Netflix Is Doing Something It's Never Done Before

Netflix is opening physical stores, but that's not the only new area that the streaming video giant is expanding into. The company has announced its first-ever live sports event, and it's coming up soon. The Netflix Cup, as it's called, is a live golf tournament in Las Vegas featuring some of the stars of its popular shows Formula 1: Drive to Survive and Full Swing.

The professional drivers and golfers will be paired up to battle it out at the Wynn Golf Club in Las Vegas this fall. This will be a match play event featuring F1 drivers Alex Albon, Pierre Gasly, Lando Norris, and Carlos Sainz. Golfers competing in the event include Rickie Fowler, Max Homa, Collin Morikawa, and Justin Thomas.

The event takes place on Tuesday, November 14, at 3 PM PT / 6 PM ET. The golf tournament serves as a lead-in to the F1 Las Vegas Grand Prix. This race is taking over Las Vegas on November 19.

The Netflix Cup will see the four pairs of racers and golfers playing an eight-hole match, with the top two teams advancing to the ninth hole to close it out.

F1: Drive to Survive is coming back for its sixth season while Full Swing is now filming its second season.

Netflix has hosted live programming before, beginning with Chris Rock's comedy special in March. In April, Netflix hosted another live show, a Love Is Blind reunion, and it went badly.

Netflix is pushing more and more into live programming, but don't expect Netflix to follow in the footsteps of Amazon or Peacock and buy the streaming rights to sports broadcasts. In 2021, Netflix said it wasn't eager to get involved in part because of the gigantic fees that top-tier sports leagues charge for media rights.