Jim Nantz made the smooth intro, Sunday afternoon as PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan sat in on the CBS telecast of the Canadian Open, to talk about the week’s happenings — big happenings.
Monahan called it: “An unfortunate week created by some unfortunate decisions.”
Those “decisions” Monahan referred to was Phil Mickelson leading a band of former PGA Tour players into the LIV Series Den of Iniquity outside London.
Monahan was all smiles — the Canadian Open drew overflow crowds, thousands lined each fairway on Sunday. It dwarfed the turnout in London.
Then there were some of the PGA Tour’s brightest stars — battling it out down the stretch — Rory McIlroy, Justin Thomas, Tony Finau, Sam Burns.
“You’ve got true, pure competition, the best players in the world here at the RBC Canadian Open, with millions of fans watching. And in this game, it’s true and pure competition that creates the profiles and presences of the world’s greatest players. And that’s why they need us. That’s what we do,” Monahan said.
Over in London the LIV had a day of mediocrity on Saturday where Charl Schwartzel, a player with no wins anywhere in the past six years, beat someone name Hennie Du Plessis, Wally Uihlein’s kid and someone else you’ve never heard of.
The final group at the Canadian had rounds of 62, 64, 64 and earlier in the day, Justin Rose just missed taking a bite out of the “59” apple. Over in London, only eight of the 48 managed to shoot under par.
Monahan pointed out that the LIV is nothing more than “a series of exhibition matches, the same 48 players.”
LIV players were grilled over the money source last week. Monahan also said players paid an exorbitant amount of money would “have to be living under a rock” to not know they would be criticized for the source of the money.
Then Monahan added: “I would ask any player that has left, or any player that would ever consider leaving, ‘Have you ever had to apologize for being a member of the PGA Tour?’”
As he got further into the Saudi money grab, Monahan added:
“It’s not an issue for me, because I don’t work for the Saudi Arabian government,” Monahan said, a veiled dig at the notion of being a free agent. “But it probably is an issue for players who chose to go and take that money. I think you have to ask yourself a question: Why?
“Why is this group spending so much money — billions of dollars — recruiting players and chasing a concept with no possibility of a return?” he said. “At the same time, there’s been a lot of questions, a lot of comments, about the growth of the game. And I ask, ‘How is this good for the game?’”
American Defectors To LIV Series Get Letter From 9/11 Families:
Seems former PGA Tour players leaving for the Saudi-backed LIV Series attracted attention from outside the world of golf.
Each of the players who left the PGA Tour received a letter from the organization for the families who lost members in the 9/11 attack on the twin towers in New York City.
The letter read in part:
“As you may know, Osama bin Laden and 15 of the 19 September 11 hijackers were Saudis. It was the Saudis who cultivated and spread the evil, hate-filled Islamist ideology that inspired the violent jihadists to carry out the deadly 9/11 attacks. And, most egregiously, it is the Kingdom that has spent 20 years in denial: lying about their activities, and cowardly dodging the responsibility they bear. Yet these are your partners, and much to our disappointment, you appear pleased to be in business with them.
“Given Saudi Arabia’s role in the death of our loved ones and those injured on 9/11—your fellow Americans—we are angered that you are so willing to help the Saudis cover up this history in their request for ‘respectability.’ When you partner with the Saudis, you become complicit with their whitewash, and help give them the reputational cover they so desperately crave—and are willing to pay handsomely to manufacture. The Saudis do not care about the deep-rooted sportsmanship of golf or its origins as a gentleman’s game built upon core values of mutual respect and personal integrity. They care about using professional golf to whitewash their reputation, and they are paying you to help them do it.”
Thongchai Jaidee Gets First Champions Tour Win:
Thongchai Jaidee shot a final round 68 Sunday and won the American Family Insurance Championship at the University Ridge Golf Club in Madison, Wisconsin.
Jaidee got into the tournament thanks to a 10th place finish in Iowa and Jaidee became the first player from Thailand to win on the Champions Tour. He finished a shot in front of Tom Pernice Jr., who shot 66 over the final 18 holes.
“Very big thing for me,” Thongchai said. “The game has changed. Now I’m very, very happy to be on tour. “Great tournament here,” Thongchai said. “I played solid, solid, solid. I took one mistake on 16, hit the tree and lost the ball. We make good bogey and try to get my plan. Holed a good putt on 17 and the game changed. I think my confidence in the putting, that’s why helped me a lot for this week.”
Tournament host Steve Stricker finished in a tie for ninth. Schwab Cup points leader Steve Alker gave everyone else a chance by taking the week off.
American Family Insurance Scoreboard:
More Candidates For Defection To LIV Series:
Bryson DeChambeau and Patrick Reed will be joining the LIV Series when it move to Portland next month but there could be others joining them.
Speculation is swirling that Rickie Fowler, Matt Wolff and Jason Kokrak could be joining them and possibly Bubba Watson when he’s recovered from his knee surgery.
Fowler and Wolff have been struggling with their games in a big way and that seems to be one of the profiles for players jumping to the rival league. Kokrak has been in bed with the Saudis for a long time as a brand ambassador for “Saudi Golf.” As for Watson, his days as a factor in championships are waning — another profile trait for players making the exit.
