PGA Tour Advances Negotiations With Strategic Sports Group, PIF Talks Ongoing

The PGA Tour announced on Sunday it is advancing negotiations with Strategic Sports Group (SSG), and is continuing its negotiations with the DP World Tour and Public Investment Fund (PIF) of Saudi Arabia.

The announcement comes with just three weeks remaining until a Dec. 31 deadline, set by the two tours and PIF, to finalize an agreement to combine their respective golf-related assets into a new, for-profit entity.

The three sides announced a framework agreement to do so on June 6, with PIF outlined as the primary investor in the entity — which the tour has dubbed "PGA Tour Enterprises".

In the time since, though, the tour has received significant interest from outside investors. The six player directors on the PGA Tour board (who have been advised by Colin Neville, a partner at private equity firm Raine Group), released a memo to tour members on Dec. 1, saying that they had met with potential outside investors in the new entity.

SSG is comprised of 12 investors, including Mark Attanasio (the majority owner of MLB's Milwaukee Brewers), Arthur Blank (the majority owner of the NFL's Atlanta Falcons), Cohen Private Ventures (the family office of New York Mets owner Steve Cohen), Fenway Sports Group (which owns MLB's Boston Red Sox and the NHL's Pittsburgh Penguins), Tom Ricketts (the chairman of MLB's Chicago Cubs) and Wyc Grousbeck (the majority owner of the NBA's Boston Celtics).

Blank, Cohen and Fenway Sports Group are three of the investors who bought franchises in the TGL, a tech-infused golf league backed by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlory's TMRW Sports.