Less than five years after the official announcement of LIV Golf, the breakaway circuit that attracted many former major championship winners for its lucrative purses, worldwide schedule and team-focused format has reached a crossroads.
As expected, PIF announced on Thursday that it will stop financing LIV Golf League after the 2026 season. It has invested more than $5 billion in the breakaway circuit since its inception in 2022 and that number will grow to more than $6 billion by the end of the season.
While LIV continues to reshape its leadership and seek new investors as well as support the promise of the future, it has again created another inflection point for professional golf that may just be getting started.
What’s the latest and what does it really mean?
Mark Schlabach: Next week’s tournament at Trump National Golf Club outside Washington, D.C., will be played as scheduled, a LIV Golf official told ESPN on Thursday. On Tuesday, LIV Golf and Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry announced that a The tournament scheduled in New Orleans will not be played. A tournament could be played in Louisiana this fall, but that seems unlikely given the current state of LIV golf.
Three more international tournaments are scheduled in Korea (28-31 May), Spain (4-7 June) and England (23-26 July), followed by the season-ending championships in the US at Trump National in Bedminster, New Jersey (6-9 August), The Club at Chatham Hills in Westfield, Indiana (20-23 August) and The Cardinal at St. John’s in Plymouth, Michigan. 28-30).
Paolo Ughetti: Although LIV now hopes to secure funding to survive beyond the 2026 season, the PGA Tour holds the majority of the cards. The threat of LIV taking any more players has passed and now the Tour can play the waiting game as the inevitable question becomes: Will LIV players try to return to the PGA Tour and how?
A source told ESPN on Wednesday that Talk about possible ways for some players to return The tour has started at the headquarters, but now the circumstances are different than before Returning Member Program Opened For brooks koepkaIt seems that it will not be easy for any player hoping to make a comeback in the tour that he has decided to leave.
And although uncertainty will remain about the path to a return until the Tour decides to announce some sort of path forward — or more likely, take each player on a case-by-case basis — PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp and company have no reason to rush into any decisions now. As questions remain over whether LIV can complete this season without any events being canceled or postponed, as well as whether any players will withdraw from events, the Tour may go quiet and let players come to them, as they have already done.
Without PIF investment, what will LIV need to do to stay afloat?
Schlabach: After losing its financial backing from the PIF, LIV Golf named two investment bankers, Gene Davis and John Zinman, to its new independent board, which would attempt to realize the league’s new vision of a “diversified, multipartner investment model”.
Given the amount of money LIV Golf has spent over four years – it’s reportedly spending $100 million per month and $40 million per tournament – it won’t be easy. LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neill previously said it would take five to 10 years for the circuit to become profitable.
Even the richest oil state in the world can’t afford to lose that much money.
Even if LIV Golf somehow secures new funding, the league will not continue in its current form. The days of $30 million purses and nine-figure contracts for star golfers are over without the PIF’s endless coffers.
A source told ESPN that LIV Golf is open to holding fewer tournaments, playing them only in countries outside the U.S. and even merging with the DP World Tour to some extent.
While this may be sufficient for older golfers lee westwood, ian poulter And others, and young players like david puig, elvis smiley, Caleb Surratt And Michael La SassoThis isn’t what the stars of LIV Golf signed up for.
Ughetti: Frankly, LIV’s best lifeline may not be an influx of investors’ money, but some kind of partnership that gives them the credibility they never had before.
Even if they are able to get, say, 25% of the investment they received from the PIF, everything about their operations will have to change and scale down to fit their new budget. This is the price the league has to pay for how good things used to be – unlimited sums do not equate to strategy or business sense.
And if LIV becomes a weaker, less money-focused endeavor, the appeal quickly loses its luster. Why would a young player looking to pursue a career in the game choose to play for similar or lesser purses if the current setup of LIV only includes weak Official World Golf Ranking purses and not so many events to hone your game?
The idea of partnering with DP World Tour or even some national openings, as suggested, would be a boon for LIV. This would be the best situation as it would be able to draft the legitimacy of such organizations and events. But what makes these organizations willing to partner with a tour that has lost its financial backers in such a blatant and scandalous fashion? LIV needs to offer a clear incentive and benefit for such parties and the only way to do that would be to ask their best players to participate in those events if there are any left after this season.
Of course, some players who do not choose to return to the DP World Tour or PGA Tour (or who do not have the position to do so) will sign up for any iteration of LIV. But as an entity hoping to become an international tour, LIV, as we know, cannot continue. It is difficult to see how the entire operation would be successful given this outcome.
What will be the response from the PGA Tour?
Schlabach: Koepka, a five-time major champion, returned to the PGA Tour on January 12 through a new returning member program.
