Rex Hoggard has revealed that while October 25th is a soft deadline for all LIV Golf players to confirm whether they plan to stay or leave, the lawyers do expect to have answers about the league’s future by the end of the month.
It honestly feels like death by a thousand cuts for LIV Golf right now.
As things stand, only Richard Bland, Cameron Tringale, Ben Campbell, and Brendan Steele have confirmed that they intend to stick around for LIV 2.0.
Meanwhile, Jon Rahm and Louis Oosthuizen will both leave having been captains of their respective teams. Elsewhere, David Puig, Abraham Ancer, and Charles Howell III look set to spend 2027 playing on the DP World Tour. It also looks likely that Sergio Garcia and Adrian Meronk will leave.
The significance of the October 25th deadline for LIV Golf 2.0
It is difficult to see how LIV will be able to put together a strong enough field to convince BC Partners that it is worth investing in. The more players leave, the harder it is going to be for those currently on the fence.
There has been a deadline of October 25th for players to confirm their decisions. However, fans should probably not expect to have real clarity when they wake up on Monday morning.
According to Hoggard, who was speaking on the Golf Channel Podcast, things are likely to take a little longer to resolve.
“I think people are going to be disappointed with this comment, because we have used October 25th as sort of a benchmark, that, okay, we’ll know something by then. Either it’s going to be a 2.0 or they’re going to start winding down the operations and there won’t be anything going forward. October 25th, Sunday, is still the deadline. That’s the deadline that essentially BC Partners, the investment firm in what 2.0 will be, has said. However, it’s been made clear to me by sources that is a flexible deadline. It is a soft deadline by any stretch of the imagination,” he said.
“I’ve also spoken with plenty of lawyers involved in this and there won’t be a bunch of filings on Sunday afternoon. There won’t be a bunch of social media posts.
“I know that’s disappointing a lot of people, including for me, because I think all of us have been sitting around waiting to see what was going to happen, ever since April, ever since the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia announced it was pulling its funding at the end of this season.
“However, in hearings last week, even lawyers for LIV said that we will have answers by the end of this month because something does have to happen one way or the other. For the creditors, for the players, for LIV itself, for BC Partners, for minority partners they’ve been talking about bringing in, but it’s very much a soft deadline. BC Partners can kick the can. If they don’t have the answers they probably want by Sunday, I can imagine they would extend it. They could also just decide to let this play out and come out in trickles, that we’ll hear about it one player at a time. I don’t know there’s just going to be an en masse announcement that these players are sticking around.”
Players will now struggle to think of a reason to stay with LIV
Every player will have different reasons for their decision. However, it is getting more difficult to see why the majority of those on LIV would be prepared to stay.
Whether they admit it or not, money was the main reason the majority turned their back on the PGA Tour and DP World Tour.
LIV 2.0 events are still expected to be lucrative. However, the days of generational wealth being secured from one tournament win look to be long gone.
And with LIV becoming even more isolated ahead of 2027 – players will not be able to also be members of the DP World Tour – there is even less reason to stay.
Those who do will have given up on something. They either will have given up on getting near the top of the game personally, or given up on the idea of ever working their way back to the PGA Tour.
Perhaps one or two may genuinely believe that there is an opportunity for LIV 2.0 to grow into something credible.
But when the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia were unable to make LIV 1.0 a success after investing billions, it really does feel that the writing is on the wall.