On cue, with the Christmas lights packed away and the winter wind biting at ears and noses in many places, the PGA Tour finds itself in Maui again.
The Pacific Ocean shimmers in the south Pacific sunshine across the Hawaiian islands. The whales are breaching. Another golf season – this one confined to the same calendar year – begins.
While the resurrection of fire-ravaged Lahaina is underway a few miles from Kapalua, there is an annual sense of renewal when the tradewinds blow across the Plantation Course and another golf year comes to life.
As familiar as the scenery may be – there’s Molokai in the distance and surfers bobbing in the water down the hill from the golf course – a sense of uncertainty remains.
There is a hopefulness that some sort of agreement will be reached sooner rather than later in the PGA Tour’s ongoing negotiations with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, but what the finished product may be is still anyone’s guess.
The year 2019 feels like a lifetime ago. That was before COVID and before LIV Golf, back when the professional golf season was almost entirely about who won and who didn’t.
If it were only that simple now.
One year ago, Jon Rahm won what is now called the Sentry, its “Tournament of Champions” distinction dropped because, well, not everyone playing this week won a tournament last year. The top 50 in last year’s FedEx Cup playoffs and eligibility points list also earned spots, expanding the field to 59.
The fact that Rahm and his LIV jacket are somewhere else is like throwing a can of red paint on a white wall. It’s impossible to ignore.
Whether Rahm would have been named the PGA Tour’s 2023 player of the year Wednesday had he not taken the hundreds of millions of dollars offered by LIV Golf late last year isn’t the question as Scottie Scheffler, the honoree, had a season that his peers fully appreciated as did Viktor Hovland and Rahm.
The question is when, where and how does this swirl subside?
Leave it to the level-headed Mackenzie Hughes – who made it to Maui when he moved from 51st to 50th on the final FedEx Cup list when Rahm’s tour membership was revoked – to find the heart of the matter.
“I just think fans are kind of left scratching their head thinking, like, What is going on?” Hughes said Tuesday.
“They also don’t know where certain guys are playing and there’s spats between the LIV and the PGA Tour, and it’s not unified in any way, shape, or form. There’s negotiations going on that are unclear; they have been dragged on for a long time.
“The fan just wants to watch golf. I think you watch sports for an escape from other nonsense, but I think golf has brought a lot of nonsense onto its plate, and now you don’t get just golf, you get a lot of other stuff going on. It’s a bit of a circus.”
He’s not wrong.
“What LIV and the Saudis have exposed is that you have a tour and you’re going and asking sponsors for millions of dollars to sponsor these events and you’re not able to guarantee those sponsors the players that are going to show up.” – Rory McIlroy
The images from Kapalua will be as enchanting as ever because it’s just that pretty. The golf will be spectacular at times because the Plantation Course lends itself to dramatic swings. By Sunday evening, someone already will have earned his ticket back to Maui in 2025.
Half a world away, Rory McIlroy – who has chosen to start his ’24 season in Dubai next week on the DP World Tour – conceded on the “Stick to Football” podcast that his view of LIV Golf has evolved. That doesn’t mean McIlroy loves the new league but that he understands it’s a part of the ecosystem now and finding a path forward together is in everyone’s best interests.
LIV’s arrival fundamentally changed the PGA Tour, and what the finished product looks like isn’t likely to be known for a while.
“What LIV and the Saudis have exposed is that you have a tour and you’re going and asking sponsors for millions of dollars to sponsor these events and you’re not able to guarantee those sponsors the players that are going to show up,” McIlroy said on the podcast. “It’s very hard. I can’t believe they’ve done so well for so long.”
The forced rebuild is underway.
While that continues, the golf itself is back.
A year ago, Eric Cole was another guy chasing a dream and in danger of aging out. On Wednesday, the 35-year-old was named rookie of the year, edging Ludvig Åberg, who was playing college golf this time last year at Texas Tech and now is the game’s newest star.
Maybe Åberg delivers on the potential this year. Maybe Scheffler wins a third straight player of the year. Maybe McIlroy cracks the major-championship puzzle again.
This is the time for maybes.
And maybe time for some answers.
For tee times to the Sentry, click HERE.
Top Photo: Tracy Wilcox, PGA Tour via Getty Images
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