Golf War Concludes with $360M Fallout as LIV Faces ‘Worst Nightmare’

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The wind of golf merger’s change is finally roaring again with nearly two years of petty squabbling, multi-million dollar power moves, and widespread confusion, approaching an end.

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Don’t jinx it. Just whisper it: It’s actually happening.

A financial agreement between the PGA Tour and Saudi Arabia’s trillion-dollar Public Investment Fund (PIF) is said to be around the corner with confirmation expected in the coming months.

We’ve been lied to before. Few expected the June 2023 announcement of a framework agreement to merge to be proceeded by a tedious standoff of powers.

But the momentum of recent weeks is undeniable, with both the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, which PIF funds, hinting at a final deal being close.

And yet, formal finalisation should not be confused with harmony. Delve deeper and it becomes clear that the next step in the golf war could well be the most tumultuous of all.

Here, we try to make sense of the current merger situation, and what comes next in our mega state of play.

WHERE DOES THE MERGER STAND?

Still tangled in a mess of red tape, but the unravelling has at least begun.

There’s been momentum in recent weeks with the PGA Tour asking US President Donald Trump to make good on his pre-election claim that he could end the standoff.

Since he was sworn back into power, the PGA Tour’s powerbrokers have been in meetings with Trump, who was also spotted playing a round with Tiger Woods and his son Charlie on the weekend.

The meetings are a clear sign that Trump — a golf nut with ties to both sides of the golf divide — is actually asserting his influence.

Us President Donald Trump has been asked to step in to end the golf war.Source: AFP

“The Tour decided to use whatever political muscle it had, which probably isn’t much, but we all know President Trump is very much a golf guy … if anyone can move this along, it’s going to be Trump,” PGA Tour insider Rex Hoggard said on the Golf Channel podcast.

“This is a step in the right direction.”

Adam Scott, who sits on a PGA Tour subcommittee tasked with negotiating with the Saudis, said similar this week having been part of a meeting with Trump.

“He has a relationship with Saudi Arabia and the Public Investment Fund. I genuinely think he’s a fan of the PGA Tour as well,” Scott said

“Given this has been tied up, he can be very helpful.”

While the tit-for-tat between the PGA Tour and PIF has come and gone in waves throughout the negotiation process, one issue has remained constant; a regulatory probe into whether this is even a deal the US will allow.

Merger concerns centred around the true motives for what is effectively heavy Saudi investment in an American institution, as well as the question of anti-competitive practices.

The bottom line now is, after nearly two years of investigating and consideration, it appears the US’ Department of Justice (DoJ) will green light a merging of US and Saudi financial superpowers.

Their alliance could form a global golfing behemoth once rumoured to be worth $12 billion (A$19.2bn).

An announcement is expected in the first quarter of this year.

Exactly how concerns were alleviated, and how heavy a role Trump played, is unclear. But multiple US reports state that the PGA Tour and PIF eventually reached a financial agreement in several different configurations.

Each configuration has sat in front of the DoJ, and it’s believed at least one of them passes muster.

You can delve deeper to try and understand the how and why of the process. But the fact is it’s convoluted, largely secret, and shrouded in bureaucracy. Even those who are involved can’t seem to understand.

Scott said it best last month when asked about the merger state of play.

“Same as always. It sucks,” he said.

“It’s not worth talking about. Obviously, it’s so complex and when the (DoJ) is involved, I think we sit and just wait for them.

“Hopefully this can be helped by the President and things can move forward at a faster pace.”

We’ll take your word for it, Scotty.

Adam Scott said the situation “sucks”.Source: AFP

HOW DID IT GET HERE?

With a simple request, plenty of public flattery, and just a hint of desperation.

The PGA Tour wants the deal done and, to make it happen, the multi-billion dollar organisation didn’t see turning to Trump as beneath it.

Golfweek’s Eamonn Lynch described the PGA Tour as having chosen the “lesser of two evils” in crying to Trump for help while pumping his tyres in what he called a “pucker-up press release” last week.

“We want to thank President Trump for his interest and long-time support of the game of golf. We asked the President to get involved for the good of the game, the good of the country, and for all the countries involved,” the statement read

“We are grateful that his leadership has brought us closer to a final deal, paving the way for reunification of men’s professional golf.”

