Tag: PGA
PGA Tour: ‘Top players’ commit to ‘elevated’ events; Jay Monahan says ‘no’ to LIV golfers returning
The 12 elevated events will be the three FedExCup Playoffs, the Genesis Invitational, Arnold Palmer Invitational, Memorial Tournament, WGC-Dell Match Play, Sentry Tournament of Champions and four events to be announced; Top golfers will play a minimum of three other regular PGA Tour events
Last Updated: 24/08/22 3:23pm
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Jay Monahan say he is ‘inspired by our great players and their commitment’ as he outlines four key items to improve the PGA Tour.
Jay Monahan say he is ‘inspired by our great players and their commitment’ as he outlines four key items to improve the PGA Tour.
Golf’s “top players” have committed to play at least 20 PGA Tour events a year, commissioner Jay Monahan has announced.
The 20 events include the four major championships, the Players Championship and 12 “elevated” tournaments on the PGA Tour which will have an average purse of $20million (£17million).
Players will then choose a minimum of three other PGA Tour events to add to their schedules as the Tour bids to combat the threat posed by the Saudi-backed LIV Golf Series.
“Our top players are firmly behind the Tour, helping us deliver an unmatched product to our fans, who will be all but guaranteed to see the best players competing against each other in 20 events or more throughout the season,” Monahan said in a press conference ahead of the Tour Championship.
Asked if LIV Golf players who were impressed by the changes to the PGA Tour would be welcomed back, Monahan said: “No.
“They’ve joined the LIV Golf Series and they’ve made that commitment and many have made a multi-year commitment.
“I’ve been clear throughout, every player has a choice and I respect that choice. I think they understand that.”
More to follow…
Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy ‘spearhead new PGA Tour stadium event series’
Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy have teamed up to spearhead a new PGA Tour ‘stadium’ competition, according to reports.
Woods and McIlroy have been two of the PGA Tour’s biggest supporters amid golf’s battle between the traditional tour and the new Saudi-backed LIV Golf Series and the duo have taken it upon themselves to contribute to the fightback.
The plan was shared with their fellow professionals during the crunch players-only meeting held in Wilmington, Delaware on August 16, which was believed to be organized in response to the ongoing LIV Golf threat.
The pair have a proposed a series of one-day events that will be staged in front of a live audience, be technology-forward and be held in a non-green grass, stadium environment, according to Golfweek.
The events will be held in partnership with the PGA Tour and will complement, rather than conflict with, the Tour’s schedule.
They will reportedly launch in 2024 and will run from January through to March with a finale scheduled for later in the season.
Tiger Woods (R) and Rory McIlroy (L) have teamed up to launch new PGA Tour ‘stadium’ events
Broadcast and gaming partners are reportedly being discussed with NBC Sports touted as a potential media partner.
It is not clear exactly what the events will entail but more details are expected to be revealed by commissioner Jay Monahan at the Tour Championship next week.
The project has been two years in the making for Woods and McIlroy and the duo presented the idea to other anti-LIV pros last Tuesday as the movement against the Saudi-backed breakaway has gained momentum in recent weeks.
More details are expected to be revealed by Jay Monahan at the Tour Championship
LIV Golf has already managed to lure away some of the PGA Tour’s biggest names, such as Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and Bryson DeChambeau, with mega-money deals.
However, Woods and McIlroy have remained loyal to the PGA with the former reportedly rejecting an $800million offer to join the rebel series.
The project, along with their united stance against the rebel series, is said to have brought them closer together.
Dustin Johnson (pictured right with Donald Trump) has been lured away to the LIV Golf Series
Woods and McIlroy arranged an informal meeting of players to discuss countering LIV Golf during last month’s J.P. McManus Pro-Am at Adare Manor in Ireland before the follow-up meeting this week.
Woods took off from Stuart, Florida Tuesday lunchtime with Rickie Fowler and two hours later had landed on the east coast, just a half an hour drive from Wilmington, Delaware, where the BMW Championship was played this week.
The meeting lasted 3.5 hours and was described as ‘good’ by one player, as reported by ESPN.
The duo have been working on the project for more than two years and have become closer
The 15-time Major winner is pictured leaving the meeting of PGA Tour golfers on Tuesday
The idea was pitched to their peers as a long-term opportunity for players to build equity in the enterprise, which will have private funding in addition to corporate partnerships and sponsors.
