Among the world’s biggest golf stars, none was more outspoken about the negative impact that the Saudi-backed LIV Golf tour would have on the game than Rory McIlroy.
When the LIV Golf league first started up a few years ago, and Mr. McIlroy saw some of the PGA Tour’s best players leave for the insane money the Saudis were throwing at them, he seemed to be disgusted by it all.
At the time, he gave voice to those who were angered that any player would take money from a regime responsible for the cold-blooded murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Not to mention, a regime that last year alone was responsible for executing 170 of its own citizens, and relegates women to second-tier societal status.
Who in their right mind would want to go and play games for these tyrants? Who would want to partner with these people in any way, shape or form?
Well, as it turns out, lots of people. Including the PGA Tour itself.
Last summer, the PGA stunned the world when it announced it was in merger talks with LIV Golf. (They are still continuing.) It seemed impossible to believe, given how adamant PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan had been that LIV was evil incarnate. He had sided with the 9/11 Families United coalition that had denounced the Saudi-backed golf league as a creation of the same abhorrent regime that funded the terrorists who killed so many Americans on Sept. 11, 2001.
It was a principled position on the part of Mr. Monahan – until political and business realities got in the way.
It is now clear that everything and everyone has a price – even Mr. McIlroy. Recently, he said he was probably “too judgmental” about the players who decided to leave either the PGA Tour or the European DP World Tour to go to LIV, regardless of the tens of millions (in some cases hundreds of millions) of guaranteed money the golf league was offering. Mr. McIlroy appeared to have a change of heart after his friend, Spaniard Jon Rahm, reportedly accepted US$400-million to go to LIV in December.
Mr. McIlroy called the move by Mr. Rahm “opportunistic” and a “smart business move.” He added that his friend was in “a lucky position.”
Which is pretty wild given how furrowed his brow was only months earlier over the thought of any further desertions from the PGA and European tours to LIV.
I certainly admired the position that Mr. McIlroy had taken originally regarding LIV. Which is why I’m so shocked he’d change his tune so easily, given that all of the concerns about the Saudis remain. Among other things, their human-rights record is still abysmal. But you know what? Most people don’t care.
The Saudis are working hard on their image. They have done this in part through sports. They now host a Formula One race. They’ve bought the English soccer team Newcastle United. They brought soccer superstar Cristiano Ronaldo to their country to play the game – or at least put on a uniform and run around – in exchange for hundreds of millions of dollars, we’re informed. The Saudis have bought up shares in everything from Amazon to Uber to Meta to Disney.
No one from any of those organizations is asking questions about human-rights abuses or 9/11 funding. No one cares.
The Saudis have a US$700-billion Public Investment Fund that can buy a lot of goodwill. It can silence the kingdom’s most ardent critics. It can sniff out organizations that are in trouble and take advantage of their vulnerabilities. That’s what they have done with the PGA Tour.
Since LIV’s campaign began, the PGA has tried to make their prize payouts more lucrative. It worked on a short-term basis, but it’s not sustainable. The PGA has been asking sponsors to fork over a lot more money to have their names associated with various tournaments, but it can’t promise those dollars are a great investment given the limited television viewership numbers for PGA Tour events.
The Saudis, meantime, don’t care about that stuff. They don’t have to. No one watches the LIV Golf league events, but that’s not the point. The point all along seems to have been to disrupt the world of professional competitive golf and take it over.
That appears to be exactly what’s happening.
When people like Rory McIlroy decide to look the other way and not care about Saudi abuses, then it’s game over. Three years ago, LIV declared war on the PGA Tour. Today, that war is effectively over. And the PGA’s top players are waving the white flag.
Gary Mason