YouTube stars Fat Perez, Gabby Golf Girl and Soly set for second Content Creator Classic

USA Today

08-03-2025

YouTube stars Fat Perez, Gabby Golf Girl and Soly set for second Content Creator Classic Personalities such as Gabby GolfGirl, Fat Perez and Roger Steele will take on the Stadium Course the day before the PGA Tour's stars begin The Players Championship
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YouTube golf personality Roger Steele says his videos share a journey
YouTube has given rise to a series of golf 'content creators' who use humor, charisma and relatable goals to attract millions of viewers.
The Creator Classic, featuring YouTube golf stars, will be held at TPC Sawgrass on March 12th.
The event will be streamed on multiple platforms, including the PGA Tour's YouTube channel and Golf Channel.
The Creator Classic aims to reach a younger and more diverse audience through engaging content from popular YouTube personalities.
Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy and Ludvig Åberg will be showing off their skills at the Players Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass this week.
So will Fat Perez, Gabby Golf Girl and Soly.
The day before Scheffler, McIlroy, Aberg and PGA Tour players begin The Players Championship, the Creator Classic at TPC Sawgrass will be held on March 12, at 4:15 p.m. at the 10th tee of the Stadium Course.
The event will be streamed on the PGA Tour's YouTube channel, Golf Channel, ESPN+ and the PGA Tour channels on Pluto TV, Roku, Samsung TV Plus, Prime Video, Fire TV, Tubi, Xumo Play and LG Channel. PGA Tour Entertainment and Pro Shop Studios, which produces the Netflix series "Full Swing," are sharing production of the event.
Fans at the Stadium Course can watch 10 of the most prominent YouTube golf "creators" tackle the back nine, ending with a shootout at the par-3 17th hole among the top three over the first eight holes of that side.
"They've all dreamed of playing pro golf at one point," said Chad Mumm, co-founder of Pro Shop and the producer of Full Swing. "This gives them the chance to see what that feels like and to share it with their audience. And what they are very good about is bringing their audience into how they're feeling. They'll spend the next couple of weeks talking about their experience on short-form content, long-form and vlogs, and it will resonate with the average golf fan."
Which translates into even more hits with the PGA Tour, Players Championship and TPC Sawgrass brands front and center to a demographic group the Tour wants to reach.
"It's easy to say they've got millions of followers," said Nelson Silverio, the PGA Tour's Vice-President for Content Strategy. "But it's who those followers are that really caught our eye. Their audience, for the most part, is younger, it's a little more diverse than you typically see. And the creative engine that these people have ... it's just fascinating to see. They challenge us."
Content creators bring a fresh look to golf
The field of 10 creators achieved notoriety and hits from their videos on YouTube and other social media platforms for their varied and different approaches to golf.
Some began doing fitness and instructional videos, such as Gabriella "Gabby" DeGasperis, who at 17 will be the youngest player in the field.
Others started as an outlet during the pandemic, such as Nick "Fat Perez" Stubbe (so named for his resemblance to former PGA Tour player Pat Perez), who is one of the stars of the YouTube Channel "Bob Does Sports."
Stubbe was a former accountant who began doing videos during the pandemic, which evolved into a series of comedic YouTube shows including comedian Robby Berger ("Bobby Fairways") and Joe Demare ("Joey Coldcuts")
Others were known before the rapid ascension of YouTube and have serious golf chops such as the Bryan Brothers, Wesley and George.
Wesley Bryan won the 2017 RBC Heritage and is a three-time Korn Ferry Tour winner, and George Bryan has played on the PGA Tour's Latin American circuit. Both were noted for their trick shots at clinics and Golf Channel's Big Break and began taking their act to YouTube.
Kyle Berkshire is a three-time World Long Drive champion who is trying to become the first person to hit a 600-yard drive on a green-grass course.
They will be in the field at the TPC Sawgrass, along with Roger Steele (the PA announcer for TGL matches), Chris "Soly" Solomon of No Laying Up, Grant Horvat and Tisha Alyn. Another player representing Barstool Sports will be added.
First Creator Classic drew 2.7 million views
How best to explain the phenomenon?
While hard-core PGA Tour golf fans of an older demographic may have no idea who the Content Creators are, millions of golfers and non-golfers who watch their videos and engage with them through social media are avid fans.
Last year's inaugural Creator Classic at the East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta, the day before the first round of the Tour Championship, had more than 2.7 million views on YouTube, was its No. 2 trending video following the competition and engaged nearly 60 million viewers across social media platforms during a four-week period.
The PGA Tour has taken note of that kind of reach and last year formed the Creator Council with 10 of the most popular YouTube stars to develop strategies for content development and fan engagement.
