Will the bubble burst with Season 2 of the TGL, or is this just the beginning of a new phase in professional golf? Amid massive investment from sports team owners and investors, and a slow-starting but quickly-finished founding campaign, many are wondering whether the Indoor Simulator League, led by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, has legitimate staying power.
As we’ve seen in recent years, when it comes to fresh golf ventures like this, the real answers don’t become apparent until the initial shine and excitement wears off and the core product emerges.
There were challenges throughout the first campaign, but to TGL’s credit, we not only made midseason fixes, but also made fixes in the offseason before our second chance to build an audience. Maintaining a short attention span in a fast-paced simulator golf game is key, and the goal was to keep the product as shiny as possible.
A golf course architect was hired to design the new holes. Currently, each of the six teams has a hall specifically tailored to their roster, named after the city of New York, Los Angeles, Boston, San Francisco, Atlanta, and Jupiter, Florida. Some of them are fun, some are really fun, but TGL needs more than just a cool hole design to be successful.
The gameplay needs to be improved, and to TGL’s credit once again, changes have been implemented to that end as well.
Midway through the first season, TGL changed the hammer rules to allow each team to use three throughout a match. (In the original rules, the hammer was given to one team and allowed to be used or lost.)
There were issues with the simulator technology in Season 1, and given the company’s partnership with certain league founders, those issues aren’t likely to be resolved any time soon.
The green complex has been reimagined. It’s larger, boasts more potential hole locations, and the grass around the green is all down-grained, meaning players will face better conditions for cool, nimble spinny shots that will have fans screaming with excitement when they hit it accurately.
Changes in broadcast and general social media strategies are also evident. A new TGL analyst, former PGA Tour player and league consultant Roberto Castro, will be added to the broadcast. Content partners include influencers. Podcasts and independent projects are producing a ton of content promoting season two.
Internal viewing is also different. Fans at SoFi Center will be able to hear conversations between players that were not possible in Season 1.
This doesn’t mean much if it doesn’t make golf more interesting for players. The burden of this adventure ultimately falls on the people who take the shots and run around like chickens with their heads cut off.
Still, there are some question marks.
Tiger Woods and Justin Thomas, two of the biggest names competing in the TGL, will miss at least part of the season due to injuries. Woods’ team, Jupiter Links, does not have any players in the top 100 of the Official World Golf Rankings, including Tom Kim, Max Homa and Kevin Kisner.
Meanwhile, Billy Horschel, who sparked the Atlanta drive in the first game, returned from his own injury. Saheth Segala revealed that he suffered an injury while playing in TGL last season.
It should continue to be additive if players continue to take seriously the unserious nature of the league, but that’s probably all there is to it.
After all, TGL is not aiming to replace formal competitive professional golf. I’m not here to convince your father or grandfather. This is a sideshow, part of the entertainment during the off-season of the sports calendar, and is aimed at young people.
That’s where TGL can grow. If it tries to overextend and rethink more than the essence of golf holes and leagues, it could ultimately backfire.
