Is it fair to ban players who have signed up to play the LIV Golf Series from playing other tours?

BUNKER-TO-BUNKER….Inside Golf writers have their say!

By Michael Davis

FOR the sake of this argument, I am putting aside the appalling human rights abuse issue here.

So from the outset my argument is hopelessly flawed. But I want to focus on the US PGA Tour’s role in this whole debacle.

Let’s face it. We’re talking about the spoilt child who is chucking a tantrum when things don’t go its way and throwing all the toys out of the cot.

So powerful and for so long the top dog in world golf, simply by virtue of the almighty dollars on offer each week, the US Tour now has a genuine rival in terms of prize money.

And after financially crushing every other tour around the world, it doesn’t like it when the boot is on the other foot. What a knee jerk reaction it was from the US Tour to ban players who teed up on the LIV tour.

Instead, the LIV tour should have been allowed to burn itself out and disappear up its own backside. I am sure this will eventually be the case given the lack of genuine quality players – with a few notable exceptions – it has so far seduced to its ranks.

I am no legal eagle, but in my view players are free agents to ply their trade anywhere they like. They are basically self-employed contractors.

I was thrilled, too, to see the USGA and the R&A (apart from its petty exclusion of Greg Norman from the 150th Open celebrations) show their class by letting the renegades play in the US Open and The Open Championship. What a pity the PGA Tour lacked the foresight shown by the game’s amateur governing bodies.

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By Larry Canning

I WOULD rather ask, ‘how is sanctioning bettering our game?’

If the extraordinarily opinionated, outspoken commentators maintain their disgraceful bullying attitude, then the game will definitely be the loser. 

That’s what these self-righteous antagonists don’t seem to understand. What’s best for the game guys? You don’t have any problems spewing abuse at the 48 players and the decision most of these seemingly decent blokes have made and then blaming them for destroying the game. But what is your reaction actually doing to help?

Greg Norman, who is not always, shall we say, “endeared himself” to the media is now an easy target and fodder for any journo looking for something to write when on deadline. But this description of Charl Schwartzel is another level: “Big game hunting, anchored putting, has-been.”   

Yes, the game is probably in trouble with the LIV breakaway tour, but it’s not only LIV that’s to blame. The PGA Tour and its selected high profile ambassadors under-estimated the momentum LIV had and are now announcing changes that are exposing reasons why these guys may have jumped in the first place.

Is the answer to keep slinging crap at these players, keep sanctioning them from the PGA Tour and their recently increasing ally, DP World Tour? Keep raising money on the PGA Tour and DP World Tour to prevent more players defecting?

What about this – hate it, loathe it or use words like “vile” and “anti-Christian” or revisit your passion for a game that has so much to offer and find a resolution to this apparent speed-bump in our sport.

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By Peter Owen

I CAN understand why golfers like James Piot, Travis Smyth, Itthipat Buranatanyarat and Blake Windred would leap at the chance of joining the LIV Golf Series. They’re second and third tier players who would never get the chance to win the sort of money that’s offered to also-runners in the LIV league.

But they’re not the players that Greg Norman and his backers are really concerned about. They want the box-office stars – people like Rory McIlroy, Jordan Spieth, Cameron Smith, Jon Rahm, Tiger Woods and Justin Thomas. All of those players have turned them down – as I would have expected. But others, like Dustin Johnson, Patrick Reed, Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Sergio Garcia, Phil Mickelson, and a bunch of South Africans, have taken the millions on offer and joined the Saudi-financed series. Again, with minor exceptions, I’m not surprised at any of those names.

And I’m pretty sure that, unlike the Piots, Smyths and Windreds of the world, they don’t really need the money. We hear Saudi Arabia has spent this vast amount for PR purposes, to cleanse its image and make us think well of the country and its rulers. How, I wonder, is that going to be achieved by the creation of a golf tour based on players’ greed, selfishness, and disloyalty to the tours that made them all multi-millionaires?

Every player who signed up for the LIV series did so knowing there would be reprisals from the tours to which they belonged, and I have no sympathy for them now that they’ve been banned from those tours. Let them continue for as long as the Saudi dollars last. As far as world golf is concerned, their presence will not be missed.

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By Michael Court

LET’S be honest, if we didn’t need to put bread on the table, we’d all be out playing golf.

I don’t care what anyone says; these players jumping over to join the LIV golf tour are doing it solely for the money.

If someone offers you triple your current salary, or much, much more, of course you’re going to take it. You’d be a fool if you didn’t.

And as much as I love Rory McIlroy – and he is one of my favourite players – if he can afford to knock back, say $50m, then good luck to
him.

It suggests he has earned and continues to make much more than your average golf pro.

And to be perfectly frank, quite a few of the guys who have joined LIV are, perhaps, just a little average.

Sure, they need their marquee players – and LIV have gone all out to sign big names like Mickelson, Johnson, DeChambeau, Koepka, Poulter and others.

And they do need them, if only to draw attention to their tournaments and make people tune in.

We will see them in the majors, I hope, and as Poulter rightly pointed out that he has been playing golf around the world his whole life.

And he should be able to choose when and where he plays. I have absolutely no problem with that.

And somehow I think there will be a judge – somewhere – who’ll agree with me.