An Inside Look as TGL Production Efforts Shift Into Playoff Mode

An Inside Look as TGL Production Efforts Shift Into Playoff Mode Mixing the virtual and physical, the young golf league has evolved in its first season By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director

Monday, March 17, 2025 - 1:45 pm

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The playoffs of the inaugural season of TGL begin tonight. For the upstart golf league and TMRW Sports CTO Andrew Macaulay; VP, Content/Producer, Jeff Neubarth; TGL Director Johnathan Evans; and Director, Engineering, Colin DeFord, it's a chance to up the coverage and make the most of more than two months of regular-season coverage that provided plenty of learning about how best to produce a unique event mixing virtual technologies, real physical playing surfaces, and a production philosophy that merges sports and entertainment. It also provides a brief moment to reflect on how the reality matched up with the vision.

The semifinals take place tonight and tomorrow, with the best-of-three Finals Series on March 24 and 25.

From left: Jeff Neubart, Johnathan Evans, and Colin DeFord inside the main production unit for TGL coverage, Game Creek Video Moonshine

It's exactly what we had in mind, says Macaulay. I'm pleased with the outcome, and that's the tech for the game as well as the digital displays, the broadcast tech, and the non-sexy infrastructure of the building that supports it. This all came together with timelines that overlapped, which meant we had to be super tight in terms of collaboration and communication. We got to know the names of the electricians, the plumbers, and the steel guys as we all worked around each other.

Neubarth notes that, from a production standpoint, the team learned it's okay to evolve. I can't wait 'til we've awarded the SoFi Cup so I can watch the very first show and see how far we've come and how far we've evolved. Whether it's getting more clubs in the graphics or knowing when to talk to players or when to lay out, we're learning how to tell stories. I can't wait to sit with Johnathan after the season's over and remap this production based on what we've learned and what we've seen so we can consistently make it better.

Evans says he and the team have learned to get used to a pace of play that doesn't involve following golfers as they walk hundreds of yards down a fairway following a tee shot. Instead, the TGL concept compresses that acres upon acres of coverage down to a small footprint that can fit inside a small arena.

The SoFi Center in Palm Beach Gardens, FL, houses the massive golf-simulator screen (64 ft. wide x 53 ft. tall) and an equally massive, 3,800-sq.-ft. GreenZone short-game area with a 41-yard-wide rotating turntable. Under the putting area of the turntable are nearly 600 actuators that can change the contours and slope of the green. Toss in an onsite crowd of around 1,500, who are encouraged to make some noise, and indoor lighting created by a former WWE lighting designer, and TGL has created a special place for professional golfers, fans, and viewers.

The TGL GreenZone changes contours and rotates from one hole to the next, challenging the camera-ops team to change assignments from one hole to the next.

I think one of the biggest surprises was how fast everything is, says Evans. We can sit there and conceptualize what it's going to be, and we can plan for everything. But, once we started, we saw how fast the pace was: every single minute of the broadcast, there's a graphic, there's a story, there are mics, there are replays. It doesn't stop for two hours straight.

While much of the buzz around TGL focused on the virtual world, the simulator technology, and the massive screen that players hit into, one of the biggest challenges for Evans and the crew was the real-world GreenZone, where the players left the virtual world behind and trade in woods and irons for wedges and putters. A real-world golf tournament has dedicated camera positions at each green, where camera operators patiently wait for the next group of golfers to arrive. TGL is vastly different: the camera operators and production crew covering the green complex reshuffle for each of the 15 holes as the TGL green complex rotates on a giant turntable and even changes contours and pin locations.

We have to make sure the camera guys can get something on the backside, says Evans, covering the team that's on the ball as well as the team that's off the ball. We do need to capture those reactions because they are the best reactions. But it's one of the biggest challenges because the green will rotate, undulate, have different pins, and we have to reshuffle the deck of camera coverage. It's not the easiest thing in the world to do on the fly.

A mix of robotic cameras, a Rovercam, and Steadicam units captures the TGL golfer on the tee box from all angles.

Evans and the team have learned how to make the most of the 70-plus cameras while making sure that other cameras aren't in the shots as the players move among the three fields of play (the 20-yard tee box, the 35-yard tee box, and the GreenZone).

We've been sparingly using the Steadicam and the RF cameras on the field and, instead, using the Spidercam or the FPV drones as well as the POV cameras, adds Evans. We made sure every inch of this building was covered in some fashion, whether [using] traditional cameras or trying to find a way to put specialty cameras out, like the mini POV cameras on tee boxes that are amazing. And the C360 cameras in the bunkers give us a great look.

During the season, the team has been looking to push the drone coverage in new ways. At first, says Neubarth, it was just, Let's use it on the way in and on the way out of the break. But there's no reason not to use it to show what the actual go

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