It has been one year now – on June 9, to be precise – since the first shots officially were fired in LIV Golf’s disruptive existence, and where does professional golf find itself?
Divided?
For sure.
Broken?
More like reshaped.
Settling into a grudging coexistence?
It looks that way, though LIV officials will argue that the PGA Tour is still intent on crushing the new group into surrender.
For all of the rancor, finger-pointing and name calling, plus the back and forth lawyering, the case can be made that both the PGA Tour and LIV Golf are better off now than they were one year ago when the official separation began.
After being wounded by the defections of several of its biggest names last year – major champions Dustin Johnson, Phil Mickelson, Brooks Koepka and Cam Smith among others – the PGA Tour restructured its model, finding tens of millions of dollars more in prize money while bringing together its stars more often than before in a tighter schedule.
The PGA Tour’s pivot initially was reactionary but since has felt more progressive, sharpening the tour’s focus.
“It’s easy to get fat and happy. Now it’s stronger,” a prominent golf executive said of the tour’s evolution.
LIV Golf, in its first full season, has a television partner and is charging ahead with its team-first format, publicly confident that investors are increasingly interested in what the organization is selling even as it appears to be swimming upstream in its legal case against the PGA Tour.
The antitrust lawsuit may not be heard until 2025 as the legal maneuvering continues.
The year’s first two major championships – the Masters and the PGA – have brought together players from both sides, reminding everyone of what has gone missing while the public sparring has slowed (except for the bitter social-media hostilities between Phil Mickelson and television analyst Brandel Chamblee).
The DP World Tour and several of its former stars have parted ways, and the Ryder Cup, arguably the most passionate event in the sport, remains caught in the crossfire of who should and who should not be allowed to participate in Rome this fall. The Ryder Cup is many things, and collateral damage may be added to the list.
The case for LIV receiving Official World Golf Ranking points for its events remains unresolved, and regardless of the ultimate decision, it likely won’t make or break the new league’s intentions.
Though CEO Greg Norman hinted last year at LIV Golf getting involved in women’s professional golf, sources say there has not been any formal or informal discussion between the LPGA and LIV’s organizers.
Norman has been noticeably quiet this year, an intentional decision within the organization given his controversial and sometimes combative tone in some public comments.
Suggestions that LIV won’t last beyond another year or two seem shortsighted, given the depth of the controversial Saudi-backed Public Investment Fund underwriting the league.
“This has always been a long-term play for us,” a top LIV executive said. “We see it as a massive opportunity to modernize the sport.
“We always knew the different elements would reach commercial maturity at different stages – three to six years, depending on each, and there have been more obstacles put in our way than we expected.”
To many, it feels like an either-or situation, but it doesn’t have to be.
“Golf is still just golf. There’s another tour to watch now if that’s your thing,” Max Homa said. “I don’t think it’s awful. There are just more options now. It can be just fine.”
It may have to be.
There is no reason to believe that a deal will be brokered between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, especially not with lawsuits ongoing. Even if LIV’s lawyers slow-play the courts to avoid having to submit to formal discovery regarding Saudi Arabia’s PIF and its leader Yasir Al-Rumayyan, there is no merger on the horizon.
What would the PGA Tour have to gain by merging with LIV?
Perhaps more salient is, what might the tour give up in any potential agreement with LIV, and why would it surrender anything?
LIV’s organizers believe in their model, which presents competitive golf in a different way. They see it as an alternative to what has existed for decades. According to LIV’s data, the average age of its fans is 45, which LIV says is substantially lower than the PGA Tour’s average.
In recent months, it seems as if both sides have focused on themselves more than their rivals.
PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan has been focused more on building the tour’s 2024 schedule than talking about LIV Golf. He did, however, reiterate the tour’s position regarding players who left and may want to return to the tour in the future.
“No policy,” Monahan said.
At the majors, the LIV-PGA Tour schism has felt like a backburner issue, the focus instead being on having the best players together.
Understandably, LIV has trumpeted Koepka’s victory at the PGA Championship and having had three players tie for fourth or better at the Masters in April. Those performances pierced the argument that LIV’s 54-hole, no-cut format was dulling the competitive edge of its players.
LIV’s television coverage on the CW Network has expanded the viewership, but leaders decided to quit sharing viewership numbers, which are substantially below what the PGA Tour gets on a weekly basis and have been cited by critics as evidence LIV is not catching on with the public.
“Satisfied is a good word,” a LIV executive said when asked about the television ratings. “We are being compared to the PGA Tour, and many of their events have been in existence for decades.
“When you compare us to college basketball, the NHL and some other sports, we are punching above our weight. And we’ve only had seven events – 21 rounds of golf – on linear TV in the United States.”
On-site attendance in Australia earlier this year was 77,076, according to LIV, and the two most recent events in the U.S. (in suburban Tulsa, Oklahoma, and near Washington, D.C.) drew more than 37,000 each for the week.
LIV’s footprint, Phil Mickelson said at the PGA Championship, is “unequivocally” bigger outside the United States and added success in America isn’t necessary, “but it would help.”
Is it growing into what Mickelson, who has offered cryptic hints about what may be coming down the line, imagined it could be?
“It’s starting to,” Mickelson said. “We’re only a year in, and I’m thinking three to five years out where we’ll be. It’s still kind of like, to me it’s just starting. Two more years, that’s when we need to look back and say, ‘Are we where we want to be?’ And it seems we’re well on that path.
“It’s not going anywhere. It’s going to continue to accelerate, and hopefully people will continue to give it a try.”
LIV’s teams have begun to attract some sponsors, though no major sponsors have signed on. LIV insiders continue to insist that big-name sponsors will join down the line, though it likely will be next year at the earliest. Team identities, critical to LIV’s development, have taken shape this year.
Unquestionably, LIV’s arrival has disrupted the landscape of professional golf, which is part of the group’s vision. Tournament golf, LIV believes, doesn’t always have to be played in the same way, arguing that younger fans prefer the team competition, music and vibe that LIV Golf offers.
How well LIV is succeeding is subjective.
“It all depends who you talk to. If you talk to a LIV player, this is going to be great; it's only going to get better. You talk to people on the other side, in two years they're going to be done,” said PGA Tour member Jon Rahm, the recent Masters champion.
“I really couldn’t tell you. I have no clue. … Obviously they’re trying their hardest to be a little bit different, and it could pay off or not. I really don’t know.”
Professional golf looks different than it did one year ago.
How different it will look in another year or another three years remains to be seen.
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Top: LIV Golf has burst into professional golf in the past year and promises more fireworks to come.
Joe Scarnici, LIV Golf via Getty Images