Laurie Canter just pulled off one of the wildest moves in modern golf: he earned his first-ever PGA Tour card… and is now reportedly forfeiting it to return to LIV one week later. The crew is stunned, confused, impressed, and deeply entertained all at once.
In this episode, we break down the full Laurie Canter rollercoaster:
• Laurie Canter leaves LIV, pays his fines, and earns a full PGA Tour card
• One week later: he’s rumored to be heading straight back to LIV 😳
• The $1 million fine conversation — who actually paid it? LIV or Canter?
• Why returning now gives him WAY more negotiating power
• How going from Challenge Tour → LIV alternate → PGA Tour cardholder changes his value
• Was LIV covering fines part of the early recruiting deals?
• Should LIV contracts be public like other sports leagues?
• Would the PGA Tour be furious… or just shrug?
• The other rumored LIV returnees — and why the hints don’t match Canter
• How LIV switching to 72 holes might change players’ decisions
• The bigger question: Is the PGA Tour card still the pinnacle? Or just a bargaining chip?
This is one of the craziest career pivots we’ve ever seen — and it might say more about pro golf’s future than anything else.
#LaurieCanter #LIVGolf #PGATour #GolfPodcast #GolfNews #PGACard
There’s also talk of a player who just recently earned their PGA Tour card for the very first time who’s choosing to forfeit it. We have Lori Caner, who we spent most of last week talking about, was a part of Liv, joined early. He was one of the founding members and then stayed on and switched teams and was an alternate player. Finally leaves the tour in uh leaves the Liv golf tour in um 24, heads out, pays all his fines, pays all his in fines and stuff. Yes. Goes out, starts doing some winning, finds his way into the um the race to Dubai, finishing high enough in that to be given a full-blown PGA Tour card, not even like an exempt, you know, you only show up and stand in line out by the velvet ropes, you know what I mean? Like full-blown card. week later it is announced but not 100% confirmed that he is heading back to live the week after he gets his PJ tour card. My mind is blown right now. Completely blown. We’ve been we’ve been waiting for a day to tell you. When we found out this story, the first thought we all had is Rich is going to love this. I mean, first of all, I love that he’s going to live and I love that there’s more marketing going to live and more talk around live. That’s awesome. But how do you pay a million dollars and then go back to what you were doing? I think Liv paid it, right? Irrelevant. Like that’s even worse. How is Liv like, I’m gonna pay your million dollars so you can go to the PGA and leave our tour. Here’s the real question, though. When he first went to Liv, he didn’t really have like a gigantic career in terms of wins. He was playing on the challenge tour, which is what it used to be called, the feeder into the DP World Tour and all this stuff. Heads over to Liv. Doesn’t really do a ton there. leaves live and has quite frankly the best part of his career for that sort of year and a half. Yeah. Does that completely change his negotiating power going back to Liv? Going from a theater tour guy the first time he joins to now a full-blown PJ tour card holder the second time he joins. Does he get himself a much better deal going back round two? You would have to. I mean, yes. But then does Liv also say, “And we’re minusing a million dollars because we just paid that for you.” Um, like you’re here, we’re going to give you five million, but it’s actually a $4 million check because I do think in the very early days when they were trying to draw players into the tour before it was even really established because they had to build the field before they had the first tournament, right? That they were making deals like, “Hey guys, we will cover these fees if you come over and play.” So, I do think early on a lot of those deals were made to get these guys to commit to going because they’re like, “Listen, I don’t have a spare mill million dollars if this doesn’t work out, right?” So, I don’t know that in the early days that came with like a giant IOU. It was part of the negotiating terms of saying, “Hey, come on over and do our brand new tour that has never played an event yet.” It’s crazy. Yeah. Blows my mind. I think live contracts need to be all publicized like like every other sport. Like I just crank open the file cabinet. Exactly. Like every you know what every basketball player and hockey player and football player makes. You the coaches they hide but the players they don’t. I would like to see it. I want to read the terms. I want the whole thing. Give me the whole thing. PDF for everyone. I just want to know what like the PGA tour was thinking like when he’s decided he’s going back to live. I wonder if they were like or they’re like whatever. Is is he the guy that Liv was talking about that’s going back? We don’t think so. And the reason we don’t think so. Why do we not think so? Because I don’t think he won on the PGA this year. Right. That’s it. Yeah. Yes. Right. Play on the PJ tour. That was what like the the the teaser was that they have won this year on the PGA tour. And is it both the guys that have won? Cuz they said two names are coming, right? That’s what they say. But the farther we get away from that report, the less I even am trying to put faith in it at this point. Like who knows? That could have just been rumors to try to draw buzz for live next season. I’m putting all my faith in it. Okay. Actually, I am too. All all of that could have changed when Liv went to uh 72 holes. You know what I mean? It’s like why would I want to join the exact same thing and be banned? Money. Yeah. But the thing I love about it and lots of the thing I love about it was last week he was the first player to leave live and earn his PGA tour card. Yeah. It’s so crazy. And now he’s the first player to leave Liv, earn his PGA tour card, and then immediately forfeit a week later, and then go back to live. You know what’s crazy to think about is like like a Bryson de Shambo or something like that. Like, you know, could you imagine him taking a year off of golf? No, I can’t imagine him taking five minutes off of golf, right? But like I mean because if if PGA is gonna follow the rules and not make an exe exception exception exemption exemption that’s the word I’m exception works too there I think. Yeah both apply you can just ram the words together. They are the same words together though. But yeah you know that would be absolutely crazy that he’s just got to take a year off. Yeah. I don’t know. This is wild though. completely. What a what a just an absolute turn of events so quickly. That’s such a big FU to the PGA Tour. Well, then the question that starts to be asked is it like the PGA Tour and your PGA Tour card is no longer the pinnacle of all of golf for some players. It’s becoming a bargaining chip. Yeah. Which does that devalue PJ tour in terms of like we are the you know greatest players in the world the whole
1 Comment
Probably substituting for Hendrik Stenson