JON RAHM IS A LIV TRAITOR WHO WRECKED GOLF AND LOST MORE TV VIEWERS
Reduced to the CW Network, a majors winner has flipped to the Saudi-funded rival after years of throwing grenades from the PGA Tour sideline, once saying, “I laugh when people rumor me with LIV Golf”
Refusing to suffer “Son Of A Critch,” “Shrek The Halls” and “FBoy Island,” I will not be watching the CW Network. Ever. There’s no distress in my body, spiritually and every way possible, to ignore seven winners of golfing majors since 2020. If Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka, Cameron Smith, Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau and Phil Mickelson wish to play the LIV slog on a dog channel with far lower ratings than “Dr. Pimple Popper,” they will separate without anyone else’s concern.
I’ll wait for a quartet of major tournaments, which happen four weeks out of 52, to survey the best. That means the ongoing warfare between LIV Golf and the PGA Tour has lost a fan. To devote our time determining who is performing for which circuit — and which players are real or just making immoral money from the Saudi Arabian killers — isn’t worth our bother. If about half the recent majors champions have switched to the evil league, they don’t care about a game where a small hard ball is struck with a stick.
The confirmation came Thursday, when Rahm became the biggest traitor when he snatched a reported $566 million to join LIV. That might be a larger number than what Shohei Ohtani receives in his free-agent contract. Rahm is a popular player, No. 3 in the world and the defending Masters champion, and not long ago, he was beholden to the PGA and made fun of the LIV cash-suckers. “I laugh when people rumor me with LIV Golf. I’ve never liked the format,” he told a podcast, adding that the shotgun start “is not a golf tournament.”
That comment came in August, not long after he spoke about a conversation with his wife that suggested a long-term PGA relationship. “Yeah, money is great, but when Kelly and I, this first thing happened, we started talking about it and we're like, ‘Would our lifestyle change if we got $400 million?’ No,” Rahm said. “It would not change one bit. Truth be told, I could retire right now and I could live a very happy life and not play golf again. I've never really played the game of golf for monetary reasons. I play for the love of the game, and I want to play against the best in the world in a format that’s been going on for hundreds of years. That’s what I want to see.”
Oh, the wondrous traditions of the PGA Tour, he emphasized. “I’ve always been interested in history and legacy, and right now the PGA Tour has that,” Rahm said. “There's a meaning when you win the Memorial Championship. There's a meaning when you win Arnold Palmer's event at Bay Hill. There's a meaning when you win L.A., Torrey, some of these historic venues. That to me matters a lot. After winning this past U.S. Open, only me and Tiger (Woods) have won at Torrey Pines. Making putts on 18 — that's just a memory that I'm going to have forever that not many people can say.”
Only a short time later, Rahm turns out to be a Spanish back-stabber. His words about Americanized golfing journeys don’t mean much. He’s a close friend of a LIV lifer, Sergio Garcia, and he knows people in his country are paying some attention to the new league when U.S. fans ignore it. He also was shown the grand salami — hundreds of millions, more than half a billion — including equity in the league’s 13th team.
Of dramatic importance, he gives LIV a massive concession that can be used against the PGA in negotiations with a quick Dec. 31 deadline. Suddenly, whatever Tiger Woods said last week in trying to save golf from itself is far less significant. The PGA commissioner, Jay Monahan, is hellbound to make his dream deal happen with Yasir Al-Rumayyan — governor of Saudi’s sovereign wealth trust, known as the Public Investment Fund — and U.S. management firms such as the Fenway Sports Group. Rahm evidently doesn’t care where the talks go, which could be south. He has his $566 million, a deal he announced on … Fox News, as he wore a black letterman’s jacket with a LIV emblem.
“A lot of things that LIV Golf has to offer were very enticing.” Rahm said. “It was a great offer. The money is great, obviously it’s wonderful. But what I said before is true: I do not play golf for the money. I play golf for the love of the game and for the love of golf. But, as a husband, as a father and as a family man, I have a duty to my family to give them the best opportunities and the most amount of resources possible and that is where that comes in.
