TGL Set for Debut Tonight on ESPN With Nearly 70 Cameras Capturing a New Era for Golf After year-long delay, some of pro golfs best players will tee off at huge SoFi Center By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, January 7, 2025 - 12:06 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
Tonight marks the debut of TGL (Tomorrow's Golf League) on ESPN, with some of the world's greatest golfers facing off in a two-hour competition in the league's SoFi Center in Palm Beach Gardens, FL, a 250,000-sq.-ft. venue offering a first for the world of professional golf: playing under a roof.
According to TMRW Sports CTO Andrew Macaulay, TGL aims to turn a sport that has previously required acres and acres of land into something that could fit inside an arena but also provides plenty of space for golf shots.
Rory McIlroy is one of the three co-founders of TGL golf, which tees off tonight.
The simulator screen is so far away from the tee boxes that you see the ball curve as it is carried into the computer-generated world, Macaulay explains. When the golfers get to the green end of things, it is all real life. It's an interesting hybrid, and I think the fan watching on TV will quickly forget about going back and forth between the real world and the digital world.
The venue houses a massive golf-simulator screen (64 ft. wide x 53 ft. tall) and an equally massive, 3,800-sq.-ft. Green Zone putting area on a 41-yard-wide rotating turntable. Under the putting area of the turntable are 600 actuators that can change the contours and slope of the green. Toss in an onsite crowd encouraged to make some noise and indoor lighting created by a former WWE lighting designer, and tonight is shaping up as a special one for TGL and the world of professional golf.
TGL has been a long time coming. It was set to debut last February, but a storm in West Palm Beach, FL, in November 2023 destroyed the membrane of the cloth dome covering SoFi Center, requiring a new facility and a new approach. The extra year, Macauley says, allowed the effort to take another step forward, tweaking the virtual side, figuring out all the best places to place cameras, and producing some unique angles with, for example, a live drone shot and super slo-mo on the tee boxes. EVS XtraMotion will also be available, allowing super slo-mo to be produced from any camera.
TGL has allowed some golf social-media influencers to step into the tee box at SoFi Center, but tonight the action begins for real with PGA TOUR professionals facing off.
We certainly didn't waste the gift of an extra year, he says. We made the screen bigger because the building around it changed and we could go bigger. The holes that we created were fine-tuned even more, and now some of them have cool parts of the digital world. For example, at least one hole has gone from being in the mountains to in the vineyards to the Scottish Highlands because we had a lot more time to have it played and then we decided to change it. I think we have been able to make about 20% of TGL visually better and cooler.
So, what, exactly, is TGL? Owned by TMRW Sports, TGL is a joint venture of legendary golfers Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, and TMRW Sports Group CEO/co-founder Mike McCarley. The vision for TMRW Sports is to bring together sports, media, and entertainment in new ways (investors come from across the professional- sports landscape, including Derek Jeter, Shohei Ohtani, Shaquille O'Neal, Lewis Hamilton, and Serena Williams), and tonight's effort is the biggest to date: two of the six teams (each comprising four PGA TOUR stars) compete over 15 regular-season matches, a playoff, and a best-of-three finals on March 24 and 25 to determine the champion. TGL's matches will primarily be in primetime on Mondays and Tuesdays, each match scheduled for approximately two hours (the first competition is three-on-three alternate shot; the second competition of each event is one-on-one play).
TGL's technology mix will keep things moving. A 40-second clock will allow every shot to be broadcast, and there will be unprecedented audio access, with all players wearing microphones. The broadcast will also offer advanced shot data, and the production plan calls for more than 60 robotic and embedded cameras throughout the field of play.
Railcams will give director Jonathan Evans additional angles of coverage.
TMRW Sports VP, Content, jeff Neubarth says the broadcast will have 73 camera sources, of which 28 are robotic and 10 are virtual and within the simulator environment (the 10 have six pre-programmed behaviors/flight paths, such as following the ball to the green). Including all the vendor support teams, a crew of 150 will ensure that every broadcast is rock solid.
Our compound is driven by Game Creek Video with Moonshine A and B and Edit Truck 3 onsite, along with two B units, he says. That gives us five trucks for [match] support, but we expanded out as we are also doing an entertainment show inside the arena. We have had to build out a front-of-house system, and we also have Game Creek Patriot onsite as a data center.
Johnathan Evans will be directing the broadcast, which will be seen on ESPN in the U.S., on Sportsnet in Canada, and via Claro in Mexico, Latin America, and South America. Golf fans in 30 European countries, 50 African nations, and 12 Asian countries will also be able to tune in.
The competition will definitely have a different rhythm from traditional golf, in which the players hit a shot and need to walk hundreds of yards to their next shot. When you take out the walking, says Evans, the pace is so much faster, and it gets much more akin to other sports. Here we don't have any downtime. The players for both teams know what they're hitting, and, when they tee off, it's just bang, bang, bang. There's a littl
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
TGL Set for Debut Tonight on ESPN With Nearly 70 Cameras Capturing a New Era for Golf After year-long delay, some of pro golfs best players will tee off at huge SoFi Center By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director 
