{"id":452122,"date":"2026-02-06T07:52:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-06T07:52:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/452122\/"},"modified":"2026-02-06T07:52:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T07:52:09","slug":"pga-of-america-taps-terry-clark-as-next-ceo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/452122\/","title":{"rendered":"PGA of America taps Terry Clark as next CEO"},"content":{"rendered":"

The PGA of America has filled its vacant CEO role less than a month after Derek Sprague stepped down<\/a>, with UnitedHealth Group CMO Terry Clark set to take over the position next month.<\/p>\n

Clark also has been serving as an independent director on the PGA of America board since 2024. His hiring was a quick one for the PGA, which did not use a search firm. Its hiring of Sprague in December 2024 took nearly six months.<\/p>\n

The PGA also kept the search close to its vest. Former NASCAR commissioner Steve Phelps, who resigned last month, was mentioned as a possible suitor for the PGA role in golf circles. Golfweek recently reported<\/a> on Clark as a potential lead candidate.<\/p>\n

Clark will officially become PGA CEO on March 2. Kerry Haigh, the PGA\u2019s chief championships officer who\u2019s been the interim CEO since Sprague stepped down, will stay in that position until Clark takes over. The PGA said Sprague also would still remain involved with the organization as a past president.<\/p>\n

Clark\u2019s background is a departure from his predecessor. Whereas Sprague had been GM of TPC Sawgrass and had a long history running golf courses and clubs, in addition to being PGA president, Clark has a more top-to-bottom business background.<\/p>\n

Prior to his tenure at UnitedHealth Group, Clark had senior roles at InterActiveCorp (IAC), where he worked with brands like Ticketmaster and Expedia, among others. But Clark also has major ties in golf in addition to his independent director position with the PGA.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s overseen marketing efforts for Optum, which falls under the UnitedHealth brand and has become a major player in golf in recent years. Clark led Optum\u2019s efforts to become one of three \u201cProud Partners\u201d for the Players Championship on the PGA Tour. Optum also sponsored the Golf Channel Games that were played this past December, and it\u2019s become one of Rory McIlroy\u2019s top sponsors.<\/p>\n

At the PGA, Clark will inherit a role that has plenty of challenges. On the executive front, the organization has lost its COO (Craig Kessler) and CCO (Jeff Price) in the past six months, along with Ryan Ogle, who stepped down as director of the PGA Championship just four months before the event near Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

There has been persistent industry chatter in recent years that the PGA Tour — with its new $1.5B in funding from Strategic Sports Group — could look to purchase a piece of the PGA, such as the Ryder Cup or the PGA Championship.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also the issue of how the PGA navigates its tech-heavy HQ in Frisco. The state-of-the-art building has drawn positive reviews over its first handful of years, but the surrounding golf courses have drawn criticism from players in both the men\u2019s and women\u2019s game.<\/p>\n

Some players were critical of the setup<\/a> around last year\u2019s KPMG Women\u2019s PGA Championship in Frisco, while McIlroy went out of his way<\/a> to knock the venue last year. Frisco is hosting the 2027 men\u2019s PGA Championship. <\/p>\n

Clark also has opportunity. The PGA still controls the Ryder Cup, and golf at the recreational level is riding a strong wave from the COVID-19 pandemic that has not showed signs of letting up<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The PGA of America has filled its vacant CEO role less than a month after Derek Sprague stepped…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":452123,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,50741,105062,3332,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-452122","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-golf","9":"tag-golf-channel","10":"tag-pga-of-america","11":"tag-pga-tour","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=452122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/452123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=452122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=452122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=452122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}