The proposal was said to be received well by the 22 stars who attended the meeting and the plan, along with other suggestions discussed, have been passed onto Monahan.
The PGA Tour chief is believed to already be on board with the new events with the details on the format, potential participants, the experiential elements and the planned location of the events thought to be announced by Monahan at East Lake.
The world’s top golfers met at the five-star Hotel du Pont to assemble a plan of action
Woods’ private jet, pictured in 2010, which flew him from Florida to Philadelphia on Tuesday
Woods drove away from the Hotel du Pont after acting as an ‘alpha’ in the fight against LIV Golf
Monahan is scheduled to hold a press conference on Tuesday ahead of the Tour Championship but a PGA Tour spokesperson declined to comment on what he may discuss, according to Golfweek.
Following, Tuesday’s meeting McIlroy hailed Woods as the ‘alpha’ of the group, revealing the 46-year-old made himself heard with a hands-on approach to finding ‘actionable steps’ to secure the Tour’s future.
‘We’re all great players but we’re not Tiger Woods,’ the Northern Irishman said on Wednesday. ‘He is the hero that we’ve all looked up to and his voice carries further than anyone else’s in the game of golf. His role is navigating us to a place where we all think we should be.
‘I think it’s pretty apparent that whenever we all get in the room there’s an alpha in there and it’s not me. He cares a lot.’
The Northern Irishman hailed Woods for his role in leading the PGA Tour players’ meeting
Woods acted as ‘the alpha’ in the meeting of the world’s top players, according to McIlroy
McIlroy and his colleagues have kept tight-lipped about what was agreed in the meeting but it is understood the Tour’s top players agreed on trying to find ways to face each other more often – while avoiding LIV Golf rivals outside of majors.
Xander Schauffele, ranked sixth in the world, said there was ‘new’ and ‘fresh’ ideas raised at the meeting.
And Woods was at the center of the bid for unity among those who have not defected to LIV Golf.
Of Woods’ contribution, McIlroy added: ‘It shows how much he cares about the tour, it shows how much he cares about the players that are coming through and are going to be the next generation.
‘He’s carried the tour for a long, long time. Players that were his contemporaries, we’ve all benefited from that.’
Elk Ridge-hosted PGA Tour Canada golf event cancelled – Saskatoon | Globalnews.ca
The 2022 PGA Tour Canada golfing event was cancelled due to inclement weather.
The announcement was made early last Saturday after PGA Tour Canada felt that the course at Elk Ridge was unplayable, due to all the rain they have received over the tail end of the tournament — over four inches to be exact.
Naturally, organizers are disappointed, but it was out of their hands. Now they can only look forward to better weather in 2023.
“Kudos to the players in the whole community. Everyone rallied and did whatever we could. But at the end of the day … Mother Nature called the shots, and unfortunately, our golf course is unplayable for PGA Tour Canada standards. They have an obligation to look after the player safety,” said Ryan Danberg, Elk Ridge Resort managing partner.
Elk Ridge Open Tournament Director Hugh Vassos says there was a lot of work put into the event thanks to the more than 100 volunteers working on the course, getting it prepared.
“We pick ourselves up and we start planning for next year. And what we can do besides build a dome? It was a good event leading up to it, I just feel bad for all the volunteers and organizers,” Vassos said.
“They didn’t get a chance to showcase this event. I know it would’ve been a fantastic one.”
But there is still golf to be played and money to be made. Thanks to the Elk Ridge Resort ownership group, they will be putting up $40,000 themselves for a one-round shoot-out on Sunday to help offset the player’s expenses.
Attendance on Sundays is free, and they even plan to set up hospitality tents on the 18th green. As they are also putting up $3,000 for the golfer or golfers (to which it will then be split up), that can eagle the par for the 18th hole.
“Kudos to our committee. They went above and beyond in my opinion. There are a lot of players smiling today, to a cancelled event. And at the end of the day, if you’re ever going to have a cancelled event you couldn’t ask for a better plan B,” said Danberg.
“Us players we have a lot of expenses. Staying in a hotel and travel, and all that stuff. For the ownership group here at Elkridge to come out and have this Sunday shoot out with a $40,000 purse, for one day, most guys already have hotel rooms anyway so it’s really great and it’s a great gesture,” said Brad Reeves, a golfer in the tournament.
© 2022 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
Will LIV Golf Diminish PGA Tour Events Like the Travelers Championship?
