LIV golfers should be on the European Ryder Cup team
LIV golfers should be on the European Ryder Cup team: To this day, the LIV Golf League has been met with resistance from golf’s most influential figures despite its best efforts to collaborate with other major leagues and organizations throughout the world.
The PGA Tour has issued a blanket ban on LIV Golf participants and is currently in court with a small group of those players and the league itself over whether or not to reinstate them.
It is uncertain what the long-term answer will be for golfers in Europe, but the DP World Tour has permitted them to play for time being.
Players like Jon Rahm, Shane Lowry, and Rory McIlroy expressed resentment toward LIV Golf players for seizing their spots on the DP World Tour at last week’s BMW PGA Championship.
McIlroy, who is now competing in the Italian Open at Marco Simone Golf and Country Club in Rome, was asked about the inclusion of LIV golfers on the 2019 Ryder Cup team.
Remarks
“I don’t think any of those guys should be on the Ryder Cup Team,” McIlroy has remarked more than once.
The current situation for the DP World Tour is challenging.
Given its depleted state and the fact that it is not nearly as strong as the PGA Tour, having some big-name LIV golfers playing might actually be enticing for the tour to draw interest and attendance (even if it is based around a bit of drama), even though it was legally forced to allow LIV golfers into its events this summer.
McIlroy has also brought up the Ryder Cup several times over the past several weeks.
Sergio Garcia, a defector from the LIV, questioned DP World Tour CEO Keith Pelley at a player-commissioner meeting at the BMW PGA Championship last week if he and others like him would be permitted to play in the 2023 Ryder Cup. Here’s what happened, as reported by Golf Digest.
Ryder Cup points may only be earned in events sanctioned by the OWGR, which currently does not include the LIV Golf League.
All this, of course, may be moot anyway, given the vast majority of past Ryder Cup players who are worried about the event’s future are not strong enough golfers to qualify.
Lee Westwood and Ian Poulter would not have made the cut, and while Sergio Garcia and Paul Casey might have secured a captain’s pick, neither is in particularly good form.
Statement
McIlroy has stated that he does not currently have a “close relationship” with the Europeans who have switched to LIV Golf. “Nonetheless, if you’re only considering the Ryder Cup, that’s not where the team is headed.
In all likelihood, they have participated in a total of twenty-five to thirty Ryder Cups.
Still, rising stars like the Hojgaard brothers (Nicolai and Rasmus), Robert MacIntyre, and others are the Ryder Cup’s hope for the future. They are the topics that need to dominate our discussions.”
It’s an excellent point that renders the rest of this discussion unnecessary.
McIlroy, Rahm, Lowry, Viktor Hovland, Matt Fitzpatrick, and Tyrrell Hatton make up the Euros’ new core and aren’t planning to rely on their old lions.
Declarations
‘I believe the European Team has a core of six or seven guys that I think we all know are pretty much going to be on that team, and then it’s up to some of the younger guys to maybe rise up,’ said McIlroy.
We probably needed to start again anyhow, though. We had great success with the same men for quite some time, but as I was saying, all good things must come to an end. It seems to me that Whistling Straits serves as a decent boundary.
“We’ve moved on from all of it now. We already have a solid foundation, but instead of filling those three or four positions with grizzled veterans, let’s give some young players a shot so that we can prepare for the future. That, I believe, is crucial.”
The eligibility of LIV players to compete on the DP World Tour will be the subject of an upcoming hearing scheduled for the first few months of 2023.
Whether or not they are permitted to compete has implications for players’ ability to earn OWGR points for the sake of major championship qualification, but what about their chances of making the Rome Ryder Cup team? It’s highly unlikely that it will make a difference whether or not they are granted full-time status on the DP World Tour.