I recommend listening to Steve Hill's interview with Jussi on the Ultiworld Pod which posted yesterday.
If you've been paying attention to Jussi's line of thinking regarding his tour, which he has clearly and repeatedly explained since he announced plans for the DGWT last year, there might not be anything new for you in this interview. However, after judging from the level of steady indignation focused on Jussi based on his personality, vision & strategies, it's clear that most people expected something completely different from Jussi for USDGC. For the life of me, I can't figure out why they would.
As a hardcore pro disc golf fan, I don't like many basic aspects of DGWT. And I happen to disagree with his business plan if his goal is to build the sport in this country. But I can't say that Jussi's operating in bad faith. He's been 100% consistent and available for comment since he announced the DGWT last year.
He has stated clearly, many times over the last 12 months, that his focus of DGWT has been to package a slick, professional media production to market to huge corporate sponsors - he mentioned Coca-Cola, as an example, several times. That's it. He doesn't care about the current or longtime hardcore fan, but he admits to that. On the Ultiworld pod, he was downright disdainful and dismissive of the whole last-minute PDGA/Smashboxx/USDGC live coverage offer fiasco, essentially describing the whole negotiation/discussion as unprofessional and beneath the DGWT.
The one thing that Jussi stated in his Ultiworld interview that I had never heard from him before is that he sees a clear division between growth of disc golf in Europe and growth of disc golf over here. He states that disc golf is already a nationally televised sport in Finland as a sign that disc golf is a lot closer to big time status in Europe than it is over here. This adds credibility to his business plan, as it pertains to growing the sport in Europe. That's why I said I didn't agree with his business plan to grow the sport in this country. I think he might be mentioning Coca-Cola over and over because companies like Coke might be pretty close to sponsoring the sport in Europe.
And he mentioned that the PDGA is opening up an office in Europe and will be staffing it up next year. That's interesting.
I think Jussi's focusing on growing the sport in Europe, not here. That's fine, of course. Disc golf looks like it's growing like crazy over there, so it makes good business sense. I just think that might be why many American disc golf fans can't figure out a lot of what he's doing.