CROMWELL, Conn. — The Travelers Championship in central Connecticut, contested on a golf course beside cornfields, is celebrating its 70th anniversary this week, which makes it one of the oldest continuously operated PGA Tour events. Through the decades, the tournament has changed names and venues, but in a small state lacking a professional franchise in one of the four leading North American sports (the N.H.L.’s Hartford Whalers left 25 years ago), the Travelers has been a prized mainstay of Connecticut’s sporting calendar.
It has also been valuable to the PGA Tour, reliably drawing some of the biggest crowds of the tour season. It is beloved by golfers because of its homespun approach that showers players’ wives and children with personal attention, and that in turn has produced a host of marquee winners like Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Jordan Spieth and Bubba Watson.
The 1995 winner was Greg Norman, then the No. 1-ranked men’s golfer worldwide. Norman is the chief executive of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf series, which has roiled the PGA Tour by luring top golfers with guaranteed contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars. In the span of two months, the upstart circuit has threatened the primacy of the PGA Tour, and, potentially, the tour’s legacy events like the Travelers — which, in addition to entertaining southern New England golf fans, has attracted sponsorships that have led to more than $46 million in donations to 800 charities.
The chief beneficiary most years has been a camp in northern Connecticut that helps about 20,000 seriously ill children and their families each year and was founded by a state resident, the actor Paul Newman.
The focus of the intense showdown between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, whose major shareholder is the Public Investment Fund, the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia, has been garish monetary offers to already wealthy golfers — along with a host of geopolitical underpinnings — but unseen in the struggle are other connected entities, like Connecticut’s treasured golf tournament.
Could LIV Golf, which has planned eight events this year, including five in the United States, eventually upend or diminish the Travelers Championship and the other 30-plus PGA Tour events like it around the country? Already, Mickelson and Johnson, who were recently banned from the tour along with every other LIV Golf defector, are missing from this week’s field. Mickelson, 52, probably would not have played, but Johnson, the 2020 champion, had enthusiastically promised in February to return to Connecticut.
Standing on a hillside in the fan gallery overlooking the 18th hole during the first round of the Travelers on Thursday, Jay Hibbard of Woodstock, Conn., said Johnson was missed, “but not that much.”
“Dustin took the money and made a choice, but I don’t come here to root for any one golfer,” Hibbard, 39, said. “Most golf fans come for the atmosphere and to see great golfers up close. And there’s enough other major champions out here this week.”
Standing nearby, Mike Stanley of Plainville, Conn., said: “It’s a little depressing to see things get split up because I think it’s natural to want all the best guys playing together. But there’s still a bunch of top guys — I was following Rory McIlroy today and then Scottie Scheffler.”
Scheffler and McIlroy are first and second in the men’s world rankings and were joined in the Travelers field by four other top 15 golfers. By contrast, no player committed to the LIV Golf tour is ranked in the worldwide top 15.
Inside the players’ locker room here this week, Sahith Theegala, a 24-year-old PGA Tour rookie, said the players his age are of a similar mind: Their loyalty is to the PGA Tour.
“I come from a modest upbringing,” Theegala said, “and I feel like the value of money has been kind of lost. It just seems like a million dollars, which a lot of guys earn on this tour, gets thrown around like it’s nothing, right?”
Asked if he was worried about the future of PGA Tour events like the Travelers, Theegala shook his head.
“There’s a history and legacy of this tour that the young guys have longed to be a part of,” Theegala said. “A new tour has no standing; you’re literally just playing for money.”
A Quick Guide to the LIV Golf Series
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A new series. The new Saudi-financed, controversy-trailed LIV Golf series held its first event in June. But what is it? Who is playing it? What’s all the hubbub, and how can you watch it? Here’s what to know:
He added: “You can’t buy clarity of mind and playing with a clear conscience.”
Joanna Aversa of Waterbury, Conn., who was attending her first Travelers, wondered if LIV Golf’s entry into the men’s golf marketplace might not broaden the appeal of the sport.
“In the past, the golf community has been painted as being very elitist,” she said. “Maybe with some golfers exiting for these big contracts, we might get a whole new wave of fans who feel more comfortable because they don’t have to know all the top people and things like that. They can just come out for the good golf and have fun.”
Financially, officials for the Travelers said the event was on sound footing. Nathan Grube, the tournament director, said ticket sales for this year’s event had outpaced the 2019 tournament, which was the last time the Travelers was not restricted by the pandemic. Corporate hospitality tents are sold out. With all net proceeds going to charity, the total donation, which was more than $2.2 million last year, is expected to rise.