“This decision was for many reasons what I thought was best for me. I had a really good offer in front of me and it's one of the reasons why I took it, right? They really put me in a position where I had to think about it and I did. Well, every decision I feel like we make in life, there (will) be somebody who agrees and likes it and somebody who doesn’t. So I'm very comfortable with my decision. I'm no stranger to hearing some negative things on social media or in media, so it's part of what it is. We're public figures, but just learn to deal with it, right? It certainly won't define who I am or change who I am, so I think with experience, you just learn to deal with negativity a little bit better.”
His remarks were followed up in a news release from Lawrence Burian, the COO of LIV Golf, who said, “LIV Golf is here to stay.” It’s hard to see the rival going anywhere when Rory McIlroy, who also has been back and forth on the issue, didn’t rip Rahm after hearing the news. “It’s hard to sit here and criticize Jon because of what a great player he is,” McIlroy told Sky Sports. “Jon is going to be in Bethpage in 2025 (for the Ryder Cup). Because of this decision, the European tour is going to have to rewrite the rules. There’s no question about that.”
Everyone might be rewriting rules. If Rahm can change his mind as an all-time sports renegade, can’t everyone switch? “Once you get past that, the love of the game, wanting to grow it to a global market and be part of a team, be a captain and hopefully being a leader to teammates, it is something that is so, so special,” Rahm said of the team aspect. “My goal with this is to grow the game of golf, to make it better — whatever that may be. I’m an ambitious person, but I’m not a greedy one. I know I can’t have everything, so there are some things I will have to sacrifice and for right now, that seems like one that I can live with.”
With Monahan in charge, the PGA Tour also backed Rahm’s move as “unifying the game for our fans and our players.” Unifying? Everyone is whacked out when seeing what’s ahead. Sports is more dependent than ever on broadcasting links. Think many in this country will make sure the CW is on a remote list, now that Rahm is in LIV gear? And won’t the PGA events now feature lesser names? They’ll be less attractive, too. Everything is less attractive.
Said the PGA Tour: “We can’t speak for decisions that any individual players might make but based on the momentum of the past season and strength of the PGA Tour, along with the accelerated interest from and negotiations with a number of outside investors, we are in position to make our players equity owners and further allow the tour to invest in our members, invest in our fans and continue to lead men’s professional golf forward.”
Of all people, when we thought Mickelson and Kopeka were LIV forerunners, it’s Jon Rahm who makes us gasp. Never mind that we can’t ever believe a word he says. “Nobody is forcing us to do this. This is our own choice,” Rahm said. “And if the product wasn’t good, I don’t think people would be making this jump. I certainly wouldn’t be doing it because, again, I have had a great platform on the PGA Tour and I’m forever grateful for the platform that they’ve given me. If lucky, and things go well in the future, I still want to be part of that platform.”
Guess what? He suddenly enjoys LIV, weeks later. “I like the LIV Golf product. I like the business,” Rahm said. “I like the idea of playing golf in counties I’ve never played golf before and being part of something that I really didn’t know was going to be a possibility growing up or even four years ago. This wasn’t a reality. It’s something really exciting to me and that’s why I’m so eager to be part of it. I hope whatever happens behind those doors is best for all of us and golf in general.”
It was Jordan Spieth who cringed at the initial concept of Rahm leaving. “All in all, Jon Rahm is one of the biggest assets that we have on the PGA Tour,” he said last week. “So it would really be not very good for us in general, because we want to play against the best players in the world, and that's what Jon is.”
The major championships haven’t responded to the warfare. The Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and The Open — will they distance themselves from the Saudis? Probably not, or their tournaments will be shredded.
Five hundred and sixty-six million dollars. “Obviously good enough,” Rahm said, “for someone like me to see this thing through.”
I’d submit you don’t root for him anymore. Better, stop watching. It’s much like “The Bernie Mac Show.”
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.