70 | FORBES ASIA OCTOBER 2017
to Kim, the little-known, then- 2 1-year-old who was in fourth place,
two strokes off the lead. That would change.
During the windy and difficult final round, Kim remained
unflustered. He carded the only bogey-free round of the day
and ran away from the big names in the field. With his three-
stroke victory he became the youngest player ever—by two
years—to win the Players and earned a check for $1. 8 9 million.
He also became only the fourth PGA Tour player in the mod-
ern era to claim two tournaments before the age of 22 (Kim
won the Wyndham Championship in 2016 ), joining Tiger
Woods, Jordan Spieth and Garcia. More important, though,
was what Kim’s landmark win signified: that the long-anticipat-
ed Asian invasion of the PGA Tour may have finally begun in
earnest.
To be sure, there have been important wins for Asian men
on American soil before. “I remember watching the 2 009 PGA
Championship when [Korean] Y.E. Yang beat Tiger,” says Kim.
Another Korean, K.J. Choi—who happens to be Kim’s idol—won
the Players, too, back in 2 011. But those wins seemed more like
outliers than trends.
There were 3 full-time Asian players on the PGA Tour
when Choi joined in 2 000. In 2 010, there were 8. In the
upcoming PGA Tour season, which begins later this month,
there will be 1 3 full-time players from Asia. (The total
number of players on the Tour has remained the same for
decades.) South Korea is expected to field more players on the
Tour than Australia, which has long been a golfing power-
house. This season will see the debut of the first two golfers
from China to ever qualify as members of the Tour. And lurk-
ing near the very top is Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama, No. 3 in
the world (the highest ranking ever for an Asian male). The
25 -year-old won three tournaments in the season just ended,
including two World Golf Championships, and has amassed
$20 million in career earnings to go along with his annual
$8 million in endorsements.
The recent infusion of Asian talent is no accident. In recent
years, the PGA Tour has been especially aggressive in Asia,
creating a new professional circuit in China, opening offices in
Beijing and Tokyo and launching a new tournament in Korea.
“It’s not a surprise to us,” says Ty Votaw, the PGA Tour’s execu-
tive vice president of global business affairs.
Growing middle classes—Japan and Korea have had large, stable
ones for decades, while those of smaller nations, like Thailand and
Vietnam, are burgeoning—set the stage for golf ’s growth in the
region. And in the world’s two most populous countries—China
and India—the middle classes have grown by 33 0% and 1 5 0%,
respectively, since 2 000. “The industry of golf has always followed
the growth of the middle class and middle-class consumerism,” says
Giles Morgan, the global head of sponsorships and events for HSBC.
“In the 19th century, it was Great Britain. In the 2 0th century, it was
the U.S. This century will be about China and India and other parts
of Asia.”
The consumerism has already begun in earnest: Accord-
ing to the Brookings Institution, the Asia-Pacific middle class in
2015 spent double that of the North American middle class and is
expected to spend nearly three times as much by 202 0. The major
professional golf tours, which are, in essence, vehicles for corporate
spending, have simply followed the money.
The European Tour was the first to seize opportunities in Asia,
most notably with its creation of the Dubai Desert Classic in 19 8 9.
That was folllowed up three years later with the sanctioning of the
Johnnie Walker Classic in Bangkok, the
first significant international professional
golf tournament in East Asia. In 2005 , the
European Tour made its biggest mark in
the region with the launch of the HSBC
Champions, which has been played all but
one year in Shanghai. The inaugural event
attracted Tiger Woods, then the No. 1 player
in the world (he finished second).
Big tournaments, though, are only part
of the developmental story. In 2 007, to com-
plement its tournament sponsorship, HSBC
created a junior golf program in conjunc-
tion with the China Golf Association, which
catered to both experienced and beginning players. Thus far, 8 0,000
kids have participated.
The PGA Tour, which has had corporate sponsors from Japan
for some time now (Sony since 1999 and Bridgestone since 2006 ),
soon followed the European Tour, spurred on by what might turn
out to be the single biggest catalyst for the game of golf in Asia: The
2 009 announcement that the sport would return to the Olympics in
the 2016 Summer Games (after a 11 2 -year absence). It was the PGA
Tour, along with the Royal & Ancient (which oversees golf ’s rules
outside of the U.S. and Mexico) and other groups, that successfully
lobbied for golf ’s reentry into the Games.
The Tour’s point man was Votaw. “When a sport becomes an
official Olympic event, countries like China begin to invest in it,
a model, whether the money comes from the government or the
country’s Olympic committee, that’s very common throughout the
rest of the world,” he says. “So we knew that if we got golf into the
Games, those revenue sources would be increased and, in some
cases, created, in many countries.”
Votaw recalls traveling to China shortly after the October 9, 2009
announcement by the International Olympic Committee. He and a
group of golf executives toured the Chinese training facilities. “WeFORBES ASIA
ASIAN INVASION
HE IS EMINENTLY LIKEABLE. AFTER HIS
PLAYERS WIN, A PHOTO OF A SMILING
KIM FLYING TO ATLANTA IN THE MIDDLE
SEAT OF THE COACH CABIN WENT VIRAL.
HE HAD PURCHASED THE TICKET BEFORE
HE BANKED THE WINNER’S CHECK.