:06:47
Speaker 2: I was just an intermediary, and you know, and the and the deal.

00:06:52
Speaker 1: No much appreciated. They're sweet, but I so the the results are in like warm weather, right because it's just recently kind of got cool down here, but good warm weather. I carry my driver two seventy two seventy five Mike Callaway, and I carry the Woody two forty if I peer it. So and then the irons are almost a club week. And then they just not they're super pure, Like I think I play with them, like my results are about as good, but I hit a seven iron instead of hitting a seven iron one seventy, it goes one fifty five. So you're looking at the game being like a completely different proportion, Like the a four hundred yard hole is now a driver and a seven or and eight iron as opposed to a driver and a fifty two degree wedge, right, And so it's just a it's a totally different deal.

00:07:40
Speaker 2: I think the big thing from my you know, year and a half doing it was the carry distance of the driver. Yeah, all of a sudden, like two forty, you're pumping it, and if if the course is firm and fast, like the ball is going to get out there, you can get it out there to eighty. Especially with the modern ball, it kind of knuckles, it doesn't get up the way.

00:08:05
Speaker 1: You know.

00:08:05
Speaker 2: I think if you were playing an optimized ball, you might be able to get a little bit more carry out of it, but just bringing it back that much brings so much more hazards into the game. And then what I noticed is when you're just consistently hitting like two or three more clubs into the greens. It is just such a harder game.

00:08:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's totally different. And then part threees are the same, like that one ninety Part three, Like if it's warm out, I can like turn down a six iron or just hit a five like the one ninety is a three iron with those with that vintage set, and if you don't hit it right in the mouth, it's going one sixty five, you know. And the and the crazy thing is that I saw I used them exclusively for like eight weeks, and then Saturday I went to hit a few balls and I got my gamers back out. And I have never had that good of numbers on my driver because I basically learned with the persimon that if just swing up on it more and all fourteen of the vintage clubs, if you don't hit him right in the middle. And honestly, I picked up like three four yards with my irons, like I had comfortable distance with my irons, and I was swinging four up on a driver twenty six twenty seven hundred spin and I have struggled for twenty years to get under three thousand spin. So the first time, and I wasn't even trying to, like I had just basically learned how to hit a driver properly by playing these old heavy clubs. And it was pretty wild, I mean really wild.

00:09:29
Speaker 2: I you know I got. I got. One of the reasons I got into this rabbit hole is some of my clubs broke, like my irons the POxy wore off, and anybody that knows me, it's like the worst thing. Everybody's like, oh, take two seconds for somebody fix it. It's like, well, it's not that it's me getting to somewhere. Somebody will fix it, you know. So anyways, that's what that kind of threw me into this where I just started playing with the old irons. Then I went to the old woods. But anyways, I felt the same way is that I came out out of it a way better golfer. A. I was missing a lot, a lot more greens, so I was chipping more. So I became just like way better around the greens. B. I actually think I picked up speed with a modern driver because I was playing a heavy per Simon driver for a year and a half. And like you said, you really have to hit up on the ball, especially with the modern ball, because the ball that's the only way you're going to get it up into the air.

00:10:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, And it really made me realize how lazy I swing at my modern driver, like I kind of unless I'm playing and I rarely ever play like Shinnacock. It's like seventy four hundred yard parts right, Like most of my golf, I'm just making lazy swings and it goes out there like two sixty five and it rolls and I hit a wedg end of the green.

00:10:52
Speaker 2: Right.

00:10:52
Speaker 1: If I'm playing an upt especially with the Persimmon driver, you cannot make a lazy swing like. You have got to rear, you've got to turn, and you've got to try to smoke it. The only way to hit a really good shot is to try to smoke that persim And driver. It's like the old videos of like Sevy or Norman hitting drivers. Like if Rom swung that hard in a driver today, he would hit it like four hundred yards. You had to like crank on it. And then when I went back to the modern driver, I was still trying to crank on it and I was shipping it for me again. I'm sure so right?

00:11:25
Speaker 2: Is this your announcement that you're coming back to PGA Tour Golf, because you're.

00:11:28
Speaker 1: You know, I wish I had. I would have never done this when I was playing, because you know, everything's got to be so finely tuned. But I really wish, like on an off week I would have played or practice for three days with a vintage set. I do think it would have helped. I.

00:11:44
Speaker 2: You know, I think there is like a thing where you get in some driver rut with modern driver and it's like it's just really it's really just bad habits. And when you put that, like, there's something about when you look down at the percimin in that small head, it makes you refocus and really think about making a good swing. And as you said, like you know you have to turn right and that focus. I think like if you're in a driver rut, it sounds so and it's just like anything in golf, right, it's kind of intuitive. Is like, hey, you know, if you're struggling with your driver, put this percimon in for a day and a half and then you're gonna be better. You're gonna take this harder to hit club is gonna get you out of the rut because it's it's just like you have to focus on hitting it well, like it's it's kind of crazy. It's like it sounds so simple, but like the focus that requires it will make you a better player. Do you have like a favorite memory of somebody like looking at it and wanting to hit it?

00:12:45
Speaker 1: Well, I played in our Georgia Tech fundraiser on Monday, and so I don't have a big sample size here, but I was at the range like four six weeks ago, and Vince Waley who plays on the PGA tour now, and Vince is probably one of the fifty best drivers of the ball on the planet. Like he's a phenomenal driver. It's a joke. And he picked up this per Simon and it was going shorter, but it was this, it was like this, it was absolute high lasers. It was really impressive. So then the Georgia Tech team at our fundraiser they grab it and kind of the same thing happened. I mean, one of the guys that's kind of battling for the five to six spot, he pulled it out in the first two or three were like pretty ugly, right, like really pretty rough. And then this freshman that we've got from Louisiana who swings it like a tour player. He teased this driver up and he hit like a two hundred and eighty yard laser on the first swing he made. So I think like really good drivers doesn't affect as much.

