LIV Golf is still going, but its days seem numbered and probably always have been

LIV doesn’t seem to have much life left, which even in its early days of unlimited cash and immense bluster seemed inevitable.

LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neill emailed his staff Wednesday that the 2026 season will be Continue “as planned, uninterrupted and full throttle.” This weekend’s event in Mexico includes.

Saudi Arabia’s public investment fund is set to pull funding after dropping nearly $5 billion over five years on an oil-pipeline-funded pipe dream that it did not address after media reports it could build the world’s preeminent professional golf tour.

Whoever sold the first PIF on this concept, sold a bill of goods. A lot of people got rich from it, mainly golfers, both in terms of huge LIV paychecks and the eventual reform of the PGA Tour. The gravy train is probably always going to last though.

Soon, sure enough, the losses are going to be too high, the American television ratings too small and the US-based PGA Tour too deeply uprooted.

The primary argument was that the Saudis had a bottomless well of money to squander. may be But what they never had and no one has, is an endless desire to be embarrassed for playing the fool.

It’s all fun and games burning piles of cash until someone realizes they paid cleft palate About $70 million. (Good for Gotch, by the way.)

In 2023, LIV was so sure of his ultimate dominance that Firebrand CEO Greg Norman LIV golfers will celebrate a group behind the 18th green at Augusta National if one of them wins the Masters.

Golf traditionalists recoiled at the discomfort. When everyone was spared John RahmThen won the PGA Tour, instead. LIV He countered by signingEight months later, in a deal worth $300 million-plus.

Last week though, LIV was nothing short of sparkling at Augusta.

Critics have long argued that LIV’s lack of fierce competition and high-end courses will soften its stars. while of LIV Terrell Hatton Finished T-3, big names like Rahm (T-38) and Bryson DeChambeau (cut misses) Frustrated. Then there was Cam Smith, who signed LIV when he was world No. 2 at an Open Championship, failing to make the cut for a sixth straight major.

Meanwhile, Form-LIV/PGA Returners Patrick Reed And Brooks Koepka Both finished T-12.

LIV made a lot of noise and caused a lot of nervous days on the PGA Tour. It was raucous as a parade of the sport’s most marketable names departed. At one point, some sort of merger seemed inevitable.

And LIV was a positive force at times. It stages events in Asia and Africa where the sport rarely ventures. Its tournaments are fan-friendly. More golf is never a bad thing.

And it has forced substantial reforms in how the PGA Tour treats its players. Its lighter schedule even helped DeChambeau embrace YouTube and better express his personality.

For most golf fans, though, these were abstract concepts. All they want is to tune in on a Sunday afternoon and watch the best play on the best course. Tradition is important in golf. And it’s hard to buy.

LIV wasn’t just trying to compete with the PGA Tour and deliver a better product, it was trying to change the core tastes of golf fans to deliver a slightly, but noticeably, different product. It’s harder to buy.

At some point, most golfers will share a laugh about this, perhaps some entertaining “30 for 30” that reminds future viewers that this fever dream actually happened.

54-hole tournament. Resort course. shorts The shotgun starts. As Augusta National disliked Norman so much that it would not extend an invitation to the Masters, causing him to Buy a badge on the secondary market Like some old schlub carrying a folding chair up Washington Road.

Oh, and what about team sports? Remember when that was going to be revolutionary?

“How I signed up with LIV,” Bubba Watson Once claimed with a truly straight face, “My 10-year-old son (and I) was watching golf on TV, and he knew the aces. Everybody knew the aces. They kept winning. He knew the aces. He knew the stingers.”

In fact, almost nobody knew anything about Aces or Stingers or LIV, but it paid big names like Watson a ton not to play on the PGA Tour.

At LIV, pretending otherwise was easier than admitting the reality. It was an epic money grab; They caught some rich people walking slowly.

LIV is still alive, for now. Maybe the Saudis will recommit. Maybe there are other funding sources. Anything is possible, but most of it is unlikely.

The big question now is what to do with the PGA Tour defectors; LIV and LET LIVE, or use it as a turncoat with those who tried to destroy the tour?

Some are old and irrelevant, so it doesn’t matter. For others, there is probably a sliding scale. no, Phil MickelsonYou’re banned for life, but, Gooch, come back, who can blame you?

A suggestion: make them fit for the tour by sending them to the Corn Ferry for a year; A combination of gentle austerity and that level of sportsmanship… a week in Chile or Amarillo or downstate Illinois.

After all, the LIV guys always claimed it was about “raising the game”, not champagne and charter flights.

or something like that.