“Are you asking a LIV question?”
“Essentially, yes.”
“Well, ask a LIV question.”
In his first Tour Championship address as CEO of the PGA Tour, Brian Rolapp, now a few weeks into his new job after coming over from the NFL, discussed a handful of topics with media members on Wednesday morning inside the Georgian, one of East Lake’s hospitality venues. Among them was the continued fracture of the professional game and what plans, if any, Rolapp had of reuniting the best players in the world.
For starts, Rolapp revealed that he has not spoken to any representatives of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which owns LIV Golf. That news comes after chatter that talks between the PGA Tour and PIF have stagnated since a series of meetings, including a couple at the White House, earlier this year.
“I’ve been here for three weeks, so my focus has obviously been on the Tour, and focusing on the Tour, and in learning and starting to develop a bit of a vision for the future,” said Rolapp, who added that he has met with Guy Kinnings of the DP World Tour.
“I think we have an investment in the DP World Tour. I think golf is a global game; we all know that. We have quite a bit of European players on the Tour. I think it’s an important partnership that we want to figure out how to grow. I think conversations with them and how they might fit in a new competitive model will certainly be part of this committee’s work, so we’ll continue to work on that.”
With what he’s called his blank-sheet-of-paper approach, Rolapp did not rule out any changes, LIV-related or otherwise, so long as it strengthens the PGA Tour.
New committee’s goal is a “holistic relook of how we compete on the Tour,” and will focus on both the regular season, playoffs and off-season.
“Whatever does that,” he said, “I’ll pursue aggressively.”
But one of his comments was revealing as it pertains to reunification: “I would offer to you that the best collection of golfers in the world are on the PGA Tour.”
“I think there’s a bunch of metrics that demonstrate that, from rankings to viewership to whatever you want to pick,” he added. “I’m going to lean into that and strengthen that.”