00:13:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean it's like the clip of Rory from the summer in Scotland when he hit that one and it carried, you know, I think it was I think the carry was like two eighty seven, and it's like, the guys, this is like the whole point and I think, like the thing and maybe who knows what happens. I feel like the entire professional games and Flux and one of the things that's also just lingering out there that would if it was any other year, be like storyline one A is like what's going on with the with the ball and the rollback, But somehow right now it's like storyline f you know, maybe it's like completely out of the news cycle, but you know, one of my hopes long term is that they get, you know, to some level of understanding that the game is going to be regulated and the driver head is looked at because to me, just making that head smaller reward skill and that's really what what equipment should be doing at the highest level of the game.

00:14:48
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but it's been fun. It's been And then of course I went a little bit down the eBay, you know, I ordered another set of person and I found the irons will never be tough. They're they're absolutely per When I went back to the modern driver a couple of rounds but kept the irons in, I hit it shorter, but I got like a full set of Tony Pennis.

00:15:09
Speaker 2: Oh nice.

00:15:10
Speaker 1: The drivers a little beat up, but the three four and five order money.

00:15:13
Speaker 2: That I'm sure you could find somebody to refinish it, you know.

00:15:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, it just I just don't hit it like it does. It's it's not good, like all right, it just doesn't come off right. I think that one needs to be retired.

00:15:25
Speaker 2: To the I mean that's the way the club's like. I couldn't imagine playing pro golf in the like eighties and seventies and and even early nineties, where it's like you're trying these clubs and like some just work, some don't compare it to now where it's like just like science of like this is your club, right, yeah yeah, And then do you think about all the careers that kind of like made some bad equipment decisions and it's like, oh, he lost like five years because he played a terrible golf ball.

00:15:54
Speaker 1: You know. But that's something that doesn't really happen anymore. That happened during the first part of my career. You had like the Stuart Applebee's and the guys that went that switched and then everyone makes such good stuff. Now that doesn't happen to anyone anymore. Really, like Xander rom they've all switched and they are still one in three in the world or whatever they are. I don't know. Maybe it does, but I haven't seen it happen in the last like five to eight years, whereas it did used to have.

00:16:21
Speaker 2: I was before I got my new clubs. I was using a twenty It was the Calaway Apex Pro. Remember the blackhead is like probably a twenty fifteen driver. Yeah, and now I have the paradigm, and I have to say, it's like astonishing how good the driver is.

00:16:40
Speaker 1: I know, it's really good.

00:16:42
Speaker 2: Like it's like hard to move the ball, like I struggle because like my cut doesn't move. Yeah, it's like it just goes straight. Like the problem is it goes straight. And I still am used to setting up down the left edge of the fairway and cutting the ball. Yeah, you know, and it's just a weird, weird thing where it's just I mean, it's not a weird thing. It's just it's a it's crazy. How much better from twenty fifteen to twenty twenty three the drivers have gotten, Yeah, I mean they're astonishing.

00:17:11
Speaker 1: The one thing I have not done with the Vintage set yet is play a really hard golf course. Like my other home course is like setting Down. We have US Open qualifying there every the year, seventy three hundred yards, like really long, hard golf course. I didn't get up there to play. I would play it from a tee up. I wouldn't play the Vintage set from the back. But that golf course from like sixty nine seven thousand, with the Vintage set, I was really I'm really excited to do it because like seventy would be like a damn good score, right, like seventy one, and if I shot seventy five, like I could easily see myself like shooting seventy six on a bad day, right.

00:17:49
Speaker 2: I think The thing too, I having done it is like I played some really great rounds, like really great rounds with them, but you just have to be so you have to be cooking. Yeah, Like, it's like what I found was it's really easy to fall into that. I shot like seventy and this is just me. You're obviously a much better player than me. But it's like I shot seventy five to eighty. It was like where I felt but like then, I felt like I could still go pretty low. It's just hard to generate a ton of birdie chances if you don't have a ton of wedges. Right, totally, So all right, let's move on. Enough retro golf chatter. We could we could probably talk about you know, maybe we should go play a really tough course. I'll bring my retros back out. But let's talk about the TGL. I you know, this would have been topic fur but you're involved, so you know, let's let's chat about it. So it came out in the Wired article that you're involved with the TGL. I'm curious how that came about, and and I would love to hear a little bit about the experience of being involved with the beginnings of a new golf format.

00:19:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's been a really wild ride. And I got involved because when I stopped playing, I went to work for a consulting firm, cap Tech, and our core clients were on the technology side. Our core clients are like your fortune five hundred types, but we built out this sports practice really focused on like the data side, data platforms, so with working with PGA of America, NASCAR, and we basically got a phone call. My boss got a phone call from a former colleague like fifteen months ago, and it's like one of those memories like I remember dialing into the zoom call and then five minutes into this presentation, like texting amongst my colleagues like what is this and how has nobody heard of? Like how have we not heard about this? Because it's this just massive idea. Tiger and Rory are involved, and then it really I mean we just we've been working on it ever since. So it's been a really fascinating project from top to bottom.

00:20:05
Speaker 2: All right, now for a quick word from our sponsor, Mizzen and Maine. Listen. Uh, this has been a delight this year, miss and Main's come on. And one of the things that I love about it is, uh, I've got lots of golf clothes and one of the things I don't always do is go out and get some other clothes. So Missus and Maine sent a box out and it's been awesome. I got a nice like flannel shirt, a really nice jacket, and a nice vest that has been ready to go for the fall. So you know, everyone loves the end of the year, but they love it even more when they're wearing a miss and Maine dress shirt. Comfortable, breathable, packable, machine washable. These are the dress shirts that have been made the brand famous. They're designed to keep you really comfortable and that you'll close out the year in style, so you know you can. This is a great gift. This is a great uh way to reward yourself at the end of the year is get a nice array of clothing. Miss and Main makes a ton of different styles from very casual to very dressy. So this this stuff has been really delightful. Is super comfortable. It's uh, you kind of like forget you're wearing dress clothes when you're wearing it. Use the promo code frieda Egg to get twenty five percent off if you if you spend one hundred and thirty dollars or more at Mission in Maine dot com. That's m I z Z E N and a N D Maine m A I N dot com and use the promo code Frida Egg for twenty five percent on one hundred and thirty dollars or more. Thank you so much to Mission and Maine. Uh and uh awesome clothes. Now back to Roberto Castro. Yeah, what I guess, uh, you know, as somebody who played golf, I imagine it's it probably feels a little bit entrepreneurial, even though you guys are on the consulting side, you're not, like, you know, you're not on the floor founder. But could you shed some light on maybe some of the learnings some of the you know, creating and I know you've been super involved with the formatting of of what what you're going to do in terms of how the gameplay is gonna happen. Can you could you just shed some light on how you guys have been id eating around this.

