After Serena Williams Jumps Onboard to Aid Tiger Woods Against $3,000,000,000 Shock, Will Lewis Hamilton Follow His “Best Friend” to the Same?

The sports world has seen some of the biggest rivalries of all time—Roger Federer versus Rafael Nadal, Ayrton Senna versus Alain Prost, Joe Frazier versus Muhammad Ali, LA Lakers versus Boston Celtics, the PGA Tour versus LIV Golf. But wait, are PGA and LIV really rivals anymore now that they’ve formed a $3,000,000,000 merger? The golf community was taken by storm when the two organizations—who were supposedly sworn enemies—announced their merger on 6th June 2023. Since Saudi-backed LIV Golf came into the picture, Tiger Woods has been apprehensive about it.

In 2022, he and Rory McIlroy started a joint venture called TMRW Sports, and F1 star Lewis Hamilton became its first external investor. Tennis queen and Hamilton’s best friend Serena Williams quickly followed suit, and the agency now has athletes from the sporting world investing in it left, right, and center.

One of the first things TMRW Sports did was conceptualize a golf league called TGL in partnership with the PGA Tour. Even though the inspiration behind TGL and its partner have now merged, it is set to commence in 2024, regardless of further developments in the PGA-LIV merger. Keeping the merger’s developments aside, TGL saw one of its most significant developments recently—Serena Williams just bought the first of six franchises in TGL. This move begs the question: Will Lewis Hamilton follow suit and buy a franchise too?

The PGA Tour and LIV Golf story

With a history of over 100 years, the PGA Tour has been organizing professional golf events in the US and North America for as long as anyone can remember. It has a legacy. On the other hand, LIV Golf came into the picture less than two years ago. Backed by the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund, it started luring some of the biggest names in the golf world with big payouts as soon as possible. 

Much to the PGA Tour’s dismay, many players left the tour and its legacy to participate in LIV’s events for a bigger paycheck instead. Phil Mickelson was one of the biggest names to do so, and he became the face of LIV as soon as he did. As and when players followed his footsteps, the PGA decided to suspend all of them from its tour. And the two organizations have been embroiled in antitrust lawsuits since then. Well, up until a week ago, when they decided to merge. But how and why did that even happen?

The two organizations were grappling with serious existential problems—PGA was spending millions of dollars in legal fees, even dipping into its reserves. LIV was facing viewership problems because money was never the problem for it. While PGA was amassing upwards of two million viewers for every event, LIV struggled to reach even half a million. 

Was this a question of mutual benefit? Well, if that was the case, only time can tell if the merger actually worked.

The TGL Golf League

While PGA and LIV were fighting it out in the courts, golf legend Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy were conceptualizing a masterpiece of their own. In 2022, they launched their joint venture, TMRW Sports (a cool way to spell ‘tomorrow,’ but also possibly an acronym for Tiger-McIlroy-Rory-Woods), whose aim is to focus on a progressive approach to sports, media, and entertainment. 

The first event they launched, which is set to start in 2024, is the TGL Golf League. According to TGL itself, “It is an innovative golf league in partnership with the PGA TOUR fusing advanced tech and live action in primetime.” It’ll feature six teams facing off in a custom-built stadium and competing on a virtual course. One of the six teams is the Los Angeles Golf Club, and guess who owns it? Serena Williams.

Serena beat Lewis to the punch in Tiger Woods’ TGL 

Although Lewis Hamilton was the first person outside the golfing world to invest in TMRW Sports, Serena Williams and her husband Alexis Ohanian and sister Venus Williams just bought the first franchise in the TGL League. When Ohanian was asked about the purchase, he said, as quoted by onmanorama.com, “I knew I wanted to do this team, and I knew I wanted to bring Serena in, so I was like, babe come on …” It didn’t take much to convince Serena because she’s now the owner of a golf team!

Williams started taking an interest in golf about a year ago. And that’s when Lewis Hamilton decided to invest in TMRW Sports. Being best friends and all, she and Ohanian invested too, quickly realizing how great the idea was. Now that Serena has bought a team, will Lewis stay on par with her and buy a team as well?

Will Lewis Hamilton buy a franchise in TGL?

Now that Serena has bought the LA Golf Club, will Hamilton decide it’s time he owns a sporting franchise too? Given how he looks up to Tiger Woods (and Serena) and was one of the first people to support his new venture, the move to buy a franchise in TGL might sound very appealing to him. Hamilton might just become the second person to own a golfing franchise. Who knows, maybe it’s already in the works.

If Hamilton takes the plunge, the sporting world might witness a rivalry it never thought possible—Serena Williams versus Lewis Hamilton. And who wouldn’t want to witness that?

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