Hughes Norton predicts Tiger Woods will smash records on PGA Tour Champions

Norton knows because he was Woods’ first agent, the man who got Woods $40 million from Nike and $20 million from Titleist before he hit a professional shot.  In those days, Norton headed the golf division for IMG where he also signed Greg Norman, Mark O’Meara, Curtis Strange, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Watson, Peter Jacobsen, David Graham, Bill Rodgers, Nancy Lopez, and Bobby Clampett. 

One thing led to another, and two years later, Woods fired Norton for—according to his account—making him too much money and asking for more time than Woods wanted to give.

“He's what, almost he's 3 months away from being 49. He's had all these surgeries that we know about. He can barely walk. He's got another micro disc whatever the thing is a month ago,” Norton noted.

Woods underwent a “micro decompression” surgery, which was revealed in September of 2024.  It was his sixth back operation in a career that has been punctuated with physical problems in between miraculous tournament victories.

Yet with all the medical procedures, Norton, in his second interview for The Golf Show 2.0, noted that Woods is just 15 months away from PGA Tour Champions age. He predicted that Woods will go to the over-50 or “Old Guy Tour" or the "Dark Side" as some call it.

“I promise you he will not only attack the senior tour with vigor and enthusiasm, he's liable to win 10 or 12 times a year out there, and believe me when I tell you, in his mind, he's already thinking Hale Irwin, Bernhard Langer, 46 whatever,” Norton continued. “He's looking for 50 and beyond, and don't bet against him.”

One reason the Champions Circuit opens up good opportunities for Woods is that walking is what holds him back now. His PGA Tour friends at home say that he can hit any shot on the range, but it’s the walking that’s the issue. However, on PGA Tour Champions, he can use a cart.

Hughes Norton thinks Tiger Woods can’t get there fast enough.

Norton points to the fact that his results in tournaments this season have not been good. The reason he thinks that is he knows Woods loves competition more than anything. It will be interesting to see if Woods does take up the challenge of PGA Tour Champions.

Woods isn't the only player to fire Norton, who has been out of golf for multiple decades. Another high-profile client who let him go was Greg Norman, who has inserted himself into golf again in recent years as commissioner of LIV Golf. 

The idea of Greg Norman’s world tour, according to Norton, was not Norman’s.

“It belonged to a guy named Mark McCormack,” Norton explained.

As the story goes, in 1967, McCormack lined up a TV network and sponsors and then went to discuss it with Arnold Palmer, his first client, the one that made him successful as an agent.

“Arnold famously said, ‘Mark we can't do this, you know.  It’ll kill the other guys on the tour,’" Norton explained. So, McCormack dropped it.

Norton told the same story to Norman during their travels and didn’t think about it anymore. But then in 1994, Norman made a similar proposal to the PGA Tour through two well-known tournament organizers. And the idea was pitched to PGA Tour players who were playing the Shark ShootOut at Sherwood Country Club.

Arnold Palmer was in the room when the idea was presented, and he made a stand, saying more or less:

'Greg, how many times do you think Jack, Gary, and I were approached with this same idea over the years? It didn't work then. We shot it down, and it's not going to work this time for me. You guys do whatever else you want to do in this room today but I'm never going to support something because it'll be bad for the fellas.'

And so Norman’s idea of an “elite” tour hit the wastebasket before it was started.

“Greg really never got over that in my opinion,” Norton said. “He had left me and IMG at that point. But he is famous for holding grudges. I saw this all during the time I was with him.”  

Norman, according to Norton, held and probably still holds a grudge against the PGA Tour over this. 

Norman’s resentment toward the Tour and his willingness to treat the organization the way he did in helping the Saudis create LIV Golf, Norton believes, is one reason that PGA Tour players have insisted that Norman has to be fired in order for a deal to be struck between LIV and the PGA Tour.  

Whatever happens next, Norton probably knows and has had more business contact with both Woods and Norman than most people, and he thinks the writing is on the wall for LIV Golf.

So, Woods on the Champions circuit? Norman fired from LIV? We don’t have long to wait. Woods turns 50 a year from this December, at the end of the month. Norman’s contract with LIV is supposedly up in August of 2025. Will it be renewed? Not if PGA Tour players have anything to say about it. Next year is going to be really interesting.