If you thought the LPGA was in trouble, you haven't seen anything yet. According to the Associated Press, the Corning Classic, the longest running LPGA tournament with the same sponsor and same venue will be history after this season. Yikes.
Corning Inc. Executive Vice President Kirk Legg made the announcement Monday afternoon at the Corning Country Club. He says the tournament has lost $500,000 in sponsorships and has not been able to replace the lost revenue.
Corning has been restructuring recently and laid off 3,500 people from its global work force. Legg says financing the tournament is no longer a viable expense.
Tournament president Jack Benjamin also says attendance is down in recent years, and fewer volunteers are coming out to help.
I mean, wow. This tournament has been around for 31 years and is crapping out after 2009. If the LPGA can't keep a tradition like this around, how are other tournaments going to withstand the economic downfall?
I'm really not trying to sound like Debbie Downer right now, but if the LPGA doesn't watch out, there might not be a tour come the next decade.
Kyle Auclair, Getty Images
1 comment:
Tell me half of the players not speaking English doesn't have something to do with this. Imagine a bunch of Angel Cabreras winning, then giving limited responses through their translators in the press conferences. I guess that's racist though. That's more important than the viability of an entire tour, right?
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