US golf’s elite PGA Tour has strengthened its leadership team by adding experienced media executive Ryan Holcomb as the organization’s senior vice president and head of original content.
In the role, Holcomb will take responsibility for developing and driving the tour’s content beyond live competitions, including through its PGA Tour Studios, whose content team is behind several original and co-produced documentary series, such as Full Swing, Chasing Sunday, and Truth or Putt.
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He will report to Luis Goicouria, executive vice president and general manager of PGA Tour Studios.
PGA Tour Studios sits within the tour’s enterprise operations division, led by its president Andy Weitz, alongside marketing, technology, investor relations, and board administration.
In a statement, Holcomb said: “The PGA Tour provides an unmatched opportunity to tell stories that deepen the connection between fans and players, while highlighting the incredible competition that defines this sport.
“I’m excited to help build on that foundation by developing original content that showcases the personalities, competition, and culture of golf in new and compelling ways, reaching audiences wherever they engage with sports and entertainment.”
Holcomb most recently served as head of development at Box to Box Films, the studio behind the infamous Formula 1: Drive to Survive series, which transformed the sport’s appeal, and Faceoff: Inside the NHL.
He also previously worked in content at World Surf League, Excel Sports Management, STX Entertainment, and Lionsgate.
Holcomb’s appointment comes as the PGA Tour looks towards its next era of commercial growth and aims to replicate the success of Formula 1’s use of non-live content to boost the competition’s visibility, capture new fans, and secure a new broadcast agreement.
Last month, the PGA Tour hired former NFL executive William Deng as its new senior vice president of media strategy to head up the organization’s crucial upcoming media rights negotiation.
Though the PGA Tour's current media rights agreements expire in 2030, and the next cycle is not expected to go to market until 2028, those negotiations could be some of the most pivotal in tour history.
The 2027 PGA Tour campaign will be the first with a reshaped two-tier competitive structure that will institute promotion and relegation between two event tracks: a top-tier elite player track competing at prominent, high-purse events, and a second-tier ‘Challenger Series’ from which top performers may gain promotion to the top-tier ‘Championship Series’.
This effectively makes the Championship Series a potential money spinner for the PGA Tour, with a condensed field of the very top golfers in the world competing against each other with more regularity, naturally making for a valuable and, potentially, highly sought-after broadcast product.
With several other sports properties also going to market around the same time, including possibly the NFL, which is reportedly pushing to renegotiate its agreements before a 2030 broadcaster opt-out, the PGA Tour will need to battle to ensure it maximizes the value of its rights in a highly competitive landscape, presenting a big challenge for Deng in his new role.
Deng is the second prominent NFL executive to join the PGA Tour in recent years, after, of course, the tour’s chief executive Brian Rolapp, who will soon step into the role of commissioner.
Rolapp will succeed Jay Monahan to become only the fifth commissioner in tour history on January 1, 2027, having only become the first-ever PGA Tour chief executive in June 2025.
Prior to joining the PGA Tour, Rolapp had spent over 20 years at the NFL, becoming its chief media and business officer in 2017, making Deng a long-time colleague.