Trump’s involvement will prove divisive, but it’s easy to see why the PGA Tour sought some Presidential assistance.

While in much stronger health than LIV Golf, there’s no doubt that the PGA Tour product has been weakened by losing the likes of Bryson DeChambeau, Jon Rahm and Cameron Smith.

It’s in the Tour’s best interest to bring these superstars back into the fold, otherwise only the four majors can lay claim to having the world’s best male golfers in direct competition. The PGA Tour was able to include itself in that category for several decades, and you can bet it has every intention of returning to that glory.

PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan confirmed as much this week, making it clear that he has far more than just a financial agreement with PIF in mind.

The PGA Tour wants players like Jon Rahm back in the fold.Source: Getty Images

“The only thing that matters to fans and the game is reunification,” Monahan said.

Hoggard said that any deal that didn’t allow LIV Golf’s biggest stars to feature on the PGA Tour in some capacity was “unlikely”, such is the eagerness to restore its strength.

“I don’t think it’s realistic because then the PGA Tour doesn’t get the players they want back like Bryson (DeChambeau), or Brooks, or Jon Rahm, or any of the players that really move the needle like the Tour desperately needs right now,” he said.

Meanwhile, the majors — which underpin the PGA Tour, though they do not technically belong to it — have been starting to crack.

This month, both the R&A and USGA announced a LIV Golf exemption for the majors they operate, The Open and US Open respectively. The decision follows the lead of Augusta National which has extended invites to select LIV Golf players at the past two US Masters.

Merger or no merger, those moves have ever-so-slightly begun to soften golf’s lines division, as did the PGA of America’s decision last year to make LIV Golf players eligible for Ryder Cup selection.

But the PGA Tour can’t just cave to PIF demands, and nor will the US Government want that, such is the nature of the political undercurrent that runs through this US-Saudi negotiation.

The controller of Saudi sovereign wealth will be just as eager to emerge looking like a winner.

That’s where Trump comes in. Apart from being the leader of the free world, he has standing ties with PIF, while his courses have played host to LIV Golf events since its inaugural season.

Between his relationships and influence as US President, Trump stands as the ideal middle-man to kick-start the merger.

And it appears as though that has already happened. It’s just unclear exactly how.

It does, however, come at the cost of the PGA Tour looking somewhat ineffective at the negotiating table.

But will the optics of that really matter to the PGA Tour if the end product is an enterprise worth US$12 billion?

WHY NOW?

None of this is to say that the PGA Tour is the more desperate of the two parties — because that dishonor could well sit with PIF.

LIV Golf burst out the blocks but has hit a brick wall with growth avenues repeatedly running into dead-ends.

The entire venture is simply too big to fail and there’s every chance that it still exists in a post-merger world. But to have any sense of golfing credibility, beyond the middling one it has now, it needs to re-open those avenues.

World rankings, more spots at majors, better players, and greater viewership — the PGA Tour has a significant upper hand in each of these key areas.

In golf’s current limbo, LIV Golf is virtually powerless to make any inroads that will develop a strengthened product. Worse still is that unless a merger is passed soon, that situation could become increasingly dire.

There’s a growing belief that the PGA Tour has been chiefly responsible for the protracted nature of negotiations having identified a way to land the most significant blow in golf’s see-sawing power struggle.

The reason? The looming contract expiries of LIV Golf’s biggest assets.

Those who signed three or four-year deals in LIV Golf’s early months are now due to renegotiate their mega-money contracts.

Most notably, this includes recent major winners Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka, who signed for reported sums of $125 million (A$199m) and $100 million (A$159m) respectively.

Bryson DeChambeau’s contract poses a problem for LIV Golf.Source: Getty Images

Not only are their renewals up soon after major wins, and with the merger yet to be completed, but they also come with LIV Golf not signing a big-name player since Rahm’s defection in December 2023.

“They didn’t get an A-list player. They didn’t get a B-list player (in the off-season). That gives Bryson and Brooks huge leverage,” veteran golf journalist and author Alan Shipnuck said on Dan on Golf.

“And if LIV loses those two guys, it’s over.”

