LIV Golf loses fight to join world ranking
LIV Golf has lost its battle with the Official World Golf Ranking board.
More than a year after submitting an application for its golfers to receive OWGR points, the Saudi Arabia-backed league learned Tuesday that request was rejected.
The OWGR reasoned it was unable to measure the 48-man, 54-hole, no-cut league with the 24 other tours around the world, according to the Associated Press.
The application was submitted on July 22. Since then, the OWGR had come back to LIV with several undisclosed issues.
“We are not at war with them,” Peter Dawson, chairman of the OWGR board, told the AP. “This decision not to make them eligible is not political. It is entirely technical. LIV players are self-evidently good enough to be ranked. They’re just not playing in a format where they can be ranked equitably with the other 24 tours and thousands of players trying to compete on them.”
LIV’s 48-man fields and no-cut format are two aspects that do not meet OWGR points guidelines, although a tour can be awarded points without meeting all guidelines.
At the PGA Championship in May, Seth Waugh, CEO of the PGA of America, said the OWGR governing bodies and LIV continued to have amicable discussions. Waugh is on the OWGR board of directors.
The voting members of the committee that rejected the application included leaders from Augusta National, the PGA of America, the US Golf Association and The R&A, which host the four majors
PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, DP World Tour CEO Keith Pelley and DP World Tour COO Keith Waters recused themselves from being a part of the review board for LIV’s application.
Unable to earn points in any of the league’s events, which will number 14 this year, many LIV golfers’ world rankings have plummeted since they joined the Greg Norman-run league. Among the most notable:
Jupiter’s Dustin Johnson from No. 13 to 121.
Luis Oosthuizen from No. 20 to 385. Bryson DeChambeau from No. 29 to 132.
Kevin Na from No. 33 to 453. Sergio Garcia from No. 54 to 375. “The OWGR is not accurate, one,” DeChambeau said this year at the LIV event in Singapore.
“Two, I think that they need to come to a resolution or it will become obsolete. It’s pretty much almost obsolete as of right now. But again, if the majors and everything continue to have that as their ranking system, then they are
hhhhhbiting it quite heavily.”
Brooks Koepka has maintained his ranking, currently No. 18, off a strong major season in which he was runner up at the Masters and won the PGA Championship. Koepka was the lone LIV golfer to play in the recent Ryder Cup.
“Dustin Johnson, Sergio Garcia, of course they should be in the ranking,” Dawson said.
“We need to find a way to get that done. I hope that LIV can find a solution — not so much their format; that can be dealt with through a mathematical formula — but the qualification and relegation.”