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Ryder Cup ticket prices have never been higher. That’s a real problem for golf

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Ryder Cup ticket prices have never been higher. That’s a real problem for golf

It should not be this hard to like golf.

Even if you can chuckle at a golf company putting a YouTube channel logo on a driver and charging $700, accept that the polo in the pro shop can easily cost upwards of $100, rationalize the cost and hassle of the trip to the top-tier golf resort, or nap your way through umpteen “playing through” commercial breaks on the Sunday afternoon broadcast, at least live professional golf has generally been good.

You walk around or find a good spot and take a seat. And either way, you see the best players in the world in competition closer than just about any other sport can offer. Most of the time it’s an excellent value — I can buy a ticket right now for Sunday at the 2025 U.S. Open at Oakmont Country Club outside of Pittsburgh for $185.

That would not get me past the gates on Tuesday at the 2025 Ryder Cup, three full days before the competition actually begins. And if I actually wanted to see Scottie Scheffler, Jon Rahm and the rest of the best players in the world in an alternate shot match? The PGA of America has made it beyond the limits of most golf fans.

A single ticket for each match day at the Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black in New York will cost $749.51.

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Seven hundred and forty-nine dollars and 51 cents. For one ticket. For one day.

It’s beyond. It just is. I do not want to hear about supply and demand, or how much tickets go for on the resale sites. Rory McIlroy is not Taylor Swift, and face value for tickets to her shows is nowhere near that high.


The Ryder Cup is a massive event with ticket prices that now reflect that. (Adam Cairns / USA Today)

That’s four times the prices at the last U.S.-hosted Ryder Cup, at Whistling Straits in 2021. It’s $255.27 to attend practice days, and $423.64 for Thursday’s practice round, opening ceremony and celebrity competition. Has the PGA of America gone mad?

They rationalize that these tickets are actually Ryder Cup+ tickets, a marketing ploy that means I can get all the food and non-alcoholic drinks I desire. How good are these hot dogs if I have to pay an extra $500 for them? And can you bring a case of them around to the parking lot? Because I’ll need to bring them home to feed the family for a while. Throw in some buns, yes.

It will cost a family of four $3000 to attend the Ryder Cup. I’m not arguing everything should be for everyone, but that feels excessive, no?

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I expect the crowd at Bethpage Black, as a result, to be a bizarre mix. On one hand, it’ll be overly corporate, because those charge cards don’t blink. Those fans also do not care what’s happening on the course, because they’re more concerned with making deals under the tents. Then you’ll have the crowd that has scraped together the cash to get in, and feels that paying $1,000 (once you include parking, merchandise and alcoholic drinks) entitles them to do and say anything they damn well please. Should be fun!

Normal golf fans are outraged. They should be. We have put up with years of bickering and lawsuits, and desperate decisions that aided bank accounts and made the product worse. Purses have never been higher, but the same can be said for the costs of sponsoring and airing a PGA Tour event. That means more commercials and less golf shots, and we wonder why TV ratings are down week to week.

But at least the live product was good. It still is — if you live near a pro golf stop on any tour, you should go. You’ll probably enjoy it.

But the Ryder Cup is the Ryder Cup. It’s the only event we have that can rival the Masters, and it brings out a sense of nationalism in all of us. The stakes feel so high that the anticipation for every shot is heightened, and the atmosphere around that first tee box can take your breath away.

I hope you can experience it one day. I hope you’ve been lucky enough to be able to go to Bethpage and not worry about the cost. But if you can’t, I hope what has been done here is only an outlier, and not a sign of what is to come.

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(Top photo: Alex Burstow / Getty Images)

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Lindsey Vonn shares health update after Olympic crash

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Lindsey Vonn shares health update after Olympic crash

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United States skier Lindsey Vonn provided a lengthy update after her crash during the alpine ski women’s downhill at the 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics resulted in a leg fracture on on Sunday.

Vonn, 41, was already skiing with a torn ACL, but she needed to be airlifted off the mountain in a scary scene. She posted on her Instagram on Monday, saying her “Olympic dream did not finish the way I dreamt it would.”

“It wasn’t a story book ending or a fairy (tale), it was just life,” her detailed caption read. I dared to dream and had worked so hard to achieve it. Because in Downhill ski racing the difference between a strategic line and a catastrophic injury can be as small as 5 inches.”

This is a developing story. More to come.

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YouTube TV introduces lower-priced sports and news packages

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YouTube TV introduces lower-priced sports and news packages

YouTube TV will start offering customers lower-priced channel packages, including one aimed at sports fans.

The Google-owned pay-TV service announced Monday it will roll out more than 10 plans that will be priced below a full YouTube TV subscription that offers more than 100 channels.

