PGA Tour begins anew in Napa, trying to transfer previous LIV Golf gossip
Formally, the brand new PGA Tour season begins Thursday in Napa. Solely two-plus weeks after Rory McIlroy hoisted a shiny trophy on the Tour Championship, golf’s huge center class tees off at Silverado Resort.
Unofficially, it is going to take longer than two-plus weeks — for much longer — to type out the sport’s new world order.
This previous season bubbled with unprecedented turbulence. A distinct segment sport with deep pleasure in decorum and dignity was a playground struggle, because the upstart LIV Golf sequence lured away several big-name players with eye-popping piles of shady, Saudi Arabian cash.
So as a substitute of the customary questions getting ready to a PGA Tour occasion — particularly, who’s going to win this week? — the chatter targeted extra on who’s staying, who’s leaving and the way a lot cash did they pocket.
And, OMG, did you hear what (Participant X) stated about (Participant Y)?!
“It seems like highschool at instances,” stated Cal alum Max Homa, who won last year’s Fortinet Championship at Silverado. “Simply the rumor mill, the tales and the rumour. That’s lastly gone, however for 4 months that was just about each breakfast, each lunch, each vary session.”
Stanford alum Joseph Bramlett additionally discovered himself flashing again to his teenage years.
“The highschool cafeteria is unquestionably metaphor,” Bramlett stated Wednesday, “as a result of there are lot of individuals speaking about lots of people. … The tone has been totally different.”
Think about final week’s BMW PGA Championship, the flagship occasion on what was previously referred to as the European Tour. Billy Horschel (who rebuffed LIV) and Ian Poulter (who defected) engaged in an animated dialog on the observe inexperienced, and it wasn’t about having dinner collectively.
On the identical event, McIlroy took a dig at LIV’s 54-hole format by saying of that tour’s gamers, “They’re going to be fairly drained on Sunday, it is going to be the fourth day.” And Shane Lowry, who additionally caught with the PGA Tour, stated after edging McIlroy to win, “I really feel like that is one for the great guys.”
Extra full of life than most quotes from usually staid golfers.
However because the 2022-23 season begins, it additionally appears well timed to view this uncommon dust-up via a long-term, wide-angle lens. The specter of LIV prompted the PGA Tour to reshape its schedule, bulk up its purses and search methods for its prime gamers to compete towards one another extra typically.
That’s factor for followers, even when the impetus — Greg Norman and his unsavory alliance with Saudi Arabia — counts as wholly unappealing.
LIV’s splashy arrival on the scene may not precisely “supercharge” the sport, because the tour’s web site suggests, nevertheless it clearly pressured the PGA Tour to rethink the way it does enterprise. And as soon as the mud settled, few elite golfers bolted.
Eighteen of the highest 20 gamers on this week’s world rating stayed on the PGA Tour. The one ones to go away have been British Open champion Cameron Smith (ranked No. 3) and Joaquin Niemann (No. 20).
Some recognizable gamers went to LIV, completely — together with Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and Bryson DeChambeau — however golf’s future stretches a lot deeper than that trio.
“I definitely don’t assume it’s good for the sport,” stated Webb Simpson, the 2012 U.S. Open champion on the Olympic Membership. “I’m certain guys may be comfortable the PGA Tour is pumping considerably extra money into purses, however I believe that was coming in some unspecified time in the future anyway.
“A number of our nice gamers have gone to that tour, however I’m very excited at how the Tour responded. I really feel like we didn’t simply survive however we got here out extra unified and stronger, with totally different gamers’ concepts to make the Tour higher.”
He’s proper. In the long term, the PGA Tour will profit from a challenger like LIV shaking up the established order. It’s potential for 2 issues to be concurrently true: LIV is a contrived product (54 holes, no cut, awkward team element) and PGA Tour officers wanted a kick within the butt.
Even so, it simply feels unusual to rising gamers equivalent to Homa.
“The panorama of golf looks like it’s altering,” he stated. “As a fan and a member of the PGA Tour, I’m not comfortable in regards to the truth it feels prefer it’s fraying skilled golf. There’s lots of people on each side who’re being snarky on the market. … I simply wish to see professional golf succeed.”
Homa, a four-time tour winner who has climbed to No. 22 on the planet rating, heard from LIV because it aggressively recruited gamers. Homa obtained an electronic mail and easily didn’t reply. He didn’t flip down a profitable provide as a result of he didn’t let the courtship attain that time.
Homa selected to remain as a result of he desires to measure his sport towards the world’s prime gamers. He was an NCAA particular person champion at Cal, then endured a brutal stretch early in his professional profession — he made the minimize solely twice in 17 begins within the 2016-17 season.
However he stored grinding, rediscovered his contact and now prepares to make his Presidents Cup debut subsequent week in Charlotte. One huge lure to stay on the PGA Tour: Homa covets world rating factors, which gamers don’t earn at LIV occasions (no less than for now).
“I might like to be the No. 1 participant on the planet,” he stated, “however I rattling certain wish to know the way far up that listing I can get.”
He’s on observe to search out out, assuming he survives the high-school gossip.
Ron Kroichick covers golf for The San Francisco Chronicle. Electronic mail: rkroichick@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ronkroichick
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