After the Saudi government created an upstart professional golf tour in 2021 to compete with the PGA — the world’s most prestigious tour, based in the U.S. — top PGA executives set out to destroy the new venture.
They banned golfers who signed up with the Saudi tour, known as LIV Golf, from PGA events and put intense pressure on other golfers not to join LIV. PGA executives also complained to members of Congress about Saudi Arabia’s human rights record. Anybody ignoring that record, said Jay Monahan, the PGA commissioner, was “living under a rock.”
Monahan went so far as to suggest that LIV golfers were betraying the victims of the 9/11 attacks (an allusion to the fact that most of the attackers were Saudi citizens). “Have you ever had to apologize for being a member of the PGA Tour?” Monahan asked on national television.
It was all part of a campaign to undermine LIV, even if doing so required damaging the reputations of leading golfers.
A Stunning Merger Angers Athletes
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