Will the lengthy holiday pause help ease tensions between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf? Don’t count on it

ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. — The setting of the RSM Classic, the PGA Tour’s final fall event, has a serenity that can almost dissolve all cares.

The Sea Island Club Seaside Course, with spectacular views of the St. Simons Sound and weaving its way in and out of marshes, sea grass, sand dunes and centuries-old trees has been a balm to a golfer’s soul since the 1920s. Allow it, and the best players in the world can fall into a trance between shots, just as 20-handicappers do.

Golf’s current conflict, which has raged between the Tour and LIV Golf, seemed far away. It was all about a tee, a ball and the clubs, amid the best nature can offer.

Long-time St. Simons Island resident Zach Johnson called it “a perfect synergy between the Tour, Sea Island, RSM, Davis [Love III] and his foundation.”

But a peaceful setting didn’t necessarily lend itself to thoughts of a peaceful resolution to the PGA Tour vs. LIV war.

“I’m not optimistic,” said PGA Tour Policy Board member Charley Hoffman when asked if the upcoming break in golf could give both sides a chance to breathe deep and reflect on any possibility for conciliation. “I don’t see how you partner with them at this point in time. They don’t have a sustainable product.”

Kevin Kisner, who will end his current term on the Policy Board at the end of the year, was even more blunt.

“No … I don’t think that’s the future,” he said.

Both tours on extended break

The conclusion of the RSM Classic two weeks ago started a 46-day hiatus from official-money tournament golf on the Tour, with the qualifiers for the Sentry Tournament of Champions gathering in Kapalua, Hawaii Jan. 5-8.

That’s six weeks and four days with a chance to recharge the mind or retool the swing or both, with the exception of three unofficial events in The Bahamas (the Hero World Challenge), Naples (the QBE Shootout) and Orlando (the PNC Championship).

Also on break is LIV Golf, which launched last June and conducted eight tournaments in the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, Saudi Arabia and Thailand.

It’s bankrolled by the Saudi Public Investment Fund and run by World Golf Hall of Fame member Greg Norman. LIV Golf has showered stars such as Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Cameron Smith, Sergio Garcia, Bryson DeChambeau and Patrick Reed with guaranteed contracts (rumored to be in excess of $100 million for Mickelson, Johnson and Smith), plus $255 million in prize money for the first year.

They were suspended, as promised at last March’s Players Championship, by PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan.

The main issue LIV Golf critics have is that it’s backed by Saudi oil money and a government that still restricts basic civil rights for women, criminalizes homosexuality and has the death penalty for offenses such as theft, adultery and protesting against the government, according to Amnesty International.

LIV is planning a 14-tournament schedule next year, beginning Feb. 24 at the Mayakoba Resort in Mexico — a venue that had hosted a PGA Tour event for 16 years but is now in the LIV fold.

Yes, LIV is raiding Tour sites as well as Tour players.

But LIV still doesn’t have a TV contract of any significance (its tournaments are streamed on YouTube), its members are not earning World Golf Ranking points (which grates on Norman’s nerves to no end) and the golf world will be waiting with much anticipation to see if the Augusta National Golf Club will extend invitations to LIV players eligible who would qualify by being past champions or who have won other majors in the past five years.

Legal action precludes peace talks

In the weeks before the RSM Classic, LIV Golf joined in an antitrust suit against the PGA Tour and the Tour countersued. Well before that, the war of words was ugly since the Tour suspended every one of its members who jumped to LIV Golf.

Monahan announced a series of changes and financial enhancements that have bumped the purses of 17 events to at least $20 million (led by The Players Championship at $25 million), added millions to the Player Impact Program and worked to ensure the top players in the world are in the fields for at least 20 tournaments per year.

He said in October that any co-existence with LIV Golf is “not in the cards, hasn’t been in the cards.”

Norman said two weeks before that LIV Golf “has no interest” in any truce.

A handful of players who have served numerous times on the PGA Tour Policy Board, or are current members, agreed with Monahan: There can be no peace and the hiatus on the Tour schedule will not turn down the heat.

