BROOKLINE, Mass. — When PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan took his hard-line stance in opposition to the gamers who signed on to play with the LIV Golf Invitational Collection and suspended them from competing in PGA Tour occasions, everybody waited to see what the subsequent transfer was going to be within the golf world.
Everybody waited to see final week what the USGA was going to do, with the U.S. Open subsequent up on the calendar.
Would the USGA not welcome the likes of Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson and different outstanding gamers into the U.S. Open, which begins Thursday at The Nation Membership?
The reply was no. After Monahan and the PGA Tour introduced its suspensions, the USGA did nothing to change its plan and didn’t comply with swimsuit. They welcomed all gamers who had certified into its discipline — together with Mickelson and Johnson, a previous champion.
Herein lies the linchpin for Monahan and the PGA Tour: If the governing our bodies of the key championships aren’t going to align themselves with the PGA Tour and ban the gamers concerned with the LIV tour, Monahan might have some large issues.
As a result of if the gamers aligned with LIV Golf usually are not going to eligible to play within the main championships, that might be a deal-breaker for gamers leaping to the LIV tour.
If they're allowed to play, the PGA Tour suspensions — even when they maintain up in courtroom ought to gamers sue (which is anticipated) — can have plenty of starch taken out of them.
The powers that be at Augusta Nationwide, who’ve been conspicuous by their silence, don’t actually face a lot urgency to reply to LIV as a result of the subsequent Masters isn’t till April 2023.
Nor do the powers on the PGA of America, which runs the PGA Championship and the Ryder Cup, as a result of the subsequent PGA isn’t till Might 2023 and the Ryder Cup gained’t be contested till September 2023.
After this U.S. Open, the subsequent main would be the British Open in July. Will we hear from the governing physique of the Royal & Historic banning gamers?
On Wednesday, the eve of the 122th U.S. Open, USGA CEO Mike Whan was noncommittal about what the group may do sooner or later in regards to the LIV opponents, however studying between the traces, it didn’t sound like he has plans to ban them.
“We positively really feel accountability to this sport, and we really feel a accountability to the opponents that play it,’’ Whan mentioned. “We did sit down and have a protracted dialog a couple of week earlier than the U.S. Open, [asking,] ‘Did the place any individual else performed and what promoter they performed it with, disqualify them for this occasion?’ We determined no on that, with all the attention that not everybody would agree with that call.
“Whether or not all of us prefer it or not, in February, 30 guys performed for a similar promoter in Saudi Arabia [at the Saudi International] with an appropriate launch from the PGA Tour, and for years the DP World Tour [formerly known as the European Tour] had an occasion there, identical promoter.
“I’m certain there are gamers that each got here via our qualifying and perhaps teeing it up which might be sponsored by these completely different [sponsors]. So we requested ourselves the query of 1, one week earlier than in the event you play someplace the place you’re not authorized to play, would you be disqualified for the 2022 U.S. Open? And we mentioned no.
“And we additionally needed to ask the query, in the event you’re going to place that form of clause in, who will get in, we’ve obtained to return to 9,300 individuals [who attempted to qualify for the U.S. Open]. … It turns into a reasonably slippery slope to attempt to apply that throughout 9,300 individuals.’’
Whan is shut with Monahan.
“Jay and I are pals,’’ he mentioned. “I used to be on the Memorial and truly he introduced me in to speak about distance [issues in the game]. We really didn’t speak about this [LIV]. On the finish of the day, we do plenty of issues collectively.’’
However apparently they don’t droop gamers collectively.
“Any person requested me the opposite morning, ‘Have you ever talked to Martin Slumbers [CEO of the R&A]?’ ’’ Whan mentioned. “I speak to Martin Slumbers on a regular basis. We don’t speak about our discipline standards. All of us run championships. They’re all completely different in how we run these championships.’’
This may not be excellent news for the PGA Tour.
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