Celebrity Golf Tournament in Las Vegas: Golf Pros and F1 Drivers to Battle It Out [Report]
It seems like we're in for an exciting event in Las Vegas! A golf tournament, featuring some of the biggest names in the PGA Tour, going head-to-head with formula one drivers, is currently being planned by Netflix. The news comes from a recent article in the Wall Street Journal.
While no official dates or venues have been revealed yet, it's speculated that the event will likely take place between October 16 and November 15, 2023. Both golf's best players and formula one drivers are expected to be in Las Vegas during these dates - the former for the Shriners Children's Open at TPC Summerlin, and the latter for the Las Vegas Grand Prix.
The tournament will be attended by celebrities from "Formula 1 Drive to Survive" and "Full Swing", two popular Netflix sports documentaries that offer a behind-the-scenes look at racing and golf. This would be Netflix's first foray into sports livestreaming.
Making a Profit
Organising their own event could save Netflix a fortune. They wouldn't have to spend billions on licensing deals with professional sports leagues, something they've been struggling with as of late.
Netflix co-CEO, Ted Sarandos, told the Wall Street Journal that they want to make a profit, and their current strategies for bidding on sports rights haven't been working. Last year, Netflix lost the race to ESPN for the rights to livestream Formula 1 racing for the next three years. Additionally, they considered bidding on rights for tennis and cycling events.
To test the waters, Netflix dabbled in live streaming earlier this year with a Chris Rock comedy special and a "Love is Blind" reunion episode. However, the latter didn't go as smoothly as planned with a programming outage affecting viewers for over an hour, resulting in an apology from Netflix and the decision to rerelease the event the following day.
