Sky Sports And The Masters: Are Golf's Governing Bodies About To Cut The Cable Cord?

In the week Sky Sports has introduced a dedicated golf channel here in the UK for its extensive golf offerings, we learned they have lost the PGA Championship rights held since 1992.

Now Ben Rumsby reports exclusively for The Telegraph that Sky did not get is Masters contract renewed, while weekend and highlight rightsholder BBC did following the Masters.

This latest news, while not immediately affecting American viewers, suggest we are on the verge of seeing a major shake up in how golf tournaments are seen.

It's hard to see where The Masters goes except either to BBC for four days or to a streaming/app only version. Or, dare I say, testing out a pay-per-view model.

Could this also be the case for the PGA of America in the long term? Perhaps, though it's still a head-scratcher to not have their UK broadcast rights settled a month out from their championship.

We've seen signs in recent years that golf's leaders believe they will have to create very different ways to reach audiences going forward, but given that golf fans tend to be five years behind on most trends, might some of their sponsors think they're getting ahead? Or is this the perfect time to test out new models on a relatively small but sophisticated market? Is that enough rhetorical questions for a Friday?