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How to make peace in golf: a world circuit and a severed head

2022-06-18T10:34:16.409Z


The idea of ​​a single competition that integrates the American circuit and the Saudi league can claim the position of the American commissioner


The war in golf burns in the offices.

As the world's best players battle it out at the US Open, the US circuit, the European circuit and the Saudi league study their moves on the board.

The starting positions are defined: LIV Golf has started a series of eight tournaments that will distribute 255 million dollars, a mountain of gold;

the PGA Tour has expelled from its competitions the rebels who have changed sides;

and the European circuit, an ally of the American, has not opened its mouth.

Nor the big four, organized by four different organizations and that for now do not prohibit the participation of dissidents.

The split is complete.

The Saudi league has attracted a few stars (Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau, Patrick Reed, Sergio Garcia, Phil Mickelson...) and the drums announce new signings, some of the nobility, for next week.

It was an announced birth, but from the other side of the trenches they did not expect the creature to come into the world making so much noise.

LIV Golf has surprised by the great economic muscle that it has shown: four million per tournament for the winner when the juiciest big is precisely this US Open, with 3.15 (the bag has increased compared to the 2.2 million that Rahm entered the previous course).

Among golfers there is confusion about the present and the future.

Most refuse to position themselves: they belong to an American circuit that has made them millionaires but they do not want to close the doors to a Saudi league that would retire their grandchildren.

Only Jon Rahm, Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas have been outspoken in favor of the PGA Tour.

Meanwhile, the Ryder is now forbidden fruit for the rebellious Americans, and danger for the Europeans.

In this scenario, a crack can be opened: the creation of a great world circuit that uses the structure and experience of the two largest estates and incorporates the stream of Saudi money.

The idea is on the table, but ending the war would have its victims.

The oldest would be Jay Monahan, the PGA Tour commissioner since 2017, the man who has signed the expulsion of the escapees to the Super League and fights face to face with Greg Norman, CEO of LIV Golf.

With Monahan at the helm, a deal between the two sides seems a long way off.

A new interlocutor would allow negotiations to start from scratch.

For that he should shoot his head, on the one hand, and that the circuit would look the other way before the accusations of human rights violations that beat in the background of this story.

A complex movement.

“There are players who chose to violate the rules of our circuit and signed lucrative multi-year contracts.

My job is to protect and defend our loyal PGA Tour members, our partners and our fans.

And that is exactly what I did.

Why is this group spending so much money, billions of dollars, recruiting players on a no-return concept?” Monahan recently commented.

The third leg is the European circuit, the weaker brother.

Among the players, the figure of the president, Keith Pelley, is also on trial, over whom weighs the decision of having rejected LIV Golf's offer to join its structure (instead of finding shelter in the Asian circuit) and the doubt of whether he gave voice to the staff so that the golfers would have an echo in this mess.

He is another one of the bosses that can drop.

The next appointment of the Saudi league is in Portland from June 30 to July 2, coinciding with a tournament on the American

tour

, the John Deere Classic.

By then he may already have lowered some guillotine.

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Source: elparis

All sports articles on 2022-06-18

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