Why LIV Golf is Becoming Irrelevant

View From The Fairway by Derek Clements

Unless you have been living under a rock, you cannot have failed to notice that there has been a LOT of LIV Golf-related noise on social media in recent days.

I was a huge opponent of the whole Saudi-backed golf league when it first launched. Now? Not so much. 

Why? In truth, I believe that it has become an utter irrelevance. 

Since Jon Rahm’s high-profile defection, not a single PGA Tour player of any note has followed him. And when I look at their playing roster in the main all I see is a host of golfers who are long past their prime - Lee Westwood, Paul Casey, Ian Poulter, Phil Mickelson, Charles Howell III, Louis Oosthuizen, Charl Schwartzel, etc, etc, etc.

Of course the PGA Tour would be a stronger place with Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka and Joaquin Niemann. There will also be some who would put Patrick Reed in that category. I am not one of them.

So the noise all began when Keegan Bradley took advantage of Tommy Fleetwood’s misfortune and won the Travelers Championship, a signature event carrying a huge prize and extra FedEx Cup points. 

Like many others, I could never understand why the PGA of America appointed Bradley as a captain because it seemed pretty obvious that he always had a decent chance of making the team as a player. And this is now looking increasingly likely. It seemed to me that it was done as a sop to Bradley after he was inexplicably left out of Zach Johnson’s team in 2023 when he quite clearly deserved a captain’s pick. 

Even Bradley is now coming around to the view that he may have to become a playing captain. The last man to do so was Arnold Palmer but the Ryder Cup is a different animal now, with huge demands on the captain. So speculation has been mounting about what might happen if Bradley does indeed make the team. He has plenty of able lieutenants, not least being Webb Simpson, who would have been the sensible choice in the first place.

But another name has been thrown up. Mickelson! His supporters at LIV have expressed the view that he is a natural choice to lead the team. He is a natural choice if you happen to be a European or an American who does not want your team to win.

I would remind you that Mickelson ripped into Tom Watson after the USA were thrashed at Gleneagles in 2014. It was both embarrassing and unedifying and it did Mickelson no good whatsoever. It should also be remembered that he has a dire Ryder Cup record.

And this is the same man who described the Saudis as "scary m*****f*****s" and then promptly accepted their money. He also recently described Niemann as the real world number one on the back of him winning a few LIV events. His record in the majors would suggest nothing could be further from the truth.

Mickelson a Ryder Cup captain? It is never going to happen.

And then there is Reed, the so-called Captain America. Reed was one of the earliest converts to LIV and is a man who divides opinion in exactly the same way as Mickelson now seems to do.

He has attracted controversy throughout his professional career - and long before that during his college golf days.

Reed has recently won a LIV tournament in Dallas and, entirely predictably, there is now noise being made about his Ryder Cup credentials.

Let’s put things in perspective. He won nine times on the PGA Tour but the most recent of those successes came at the 2021 Farmers Insurance Open. He did win the Hong Kong Open last year. But this was his first win since joining LIV. Remember that he is playing in restricted field tournaments played over 54 holes with no cut. 

Yes he finished third at The Masters in 2025 but his recent record in the majors is pretty dire. 

Bradley has made it clear that the door is open to LIV golfers if they are playing well enough. Reed is not doing that. 

You have to think that DeChambeau is going to be a shoo-in. I would also have believed that he was going to be joined by Koepka but the American has now slipped outside the top 250 in the world rankings and has been making headlines for all the wrong reasons. 

At that Dallas event Koepka hit a poor drive and then smashed his driver into the ground before turning and striking a tee marker, which ricocheted into the gallery. He then stormed off the tee box and later withdrew from the event. It was widely shared on social media platforms, sparking concern due to the apparent risk posed to nearby spectators. It was an incident that did the American no favours and showed him in an extremely poor light.

There were calls for LIV to take action and, thankfully, they have acted. In a statement they said: "We have imposed a financial sanction and a suspension from future LIV Golf events on Brooks Koepka following his conduct during the first round of LIV Dallas. Player safety, fan safety, and professionalism remain top priorities within our league, and this behaviour does not reflect the values we expect from our athletes. The safety of our fans and the integrity of our tournaments are non-negotiable."

So there you have it. Why would either the PGA Tour or DP World Tour have any reason to quake in their collective boots over the continued existence of LIV?