Ian Poulter takes brutal swipe at PGA Tour over TV ratings after Masters figures emerged
The PGA Tour has seen a fall in TV viewership in recent months, and LIV Golf star Ian Poulter could not resist a dig at his rival circuit after taking to social media
Ian Poulter fired a brutal swipe at his rivals over on the PGA Tour amid the American-based circuit’s well-documented drop in TV ratings.
The decline in viewership on the PGA Tour has been a common theme so far in the 2024 season. February’s Waste Management Open saw one of the biggest, with TV viewing statistics for the final round down 30 percent. The same followed at the Arnold Palmer Invitational a month later, which fell by 15 percent.
Whilst the Tour’s flagship event, and golf’s often dubbed ‘fifth major’ the Players Championship fell to the same fate, as TV figures were down 10 percent on the year prior.
Arguably the most surprising of all though was the fall at last week’s Masters Tournament in Augusta. Once again viewership was down during Sunday’s final round which saw Scottie Scheffler win his second green jacket. In total, TV figures had dropped 20 percent, a worrying sign for the top of professional golf.
In the wake of the struggles, one man who could not resist a cheeky dig was Majesticks star Poulter. His former DP World Tour colleague Pablo Larazabal lit the fuse on Thursday, as the PGA Tour’s official X account referred to RBC Heritage J.T. Poston as ‘The Postman’ – a nickname synonymous with European legend Poulter.
“There is only one Postman, right @IanJamesPoulter?” Larazabal tweeted in response to Tour highlight reel of Poston. In response, Poulter tweeted: “Yeah it’s alright Pablo.. It’s not worth losing energy over. If it helps their ratings then they can borrow it for now.”
Poulter finds himself on the LIV Golf side of the recent divide within the sport, which has seen the Saudi-backed series locked in an ugly dispute with the PGA Tour. As a result, the Englishman’s former Ryder Cup partner – and avid LIV critic – Rory McIlroy highlighted the fallout as the reason behind a fall in TV ratings.
“If you look at the TV ratings of the PGA Tour this year, they’re down 20 per cent across the board,” McIlroy said earlier this month. “That’s a fifth. That’s big. I would say the numbers on LIV aren’t great either in terms of the people tuning in. I just think with the fighting and everything that’s gone on over the past couple of years, people are just getting fatigued
“It’s turning people off men’s professional golf, and that’s not a good thing for anyone. It’s going to be really interesting to see how the four major championships do, or even the three, because put Augusta aside, I think that sort of lives in its own world.” A similar point was also raised by PGA Tour star Max Homa his week, who described the recent financial arms battle within pro golf as ‘nauseating’.
