Shockwaves reverberated around the PGA Tour when LIV Golf emerged onto the scene back in June 2022.
Numerous high profile PGA Tour players jumped ship to LIV Golf including the likes of Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and a little later on Cam Smith and Jon Rahm.
The PGA Tour continues to dominate LIV as far as TV ratings in America are concerned, and their players were far superior to their counterparts during the majors this season as well.
As much as golf fans would love to see the best players in the world competing regularly outside of the majors, it seems like a merger between the two tours is a long way from coming to fruition.
It has been suggested that a merger between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf simply will not happen.
Matt Kuchar recently claimed that the main stumbling block stopping a PGA Tour and LIV Golf merger from happening is the Saudi-backed outfit’s insistence on the team concept being included in any kind of deal.
However, the PGA Tour are now being accused of actually copying the LIV model in one aspect in particular.
The PGA Tour warned they are copying LIV Golf’s model
There has been a lot of talk about how the PGA Tour are slowly moving away from the system of meritocracy that made it such a highly prestigious tour in the first place.
With the recently formed Signature Events, only the very elite players on the PGA Tour are given the chance to play in a select number of tournaments each season, with enormous financial prizes on offer.
5 Clubs Podcast host Gary Williams shared his concern about this and the effect it could have on professional golf in the United States moving forward, and Johnson Wagner echoed a similar sentiment.
Wagner responded when it was put to him that Signature Events on the PGA Tour surely should have halfway cuts if genuine meritocracy is the end goal.
He replied: “That’s why the numbers should be 100 or 120, because you have to have cuts. The 70-man no-cut is not what the PGA Tour is.
“It’s funny, all of these great ideas that players want. Seemingly you’re just copying the model you swore to hate. Limited events, no cut, guaranteed money, relegation and elevation. It’s basically saying that the model of LIV is pretty good other than the team aspect, let’s just copy what they’re doing.
“It’s walking down a slippery slope right now, to lose professional golf.“
Wagner makes a great point here. If the PGA Tour continue down the road of having so many limited field events, what will the future of professional golf actually look like for those on the outside of the top 70 or so players in the world?
New PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp has to think very carefully about what his next steps will be in this regard.
What Brian Rolapp said that worried Brandel Chamblee
Chamblee is a staunch supporter of the PGA Tour and an outspoken critic of LIV Golf.
So when he says something is concerning him about the PGA Tour, it means that a big problem could be brewing.
Chamblee said: “It’s a compliment to the Tour that they can wrestle away a man as talented and successful as Brian Rolapp,“ Chamblee said. “Having said that, it’s bursting at the seams recreationally. It is very popular with every single avenue. Golf is everywhere.
“Brian, speaking at the Tour Championship said something along the lines of, ‘we’re not going to make incremental change, we’re going to make substantial change and we’re going to be aggressive’ and I thought, ‘okay here’s the game, it’s never been better and you’re going to blow it up’. So there was a disconnect there for me, I didn’t quite understand it.
“I’m concerned about wanting to blow the Tour up. I have no doubt that Brian will figure out a way to do it and make more money for the PGA Tour but will it be to the detriment of the PGA Tour?
“If he’s talking about shrinking the Tour from 45 events to 25 or 26, and the Tour has historically hated a void, because if there is a void, trust me, someone is going to want to come in and run a golf tournament and use the players from the PGA Tour. What are the chances that somebody is going to create, domestically, another PGA Tour?
“I’m a little cautious of the idea that he wants to blow the Tour up and change it drastically and aggressively which was kind of the message I got from him.“
The main concern here is that the proposed changes Rolapp has in mind for the PGA Tour could be too severe.
And he really needs to look at the format for Signature Events, if he is to avoid accusations of simply copying the LIV Golf model.
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