Mark Schlabachapr 4, 2025, 06:38 am et
College Football Writer Author of 7 Books on College Football Alumni at the University of Georgia
The PGA Tour requires one Premier Circuit operated by professional men’s golf.
Saudi Arabia’s public investment fund wants two. That’s why the talks on the side to reunify sports seem to have returned to Square 1.
Sources confirmed to ESPN that the PGA Tour has rejected PIF’s latest offer to invest $1.5 billion in PGA Tour Enterprises. This is a tour for-profit with warnings that rival Liv Golf League remains intact.
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PIF, which has funded LIV Golf since its inception in 2022, hopes Governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan will co-chair the board of PGA Tour Enterprises. Former Valero Energy CEO Joe Gorder is chairman of the PGA Tour Enterprises Board and is Vice Chairman by Tiger Woods.
The Guardian of London reported that the PGA Tour responded to PIF in a letter Monday.
Sources previously told ESPN that the continuing Liv Golf League in its current form is a non-starter on the PGA Tour and prefers to compete with the world’s top golfers on one circuit.
Sources say PIF will dig into the heels in negotiations and hope that team golf will become part of the sport’s future ecosystem if the team reaches a deal. The PGA Tour attempted to provide PIF with a solution for PIF that includes some repetition of LIV golf on future schedules, including holding a team competition at a fall international venue.
“We don’t do that in ways that reduce the strength of the platform or the very realistic momentum with our fans and partners,” PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monaghan said at the athletes championships last month. “So while we’re removing some hurdles, others remain. But like our fans, we still share the same sense of urgency to reach a solution.”
The latest newsletter appeared at a side’s four-hour meeting held at the White House on February 20th. US President Donald Trump met with Monaghan and Scott earlier in Washington on February 4th.
Trump told Air Force 1 reporters on Thursday that he hopes the competing tours can reach the deal. Trump flew to Miami to meet with Liv Golf officials at Trump National Doral, which he owns.
“I hope that the two tours will eventually merge. That’s good. I’m involved in that too,” Trump told reporters on a flight to Miami, according to the Associated Press. “But hopefully we’ll merge the two tours. We have a PGA tour and a LIV tour. And I think it’s great to merge them.”
Public reports show that PIF has injected $5 billion into LIV Golf by the end of this year. The 54-hole tournament, no cuts, a shotgun start and a circuit celebrating team golf is struggling to gain foothold in the US in terms of corporate sponsorship and television ratings.
Before this week’s LIV Golf League tournament at Trump National Doral in Miami, LIV Golf League captain Brooks Coepka said he hoped the breakaway circuit would go further in the fourth season.
Koepka was one of several PGA Tour stars invited by Liv Golf on a guaranteed deal of over $100 million. Past major champions Bryson Deccanbaugh, Dustin Johnson, John Larm and Cameron Smith have left the PGA Tour and are among others who have been suspended by Monaghan.
Financial records filed by the UK-based company of Liv Golf, which operates tournaments outside the US, show an operating loss of nearly $400 million in 2023. Financial records for US events were not available.
New Liv Golf CEO Scott O’Neil told reporters Tuesday that his league doesn’t need to sign a PGA Tour contract for Survive.
“If this deal helps grow the game of golf, I’ll jump in two feet,” O’Neill said. “Do we have to trade? No. As long as we focus on the same thing, it’s good to trade.
“So we have to trade, do we have to trade, do we need to trade, whatever the words you use, leave it to someone smarter than me. I love what we do, I love our outlook. I love growth in three months.
O’Neill is not involved in negotiations for PIF on the PGA Tour.
“The reality of the way I see the world is that I see the Liv Golf League with a lot of hope and a lot of future,” O’Neil told ESPN. “I hope we find ways to increase the chances of playing together the best players in the world. That may or may not be in a nice, neat bow.
The PGA Tour and PIF sued each other in federal courts, but on June 6, 2023, the lawsuit was dropped to form an alliance that reunifies sports. The transaction expired at the end of 2023, but has been trying to prevent it from happening for the past two years.
In January 2024, the PGA Tour and Strategic Sports Group, a consortium of US professional sports teams and others, signed a deal for SSG to invest $1.5 billion in PGA Tour companies.
