Pat Perez will spend a third season with Dustin Johnson’s 4 Aces GC LIV Golf team after his contract was renewed with the 2022 Team Championship winners.
Perez’s future with LIV Golf had appeared uncertain after he finished the season as one of five out-of-contract players in the Open Zone of the individual standings.
That left the American with a few options. He could negotiate a new deal with his current team or one of 4 Aces GC’s rivals. Alternatively, if neither of those came to fruition, he could have tried to finish in the top three of December’s LIV Golf Promotions event in Abu Dhabi.
Earlier this month, LIV Golf announced that Phase Two of its transfer window, Free Agency, had begun. However, while some players, including the 47-year-old's 4 Aces GC teammate Peter Uihlein, quickly negotiated new deals with their teams, others, including Pérez, still hadn’t committed to an agreement.
That has all changed now with the official 4 Aces GC Instagram account declaring the 2024 roster "locked in," where Perez will once again line up on the team alongside Johnson, Uihlein and Patrick Reed.
Perez’s LIV Golf career has been something of a rollercoaster. Shortly after it began, he was videoed partying on an incredible private jet, while he has never been afraid to speak his mind about those hostile to LIV Golf, including PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, of whom Perez said: “We don’t give a damn how he feels" following the circuit’s successful Adelaide event.
Perez was also one of 11 LIV Golf players named in an antitrust lawsuit against the PGA Tour before eventually withdrawing from it.
In among all that was scrutiny over his performances, with some raising eyebrows over the fact that he won over $8m in his debut LIV Golf season despite just one finish in the top 20 in any of the six tournaments he played.
In 2023, there were more high spots, including three top-10 finishes, but it still wasn’t enough for him to finish in the safety of the top 24, which would have seen him guaranteed a new contract.
He didn’t finish too far beneath that cut-off, though, in 28th, and Johnson, who was instrumental in bringing him to the circuit, clearly thinks it was good enough to earn him a new contract.
With the 4 Aces GC team now complete, attention will turn to preparations for the 2024 season, where the team will attempt to finish top of the standings for the third successive season.
The confirmation Perez is staying with 4 Aces GC comes after it was revealed that Carlos Ortiz had declined the chance to stay with Sergio Garcia’s Fireballs GC.