“This is a good place to be right now,” Grube said.
The Hole in the Wall Gang Camp for sick children that Newman founded in 1988 opened this year on the same day as the first round at the Travelers. The organization has hospital outreach programs that bring the summer camp experience to the bedsides of children at dozens of locations throughout New England and the Mid-Atlantic states. All programs, which are devoted to assisting children with cancer and other diseases like sickle cell anemia and blood and metabolic disorders, are provided free of charge.
“Being the primary beneficiary of the Travelers Championship has let us expand our reach,” Ryan Thompson, the camp’s chief communications officer, said on Friday. “It’s so much more than a golf tournament; it’s a source of community pride for all it contributes.”
LIV Golf tour schedule 2022: Dates, locations for all eight events in the controversial Saudi-backed PGA Tour rival
With a tumultuous build-up and a succession of frequently jarring pre-tournament media engagements all but done, the LIV Golf Invitational Series will tee off at the Centurion Club in Hertfordshire.
Former world number one Dustin Johnson and Phil Mickelson are among the leading lights taking part in the competition, which is not being recognised by the Official World Golf Rankings (OWGR).
Major winners Martin Kaymer, Graeme McDowell and Louis Oosthuizen are also involved, along with European Ryder Cup stars Sergio Garcia, Ian Poulter and Lee Westwood.
Johnson is the only player currently ranked inside the world top 20 taking part – Oosthuizen slipped to 21st this week – but intrigue remains significant around the Saudi-backed project that organisers are billing as “golf, but louder”.
So, what accounts for this volume alteration other than the well-documented vast wads of cash? Here, we run through the inaugural LIV Golf schedule and format, along with the prize money on offer.
What is the schedule for the LIV Golf Invitational Series?
This week’s opener is the first of eight events, spanning four countries and running until the team championship finale at Trump National Doral, Miami in October this year.
| Course | Location | Date | |
| 1 | Centurion Club | Hertfordshire, England | June 9-11 |
| 2 | Pumpkin Ridge | Portland, Oregon | June 30 – July 2 |
| 3 | Trump National Golf Club Bedminster | Bedminster, New Jersey | July 29-31 |
| 4 | The International | Boston, Massachusetts | September 2-4 |
| 5 | Rich Harvest Farms | Chicago, Illinois | September 16-18 |
| 6 | Stonehill | Bangkok, Thailand | October 7-9 |
| 7 | Royal Greens Golf & Country Club | Jeddah, Saudi Arabia | October 14-16 |
| 8 | Trump National Golf Club Doral | Miami, Florida | October 27-30 |
LIV Golf format explained
The LIV Golf Invitational Series features two competitions that will take place concurrently: an individual event and a team event.
The first seven events will take place over the course of LIV Golf’s four-month regular season. The eighth event will be the team championship in late October in Miami, where teams compete against one another in a matchplay format for the LIV Golf team trophy.
Individual event
The first seven LIV events will have an individual competition, where each golfer will compete in a strokeplay format over the course of 54 holes, as opposed to the standard 72-hole tour events.
There are no cuts and the golfer with the lowest score after 54 holes will be declared the winner. The events will feature shotgun starts – each player starting at the same time but at a different hole, as opposed to consecutive playing groups starting one after the other at the first.
On each day of the opening competition at Centurion Club, the golfers will make their shotgun starts at 14:00 BST. The trophy presentation is scheduled for 18:30 BST on Sunday, highlighting the compressed playing time that the shotgun format allows.
Team event
Each event will feature 12 teams made up of four golfers each, with LIV Golf appointing a captain to lead each team. Those captains will then select the other three players for their teams in a snake draft format each week, as was the case for the opener in London.
Captains will also select the lineup for each week. Each team will have its own logo, name and colours.
MORE: Why is Dustin Johnson playing in Saudi-backed LIV Golf Series?
Team scoring
During the first two rounds, each team’s best two scores will be used to decide where they rank. That number rises to three in the third and final round.
The team championship in Miami will be a four-day, four-round match-play knockout bracket.
LIV Golf prize money
Each regular-season event features a $25 million purse (£20 million), with $20 million to be split over the 48 golfers taking part. The winner stands to make $4 million, with the player bringing up the rear in the no-cut format having the consolation of pocketing $120,000.
The remaining $5 million will go to the top three teams, with $3 million, $1.5 million and $500,000 covering the respective podium positions.
