For all the conjecture and speculation about what role the major championships will play in determining the ultimate result of LIV Golf’s challenge to the PGA Tour and the professional golf hierarchy, the majors might have a simple solution.
Do nothing.
Let the courtroom battles play out – and this feels like it’s one hole into an 18-hole street fight, with the PGA Tour jumping to an early lead – and let the natural course of professional golf dictate what happens.
Judge Beth Labson Freeman’s ruling last week clarified the question as to whether players who have signed with LIV Golf can return to the PGA Tour despite their suspensions.
That’s not happening. Not now and not in the future.
They chose LIV and its millions, and good for them. It provides them financial security, a defined schedule – everyone must play all 14 LIV events next year – and, it should go without saying now that they’ve all said it, the chance to spend more time with their families.
What it does not give them is the chance to accrue world-ranking points, which, for many of the LIV players, is their access to the major championships. For the foreseeable future, they’re not earning any more world-ranking points unless they play the random Asian Tour event in which players can earn more air miles than ranking points.
It’s those world-ranking points – which LIV Golf has petitioned to receive but is unlikely to get for at least a year, if at all – that provide the golden tickets into the majors for most players. The fall is fast when players aren’t earning points.
The Masters invites the top 50 in the world at the end of each calendar year and anyone not previously qualified who is in the top 50 one week before Augusta.
The top 60 get into the U.S. Open, the top 50 are in the Open Championship and the PGA Championship is open to 70 players based off the PGA Tour money list (with each championship having a specific cutoff date usually a couple of weeks before the event).
That means Ian Poulter, Lee Westwood, Paul Casey, Abraham Ancer, Louis Oosthuizen, Kevin Na, Carlos Ortiz, Branden Grace, Matthew Wolff, Hudson Swafford, Talor Gooch and others have no automatic pathway to the 2023 major championships because each of them will be outside the top 60 in the world rankings next year because they are no longer accumulating points.
Both Opens have indicated players are welcome to go through the multiple-stage qualifiers if they want to play.
The question is whether the majors will tighten their qualification processes in regard to past champions and their entry into the various majors. Small tweaks could have big impacts.
It’s difficult to imagine the Masters, with its traditions and emphasis on history, denying six past champions with nine total wins their spots in the field, though chairman Fred Ridley has made it clear he’s not a fan of what’s happening with LIV Golf.
Each of the majors offers a five-year exemption for major-championship winners beyond their own. The Players winner gets a three-year exemption into the majors.
“I never said the best golfers will not be able to play. We will hold totally true to the Open being open to anybody. But we may well look at how you get into that, whether it's an exemption or a need to qualify through our qualifying process."
Martin Slumbers
Dustin Johnson, for example, has a 10-year exemption into the U.S. Open as the 2016 champion and a lifetime spot at Augusta National for his 2020 win there, getting him into majors through 2025.
Should Cameron Smith, the reigning Players champion and Open winner, jump to LIV as seems likely, he’s booked into majors for at least five years by virtue of the Claret Jug he won and the Open until he’s 60.
That’s where Phil Mickelson and Brooks Koepka are set for a while. Sergio García will remain eligible for the Masters, but his five-year exemption into others has expired.
Would the majors disavow their past champions? That seems unlikely.
It’s no secret that the major championships, each of which is run independently of the PGA and DP World tours, are paying close attention to what happens with LIV Golf. They have been unified in their support of the existing structure of professional golf and have indicated they will adjust their qualification procedures should they feel it is necessary.
They are also being careful to avoid any indication of collusion with an ongoing lawsuit and Department of Justice investigation underway. Texts and email chains likely have gone quiet.
“I never said the best golfers will not be able to play,” Martin Slumbers, chief executive of the R&A, said at the Open Championship in July. “We will hold totally true to the Open being open to anybody. But we may well look at how you get into that, whether it's an exemption or a need to qualify through our qualifying process. And when we will look at exemptions and qualifications, we will do so in the context of what is going on in the men's professional game, how is the men's professional game being structured, and how do we create the right balance of exemptions and qualifications to enable the best players in the world to be teeing it up next year at Hoylake?”
Asked at the U.S. Open whether he could foresee a day when it becomes more difficult for LIV golfers to compete in the U.S. Open, Mike Whan, CEO of the USGA, said, “Yes,” but did not specify potential changes.
Seth Waugh, CEO of the PGA of America, has said his group believes in the game’s existing ecosystem and added, “We don't think this is good for the game, and we are supportive of that ecosystem. We have our own bylaws that we will follow towards those fields.”
In other words, it’s tough to get in the PGA Championship if you’re not playing the PGA Tour.
In its 106-page lawsuit against the PGA Tour, LIV Golf cited Ridley’s stance against the breakaway league as evidence of the major championships seeking to undercut what is happening.
This from the lawsuit: “Augusta National, the promoter of The Masters, has taken multiple actions to indicate its alignment with the PGA Tour, thus seeding doubt among top professional golfers whether they would be banned from future Masters Tournaments. As an initial matter, the links between the PGA Tour and Augusta National run deep. The actions by Augusta National indicate that the PGA Tour has used these channels to pressure Augusta National to do its bidding. For example, in February, 2022 Augusta National representatives threatened to disinvite players from The Masters if they joined LIV Golf…
“In addition, Augusta National Chairman Fred Ridley personally instructed a number of participants in the 2022 Masters not to play in the LIV Golf Invitational Series. Plainly, these threats to top players served no beneficial purpose, as they would only serve to weaken the field in the Masters.”
At his annual pre-Masters press conference in April, Ridley stated that he “did not disinvite Phil,” noting Mickelson qualified to play as a past winner and reigning PGA champion. Ridley fielded a question regarding his stance on any rival leagues and whether he had spoken to players about joining any new tours and if that might preclude them from being invited to the Masters: “Our mission is to always act in the best interest of the game in whatever form that may take.
“We have been pretty clear in our belief that the world tours have done a great job in promoting the game over the years,” he added. “Beyond that, there's so much that we don't know about what might happen or could happen that I just don't think I could say much more beyond that.”
Because the Masters is the next major championship to be played, eight months from now, whatever Augusta National does could offer a window into what the other majors do. Invitations traditionally are mailed in December to players who already have qualified.
Extrapolating from Freeman’s 14-page ruling released Aug. 11, she isn’t buying what LIV Golf is selling in terms of antitrust violations. The result of one narrow hearing doesn’t assure similar results down the line, but LIV Golf’s legal strategy had holes poked in it.
The major championships set their own guidelines, and they are subject to change. By doing little or nothing, they may be doing the right thing.
Top: It's a cloudy time for LIV Golf and the four major championships.
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