12 Comments
JimmyD5cc
If I’m a middle of the road PGA player and I look at what LIV is offering, I’d jump at the chance to make lot of money, on top of having all my expenses covered. For example, travel, lodging, food, car rental, caddy fees etc. all paid for. For me that woud be hard to walk away from. Just sayin….
Tom Edrington
I’m pretty sure they’re not covering “travel expenses” they’ve forked out a lot to some pretty insignificant players, it won’t help them to add “middle of the road” Tour guys, they’ve already got a bunch of those….Players still pay their caddies, etc.
baxter cepeda
Tom is correct but all the LIv players have at least 120 $ thousand to work with for each event.
#Expenses handled.
forky76
Some of my comments on your recent articles about LIV golf suggest I am a supporter of that series, and yes I enjoyed seeing what they had to offer. But my stance is more about being anti pga tour rather than pro LIV golf.
The direction of the pga tour in recent years is what has led many players to move. Yes it’s mostly for the money, but I agree with Phil’s comments the tour needs reshaping. Some of Monahan’s innovations include:
PIP: a confusing load of rubbish.
Fedex cup strokes: pro golf is not a handicap game.
Aon risk reward challenge: does anyone care?
WGC events. Reducing the events and going back in time bringing them all to US soil. This is not growing the game globally as was the original intention.
And don’t get me started on the tv broadcast.. its horrible. The two best tournaments to watch each year are the open (sky sports production) and the masters (their own production).
Any sports war ultimately leads to a better product.. nfl, indy car, world series cricket are some historical examples. For the sake of golf fans I hope Monahan and Norman can put the egos aside and work together for a better product we can all enjoy. Both leagues/ tours have their good points, but its probably going to get worse before it gets better.
Tom Edrington
I can’t wait for the Open Championship, Scotland is in my heart and soul as is the old course, I have a piece of turf from the Old Course in a plastic bag here in my desk!!
baxter cepeda
Good stuff forky.
baxter cepeda
I didn’t see the commissioner smiling too much, maybe trying to.
You didn’t mention the most important part of his chat, which was Monahans lame answer to Jim’s direct question of why not let Liv players play on the pga tour. To which the commissioner Said about owing it to the other member and fans and whoever else. Nonsense to me.
Monahan owes it to everyone associated with the pga tour to provide the strongest fields possible. As more names surface that they are signing with LIv, Monahans tour just gets weaker and weaker and weaker.
Right now Monahans tour has the stronger fields, but LIv is only getting stronger while the pga tour gets weaker with each defector.
Remember We are seeing college stars sign with LIv.
At what point does this tilt the other way?
Tom Edrington
Thus far there’s a profile for guys going to LIV and I’d say at this point most are losing their capacity to compete with the best on the PGA Tour — prima facia evidence — just look at the awful scores from last week…..good thing there was no cut!!!
baxter cepeda
So much to disagree in so few words Tom.
I don’t think there is a profile. In fact if I look at majors since 2019, there’s quite a few guys in LIv —already—whom have won or regularly finish very high in majors. Again, I’m not going to get into each name. But you know who they are.
Never mind I’ll help you a little:
The one name that really stands is DJ, who can still be number one. The guy has been completely unfocused by LIv issues and a crazy wedding. But now he is able to refocus. He will win big again. He will contend and likely win a major again.
So will Bryson.
Gooch has a major or more in him.
Oostheisen is literally in every single major.
And again, it’s only the beginning. You already reported a few more names today.
Now, You have to be kidding about the scores. This is golf, not track and field. The scores thing is about the course, not the players, which is another of the pga tours problems that all the courses are too easy.
That perfect rough in Canada looked beautiful but it was easier than centurion. Centurion is simply a much tougher track. Everyone knows that.
That’s being said, as more players make the switch, LIv scores will lower. LIv will have more potential major winners.
But what do you say when the pga tour goes to the few tracks they have that don’t allow 20-30 under par? But instead scores close to Livs scores this week?
Liv will have its share of 20-30 under. Dj in fact is one of those players that can go as deep as anyone when the course allows.
baxter cepeda
One important note:
I am extremely empathetic to the 9-11 families. That day continues to impact all of us.
And I deeply love and believe the United States to be the greatest nation in the world.
But even the best of the best do crazy things.
Having just rewatched the movie “Vice” let us remember that after 9-11 our leaders at that time chose to harass Iraq instead— with no justification —and as the Dick Cheney movie states: at least 600,000 Iraqi civilians (kids, moms, old people) died as collateral damage; not to mention 10s of thousands more military boys.
This is what folks mean by:
all nations have a cross to bear.
Tom Edrington
Phil needed you to answer questions for him on Monday, cause he sure had a tough time and never gave any answers as to what LIV is going to “grow the game”…..this US Open is growing the game as is the USGA, the Saudis don’t even play golf….not sure how they think they can grow the game through sports-washing which in real life terms is exactly what the LIV Series is.
Tom Edrington
I’ll let you keep on going Baxter, I’ve got to turn my attention to what looks to be an incredible US Open