If LIV Golf wants to increase its viewership – and, be honest, in these worrying times of a mass switch-off,
every Tour worthy of its TV deal wishes for nothing more – it should screen the moment Phil Mickelson tells Brooks Koepka he must boycott the majors to stand in unison with Talor Gooch.
It would be utterly captivating and a surefire pay-per-view blockbuster.
Alas, it will never happen because not even Phil The Thrill is brave or stupid enough to take on that challenge. However, the six-time major winner – one ahead of Koepka – did suggest that something akin to this scenario could be possible in a bizarre tweet that risks damaging his reputation yet further.
Last weekend, in a reply to a post from the popular Flushing It account that stressed LIV’s unequal struggle to land exemptions into the majors for its members, Mickelson replied with the following:
“What if NONE of the LIV players played? Would they be missed? What about next year, or the year after? At some point they will care and will have to answer to sponsors and television. FAAFO.”
As I am down with the kids, I know that “FAAFO” stands for “F— around and find out”, which essentially crystallised Mickelson’s threat. One out, all out. Power to the people. Let’s picket Magnolia Lane.
For what it’s worth (or, in Mickelson speak FWIW), I believe the majors should make provisions in their qualifying criteria to grant direct access via the LIV money list.
Good on the PGA of America for inviting Gooch to next week’s USPGA and even though it is ludicrous that the 2023 LIV champion has refused to enter qualifying for either the US Open or Open in presumably some show of martyrdom – Joan of Arc must be twitching in her spikes – his displays over the past few years on the Saudi-funded circuit demand he should be included in all four.
Fair enough, he made his bed, but the Big Four must want to showcase the best against the best and if you look at the champions who Gooch has bettered for a sustained spell then he should be there at next week’s USPGA and at Pinehurst for the US Open and Royal Troon for the Open.
Patrick Reed is another who will be absent from Valhalla next week as his streak of 40 straight majors comes to an end, although at least he is having a crack at the latter two. Meanwhile, as the 2010 champion, Louis Oosthuizen will be at the Open, but should also be in North Carolina and be assured of a berth at the US Open. The tournaments will be poorer without them, in my opinion (IMO).
Furthermore, this “problem” is going to become more pronounced in the next few years unless things change. Dustin Johnson is in danger of having no exemption for the 2025 USPGA at Quail Hollow and the year after could be left stranded for the Open at Royal Birkdale. The same could apply to Bryson DeChambeau, whose exemptions for winning the 2020 US Open run out next year.
The word is that as “soon” as a deal is struck between the PGA Tour and the Public Investment Fund – the Saudi funders of LIV – a direct pathway will be opened. But why and what exactly has that got to with the majors?
Between them, Augusta, the PGA of America, the US Golf Association and the R&A refused to bestow official world ranking status to LIV and thus backed themselves into a corner that could hurt their competitions. A solution must be found.
But a strike? Seriously. No wonder that Mickelson’s tweet was deleted by Monday morning. It was anything but helpful and reminded of that time in 2022 when Majed Al Sorour, then the LIV managing director, gloriously attempted to raise two fingers. “If the majors decide not to have our players play?” he said. “I will celebrate. I will create my own majors for my players.”
By the start of 20-23, he had stepped down. Even Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudi Crown Prince, seems to recognise that there are some things money – not even an entire Kingdom overflowing with the stuff – cannot buy. Mickelson might be advised to remember that.
LIV can only pile more pressure on the establishment by signing more star names and if the negotiations continue to hit brick walls then this will surely be the tactic. What will not work is a laughable Mickelson warning.
Certainly, the majors will have given a unanimous harrumph. If anything has become clear in this sporting civil war it is that a) the majors matter more than ever and b) the professionals are more entitled and self-centred than ever. The notion of this lot ever grouping together and doing something they consider to be for the collective good and not simply for their own gain is as comical as it is sad. As Paul McGinley puts it, “it’s like trying to herd cats”.
Some of this lot – indeed, many – cannot see that they are already overpaid considering the interest they muster and the entertainment they provide and just want more and more. There is no end to their greed or to their sense of superiority. They are not simply slaying the golden goose, so much as hauling it onto a marble slab and smashing three-irons into its nether regions. It is a rather grotesque spectacle.
A famous coach, who shall remain nameless, has long said that “99 per cent of golfers who become successful pros eventually turn into w——”. Yet after the last three seasons it can only be presumed that the coach has revised his estimate. Upwards.