The PGA Tour has extended the same offer to LIV golfers who were away from the PGA Tour for at least two years – and who have won The Players Championship or one of the four majors (Masters, PGA Championship, US Open and The Open Championship) through 2022 – to return to the PGA Tour under certain conditions and with severe financial penalties.
Bryson DeChambeau, john rahm and australia’s cameron smith Were eligible to return under those conditions. None of them decided to come back and the last date was 2 February.
Koepka’s penalties were financially harsh: he agreed to forfeit any player’s equity shares for the next five years and would not be eligible for the $100 million FedEx Cup bonus program this season. At the request of the PGA Tour, he also agreed to donate $5 million to charity.
In a memo to PGA Tour members at the time, Rolapp said Koepka was forfeiting $50 million to $85 million of potential earnings depending on his performance and the tour’s growth.
former masters champion patrick reed On January 28 it was announced that he Plans to return to PGA Tour this fall. He last participated in an unofficial competition (LIV Golf Tournament) on 24 August. Since Reed resigned his PGA Tour membership before playing in the LIV golf tournament, he will serve a one-year suspension and will be eligible to play in the PGA Tour tournament on August 25.
I’m guessing there are some golfers who won’t want to come back to the PGA Tour. I could see Poulter, Westwood and others returning to the DP World Tour. Louis Oosthuizen May give up competitive golf altogether.
PGA Tour may not want to bring every golfer back from LIV Golf — joaquin neiman And Tyrell Hatton There may be two more – and not every LIV golfer will want to come back.
But the punishment for those who want to return will be steep – perhaps even worse than what Koepka endured. “There were rules, and they were broken,” Rolapp told The Wall Street Journal this week. “With rules comes accountability.”
DeChambeau and Phil Mickelson He was one of 11 suspended golfers to file a federal antitrust lawsuit against the PGA Tour in August 2022. Yes, DeChambeau is one of the most popular golfers in the world, but not everyone on the tour has forgotten that he made some losses on his way out.
DeChambeau’s contract with LIV expires at the end of the season.
“I don’t necessarily have scar tissue, but there are a lot of people around us on tour who do,” Rolapp told the Wall Street Journal. “This will have to be accounted for in some shape or form.”
Ughetti: All indications are that the Tour will not run back the returning member program offered by Koepka as well as Rahm, DeChambeau and Smith, but it will have to answer the question of how (and if) they want to add players who want to return to their structure.
Of course, a complicating factor is that the Tour’s own structure is also rapidly changing. But Players Championship, Rollup Announced One of the goals of the competition committee is to potentially set up a two-track tour with the top players in the main track and players attempting to move up in the lower track. This will be a kind of demotion system.
Should either Rahm or DeChambeau find a way to return to the PGA Tour, I think the Tour will find a way to get them into top events to boost overall competition. But as far as other players who are looking to make a comeback are concerned, it won’t be immediate. A source indicated that the Tour will evaluate all of the outstanding factors: prior standing and performance, whether or not the player has resigned his membership, as well as his past involvement in the antitrust lawsuit against the PGA Tour that Mark mentioned above.
There is also the question of value added. DeChambeau and Rahm are clear in what they bring to the table – together they have worked for four major companies and have large followings domestically and internationally. But most of the rest of LIV’s potential returnees don’t have the same reputation. As Rolapp told The Wall Street Journal this week, he’s only interested in players who can help make the PGA Tour the best tour.
“Not every player can do that,” Rolapp said.
What are the players saying?
Schlabach: brian hermanThe 2023 Open Championship winner was asked about LIV status after a 4-under 68 in the opening round at the Cadillac Championship on Thursday in Doral, Florida.
“There are people who are going to come back,” Herman said. “I can’t speak to each of them individually. It seems like they’re treating them all on a case-by-case basis. I think the fans want everyone to play together and time will heal all wounds. There’s still some feeling here, especially with all the lawsuit stuff, those things will be tough to overcome. We play with all those guys in the majors, so, yeah, I think there should be a way to get back.”
Harman was not sure what punishment should be given for leaving the tour.
“I think something needs to happen,” he said. “I’m not smart enough to tell you what it is. That’s other people’s work. I think there must be something. I think this will help [with] “Some bad blood and some resentment, although I haven’t heard as much about it over the years as I did when we started the trial.”
Jordan Spieth wasn’t sure The return path will be the same for allOne of the two.
“I know the olive branches were extended a few months ago,” Spieth said. “Brooks took them on. So I’m not sure what will change now. That doesn’t mean LIV won’t still move forward. I think there are too many unknowns for me to make a good guess as to what will happen there.
“But I think, if there’s a system for Brooks and a system for Patrick Reed, will it remain the same for the same category of people who are coming back or does it change now? Does it change for the people who filed lawsuits and gave up their membership? It’s taken a lot of different things over the last four years for that to happen. I’m glad I’m not in that room, and I trust the people in that room to make the right decision.”
