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LIV Golfers Are Competing, but LIV Isn’t
The Masters weekend represents a pinnacle for professional golf. However, in recent years, it’s also served as a stark contrast to the goings-on elsewhere in the sport.
This week marks two years since the Masters first saw the PGA Tour’s elite players return to face off against those who joined the Saudi-backed LIV Golf series.
Remember the upheaval that caused?
Greg Norman declared that if a LIV player won, those on the PGA Tour who switched would join him at the 18th green to celebrate. To prevent any diversion from the tournament’s focus, Augusta National Golf Club didn’t invite him. In a surprising twist, LIV’s Phil Mickelson and Brooks Koepka finished tied for second, with Jon Rahm, who moved to LIV just months earlier, taking the win. This shift raised discussions regarding whether Rahm had lost some competitive edge. (An argument that seems exaggerated as things are currently not going smoothly for LIV.)
While LIV players routinely perform well in major tournaments, two of them, Bryson DeChambeau and Tyrrell Hatton, currently stand near the top of the leaderboard today, with DeChambeau in second place and Hatton tied for fifth. A victory for either of them could greatly benefit LIV, as the organization’s presence at Augusta has been minimal. Here are a few facts:
- The circuit has fielded 12 players in the 95-man contest, a decrease from last year’s 13 and from 18 participants in 2023.
- The absence of an agreement between the Saudi Public Investment Fund and the PGA Tour has hindered LIV players from accumulating world ranking points in their events.
- Augusta National has offered a special invitation to JoaquĂn Niemann, citing him as the premier player from Latin America. Other LIV players who failed to qualify received no such courtesy.
The only mention of LIV at the pre-tournament press conferences was Rahm’s comment that a PGA Tour and PIF deal is “not happening anytime soon.” It’s been approaching two years since both sides established a vague “framework agreement” that still has not progressed. As The Athletic’s Gabby Herzig noted last month, the PGA Tour aims to consolidate the world’s top players back onto one tour, while the Saudis want LIV to remain a unique format centered around team golf.
