Golf is ‘in a Great Place,’ Greg Norman Tells Palm Beach Audience
Courtesy of Jodie Wagner & Palm Beach Daily News
World Golf Hall of Famer and businessman Greg Norman told a Palm Beach audience that the growing amount of private investment in golf is good for the sport.
During an appearance at the Society of the Four Arts, Norman told moderator Steve Sands, a golf host and announcer for NBC Sports and the Golf Channel, that the sport was in “a great place” thanks to the influx of private equity.
“Private equity now has true value in the world of sport,” Norman said. “It’s happening all around the world. It’s happening in cricket, in Australia and in India. It’s happening in other places. I’m just so proud of the fact that that’s happened to golf, where billions of dollars are being moved into the game of golf because of private equity.”
Norman, known as “The Great White Shark” discussed golf, business, and philanthropy with Sands, who also took questions from the audience. Their wide-ranging discussion was part of the Esther B. O’Keeffe Speakers Series.
“It’s an honor to be sitting here,” Norman, an Australia native, told the audience at the start of the discussion. “I’ve lived in this community in the Palm Beach area now, and in Martin County for nearly 40 years, so I’ve seen this place evolve.”
The two-time British Open champion, who lives in Palm Beach Gardens, is chairman and CEO of the Greg Norman Company, a global enterprise spanning golf course design, real estate, apparel, wine, and hospitality.
He also previously served as the CEO and commissioner of LIV Golf, a Saudi-backed men’s professional golf tour launched in 2022.
Golf was a central topic throughout Norman’s talk. While highlighting the impact of private equity in the sport, he noted that Tomorrow’s Golf League (TGL), a tech-driven, team-based golf league founded by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy in partnership with TMRW Sports, has flourished as a result.
The league, which is based at the SoFi Center at Palm Beach State College in Palm Beach Gardens, recently wrapped up its first season.
“The TGL is great,” Norman said. “Everybody asks me what I think of the TGL, and I say it’s fantastic. It’s more stuff, more golf, it’s more innovation. It’s taking things to a new level. It’s catering to a new market. It’s doing this, doing that. There’s no angst or animosity from my perspective. It’s just magnificent now people are seeing the value that golf can give them.”
Norman addressed other golf- and business-related topics during Tuesday’s discussion:
How did you become the "Great White Shark?"
“1981. I was playing in my first U.S. Masters. I had the lead after 36 holes. In those days, I had really long, blond hair, and I was a really aggressive-style golfer. The media didn’t know who I was. So I go to the media room, and they asked what I did and where I came from. I said I grew up in Australia, in Queensland. I grew up on the Great Barrier Reef, and I swam with sharks. They all looked at me like, ‘Who are you?’ The next morning, the Atlanta Constitution had (the headline) ‘Great White Shark leads U.S. Masters.’ So the great white shark stuck.”
How important is it, when you're the best player in the world, to understand the responsibility of that, and not just look after your own career but also look after the sport in general when you're sitting on top of it?
“It’s hugely important. You can never forget the support mechanism that happens out there. It’s not the support mechanism within your team or your organization, it’s the support mechanism of the game of golf and where it is. So I took it upon myself at the time to say because of my responsibility of being the best player in the world, to go and play exhibition matches. Did we get paid? Of course we got paid. We’re professionals. We have the right to earn a living. But I exhausted myself going around the world. I would leave from Florida, fly to Japan, play an exhibition match, get on a plane and come back the next day, just because of the magnitude of what it represented to the individuals and those nations.”
See the original article from the Pam Beach daily news at https://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/story/news/2025/03/31/greg-norman-to-palm-beach-audience-golf-is-in-a-great-place/82640064007/.
