SAN DIEGO – Jay Monahan met with a group of reporters Wednesday at the Genesis Invitational to cover, primarily, last week’s meeting between the PGA Tour’s commissioner and U.S. President Donald Trump.
Although Monahan was understandably vague when pressed for details about the meeting — which included Adam Scott, stretched 40 minutes, was initiated by the Tour and covered the Department of Justice’s ongoing antitrust investigation into the Tour as well as the negotiations between the circuit and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund — the most telling moment in his 23-minute back-and-forth with the media came towards the end when he was asked about the circuit’s search for a new chief executive.
“We have some great candidates, like some really good candidates. In terms of timing, these things take time,” said Monahan, who announced late last year the circuit was searching for a new CEO.
Whoever lands in the big chair will have their hands full as the Tour attempts to navigate an unprecedented divide in professional golf with the emergence of LIV Golf, which is financially propped up by PIF.
“I think the meeting [with Trump] ultimately gets us one step closer to a deal being done, but there’s a lot more work to do,” Monahan said. “Hopefully you sense my enthusiasm as I talk about it today.”
Rory McIlroy took a more direct approach when asked how Trump could expediate the negotiations that have now dragged into a third year.
“So the president, he can do a lot of things. He has direct access to [PIF governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan’s] boss [the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman],” the Northern Irishman explained. “Not many people have that. Not many people can say, I want you to get this deal done and by the way, I’m speaking to your boss, I’m going to tell him the same thing. There’s a few things that he can do. He can be influential.”
While Trump’s involvement doesn’t guarantee the ultimate outcome, which is the reunification of the game, it does create the cleanest pathway without the DOJ’s regulations or international politics bogging things down.
Monahan’s enthusiasm is well placed, which means it’s time to turn the conceptual into the concrete.
“I do, and the details of which we’ll be talking about at a future date,” Monahan said when asked if he had a “clear vision” of what the professional game will look like with a unified landscape.
Poll the 72 players at this week’s Genesis Invitational about that future and you would get 72 different answers. The same would apply to the 54 players at this week’s LIV event in Australia.
Many of those who ventured across the line for the PIF riches see no reason why they would need to pay their pound of flesh via fines or suspensions to return to the Tour. Many of those who remained loyal to the Tour see no way the treachery and disloyalty should go unpunished.
Finding consensus in professional golf is beyond difficult on the most mundane issues — consider the current narrative surrounding pace of play as the best example — but when it comes to LIV Golf, there is no common ground.
Again, McIlroy is the voice of reason here.
“Everyone’s just got to get over it and we all have to say OK, this is the starting point and we move forward. We don’t look behind us, we don’t look to the past,” said McIlroy, who was once the most outspoken critic of LIV Golf. “Whatever’s happened has happened and it’s been unfortunate, but reunification, how we all come back together and move forward, that’s the best thing for everyone.
“If people are butt hurt or have their feelings hurt because guys went or whatever, like who cares? Let’s move forward together and let’s just try to get this thing going again and do what’s best for the game.”
That leaves only one option for the Tour’s new CEO, whoever that might be, and in the age of player empowerment it is going to be equally unpopular. Whoever leads the game back from the brink will need the iron fist of a benevolent dictator.
Monahan’s predecessor and mentor was Tim Finchem and he was, by many accounts, the ultimate autocrat, pushing his agenda for what he believed was best for the Tour despite relentless push back from players and fans. Finchem was a savvy leader who sought consensus but knew that there were times when an ultimatum was the only way.
In the wake of the June 2023 framework agreement between the Tour and PIF that ended years of costly and bitter litigation and set the path to what now seems so close, players fumed and Monahan moved to appease them by adding player directors to the policy board, including the indefinite addition of Tiger Woods to the governing panel.
Wresting back that influence will be beyond difficult and Monahan should expect challenges from across the membership if he moves to reunify the game with a one-size-fits-all option, but it’s the only way forward through an impossibly complex and emotional no-man’s-land.
