LIV Golf has began making inroads in their quest to transform professional golf. With every passing week, and the more players who commit to the league, the larger their threat becomes to the PGA Tour. What once was theoretical competition is now very real.
LIV’s initial crop of players featured a handful of pros in the latter half of their careers, but as of late, they’ve secured commitments from current stars as well, such as Brooks Koepka and Bryson DeChambeau. But they haven’t stopped there. They’ve started picking up the future stars of the game, too.
The likes of Andy Ogeltree and James Piot have already competed on the upstart tour, and Eugenio Chacarra, the No. 2-ranked amateur in the world, signed a deal with LIV last month as well. Securing commits from golf’s up-and-coming players is the next step in LIV’s talent-acquisition strategy, and that investment could set them up handsomely in the future.
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However, according to reigning NCAA champion Gordon Sargent, most elite college players remain committed to the PGA Tour — and earning status on their feeder tours via PGA Tour U.
“That’s what college players are focused on right now,” Sargent said on this week’s episode of GOLF’s Subpar.
But while collegiate golfers might be focused on trying to get to the PGA Tour, there is a point of contention among those who do not yet have status.
“The only thing I don’t like is that is you don’t have status [on the PGA Tour]. They’re saying, ‘You can’t play in our events, but also you can’t play in their events,” Sargent said. “So there’s definitely kind of like a little bit of controversy there.”
Check out the entire episode of Subpar below.