Before you ponder the enormity of the task facing LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neil — before you debate the merits of TV ratings and PR battles and a sport in a prolonged state of competitive turmoil and $5 billion in Saudi funding — remember something very crucial.
Scott O’Neil chosen this.
“How you live is truly a choice,” O’Neil wrote in his book “Be Where Your Feet Are.”.” “What you’re going to do and who you’re going to do it with are choices that only you can make. That was my ‘aha’ moment.”
In two decades as a sports manager (primarily in basketball), O’Neil earned an MD in organizational surgery – first as a rising marketing and sales executive with the New Jersey Nets and Philadelphia Eagles in the early to mid-1990s, then as president of Madison Square Garden Companies. with the early Carmelo Anthony Knicks and eventually as CEO of the Processera Philadelphia 76ers and New Jersey Devils. In all these jobs, O’Neil found himself selling out on losing business – and taking the path back to winning.
These experiences forged a worldview that O’Neil leans on today, as CEO of a golf league still in its infancy. Since replacing Greg Norman as CEO of LIV in January 2025, O’Neil has sought to overhaul LIV’s business, refocus its position in the professional golf world and lay the foundation for a path to profitability. These goals could be sound opaque, but they have produced some tangible changes: In November, O’Neil announced that LIV – an organization so wedded to 54-hole tournaments that it was named after the Roman numeral for 54 – would expand its events to 72 holes, effective immediately.
As the calendar turns toward 2026, there are still many questions O’Neil’s league must answer: about LIV’s changing tone on its “rivalry” with the PGA Tour, the long battle for financial viability and, perhaps most pressingly, how the league judges yourself. Earlier this week I spoke with O’Neil about all these topics and more; our conversation below has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Scott, I’ve heard you call yourself a “change agent” a few times. What have you done? think something needed to be changed about LIV Golf when you took the job?
Yes, I would say that any four-year-old company in a very mature industry needs to be agile, bold and ruthless. You must be on the journey of evolution, if you will. What the group has gone through here to build and break through in golf – I don’t know if we’ll ever see it again in our lifetimes, and I think it’s somewhat spectacular.
What I’m here to do is take that foundation and build the company. There are a whole series of paths that can lead us. One of them is clearly on the golf side – on the golfer’s side. When you start to see faces like Tom McKibben and Josele Ballester and David Puig and Caleb Surratt – when you start to see an emerging next generation of talent, that should give us confidence that this is going in the right direction.
I would say it was something different to be on television. Get into one of the four major networks and launch on Fox; adding a handful of household names as marketing partners such as HSBC and Salesforce and Qualcomm; and for endemics like Ping and Callaway to raise their hands and say, “Oh yeah, there are some of the best players in the world.”
That’s the kind of thing we talked about early on, and we’ve had quite a bit of success.
Something that has always left me a little perplexed is that LIV doesn’t often publicly announce its goals. It is very difficult to know what LIV thinks about LIV’s performance so far. I noticed you changed that a bit. You announced $500 million in new sponsorship earlier this year and have been a bit more transparent about bigger causes like the OWGR. But before I get into the details, I wanted to ask you a simple question: if your time at LIV is a success, what will it look like?
I would say we are the dominant global golf league and are recognized as such outside of the US. I think that would be successful.
What are some specific metrics you use to assess your success in that goal? What are you looking for when you say we are on the right track or that we should continue to grow here?
I have a hat that I always wear at home that says: Never satisfied, always grateful. There aren’t many things we’re checking off here, so my approach is a little different.
It’s not that we don’t enjoy the journey of progress, because we do. It’s not that the climb isn’t exciting or fun. And it’s not like the amazing team we have here at LIV didn’t sign up for this. But this group is humble and hungry, and that combination sets us up for quite an adventurous run. I’ve mentioned some things where we’ve seen great progress, but we won’t be substandard, and we think there’s so much opportunity.
I have been in the sports world for a long time and there are general principles in professional sports that apply to LIV. We see so much opportunity here and – how do I say this in a way that doesn’t sound like I’m waving a flag? – I have confidence in it. I have confidence in it.
What are some general sports principles that you apply at LIV?