00:22:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right, And I mean it's really a couple different ways. We've we kind of engaged with TGL in the i'd call it discovery phase, right, so we were helping them like, hey, where do you want to go, what are the requirements, what are you going to need to build on the technology, side, So that kind of broke off and went down its own workstream. Right, they don't let me code anything. So we've had big teams of engineers like building out the core data platform, the data distribution, the tech that's going to power the league. And then my side was really focused, like you said, on the gameplay. So Scott Armstrong is who is the VP of game play for TGL, is a great golf background. His dad played on tour for years. Scott spent time at NBC, spent time at the Golf Channel, spent time at the Tour actually, so we really went down a testing road, like an iterative road, where they had an idea where they were like, hey, we can play eighteen holes, it can be teams, we can play these formats and those, and we can do it in this amount of time and all great ideas, but until you try it, you don't know. So we just started like, really, we got a group of testing players together, we would basically like retro fit a venue to work for us. Especially in the early days. They ended up building a test venue, which there was a bunch of photographs in that Wired article Universal Yeah, it was really cool. But the first one we did was like at one of these like you know, sim golf places, right, and we would hit into a SIM and then we would walk outside where they had like putting green where you're supposed to grab a cocktail and go putt. And even after the first one, we figured out like, hey, this.

00:24:06
Speaker 2: Did you guys, like, did you guys rent out the whole place or where? Yeah, he said, we're taking it down.

00:24:12
Speaker 1: Yeah we rented.

00:24:13
Speaker 2: I wonder what the manager of the store was thinking.

00:24:16
Speaker 1: We got a little bit of an inside track. It was fairway social and Alpharetta nicest people. We went kind of in the morning again the target audience there is afternoon and evening, and it was like, I mean, very entrepreneurial is the right word. But we realized pretty quickly, like I think an early idea, and I mean there's been so many versions, was hey, there's three players on a team, and two of them play the kind of two on two match, and the third guy maybe plays singles like the star player. And then we realized, like, the third guy's just sitting there right for forty five minutes, and then we just kind of kept yes exactly, so we realized, like, hey, what the two big themes that we had en up like anchoring on that you Scott latched onto immediately. It was like one the cadence and the pace has to be quick, like it needs to have a fast paced cadence. And the second one was it needs to be like really team golf, it needs to be collaborative, Like you can't just be three guys that are playing independently like college golf, the other team golf that's out in the news now, like it's not really team golf. You just go play and then you add up your score. Right, this is really collaborative where we landed. So when you play all shot, you're not only playing with a partner, but you your teammates. But the shot clock and the cadence makes you work together, Like if you want to read the putt from the other side of the hole, you don't have time. You have to have your teammate be like, hey, looks left edge from over here, or you're gonna be calling out like hey, it's one sixty, Like I mean, you think it's just like a hard nine iron and you're gonna hear a lot of that, which is gonna be cool. And that's driven again by like us focusing on it being collaborative and then us focusing on it fast paced.

00:26:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, the I think obviously, we do events across the country and one of the the tenants of these events is alternate shot. We do them in every single event. And one thing I noticed with this watching a lot of alternate shot, having played a lot of alternate shot, is that it is actually team golf. Yep, Like best ball is not team golf. You just like go out and you just you know, like the best best ball strategy is like, hey, I'm going to do me, you do you, and let's just play like we normally play because we're good players and we'll get this done right. Alternate shot you actually have to like think and you are in it together. And I do I do really like that. I'm curious, did you guys start with like a time like a broadcast window and back out of that? Is that how you started to think about it? And and I imagine then you have built in like you need built in breaks for commercials. How how do what does that look like like taking a backing out? And what were some things that you tried before landing on the format? And real quick, I'll just explain the format and you can correct me if I'm wrong. It's nine holes of three man alternate shots. So you have teams of three, you know, be player A hits, player B hits, player C hits and then are they is it player ABC for the t's. Is that the way? Is it reset on the.

00:27:22
Speaker 1: Player A t's off on hole one, four and seven?

00:27:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then the the last six holes is a Every player plays a two holes of a six hole match, right, so it's two effective matches.

00:27:40
Speaker 1: Yeah. The a's from each team would play each other in two holes, the b's play each other in two holes, and the c's. So there's six holes of singles and each player plays two of them.

00:27:49
Speaker 2: So how did you guys come to this format from? You know? And and what were some challenges and things that you thought might work that didn't work.

00:28:00
Speaker 1: I'll get there, but I'll say this too. If you're listening and you're just like, well that I have literally no idea what they just said. I have a seven year old daughter, and when we open a kid's board game and I read the directions, I'm like, this is the most complicated thing I've ever read. And then you start playing, and after like five minutes you're like, Okay, I get it right. So I think there's been some pushback out there about like I don't understand this format, like it's so convoluted, and I think once people see like one match or ten minutes of a match, they're going to understand it. And but how we got there. We did back out of a TV window, So I mean, you know, the CEO of TGL, Mike McCarley, who ran the golf channel, we started with it building a two hour TV show, so that was the timeframe. I think the first idea was eighteen holes, because why wouldn't you just pick eighteen holes as the first kind of place to start, And then if you factor in TV times and then one thing that Mike always talks about when he does interviews is like he thinks that seeing every single shot is going to be a big, a big draw of this, Like all the action is right in front of you where which is what happens in every sport except for golf. So that is pretty interesting. If you're watching TGL, you will see every shot hitting the competition in a two hour window, which even if you're watching like Sunday of a major, you don't see every shot of even like the top three guys on the leaderboard. I mean, we've all that one masters Dustin. We didn't see him hit one shot till he had a ten foot or to win to tie on eighteen, which was like where did he come from? Right? That is that is unique to TGL but but that's how we started in the The three man all shot is really cool. The second test we did was an interlock in in Orlando. Somehow we managed to like simulate one outside and I think it was in the kind of retro where we would get together after the test that somebody was like, what if we just did a three man all shot as opposed to having someone sit at out. It seems obvious in retrospect, but until you test. That's how we came to that, and.