At the end of the individual events, players who have participated in at least four will divide a $30 million bonus pool. The individual champion will net $18 million, the second-place golfer $8 million, and the third-place $4 million.
The winning team after the season finale will receive $16 million, with the group in last place still able to split $1 million in tournament earnings.
Saudi-backed golf tour lures PGA pros, but backlash lands them in the rough | CBC News
The world of professional golf is embroiled in a very messy, very public divorce with hundreds of millions of dollars at stake.
Thursday in London, 17 of the world’s top golfers, including Dustin Johnson and Phil Mickelson, teed off in the first event on the new Saudi-sponsored LIV Golf tour.
Even though 10 of the 17 players had already formally resigned from the PGA tour, commissioner Jay Monahan officially banned all of them from playing in future PGA events moments after the London event began.
LIV players are still eligible to compete in golf’s four major tournaments, which the PGA does not control.
“These players have made their choice for their own financial-based reasons,” Monahan said in a statement. “But they can’t demand the same PGA Tour membership benefits, considerations, opportunities and platform as you. The expectation disrespects you, our fans and our partners.”
LIV Golf quickly responded: “It’s troubling that the tour, an organization dedicated to creating opportunities for golfers to play the game, is the entity blocking golfers from playing.”
Like many divorces, this is about money.
The eight-event LIV tour is being funded by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, which is controlled by members of the Saudi royal family and has about $600 billion in assets. It is offering prize money of $25 million per tournament, dwarfing even the biggest purses on the PGA tour.
It’s also paid massive appearance fees to entice top players to join this new tour. Johnson and Mickelson were reportedly paid $150 million and $200 million before ever hitting a shot.
Fracturing the game
The RBC Canadian Open, one of the oldest stops on the PGA tour with a total purse of $8.7 million, is being held this week in Toronto and is the first PGA event to go head to head with the LIV tour.
(LIV is the Roman numeral 54, referring to the 54 holes that make up tour events as opposed to the 72 on the PGA Tour)
Even before the tournament began, RBC lost its main spokesperson and face of the Canadian Open when Dustin Johnson abruptly bolted to the LIV Tour.
Tournament officials point to a quality field featuring five of the top 10 players in the world and robust ticket sales as evidence that despite LIV’s arrival on the scene, the PGA is stronger than ever.
“You want to watch the best players in the world, especially some of the best young players in the world. They’re here in Canada. They’re here in Toronto,” RBC Canadian Open tournament director Bryan Crawford told CBC.
At the same time, players expressed worry about how this new deep-pocketed tour could change golf’s future.
“Any decision that you make in your life that’s purely for money usually doesn’t end up going the right way,” said four-time major winner Rory McIlroy. “I think it’s a shame that it’s going to fracture the game.”
Canadian golfer Graham DeLaet, who played for more than decade on the PGA tour before recently retiring, says it will be hard for many players to turn their backs on money never seen before in golf.
“There’s a lot of ethical and moral questions regarding where the money is coming from but guys make their own decisions and, when that cheque is dangled in front of your eyes, I mean it makes things a little more difficult,” DeLaet told CBC.
As DeLaet points out, this story is about more than just money and golf. It’s also about politics.
There has been a renewed focus on Saudi regime backing the upstart LIV tour and its atrocious human rights record including, most recently, the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.
WATCH | LIV Golf’s big money has lured top golfers away from PGA tour:
The LIV Golf league funded by the Saudi government is poaching some of the world’s top golfers, including Dustin Johnson, to leave the PGA Tour.
Golf vs. politics
In the days leading up to the London event, players like Mickelson did their best to keep the worlds of golf and politics separate.
“I’m certainly aware of what happened with Jamal Khashoggi and I think it’s terrible,” Mickelson said. “I’ve also seen the good that the game of golf has done throughout history, and I believe that LIV Golf is going to do a lot of good.”
Fellow LIV player Graeme McDowell rejected the notion that by participating in the Saudi backed tour, he was normalizing or excusing the regime’s atrocities.
“I think as golfers, if we tried to cure geopolitical situations in every country in the world that we play golf in, we wouldn’t play a lot of golf,” he said.
Still, some contend that for golfers, many who have made a fortune playing the game, this should be about more than the money being dangled by the LIV Tour.
Cheri Bradish, a sport marketing professor at Toronto Metropolitan University, argues that the golfers who so far have rejected LIV’s overtures may be the ultimate winners in this just-beginning battle.