Davis Love III, the RSM Classic host who has served five terms on the Policy Board, said making nice with LIV Golf is impossible as long as the organization is enticing players with mind-boggling money the PGA Tour can’t hope to match, and suing the Tour.

He called it “a hostile takeover attempt.”

“If they say, ‘maybe we made a mistake and maybe we should drop a lawsuit and maybe we should quit stealing your players, then we might want to talk to them,” Love said. “But I don’t think that’s their model.”

Hoffman, who is serving a two-year term on the Policy Board, agreed with Love’s characterization that LIV Golf is acting like a corporate raider.

“Davis nailed it,” he said. “I don’t see how you partner with them at this point in time. I’m not that optimistic. As long as they have the play money they’re going to be in the game as long as they want to spend it. I don’t think they’ll ever be able to deliver a product better than the PGA Tour but if they want to keep losing money …”

Kevin Kisner, whose term on the Policy Board expires at the end of the year, also doesn’t see the need to extend olive branches.

“I don’t think you would ever look at a competitive threat and try to figure out how to work together,” he said. “Maybe before it ever started but at this point, don’t see any direction for that.”

Replacing Norman?

There has been chatter that LIV Golf may replace Norman as the CEO with an industry insider such as former Taylor Made CEO Mark King. LIV officials shot that rumor down but two of the biggest voices in golf, Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, have said Norman and his abrasive, confrontational posture has to be removed from the picture for there to be any hint of peace.

“I see that there’s an opportunity out there if both organizations put a stay on their litigation, but that’s the problem, they’ve got to put a stay on it,” Woods said on Tuesday during a news conference in The Bahamas.

“There’s no willingness to negotiate if you have a litigation against you. But I think Greg has to go, first of all, and then obviously litigation against us and then our countersuit against them … those would then have to be at a stay as well. So then we can talk, we can all talk freely.”

“Greg needs to go,” McIlroy told reporters at the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai two weeks ago. “He needs to exit stage left … no one’s going to talk unless there’s an adult in the room that can actually try to mend fences.”

What’s ahead for PGA Tour?

Johnson said he’d rather focus on the Tour’s future and pointed out that it’s a multi-faceted 501 (c)(6) trade organization that has more prongs in addition to its primary charge, setting up business opportunities (tournaments) for its members (players).

“There’s many missions,” he said. “No. 1 is going to the markets and giving back [the Tour has donated more than $3 billion in charity since 1933] … great stewardship. No. 2 is playing opportunities. They’re fulfilling that mission. If we can completely appease our title sponsors … and television along the way and make that better, which we seem to do every time, my confidence is ultra-high.”

Kisner said despite efforts by LIV Golf to entice college and amateur golfers, the primary goal remains the PGA Tour.

“I think the direction of our Tour is only going up,” he said. “Every kid who wants to grow up and be a professional golfer thinks about playing on the PGA Tour and that’s a good thing to have on our side.”

The LIV side of the argument is that it forced the PGA Tour to make changes. Norman said in a recent interview that Tour players “should be thanking LIV.”

“Since LIV’s come on board, the PGA Tour has stepped up,” he said during an interview with ESPN Chicago. “They would never have done that without competition.”

Hoffman said that lost in the noise is that the PGA Tour signed a record TV deal two years ago and the 2021-22 season produced record purses.

“We were growing anyway,” he said. “That’s what everybody was missing, that we were copying LIV. No. Once we signed the TV deal we had the best financial year ever. Our purses were going to go up anyway. We really didn’t do anything different besides hopefully come up with a better model that will get our top players together more often, which is the most important thing.”

At the heart of the issue, Monahan said in an October interview with ESPN, is that LIV’s legal actions ruled out any chance of ending the conflict in a boardroom.

It’s now in courtrooms, and likely for a long time.

“I think words and actions are important,” Monahan said in the interview. “I think it’s impractical when you look at the fact that certain players have sued the PGA Tour, their employer has sued the PGA Tour.”

Contact Garry Smits at gsmits@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @GSmitter