Terry Duffy – Syndication Server

CME Group CEO moves on from last year’s LPGA leadership misstep to elevate women’s sport even higher

What a difference a year makes.

NAPLES, Fla. – What a difference a year makes. One year ago, CME Group Chairman and CEO Terry Duffy was “exceptionally disappointed” in how events outside the ropes unfolded at the CME Group Tour Championship.

The future of one of the most lucrative events on the LPGA schedule was uncertain after not one player showed up to Duffy’s Tuesday night dinner. Duffy’s beef was more with tour leadership than with the players.

“They better get their act together,” Duffy told Golfweek last year, “because they’re going to lose people like me over stuff like this.”

One year later, Duffy and LPGA commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan were posing together for pictures after a blockbuster announcement that included a purse increase from $7 million to $11 million in 2024 and a first-place prize of $4 million, up from $2 million this year. CME also announced a two-year contract extension. Beginning next year, the tour championship will boast the largest first-place prize in all of women’s sport.

2023 CME Group Tour Championship — CME Group CEO Terry Duffy speaks to the media after announcing a two-year sponsor extension of the CME Group Tour Championship with an increased $11 million purse and record $4 million first-place prize during a news conference at The Ritz-Carlton Naples in Naples, Florida. (Photo: Michael Reaves/Getty Images)

Duffy said he and Marcoux Samaan got together several times throughout the year, and that those conversations helped give him confidence to move forward with the LPGA.

“I think it was more of a breakdown more than anything else,” said Duffy of last year’s drama. “As I said, when communications go bad, a lot of other things can snowball with it. I think we started to see a little bit of that.”

HOW TO WATCH: 2023 CME Group Tour Championship

The format for this year’s Tuesday night festivities was different than last year but LPGA officials reported that every player in the field showed up.

“As Terry said, communication is the key,” said Marcoux Samaan, “and being accountable for things that don’t go perfectly. We had communication right after the incident and we continued during the season. As he said all along, I just wanted to push you guys to be better. We moved on right away and moved on to the future and we moved on to continuing to work together to elevate the tour and elevate our impact.”

This marks the 10th anniversary of the CME Race to the Globe points list, which is used to not only determine the season-ending field, but also who gets a card for next season.

CME first became title sponsor of the LPGA season-ending event in 2011 with a purse of $1.5 million.

For years, Duffy’s efforts as title sponsor have pushed other events on the LPGA – particularly the majors – to raise the bar. But another reason Duffy wants the CME Group Tour Championship to be so lucrative is to ensure that players circle this event on their calendars as a must-make week. And to get here, they might have to tee it up in more events along the way, thus lifting the entire tour.

It’s worth noting, of course, that neither Lexi Thompson nor Lydia Ko are here this week. Both are past champions of this event, with Ko sweeping all the post-season honors last year after winning the title and $2 million prize. Thompson played in only 14 events on the LPGA schedule this season. Ko competed in 20.

More: Notable players missing from this week’s CME Group Tour Championship field

While purses on the LPGA vary wildly, with nine full-field events in 2023 having a purse of $2 million or less compared to major championship purses that are $9 million and $11 million, CME points act as a leveler. Players earn 500 CME points for a victory whether the purse is $1.5 million or $3.5 million. At the majors, players receive 650 points for a victory.

“I am trying to be a catalyst for women’s golf,” said Duffy. “Not against the other sponsors. So if, in fact, they want to up their purses, great. But I don’t think it’s absolutely – and I know Mollie is not going to want to hear me say this – absolutely necessary.

“That’s up to them to decide. The last thing you want to do is chase anybody away.”

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CME set to raise purse to $11 million in 2024, with record winner’s prize of $4 million

The runner-up of next year’s event will receive $1 million. Every competitor will be awarded at least $55,000.

NAPLES, Fla. – Terry Duffy and CME and have once again raised the bar for women’s golf. Beginning in 2024, the LPGA’s season-ending CME Group Tour Championship will offer an $11 million purse and record $4 million winner’s check, the tour has announced.

The runner-up of next year’s event will receive $1 million. Every competitor in the 60-player field will be awarded at least $55,000.

In addition, CME Group has extended its sponsorship of the Tour Championship and Race to the CME Globe through 2025.

“As a long-standing supporter of women in business and sports, CME Group is pleased to continue our partnership with the LPGA to further elevate women’s golf,” CME Group Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Terry Duffy said in a release.

