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Issue No. 162 | February 27, 2025
Hello,
The Masters starts 42 days from today.
Let’s jump in.
Today’s newsletter is presented by Seed Golf. If you somehow haven’t heard me going on and on and on about the Ireland golf trip of a lifetime we’re giving away to a reader this weekend, this is your last chance to take part.
We will draw one random Normal Sport paid member from our list of just over 500. Incredible odds for a trip that includes two courses that one reader called “two of the true gems in all of world golf!”
You can read more about the trip right here.
You can sign up for membership here.
Thank you again to Seed Golf for partnering on this idea with an assist from Experience Ireland Golf and Travel. We literally could not have done this without them. As always, we appreciate it when our readers support the businesses that support us!
OK, onto the news.
1. I went on a pod this week called Make it. Share it. with some of my friends, and we talked about my story, the Normal Sport story, what the writing life is like and what we’re trying to accomplish at NS. I got pretty personal with my life story and pretty detailed with the future of NS if you’re interested in that kind of thing. You can listen right here.
2. Last week I polled our audience to see what they thought we should start building once we get the newsletter rhythm down.
Here are the unsurprising results.
The commentary on this was good.
Here’s one example that I appreciated …
Trust your gut here. Your instincts have been good so far. This is a wild space, and I can’t believe I pay for a newsletter that’s kind of about golf but makes me think about life in general through a different lens.
Your feedback is appreciated and received. You (hopefully) trust me, but that goes both ways. I also trust those of you who are reading and listening. And while it’s difficult to satisfy each individual person — and we never will — know that I take all of it into account when I consider what we’re doing and what we want to do.
The more Jason and I have talked, the more we lean toward the idea of just making stuff — whether that’s books, pod, whatever — that we want to exist and that we ourselves would love.
I don’t know if that’s the right path, but recently this intense optimization of … the entire world has felt exhausting to me. I was considering that this week when I saw this dystopian pic of Bryan Johnson, the man who doesn’t want to die.
Like, what are we doing?
You listen to all these business pods and see all these Instagrammers who are like “Here are the 129 levels to your business funnel, and here’s how to commoditize your soul so that you can carve out your place in the content world!”
Or, idk man, I think I just want to build cool stuff in a world that I love.
That’s all we wanted when we started Normal Sport, and your suggestions and commentary help us with that directionally. So thank you!
3. In terms of golf! One thing that got a bit glossed over was Rory’s recent quote about how SSG — which, remember, invested up to $3 billion in the PGA Tour — views golf.
They want to see all the best players compete against each other more often. They also -- I think they want to own and operate more of their own tournaments. I would say they'd probably like to see it -- I'd probably say they would like to see it transition more to like a Formula 1 global model a little bit more.
But that's a very hard thing to do. Like there's been a lot of research and projections done on that, and if they went to that global model straightaway, I think that would probably cost the Tour about 200 million a year just in terms of the media rights are very U.S. centered.
You have to work through that. It's a complicated thing, but there's no reason why you can't bring the media rights-holders back to the table and try to figure something out.
Rory | Feb. 12 at Torrey
That’s the number I’ve been looking for. That $200 million. That’s a big loss. Could you make up for it over the next 10 years? I personally think so, and I love the idea of golf being played globally (even if it does not benefit me personally), but I also understand the reluctance to, you know, lose $200 million a year based on one decision.
This post will continue for Normal Sport members below, and includes …
A golf confession from me.
How golf can embrace the 4 Nations event.
A Timothy Chalamet-KVV comp?
Welcome to the members-only portion of this Thursday’s newsletter. I hope you both enjoy it and find it to be valuable to your golf and/or personal life.
Thank you, as always for supporting Normal Sport.
4. Related (!): (and perhaps as a confession) I did not watch the Mexico Open. And to be honest, there’s no reason to have the Mexico Open as a PGA Tour event. Or at least as a Tour event that counts toward the same year-end goal as the Bay Hill and the Memorial. They’re just such different things, and the fact that they are part of the same league is absolutely preposterous.
5. I, like many of you, got very intrigued by the 4 Nations hockey event, which drew nearly 10 million people to its USA-Canada final.
My question: Why did so many people care about something that seemingly just got … made up out of thin air?
Here’s the Athletic.
Jack Eichel is excited for the opportunity to represent the United States.
