The sixth and final TGL franchise, at long last, is here. It will be called Jupiter Links Golf Club, and will be owned in part by Tiger Woods, who will be the leading player on the team as well.
The team name was officially announced Tuesday in the latest of what has become an announcement spree for the mixed-reality league, but it was made clear in trademark filings as early as October 25. What was newly announced Tuesday was that Woods is not alone in the ownership group.
Jupiter Links GC will be owned by TGR Ventures, Woods’ parent company, as well as David Blitzer, a managing partner of Harris Blitzer Sports and Entertainment, which owns the Philadelphia 76ers and New Jersey Devils, among other pro sports teams. Blitzer’s investment is a personal one, rather than an investment made by the Harris Blitzer company, though many of his sports ownerships take place alongside Josh Harris, his co-chairman.
The two were part of the group that recently purchased the Washington Commanders for just north of $6 billion. Considering Blitzer’s part ownership of the Cleveland Guardians, he is among the few people who can claim an ownership stake in teams from the NFL, the NBA, the NHL and the MLB, and is a partner with Crystal Palace Football Club from the Premier League.
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As has become clear from six TGL team announcements and six ownership groups — from Arthur Blank in Atlanta to Steve Cohen in New York to Marc Lasry in the Bay Area — figures that own franchises in major American sports are happy to buy in to the TGL, which begins two months from now on Jan. 9. But there remains much to be learned about these investments.
We do not know what they are worth, nor do we know what previously non-existent franchises are being valued at. In Blitzer’s case, it would be fair to expect that Tiger Woods’ affiliation makes the Jupiter team’s value greater than any other in the league.
As for his interest in the TGL entity, rather than the quotes shared in a press release, a much more charismatic Blitzer took part in a 30-minute roundtable just last month at the Invest in Sports seminar hosted by Sportico. The roundtable’s title: Building a Growing Portfolio.
Though these seminars often trade in veiled language, as the managers of billion-dollar deals are keen to never misstep on a money-making endeavor, Blitzer did volunteer some intriguing thoughts as it came to a close.
“We tend to spend — not all our time — but most of our time in these discussions talking about the big, major sports leagues, okay?” Blitzer said. “I just want to make the point that I started earlier … there’s a lot more than baseball, basketball, football, hockey and soccer, right?
“We’ve got softball and field hockey and we’ve got volleyball. These things I think people underestimate. I was blown away when I saw 92,000 fans at the University of Nebraska’s volleyball game a couple weeks ago. There was a women’s soccer match — I think it was at Barcelona’s stadium — that got 90-something thousand people … There’s just a much bigger world out there is all I’m saying than just the major leagues.”
