SAN DIEGO — Superstar golfer Rory McIlroy, once a leading critic of LIV Golf, said Wednesday that it’s time for the Saudi-owned league and the PGA Tour to reunite.
The world’s No. 3-ranked golfer, speaking on the eve of the Genesis Invitational at Torrey Pines Golf Course, said professional golfers have “all done better from all of this,” but McIlroy said the current format is “unsustainable” and the tours need to begin reunification as soon as the 2026 season.
“Whether you stayed on the PGA Tour or you left, we have all benefited from this,” McIlroy told a group of reporters. “I’ve been on the record saying this a lot: We’re playing for a $20 million prize fund this week. That would have never happened if LIV hadn’t have come around.
“I think everyone’s just got to get over it and we all have to say, OK, this is the starting point and we move forward. We don’t look behind us, we don’t look to the past. Whatever’s happened has happened and it’s been unfortunate, but reunification, how we all come back together and move forward, that’s the best thing for everyone.
“If people are butt-hurt or have their feelings hurt because guys went or whatever, like who cares? Let’s move forward together and let’s just try to get this thing going again and do what’s best for the game.”
About an hour after McIlroy spoke, PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan said a meeting last week with President Donald Trump and golfers Tiger Woods and Adam Scott moved the tour “one step closer” to reunification.
“Candidly, that’s what the fans want,” Monahan said. .”.. All the best players in the world competing with each other and against each other.”
McIlroy said he discussed the situation with Trump when the two played golf in early January and he believes the president can help bring the tours together. LIV hosts a tournament each year at a Trump-owned property.
“He can do a lot of things,” McIlroy said. “He can be influential. … I think whenever he says something, they listen and I think that’s a big thing.”
McIlroy admitted he didn’t always feel that way about golfers who left in 2022 for LIV. But he said he grew to change his mind as he looked at his bank account.
“I look at what I made in 2019 before LIV came around and I look at what I’ve made after LIV came around and it’s very different,” McIlroy said.
He added that he didn’t feel that way originally “because of the fracture” LIV caused in the game.
“It wasn’t good for the overall game,” McIlroy said. “It wasn’t good for either tour.”
McIlroy also addressed the Genesis, his first tournament at Torrey Pines since finishing in a tie for seventh in the 2021 U.S. Open. McIlroy has played the Farmers Insurance Open here three times, with top-five finishes in 2019 and 2020.
“It’s good to be back,” he said. “It’s a little bit of a different setup to the U.S. Open in ’21; it’s a lot softer and rough is thick and (the) course is playing very long.
“The course is going to play long, the rough is very, very penal, so there’s a premium of putting your ball in the fairway and then controlling the spin into the greens.”
–Jay Posner, Field Level Media
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