“Beginning next year, the CME Group Tour Championship’s $11 million purse will be the highest on the LPGA Tour, and the $4 million first-place prize will be the largest single prize in women’s sports. Both of these developments will make our event even more exciting for the players and spectators, while bringing more parity to the game.”

This week marks the 10th playing of the CME Group Tour Championship at Tiburon Golf Club. The inaugural Race to the CME Globe points race was in 2014. From 2011-2013, the season-ending event was known as the CME Group Titleholders.

When CME first became a title sponsor in 2011, the purse was $1.5 million. It moved up incrementally until 2019 when it doubled from $2.5 million to $5 million, with the winner earning $1.5 million.

Duffy said back then that he wanted to be a leader. His efforts pushed the LPGA majors – the U.S. Women’s Open in particular – to a higher standard.

This year’s CME purse of $7 million – of which $2 million goes to the winner – is already larger than two LPGA majors: Amundi Evian ($6.5 million) and Chevron Championship ($5.1 million). Next year’s purse of $11 million matches that of the 2023 U.S. Women’s Open. The KPMG Women’s PGA recently upped its purse to $10 million and the AIG Women’s British checked in this year at $9 million, 23 percent higher than last year.

U.S. Women’s Open winner Allisen Corpuz earned $2 million for her victory at Pebble Beach, the same amount the winner will receive this week in Naples.

“CME Group has been pushing the LPGA forward at every step of our evolution since 2011,” said LPGA Commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan, “and with this extension they are once again helping take the LPGA, women’s golf and women’s sports to unprecedented heights.”

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Your 2022 picks: Our top 10 LPGA golf stories (No. 1 is an idea that could get Nelly Korda to the Presidents Cup)

Here’s a look at the top 10 LPGA stories, as clicked on by you.

For the final 10 days of 2022, we’re offering up a snapshot of the top 10 stories from each of Golfweek’s most popular sections, including travel, the PGA and LPGA tours, instruction and amateur golf.

Our esteemed LPGA beat writer Beth Ann Nichols has already given us her perspective on the biggest stories of the year earlier this month.

But to close out the year, we’ve been looking through the numbers and tallying up which stories drew your attention, and we’re now sharing the findings with you. Here’s what we’ve already counted down.

And now here’s a look at the top 10 LPGA stories, as clicked on by you (we should note, the top LPGA post of the year by far was this gallery of Michelle Wie West, but this list doesn’t include photo galleries or money lists):

CME Group CEO ‘exceptionally disappointed’ with LPGA leadership heading into record payday

“I’m concerned about the future of the tour,” said Duffy, who will hand over a $2 million check on Sunday.

NAPLES, Fla. – The seeds of the CME Group Tour Championship began with a pro-am 15 years ago. In those early years, CME Group Chairman and CEO Terry Duffy received note after note from clients who so enjoyed their rounds of golf with LPGA players that they instantly became fans of the tour.

Beginning in 2011, CME began title-sponsoring the LPGA’s year-ending event, eventually integrating the firm’s Global Financial Leadership Conference in Naples, Florida, with the LPGA’s season-ending event at the Ritz-Carlton’s Tiburon Golf Club. This week, Duffy will hand over the biggest check in the history of the women’s game – $2 million. The overall purse of $7 million is the largest on the LPGA outside of the majors (and is bigger than the purses at two of the five majors). The last player in the field of 60 will make $40,000, close to what 10th place made last week.

Former U.S. presidents, secretaries of state and business tycoons have presented at CME’s conference, and for Tuesday night’s dinner, the firm typically invites a select number of players to attend. Earlier this week, when Duffy asked for the houselights to be turned on so that he could applaud the players in the room, the only people standing were those serving the tables.

Not a single player showed up.

“It’s an embarrassment to a company of my size and an embarrassment to me personally,” said Duffy, two days after the event.

Duffy’s beef isn’t with the players, though — it’s with who’s at the helm.

“I am exceptionally disappointed with the leadership of the LPGA,” he continued. “They better get their act together because they’re going to lose people like me over stuff like this.”

When CME first sponsored the Titleholders event in 2011, the purse was $1.5 million and the winner received $500,000. Three years later, the Race to the CME Globe season-long points race was introduced with a $1 million bonus. That bonus has since been folded into the official prize money with a winner-take-all format. In 2018, it was announced that the winner would receive $1.5 million, which at the time was more than what most PGA Tour winners received.

