The only person happy about all of this is probably Portnoy. Dude is printing money right now. Should there be a II2026 there is going to be even more drama, because it sells, mark my words.
Oh I understand, I was an Archer and Handballplayer. But money was never my motivation but that is a me thing. I don't have to work for the rest of my life and should I have kids, they don't have to work. And don't get me wrong, I agree with you about the character stuff but they are entertainers and business people. They are never as nice in real life. I also don't understand why she did it in the first place, she is rich, her boyfriend is rich, he works for a bank, my family has bank accounts at, since over 100 years.
You saying that "a million is as much as you think it is" tells me that you have never played serious golf with legitimate money on the line. I have played in events with prize pools in the $30-40,000 range. It doesn't matter how much money you have in your investment accounts, you get nervous and your mental game and the feel that runs through your body totally changes when every swing/putt could be the difference in thousands of dollars. Professional golfers get nervous over $20 putts because they don't want to lose to their friend. Your competitive juices get flowing and as much as you want to earn the money, you especially don't want to watch your competitor get to celebrate on the 18th green. If you don't understand that, then you're just not an athlete and you've never played any sport under pressure.
Of course the whole thing is meant for "entertainment." What else would it be? That's literally the sole purpose of any sport we are watching on TV. But the money is real and the golf is real. They were trying to manufacture drama the entire event with Dave throwing extra money around to try to get the players to do something selfish for themselves and risk everything for their team. In the end, they didn't have to manufacture any of this drama because it happened on it's own with obvious and blatant cheating, and then tons of cringey lying to try to cover it up.
Kwon got everything he deserved. A pro golfer sleeping through a 9:30 tee time is inexcusable. He did it the day before for a video shoot with the Bryan brothers....obviously that's not a big deal because it's just a meaningless round for another boring video to fill up the week. But to do it two days in a row...and then other information came out that he has been doing that since he was in college...it just shows what an inconsiderate, spoiled, country club brat he is. He needs his mommy to wake him up and iron his clothes for him. This event had about as much, if not more money on the line than anything he has ever played for on the Asian tour or Korn Ferry. And to play it off like he didn't care showed what a clown he is. This was a team event, and he screwed the other people on his team. They would have easily won that match (had he been on time) and that would have changed everything for the afternoon round.
The online personalities that played in the invitational got exposed for who they truly are...Paige, Malosi, Kwon, and others. When they are on their own youtube channels playing their no-stakes hit-and-giggle golf, they can act and edit their content to paint any type of picture they want. But when they gave up control of the final edit to barstool, and submitted to the fact that there were like 50 cameras capturing everything, we all got to see their true selves. Character isn't determined by how people act when they know people are watching, it's how people act when they think no one is watching. All of that was scummy behavior....from people who portray themselves as happy-go-lucky, innocent, friendly people.