00:30:05
Speaker 2: That's I love the three man all shot. I think like the one thing when I looked at it probably push back, and I'm curious on your guys side, I'm sure it was thought of, is like is you know. One of the appeals to me is like we rarely ever see guys like Rory and JT square off. We're lucky if we get Superstar versus Superstar once in calendar year. And to me on the single side of it, you know, you had this great opportunity where you have you know, well, what would happen if Tiger and Rory squared off? We we got that a couple times in their entire careers, is you know, and you know we get kind of these two whole singles matches within one singles match. Was there any thought to letting player a's go against each other or having those matches going on simultaneous and what was the drawback to that?

00:31:02
Speaker 1: If there was the one thing that you wouldn't anticipate till you see it is that the player a's will actually be kind of head to head in the in the triples, in the nine holes of three man all shot. Because let's say Tiger and Rory are the a's, they're gonna tee off together on one, on four and on seven, right, and one of those will be a part of three, so like they'll be head to head. So the match actually unfolds where there's a cadence of a bit more head to head than just the singles, And it's the same thing like let's say you're the B player on a part three, like it's gonna be Tiger and Rory are gonna be putting against each other, and if both their teammates hit it to ten feet, now they're both on the green together, they're both head to head on their putts, So you kind of end up spending most of the match with your counterpart on the other team, whether you're the ABC player. And I don't mean like best worst second. I just mean like in the order that you're hitting right. You know.

00:32:00
Speaker 2: One thing that's super exciting to me is like the golf course stuff where you can just like kind of make believe design holes and like we I think there's, like, you know, especially for this podcast, some interest in like testing, Like you know, if you get the right people involved with design, like there could be some really crazy tests of golf architecture things that you've always wanted to see. How would this play out, how would this type of hole play out? And it's like a low stakes, you know, one one round through of testing architecture ideas. I think this honestly could really push golf architecture in different directions and be a laboratory to see, you know, at the highest level, what golf design for modern tour pros could be. If you know, if you think about it differently. One of the things I think about is like there's also potential for a lot of strategy within teams, Like maybe you don't want to have Rory b playing on one course because that leads to you know, I mean, he's great at everything, but like he you know, two of the three holes he might play or part threes versus you know, if he goes to player B slot, he's playing two par fives and hitting the t shot for a guy like uh, you know, I guess on his team who would be a good uh yeah hatt and hitting approach shot right, you know, like that that type of strategy is also very interesting from the golf course side and the way a three man all shot works. You know, I think it almost increases the the way you want to think about building a team and building a roster for a specific course.

00:33:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so the courses that they'll be playing will be like a collection of holes, and then each match will have Hey, we're going to pull these fifteen holes or we're going to play these holes. So the first hole could be like a Hawaii type setting, the second one could be like a Colorado setting. So it's going to really have a lot of variety, but the players will know and before the match like what the course, what the hole is being played that match are, and they can lay out their strategy according to that, so one hundred percent. And then the other thing that'll come in on the strategy is again shot clock cadence. They'll have some timeouts. If you go over to the shot clock, it's a one stroke penalty, so you have a timeout to save yourself. But it's very different than like the suggested you're on the clock on tour type stuff, right. And then there's also going to be a hammer, which is like a press, so you hit it up there and three feet throw the hammer and the hole. You know, the other team can either fold or accept the hammer, So there's going to.

00:34:42
Speaker 2: Be what what does the hammer do? Is it like in terms of like this match, how does that that so work?

00:34:49
Speaker 1: The hole is worth one point and if you hammer, it's now worth two, but you have the choice to fold and give up the one point, or you have the choice to accept and play for two points.

00:35:00
Speaker 2: The other limited hammers there's only.

00:35:02
Speaker 1: One, so only one team has it at a time, so you have to That's the thing that we really learned in the testing too. It's like the game becomes pretty strategic and like intense because you have to really think about like if you're slightly ahead and you get a slight advantage, you may want to keep the hammer as opposed to just using it. And then now the other team has it, so now they're one hole away, one shot away from taking the lead on a two point hole. And then we also had like just like in real you know, gambling, Saturday gambling, you can throw the hammer back in a point a hole can be worth three points, so you end up with these like awkward five footers for three points. Sometimes we've all been there, right, like you hammer and then all of a sudden you're like, oh my gosh, now I just tripled the bet and I got to make a four footer. So it's it's pretty interesting.

00:35:50
Speaker 2: I think one of the beauties of golf and golfers is that you knows. And I'm just kind of thinking about this as we talk about this, but like one of the things you don't have to really worry about with top tier professional golfers is like is competition level, because like most of these guys I think probably fall in the bucket of hate losing more than they love winning. It's probably like a common mindset thing that of top flight professional golfers. Would you agree with that?

00:36:24
Speaker 1: I agree, and I think that's one hundred percent right. And the way that kind of the ethos of the whole league and TGL and the competition, like you know that aforementioned slide deck fifteen months ago that was like what is this? They were very clear that it was going to have competitive integrity and it was going to be competitive, and yeah, it's going to push the limit with you know, interesting design holes and there's a hammer, and there's timeouts, and it's you know, probably not wearing pants and polo shirts and you know, if your shirt's untucked, it's probably okay. But at the end of the day, it is a real competition and there will be a winner at the end of each match. And yeah, I mean when we were testing this thing, the first hole was pretty friendly and by the end it was like pretty intense.