“If you want to think about keeping your partners, doing your speaking gigs and still having relationships commercially and people will argue with $150 million, you don’t need those,” Bradish said.
“But you want to believe in this society. that sports figures will understand that they can and could and should do very good things with the platform that they have.”
PGA Tour suspends players in Saudi-backed event as golf’s discord deepens
Having poached players with tens of millions of guaranteed dollars and promised fans more action than traditional tournaments, LIV Golf staged the opening round of its inaugural tournament at the Centurion Club in England amid criticism it was participating in an attempt to cleanse the global reputation of the Saudi Arabian government.
Moments after the first balls flew through the air, PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan sent a memo to members from the tour’s Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. headquarters, announcing the tour had suspended the 17 of its players participating in LIV Golf and, with several other stars on the verge of leaving, vowing it would do the same to others.
The Tour’s immediate and strong response underscored the existential threat LIV Golf presents to the business model around which professional golf revolved from the days of Arnold Palmer through Jack Nicklaus’s prime to Tiger Woods’s reign.
Shepherded into existence by former pro golfer Greg Norman and backed by a Saudi investment fund, LIV Golf attracted a number of PGA Tour stalwarts by offering massive signing bonuses and purses; shorter, no-cut events; a lighter schedule; and guaranteed prize money and appearance fees that are foreign to almost every form of professional golf. The rebel tour has no designs on turning a short-term profit, aiming instead to gain an instant foothold in the sport. It used nine-figure contracts to lure Phil Mickelson — a six-time major winner and one of golf’s most familiar faces, who infamously referred to the Saudis as “scary mother——-” in an interview with his biographer — and Dustin Johnson, two of the game’s greatest players.
The PGA Tour has argued to its players that moving to LIV Golf will cost them stability and legacy. LIV Golf can offer guaranteed money on par with athletes in other sports, even if many believe the money is tainted by atrocities of a repressive Saudi government.
The insurgent players will compete initially in an eight-event series around the globe. Two tournaments, including the season finale, will be played at courses owned by former president Donald Trump, whose courses the PGA Tour has distanced itself from. With a handful of players, including major winners Patrick Reed and Bryson DeChambeau, expected to jump to LIV Golf by its next tournament June 30 in Portland, Ore., the series is threatening to reconfigure the order of a mannerly sport.
“It’s a shame that it’s going to fracture the game,” star Rory McIlroy, perhaps the most vociferous defender of the PGA Tour, told reporters Wednesday at a news conference before the Canadian Open. “The professional game is the window shop into golf. If the general public are confused about who is playing where and what tournament’s on this week and who is, you know, ‘Oh, he plays there, okay, and he doesn’t get into these events.’ It just becomes so confusing. I think everything needs to try to become more cohesive, and I think it was on a pretty good trajectory until this happened.”
Players who join LIV will likely face the same thorny questions their peers did this week, when golfers deflected reporters’ inquiries about the Saudi government’s alleged killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and other human rights concerns.
Norther Ireland’s Graeme McDowell said in a news conference that “the Khashoggi situation” was “reprehensible,” but that he believed LIV Golf could be a positive force.
“I just try to be a great role model to kids,” McDowell said. “We are not politicians. I know [reporters] hate that expression, but we are really not, unfortunately. We are professional golfers.”
That stance, experts say, is exactly what the Saudis want as they seek to change the subject from alleged human rights violations.
“The Saudis want normality. They want to be seen as supporters of a game that a lot of people like to watch and play. They’ll therefore expect the players to behave much as they would do in any other tournament,” said University of Sussex politics professor Dan Hough, who specializes in integrity and corruption in sports. “It’ll be much more a case of talking positively about the tournament they are involved in from a golfing perspective.”
In his memo to PGA Tour players, Monahan pointedly referred to LIV Golf as the “Saudi Golf League” and called LIV Golf participants “players who have decided to turn their backs on the PGA Tour.”
“These players have made their choice for their own financial-based reasons,” Monahan wrote. “But they can’t demand the same PGA TOUR membership benefits, considerations, opportunities and platform as you. That expectation disrespects you, our fans and our partners.”
Monahan told players he is certain fans and sponsors “are tired of all this talk of money, money and more money.” But the tour has attempted to assuage players with its own financial incentives. It has raised purses, enhanced end-of-season bonus money and introduced the Player Impact Program, which funnels money to stars based on a combination of performance and off-course promotion.
