TGL was as exciting as exciting could be. The best-of-three series between the Atlanta Drive GC and the New York Golf Club. It featured tight competition, crazy comebacks, brilliant strategies, distraught heroes, and ominous villains. A few crazy action sequences and visual effects, and it could have easily been confused for a movie!

The Atlanta Drive overpowered New York Golf Club in two matches, with two matches decided by one point each. Despite the tight-knit affair and brilliant action, the viewership did not peak as it was expected to. Instead, the simulator golf finale churned out average viewership numbers. As per Josh Carpenter, “Numbers for TGL’s championship: 557K on ESPN, down substantially from the same window last year (Georgia-OSU NIT quarterfinal, 1.029M). Last night peaked at 681K at the end of the match. Of the 12 TGL matches on ESPN this season, the final ranked 5th in viewership.”

This will be quite disappointing news for the fans of the Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy-led league which saw some good numbers at the beginning of the year. The viewership hit a million for Tiger Woods’s debut, the second match of TGL, but has since then fallen flat. Despite the concerning numbers, one golf insider believes that TGL stood out this year and was a major success.

Joe Pompliano believes in Tiger Woods’s TGL

In his YouTube channel The Joe Pomp Show, LIV Golf insider Joe Pompliano put up a video analyzing TGL’s first season, In this video, he showed the actual numbers of TGL and used it as a base to come to the conclusion that the league was a roaring success.“TGL’s first regular season averaged 513,000 viewers on ESPN platform with a total audience of 19.3 million viewers,” the social media star stated. However, he also added the caveat that the numbers are, in fact. not telling the whole story. “The topline viewership number for TGL is misleading,” addressed Pompliano.

TGL, whose viewership pales in comparison to what the PGA Tour brings in, has operated from several disadvantageous situations. Firstly, the matches mainly happened during the weekdays. Moreover, the TGL also had triple and double headers at times, which forced the timings to even more unflattering hours. “TGL’s condensed schedule forced some matches to the early afternoon window of 3 PM Eastern Time, including a triple header that started at an even earlier 1 PM Eastern Time start on President’s Day,” explained Pompliano.

The TGL was also shown on ESPN and ESPN 2 interchangeably. ESPN is the more famous enterprise, and more frequented by viewers. So naturally, the viewership will hit a downtrend when the telecast is on ESPN 2. Pompliano stated that it could be one of the reasons that the number“ESPN is a far more popular channel, somewhere in the top 10 most popular channels. So while 300,00 viewers might not be a home run for them, it is for their sister channel ESPN 2, which is a far less popular channel,” opined Joe Pompliano.

And when you do a side-by-side comparison with College basketball and NHL which was streamed at similar timings last year, TGL comes out on top. “When you compare TGL matches to what ESPN showed in that same time slot a year prior, TGL’s viewership numbers were 21% higher.”

With such good numbers, TGL 2026 will look to push its reach a bit further. But what changes can you expect for next year?

What’s next for TGL?

Losing finalist Xander Schauffele had some ideas regarding what needs to work next season to push the TGL to bigger success. “I think just like us players sit down in our off-season with our team, they’re going to sit down here and see how they can tweak everything, whether it’s shortening the season or having it end (sooner),” Schauffele stated.

Adding LPGA players has also been a concept that has been widely discussed and something that has gained a lot of traction since Rose Zhang became a minority owner of the Bay Golf Club. Even LPGA pro and Thai golfer Jeeno Thitikul was on board with the idea, stating, “I think should be fun (indoor golf). Should be fun in the off-season. I have been [able to] experience it one time in Korea. It’s just like a simulator golf. But it’s not as good as what they play in that one. That one is just like hit in the simulator and chip it, putt it.”

What do you think are some added features TGL needs to consider for 2026? Do you think shorter schedules help? More teams maybe? More variety in holes?