What goes around comes around.
Such is the case with the Skins Game.
In 1983, four legends of the game—Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player and Tom Watson—descended upon Desert Highlands for the inaugural Skins Game. And little did they know what they were sparking. The silly season exhibition became a Thanksgiving weekend staple for 25 years. Broadcast on NBC and later ABC, with Vin Scully handing play-by-play, it, for many years, challenged the Masters each year for the highest television rating in golf.
Chad Mumm, while growing up, was one of many who made it appointment television with leftover turkey in the fridge. Now, he’s the co-founder and president of Pro Shop, a media company behind Netflix’s Full Swing. And after the docuseries became a rousing success, he knew what he wanted his next venture to be.
A reboot of the Skins Game.
On Friday, 17 years since the competition was last played, Mumm’s vision will come to life, with the help of Propgate Content and PGA Tour Studios. Tommy Fleetwood, Shane Lowry, Xander Schauffele and Keegan Bradley will tee it up at Panther National in South Florida, a Justin Thomas and Jack Nicklaus co-design. It’ll be broadcast on Amazon Prime Video, starting at 9 a.m. ET.
To ensure the Skins Game’s sequel isn’t short-lived, it won’t shy away from its roots.
The Skins Game returns w/ @TommyFleetwood1 , @Keegan_Bradley , @JustinThomas34 , @XSchauffele 💰
— Skins Game (@the_skins_game) October 7, 2025
Live on Black Friday (11/28) only on @primevideo pic.twitter.com/lvtrc1SndS
“We’ve got all those old highlights,” Mumm said. “... We’ve got the iconic logo, we’ve got all the history, and I think that we live in a nostalgia culture right now and I think that the audience of people who grew up watching this, they’re now the sort of core golf fan and this is coming back to a traditional home for this event. I think the other piece that will help it be successful is again, kind of planting a flag on this holiday weekend and kind of resuming this tradition that used to be as much a part of Thanksgiving as the NFL and turkey.”
And being on Amazon Prime, which will also be the home to Bears-Eagles that afternoon and then two NBA games, will be vital to its success.
“When we were looking at bringing this back,” Mumm said, “we obviously talked to every broadcaster and we love the idea of being a part of this massive day of sports. … Amazon has this, they own that Friday, obviously, Black Friday’s the busiest shopping day on Amazon.com. They’ve got an NFL game and then two NBA games right after. So they’re really building that Friday into a thing that they can truly own. And so the idea that the Skins game is the opening act for this amazing day of sports, where you can literally tune in at 9:00 AM and not change your dial … We love the idea of being a part of that. We love the idea of seeing that Skins Game and the PGA tour logo sitting next to the NFL and NBA logo.”
Some of the original concepts will remain, like the format, in which each hole has a dollar value and tied holes roll over. There’s some innovation, though. This year’s competition will feature a “reverse purse,” where each player begins with $1 million and that will increase or decrease if a player wins or loses a hole.
When the Skins Game began, it boasted money that even Nicklaus and Palmer had never won in a golf tournament. Now, purses on the PGA Tour are astronomical. And that could be attributed to the Skins Game’s demise 17 years ago, along with the abundance of silly season events currently within the golf landscape, which the initial success of the Skins Game helped create.
But for the players teeing it up this Black Friday, this is a chance to finally be part of something that was a mainstay of their childhood, regardless of how much they’ll earn from it.
“I loved watching the Skins Game growing up,” Bradley said. “It was always for me, growing up in New England, it was the end of the season, so I was bummed about that golf was winding down and then we always had this thing to look forward to of watching legends of the game play … that was the first time we’d ever seen guys interact with each other while they were playing and hear what they were saying to their caddies and it was always just a really exciting thing to look forward to for me as a kid.”
If their passion for the competition is as infectious as Nicklaus’s, Palmer’s, Watson’s and Player’s was over 40 years ago, that will certainly help the Skins Game maintain a healthy second lease on life.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as With Amazon Prime and Nostalgia, the Skins Game is Ready for its Big Return .