LIV is different from other tours. First of all, it’s a competition, not a tour. But one thing I noticed: we have extraordinary talents that we asked to make a commitment, and they did. Bryson [DeChambeau] has taken the lead on social media, but so has Phil Mickelson, who is 55 years old. Our players shake hands, take selfies and sign autographs when the cameras aren’t on them – that matters. They show up for extra media sessions. They’re doing a broadcast. They are my business partners. You know, these guys are looking for sponsorship deals.
Focusing on the product and the player is something that is universal across all sports. Sometimes everyone gets distracted by the everything else. But we have the right product and we have a commitment from the players who matter most in the world.
But that’s the first thing. The second point is: this business is simple, not easy. There are slight variations in each of the different sports. You need to have your broadcast and media platform in order. You need to have marketing partners – in our case worldwide – who understand what you do and want to get behind you. Your premium experience should be second to none. If a VIP comes in, whether that’s a pro-am for some of our premium products, I believe it will surpass F1. And then you have to think about the fan. Can you concentrate your effort and focus on the fan? Our fan is the next generation fan, and that’s the other thing that sometimes distracts you: can we keep the fan at the center?
One of the areas of concern you mentioned is media rights. LIV’s rights have expanded over the years, but the public hasn’t necessarily followed suit. Why do you think LIV has failed to sign a big-money TV rights partner?
Well, let me take you to 20,000 feet. It’s a startup league for sure, but there isn’t a four-year-old sports league in history that wouldn’t accept our deals.
Remember, Fox is a big four network – and there are positives in terms of ratings too. We’re up 120 percent year over year, and while that will require a lot more growth, I think if we can get some 100 percent increases in the next few years, we’ll be doing just fine.
We also feel [the ratings conversation] is different. This is a global competition and that’s why I’ve used the analogy of F1 and IndyCar quite a bit. If we are Formula 1 and our good friends on the PGA Tour are IndyCar, IndyCar is a great company. It is a US-focused company. But we’re getting on a plane on February 1 and going to Riyadh, and then we’re going to Australia, and then we’re going to Hong Kong, and then Singapore, and then South Africa.
That’s why I spend a lot of time thinking about our great partners at Fox and Fox Sports. But I also think of Britain and Europe and Africa and Asia and Australia. For us, the canvas is a little bit different, you know, it’s a little bit wider. I’m not running away from that. I lean in and say, “Okay, what does the Asian market look like? Who are the sponsors we need to talk to? Who are the media partners?”
So, what is my perspective? Back to never satisfied, always grateful: Am I grateful for where we are? Absolute. A competition for four-year-olds like this has never been done before in sports. But do I want more? Naturally.
How do you think LIV’s official World Golf Ranking application fits into the conversation? You’ve overseen a series of competitive changes aimed at gaining entry into the OWGR, and if accepted, LIV events will help players qualify for the majors. Do you expect to receive world ranking points soon?
I don’t want to be presumptuous, but I can say that we hope to be recognized by OWGR before the start of the 2026 season.
I’m very impressed and grateful for that [OWGR president] Trevor Immelman. I think he may have the toughest job in the world, and I may have suggested that he might be eligible for a Nobel Peace Prize, given what he does. Trevor speaks in the best interests of golf.
I have a lot of time for those who talk about open trails. I have a lot of time for those who are thinking about the future of golf, in the best interests of golf, and growing the game of golf. And all I’ve seen from Trevor since day one is a lot of that.
Last question. You wrote that when you were younger, you were fired from MSG because you were more interested in being “right” than being “effective.” What’s an example of something at LIV where you chose to be ‘effective’ over ‘good’?
Oh man, I could give you 100 examples. I think when we came out of the gate we were seen as a bit anti-establishment. Since I’ve been here, there have been times when we’ve tried to take a breath, find some humility, and have a balanced conversation.
Sometimes that is very difficult. We will encounter surprising objections to deals at the last minute, for example that the “invisible hand” will occasionally come for us. But the “being effective” part is about surrounding yourself with the most talented people in the world who stay focused on your mission.
This is golf. I think it’s the most powerful sport in the world. I think it’s the most important sport in the world. It’s a game that teaches you the most important values in the world: humility and resilience and consistency, hard work.
But it’s still a game. Ultimately, our job is to put more clubs in the hands of more kids because we think those values matter in the world.
I know it sounds like I’m staying at 20,000 feet, but if I don’t, who’s going to?
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