“Listen, when you put guys in that situation and you have your country on your chest and you’re representing more than you normally do, I think there’s not only a lot of pride that comes with it, but yeah, I think there’s going to be a ton of competitiveness,” Eichel says. “We all want to win right? We want to be the champions of that tournament. We’re going there to win.”
Bruins captain Brad Marchand, who will represent Canada, expects the tournament to be as intense as past Olympic clashes.
“Guys are going to be out for blood. We’re not out there as an exhibition match,” he says. “It doesn’t matter how quick it gets thrown together, or who’s involved — when you put that Canada jersey on or U.S., whatever it is, you’re going to leave it all on the ice.”
The Athletic
This intrigues me as it relates to golf. And while this is not breaking news, it does seem like country-on-country competition is historically undefeated as a format.
In light of that, I thought my old colleague Patrick McDonald had a wonderful idea in his newsletter last week.
In lieu of the P Cup, we roll out the World Cup — we can workshop that name we don’t need this to be problematic from the start …
Thirty-two teams of two will make up the field, and those 32 teams will be split up into eight different groups from which two will emerge from a round robin style match play format.
The format in the group stage will be four-ball, best ball, whatever you want to call it. Each team will play three matches and if there is a tie in the standings then a sudden death playoff will be required.
From 32 teams, we are now down to 16 teams in a single-elimination bracket where the format is no longer four-ball, but foursomes (i.e. alternate shot).
You play it out from there.
Status Update
Me reading that.
I could not possibly be more in. I think it solves two Presidents Cup problems.
It feels weird if you’re Korean or Australian to root for … the World.
The Americans are the only team that ever wins.
Team golf rules. Country vs. country team golf is not something we’ve ever seen (or at least not since I’ve been covering the game). And in a golf world obsessed with money, this feels like an incredible reprieve.
6. This right here is certainly one way to look at the PGA Tour-LIV negotiations.
There are certainly conversations flying around that the White House meeting was perhaps not as rosy as it was presented in the aftermath. Trump humorously noted that the Tour-LIV deal is “much more complicated” than Russia-Ukraine, and even though that was clearly tongue in cheek (I hope), it sometimes does feel like that on paper.
The Tour is in a weird spot, though, which is not acknowledged by Reilly. The Tour is not only (rightly) concerned about its own business interests, but it is also — as the preeminent league in men’s pro golf — looked at as a custodian of the game.
That sounds saccharine, but on a week to week basis, it’s also kind of true. And what is best for big-G golf is not necessarily what’s best for the Tour. I don’t sympathize with how a lot of this has gone, but I definitely sympathize with that part of things from the Tour’s perspective.
7. I absolutely loved this from Timothy Chalamat on not being ashamed of wanting to be great.
Speaking of cringe and greatness, we love the subtle outfit shout-out to Tim Heidecker
And I thought of something KVV wrote this week for NLU. He was talking about a conversation he witnessed between his daughters and their friends.
One of the girls mentioned a boy who was particularly cringe, a bit of a try hard, and I immediately felt a twinge of sympathy for this boy. But then my daughter’s best friend, Emerson, dropped a nugget of life wisdom that was so profound, it made me chuckle.
“Bro, to be cringe is to live free.”
NLU
To walk without shame or fear toward something meaningful in your work is truly a wonderful, freeing place to be.
8. I interviewed photographer Jeff Marsh last week, and this was the bit from our conversation that stood out to me the most.
KP: This can be golf related, but it doesn't have to be. What's one underrated daily habit that most people rarely participate in?
Jeff: The one thing I do, whether I'm playing or shooting, every single day that I'm on a golf course, I will lay down somewhere on the grass. If I'm playing, it might only be for two minutes before I have to get up and hit a shot. But even before or after the round, a lot of times I'll take my shoes off and I'll literally just lay down. I've got ADD so I'm a squirrel in a way.
I don't usually warm up for a golf round because I'm running around with a camera or saying hi to people or whatever. And so that's one thing that I've really been intentional on putting into practice. I just look up at the sky, watch the clouds or whatever and just try to slow my world down because it's just our world is still freaking fast now.
Normal Sport Newsletter No. 160
That’s beautiful, and it gets at part of the reason why I love golf.
9. I pulled this quote from Patrick O’Shaughnessy. He was not the one who said the quote, but it’s a bit unclear who did. Regardless, it rattled me.
