What You Need to Know About the LIV Tour: A Timeline
By now, you’ve probably heard about the LIV Golf International Series, a Saudi Arabia-funded tour directly competing with the PGA. But where did this all come from? When did the rumors start, and what were the major events leading up to, and then resulting from, its conception?
We don’t claim any inside information, but we do have time to read and review all the news, notes, and hot takes given since rumors of this rival league first started in 2019. So if you feel behind on what has quickly become the biggest story in golf, Great Golf Memories has you covered with a rundown of the LIV Tour Timeline.
Origins of the LIV Golf International Series
According to the LIV Golf wikipedia page, the early framework for the “Premier Golf League” (as it was first known) became public in 2019 when it sought funding from private Saudi investors. It would ultimately be funded by Saudi Arabia’s Sovereign Wealth Fund through a division called Golf Saudi, created in 2020 to further the regime’s goal of establishing a global professional golf league. This would eventually become the LIV Golf International Series.
Early on, there was much speculation about what LIV would do differently than the PGA Tour. Golf Digest reported on rumored innovations such as the team golf aspect, shotgun starts to enable a full broadcast to be completed in 5 hours, and no-cut/high purse earnings that could compensate its players better than the PGA. It certainly got the attention of PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan, who warned in January 2020 that Tour members would have to decide between one or the other, and that exemptions to play in LIV events would not be honored.
While this kicked off a significant amount of pearl clutching from PGA leaders, players, and talking heads alike (current PGA stalwart Rory McIlroy even pontificated that a rival tour could catalyze change), progress continued behind the scenes until October 2021, when LIV named Greg Norman as Chief Executive Officer. Then, in an effort to accelerate organizational efforts so the fledgling enterprise could actually host its 10 inaugural events in 2022, Golf Saudi purchased a majority share of the Asian Tour and LIV went from a hazy mirage to a hopping reality. And that’s when things got real…
Phil Mickelson’s Canary in the Coal Mine
In early February 2022, Phil Mickelson gave an interview to Golf Digest at the Saudi International golf tournament (part of the independent Asian Tour) roasting the PGA Tour for what he saw as greed and unfair control. In that interview, he cited issues with the Tour’s treatment of its players, independent contractors who are guaranteed no income from competing in its events nor have any right to monetize their media image.
Notably, in order to participate in that Saudi International event, PGA Tour members required a release from the PGA, but that release didn’t come without strings attached. Terms of the release required players to compete in the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am at least once in the subsequent three years. This event-release requirement would later prove to be a major sticking point for LIV-departing golfers such as Ian Poulter, who hinted at his free agent status in recent comments citing his ability to play in other independent tour events such as the Asian Tour and Japanese Tour.
Phil’s involvement in the LIV affair went deeper when author Alan Shipnuck, who recently published an unauthorized biography of Mickelson, posted an article in Fire Pit Collective detailing a conversation he had with the Hall of Fame star. Phil’s self-described rationale for helping LIV get off the ground, which included co-writing the Saudi Golf League’s operating agreement, focused entirely on money and control. He cited license fees required by the PGA Tour for head-to-head events like The Match against Tiger Woods in November 2018 to the fact that players don’t even own the rights to their media, which he said could be turned into Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT’s) and sold to fans for a golfer’s personal gain.
In the interview Phil did acknowledge the problematic nature of playing for the Saudis, referring to their dismal record on human rights and calling them “scary motherf*ckers.” He also recognized the “sportswashing” effect of using sports to bury the Saudi regime’s faults under the auspices of “growing the game of golf” around the world.
Whatever Phil’s intentions, he quickly became the face of the LIV Series and persona non grata in the eyes of PGA Tour leadership. For unspecified reasons that popular opinion attributed to his involvement in the LIV controversy, he would withdraw from the 2022 Masters and choose not to defend his improbable 2021 PGA Championship title the following month at Southern Hills.
Suspensions of PGA Tour Members Competing in LIV Golf Events
As rumors turned into scheduled events (the full calendar would be formally announced on March 17, 2022), the PGA Tour made its opposition known by rejecting member requests for release to play in LIV tournaments. PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan, who had hinted of suspensions for tour members who competed in LIV Golf Events as early as 2020, made good on that promise in a Jun 9, 2022 memo announcing the suspension of 17 members who competed in the inaugural event in London. Further, any additional players who participate in future events will be suspended as well.
So what does a suspension mean? According to the memo, suspended players cannot participate on the PGA Tour or its four other sanctioned tours (Korn Ferry, Champions Tour, Canada, or Latinoamerican). This includes the FedEx Cup, and forfeiture of any points earned by suspended players thus far in the season.
The suspension is a big deal, but it doesn’t prevent them from playing in the four Major golf tournaments which are run by independent entities...at least for now. This was clear when Mickelson and Dustin Johnson were permitted to play in the 2022 US Open, run by the United States Golf Association. And Martin Slumbers, chief executive of the R&A (organizer of the British Open) confirmed that any player who was previously exempt or qualified for golf’s final major would still be eligible to play.
That covers the 2022 major calendar, but 2023 is very much an open question. We do know that LIV players who have been suspended from the PGA Tour will not be eligible for the President’s Cup or future iterations of the Ryder Cup, which is certainly a big penalty as players take a lot of pride in competing for home country bragging rights. It remains to be seen what implications LIV participation will have for PGA Tour professionals, though Monahan has indicated that a lifetime ban may be under consideration.
PGA Tour Changes
It turns out that Phil Mickelson was right about one thing: the LIV Golf Series would be a forcing function for changes to the PGA Tour. For the 2021 season, the Tour announced an increased prize pool for the 2021 Players Championship and a $40 million “Player Impact Program,” a sort of bonus pool for Tour players who build up their social media personas and increase their engagement with fans. And in December 2021, the PGA tour announced plans to release a series of NFTs and hinted at the launch of a video-based NFT platform, as reported by Golf.com.
The most recent big event on the LIV timeline happened on June 22, 2022, when Monahan outlined further changes to the Tour structure that take effect at the end of the 2022-2023 season. These changes, summarized below, appear in direct response to innovations reflected in the LIV Golf Series:
FedExCup season will revert back to January to August and playoffs will be decreased from Top 125 back to Top 70;
The Fall events will provide opportunities for players outside of the Top 70 to earn FedExCup points, as well as play their way into the Top 50 to be eligible for…
Three “international, no-cut, limited-field events” that include the Top 50 golfers in the final FedExCup standings and the top golfers from the new fall season;
Only the Top 70 golfers who make the playoffs will secure their playing privileges for the following season; all others will be able to compete in the Fall events to place within the Top 125 for fully exempt status;
Increased purse size for 8 marquee events in 2023, including the three invitational tournaments hosted by Tiger Woods, the late Arnold Palmer, and Jack Nicklaus.
There’s been a lot of angst, churn and fighting words about what has materialized into possibly the biggest shakeup in professional golf history. Only time will tell what additional changes might occur, as big names continue to announce their participation in upcoming LIV events. For now, we can only watch and hope the powers that be can figure out a way to either retain their autonomy or co-exist peacefully with each other, so that fans of golf can enjoy watching the game we love.