He added that PIF governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan now faces “a moment of inflection” given he never predicted he would be re-negotiating with the superstars when a framework merger agreement was announced in June 2023.

“It just continues to be messy and fascinating,” he said, before pointing to the PGA Tour’s merger subcommittee’s role.

“I honestly think this was part of Monahan, Tiger (Woods), (Patrick) Cantlay and (Jordan) Spieth. They’ve been slow-playing this on purpose.

“They know that the longer it drags out, it tilts back to the Tour’s advantage because these contracts run out. Guys are antsy and guys are unhappy on LIV.

“That’s given them some leverage in this.”

Host Dan Rapaport pointed to how dramatically the power has swung since Rahm’s bombshell recruitment 14 months ago.

“There was a minute there when Rahm went that was like ‘the PGA Tour is one player away from collapsing’. What you’re saying is actually it’s LIV now with more at stake,” he said.

The expiry of deals also exposes LIV Golf to an airing of dirty laundry it hasn’t had to contend with yet due to player non-disclosure agreements.

Former college prodigy Eugenio Chacarra offered the first taste of this last month in a vicious parting shot at LIV, claiming promises were broken, leaving his once-bright future shrouded in doubt.

“I see what it’s like to win on the PGA Tour and how your life changes. How you get major access and ranking points. On LIV, nothing changes, there is only money,” Chacarra said.

“It doesn’t matter if you finish 30th or first, only money. I’m not a guy who wants more money.

“When I joined LIV, they promised OWGR (points) and majors. But it didn’t happen. I trusted them.

“I was the first young guy, then the others came after I made the decision. But OWGR and majors still hasn’t happened.”

Shipnuck warned that Chacarra’s words offered a jarring insight into what could follow for LIV Golf if it doesn’t play its cards right.

“He started speaking truth to power and he let it rip,” he said. “LIV Golf’s worst nightmare are for all these guys’ contracts just to run out, and for them to be no longer bound by NDAs and say whatever they want about everything.

Jay Monahan, Commissioner of the PGA Tour and Yasir Al-Rumayyan, Governor of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund in October.Source: Getty Images

“It’s going to get messy, it’s going to get noisy, so they have to keep these guys in the fold.”

Furthermore, LIV Golf’s lackluster opening to the 2025 season in Saudi Arabia has added renewed urgency to negotiations due to poor viewership.

Having not held a major broadcast deal in America across its first three seasons, Fox Sports in the US picked up the rights for this year, only for an average of 12,000 viewers to tune into the opening round.

“It was just like a fart in church,” Shipnuck said.

“I’ve always treated it like a serious endeavor but in year four they still can’t find a good audience, they’re still struggling to find good venues, they’re more or less pulling up stakes in US market and playing internationally …

“It just feels rudderless … this is do-or-die these negotiations.”

MESH, CO-EXIST, OR WINNER-TAKES-ALL?

A merger being finalised no longer feels like the biggest talking point in men’s golf. Instead, it’s what the game actually looks like post-merger.

Does some fusion of both tours come into existence? Do they both continue to run concurrently, but, harmoniously? Or does one absorb the other in a winner-takes-all scenario?

All three are live possibilities, and there’s little consensus on what the outright favourite is. However, one of the first two options is far more likely — it’s hard to imagine Al-Rumayyan will sign off on any future without LIV Golf, which he once described as “his baby”.

As such, a clear possibility is the PGA Tour and LIV Golf continuing as fully-fledged, parallel tours, but with players eligible to feature on either circuit to some extent.

This will involve coordination of schedules, but LIV Golf has already modelled its calendar to avoid conflict with the overwhelming majority of the PGA Tour’s flagship events. As such, it’s not hard to see the likes of DeChambeau or Smith featuring at the Players Championship before Ludvig Aberg, or McIlroy, turn out for a European LIV event. It’s a win-win situation on paper.

A more integrated approach is one where the PGA Tour exists as the central circuit, but key players are forced to play in regular, global team events – aka LIV Golf. That’s a smaller, but still present, possibility.

Rory McIlroy has urged players to move on from the saga.Source: AFP

How the merger endgame looks in terms of the golf itself truly is anyone’s guess. As such, speculation is running wild.

Either way, renowned American golf analyst Peter Kostis said that the PGA Tour is going to have to end its dream of running a monopoly.