00:37:14
Speaker 2: Yeah. I feel like that's the way like pickup basketball works, right, is very friendly at the beginning, but then when it's you know, ten ten and you're playing to eleven or nine ten and you're playing a to eleven, all of a sudden, the defense ramps up a little bit, and you got to like, you know, because you've got a bunch of people that are playing pick up basketball because they're competitive, just like golf. Right, So anyways, I would love you know, what do you think is the one thing if you had to distill it down to about the format that's really going to work.

00:37:47
Speaker 1: I think timing. I think that you're going to be able to see fifteen hole match in two hours is pretty compelling.

00:37:54
Speaker 2: How many commercial breaks are we talking? Are we? Are we going to get hammered with like Sunday telecast commercials.

00:38:01
Speaker 1: It's not the Sunday telecaster problem. It's like the Thursday, Friday, early Saturday, that Sunday afternoon that like, it's the early rounds that are on that he all that tell commercials, that's that's beyond my pay grade. You got have to ask the CEO is a TV guy, you can.

00:38:17
Speaker 2: Ask, Yeah, Okay, I just you know, I think that's going to be probably a sticking point.

00:38:23
Speaker 1: But maybe maybe there's a world you know, it's going it's launching on ESPN and ESPN Plus, which the ESPN side is amazing because you have such a wide reach, and then the ESPN plus side, maybe there's a fee based uh no commercial option for you. Andy, Well, I'll ask Okay.

00:38:39
Speaker 2: I've said I've said this about professional golf. Is I would pay an on god Like, obviously I'm in a position where it's part of my job, but I would pay an ungodly amount of money to just bypass the playing throughs, the the commercial loads. It's but I don't know if there's a critical scale there that would actually make the does work, especially with the right space.

00:39:03
Speaker 1: I mean, it's easy to joke, but one thing that's awesome about TGL is like it's truly innovative, right, Like it's not just clipping up the same thing in a different way. It's also happening against a backdrop of like may major media disruption, So it's it's really it's you know, it's a really ambitious and innovative path forward for sports, and I think it's been cool for me and cap Tech to be a part of. But also I think it's the beginning of a bunch of things that are going to that are going to be fast moving in the next five to ten years in sports.

00:39:39
Speaker 2: What would you say is your biggest hesitation? Worry about about it? This is like the interview question, what's what's your biggest weekness?

00:39:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think the I think the players have to be into it, right, They they really have to get into They have to be locked in. The have to be trying to win. And I think we've you know, I think Scott and all the way you know, all the way up to Mike McCarley, like keeping that front and center, I think is going to be is going to make that happen. But it needs to be closer to a you know, high level competition than a hit and giggle, right. And I think I'm not I'm not concerned about it. I think, like you said, players are competitive and they'll be there to win. But that's that's gonna be a big key yeah that.

00:40:32
Speaker 2: I I think that. And I think the guys I know, like miked up trash talk is like a big thing they're kind of hammering on from a PR side. But like I think, if we've learned anything from the many many iterations of the match all the way back to like the Battle of Big Horn, right, we cannot like force it. It has to be natural in the flow and in the best side is always a good option with golf, like it's always a good option. And I think, like you know, that to me is like it cannot become like a contrived trash shock.

00:41:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I've seen some of that, but I don't think there's gonna be time for it to be honest, because there's been the micd up. Is gonna be cool because you're gonna hear the players talking shots out. I really do think that because that's what we've been doing in the testing. I don't think it's gonna be filling dead time because like in the match, they have to get from one shot to the other. Right, this is all in a contained space, so it's fast paced. So I think the shot clock will make the players collaborate, play team golf, and it's I don't think it's gonna leave a bunch of time for that idol Charles Barkley, you know, kind of trash talk type type interaction.

00:41:53
Speaker 2: All right, now for another quick break from our sponsor, the USGA. This is all about becoming a member. I've been a member. I saw I was looking at my bag tag, which I keep on my backpack. I've been a member since nineteen ninety nine. Sure, you know, there are probably some college years where my mom paid my membership. Mom and dad kept the membership going. I might not have been, you know, really really invested in the USGA then, but now I am, and really I think the thing with everything going on in golf, with the framework agreement or lack thereof framework agreement, with the you know, the TGL, which is going to you know, reward top end play. One of the things that I find quite refreshing is there are organizations such as the USGA who are out there taking money and investing it back into the game, whether it's like turf grass research, whether it is programs to introduce more people to the game of golf. This membership leaves a positive impact on the game that I love the game. That's given me so much and that's why I will always be a member. So this holiday season, give the gift of a USGA membership. Members will get a lot of benefits. You get the members only had a bag tag, a subscription to the USGA's publication called The Golf Journal. It's really delightful. I enjoy reading it, and it most importantly ensures a strong future for the game of golf, So give a gift of the USGA membership by visiting USGA dot org slash fried Egg. That's USGA dot org slash fried Egg. Big thanks to the us GA, and thanks to them for all they do for the game with the different programs that a lot of people don't know about. So thank you to them, and hopefully people can give the gift of their membership this winter. Now back to Roberto Castro. If you could take one thing from what you've kind of learned creating this format from TGL and take it to the PGA Tour, which would.

00:44:06
Speaker 1: What would it be? That's phenomenal question. I think just I would take it to all sports is being open minded about what the rules can be. Like we created these games. They didn't come from some mountain on high, right, And I think being open minded to change and to being progressive would be the one thing I would take right to the tour to other sports. You know, like the three point line didn't exist until they just drew a line on it and made the points higher. And we get so stuck in the mud golf especially about what's you know, just sacred. And I think TGL is going to open people's eyes to the fact that you can you can write your own rules, you can make it fun, you can make it engaging. So that's what I would take, you know.

