San Diego (AP) – Rory McILroy thinks that the reunification of the players who defeated the LIV golf funded by Arabia is best for membership in the PGA Tour and “Everyone must just recover” and go front.
Adam Scott will understand if there are still bad feelings. He was put in the foreground of such discussions since he joined the PGA Tour Board at the beginning of 2024, roughly when the PGA Tour was part of the strategic sports group and its investment of 1.5 billion dollars.
“I would not be surprised – or I would not judge anyone, the members – if the reunification happened and that they were not satisfied with the way it happened,” said Scott, stopping for Rub your eyes with both hands before adding: “I hope they don’t spend as much time talking about it.
“I would not keep anyone against anyone if there were negative emotions attached to it, the thoughts of the returning players.”
PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan said reunification was a priority in touring the tour with the public investment fund of Saudi Arabia. Scott shared an overview of the reasons why it took time, even if the talks seem to progress.
When asked if reunification was the only way to follow, he replied: “It is a way to follow”.
“But it’s not just the decision of the tour, you know what I mean?” He said. “There are two people in this discussion, more to be honest – the DP World Tour, many other stakeholders in the professional game. The tour and its representatives talk about it a lot.
“It is not an easy thing to solve, otherwise we would have resolved it, I think.”
Scott has no regrets to have agreed to be on the advisory advice of players for the first time at the age of 42, then to win an election to be president of PAC who led to being director of the players and Finally a trip to the White House with Monahan to meet the meeting with President Donald Trump.
But it was a lot.
“I’m going to be honest, it took a few months to wrap the stuff of the head,” he said. “During the first weeks of me coming to the board of directors, we vot for a minority shareholder to take equity in the tour. There are no easy answers to all this. Everyone has the right to Feel something about what happened.
“The only thing I know is that we are not going to please everyone, but everyone should know that I will support these players of players,” he said “they try to do the Best thing for the whole of membership.
Get a step on it
One of the advantages of the signature events of the limited field was to avoid too much traffic on the golf course, which often leads to long rounds. PGA Tour officials have succeeded – hardly – to stick to the plan of Twosomes off a tee at Genesis Invitational, a rarity on the west coast when you try to integrate into the CBS diffusion window .
This helped that 54 players cut Torrey Pines from the 72 men’s field (the cup is not a bad idea for other signature events – not only Genesis, Bay Hill and Memorial). One more group and the tour would probably have gone to the T-shirts division.
Time has certainly helped too. When the tour was in Torrey Pines a month ago, it was a complete field (cut in the top 65 and the links) with bouncing and courageous conditions.
Meanwhile, the LPGA tour is not mistaken while trying to get things done. It has an effective new policy when the tour resumes its national schedule in Arizona at the end of March.
The players will be sentenced to a fine for having taken up to five seconds above the limit. They will receive a penalty at a blow if they are six to 15 seconds above the limit and two strokes if they are exceeded by the limit of 16 seconds or more.
The first player in the group to strike 3, the shots and the approach putts will obtain 10 additional seconds, but not for extinguished on the by 4 and the by 5 (unless it is one by 4 accessible) .
Justin Leonard coaches
Mike Thomas was walking in the final of the Genesis Invitational in Torrey Pines looking at his son, Justin, recording another top-10. And from time to time, he checked his phone to get a score update – on the PGA Tour champions.
There, the first Sunday of the Chubb Classic was Justin Leonard, who won for the first time in almost 17 years.
The link with Thomas is southern Florida and Leonard’s son Luke.
Thomas, who has retired after a long career as a PGA professional in Kentucky, is best known for his work with junior golfers. Having moved to Florida, he helped Luke Leonard.
This led Justin Leonard, a former winner of the British Open and the players, to ask Mike Thomas last year to Royal Troon if it did not bother him to take a look.
Leonard grew up with the coach of the PGA renown temple, Randy Smith, in Royal Oaks, and this is always the case. Thomas gives him a set of eyes near his home, and the work has borne fruit.
“Luke, my 18 -year -old son, worked with Mike Thomas and I always appreciated the way he communicated and his eyes,” said Leonard. “So I contacted him when I was in Too after the first round and he somehow showed me what was going on and why I was struggling. So we tried to do some work in there. “”
Leonard won for the first time since St. Jude Classic in 2008.
“I have an excellent situation with Randy Smith and Mike Thomas,” he said. “It’s so fun to be finally here because I always felt like I would be.”
Classification updates
The official classification of world golf should not mean as much for Jon Rahm since he left to join the Liv Golf Funded by Saudi Arabia, which does not obtain large -game ranking points because its small list does not Never change the whole season.
He crossed the bad type of milestone anyway. Rahm fell from the top 50 this week (n ° 52) for the first time in eight years. The Spaniard first carried out the top 50 by winning the farmers’ insurance open in Torrey Pines in 2017.
Justin Thomas tends slowly in the other direction. He now has six top 10 in his last eight tournaments in the world, and his equality for the ninth at the Genesis Invitational allowed him to return to the top 10 for the first time since he missed the Cup in the Masters 2023 .
The next step for Thomas wins for the first time since he won his second PGA championship in May 2022 in Southern Hills.
Divots
Only two of the seven winners of the PGA Tour this season were not already exempt from the Masters. This is likely to change this week in Mexico, an area that has only 11 players already planned for Augusta National. … Mike Corbat, former CEO of Citigroup, and Bill Rhodes, executive president of Autzone, joined the PGA Tour Policy Board. There had been vacant posts since Jimmy Dunne and Mark Flaherty resigned last year. … Rose Zhang, champion of the NCAA of Stanford and double winner of the LPGA tour, joined the Bay Golf Club ownership group on the Indoor TGL League. … With his equality for the ninth in the Genesis Invitational, Nick Taylor became the 117th player to exceed $ 20 million in PGA Tour gains.
Weekly statistics
The seven winners of the PGA Tour this season came from seven countries – Japan, Canada, Austria, the United States, Northern Ireland, Belgium and Sweden.
Last word
“You don’t have to look too far beyond our ranking to know that outside the majors, if you want to see the best players in the world, there is only one place to see it. And It’s in Liv. ” – Scott O’Neil, the new CEO of Liv Golf.
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AP Golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
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