[PHOTO: Kate McShane]
It has now been 16 months since PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan and PIF governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan appeared on television together to announce the framework agreement between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf. For those who haven’t been paying attention, those talks remain ongoing. Translation: no “merger” has taken place.
The longer it takes, the more a general apathy sets in among golf fans, who remain the biggest victim in this whole mess. The best players in the world only all got together a handful of times in 2024, and as of now it seems like that will be the case again in 2025. That said, over on the DP World Tour this week at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, a number of LIV players – among them Jon Rahm and Brooks Koepka – were invited into the field and are playing in the event.
Also in the field is former US Open winner Matt Fitzpatrick, who shares the same sentiment as many golf fans in regards to the state of professional golf – apathy. Fitzpatrick, the defending champion, was asked earlier this week if he believes professional golf is closer to coming together after news of Monahan and Al-Rummayyan being paired in the same group in the pro-am in Scotland made the rounds.Â
“Yeah, I don’t think they are going to decide the future of golf in five hours around Carnoustie,” Fitzpatrick said. “I know Carnoustie is pretty bloody hard. Not much time for talking.
“I think in terms of bringing the game together this week, I’m past the point of caring. I just don’t care. Me saying things to the PGA Tour board, me saying things to the DP World Tour board, it’s not going to change, so why am I going to waste my time talking about it?”
Ideally, though, the pro-am pairing of Monahan and Al-Rumayyan might mean the game is getting closer to coming back together. An indication that there’s no more bad blood. Fitzpatrick isn’t so sure about that.Â
“Not necessarily. I think there’s probably some players in the States, their feelings, I don’t think they would be very happy,” he said. “If I’m probably brutally honest, at the start, I probably was pretty against, and it was not of any interest to me to go and play LIV. But I’ve always said that I understood why people went. I’ve got no issues with that. No issues at all.
“My issue was always – at the start, anyway – is you’ve gone over there. Like, I don’t feel like it’s fair for you to try to come back and play as well. But I would say I’ve changed on that now. Again, I just don’t care. I just want to focus on myself. I think that’s what’s important, and try to play the best golf I can. I don’t want to get 10 years down the road, obviously, and look back and I’m not going to sit there and think, Oh, I wish I’d got more involved in that LIV and PGA Tour. It’s like, you’re wasting your time.”
The way this whole ordeal has played out, simply focusing on yourself and what you can control seems to be some very sound advice from the Englishman.