The tour, though, cannot compete financially with the deep pockets of LIV Golf or its guaranteed money for appearances, which violates the PGA Tour’s entrenched pay-for-performance ethos. Its best appeal may be the promise of playing in non-tour events such as the four majors, the Ryder Cup and the Presidents Cup, which is scheduled for September. The organizations that run those events have not offered definitive decisions on how to deal with the breakaway players.
The United States Golf Association, which runs the U.S. Open, said this week it will allow players who have already qualified to play next week in Brookline, Mass. PGA of America CEO Seth Waugh, whose organization runs the PGA Championship, said last month that he didn’t think LIV Golf was “good for the game” and that his group supported golf’s current “ecosystem.”
The PGA Tour also recognizes it could receive a legal challenge from the suspended players, backed by LIV. Mickelson, who took a months-long, self-imposed exile after his controversial comments surfaced, has said he intends to keep the lifetime exemption his performance earned him.
“You probably have more questions,” Monahan wrote in his Thursday memo to players. “What’s next? Can these players come back? Can they eventually play PGA Tour Champions [the tour’s senior circuit]? Trust that we’ve prepared to deal with those questions …”
Meanwhile, the new league — whose LIV name refers to the Roman numeral of its 54-hole events and rhymes with “give” — struck a cheery tone during its first round. Without a traditional television deal, it was streamed on YouTube, Facebook and the LIV website. The event began with a shotgun start, placing threesomes at every tee box on the course as men in Beefeater outfits blew an opening horn.
“I feel so happy for the players. I feel so happy that we’ve brought free agency to golf,” Norman said as the first broadcast began.
Said Johnson: “I’m just excited to get it started. It’s a new chapter for golf. The fans are going to love it, all the players who are here are going to love it.”
But in a statement released by LIV Golf with the first round underway, the crisis roiling this sport was laid bare.
“Today’s announcement by the PGA Tour is vindictive and it deepens the divide between the Tour and its members,” the statement said, in part. “ … This certainly is not the last word on this topic.”
PGA Tour suspends LIV golfers from all events
The PGA Tour has suspended the 17 members who are competing in the inaugural LIV Golf International Series event, it announced Thursday.
Players who resigned their membership before starting the LIV Golf event being held outside London that began Thursday are also no longer eligible to compete in tour events or the Presidents Cup.
“These players have made their choice for their own financial-based reasons,” PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan wrote in a memo to the tour’s membership. “But they can’t demand the same PGA TOUR membership benefits, considerations, opportunities and platform as you. That expectation disrespects you, our fans and our partners. You have made a different choice, which is to abide by the Tournament Regulations you agreed to when you accomplished the dream of earning a PGA TOUR card and — more importantly — to compete as part of the preeminent organization in the world of professional golf.”
The memo said players who compete in LIV events are ineligible to participate on the PGA Tour or any other tours it sanctions, including the Korn Ferry Tour, PGA Tour Champions, PGA Tour Canada and PGA Tour Latinoamerica.
Monahan wrote that any players who take part in future LIV Golf events will face the same punishment.
“I am certain our fans and partners — who are surely tired of all this talk of money, money and more money — will continue to be entertained and compelled by the world-class competition you display each and every week, where there are true consequences for every shot you take and your rightful place in history whenever you reach that elusive winner’s circle,” Monahan wrote.
“You are the PGA TOUR, and this moment is about what we stand for: the PGA TOUR membership as a whole. It’s about lifting up those who choose to not only benefit from the TOUR, but who also play an integral role in building it. I know you are with us, and vice versa. Our partners are with us, too. The fact that your former TOUR colleagues can’t say the same should be telling.”
LIV Golf, in a statement, called the PGA Tour’s punishment “vindictive” and said it “deepens the divide between the Tour and its members.”
“It’s troubling that the Tour, an organization dedicated to creating opportunities for golfers to play the game, is the entity blocking golfers from playing,” LIV Golf said. “This certainly is not the last word on this topic. The era of free agency is beginning as we are proud to have a full field of players joining us in London, and beyond.”
The PGA Tour announced the discipline less than 30 minutes after 17 of its members or former members who resigned from the tour in the past week hit their opening tee shots in the inaugural LIV Golf event at Centurion Club outside London.
Among them were six-time major champion Phil Mickelson, two-time major champion Dustin Johnson and longtime Ryder Cup participants Ian Poulter, Lee Westwood and Sergio Garcia.
