For almost two years, PGA Tour players and LIV Golf stars have, with the exception of Brooks Koepka at the Ryder Cup, been restricted to the four Majors for the chance to play against each other.
That’s despite protracted negotiations between the PGA Tour and Saudi Public Investment Fund behind LIV Golf on a way for the two organizations to coexist in the future.
Against that backdrop, one of 16 LIV golfers appearing at the PGA Championship, Jon Rahm, appeared in a pre-tournament press conference on Tuesday, and suggested that he doesn’t see himself as a PGA Tour outsider looking in, despite his suspension from it after his big-money move in December.
Rahm said: “See, you guys keep saying 'the other side,' but I'm still a PGA Tour member, whether suspended or not. I still want to support the PGA Tour. And I think that's an important distinction to make. I don't feel like I'm on the other side.”
While some may have interpreted that as a peace offering, the comments haven’t gone down well with former PGA Tour pro and Golf Channel analyst Aaron Oberholser. Appearing on the Golf Channel in the aftermath of Rahm’s appearance in front of the media, he insisted the Spaniard doesn’t understand why the fractures at the top of the men’s game are proving so hard to heal.
He began: “He doesn’t get it. To this day, he doesn’t get it. This is a guy who wanted a position, or wanted to be heard from what I understand. Either a board position... policy board. He wanted to be heard on this whole thing before he went to LIV and I feel like it wasn’t as heard as much as you probably should have been, and now I’m glad he wasn’t in that position because he doesn’t get it.”
The 2006 Pebble Beach Pro-Am wasn’t finished there… far from it, and continued: “As a PGA Tour player, and as a PGA Tour member - still a card-carrying PGA Tour member and someone who supports the PGA Tour, not happy with what’s going on right now, obviously, but supports the PGA Tour, I’m incensed by that, quite honestly. You still don’t get it.”
here’s oberholser wanting to wring @JonRahmOfficial ‘s neck. seemed like jr was trying to be nice, willing to help out a failing event like farmers.everyone inside that pgat bubble is self righteously and sanctimoniously nuts.@LegionXIIIgc pic.twitter.com/Y6lg75GCJOMay 14, 2024
Rahm, who was one of the PGA Tour’s biggest stars, reportedly made the switch to LIV Golf for a contract worth more than $500m, and, given that, Oberholser suggested the two-time Major winner wants to have his cake and eat it, too.
He added: “You took 500 large, and then you’re going to sit there and tell me, oh, you still feel like a PGA Tour player, I want to support the PGA Tour. I want to wring his neck through the television. I’m that mad right now, I’m that mad.”
Following The Masters, Rahm revealed he had faced “hostile attitudes” at the Augusta National Major, and Oberholser doesn’t expect his comments before the second Major of the year will go down well with any PGA Tour player who witnessed the press conference either. He said: “I mean, every player in that locker room right now, if they watched that, on the PGA Tour, should be absolutely incensed with him.”
The saga over whether the PGA Tour and PIF will ultimately join forces has taken more twists in recent days. Last week, one of the Tour’s most influential players, Rory McIlroy, confirmed he wouldn’t be rejoining the board, while earlier this week, one of the figures pivotal to the warring parties getting round a table, Jimmy Dunne, tendered his resignation from it.
