NAPLES, Fla. — The 2024 Grant Thornton Invitational, an unofficial mixed team event, marked the end of Mel Reid’s tour career, though the 38-year-old didn’t really tell anybody.
“I didn’t want to sing and dance about it,” she said from outside the Golf Central set at last month’s CME Group Tour Championship. “I don’t regret it one second.”
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The entertaining Englishwoman returned to Tiburon Golf Club, which also hosts the Grant Thornton, in late November to work as an analyst alongside Brandel Chamblee and host Anna Jackson for live pre-game and post-game shows from the LPGA’s season-ending event.
Reid admits to thinking about tour retirement on and off for about a decade. The tragic death of her mother, Joy, in a car crash in Germany in 2012 understandably took its toll.
“I think obviously with my mom and stuff, that kind of made me think about it sooner than I would’ve wanted,” she said, “but something just kept me in it. Back against the wall, I wanted to prove to myself that I wasn’t going to let that defeat me.”
A six-time winner on the Ladies European Tour, Reid joined that tour in 2008 and was named Rookie of the Year. She earned her LPGA card in 2017 and broke through with her first LPGA title at the 2020 ShopRite LPGA Classic. This year, Reid returned to the Jersey Shore, family in tow, to work in her new role as a full-time television on-course reporter and analyst.
Two years ago, Reid and her wife, Carly, welcomed their son Kai, and the family of three began traveling together when Mel returned to the tour. That marked another shift for Reid, who began doing work for Golf Channel/NBC Sports in between events.
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“I remember Carly talking to me one day and she was like listen, you’re putting us through quite a lot here, and I feel like you’re not even enjoying it. I would 100 percent do this with you and support you 100 percent, but I know that you don’t enjoy this, and she was right,” recalled Reid.
After that honest conversation, Reid decided she was ready for the next step, and committed full-time to her new role in television in 2025. She also launched a podcast with follow sports reporter Kira Dixon called “Quiet Please! With Mel and Kira.” Reid is one of eight LPGA players who have recently retired.
“I’m so against the grain as a golfer,” said Reid. “I always hate being on my own. I’m an extrovert. I love being in team environments. I played team sports my entire life. I look back on my career, and everything good in my life has come from golf, and I love golf so much, but it is so against my personality it’s crazy. I think now I’m back on a team, and I think that’s what I’m enjoying again.”
Golf Channel teammates Chamblee and Jackson note they can throw anything in Reid’s direction and she can respond in an insightful and poised manner. Live television often takes unplanned, abrupt turns, and Reid doesn’t flinch.
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“First of all, I don’t think people fully understand how good of a player she was,” said Chamblee. “She won on the LPGA, had a chance to win a major or two. She’s one heck of player, but she has such a marvelous rapport with everybody in the game of golf – obviously the players but also the caddies, managers, executives in the game. She’s just got a very disarming way about her, so when people come on our desk, they’re disarmed, they’re at ease, they’re comfortable. Even if they hardly know her, she’s one of those people that brings out the softer side. They lower their inhibitions, they smile, they light up around Mel.”
Reid’s first experience on the desk came as a last-minute call at the 2023 U.S. Women’s Open at Pebble Beach. With no time to prepare, Reid suddenly found herself thrust into an hours-long preview show early in the week. Jackson, who was hosting, said Reid simply spoke from the heart.
“To her credit, she filters out a lot of the stuff she shouldn’t say,” said Jackson with a laugh. “She knows a lot of secrets, Mel Reid. She found a way – very, very quickly – to deliver really fresh and interesting insight on the tour and on players in just a very honest, raw, untrained way. I think her general nature is unapologetically Mel Reid – this is who I am – I’m going to speak the truth.”
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Jackson went on to note that in Chamblee, Reid has a mentor and friend who has helped her learn how to elevate her compelling anecdotes with data.
“What will get you in trouble in the business of commentating is thinking that because you’ve played the game and know the players, that you will always have something to say,” said Chamblee. “You have to do work because the game changes, and the last thing in the world you want to do is repeat yourself week after week after week. So she’s willing to do the work. She wants it. She’s as competitive at this as anybody I’ve ever seen. And that says a lot. What made Johnny Miller great was a lot of things, but at the core of it was that he wanted to be great. He wanted to work at it.”
European Solheim Cup captain Anna Nordqvist says Mel Reid will go over and beyond to light up a team room.
In addition to her media roles, Reid is once again serving as a vice captain for Team Europe at the 2026 Solheim Cup. A four-time Solheim Cup player, Reid previously served as vice captain in 2019 and 2024.
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Captain Anna Nordqvist chose her childhood friend for a number of reasons. Like Nordqvist, Reid can be to the point when it matters, alleviating drama. She’ll be up on player performance with her work in TV and will bring energy to the team room.
“She’s a fun character to be around,” said Nordqvist earlier this year at a year-to-go event in the Netherlands. “She brought this blown-up, not a fat suit, it was like a sumo wrestler. I can’t remember which [Solheim], I think it was Gleneagles. … She was wearing it in the team room and everyone was just dying.”
As Reid’s new media career flourishes, no doubt captain duties will soon follow.
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Mel Reid on move to TV and how pro golf went against her personality
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