Meet LI's Jeff Price, a driving force behind success at Ryder Cup

Each Ryder Cup brings new stories.

The golf community hopes that this week’s tournament at Bethpage Black provides the best ones yet. Long Islander Jeff Price has been one of the major figures to ensure that will be the case.

Price, a 20-year Sea Cliff resident, is the chief commercial and philanthropy officer for the PGA of America, which owns and operates the Ryder Cup when played in the U.S.

He leads the association’s day-to-day commercial operations — which includes global media, marketing, digital framework, public relations and partnerships — as well as its philanthropic development efforts.

Whether it is overseeing media and business partnerships domestically and across the globe, creating new media initiatives or establishing fundraising efforts, Price has worn several different hats ahead of the 45th Ryder Cup.

“For me, it's kind of working with those teams and helping to drive strategy and then ultimately make sure that we execute with excellence,” Price told Newsday. “Hopefully you'll see that all come together in cohesion in what turns out to be hopefully on so many different levels — for our spectators, for our media partners, for the media themselves covering it, and everyone who's associated with this, all of our partners and their guests — that we've created something that is going to be the best Ryder Cup that’s ever been played.”

Price, 60, has held his commercial role since 2014 for the PGA of America, which represents more than 30,000 golf professionals and operates the PGA Championship and other events. He added the philanthropy title last year. Earlier in his career, he served as the president and publisher of The Sporting News, the president of Sports Illustrated Digital and the head of sponsorships for Mastercard, where he learned the business of golf.

Price, a New Englander by birth who played football at Bates College in Maine, helped create a partnership program with Ryder Cup Europe, which manages the event overseas. It has grown from one worldwide partner in 2016 to seven, including companies like BMW and Rolex that Price said are “really telling the story of the Ryder Cup." 

On the digital side, Price has steered the Ryder Cup into new waters. The alternate broadcast “Breakfast at Bethpage,” a program Price described as College GameDay meets the ManningCast, will debut. Hosted by “Saturday Night Live” star Colin Jost and produced by Peyton Manning’s Omaha Productions, it will air from the first tee box each of the three mornings on Peacock, YouTube and the Ryder Cup’s app and website.

Ryder Cup Live brings watch parties to Rockefeller Center, where fans will get a chance to practice their own golf shots on a recreation of Bethpage’s first tee, eat, drink and shop.

Commercially, Price lauded how the New York market has rallied around the Ryder Cup. Tickets for competition days sold out in 48 hours, and Price said fans from dozens of countries and 47 states will be in attendance. The People’s Perk program gave away tickets to 3,000 New Yorkers.

From a philanthropy perspective, the PGA HOPE (Helping Our Patriots Everywhere) program introduces and teaches golf to veterans. Every $330 raised gets another veteran into the program, and it will have a fundraising presence at Bethpage.

“When it all comes together," Price said, "when you kind of see how this manifests at Bethpage — what you see digitally, what you see from a television perspective, the partnerships on a global basis — to pull all that together and to do it as fiercely as those players will be competing. The collaboration that happens off the course to take this property to the next level is something that I'm incredibly proud of, and I'm proud of the team that's made it happen.”

Bryan Karns, the PGA of America’s championship director, has worked with Price since 2014 and on a daily basis since 2022.

“He's a resource in a way that a lot of leaders I've come across in the last 20 years just don't operate,” Karns said.

He credited Price as a “champion” for thinking outside the box by supporting ideas that previously may not have been encouraged.

“You walk away and you go, ‘Jeff’s just good at his job, and he's a nice guy and he's understanding. He’s a person that people want to work with,’ ” Karns said. “You just forget that there's this kind of simplicity in that that goes so much further than the egomaniacal, overly-driven sort of person who, ‘It's my way or the highway.’ Jeff is the ultimate collaborator. He's the ultimate supporter.

“Most importantly, he's just got a tremendous sense of, ‘We'll get to the end of this together.’ And that just really inspires people, and it really turns out big ideas.”

By Ben Dickson

benjamin.dickson@newsday.com@bendickson__

Ben Dickson is Newsday Sports' general assignment reporter. He joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.