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LIV Golf wins in its merger with PGA Tour

Greg Norman. Mike Frey-USA TODAY Sports

LIV Golf wins in its controversial merger with PGA Tour

By Eric Smithling | Last updated 6/7/23

In the battle between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, the Saudi-backed golf league and its players won.

The PGA Tour spent the past year in a contentious back-and-forth with rival league LIV Golf, only to backtrack on all of its attacks when the money became too much to resist.

At least the Tour can relate to the golfers who fled for LIV Golf for a huge payday only to be welcomed back with open arms.

Brooks, Phil, DJ, Bryson, etc. are all back and all essentially got 8-figure signing bonuses along the way. Incredible.
— Albert Nguyen (@AnalyticsCapper) June 6, 2023

$100+ million signing bonus + still winning majors + got my PGA Tour card back pic.twitter.com/tIaqhImSN4
— Albert Nguyen (@AnalyticsCapper) June 6, 2023

The news sent shockwaves throughout the golf world, with reports stating PGA Tour members had no idea a merger was in the works and learned at the same time as everyone else. It's unlikely to go over well.

Hearing from multiple PGA Tour players that they had absolutely zero heads up on this before the announcement was made on social.
— Shane Bacon (@shanebacon) June 6, 2023

The PGA Tour convinced many of its players that taking Saudi money from LIV Golf was immoral.

But now the PGA Tour is merging with LIV, creating a new entity with Saudi's sovereign wealth fund as the only outside investor.

The players that turned down the money must be PISSED.
— Joe Pompliano (@JoePompliano) June 6, 2023

There’s gonna a tonnnnn of angry PGA Tour players who turned down hundreds of millions of dollars. Do you compensate those guys? What happens with the designated events next year?

This is a player-run organization and they didn’t tell them shit. https://t.co/VrIy8iXqCL
— Dan Rapaport (@Daniel_Rapaport) June 6, 2023

Players including Brooks Koepka, Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson signed lucrative contracts with LIV Golf, complained about being ostracized by the PGA Tour and are returning to a joint PGA-LIV venture that is primarily funded by the Saudi government.

So does this mean that the PGA Tour is full partners with the Saudi government now? This is absolutely wild.
— Albert Breer (@AlbertBreer) June 6, 2023

"Under the terms of the tentative agreement ... the Saudi wealth fund ... will at first be the exclusive investor in the blended operation," the New York Times reported.

In August 2022, LIV Golf players sued the PGA Tour as part on an antitrust lawsuit, with the PGA Tour countersuing LIV Golf and later adding the Public Investment Fund of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (PIF) and its governor, Yasir Othman Al-Rumayyan, to the suit.

Per the Times, Al-Rumayyan will be the chairman of the new venture.

It can't be overstated how big of a win the PGA Tour gave LIV Golf and the PIF by agreeing to a merger. In February 2023, a federal judge ruled the PIF must share key organizational and financial details as part of its litigation with the PGA Tour, something the PIF argued against on the grounds of "sovereign immunity."

Per USA Today, "The wealth fund ... has been estimated to be worth over $650 billion."

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