I might get the best conversationalists are truly curious about the vivid interiority of another person tattooed on my body somewhere.
It is truly aspirational to be enamored with the vivid interiority of another person. Wow.
Thank you for reading until the end.
You’re a complete and total sicko for reading a golf newsletter that is 2,149 words long.
Here’s to our next 500.
Issue No. 162 | February 27, 2025
Hello,
The Masters starts 42 days from today.
Let’s jump in.
Today’s newsletter is presented by Seed Golf. If you somehow haven’t heard me going on and on and on about the Ireland golf trip of a lifetime we’re giving away to a reader this weekend, this is your last chance to take part.
We will draw one random Normal Sport paid member from our list of just over 500. Incredible odds for a trip that includes two courses that one reader called “two of the true gems in all of world golf!”
You can read more about the trip right here.
You can sign up for membership here.
Thank you again to Seed Golf for partnering on this idea with an assist from Experience Ireland Golf and Travel. We literally could not have done this without them. As always, we appreciate it when our readers support the businesses that support us!
OK, onto the news.
1. I went on a pod this week called Make it. Share it. with some of my friends, and we talked about my story, the Normal Sport story, what the writing life is like and what we’re trying to accomplish at NS. I got pretty personal with my life story and pretty detailed with the future of NS if you’re interested in that kind of thing. You can listen right here.
2. Last week I polled our audience to see what they thought we should start building once we get the newsletter rhythm down.
Here are the unsurprising results.
The commentary on this was good.
Here’s one example that I appreciated …
Trust your gut here. Your instincts have been good so far. This is a wild space, and I can’t believe I pay for a newsletter that’s kind of about golf but makes me think about life in general through a different lens.
Your feedback is appreciated and received. You (hopefully) trust me, but that goes both ways. I also trust those of you who are reading and listening. And while it’s difficult to satisfy each individual person — and we never will — know that I take all of it into account when I consider what we’re doing and what we want to do.
The more Jason and I have talked, the more we lean toward the idea of just making stuff — whether that’s books, pod, whatever — that we want to exist and that we ourselves would love.
I don’t know if that’s the right path, but recently this intense optimization of … the entire world has felt exhausting to me. I was considering that this week when I saw this dystopian pic of Bryan Johnson, the man who doesn’t want to die.
Like, what are we doing?
You listen to all these business pods and see all these Instagrammers who are like “Here are the 129 levels to your business funnel, and here’s how to commoditize your soul so that you can carve out your place in the content world!”
Or, idk man, I think I just want to build cool stuff in a world that I love.
That’s all we wanted when we started Normal Sport, and your suggestions and commentary help us with that directionally. So thank you!
3. In terms of golf! One thing that got a bit glossed over was Rory’s recent quote about how SSG — which, remember, invested up to $3 billion in the PGA Tour — views golf.
They want to see all the best players compete against each other more often. They also -- I think they want to own and operate more of their own tournaments. I would say they'd probably like to see it -- I'd probably say they would like to see it transition more to like a Formula 1 global model a little bit more.
But that's a very hard thing to do. Like there's been a lot of research and projections done on that, and if they went to that global model straightaway, I think that would probably cost the Tour about 200 million a year just in terms of the media rights are very U.S. centered.
You have to work through that. It's a complicated thing, but there's no reason why you can't bring the media rights-holders back to the table and try to figure something out.
Rory | Feb. 12 at Torrey
That’s the number I’ve been looking for. That $200 million. That’s a big loss. Could you make up for it over the next 10 years? I personally think so, and I love the idea of golf being played globally (even if it does not benefit me personally), but I also understand the reluctance to, you know, lose $200 million a year based on one decision.
This post will continue for Normal Sport members below, and includes …
A golf confession from me.
How golf can embrace the 4 Nations event.
A Timothy Chalamet-KVV comp?
Normal Sport is supported by 500+ sickos who can’t get enough. By becoming a member, you will receive the following.
• The satisfaction of helping us establish our business.
• Access to the entirety of our Thursday newsletters (like this one).
• Entry into giveaways like our Ireland trip.
• All behind-the-paywall coverage from major championship weeks.
• First dibs on merch, like the Seamus head cover we’re dropping soon.
By clicking below to join the Normie Club (still testing that name), you will have a front row seat to what we’re building. Like a Spieth round, it won’t always be pretty, but — unlike a Reed round — we promise it will always be honest and earnest.
