Phil Mickelson has claimed that LIV Golf is the best circuit for players hoping to be competitive in the Majors because of its lighter schedule than alternatives.
The LIV Golf season is played over just 14 tournaments and that's a quality the six-time Major winner thinks works in LIV Golf’s favour when it comes to the year’s four showpiece tournaments.
He wrote on Twitter: “Love LIV or hate it, it’s the best way/Tour to be your best in the majors. Enough events to keep you sharp, fresh and ready, yet not be worn down from too many tournaments or obligations. 14 LIV events, 34 weeks left open to prepare for the 4 majors. Fact.”
Love LIV or hate it, it’s the best way/Tour to be your best in the majors. Enough events to keep you sharp, fresh and ready, yet not be worn down from too many tournaments or obligations. 14 LIV events, 34 weeks left open to prepare for the 4 majors. Fact.May 23, 2023
There is plenty of evidence to suggest Mickelson has a valid point. Before the first Major of the year, The Masters at Augusta National, many wrote off the chances of LIV Golf players, claiming they would not be at their best with fewer tournaments and the perception that the events on the circuit lacked the intensity of those elsewhere.
Mickelson was one of several LIV Golf players who made a mockery of that argument when he finished tied for second with another player on the circuit, Brooks Koepka. Not far beneath them on the leaderboard was another LIV Golf player, Patrick Reed, who finished tied for fourth.
Any thoughts that would be a flash in the pan were well and truly debunked in the PGA Championship when, this time, Koepka went all the way to the title at Oak Hill Country Club, while fellow LIV Golf players Bryson DeChambeau and Cameron Smith also finished in the top 10.
Of course, there are still two Majors to go, with next month’s US Open at Los Angeles Country Club and July’s Open Championship at Royal Liverpool sure to offer different challenges to the players than the two that have taken place so far.
However, considering a current LIV Golf player has just won the Major with arguably the strongest field of all, there’s every reason to think its players will perform well in the ones that remain, regardless of how much the LIV Golf schedule has to do with it.
