PGA Tour and LIV Golf 'chaos' as major champion makes concerning statement
The PGA Tour and LIV Golf League remain at loggerheads despite initially agreeing to merge in June 2023, and the situation shows no signs of being resolved
Former PGA Championship winner Mark Brooks thinks golf has become riddled by chaos and tension. The sport has been divided in recent years with the emergence of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (PIF) backed LIV Golf League as a serious competitor to the PGA Tour.
This rivalry has prompted the latter to make significant changes to certain tournaments in an attempt to stay competitive, including larger prize money and no-cut events, mirroring the format seen under the LIV banner. This has led to a drastically different golf landscape, where some of the sport's biggest names are no longer competing at majors and players are becoming more strategic about the competitions they participate in.
Despite the two organisations initially agreeing to merge in June 2023, discussions continue regarding a resolution between the two conflicting parties. Ahead of this year's PGA Championship, Brooks - who claimed the PGA title in 1996 - stated he was: "Surprised it took this long for some kind of splintering to happen".
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The 63-year-old played a crucial role in establishing the Tour Players Association - essentially a form of union - in the 1990s and believes a similar group today could have avoided much of the drama. "I do think it's absolutely chaos," he added.
"I think putting pieces back together, putting humpty dumpty back on the wall, it's going to be pretty tough. Guys don't want to come back. They don't have a desire to come back," reports the Mirror.
LIV Golf is attracting top-tier talent with its promise of colossal pay-outs, with Jon Rahm being one of the latest to sign up in December 2023 for a reported sum between £315million and £470m. The PGA Tour has been struggling to compete with these figures and it does not look like LIV is going anywhere, with Saudi investors continuing to pour money into the sport.
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The average PGA Tour field has since become less star-studded than in previous years. Some might see this as creating a more competitive field overall, with Brooks noting some benefits from many of the elite players moving on.
Brooks added: "Some of these events are, let's just call it, top 70 shallow. Below that they're heavy.
"They're not going into, you know, past champions like me. I'm not showing up on the eligibility list, they're not going that kind of deep.
"But probably 15 events this year will be very light in terms of the top 70 and you go, 'Well, does that mean anything? 'Absolutely it means something. Are you kidding me? If I take 62 out of the top 70 out of a field, do I have a better shot of winning? You're damn right I do."
Former world No.1 Dustin Johnson clinched the inaugural LIV Golf League title in 2022 before Talor Gooch took the crown last year.
Chile's Joaquin Niemann currently tops the 2024 money list as the only player to win more than one event so far this year, although LIV's viewership figures still lag behind their PGA counterparts.
