By Todd Dobson | Grass League
I want to talk about what just happened. Not in a press release kind of way — in a “this changes things” kind of way.
Because when Grass League named Michael Prindiville as President, the league didn’t just fill a seat at the top of the org chart. It made a statement about what it intends to become.
Let me explain why this matters more than you might think.
The League Has Been Building Toward This
In just 2 years, Grass League has done things the broader golf world was told simply weren’t possible. 11 franchises. Franchise valuations up more than eightfold. Event gates exceeding 15,000 fans. Open qualifiers that sell out in hours. A digital broadcast deal on Peacock that built the audience. And then last December — the moment the league had been working toward — a live broadcast on Golf Channel. Linear television. The real thing.
Todd Dobson has watched every piece of this get assembled from the inside, and I’ll tell you what I’ve told anyone who would listen: the foundation here is real. The competition is real. The energy in the stands is real. What this league needed — and what it was always going to need at this stage — was the right person to take all of that raw momentum and turn it into something that lasts.
Enter Prindi.
Who Is Michael Prindiville?
NBC Sports. Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment. Sixth Street-backed properties. Teams, leagues, touring events, digital-first media platforms. The résumé speaks for itself, but I want to highlight something specific about what Prindiville has built over his career: he’s never just run operations. He has built businesses at the intersection of media, fandom, and live experience.
That phrase isn’t just a talking point. It is exactly the Venn diagram that Grass League lives inside.
This is a league that just made its linear television debut on Golf Channel, sells out qualifiers, and has franchise owners who are both professional athletes and YouTube creators with millions of followers. It is a live event and a media property and a franchise ecosystem all at once. The person leading it needs to understand all three dimensions — not just one, not just two.
Prindiville has operated in all three. That is not a coincidence in how this hire was made.
What He’s Actually Going to Do
Here’s where it gets interesting. Prindiville was in the building at the GL Championship last December — the first time Grass League hit the Golf Channel airwaves. He watched the product up close. And what he said afterward wasn’t generic executive-speak — it was specific.
He wants to make Grass League one of the most interactive leagues in golf. Fans and brand partners with the ability to actually impact the product — through the broadcast, through the fan experience, through elements of the competition itself.
I want you to sit with that for a second.
We are not talking about a jumbotron and a sponsor banner on the third hole. We are talking about a fundamentally different model for how a sports league and its audience relate to each other. The leagues that win over the next decade, Prindiville has said, are the ones that empower their communities to be part of the product.
This is the future of sports, and Grass League just hired the person to build it here first.
The 2026 Season Starts Now
The 2026 Grass Clippings Open kicks off April 22nd in Tempe, Arizona — and if you’ve never seen a Grass League qualifier, let me paint the picture for you. One hundred teams. Two hundred players. All of them competing to play their way onto rosters of contracted professionals, fighting for one of the most coveted spots in short-format golf.
Golf’s only live draft follows on April 23rd — where the qualifier’s survivors get slotted into eleven franchises alongside rostered pros — and then the $100K purse Grass Clippings Open runs April 24th and 25th on Golf Channel.
All of it live. All of it on the same course where this league was built. And all of it happening with Prindiville now in the building, shaping what this league looks like for the next decade.
The timing here is not accidental. This is a league that does things deliberately. You bring in a President of this caliber when you believe the window is open — and you want to make sure you walk through it.
Jake Hoselton said it best when he announced the hire: Prindiville has the leadership, the operating discipline, and the understanding of how emerging leagues scale to guide Grass League into its next phase of growth.
Emerging leagues. Next phase of growth.
Those words used to describe Grass League’s future. After this hire, I’d argue they describe its present.
Buckle up. It’s go time.
