Fenway Sports Group (FSG), the owners of baseball’s Boston Red Sox and English Premier League soccer giants Liverpool, have added a Boston-based team that will play in the new innovative and tech-infused TMRW Golf League (TGL) next year.
FSG was one of the initial investors in TMRW Sports, the parent company of TGL founded by golf stars Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy (in partnership with the PGA Tour), in October 2022. It has now stepped up its level of involvement in the stadium-based project by taking the second slot (to cover the New England region as well as Boston) from the six available teams.
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The Boston outfit joins Los Angeles Golf Club, which was announced as the first TGL team on June 8 and is owned by iconic tennis stars Venus Williams and her sister Serena. TGL’s inaugural season begins in January 2024, with the competition aiming to combine technology and live action at a specially-designed venue in Florida, US.
In a joint statement, FSG’s principal owner John Henry and chair Tom Werner said: “We are excited for this new journey as one of the six inaugural TGL teams in honor of a city whose love and passion for sports is unparalleled. Through this new, tech-focused version of the game, New England sports fans will soon have a team of world-class PGA Tour players to cheer for and redefine for this community what it means to play the game in the modern era.”
A competitive bid process has been taking place to allocate ownership rights.
An official team name and further details will be unveiled for the Boston side later this year. Each TGL team will contain three PGA Tour players.
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By GlobalDataAside from the Red Sox (bought in 2002) and Liverpool (2010), FSG is also the owning company behind the Pittsburgh Penguins (2021), from ice hockey’s NHL.
Mike McCarley, chief executive at TGL, added: “Fenway Sports Group has been a believer in TMRW Sports from our first conversations and it’s fitting to welcome them as the next TGL ownership group with their acquisition of the Boston team.
“The team at FSG is uniquely positioned to help build an expanding community for fans of golf and embracing that audience is foundational to the Boston’s TGL team’s mission.”
The stadium-based TGL format will have a “data-rich, virtual course complete with a tech-infused, short-game complex” and a “high-energy, greenside fan experience with every shot live within a two-hour, primetime televised match.”
Teams will compete in head-to-head match play across 15 regular season matches followed by semi-finals and finals matches.
So far, players to have committed to TGL include Woods and Mcllroy, as well as names such as Jon Rahm, Justin Thomas, Matt Fitzpatrick, and Justin Rose.
Along with the Williams sisters, the Los Angeles team is co-owned by Alexis Ohanian, co-founder of the social media site Reddit and founder of venture capital firm Seven Seven Six. Ohanian is also a founding investor of Angel City FC, of US soccer’s top-tier National Women's Soccer League, and married to Serena.
Woods and McIlroy unveiled TMRW, alongside McCarley, in August 2022, and announced initial plans for TGL the same month.
Last week, TMRW announced a trio of senior executive appointments to bolster its leadership team.
The company added Jarrett Dube as chief marketing officer (CMO), Jeff Neubarth as vice president of media production, and Ashley Chalk as vice president of global partnerships.
