Strike 3: Other than winning baseball, what’s missing from Colorado’s permanent summer sports calendar?

Our own professional golf event, perhaps?

This August we get another one-time taste when the PGA tour returns to Castle Pines for the BMW Championship. It will be the second time the event has been held here, the last being 10 years ago at Cherry Hills. The pros will take on the altitude for the first time in a decade. This will be a big deal, with the BMW Championship being the second of three “Fed Ex Cup” playoff events that promises to bring some very big names with it.

This second BMW event will also be just the second PGA tour event held in our state since 2006.

Yes, we’ve certainly had some big time golf tournaments around here in the past. Three US Opens and three PGA championships. The US Women’s Open. And of course “The International” golf tournament at Castle Pines, held from 1986 through 2006 before it was disbanded. The International was a rebel of sorts. While it was an official PGA Tour event, the event was the only one to use the “modified stableford” scoring system (a points system that rewards aggressive play more than it punishes mistakes) rather than the standard “stroke play,” under-par/over-par model used pretty much universally everywhere else. (The tour did have a match play event that was discontinued after the last event in 2023, and the Stableford system is used in a tournament in Nevada these days.)

The International was an outlier, unable to attract Tiger Woods and some of the other big names partly due to scheduling/sponsorship and partly to the impact of the elevation and the scoring system, which some players had a problem with. Frustrated tournament organizers finally just threw in the golf towel.

But now, there might just be a better fit for Colorado: The LIV golf tour.

Outlier, meet Rebel.

LIV golf is the rebel tour, the one that allows players to wear – gasp – shorts to play in during the hot weather, and encourages fun for players and spectators. And the organizers – funded by the Saudi government – have cash. Lots of it. Blood money perhaps? There are lots of folks concerned and even deeply offended by the influence and impact the Saudis have over the tour. A government that has been accused of participating in the murder of a journalist, numerous human rights abuses and other shady dealings has no place in American sports, they argue.

Whether those objections are justified or not, LIV golf lives on, luring prominent PGA tour stars like Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau and many more with bloated guaranteed contracts. There is still a “peace treaty” sort of collaboration in the works between the PGA Tour and the Saudi Public Investment Fund – the source of the revenue behind LIV – although nothing is formal yet. LIV players remain eligible to participate in the major tournament like the Masters and the upcoming PGA, where Koepka, who just won the LIV event in Singapore, will defend his title. That is, of course dependent, on their status in the world golf rankings or exemptions into majors.

The best news for Colorado golf fans is that merger or no merger, the LIV tour is poised to continue to grow on its own. While they play events all over the world, they also play in places like Nashville and West Virginia. Are those more attractive host spots than say, Castle Pines? What about the Colorado Golf Club in Parker, or the Broadmoor? Maybe the new TPC Colorado course west of Berthoud?

Up and down the front range, we have an undisputed and wildly successful sports market here. LIV golf and Colorado golf would be a perfect merger.