PGA Tour Stengthens Sponsor Platform Ties By Filing Lawsuit Against Sponsor

Garry Smits reports on the lawsuit filed today over Ginn pulling out of their sponsorship obligations. Geese, it's just a Champions Tour event!

The Tour issued a statement to the Times-Union Friday afternoon on the matter. The statement was sent by the Tour's communications department.

"We regret having to take this legal action, but feel we have no other recourse than to try to recover what had been guaranteed to our members through existing agreements with Ginn Companies," the statement said. "We also had no forewarning that Ginn was planning to cancel the 2009 Ginn Championship at Hammock Dunes, and only learned of the decision when the company issued a release late Wednesday. In fact, we had been in discussions with them on possible modifications to the agreement. Until this issue is resolved through the legal process, it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time."

Ryan Julison, senior vice-president for corporate communications for Ginn Resorts, said there would be "no comment on pending litigation."

That's not a very original comeback!

Steve Elling also reports and notes several interesting bits about the suit, including this:

According to the filing, the tour was notified by Ginn president Robert Gidel last August that it was going to cancel its sponsored PGA Tour event, the Ginn sur Mer Classic, after its staging last fall. It also served notice that the March 2009 staging of the Champion's Tour's Ginn Championship at Hammock Beach would be the last for that tournament.

With this week's announcement from Ginn, the Champions event won't happen, either. Interestingly, the Ginn sur Mer ended Nov. 2, which meant that while the tour and Ginn officials were publicly maintaining that no determination had been made on future of the Fall Series tournament, plans were well under way to shut it down.