The date that golf fans have been anxiously awaiting has officially been set: Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson will face each other in an historic head-to-head, 18-hole duel over Thanksgiving weekend at Shadow Creek in Las Vegas, it was announced Wednesday.
While both are past the prime of the careers, the championship golfers have won a combined 19 Majors, and 42-year-old Woods has seen a huge resurgence in both his performance and his popularity in 2018.
WarnerMedia has secured worldwide media rights to “The Match,” and Turner Sports will produce the pay-per-view telecast of the event, which will offer $9 million to the winner and will be played Friday, Nov. 23. It will air on Turner’s TNT and HBO’s 24/7 Reality franchise.
As part of the live event, both Woods and Mickelson will selectively make side-challenges against one another during the match. Both golfers tweeted confirmation of the face-off, which has been the subject of speculation for weeks.
Mickelson, 48, joked: “I think this is the easiest $9 million you will ever make.”
It’s on @PhilMickelson #TigerVSPhil pic.twitter.com/PZivYPOEf5
— Tiger Woods (@TigerWoods) August 22, 2018
It’s on @PhilMickelson #TigerVSPhil pic.twitter.com/PZivYPOEf5
— Tiger Woods (@TigerWoods) August 22, 2018
“It’s an opportunity for us to bring golf to the masses in prime time during a period where we don’t have much going on in the world of golf,” Mickelson said later on Wednesday, according to ESPN.
“It’s a way to show a side you don’t normally see by having us mic’d up to hear some of the interaction between us.”
“The iconic Tiger Woods and five-time Major Champion Phil Mickelson are generational talents who have transcended the game of golf and their rivalry continues to be one of the most compelling in sports,” David Levy, president of Turner, said in a statement. “This one-of-a-kind, winner-take-all matchup provides a great opportunity to show fans the benefits of AT&T and WarnerMedia coming together. For the first time since AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner (now WarnerMedia), Turner, DirecTV and HBO will present a multi-faceted presentation of the live event and accompanying content across a vast array of platforms.”
The Woods-Mickelson live event and accompanying content will be distributed across wide-ranging Turner, WarnerMedia and AT&T platforms:
- Live pay-per-view coverage of the event will be distributed through Turner’s B/R Live, the company’s new premium live sports streaming service, AT&T’s DIRECTV, AT&T U-verse, and will be offered to other on-demand platforms.
- HBO Sports and its 24/7 reality franchise will capture all the excitement leading up to the match.
- Bleacher Report and its House of Highlights will offer highlights and behind-the-scenes content.
- TNT will televise programming with select content from the event in the weeks following the live competition.
- Turner International will facilitate distribution of live PPV access to the event outside the U.S.