“This announcement is really about setting a new standard in women’s golf,” said then-commissioner Mike Whan four years ago. “I would love to lie to you guys and say that I called Terry 16 times and pushed and pushed him for it, but it was his idea.”

Duffy aimed to blaze a trail that he hoped other organizations would follow. His influence today is similar to what David Foster did at Mission Hills in the 1970s to elevate the women’s tour with the Colgate-Dinah Shore Winner’s Circle.

LPGA commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan speaks with the media during a roundtable during the second round of the CME Group Tour Championship at Tiburon Golf Club on Nov. 18, 2022, in Naples, Florida. (Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images)

Mollie Marcoux Samaan was named commissioner of the LPGA 18 months ago, and she was at the dinner that players skipped.

“There hasn’t been any greater supporter of the LPGA than CME Group and Terry Duffy,” Marcoux Samaan told Golfweek on Friday when asked about the incident.

“There was clearly a disconnect, and it’s my responsibility to make sure that this doesn’t happen. So on this particular issue, I’m taking full responsibility as a leader of the organization to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”

This week, the LPGA announced that the total prize fund in 2023 will cross the $100 million mark for the first time, despite losing three full-field events and only adding one (although it’s unknown at this point if players will actually be able to travel to the two events in China that are worth $4.2 million). The majors and CME represent nearly half of the tour’s prize money, with only three additional events on the schedule with a purse of at least $3 million. A dozen events still offer purses below $2 million.

As the LPGA’s big events do the heavy lifting, it’s still a grind to push longtime sponsors to higher purses and fill in the gaps of those who don’t renew. Veteran players, who not too long ago worried that the LPGA might not survive, understand that a culture of appreciation remains vital.

The accessibility and approachability of players is what drove Duffy to take a pro-am event with about 20 players and build it into a benchmark event for women’s sports.

While the LPGA continues to reach new heights financially, the chasm between the men’s and women’s tours only grows deeper as some purses on the PGA Tour’s schedule now reach $20 million. LPGA veteran Karen Stupples believes it’s critical that LPGA players maintain the “act like a Founder” mantra that Whan preached for years.

“They went to baseball parks and did tricks on the fields to bring people in to watch them play golf,” said Stupples of the 13 women who founded the tour in 1950. “The players don’t have to do that anymore, They have to go to a party or two. Just treat it as your job. Your job description is to do this.”

Terry Duffy addresses the crowd with Keith Urban, who performed on the lawn at the Ritz on Wednesday as part of the week’s festivities at CME. (Photo courtesy of CME)

It’s not unusual now for top players to turn down pre-tournament interviews, even at major championships and CME. Some will meet with the print media or Golf Channel, but not both. Sometimes, it’s nothing at all.

When Stacy Lewis became the No. 1 player in the world, a couple of LPGA Hall of Famers sat her down and outlined the expectations.

“They just said, as a top American, as No. 1 in the world, you’re going to be asked to do a lot of things,” said Lewis. “You’re going to be asked to do a lot of interviews that you don’t want to do. You need to do it because it’s what’s best for the tour. It will be productive for you; it will be productive for the tour. It creates more exposure, and that’s your job. Your job as a top player is to help build this tour.”

Stupples believes that players often get so caught up in their own little bubbles that they fail to see the bigger picture. Lewis agrees.

“It’s all these kinds of things that for so long they were unsaid, and people just did it because it’s the right thing to do,” said Lewis, “and the current generation needs to hear it, needs to be taught it.”

For the LPGA to continue on an upward trajectory, player buy-in remains critical, especially when it comes to knowing the expectations of those who write the checks.

“I’m concerned about the future of the tour,” said Duffy, “because the leadership needs to work with their players to make sure that everybody has a clear understanding of how we grow the game together, along with sponsors and others. There’s no one person, no two people who can grow it alone. You need everybody. They say it takes a village, and I think their village is getting a little fractured.”

Marcoux Samaan said she continues to emphasize the “act like a Founder” culture Whan created at staff and player meetings, believing that the organization’s “secret sauce” of hospitality, sponsor engagement and accessibility remains one of its biggest strengths.

“We just need to continue to deliver that message,” said Marcoux Samaan, “and I don’t think anyone disputes it. I think everyone believes it. Sometimes you just miss in the moment.”

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