Question about the PGA Tour-LIV Golf integration? The Tour CEO says he only has 1 goal

The PGA Tour’s new executive, when asked about reuniting in the men’s game, says he has one goal.

You are focused on one journey.

“It makes the PGA Tour better,” Brian Rolapp said.

But it wasn’t clear Wednesday if that meant merging the Tour and LIV Golf, the leagues that have partnered with each other since LIV began play in June 2022. In June 2023, the Tour and the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund, which sponsors LIV, had agreed to begin negotiations on a sponsorship deal, but those negotiations have stalled.

Still, thoughts of playing between the sides, beyond the majors, continued, and, at a press conference before the Tour’s Players Championship, Rolapp was asked if integration was still part of his “brief” going forward.

He answered this way:

“I think I’ve been clear about this – my brief is to make the PGA Tour better,” Rolapp said. “I’m open to anything that makes the PGA Tour better. That’s my brief. Better for the fans, better for our members.”

“So that’s what I focus on, and that’s where I put all my efforts.”

What it may mean for the foreseeable future is the continued separation; this week, in particular, the Tour plays its showcase event, while LIV plays in Hong Kong. But Scott O’Neil, CEO of LIV Golf, said he has spoken to Rolapp. Late last year, during Sportico’s “Invest in Sports” Conference, O’Neil said the discussions focused on development, although those were about quality golf as a whole.

“We generally have the same vision about what the world of golf could or should be in the next few years,” O’Neil said. “There is an opportunity for the entire golf world to come together and grow this pie.”

On Wednesday, Rolapp also answered two other questions related to LIV Golf.

LIV Golf Players at the Players Championship?

Before this year’s players’ tournament, there were rumors that the event would seek a major position, although Rolapp seemed to shut down that thought on Wednesday. (“I think what’s important,” he said, “is not for us to decide.”) Still, the Players were left without LIV experts, and Rolapp was asked if they would ever be allowed in the event.

“That’s not the kind of priority I put on my list,” he said. “So that’s not something I ever thought I was in love with, there are other important things besides that.”

Expansion of the Returning Member Program

On Jan. 12, the PGA Tour said that Brooks Koepka is returning to the Tour using the newly created “Returning Member Program”, a policy that was open to three other LIV players (Bryson DeChambeau, Jon Rahm and Cameron Smith) for their championship wins in the past four years and show the final series of Feb. 2 of financial penalties. The program was created after LIV and Koepka announced on December 23 that he was leaving the league he joined in 2022.

On Wednesday, Rolapp was asked if the program would expand. Most notably, within a month of Koepka’s announcement, Patrick Reed also said he was leaving LIV to play again on the PGA Tour, although the Tour said he would be suspended for one year.

“The returning members program was created for a set of circumstances that arrived at our door unexpectedly,” said Rolapp. “As I said, we heard about Brooks on the 23rd of December and he told us that he was out of contract, so we have a new situation to deal with.

“We created a temporary plan that worked for Brooks and anyone who might have been in a similar situation. Turns out, others weren’t. We made it clear that it was a plan for returning members at one time, and I stand by that.

“I don’t know the contractual relationship or the terms of the others on the LIV Tour, and they have contracts and they have to be respected. But we have a method; Patrick Reed is obviously using that method as he is, I think, with his commitment to the contract. So I think the LIV players know what those methods are, and until they change, those are the methods.”

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