By DOUG FERGUSON (AP Golf Writer)
The most disruptive yr in golf ended Tuesday when the PGA Tour and European tour agreed to a merger with Saudi Arabia’s golf pursuits, making a business operation designed to unify skilled golf world wide.
As a part of the deal, the perimeters are dropping all lawsuits involving LIV Golf towards one another efficient instantly.
Still to be decided is how gamers like Brooks Koepka and Dustin Johnson, who defected to Saudi-funded LIV Golf for nine-figure bonuses, can rejoin the PGA Tour after this yr.
Also unclear was what kind the LIV Golf League would soak up 2024. Commissioner Jay Monahan stated in a memo to gamers {that a} thorough analysis would decide easy methods to combine workforce golf into the sport.
The settlement combines the Public Investment Fund’s golf-related business companies and rights — together with LIV Golf — with these of the PGA and European excursions. The new entity has not been named.
“They were going down their path, we were going down ours, and after a lot of introspection you realize all this tension in the game is not a good thing,” Monahan stated in a cellphone interview with The Associated Press.
“We have a responsibility to our tour and to the game, and we felt like the time was right to have that conversation.”
Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, will be part of the board of the PGA Tour, which continues to operates its tournaments. Al-Rumayyan might be chairman of the brand new business group, with Monahan because the CEO and the PGA Tour having a majority stake within the new enterprise.
The PIF will put money into the business enterprise.
Monahan stated the choice got here collectively over the past seven weeks.
___
AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
Source: www.bostonherald.com