Two other past major winners, 2020 U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau and 2018 Masters champion Patrick Reed, have also reached agreements with LIV Golf to compete in future tournaments, sources told ESPN on Wednesday. LIV Golf officials have also had ongoing discussions with other players, including Rickie Fowler and Jason Kokrak.
Johnson and Garcia are among the players who have resigned from the tour, along with 2010 Open champion Louis Oosthuizen, 2011 Masters champion Charl Schwartzel and Kevin Na. The players hoped to avoid punishment from the tour by quitting.
Monahan said the 10 players who have resigned their PGA Tour memberships will be removed from the FedEx Cup points standings after this week’s RBC Canadian Open. He wrote that “these players will not be permitted to play in PGA Tournaments as a non-member via a sponsor exemption” or any other eligibility category.
“This week, the RBC Canadian Open is a shining example of what you have created with the PGA Tour: a star-studded field, a committed sponsor, sold-out hospitality offerings, record crowds and a global broadcast distribution,” Monahan wrote. “These elements are part of the Tour’s DNA, built by the likes of Jack and Arnie, furthered by Tiger and countless others — whose legacies are inextricably linked, with each other and with the PGA Tour. This collective legacy can’t be bought or sold.”
LIV Golf CEO Greg Norman, a former world No. 1 golfer and two-time winner of The Open, has told ESPN in the past that the new circuit was prepared to help its players fight the PGA Tour’s position in court. Norman said he had players who were willing to participate in a legal battle.
“I can only speak on information given to me by our legal team, and I have an extremely talented legal team in antitrust and anticompetitive laws, and we believe we’re in the right position,” Norman said. “We believe the players are independent contractors and have a right to go play wherever they want to go play.”
On May 10, the PGA Tour denied conflicting-event releases to players who had requested them. Monahan had told players several times that they would face punishment for competing in the LIV events without releases.
The first LIV Golf tournament in the United States is scheduled for June 30-July 2 at Pumpkin Ridge in Portland, Oregon.
The LIV Golf series features 54-hole events, shotgun starts, no cuts and a team format. The seven regular-season events — a slate that also includes stops in Bedminster, New Jersey; Boston; and Chicago — are offering $25 million purses, the richest in golf history. The winner gets $4 million, and the last-place finisher gets $120,000. A season-ending team championship, Oct. 27-30 at Trump National Doral in Miami, has a $50 million purse.
According to reports, top players also received signing bonuses from LIV Golf worth more than $100 million.
A longtime PGA Tour player who wasn’t approached about playing in the LIV Golf series told ESPN that he agreed that the tour had to punish the players to prevent others from defecting.
“We’re going to end up in a worse position because these guys wanted a quick money grab to go play in an exhibition,” the player said. “The [Saudis] are going to lose interest eventually. I think we all have a little bit of a responsibility to leave the game better than when we got here, and repping for a shady government with a questionable record isn’t doing that.”
LIV Golf is supported by the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, which is controlled by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Salman has been accused of numerous human rights violations, including the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.
Four-time major winner Rory McIlroy, speaking at a news conference at the RBC Canadian Open in Toronto on Wednesday, said he was concerned about golf’s future.
“I think it’s a shame that it’s going to fracture the game,” McIlroy said. “I think if anything, the professional game is the window shop into golf. If the general public are confused about who is playing where and what tournament’s on this week and, OK, he doesn’t get into these events, it just becomes so confusing. I think everything needs to try to become more cohesive, and I think it was on a pretty good trajectory until this happened.”
Danielle Kang announces she’ll miss events, including KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, due to spinal tumor
During the U.S. Women’s Open, Kang’s brother posted on Instagram some troubling news: His sister was playing the major championship with a tumor in her spine. Kang had withdrawn from the Palos Verdes Championship at the end of April, citing back pain. It wasn’t until the U.S. Women’s Open that news of the tumor was public.
As Kang continues to work with her doctors on a plan, she announced on Instagram that she’ll take some time off from competitive golf. In addition to three regular LPGA Tour events, she’ll miss the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, the major she won in 2017. That event is scheduled for June 23-26.
Said Kang in her post: “As a past champion this was not an easy decision, however, if I’ve learned anything from throwing a fit to play in the U.S. Open, I want to compete, not just participate.”
Despite the back pain, Kang made the cut last week at Pine Needles and ultimately tied for 63rd.
