Enjoy the blood money LIV golfers

Golf's meritocracy goes out the window on LIV Tour

Nine summers ago Scottie Scheffler won the U.S. Junior Golf Championship. He parlayed that into a golf scholarship at the University of Texas where he played competitive golf from 201418. In 2017 he represented Team USA in the Walker Cup Matches. In the summer of 2018 he turned professional and headed to the Web.com (now Korn Ferry) Tour Qualifying School. He passed with flying colors, won twice on that tour in 2019, and graduated to the PGA Tour for the 2019-20 wraparound season. It was the year of COVID, tournament cancellations, and zero spectators. Scottie finished fourth at the PGA that August at Harding Park and finished the season as the rookie of the year. It was a pretty solid start to his professional career.

The following season was another one of graduated success and Scheffler was a captain's pick for Team USA at the Ryder Cup Matches at Whistling Straits. He posted a 2-0-1 record with a Sunday singles win over Jon Rahm.

This current season has been a giant step forward as Scottie has won at Phoenix, Bay Hill, the

World Match Play, and the Masters. He is now the No. 1-ranked golfer in the world. During the course of nine years he has gone from high school hot shot to NCAA champion to mini-tour phenom to PGA Tour rookie of the year to Ryder Cup hero to world No. 1 and major champion. Golf is a meritocracy, and Scheffler has parlayed his talent and work ethic to get to where he currently sits atop the world of professional golf.

Of course not all golf is a meritocracy that rewards one for good play. This weekend, the LIV Tour is finishing its 54-hole tournament in Portland. The LIV Tour is backed by the financial arm of the Saudi Arabian government and has past major champion Greg Norman as its commissioner. The format is 54 holes and a shotgun start, just like the member-guest you play in each summer. Norman had attempted to form a splinter tour in the past with guaranteed purses and no cuts, but this is the first time that his convoluted plan has come to fruition.

The LIV Tour has been a bone of contention to the two main tours in America and Europe because of sponsorship and television commitments. Sponsors “hope” to get the top golfers to compete in their tournament, and the LIV schedule competes with such established events as the Canadian Open, this week's John Deere Quad Cities, and future events down the line in places like Detroit, Napa, Las Vegas and Bermuda. On top of that, both tours have a mandatory schedule commitment required of all its players. If you commit to play the LIV eight times, then what are the chances you'll be able to play 15 more events on the PGA Tour? Slim or none? The television folks want to be able to feature the best golfers from week to week. If some players have gone to London or Portland or Bangkok, then advertising revenues suffer.

Initially some of those golfers who made the decision to leave the PGA Tour and the DP World (European) Tour were aging stars in their 40s such as Charl Schwartzel, Louis Oosthuizen, Sergio Garcia and Kevin Na. All of the aforementioned will make more money playing LIV golf than they could ever make trying to compete against the young stars of the PGA Tour. They were enticed by offers of signing bonuses and guaranteed payouts. The more than $4 million that Charl Schwartzel made in London constitutes about 20 percent

of his career tour earnings. There's more to come with as a last-place finishes resulting in a $250,000 paycheck instead of a missed cut zero.

However, within the last few weeks, noted younger golfers such as Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed have also signed on with LIV. The added impetus that some golfers have bought into is that they “can play less golf and make more money.” Forbes Magazine estimates that Phil Mickelson is worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $750 million. Exactly how much money do these millionaire golfers need to survive in our world?

Which brings us back to Scottie Scheffler. At his press conference last week, Scheffler said, “I get paid more than I deserve — definitely more than I deserve for whacking a little white golf ball around.” Another interesting take came from Wayne Grady, an Australian golfing contemporary of Greg Norman's who won the 1990 PGA Championship. Grady stated that “Norman has been trying to take down the PGA Tour for 30 years.” He continued by saying, “You should hang your head in shame, Shark.” Whether this is all about money or loyalty or for that matter one's place in history, the LIV Tour is not going to go away. Meanwhile a financially revamped PGA Tour might have to cut back on its charitable donations and it mini-tour support.

Last week the PGA Tour announced greater purses, and a differing set of formats with regard to the schedule, the Fed Ex Cup playoffs, and the Fall Series. While Tailor Gooch, one of the LIV Tour members contended that the added prize money was due to the fact that he and his band of cohorts had forced the tour into raising the purses, the new 10-year television contract with NBC and CBS is perhaps a better reason for increased purses. The reality of the situation is that regardless of how much money the PGA Tour throws out there, the Saudi Arabian government will continue to pump oil and can continue to invest in their form of sports-washing.

When Charl Schwartzel won the inaugural LIV Tour event in London, he still made a whole lot less money than Phil Mickelson. Mickelson is guaranteed a greater amount of appearance money that is far and above what Schwartzel or Garcia or Gooch will ever expect to make. I've always thought that if you win the Masters, you should get more from the prize fund than the golfer who came in fourth or last. Such is not the case with LIV golf.

Johnny Pott won five times on the PGA Tour during the course of 20 years and was right there in the middle of golf's golden era alongside linksters named Palmer, Nicklaus, Casper and Player. I asked him if he could ever imagine Ben Hogan and Sam Snead leaving the PGA tour to play and get paid on the Joe Stalin Tour? In Pott's time, would he have ever considered playing on the Idi Amin Tour? Of course, you can imagine his answer. The game has always been a meritocracy … until now.

When all is said and done, LIV Golf is all about tainted money. These are the very same folks who had a hand in the bombing of the World Trade Center and the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Sad to say, but golfers who are millionaires are taking blood money from a most questionable regime. This is bad for the world of golf and it is all very shameful.