“(The PGA Tour) want to be the end-all and be-all for professional golf. That’s going to go away in 2025,” he said.

“They are going to have to learn to exist in an ecosystem that includes more worldwide golf, whether that’s LIV or the DP World Tour or whatever the case may be.”

Meanwhile, Hoggard flagged the potential for a similar arrangement where the PGA Tour and LIV Golf continue to operate on “parallel paths”, but with a level of free movement between rival players.

“There’s an option that you don’t actually mesh the two (tours) together … and that there’s no more poaching and maybe one (player) goes to one side and comes back to the other,” he said on the Golf Channel podcast.

Hoggard added: “I think there’s an element on the PGA Tour that doesn’t want to see that option.”

It’s in that added warning where golf’s next giant wave of discontent lies. As the path towards a merger gets clearer, the waters that lie beyond it only get murkier.

Players are feeling hurt. They saw peers threaten their livelihoods by joining a rebel tour for big money – and now they could have their cake and eat it too by being brought back into the fold.

While a little reductive, the situation is akin to a former colleague being rewarded handsomely for their agitation instead of being punished. Understandably, those who remained loyal will want their own reward to compensate.

What comes next therefore goes well beyond business and breaches into the deeply personal.

McIlroy hinted as much this week, suggesting a number of his PGA Tour colleagues will need to put aside their hurt feelings in the interest of progress.

“I think everyone has just got to get over it and we all have to say, ‘okay, this is the starting point and we move forward. We don’t look behind us, we don’t look to the past’,” McIlroy said. “Whatever has happened has happened, and it’s been unfortunate. But reunification, how we all come back together and move forward, that’s the best thing for everyone.

“If people are butt-hurt, or have their feelings hurt because guys went or whatever, like who cares? Let’s move forward together and let’s just try to get this thing going again and do what’s best for the game.”

While an admirable point, it is easier to say for McIlroy, who only needs his endorsements to be mega rich, while as a top player, he also benefits from the reduced-field events now on the PGA Tour.

LIV Golf stars like Cameron Smith won’t receive a warm welcome from everyone on the PGA Tour.Source: Getty Images

His point will be much harder to swallow for the hundreds of names fighting on, or below, the cut line just to make a living. Keeping the PGA Tour membership happy shapes as a near-impossible job.

Nonetheless, McIlroy is right in saying that players must find acceptance, because fans are reaching their tipping points, and none of this means anything if they tune out altogether.

“The clock is going to be ticking because fans aren’t going to wait forever for PGA Tour players and decision-makers who might be jealous, or vengeful, or bitter, or spiteful for how this whole thing has played out for the past couple of years, to make the PGA Tour events stronger,” the Golf Channel’s Ryan Lavner said. “Once the financial component is finalised … then the really tricky part comes, and fans aren’t going to be as patient as that.

“It will be up to the PGA tour to bring some of those players back into the fold, and any sort of lengthy delay to figure that out is not going to go over well.”

ANY FINAL TWISTS?

One rumour that hasn’t gone away is PIF making a play to have the DP World Tour tear up their strategic alliance with their American counterparts and strike a separate deal with the Saudis.

The whispers emerged in late 2024 and while they haven’t snowballed into something with more substance, they haven’t gone away either.

Former pro and commentator Gary McCord believes that a deal is on the cards which will effectively give LIV Golf players no reason to play on the PGA Tour ever again.

“I think they will exist apart,” McCord said of the PGA Tour and LIV Golf. “From what we are hearing, (LIV) are going to go buy the DP World Tour. It’s already there. They already get points. They can go get their 20 events that they are going to play there.

“Now these guys get world rankings points, so they can literally go and play in the majors and do what they want to do. (They can) be in these big tournaments now that they get world-rankings points.”

This is, of course, only speculation. But it’s worth noting that PIF operates in small circles that remain perfectly hidden in the shadows.

Think the announcement of the initial framework agreement, or the signing of Rahm; every major move PIF has made so far has seemingly come out of the blue.

So, sign Rory McIlroy? Buy the entire European and Asian circuits? Get Tiger Woods and Greg Norman to box-on in a PPV?

What’s to say this saga doesn’t have one more bombshell left in it?