Think of it like this. They play a fraction of the golf that PGA players are supposed to in a normal schedule, so the qualifiers are there to make up for the golf they are not playing. Should be a cinch to win that since they should be better than the other low level pros fighting to get the last spots.
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It’s never a cinch to beat an enormous field of worse golfers….thats what this entire website is built on. Forcing LIV golfers to qualifiers while PGA golfers get given direct invites is essentially tipping the scale to ruin LIV‘s chances of becoming an established league
The PGA golfers are given invites for their play on their tour while LIV are not (now there will be 1-2 who are in future, but not 50 like PGA)
I think the main problem here is for some reason you have this prior belief that the PGAT and LIV should be treated equally. They shouldn’t be. And this isn’t because I’m some PGA Tour shill—those don’t really exist, the only people who call themselves fans of a “league” are the LIV bots—it’s because I care about the long-term health of golf. And LIV has likely done irreparable damage to that.
If you come in and offer a massive bag of money to all the best players to go play the next few years in obscurity, nobody—fans, media, governing bodies—is going to be happy about this.
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Not equally, but some path where playing well in a top league counts. There is no way to build the league up (qualification and relegation becomes near impossible) without the major access.
It makes no sense to simply ignore top level golf played by top level players in a top league if you are trying to get a competitive field
Majors are great and all but LIV is not going to fail because they don’t have direct major access. If LIV was drawing massive ratings and thriving you don’t think the majors would jump on board as well?
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That’s the wrong way around. If performing on LIV led to major access you would see a much higher quality of player and a higher level of golf week to week
Well the whole idea with LIV (according to the bots) is that the franchise model was the future of global golf. Although you don’t really hear them talk about that anymore… If it’s just stroke play with major access on the line, then that’s just PGA Tour 2.0.
I think what LIV should have done, if they were serious about becoming a competitor to the PGA Tour and additive to global golf (which I don’t think they ever were), is started out small. They should have partnered with the Asian Tour and experimented with team stuff to see if there was an appetite for it. And then try to grow organically based on interest and have an actual business model that has some hope of succeeding. But obviously this doesn’t fit with the Saudis’ goals or timeline.
edit: I should add that I don’t think LIV was purely a Saudi sportwashing project. Andy Gardiner and whoever was involved with PGL and the terrible idea of team golf should bear a lot of the responsibility of this mess. Presumably these guys all sold Yasir on this idea and that it would be wildly popular and profitable.
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I do like the team golf idea also and think it has serious potential as an additive product for fans. In a solo runaway the team competition is great to watch: makes lots more shots matter
No way would starting small make any sense. Can’t be a rival league without big players and can’t do that slowly I don’t think.
THIS WAS THE WORST MASTERS EVER-- NO MARC LEISHMAN AND EVERYONE WAS BEING SO MEAN TO JOCO
What the hell are we even talking about? All of these guys knew they would struggle to get into majors, half of them don’t even bother showing up for open qualifying for the US and British Opens (looking at you, Mito!).
The guys who care do one of two things:
– get a bunch of crappy starts at random asian tour events for OWGR points (Reed)
– complain loud enough to get an invite (Joco)
Joco stinks! His win at the Genesis was the LUCKIEST WIN OF ALL TIME (holed out like 4 times) and cost me a shitload of money.
I was not able to catch the live blog but I find it hard to believe it was harsher-than-median-golf-fan (of which I am a perfect representative 
).
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Sure. But they shouldn’t have to do that. The majors need to invite in the best performing LIV players. The only argument I’ve seen against this so far is the fact they got a lot of money
No, they knowingly traded losing the ability to directly qualify for majors in exchange for unrealistic amounts of money. That exchange has also knowingly deteriorated professional golf.
So no, majors don’t “need” to do anything to accommodate those choices.
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There have been several arguments here made apart from ‘they got a lot of money’, you are just choosing to ignore them.
On further thought, I think hogtrough is right. I think that the Masters should abandon their current invitation criteria, and instead ask ME who I WANT to play in the Masters. Some notable differences between my field and their field:
Matteo Manassero IN
Haotong Li IN
Bring back Ryo Ishikawa while we are at it
Padraig Harrington IN (Padraig, by the way, I would take over Joco H2H at the 3 of the 4 majors this year)
LEISHMAN IN
Oosty IN
Henrik IN
Aaron Wise IN
The following players would not be in the field:
Niemann OUT
Adam Scott OUT (because in my mind he didn’t win, Angel did)
Pat Reed OUT (same basic idea)
Couple of the guys that got in due to low quality tour wins, OUT!!!
This is fun!
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It has deteriorated the PGA Tour, which in my opinion has made positive moves and gotten itself in better shape since the start of this. For me, it’s put golf in a better place (majors have more drama, more high level golf to watch, PGA is better structured, LIV innovations I broadly like)
Just because they took a lot of money doesn’t mean that majors should ignore play on their tour, which has a high level of play
Fair, I haven’t seen a strong one yet I guess.
Serious question as someone who tries to watch LIV because many of his favorite players now play there, what are the innovations? A scoreboard that makes you nauseous?
They aren’t ignoring it because of the money, they are ignoring it because LIV came to OWGR and asked what they would have to do to get OWGR points, and OWGR told them-- (4 rounds, some way of open qualification into LIV) and THEY IGNORED THEM.
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My opinion, again, as someone who loves many of the players who fled for LIV, and does not hold their decision against them, is very much the opposite.
We have a bunch of crappy, limited field, no cut events that completely suck and we are missing some of the best players (Rahm, Brooks, Bryson, I am not referring to Joco). What is good about that?
Hog thinks that the PGA Tour revamped their season-long race and made it way better. Even though it’s identical to what is was pre-LIV, with some adjustments made for sig/non-sig point distributions.
There were no signature events pre LIV? I think creating a clearer and smaller field of players that matter is the big improvement. We know when the real players are going to play and it’s not as much an amorphous blob of 200 members who might or might not play any semi equal event