PGA Tour board member Adam Scott reveals biggest hold-up to LIV Golf deal

Ahead of this week’s Players Championship, Adam Scott talked about the PGA Tour’s ongoing negotiations with the Saudis and LIV Golf.

Adam Scott has participated in countless meetings over the past two years, working to solve golf’s great schism between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf.

Two of those meetings happened at The White House, a surreal experience in which he never thought he would find himself. Scott is a golfer, not a politician. Yet, there he was in the Oval Office, talking with President Donald Trump, Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) Governor Yasir al-Rummayyan, PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan, and Tiger Woods. Scott last visited Washington, DC, on Feb. 20, the second meeting in the nation’s capital in a two-week span. Reports then emerged that this summit did not go as well as one could hope. Rory McIlroy then all but confirmed this the following week at Bay Hill, saying that the PGA Tour does not necessarily need a deal with the PIF at this point.

Monahan then spoke to the press ahead of The Players Championship on Tuesday and reaffirmed that he hopes to finalize an agreement soon. His tone also indicated that the PGA Tour currently held the upper hand.

So what is the hold up?

“I think the biggest hangup is how we see the highest level of competitive golf going forward,” Scott said.

“The product of LIV and the product of the PGA Tour work in very different ways. So I think the challenge is figuring out how that can come together and be really reunification, which is kind of what everyone is shooting for.”

Monahan emphasized how the PGA Tour — and golf fans — long for reunification but the Commissioner failed to specify what that would look like.

“As part of our negotiations, we believe there’s room to integrate important aspects of LIV Golf into the PGA Tour platform. We’re doing everything we can to bring the two sides together,” Monahan said.

“That said, we will not do so in a way that diminishes the strength of our platform or the very real momentum we have with our fans and our partners. So while we’ve removed some hurdles, others remain. But like our fans, we still share the same sense of urgency to get to a resolution. Our team is fully committed to reunification. The only deal that we would regret is one that compromises the essence of what makes the game of golf and the PGA Tour so exceptional.”

As for how soon a deal could get done:

“I think there’s an urgency for a result, no matter what. I think that would be in everyone’s best interest, to be honest, whether you’re the PIF or a player anywhere or the PGA Tour,” Scott said.

“I think it just doesn’t need to linger. I think there are positive things happening in the game and at the PGA Tour and that can continue to happen. I just think we hopefully will get to an outcome soon. That would be what I would like. I guess that signals urgency.”

Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Follow him on X @jack_milko.