re: Adidas drops DJ and Sergio

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plus they both married a lot of money

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Sergio married into money? Deets?

Sergio married Marty Akins daughter, Angela.

Marty did well as a trial lawyer, but he just also happens to be the Uncle of one Drew Brees.

Sergio & Angela live in Austin now, believe in Spanish Oaks, as I know he’s a member there.

I don't have a dog in the PGA / LIV fight, and honestly don't understand the PGA (or LIV) fanboys. That said, it's not 100% accurate to say Adidas dropped Johnson. Seems like he asked out of the contract and Adidas was probably happy to oblige. There are times when both parties are happy to move on. If the article on ESPN is to be believed, it looks like he wanted an out so that he could leverage an equity stake and make more money. His Adidas contract was a 15 year $150 million contract, easy to believe with the money LIV is throwing around that he could make that up without much effort.

Adidas doesn't own Taylormade anymore, so that relationship still seems to be intact.

Here are some quotes from the article --

"Johnson, 38, is an equity owner and captain of the 4Aces GC. To build the team's brand identity and franchise value, according to the sources, Johnson believes wearing the team's logo on his shirt is important."

"As good as the relationship with Adidas has been, it just didn't fit in his plans," one of the sources said. "A major part of starting a team is establishing a brand identity and building that brand. The primary asset is the shirt."

"DJ needed a clean break to start his team. He's grateful to Adidas for letting him out of the deal."

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some point the answer for everything bad that happens to a liv player can’t be “who cares, money “.

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For those guys, it really can.

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Yes, because sponsoring an industry backed by the worlds most wealthy country is bad for business.

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I guess that’s why EasyPost is their biggest on course sponsor so far?

I truly thought LIV would be more popular than this. But I guess we should have known. Americans never will and never have cared about other startups regardless if they have good players

I mean Jim Kelly, Steve young, and Hershel and others couldn’t make another football league work

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Where is adidas spending the money instead?

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They aren't. The Kanye fiasco set them back quite a bit, and I am taking an educated guess that they're cutting marketing expenses a fair bit. DJ and Sergio were probably their two most expensive golf ambassadors. Those two are now playing in a league that struggled to get 6 figure audiences last year, so the ROI is difficult to justify. I would guess they approached DJ and Sergio about renegotiating their contracts, and the equity investment is a light cover to let them both off. They haven't dropped Niemann yet, as a counterpoint.

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Many of you like to attack LIV but really do companies make enough money off the advertising these days with so many more companies competing that are able to provide a better product with direct marketing.

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Who are you referencing here? Even the likes of Bonobos and Travis Matthew and the like do some advertising. There is no doubt that Callaway has benefit tremendously from luring Rahm over a year+ ago, as an OEM example.

This is, however, the sort of thing that was likely built into Sergio and DJ's contracts with LIV - there was some risk premium built in that they would lose sponsorship dollars, hence the huge up front offer.

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I truly thought LIV would be more popular than this. But I guess we should have known. Americans never will and never have cared about other startups regardless if they have good players

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Not sure that LIV is necessarily going after the US market exclusively. They are signing a lot of international players, I think with the intention of trying to be the big dog in all the places that the PGA doesn't have reach while being a solid second in the US. Now, I don't have their business model in hand, but their decisions seem to align with that, to become to world tour and a competitive US tour, or at least a series of special events rather than a tour in the typical sense.

Other Australians, like Cam Smith, as well as South African players will most likely end up with LIV, just because how the PGA basically screwed them and the ability to really ever play in their home country. The Euro tour could easily be eclipsed and the Asian tour as well. Outside of the US it's a wide open market, or at least one that ripe for competition.

What's going to be very interesting is that most of the US based big names have signed contracts that have lengths that pretty much align with their exemptions to the majors. Most have signed anywhere from 2-4 year contracts that unsurprisingly line up with the end of their exemptions. Is LIV using them to jump start the league and then going to rely on the world market? Or does the league just die from talent drain when the contracts dry up.

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They didn’t drop DJ. It was a mutual parting where they let him out of his contract. He wanted his team logo to take the place of the Adidas one.

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Adidas wanted the whole shirt. DJ could not do that.

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Typical uninformed pride post

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Dude is completely unhinged. Not sure I've been more embarrassed for a poster here. Like a combo of oweo and dukkev, just on golf.

I seem to remember the LIV contracts requiring their players to wear LIV branded gear. 4 Aces would fall into that category. I'm thinking the way the LOV contracts were set up forced the Adidas logo off the shirt so Adidas probably wondered why they were paying these guys. Hence, a mutual parting of ways.