00:45:00
Speaker 2: I look at like the the NBA as like an example of this, right is like right now we're in the middle of their in season tournament and there's like I don't know if it's been successful, but what I appreciate about it is that they are attempting. Sure they have this time period when like people don't pay attention to their sport, and I think golf, like if you think about golf, like you know, when people don't really pay attention to to PGA Tour golf like Thursday and Friday and Saturday to a certain extent. So it's like similar situation like the PGA Tour or the NBA. People don't pay attention to games in November. So let's try something different. Let's try to create some stakes out of these like Tuesday and Thursday games and their tournament games, and we're gonna have a tournament with incentives. Like there's nothing wrong, Like I think, like the jury's out on whether it's gonna work. I don't think like I personally as an NBA fan haven't been like I need to watch this because it's a tournament game. It's year one of that. But like, at the same time, like I applaud the effort of actually trying, of actually being like, you know what, we're okay if this doesn't work, right, We're not okay with not trying something to enhance our product. And I feel like, like what you just said is so spot on with with the tour is like, well, we can't. This is the way the sport is. We can't do that. And it's like, what we can't.

00:46:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it but look it speaks to your I mean, you have an entrepreneurial spirit, right. You started the frieda egg and took a risk, and you know a lot of the clients we work with are trying to tackle hard problems and do kind of find a new business line, find a new customer, and that's that's the fun stuff. But you have to do it, I mean, and it may not work. Like I use the example all the time when people are like this is dumb, this is dumb. Imagine this, we just walked to lunch. What if fifteen years ago somebody had been like, hey, do you think you need a phone? That you can pull up a thing and you can order your lunch that when you get there it's ready. Like that is so dumb. Why do I need that? Right? Like, I don't what do you mean a phone? Like I have a phone in my house or I have a cell phone. So we just walked to Chick fil A and the line was super long, but when we got there, our food was ready because we had ordered on the app. Walking there save me twenty minutes of standing in line. That's progress, Like that's that is an inevitable march of technology and progress, and it's coming for every business. It's coming for every sport, sorry to tell you. So it's either get on board and try something or you're gonna get left behind.

00:47:47
Speaker 2: You know. That reminded me. I worked at a company years ago that was backed by Andrewsen and Horowitz or Andrews and Horowitz, one of the top venture funds in the world, and one of their parts, nurse Jeff Jordan, came to our office and did this talk just about how they operate. And one of the things that I will never forget that stuck with me is he talked about how they go about investing in companies, how they choose investments, right, this is a company that gets to look at every company, every idea that's a big idea, and there their policy is that if if every partner agrees that it's a brilliant idea and that it's it's a home run, they don't invest in it. At least one partner has to think that it's like ludicrously stupid, like one of the worst ideas ever, and they're there there. Their point it was that like someone has to think that it's dumb for it to work, right, because then if if everybody agrees it's a great idea, somebody's already tried it and it hasn't worked, right. So the the whole premise and I think like in a way, I like have been critical on the shotgun start of TGL and different aspects of it, but the idea of like that there are things that you, as a golf van think are stupid is probably a good sign for the league in a weird convoluted way, because that means it's doing something different in a weird convoluted way.

00:49:25
Speaker 1: We started out, I think we spent ten minutes on the virtues of clubs that are thirty eight and forty five years old vintage wooden clubs and are closing with a you know, a story about the future of technology and and venture investing. So I love the arc we took here.

00:49:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, well see, this is the thing I try to do topics. I don't do lots of questions. I like to just let the conversation go. All right, let's talk a little bit. I'm curious about your your your stance, your tired. It's it's great when you have retired players on because there's you know, a little bit less worrying about about yourself and your standing on the PGA tour, and more probably a little bit perspective on what's going on. We're a I feel like a very big inflection point. Maybe it's already happened, what's going to happen. I'm kind of reading some tea leaves of Rory leaving yesterday, the the you know, the leadership role on the policy board. As a former player, how do you feel about the situation that golf has entered here where it's kind of an open bidding season on this new company.

00:50:42
Speaker 1: It's pretty wild. I mean, taking bids, you know, for investment outside investment for the PGA tour is not something back to our last conversation, like if you don't think progress and evolution and change is coming for you and your business, who could have said this would have ever happened to the tour? But I don't know. If I was a player, I would, If I was currently playing, I would. My first thought would be that I somehow landed in the most lucrative time in professional golf history. And you know, you brought competition in the purses of I mean almost doubled since I stopped playing two three years ago. And that's good, Yeah, great time, that's that is uh, that's great for players. And then I would probably just be looking at a lot of change coming. I mean, if I think then the biggest one is the tour is a nonprofit and it's easy to crack, you know, little jokes about being a very well funded and nonprofit, but there the books have to balance at the end of the year. Right, once you start taking outside investment, there's just a profit motive there, Right, there's a there's a motive for return, and it doesn't matter who has control, it still changes the the just the mission state meant of the organization. And that's going to in turn change the operation of that organization. So if I was a player, I would I would not I know this is not happening. I know they're sitting there at lunch because I've talked to players and it's all they talk about. But I would probably be trying to ignore it because it's all changing so fast, Like you know, signature events this year, it's going to look different next year. Team golf that might be a p I mean, we just don't know what the professional golf will look like in the next one to five years, so it's probably not worth like digging too deep on the twenty four hour news cycle.

00:52:39
Speaker 2: It feels like it would be really hard as a player to as any anybody can relate to this that's had a bit of uncertainty in their job. But it's like, you know, at this point and it seems like the direction that's going you are going to be highly rewarded for being a top thirty player on the PGA Tour, so all of your mental energy should probably be focused on that. And because to me, if they are looking at you know, if they're bringing on outside investment, like you said, they're going to lose a certain degree of control they might still control it, but you know you're bringing somebody else that you know, it's just like getting married. Like you you know, you can say, oh, I've got this auntonomous relationship, but you are absolutely thinking about your partner and what they are. You know, what they want in a situation. You know that it doesn't you won't be married long if you if you don't do that. And with this, you know, if you're bringing on a partner, their goals are going to be different than what a membership organization goals are going to be. And it's it is a you know, it's it's fascinating that they got to hear. I think it will be very lucrative for players, but there is going to be a subset of players that is going to be very bad for at some point. And there's going I think it's going to create a larger class system in my opinion.

