ST ANDREWS, Scotland — Jimmy Dunne, the Vice Chairman of US Investment bank Piper Sandler and PGA Tour board member, talks with Rory McIlroy during a practice round prior to the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship on the Old Course at St. Andrews on September 28, 2022. | Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
PGA Tour board member Jimmy Dunne played a key role in the bombshell alignment that will couple the PGA Tour and the Public Investment Fund.
Jimmy Dunne knows a thing or two about mergers and acquisitions, as he worked alongside PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan to broker the deal with the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund.
Dunne also has personal ties to the Sept. 11th terrorist attacks, which has put him in a precarious position considering the response from 9/11 Families United this week.
“I am quite certain and have had conversations with a lot of knowledgeable people that the people that I’m dealing with from [Saudi Arabia] had nothing to do with 9/11,” Dunne said on the Golf Channel Thursday.
“And if someone can find someone that unequivocally was involved with it, I’ll kill him myself. We don’t have to wait around.”
Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
ST ANDREWS, Scotland — Jimmy Dunne plays his tee shot on the fourth hole during the final round of The Alfred Dunhill Links Championship on The Old Course on October 3, 2021.
On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, Dunne took the day off from work to play in the U.S. Mid-Amaetur qualifier, per Golf Digest.
At the time, he worked in the South Tower and lost countless friends and colleagues.
“Every day, [9/11 is] the first thing I think about, [I think about it] several times during the day, and it is the last thing I think about at night is that,” Dunne added. “That has not changed since that day, and I’m not alone in that. I would guarantee you that every one of those family members has that same condition. It’s just a reality of how unbelievably sad and awful that day was.”
This seemingly about-face from Dunne has left many online calling him an equal hypocrite to Monahan.
Jimmy Dunne would have been killed on 9/11 if he weren’t golfing. He lost dozens of friends and colleagues in the attacks.
Jimmy Dunne brokered the deal between the PGA & the Saudis.
The hypocrisy from Jay Monahan is disgusting – but idk how Dunne looks himself in the mirror. pic.twitter.com/DIZ0PI6mxQ
— Alex Wilcox (@AlexWilcoxTV) June 7, 2023
ABC7’s Alex Wilcox tweeted, “The hypocrisy from Jay Monahan is disgusting – but idk how Dunne looks himself in the mirror.”
The Wall Street banker now serves as the Vice Chairman and Senior Managing Principal at Piper Sandler, a large investment bank. The Long Island, New York native is also the Vice Chairman of the PGA Tour policy board.
Hence, he and Ed Herlihy, another tour policy board member and one of the country’s top mergers and acquisitions attorneys, worked with Monahan to broker the deal.
“As much as I liked the people I dealt with, the game of golf is too important; the legacy of the PGA Tour is too important,” Dunne said. “The people we have in place have too much experience that we have no desire, no need – there is no way on God’s green earth that we’re going to give up control.”
As a part of the deal, Monahan will now oversee both the PGA and LIV Golf Tours. Whether he chooses to disband LIV and re-instate former PGA Tour members remains to be seen.
The PIF also has the “right to first refusal,” meaning they help choose where the Tour will invest and who to partner with before anyone else.
Other than that, only one certainty remains: a ton of unknowns.
Photo by Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images
JUNO BEACH, Fla. — Rory McIlroy and Dustin Johnson speak to the President of Seminole Golf Club Jimmy Dunne after winning the closest to the pin playoff against Rickie Fowler and Matthew Wolff during the TaylorMade Driving Relief Supported By UnitedHealth Group on May 17, 2020 at Seminole Golf Club.
Dunne also serves as the President of the prestigious Seminole Golf Club, where he has played with many notable golfing celebrities, such as Rory McIlroy and his father, Gerry.
Dunne and McIlroy shared similar positions on the Saudi-backed LIV Golf tour a year ago.
“I don’t like it when they say they’re ‘growing the game,’” Dunne said in an interview with Sports Illustrated last summer. “That’s crap. I don’t even like it when they say, ‘I have to do what’s best for my family.’ I wonder how many of those guys, the lifestyle that they were living was so horrible that their family needed them to do this. Just say, ‘I’m at a point in my career where I want to make five times as much money against much weaker competition and play less.’ Just tell the truth. Don’t cover it with a lot of crap.”
Much has changed in the past year, as men’s professional golf grew more divided between the PGA and LIV Tours. Lawsuits emerged, players from opposing leagues jabbed at each other, and even the commissioners denounced each other.
“We needed to come together as a people. We have too much divisiveness,” Dunne said two days after announcing the deal. “There’s a point in time when you have to say, ‘let’s try to get to know one another. Let’s try to understand; let’s try to demonstrate by example.’
“I believe we should not run away from our differences, and we should get to know each other and make it difficult so that the extreme, vicious, immoral aspects of the people of the world, we don’t have to have a family deal with what we dealt with 20-plus years ago. As awful as it was for me, it was way worse for others. I can’t imagine if one of my children were involved. I have real empathy, but I’d like to do something about it, which starts with communicating.”
It’s hard to square these two sentiments from Dunne.
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