The introduction, which will begin over the next few weeks, is in response to growing consumer resentment over the rising cost for the service, currently available for $82.99 a month. YouTube TV was introduced in 2017 as an alternative to increasingly expensive cable and satellite services with an initial price of $35 a month.

Consumer interest is likely to be highest for the Sports Plan, available this fall. For $64.99 a month, consumers will get the four broadcast networks, which all carry the NFL, plus Fox Sports 1, the NBC Sports Network and all of the ESPN channels. New subscribers will be offered a one-year introductory rate of $54.99 a month.

YouTube will also offer a Sports + News plan, which combine the two most-watched genres in the pay TV bundle. For $71.99 a month, consumers get the sports package and news networks CNN, Fox News, MS NOW, Bloomberg, C-SPAN and Fox Business. The introductory rate is $56.99.

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The new plans will aim to compete with the direct to consumer offering of ESPN, which is available in tandem with Fox One, a service combining Fox Corp’s news and sports channels. The two are being offered together for $39.99 a month.

Over the last two years, El Segundo-based DirecTV rolled out smaller packages of channels aimed at consumers who no longer want a big monthly bill for networks they don’t watch. The satellite TV service now offers smaller genre packages of channels and streaming apps that cater to a particular interest available at a lower price — designed for news junkies, sports fans, children and Spanish-language speakers.

Pay-TV providers are under pressure to provide more pricing options to consumers to keep them from cutting the cord.

At the same time, carriage negotiations with programmers are more fraught, often leading to standoffs where channels are pulled, disrupting service to customers.

Disney’s channels, including ESPN, were off of YouTube TV for nearly 15 days last fall. Separately, YouTube TV customers lost access to Univision’s Spanish-language channels for two months, which drew the attention of legislators on both sides of the political spectrum.

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YouTube, which has about 10 million subscribers, is also offering an Entertainment Plan that includes the major broadcast networks and an array of cable channels including FX, Hallmark, Comedy Central, Bravo, Paramount, Food Network and HGTV at $54.99 a month and an introductory rate of $44.99.

A News + Entertainment + Family Plan — which combines, news, entertainment and children’s channels including Disney Channel, Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon, will be available for $69.99 a month and an introductory rate of $59.99.

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Austrian snowboarder strips down in cold temperatures during wild celebration after winning Olympic gold

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Austrian snowboarder strips down in cold temperatures during wild celebration after winning Olympic gold

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Adrenaline was running high for Austrian snowboarder Benjamin Karl after winning a second straight Olympic gold medal in the men’s parallel giant slalom on Sunday.

And that adrenaline had him not feeling the cold temperatures, as he ripped off his jacket and clothes in celebration.

Karl, 40, was flexing his arms and screaming, ripping off his jacket and four layers of clothes during his celebration. He was even seen face down on the snow, which was surely cold, but he didn’t care.

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Gold medalist Benjamin Karl of Team Austria reacts after winning the Men’s Parallel Giant Slalom Big Final on day two of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games at Livigno Snow Park on Feb. 8, 2026 in Livigno, Italy. (Hannah Peters/Getty Images)

Karl was an Olympic gold medalist once again, and that’s all that mattered at the moment.

Before his medal-winning run, Karl was trailing South Korea’s Kim Sang-kyum for most of the final race, when he took full advantage of Kim’s mistake.

US TAKES GOLD IN FIGURE SKATING TEAM EVENT AT WINTER OLYMPICS

Karl crossed the finish line 0.19 seconds ahead of his South Korean opponent to win gold at Livigno Snow Park. Rounding out the podium was Bulgaria’s Tervel Zamfirov with bronze.

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Gold medalist Benjamin Karl of Team Austria celebrates after crossing the finish line in first place to win the Men’s Parallel Giant Slalom Big Final on day two of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games at Livigno Snow Park on Feb. 8, 2026 in Livigno, Italy. (David Ramos/Getty Images)

The crowd at Livigno Snow Park loved every moment of Karl’s celebration, which certainly ranks atop the initial reactions to winning gold at Milano Cortina thus far.

After the celebration, Karl eventually redressed and joined Kim and Zamfirov on the podium.

As the Austrian national anthem played, Karl’s smile never faded.

Gold medalist Benjamin Karl of Team Austria celebrates after winning the Men’s Parallel Giant Slalom Big Final on day two of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games at Livigno Snow Park on Feb. 8, 2026 in Livigno, Italy. (David Ramos/Getty Images)

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He also made Olympics history, becoming the first snowboarder to win four medals. He also won a bronze medal in the 2014 Sochi Olympics, while capturing silver in 2010 in Vancouver at Whistler.

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