00:54:17
Speaker 1: Potential for that.

00:54:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's uh, what would you uh, what would you hope the structure would be if you were if you were making if you're the golf star, if you.

00:54:26
Speaker 1: Made me golfs are I would lean into some different innovative kind of new formats, you know, I mean TGL is a part of that team. Golf is a part of that. I think I think there are probably like eight to twelve legacy events that I would you know, die on the Sword. They should be seventy to two holes of stroke play with one hundred and forty four players starting on Thursday. And I mean Masters has a smaller field, and that's fine, but and but then beyond that, I would think creatively so that that that's what I would do. But you know, your four majors, your players, and then a handful of others I think should exist in the traditional format. And then I think, hey, whatever brings in the most fans and eyeballs and is still you know, competitive, has competitive equity. Like we're not just playing darts here, like it's not, but creative formats.

00:55:23
Speaker 2: That it's a I think you hit the nail on the head because if you think about golf right to me, like where mainstream interest is is in the major championships. And then like, honestly, some of these like matches made for TV things. I'm not talking about the recent ones with like just NFL players, but like when they you know, those early matches from my perspective with my friends that are very casual golf fans. That's the stuff that had them buzzing. It wasn't you know the third round of the Traveler. No offense to the travelers, right, who will do everything that can to remain one of the relevant events. But like, to me, it has to evolve. It can't be forty two weeks of the same thing, and that's like the biggest thing, Like elevate the ones that you really want, make them very serious competitions, and then you have to figure out how everything else relates. And maybe to me, like expanding the corn Faery Tour into more of a PGA tour, like a real I think maybe stricter relegation is the way that you do this and then have these tournaments that like golf fans like me and you are still going to be tuning into, like I will watch corn Ferry Tour finals, like I think that's some of the probably one of the top twenty events of golf on TV every year is that it's the end of the corn Fairy Finals, you know, like, how do we lend it together so that there's you know, these events that everybody knows really better, so they attract the biggest audience and then you know, like I don't think like a you know, RSM. This week's going to rate out of the park more so than if you had it being a mixed PGA tour b just for namesake and corn Ferry Tour event.

00:57:22
Speaker 1: Right. Yeah, but the business side and the incentives, aligning the incentives and the structure is going to be needed. It needs to adjust to facilitate that. So you just saw that. And this is what I have said. I've told this story before I played in the NAPA Tournament. I don't know whatever it was four or five years ago when it.

00:57:41
Speaker 2: Was like Fries I think safe Way because they had the shopping market carts.

00:57:47
Speaker 1: It was Safeway and it was like a week after the tour championship, like there was hardly any gap, right, And I think the national media or you were everyone was probably like, the last thing I need this week is a seventy two hohole turn in first week of September after a forty I get out to NAPA. Tickets are sold out, they're doing concerts at night. I'm out there Thursday. It off at one o'clock. There's a big food and beverage pavilion behind the first green, there's five hundred people that are out there having drinks watching golf. So as a standalone entity, which is how a lot of these PGA Tour events are. Right. The Salesmanship Club runs the Dallas event, right, the Thunderbirds runs the Phoenix event. I don't know who runs the NAPA event. The tour doesn't necessarily own that tournament. It was a big success, and that you know, they were incentivized to raise a bunch of charity dollars, get a title sponsor, put down a four to five day event, and bring people in and they succeeded on all those So that is kind of the pushback to like, the last thing I need in my life is this Safeway Championship this week. But where I was going with that is Honda couldn't find a replacement sponsor and the tour brought that under championship management in the last few weeks. So they essentially and I don't know, I don't want to overspeak, I don't know the exact details. I don't know if like they own the Honda Classic or the Palm Beach Classic or whatever, but it's like the South Florida Tour event or if they're just managing it. But now it's like it's under the umbrella. So if they want to look at their inventory and be like okay, because right now the tour has like Tour Championship, President's Cup the players. But if they wanted to turn the Phoenix Open into a six day match play event, they couldn't. Like the Phoenix Opens. The Phoenix Open. It's under this right, So you're going to start to see some changes. And I don't know how that. I have no idea how that all shakes out with the new investment, but that is going to go hand in hand with I mean, look at TGL right, it's an independent partnership, but they're partner with the tour, but it's their own company. They raised money, they're setting up the format, and they gives them that freedom. So the business structure has to align with the kind of competitive and media and market structure also.

01:00:03
Speaker 2: See it's like it's interesting you talk about the Honda the South Florida Tournament, which has gotten just absolutely demolished recently with the you know, elevated events, the you know whatever, every iteration of them. They've been sandwich in a bad spot. And it's like yet every tour, Like a huge percentage of tour players live there and they just aren't shown up for their hometown event like I would then eventually I would think about that tournament and be like, hey, what if we did nine holes nine hole rounds? Yeah, and it's like, oh, this is like I'm home, but I'm going to play nine holes regardless. Why wouldn't I go play nine holes have a chance to win a couple million dollars?

01:00:45
Speaker 1: Right?

01:00:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like what if they did nine hole rounds? Like and then you think about the TV product of that, and it's like, oh, this is this would be kind of fun, like all of a sudden, like the stakes of a nine hole round are like heightened, right, Like every hole matters so much. Anybody that like plays in a member guest ninth whole match, you're like, holy shit, I just lost a hole, Like I like that's meaningful. I don't have that much time to work it back, just like you know a guy makes a double bogie and on the third hole of a nine hole round, it's like, oh, I don't have a lot of time to make birdies to make up that.

