There’s a robust argument to be made that Mackenzie Hughes has benefitted as a lot as any participant from Jon Rahm‘s departure from the PGA Tour to LIV Golf.
At No. 51 after final yr’s Tour Championship, Hughes fell one spot shy of qualifying for all eight signature occasions in 2024. Then Rahm despatched shockwaves via the skilled golf world by flipping on his long-standing stiff-arm of LIV and signing with the Saudi-backed league on Dec. 7.
The PGA Tour reacted by instantly suspending Rahm. The web end result for Hughes was a stumble upon the fiftieth spot. He’s in Hawaii this week, competing within the first signature occasion of the yr that includes a $20 million purse.
“Clearly, being the 51st man I simply wanted one man to go, I did not want 12 guys and a mass exodus, so I undoubtedly thought there was an opportunity there,” Hughes stated on Tuesday. “I used to be residence for Thanksgiving. I heard the Rahm stuff begin to flow into on Twitter. … It appeared like a very long time these rumors had been flying round for awhile, and we by no means actually heard what was taking place by hook or by crook.
“Then he lastly introduced it. I knew earlier than, effectively earlier than he introduced that he was going, what was going to occur if he did go.”
Hughes stated he appreciates the tour performing swiftly and offering readability to his state of affairs. As a participant who has been outspoken about his concern for the sport’s followers, readability is one thing the Canadian wish to see much more of.
Hughes reminisced about 2019, earlier than the pandemic interrupted skilled golf, solely to be adopted by the disruption attributable to LIV.
“(That yr) to me was like the height of, like, skilled golf,” he stated. “2019 was, like, all about golf, ? Our financial mannequin was sustainable. The LIV menace got here alongside and unexpectedly we began to double the purses, and we’re asking sponsors to double their funding, and we’re giving them the identical product.
“Followers additionally, I feel, are left questioning, like, do guys even love enjoying golf anymore, or are all of them simply involved about cash? All these guys going to LIV have made it fairly clear that it is all about cash. I imply, rising the sport, but in addition cash.
“I simply suppose that the product, I imply, whereas I feel it is nice, it is the identical product. I simply suppose followers are type of left scratching their head considering, like, ‘What’s going on?'”
The day after Rahm formally signed with LIV, Hughes took to social media with a sequence of tweets detailing his views of the “unhappy place” males’s skilled golf is in. He sympathized with the anger shared by many golf followers.
“In addition they do not know the place sure guys are enjoying and there is spats between the LIV and the PGA Tour, and it is not unified in any means, form, or type,” he stated Tuesday. “There’s negotiations occurring which can be unclear, they’ve been dragged on for a very long time.
“The fan simply needs to observe golf. I feel you watch sports activities for an escape from different nonsense, however I feel golf has introduced a variety of nonsense onto its plate, and now you do not get simply golf, you get a variety of different stuff occurring.
“It is a bit of a circus.”
A two-time winner who enters 2024 ranked 66th on this planet, Hughes is a member of the tour’s participant advisory committee however has little perception into the negotiations with Saudi Arabia’s Public Funding Fund. A journeyman of kinds, he does fear in regards to the sport’s followers.
And just like the followers, Hughes hopes to see the sport’s brightest stars competing on the most important levels, no matter tour they could name residence. However he additionally does not understand how real looking that imaginative and prescient for the longer term is, with the most important sticking factors being the profitable presents a number of stars turned down to remain loyal to the PGA Tour.
“There may be an final result I root for, however I do not understand how we get there. I am positive that is what the tour is wrestling with as effectively,” he stated. “The result I hope for is that there’s a means for the excursions to clearly co-exist, and there is some form of unity and there is not an enormous rift between ’em. There’s like a way that there is, not a pathway, however there’s simply form of slightly extra of a free-flowing move backwards and forwards.
“The tour clearly misses guys like Brooks Koepka, Phil (Mickelson), (Dustin Johnson), Cam Smith. … There is no doubt that the tour is stronger with these guys enjoying.
“If Brooks got here again tomorrow, I’d be all proper. As a result of I wasn’t supplied an enormous sum of money to go play on LIV, and nor was I . However there have been different guys that critically entertained it and had been most likely informed, ‘Hey, like, keep put. Like, it’ll be high quality over right here. That is the place you ought to be.’ Then now we’re doing a take care of the PIF and it is, like, possibly these guys ought to have simply performed it.
“So, I do not understand how you make these guys really feel as if that is the appropriate factor to do. I feel deep down they might know it is best for the sport they need to be again over right here, however how do you justify to them, like, ‘OK, they made $150 million, and now they are going to come again and play in your tour like nothing ever occurred.’
“I simply do not understand how that will get navigated. However that is the end result I hope for … and it turns into about who’s enjoying the very best golf, who’s enjoying the very best golf within the greatest tournaments, and also you begin speaking about main moments in golf, not simply main moments within the headlines or on Fox Information when Jon Rahm says he will LIV Golf.
“How do you make everybody joyful? You may’t. The way in which ahead I hope is smoother, however I do know it is going to be messy earlier than it will get easy once more.”
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