Phil Mickelson makes cautious return to Twitter, but it’s not the same old Phil

Phil Mickelson made a return to the public eye this summer with LIV Golf, ending a monthslong self-imposed absence in the process. He did not, however, return his formerly beloved Twitter account. But it appears that might be about to change.

First, some background. For decades, Mickelson was one of the faces of pro golf, and it was hard to get away from him. At every big tournament, inside every U.S. team locker room, at every Masters Champions dinner — even on occasion in the TV broadcast booth — there Phil was, flashing his trademark smile and usually dishing out a joke at someone else’s expense.

In 2018, he brought that act to Twitter, shooting off this memorable first tweet in August of that year:

Over the next two years, Mickelson became one of the funniest, most entertaining and most active follows in the golf world, regularly throwing viral jabs and smack talk, dropping irreverent videos, and mixing it up with fans at all hours, most memorably with a late-night Q&A, wine glass in hand, while flying home from his historic 2021 PGA triumph.

But since his move to LIV Golf this year, everything has changed for Mickelson, especially on the course.

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Mickelson didn’t play the Masters this year, where he’s authored some of the greatest moments in golf history across three wins, or the PGA Championship, where he would have been the defending champion thanks to his unlikely and uber-popular win at Kiawah island in 2021.

He was missing from the U.S. Presidents Cup victory last month, and likely will be watching from home when the Americans try to retain the Ryder Cup in Rome next year.

But the six-time major champion has also made a retreat in a more digital sphere in 2022: Twitter.

Beginning when his controversial comments about LIV Golf, the PGA Tour and Saudi Arabia broke in February, Mickelson went completely silent on Twitter.

On February 22, in what would be his final transmission for months, Mickelson tweeted out a long apology, writing, “I know I have not been my best and desperately need some time away to prioritize the ones I love most and work on being the man I want to be.”

Then his account went completely dark until June 6, when he posted another lengthy statement announcing his return to the game and his official beginning with LIV Golf at the tour’s first event in London, saying, “I am ready to come back to play the game I love, but after 32 years this new path is a fresh start, one that is exciting for me at this stage of my career and is clearly transformative, not just for myself, but ideally for the game and my peers.”

While the statement marked Mickelson’s return to golf and some limited media coverage at LIV events, it did not coincide with a return to his Twitter account, which went silent once again.

Almost three full months later, on September 2, Mickelson’s Twitter page lit up, but this time it was just to share an interview (now a rare occurrence in Phil’s career), still far from the old Phil we used to know.

Later that day, he posted again, this time retweeting a Greg Norman post about LIV allowing players to wear shorts, which ironically referenced Phil’s “calves,” one of Mickelson’s favorite Twitter jokes from the old days.

Then, you guessed it, he took another break, though this time it only lasted a little over a month. Just this week, Mickelson made another return of sorts, tweeting twice about the LIV Bangkok event, first on Thursday, then again on Saturday.

Still missing, though, was any sign of the playful sense of humor that entertained many a golf fan during quieter days on the calendar, or the tips, insights, ribbings and jokes he once used to renew and grow his popularity among the golfing public.

We’ll have to wait and see whether his latest activity is a sign of the old Phil cautiously wading back into comfortable waters, or if another hiatus has already begun, only to end when the latest press release is ready to be fired off to his 823,000 followers.