The game {of professional} golf has been fractured for 2 years for the reason that inception of LIV Golf. The Saudi-backed tour has peeled off a variety of stars from the PGA Tour, together with reigning Masters champion Jon Rahm.
Numerous golfers on the rival circuit have expressed disinterest in ever returning. However Bryson DeChambeau has a really totally different take.
The previous U.S. Open winner is studying the tea leaves and feels strongly that unification is a should. He went into nice element forward of LIV Golf’s occasion at Trump Nationwide Doral in Miami.
⛳️ #DEAL OR NO DEAL? — Bryson DeChambeau says persons are ‘shedding curiosity’ in golf and a deal ‘must occur quick’ for the nice of the game: “Properly there’s a number of methods that you may remedy this downside. I feel that from a participant’s perspective, it wants to come back again… pic.twitter.com/QWbFymXYni
— NUCLR GOLF (@NUCLRGOLF) April 3, 2024
“…From a participant’s perspective, it wants to come back again collectively for the followers, No. 1. The followers are what drive this sport. If we don’t have followers, we don’t have golf… There’s bought to be a solution to come collectively. How that comes collectively, that’s above all of us out right here.”
Not solely did he specific the need and necessity for change, however harassed the immediacy.
“It’s as much as the blokes up high to determine it out and determine it out rapidly as a result of we are able to’t maintain going this path. It’s not sustainable,” DeChambeau mentioned.
“It’s nice to have the majors the place we come collectively, however we wish to be competing, at the least I wish to be competing each week, with all the greatest gamers on the planet for certain… And it must occur quick. It’s not a two-year factor. Prefer it must occur faster slightly than later only for the nice of the game. Too many individuals are shedding curiosity.”
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Certainly, tv scores for many of this 12 months’s PGA Tour tournaments are down, some significantly. It hasn’t helped that this has been the season of first-time winners on Tour.
LIV Golf, in fact, has by no means gained any traction on that entrance both.
Golf followers are merely bored with listening to all in regards to the cash gamers are making. They’re bored with questioning if the LIV Golf merger with the PGA Tour will ever occur.
Nonetheless, talks between the 2 sides appeared to have stalled. That’s till Tiger Woods lastly met with Yasir Al-Rummayan, the Saudi Public Funding Fund’s governor.
One can solely hope that DeChambeau is right and one thing is completed and finished quickly. Or skilled golf would possibly get up and discover itself wanting eerily just like tennis, the place solely 4 weeks a 12 months really matter.
Kendall Capps is the Senior Editor of SB Nation’s Enjoying Via. For extra golf protection, comply with us @_PlayingThrough on all main social media platforms.