01:01:19
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, And this is gonna sound super spoiled. I was never in this position, but I would play in the Honda and I would I would think to myself, like, if I lived within twenty minutes a here, why would I not play? Well? Here's the reality for like, why wouldn't you just opt out of the program if you could or play the pro am and like skip the practice rounds and whatnot. If you're a top player going to play around on the PGA Tour Thursday Friday, it takes five hours, takes ninety minutes to warm up, You get there to eat, you have to do media, like those guys have to do media, right, They're gonna require you to come in on Tuesday. It's a ten hour commitment for six days to play in a tour. Man, it doesn't matter if you're home. You might as well be in Charlotte or Atlanta. It doesn't matter at all. So as they're making their schedule, in fairness to them, it's you know, they have to pick their spots, and it's like, oh, you're home anyway. No, there's a difference between being home and you know, resting, working out, being with my family, practicing and spending ten hours a day at PGA National. Those are two very It's not like you if your buddy calls you and you're like, oh, you want to play tomorrow. Yeah, you can play at eight and you could be in a meeting at twelve thirty, right, Like, that's not how it works out there. So I think unless you've lived that, it's different than people think.

01:02:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, so reducing the commitment of time would all of a sudden probably entice them, but totally you know that would it probably would cut against their TV contract. But like the beauty of I think the why you should have excitement as a fan is that if you're under this new company with outside investment, there is going to be a heavy incentive and potentially demand for shake up, increased rates in different different aspects growth overall, Like nobody's investing in the business. Nobody's going to give the tour billions of dollars and not want a positive return on the money. And ideally they want a large return, so they want to put two billion in to get you know, five billion out And the only way, I think it's very clear, the only way that happens is with evolution in the sport yep.

01:03:28
Speaker 1: So you'd have to look it's you could look back ten or twenty years from now, you know what, forty ninety plus percent of the events or within a four hour plane ride. It's a big world out there, and if I was looking for, you know, a double digit return, I probably would be looking beyond just the borders of the US. I mean, I've always I've said this a million times, like the level of spoiledness on the tour. I mean we I would people are like, oh, you must be triple platinum medallion. It's like no, I would fly to la and then I would drive to Palm Springs. Then I would drive to Phoenix. Some of the top guys are like hopping twenty minute net jets or whatever. It's a three hour When you do the Florida Swing, you can get from Orlando to Tampa to Panavidra to Palm Beach. They're all fifteen minute flights for four hour drives. Like that's unbelievable. You know how good that is. It's amazing.

01:04:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I don't think. I don't think they'll have four events in Florida that if they're If you're looking for the highest dollar return.

01:04:29
Speaker 1: Maybe you do. I don't know, I don't you know, I don't know what the answers will be. But those folks that are interested in investing are really good at turning a dollar into five, so I bet they have some ideas.

01:04:40
Speaker 2: All right, last question, we'll get you out of here. If you could have a tour event one place that there currently isn't a tour event, where would it be?

01:04:48
Speaker 1: Pasa tempo.

01:04:51
Speaker 2: Fresh off for renovation.

01:04:53
Speaker 1: They should play pasta tempo with vintage clubs. It's too short to play.

01:04:56
Speaker 2: With the noose vans. Yeah, I have to be very limited hands.

01:05:02
Speaker 1: Yeah that's true.

01:05:03
Speaker 2: Did you ever play the college tournament there?

01:05:04
Speaker 1: I did one time. Yep. That was fun.

01:05:08
Speaker 2: It's amazing to look at like scoring's improved, but it hasn't gone and I think they I think recently they've gone a little over the topless setup for it. You know, it seems oh really yeah, I mean watching it and it's so awesome it's on TV. But yeah, the vintage clubs. Having played vintage clubs out there, it's a really fricking hard golf course with it.

01:05:27
Speaker 1: I believe that that is probably the perfect I mean, that's one of my favorite courses, but that's probably the perfect golf course to play, like for me, my distance my skill with a vintage set, it's probably the perfect setup.

01:05:40
Speaker 2: All right, Well we'll leave it that. See, we brought it all the way back, all the way back. It didn't make sense. But hey, thank you for your time, thank you for you know, hanging in with all these questions, and people can find you. You're on Twitter, you've got the Course Record Show, You're still doing the Course Record Show, still.

01:05:58
Speaker 1: Doing a podcast with a buddy on the business side of golf. We're doing a little bit of actually in your space a little bit. We're talking about why are golf course is closing? Kind of just general golf course real estate business right now.

01:06:09
Speaker 2: Por management. If your golf course isn't thriving right now, probably.

01:06:14
Speaker 1: That's what that's what we talk about. Apparently though it's land value redevelopment.

01:06:19
Speaker 2: That makes sense too. I mean there's a lot of a lot of offers for some of the land that golf courses are on. So all right, so everybody listen to that. I honestly I give it a plug. I will pop in and listen to a lot of episodes. It's a different take on a very crowded golf podcast space. It's it's fun. I especially if I imagine most listeners are business people. It's a interesting way to look at a lot of things going on in golf.

01:06:48
Speaker 1: It's once a month, your pods like once a day. So if you can find forty five minutes a month for the course record show, folks check it out.

01:06:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, Thanks Roberta, Thanks Andy. All right. Thank you guys for listening to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast, and thanks to Roverto Castro for joining. This episode was edited and produced by Matt Russ's Thank you Matt. As a quick reminder, it is the holiday season. I know you're gonna be hit over the head with holiday deals. If you're a Club TF YOU member, your Black Friday Sale has started. You also get twenty five percent off all of your purchases in the Friday Pro Shop using your promo code. Also on the other side of things, if you're not a Club TF YOU member, the sale will start next week. It will be twenty percent off. We've got a wide array of prints, We've got a ton of different merchandise, and we really appreciate your support, So keep your eyes out for the Black We've got lots of new gear in the shop. And I know you've got a lot of options in holiday season. We appreciate your support, and really we appreciate your support just from listening to this podcast, and if you've made it to this point, I really appreciate your support. So thanks. We'll be back next week, I think, I believe, assuming nothing goes wrong with recording, which sometimes happened mostly it's always on my end, but we will have a couple probably two Yoke with dokes to get you through your holiday drives and you know those holiday you get downtime during the holidays. I'm personally looking forward to it, so we'll get you through your Thanksgiving with a couple of Yoke with doakes. So we'll be back next week, and thanks so much for listening

01:09:13
Speaker 1: Time.