The worlds of golf and social media recurrently combine, however may we see an influencer get the chance to tee it up in a PGA Tour event this season?
The PGA Tour’s inaugural Myrtle Beach Classic takes place on the Dunes Golf and Beach Club in South Carolina from May 9-12, stay on Sky Sports, with the match that includes one-of-a-kind qualifying event to fill one to the spots within the subject.
Organisers have launched “The Q at Myrtle Beach”, an 18-hole competitors on Monday March 4, with the event seeing eight of the game’s most distinguished golf content material creators and eight professionals compete for one PGA Tour exemption.
All skilled and newbie opponents meet PGA Tour rules for sponsor exemptions, which require a USGA handicap of 0.0 or higher, with all of them eligible to tee it up on the PGA Tour ought to they qualify.
The influencer-half of the sphere contains George Bryan of Bryan Bros Golf, Luke Kwon of Good Good Golf and former Good Good members Micah Morris and Grant Horvat, whose have big presences on YouTube and TikTook respectively.
Nick Stubbe, higher generally known as Fat Perez from the YouTube profile Bob Does Sports, seems, as does UK-based golf influencer Peter Finch and journalist Dan Rapaport.
A 90-minute video concerning the event might be launched on Play Golf Myrtle Beach’s YouTube web page on April 23, with creators then posting content material on their respective channels documenting their experiences.
A very good transfer or a advertising gimmick?
The determination to have such a restricted qualifying event divided opinion on social media, though bunkered.co.uk editor Michael McEwan instructed the Sky Sports Golf podcast why he helps the PGA Tour’s transfer.
“It’s an absolutely brilliant idea,” McEwan mentioned. “They’re not taking a spot away from anybody. There’s a certain number of places in the field and there’s always only a certain number of players who get in through their rankings or whatever.
“There’s usually a couple of spaces put aside for tournament invites. It’s the same principle as the Ryder Cup – if you don’t get one of the automatic spaces, you can’t very well complain when you don’t get one of the wildcards.
“There’s a means to get in, and that is by taking part in constantly good golf. That will get you up the standings and you do not want to fear about invitations to anybody else, you’ll play your means in over a time period, so this isn’t taking anybody’s spot.
“It shows a bit of savvy from the PGA Tour. They have clocked the fact that YouTube golf has sky-rocketed in terms of interest. There are people who have got YouTube channels, solely about golf, who have bigger followings than nearly every other professional golfer out there.
“The tour wants eyeballs, the tour wants to convey a brand new viewers as a result of it has been threatened in a means that it has by no means been threatened earlier than, so this to me looks like a stroke of genius.
“I think it’s a great idea. It’s no different to Tony Romo getting a spot or Steph Curry getting a spot. All the guys are very capable golfers, so good luck to each and every one of them.”
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