Tiger Woods offers merger update and PGA Tour's plans to welcome back LIV stars
Tiger Woods has revealed the PGA Tour are looking at possible avenues to allow LIV Golf players to return to the American-based circuit in the future.
Those who opted to join LIV saw their memberships with the PGA Tour suspended, a stance that banned the likes of Phil Mickelson, Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson and more recently Jon Rahm. Last June though it appeared Mickelson and co would be offered the chance to return, after the PGA Tour announced it intended to finalise an agreement with the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia (PIF).
Despite missing their initial December 31 deadline, and doubt growing over a proposed merger in recent weeks, the Tour have reiterated that they remain in discussion with PIF, even after forming a £2.4 billion alliance with Sports Strategic Group (SSG) last month.
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Woods himself is a member of the PGA Tour's Policy Board as a Player Director, and was quizzed on what a possible route back to the PGA Tour could look like for LIV members. "We're looking into all the different models for pathways back," the 15-time major champion said in Los Angeles.
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"What that looks like, what the impact is for the players who have stayed and who have not left and how we make our product better going forward, there is no answer to that right now. We're looking at a very different -- varying degrees of ideas and what that looks like in the short term, we don't know. We don't even know in the longer term what that looks like.
"Trust me, there's daily, weekly emails and talks about this and what this looks like for our tour going forward." Woods' comments comes two weeks after his close friend and business partner, Rory McIlroy claimed the rebel players should be offered a pathway back to the Tour without punishment.
Tiger Woods returns to the PGA Tour this weekMcIlroy - who had previously been one of LIV's biggest critics - said at Pebble Beach: " Guys made choices to go and play LIV, guys made choices to stay here. If people still have eligibility on this tour and they want to come back and play or you want to try and do something, let them come back. I think it’s hard to punish people. I don’t think there should be a punishment.
"Obviously I’ve changed my tune on that because I see where golf is and I see that having a diminished PGA Tour and having a diminished LIV Tour or anything else is bad for both parties," he added. "It would be much better being together and moving forward together for the good of the game."
Not everybody is on board with McIlroy's claims, though. In the aftermath some of the PGA Tour's biggest names spoke out against the free pass back for LIV stars, with the likes of Scottie Scheffler and Justin Thomas both claiming the comeback should not come without punishment.
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