A report indicates that the PGA Tour and the Saudi PIF are close to reaching an agreement in the coming weeks.
LA JOLLA, California — A week has passed since PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan and PGA Tour Policy Board Member Adam Scott visited President Donald Trump in Washington, D.C., to discuss the ongoing saga that is men’s professional golf.
The sport remains divided between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, as both tours continue to operate independently. However, the end of this schism looks near, thanks in part to the Trump Administration, which is eager to help end the divide. Perhaps that explains why Trump played golf with Tiger Woods in South Florida ahead of his appearance at the Super Bowl. The two had plenty to discuss, especially since Woods, also a Policy Board Member, missed last week’s meeting in Washington due to his mother’s passing.
A deal between the tour and the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) — LIV Golf’s beneficiary — will reportedly be struck “sometime in the first quarter” of 2025, per Rex Hoggard of the Golf Channel. Hoggard delivered this intel on the Golf Channel Podcast with Rex & Lav on Monday.
“By all accounts, the PGA Tour and the Saudi Public Investment Fund have come to financial terms of what [a deal] would look like. It’s my understanding that they have come to numerous versions of this,” Hoggard said on the show.
“[The two sides] put that in front of the Department of Justice (DOJ). I will also give the tour credit on this front and the PIF: they did not want to wait through the process again. They didn’t want to give them one option and have the DOJ say, ‘Nope, this is not going to work.’ They have given them A, B, C, D.”
What those options are is unknown. But one of them is likely based on a Dec. 10, 2024, report from Bloomberg, which noted that the PIF would acquire a 6-percent stake in the PGA Tour’s new for-profit entity, PGA Tour Enterprises. This investment could value PGA Tour Enterprises at about $12 billion, as the PIF would likely match the influx of cash the tour received from the Strategic Sports Group (SSG) in February 2024. SSG is a group of sports owners and billionaires that committed $1.5 billion to the tour last February. They also helped establish an equity program for PGA Tour members, from which the top players will benefit greatly. The SSG plans to inject an additional $1.5 billion into the tour’s new commercial arm in the coming years, thus bringing its total investment to $3 billion.
The problem with this ordeal is that the financial ramifications of this ‘Agreement’ were supposed to be settled by now. On Jun. 6, 2023, on live television, Monahan, alongside PIF Governor Yasir al-Rumayyan, unveiled a ‘Framework Agreement,’ which put the two sides on a path towards reunification. That same agreement set a Dec. 31, 2023 deadline, but no such deal has transpired. The DOJ has since stepped in, citing potential anti-trust laws. The Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI) has also intervened, holding three separate hearings over the past 19 months — but none since February 2024. The PSI expressed worries over the Saudi Arabian Kingdom’s goals and objectives related to sportswashing. It has also worked to de-classify documents and videos related to the Saudi Kingdom’s impact on the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Albeit important to the United States and its security, none of that has to do with how things will transpire inside the ropes. Monahan will have to play a significant role in what happens, and so will the Policy Board. They face a big issue, though. They will struggle to reach a consensus on the logistics of it all: which players will compete where and how the PGA Tour welcomes those who flocked to LIV Golf.
Monahan should consider offering LIV golfers amnesty, making amends, and paving the way for them to play in marquee PGA Tour events. Jon Rahm has said he misses playing at Torrey Pines and TPC Scottsdale each year. His return to those tournaments would give each a much-needed boost. Maybe Bryson DeChambeau plays at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, where he stunned the golf world in 2021 with an otherworldly drive over the big lake on the par-5 6th hole. Thus, the agreement should include a clause allowing LIV players to compete in four PGA Tour events per year. Both circuits have concrete schedules set in stone, and both are already planning events for 2026. In the short term, they will continue to operate separately. But for the time being, having LIV golfers play in four events would allow golf fans to see the world’s best compete side-by-side more often — a 100% increase from the current reality. PGA Tour and LIV pros currently play in the four majors together, not including a few DP World Tour events.
Speaking of the DP World Tour, PGA Tour players should be able to jump over and play a few LIV events too — not unlike how Rory McIlroy and Billy Horschel play sporadically on the DP World Tour throughout the fall.
Perhaps LIV will consider backloading its calendar in the future as well. Staging events across the globe in the fall could give international players plenty of opportunity to play while the PGA Tour is more or less amid its offseason. They should stage its most popular event, LIV Golf Adelaide, during this time. The autumn months do not bode well for pro golf in the United States. Fans are entrenched in the NFL. College football, baseball’s postseason, and the beginning of the NBA, NHL, and college basketball seasons also happen then.
Still, the PGA Tour should not completely open its arms to LIV players, considering they helped threaten the tour’s existence. LIV players should not be eligible for any part of the PGA Tour’s new equity program since they received millions to join the startup league in the first place.
Regardless of what transpires, something has to change. Golf fans are growing fatigued because of the divide, becoming increasingly interested in YouTube Golf and playing themselves instead of tuning into the PGA Tour or LIV. The clock continues to tick, although the initial Dec. 31, 2023 deadline meant nothing in the grand scheme of things. Whether an agreement between the tour and the PIF is reached by this new reported deadline of Mar. 31, 2025 — the end of the first quarter — remains to be seen.
Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Follow him on X @jack_milko.