But it's more than just getting a few buddies together to video a round of golf at a public course. Mumm said the creators strike a nerve, resonate with fans and get their attention for a variety of reasons in addition to many of them being good players: they're funny, sarcastic and creative.
"A lot of people don't realize how much work it is to grow a reliable audience," Mumm said. "Most of them are good-looking people with good swings but it's a relentless climb. They've really worked at it. You have to get the camera out, set up for every swing, but you also have to be relatable, be natural."
Mumm also said the creators don't need the filter of going through a TV network, with producers and technicians.
"They speak directly to the audience without being mediated by anyone else," he said. "It creates more of a relationship. People get to know them."
The subject of their videos are limited only by their imaginations. It's Steele trying to reach 200 mph clubhead speed, Berkshire playing a nine-hole match against Rocco Mediate or the Bryan Brothers saga of buying and trying to bring to life a golf club in South Carolina in a state of disrepair.
The creators are also relatable through their background.
One Creator used videos to gain confidence
Take Gabby DeGasperis. When she attended a private school in North Palm Beach, she was on the golf team and helped them get to the state tournament twice. But she also was the target of bullying and eventually she began taking online classes and withdrew from school.
As an outlet, she began making workout videos with golf in mind. That turned into golf instructional videos, and videos of herself playing golf (with her father Ron doing much of the behind-camera work) and on Feb. 1, 2023, she posted her first YouTube golf video and has more than 170,000 subscribers.
"People see that she's authentically kind and nice and honest," Ron DeGasperis said. "It was a bold move, at 15 years old. Doing golf and putting it out there and risking a kind of cool factor ... it resonated with people."
Gabby has no fear. She recently posted a video of her taking on LPGA winner Charley Hull in a match, with no handicap and another where she took on Berkshire in a one-hole match to try and prove she could beat one of the longest drivers in the world.
"When I was in high school, I was isolated and bullied and I felt so poorly about myself," she said. "But I found something that I love and was passionate about, clean fun and exciting. You gain so much confidence because I was working on myself and what I love and you forget about what people say."
Roger Steele said it's about chasing dreams
Steele, the over-the-top announcer for TGL matches and son of a Chicago police officer who taught him to play the game, said the average golfer, while in awe of the skills of a Tiger Woods or Scottie Scheffler, can't relate.
But they can play the same golf courses and they can dream, which is what Steele is trying to touch.
"Everybody doing well in the creative space is filling a void," he said. "People are looking for something to resonate with. Maybe it's the personality. Maybe it's the humor. Maybe it's a creator who is documenting his quest to try to qualify for the PGA Tour. There are all kinds of voids around us and if you can find a niche, there's nothing stopping you. [The creators] democratize what golf on bigger stages looks like."
Steele said a dream, big or small, touches people on an emotional level.
"You would be surprised how a simple mission, taken to the golf course -- whether it's breaking 80, trying to qualify for the U.S. Open -- those simple things bring people together when you showcase it in the right way," Steele said.
Steele, who had a degree in civil engineering from the University of Illinois and worked for the state's transportation department, began playing more golf through business and was motivated to get better. He quickly got his handicap down to scratch and can bomb tee shots more than 300 yards.
His first videos were made during the pandemic when he would tell playing partners in no uncertain terms that they were slow or needed to go back for more lessons before they came back out with him.
All in good fun, he quickly added. His sarcastic, funny comments were extensions of the trash-talk he learned while playing basketball in Chicago.
"It was bringing that Chicago basketball experience to the golf course," he said. "I was being candid with people, and they appreciated it, me giving them the honesty."
Steele then began making videos expounding on slow play (he hates it) and rules of golf he considered silly. Lately he's posted videos going to various cities seeking out the best hustlers, such as going to Atlanta to face a player called "Big Rhino" for $10,000 per hole.
Mumm said the PGA Tour recognized the combined clout the creators have on social media and the digital world.
"I give them the credit for embracing this," he said. "At one point, I would not have thought we'd do this at the Tour Championship, then at The Players Championship, their marquee event. They've really leaned in and realized that here is a huge audience that's totally different, younger, more diverse, more women. They're bringing them into the tent."