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I Believe the PGA Should’ve Partnered With Crossing Broad to Make Philly-Themed Merch
By Matt Schultz
Published:
The PGA Championship is underway at Aronimink Golf Club in Newtown Square, marking the first major tournament in the Philadelphia area since the U.S. Open at Merion Golf Club in 2013. For golf fans all over the Delaware Valley, there are no limits to fascinating storylines and surprising trends to break down as the home-turf tournament is set to begin. But I’m not going to talk about that right now. I’d like to talk about the merch situation.
I’ve long enjoyed golf merch. I like the clean, regular look of it. Compared with merch for other sporting events – say, the Final Four or the Super Bowl, with their collage of bright primary colors, huge block fonts, team logos, depictions of shiny trophies, etc. – I can wear it without feeling like A) a 4th grader or B) an ironic Fishtown streetwear guy. Golf merch is a good option for a normal look. It’s unremarkable. I can wear it to dinner. I like to look unremarkable at dinner. Golf merch helps me achieve this.
The Masters, of course, is the crème de la crème of golf merch. They got some famously sick stuff. Sadly, it’s only available at Augusta. I’ve never been to Augusta, so I don’t have any. The Masters stuff is scarce, and that scarcity is exactly what makes it so appealing… and maddening…
Beyond that, the other majors have great stuff, too. The 2013 U.S. Open at Merion merch was excellent, for instance. I still see this hat around town now and then, and every time I do, I think, “Now that’s a good hat…” –
All that being said, I was pretty excited about the PGA Championship at Aronimink this weekend. I wondered if it’d be possible to drive over there and buy some shirts and stuff without having to buy a ticket to the actual event. I smiled thinking about successfully pulling that off. The perfect crime…
Then I Googled merch for the event, and was surprised by two curveballs. The first was that Barstool is one of the official merchandise partners:
These designs are fine. Pretty standard stuff. The surprise was more that the PGA – a historic, prestigious institution that has been around for what I’d guess to be 350 years – is working hand in hand with a website that employs this guy:
“We are living in a brave new world,” I thought. “Maybe websites wield more power than I knew…” Then came my second surprise, after I went to the PGA website to see what else Barstool had cooked up for them.
I was surprised… how bad this Philly-themed stuff is:
They went with cheesesteak shirts. Not great. I’m of the opinion that Barstool dropped the ball here – not that I completely blame them. Barstool is now a massive media corporation with a lot on their plate. I get it. They have a podcast network. They do pizza reviews. They got this guy:
With all of those projects taking up time and energy and resources day to day, I don’t think it’d be fair to expect Barstool to have the creative capacity to think long and hard about Philly-themed merch. They went with the first-thought idea. It happens. I imagine their meeting for it was like five marketing execs – none of whom has ever been to Philadelphia – sitting on a Zoom, blankly staring at each other in silence for forty minutes, until one finally mutters:
“…Cheesesteak. Philadelphia… is all about that cheesesteak.”
Then the rest of the Zoom call applauded. They pounded on their chests. They stomped on the ground. They were ecstatic; they caught lightning in a bottle; the decision was made. The merch would be cheesesteak-themed.
And all this has me thinking: Crossing Broad should have gotten this partnership with the PGA. We should have made the merch. We could have cooked up something real nice. There are one million other art ideas to slap on hats or shirts that are more Philly than cheesesteak stuff. Here’s a few quick ones:
- Drawing of a golf club crossed with a Franklin Mills lightning bolt.
- Drawing of the old silver-and-red Comcast cable remotes circa 2008. Every button says GOLF.
- Drawing of 200 teens riding quads down Roosevelt Boulevard, each of them doing wheelies, each of them with a golf bag slung over their shoulders.
- Drawing of a traffic jam on 95 going northbound, with CHOP coming up on your left. Everyone in their cars is watching golf highlights on their phone.
- Drawing of a Wawa sandwich order slip being dropped into the little basket on the deli counter. The little piece of paper says “PGA CHAMPIONSHIP 2026.”
- Drawing of the now-empty fountain in the Neshaminy Mall. Each of the Native Americans posing there are soft-golf-clapping.
- Drawing of a golfer trying to hit his way out of a pothole on Lincoln Drive.
That’s all I’m giving away for free. PGA, let’s link… US Open at Merion 2030… Time to make this money…
Matt Schultz is a comedy and sports writer from Philadelphia. He’s written extensively for ClickHole, The Onion, and Conan O’Brien’s Team Coco. His work has been featured in Vulture, Deadspin, The A.V. Club, Paste Magazine, and other publications. Much of his sports journalism can be found on college basketball websites that don’t exist anymore (PhilaHoops Heads rise up…)