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USA Today Sports Media Group
USA Today Sports Media Group
Sport
Charles Curtis

The winners (LIV golfers) and losers (everyone else) of the PGA Tour and LIV Golf merger

The PGA Tour and LIV Golf merger has left everyone in shock.

The ramifications of what will be a super-league that’s for profit are still being figured out. The players involved may not have even known this was happening. And golf fans? Well, they’re out here making The Office jokes and wondering just how awkward it’ll be between Rory McIlroy and Phil Mickelson.

Yes, it’s a lot. And it’s only going to get weirder.

So as we buckle up and get ready for the fallout from all this, it’s time to talk winners and losers.

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Let’s run down who’s winning here and who’s not:

Winners: LIV Golf and its golfers

Photo by Adrian DENNIS / AFP) (Photo by ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP via Getty Images)

Hey, are you a LIV Golf member who took a huge payday to leave the PGA Tour? Are you an upstart golf league that wasn’t getting watched much but was making enough waves to disrupt the norm?

Congratulations. You are rich today.

Winner: The PGA Tour

(AP Photo/Koji Sasahara, File)

Only in the sense that it felt like the tour was about to collapse under the weight of its changing rules to get more star power in and out every week, along with the threat of more golfers taking the money from LIV for an easier schedule and more guaranteed income.

Speaking of money …

Winner: Money

(HBO via AP)

There was so much talk about sportswashing and the Saudis funding LIV and what that meant.

But take it from Succession. As Logan Roy said so perfectly: “Money wins.”

How sad.

Losers: PGA Tour golfers

(Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

Imagine waking up to find this out. And imagine if you were weighing getting paid by LIV, declining, and finding this out:

 

 

Losers: Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods

Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports

This:

Although I’ve seen this speculation on Twitter:

Loser: Jay Monahan

(AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Sure, he gets to win a lot of money and saved the PGA Tour in some fashion. But he’s got a boatload of furious players who he has to face and fans calling him out for serious hypocrisy:

TBD: The sport of golf

(AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

Are we going to see a change in the way the game is played with this merger? No more or fewer cuts? Fewer tournaments? No more or fewer four-day events? More guaranteed payouts?

And how will that change the way the game is played? We’ll see when we learn more details.

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